Chapter 18

 

At first Miley and Ned couldn’t see what was happening on the far side of the door. They just had to guess that the person holding the lamp had come into the factory, followed by goodness knows how many other people. Probably not many, Miley decided.  

Boxes began to be taken away. After a while Miley

and Ned could see, through a gap in the pile, that there were only two men in total. One was busy packing the small matchboxes into the larger boxes and putting those boxes into the gaps from where the filled big boxes had been taken. The other man was doing the taking away.

  Then Bacon appeared.

  “I overslept,” she said grumpily. “My sleep was disturbed the night before. We thought that a child or children were on the loose. Not that they could have escaped.”

  “We haven’t seen anyone tonight,” said one of the men.

  “Good,” said Bacon “Well, be sure to secure the door when you leave. I’ll make you a cup of tea in the meanwhile.”

  “We could murder a cup of tea,” said the man.

  Bacon went to the kitchen. The men continued their work.

  “They don’t care that children are imprisoned in the factory,” Miley said. “That makes me so angry. Listen, Ned. As soon as the man taking the boxes has gone

outside and the man filling the boxes has gone to fill

some more – when both those things happen at the same time – then we’ll make a run for it. We can easily skirt round the door now there’s some more space, and get outside. Okay?”

  Ned nodded. He realized that Miley could not see him nodding so he whispered a reply: “Yes.”