Five minutes later, Boydy, Lady and I are heading towards the back of the Knights’ house, and Boydy is looking at me intensely.
‘You OK, Eff? You look a bit, I dunno, pale?’
I haven’t said anything to him about what I’ve just learned. I mean, what would I say? ‘I just found out my mum was really famous. Can you guess who it is? And by the way, my name’s not Ethel. It’s Tiger Pussycat.’ It’s not the kind of thing you just come out with, is it? Besides, I need to focus on stopping the Knight twins making me famous, and in the worst way I can think of.
Gram is watching her favourite TV show, in which some bloke goes for a walk in the country, and it’s on the BBC so there are no ad breaks. She won’t be moving. I tell Gram that I’m taking Lady out for her nightly wee and she nods absently at me.
There’s a back lane that runs behind Eastbourne Gardens, then turns left, and a hundred metres further along it’s the back of the Knights’ rear garden. There’s a high wall with a door in it.
‘I can’t get over that,’ I say, craning my neck to look up. ‘Besides – look!’
All along the top of the wall are lumps of broken glass set into concrete – jagged edges and shards sticking out of it at all angles – an oddly vicious-looking form of home-made barbed wire.
I try the handle of the door. As I expect, it’s locked. I try it again, then leap back in fear. On the other side, there is a thump as a dog – a massive dog, at a guess – hurls itself at the door and snarls.
Lady yelps and jumps back, jerking my arm with her lead.
Boydy sucks his teeth and says, ‘Hmm. That’ll be Maggie, their, erm … tosa cross.’ He says the last bit quietly.
‘Their what?’
‘Just their, er … tosa cross.’
I look at him, eyebrows raised, waiting.
‘It’s a dog. A tosa crossed with something else.’
‘You mean, the Japanese fighting dog? The Knights own a dog that’s a banned breed in Britain because it’s so vicious and you didn’t think to tell me? How do you know it’s a tosa?’
‘I’m sorry, Eff, I just didn’t want to worry you. I heard Jesmond boasting about it. Apparently she’s got a heart of gold and their dad rescued her from a shelter. And she’s crossed with somefing else, so she’s not actually illegal. Probably not as dangerous.’
He says this as if that makes it safe. We can still hear Maggie snarling, and Lady’s pulling on her lead.
We follow the wall round till it joins onto a fence belonging to another house’s garden. That might be one way in: get into the adjoining garden, and then gain access to the Knights’ garden. Like it makes a difference with a snarling devil-dog, albeit one with a heart of gold.
The back lane ends and we’re on the street that’s parallel to mine. We follow the road round to the right onto the coast road, where the front of the Knights’ house overlooks the Links. The house is big, but tatty, with peeling paint and a rusting car in the driveway.
The sun has just about gone down but it’s still twilight for another hour. The sky’s a deep royal blue and the street lights are coming on, so Boydy and I cross the road and sit together in the darkened bus stop, hoping to be able to observe the house unobtrusively.
Above us, an aeroplane follows the line of the coast before banking left, high above the lighthouse, and I watch it, mesmerised by its silence and grace.
Beside me, there’s a loud crunch as Boydy bites into an apple.
‘Not long now, eh?’ he says.
I follow his gaze to the lighthouse, but I don’t say anything.
‘Had you forgotten?’
‘No, no,’ I lie. I had forgotten. ‘Day after tomorrow? Light The Light?’
Boydy grins. ‘’S gonna be awesome! You’ll be there?’
I’ve been so caught up in my own stuff, but I nod. ‘Wouldn’t miss it for anything.’
Boydy turns his attention to the Knights’ house. ‘It’s the back or the front, basically,’ he says after a while.
Over the next ten minutes, we devise a plan for tomorrow night. Whether it’s going to work or not remains to be seen.
One big question is: can this all be done in the time after school? The invisibility lasts about five hours, or it did last time. It takes about two hours to activate.
So, assuming I’m back from school at about 4.30, start the process at 5.00, invisible by 7.00 …
We could be OK.
Only, Gram gets in at about 6.00, right in the middle of the turning-invisible process.
It’s unlikely she’ll go into the garage. Not impossible, but unlikely. So I need to be in there, on the sunbed, from five, and hope that she doesn’t come in. Once the process is complete, I can go out the back way, hopefully avoiding Gram. And Lady, who might just go crazy, but I’ll have to hope not.
I’ll give Boydy my phone during The Operation. That way, if Gram texts or calls, Boydy can text back as me to say I’m on my way, or have been held up.
I’m going through this in my head, wondering what will go wrong, counting on my fingers the potential traps I can fall into, worrying about that enormous Japanese tosa who might – or might not – be OK with invisible people, and wondering how – how on earth – I’m going to achieve the near impossible.
And that is: gain access to the Knights’ computer(s).
It’s a gamble. It’s all a huge gamble, with the odds stacked against me, and it’s my only choice.
Here is the plan (such as it is). Boydy writes it down and texts it to me so we both have it:
To which, of course, has to be added:
It is ridiculous. Monstrously, impossibly stupid.
But it’s going to have to work.