The Great Brain Robbery Page 8

  ‘Ah!’ sighed Alphonsine, shaking her head in frustration. ‘I know nussing about these wizzy wotsits. Nussing at all. We never had ze chance to learn these things. We is too old, Frankie.’

  Frankie and Neet looked at each other in dismay. They had computer classes once a week, but neither of them was very talented. Neet got decent scores on Space Invaders, but that wasn’t the same as knowing how to program a computer. The technology that Dr Gore was using to transform children’s memories was extremely complicated. Only an expert, a genius in fact, would be able to hack into Gore’s systems and reverse all the damage being done.

  ‘We need Wes!’ Neet cried, stamping her foot in frustration. Wes was a total whizz with computers. There was nothing he didn’t know about gigabytes, cookies, firewalls, widgets and dongles. Frankie’s head hurt just thinking about what all those words might mean, but Wes was a fearless cyber-explorer. No computer program could outsmart him. But where was Wes?

  Suddenly, Frankie had a brainwave.

  ‘Do you still have that Christmas card, Neet?’ he asked. ‘The one Wes sent us.’ Neet dug into her pocket and handed it to Frankie.

  ‘It’s not much use.’ She shrugged. ‘There’s no return address.’

  ‘I know,’ said Frankie. ‘But what if he is trying to tell us something? Look . . .’ Frankie pointed to the picture on the front of the card. It showed Santa Claus and his elves loading up the sleigh.

  ‘Elves!’ Neet exclaimed. ‘Like that list we found in the office. The one with Wes’s name on it.’

  ‘Exactly.’ Frankie opened the card and reread Wes’s message. It was full of boring chit-chat about the weather – not like Wes at all.

  ‘And all this stuff about the rain,’ said Frankie. ‘Maybe he’s writing in code or something. He might be trying to tell us where he is.’

  Eddie sat up in his chair and pointed at the card. ‘If that’s a code,’ he said, ‘then my Alphonsine will crack it. She’ll crack a code faster than you can crack an egg, isn’t that right, Alfie?’ Alphonsine blushed a deep shade of crimson, but she didn’t deny it.

  Everyone held their breath as Alphonsine swivelled her glass eye firmly into place and set to work on Wes’s message. She turned the letters this way and that, she read it backwards in the mirror, she applied complicated mathematical formulae and covered sheet upon sheet of paper with elaborate diagrams. But, as the minutes slipped by, she didn’t seem to be making progress.

  ‘Ach!’ she puffed. ‘I have never seen such a brain-bender!’

  ‘A brain-teaser,’ Eddie corrected her.

  ‘Yes, yes,’ muttered Alphonsine. ‘Mind-teaser, brain-bender – my head is as scrambled as a breakfast!’

  Frankie cast a worried glance at the old cuckoo clock above the fireplace – it was already past six. They all set their minds to the task. Neet got Frankie to read it out backwards, Eddie pretended it was a big crossword puzzle, and Colette sniffed at the letters with a frown of deep concentration, but not one of them could extract any sense from Wes’s words. The sun had set hours ago and the team was getting desperate. The piles of screwed-up paper were mounting higher and higher, until all of a sudden . . .

  Cuckoo! Midnight struck. Colette lifted her snout in the air and howled. They were too late.

  The next morning the nation’s children woke up feeling ever so slightly out of sorts. They had a strange swilling feeling in their bellies and felt as if their heads had been stuffed with cotton-wool. After a few fuzzy moments, they rubbed the sleep from their eyes, shuffled off to the bathroom to brush their teeth and started to feel normal again. However, there was nothing in the least bit normal about that particular December morning. Nothing normal at all.

  At first, the children went about their usual business. They ate their Weetabix, trudged off to school, giggled at a cheeky drawing of the teacher and swapped stickers. But before too long, the inevitable occurred. For some it happened when they were watching telly. For others it happened while they were listening to the radio, or staring out of the car window on their way to football practice. But, one way or the other, it happened. Sooner or later, every child in the country stumbled across an advertisment for Marvella Brand’s Happyland and, at that moment, it was if an enormous Christmas cracker went off inside their brains.

  Let me tell you what it felt like. Think about how you feel when you are starving hungry. Your belly starts to rumble, you can’t think of anything else and you keep on moaning at your mum and dad until dinner is on the table. Well it was just like that, only children weren’t desperate to be fed, they were desperate to get to the toyshop. As soon as a child saw a Marvella poster on a billboard, or heard Teddy Manywishes sing the Marvella song, they were gripped by an urgent desire for toys, toys and more toys. Not any old toys, mind you. It had to be Marvella toys – and right that very instant! There was no wrapping of presents or putting them under the tree or waiting till Christmas Day. No. The children had to have toys immediately and they were doing everything in their power to get them. From the peaks of the Scottish highlands to the shores of the Cornish coast a single cry could be heard, ‘Muuuuuuum! Daaaaaaaad! Pleeeeeeeease!’

  The grown-ups of the land couldn’t work out what had happened. They had never known a craze like it. In fact it was far too crazy for a craze. The nation’s children had gone completely and utterly bonkers. Teachers couldn’t get them to sit still in lessons, babysitters couldn’t get them to bed, and parents looked on in despair as their children screeched and squawked like hungry chicks. They were no longer interested in books, or football, or dance classes. They didn’t talk about their friends or films or the big match on Saturday. All they thought about was Marvella Brand’s Happyland. It was as if their whole world had shrunk to one long tunnel with a pair of golden doors at the end of it.

  Right across the country, Marvella stores witnessed the most extraordinary scenes. So many children were hammering and howling at their windows that the shops were opening hours before time, and the moment the doors gave way, there was complete and utter pandemonium. Children stampeded into the shop like a herd of raging buffalo, then charged round the store seizing everything in sight. And hot on the heels of every child was an anxious parent wondering how they could possibly afford to buy everything their little angel was demanding. Within minutes, rows had broken out across the land. Children were sobbing, wailing and stamping their feet, parents were digging to the bottom of their purses or dragging their children outside for a good telling-off, and all the time the cash registers were ringing, ringing, ringing. Marvella’s had never sold so much, so fast, and, as stocks of favourite toys ran low, tempers began to fray. Brothers and sisters squabbled over their presents, children fell out over a last Pocket Princess or Gotcha Goo-Machine, and desperate parents started swiping toys out of other people’s trolleys the moment their backs were turned.

  Never had the nation’s children been so utterly miserable. But not everybody was miserable. No, some people were not miserable at all. In a sugar-pink house on top of a hill a party was in full swing. And what a party! There were clowns, puppet shows, a bouncy castle, party-poppers – it was every child’s dream! Except there was not a single child in sight. Only a crowd of grinning grown-ups and, at the centre of it all, in a glittering tiara, the party-princess herself – Marvella Brand.

  Marvella tinkled on the edge of her glass with her fairy wand. ‘Friends!’ she chirruped. ‘A toast to our success!’ The party guests raised their glasses. ‘I always knew that children were the most excellent customers,’ she smiled, a frosty hardness round the edge of her lips. ‘They truly are the most ravenous little monsters, the most grasping little gremlins.’ The guests shifted uneasily at these cruel words. ‘Yes indeed,’ Marvella continued, her voice tart with bitterness, ‘every single one of them is nothing but a bottomless pit of greed!’ Marvella paused for breath and saw that her guests were looking extremely uncomfortable. It was time to turn back on the charm. She smiled sweetly. ‘Which is
excellent news for us, of course!’ she giggled. The guests chuckled in relief. She was only joking. Wasn’t she? ‘To children!’ Marvella cried, raising a goblet of pink lemonade high in the air.

  ‘To children!’ the guests echoed back.

  ‘And to the person who has helped the little rascals reach their full potential – to the brainbox of the century, Dr Calus Gore.’

  The audience whooped and cheered, but the brainbox of the century wasn’t listening. He was having far too much fun on the bouncy castle.

  ‘Happy Christmas to me! Happy Christmas to me!’ he chuckled as he somersaulted through the air. Watching all those glassy-eyed children marching to the shops had been enormous fun. Indeed, Dr Gore hadn’t had so much fun since the time he fried a column of ants under a magnifying glass. So why stop at Britain? he thought to himself. With this kind of success he could conquer Europe, Asia, America, the world! He felt unstoppable, all-powerful, like an evil Santa Claus.

  ‘He sees you when you’re sleeping!’ he sang gleefully to himself. ‘He knows when you’re awake!’ He turned a full backflip then belted out the chorus. ‘CALUS GORE is coming to town!’ he sang. ‘CALUS GORE is coming to town! CA-LUS-GORE-IS-COM-ING-TO-TOOOOWN!’ And this time no twerpy little school kids were going to stop him.

  Deep in the forest, Frankie and his gang sat silently around an old radio listening to reports of the rampages in high streets up and down the country. Rain had started to pour down and large globs of water were splashing through the holes in the roof and on to Frankie’s head. Frankie had never felt glummer. He felt like he had failed. That it was all his fault. They hadn’t managed to find Wes and Dr Gore had turned children everywhere into zombies. It was a catastrophe. Frankie felt a hand squeeze his knee.

  ‘Patience, little cabbage,’ said Alphonsine, looking at him like a concerned sheep-dog. ‘We will find a way.’ Frankie looked at her and shrugged. He really couldn’t see it. What could they do? Wes was their only hope of defeating Dr Gore, but they didn’t have the first idea where he was. The whole country had gone Marvella-mad, and all they could do was watch.

  ‘Yes, Frankie!’ Alphonsine insisted. ‘Zere is always a way. Sometimes you cannot see it. Sometimes it is hidden like a mole in a hole. But often, ze answer, it is right there under your schnozzle.’

  Suddenly, something seemed to click into place in Frankie’s brain.

  ‘What did you just say, Alfie?’ he asked.

  ‘Right under your schnozz!’ she smiled.

  ‘No, just before that,’ Frankie replied.

  ‘Umm . . . I said that ze answer is often hidden, invisible – but it is always there!’

  Frankie’s eyes lit up.

  ‘You know,’ he said with a grin, ‘I think you might be right!’

  Frankie snatched Wes’s postcard off the worktop and ran outside, where the rain was falling most heavily.

  ‘What are you doing, Frankie?’ asked Neet, confused. Colette barked with excitement as Frankie held the postcard out under the falling rain. As the raindrops splashed across the card, a transformation took place. Wesley’s handwriting started to wash away, but as the ink dripped off the surface another, fainter message began to appear.

  ‘Invisible ink!’ smiled Frankie. ‘That’s why Wes kept going on about the rain. Look!’

  The gang held their breath as the letters slowly sharpened before their eyes.

  It was an address. Alphonsine gasped in surprise. ‘I know that place,’ she whispered.

  ‘Marvella’s Elves: Children’s Home,’ Frankie read aloud. ‘How do you know it, Alfie?’

  ‘I worked at that address many moonshines ago,’ Alphonsine replied, stroking her chin. ‘I was a carer there, before I became a nanny. But it was just a normal children’s home back then. Nothing to do with that horrid Marvella.’

  ‘What’s a children’s home?’ asked Neet.

  ‘It is a place for kiddlers who have no family to look after zem,’ Alphonsine explained. ‘The children’s home looks after zem instead.’

  ‘That must be how Wes ended up there,’ said Frankie. ‘His parents went missing on safari, didn’t they?’

  ‘But what is Marvella doing getting mixed up in children’s homes?’ Neet frowned.

  Alphonsine raised two suspicious eyebrows. ‘A tip-top question, Neety,’ she said. ‘It is fishier than a crabcake!’

  The rain was sloshing down in buckets so the team went back inside to plot their next move.

  ‘We need to get Wes out of there,’ said Frankie, shaking his head. He dreaded to think what could be happening to his friend. ‘Straight away!’

  ‘Right!’ said Neet, grabbing her motorcycle helmet. ‘I’m ready! Let’s go!’

  Colette howled and pawed at the door.

  ‘Not so speedy, Neety,’ warned Alphonsine. ‘First we must make plans. The children’s home is not so easy to break into. The walls are very high and the gate is locked and bolted at night.’

  ‘Maybe we could squeeze through the gates,’ said Frankie.

  ‘Not on your nelly,’ Alphonsine replied, solemnly shaking her head. ‘If you could squeeze in, then the children could squeeze out. No, no, it is shut tight as an oyster.’

  The team put their thinking caps on. Neet wondered if Colette could dig a tunnel under the wall. But it would have taken far too long. Eddie thought they might pull the gates off with the motorbike. But they couldn’t risk waking anyone inside. They had to get in and out as quickly and quietly as thieves. Frankie wandered round the workshop racking his brains as the others tossed ideas back and forth. The workbenches were littered with sawn-off chunks of wood and rusty old tools. But nothing looked especially helpful. He touched a saw with the tip of his finger and leapt back in alarm – ouch! It was still as sharp as a razor. As he leapt backwards he startled a noisy family of sparrows nesting in an open drawer.

  ‘Shhh, Frankie!’ called Neet. ‘We’re trying to think!’

  ‘Sorry,’ Frankie replied, sucking lightly on his bleeding finger. Then, as he watched the sparrows disappearing through the roof, his eyes were drawn to a very odd-looking contraption suspended from the rafters. He stepped towards it to get a closer look. It looked like a cross between a bird and a bicycle. There were wheels and pedals attached to what looked like two large, broken umbrella frames covered with oily feathers. Frankie had seen something like this in a book he read about famous inventors from long ago. His gaze travelled across the ceiling of the workshop. Dozens of bizarre-looking contraptions dangled from the beams like bats in a cave.

  ‘Hey!’ Frankie called to his friends, pointing at the strange inventions that hovered over them. ‘Look!’

  ‘Ooooooooh!’ cooed Neet, springing to her feet. She immediately saw what they were. ‘Flying-machines!’

  ‘Of course,’ said Eddie, shuffling over to take a look. ‘These must be the contraptions Mr Whittle was working on before that unfortunate journey to Valkrania.’ Alphonsine whipped her spanner from her apron, sprang up on to the workbench and began to inspect.

  ‘But the trouble is,’ sighed Eddie, ‘Mr Whittle never did manage to make a success of it. These are all failures, I’m afraid.’

  ‘But Alfie can fix them up, can’t you, Alfie?’ said Neet hopefully. She couldn’t think of anything better than learning to fly.

  Alphonsine hummed and hawed and chewed her lip. She was an ace mechanic but this was a challenge.

  ‘It doesn’t need to be a super-jet,’ said Neet. ‘We just need to get over the wall. Please, Alfie – it’s our only chance of finding Wes!’

  ‘It is possible,’ said Alphonsine cautiously. ‘But it will be very dangerous! Very tricksy indeed. We do not want any nasty smash-landings!’

  Frankie inspected a particularly flimsy-looking contraption and gulped.

  ‘Oh wow! ’ grinned Neet, clapping her hands together in excitement.

  Alphonsine fetched a rickety ladder and hauled a slightly sturdier-looking machine down to the floor. Eddie nodde
d. This one looked promising. But there was work to be done. Alphonsine dusted her hands together and got down to business. Frankie and Neet passed her a series of tools as she tweaked and wrenched with her spanner, oiled the joints and glued a clutch of feathers back into place.

  After an hour of sawing, tightening, sanding and taping, Alphonsine stood back and planted her fists firmly on her hips. It was as ready as it could possibly be, but she looked worried.

  ‘It will fly,’ she said. ‘Short distances. But it is very perilsome. It will take three small children at most – you two and Wes. No more.’ She wrung her hands tightly.

  ‘It’ll be fine, Alfie!’ chirruped Neet, already clambering into the pilot’s seat. ‘I can totally see how this thing works, easy-peasy!’ But Frankie didn’t feel quite so confident. Heights made him queasy, like that time he got stuck on the diving board at the pool. Neet gave him a little nudge. ‘Don’t worry, Frankie,’ she winked. ‘You pedal, I’ll steer. That way you don’t even have to keep your eyes open.’ Frankie breathed a sigh of relief. ‘Now let’s go get Wes!’

  ‘Right!’ said Alphonsine. ‘Time to put a stop to Dr Gore, once and forever!’

  ‘Yes,’ said Frankie, feeling braver, ‘once and forever.’

  It was past midnight by the time they arrived outside the high walls of the children’s home. An eerie moon floated above them like a huge white fish and, gleaming in its dim light, was a large steel plaque.

  MARVELLA’S ELVES: CHILDREN’S HOME

  Generously sponsored by the

  Marvella Brand Foundation

  Frankie shivered. ‘Is it how you remember it, Alfie?’ he whispered.

  Alphonsine wrinkled her nose and turned down the corners of her mouth, so that she looked like an old stone gargoyle. ‘When I was here,’ she said, pointing at the top of the brick walls, ‘there was none of that nonsense.’