The Secret Key

‘I’m just curious.’ Deep breath.

‘I know that, love, I do. But I worry about you sometimes. I worry about this … morbid fascination. I worry that you’re not living in the real world.’

I sigh – this is not a new discussion. Dad loves to talk about the REAL WORLD, as though it’s a place I’ve never been to. Dad worries that I’m a fantasist – that I’m only interested in books about violence and murder. He’s right, of course.

‘I’ll do the washing-up,’ I say, quickly changing the subject. Then I look over at the sieves, pans and countless bowls that I’ve used in my culinary disaster. Perhaps not.

‘My turn, Agatha,’ says Dad. ‘You get an early night – you look tired.’

‘Thanks.’ I hug him, smelling coal-tar soap and his ironed shirt, then run up the stairs to bed.

When we’d first moved into Groundskeeper’s Cottage, I chose the attic for my bedroom. Mum had said it was the perfect room for me – somewhere high up, where I could be the lookout. Like a crow’s nest on a ship. I was only six then, and Mum had still been alive. Before that, we’d squeezed into a tiny flat in North London, and Dad had ridden his bike down to Hyde Park every day. He’d been a junior gardener when I’d been born, still learning how to do his job. The little flat was always full of green things – tomato plants on the windowsills, orchids in the bathroom among the bottles of shower gel and shampoo …

The attic has a sloping ceiling and a skylight that is right above my bed so, on a clear night, I can see the stars. Sometimes I draw their positions on the glass with a white pen – Ursa Major, Orion, the Pleiades – and watch as they shift through the night.

The floorboards are covered with a colourful rug to keep my toes warm on cold mornings. We don’t have central heating, and the house is draughty, but in mid-July it’s always warm. It’s been scorching today, so I go up on my tiptoes and open the skylight to let some cool air in. My clothes hang on two freestanding rails. Dad is saving to get me a proper wardrobe, but I quite like having my clothes on display.

On one wall there’s a Breakfast at Tiffany’s poster with Audrey Hepburn posing in her black dress. Next to her is the model Lulu. There’s also a large photo of Agatha Christie hanging over my bed, which Liam gave me for my birthday. On the other is a map of London … Everything I need to look at.

My room isn’t messy. At least, I don’t think it is, even if Dad disagrees. It’s simply that I have a lot of things, and not much room to fit them in. So the room is cluttered with vinyl records, with books, with a porcelain bust of Queen Victoria that I found in a skip. Every so often, Dad makes me clear it up.

And so, I try to tidy now. But with so little space it just looks like the room has been stirred with a giant spoon.

I take the heavy copy of Le Guide Culinaire and place it on my bookshelf, which takes up one wall of the room. I sigh – what a waste of time. What a waste of a day.

I run my hand along the spines of the green and gold-embossed editions – the mysteries of Poirot, Miss Marple, and Tommy and Tuppence – the complete works of Agatha Christie, who my mum named me after. She’d got me to read them because I liked solving puzzles, but said I should think about real puzzles, not just word searches and numbers. When I’d asked what she meant, she had said –

‘Everybody is a puzzle, Agatha. Everyone in the street has their own story, their own reasons for being the way they are, their own secrets. Those are the really important puzzles.’

I feel hot tears prick the back of my eyes at the thought that she’s not actually here any more.

‘I got called in front of the headmaster today …’ I say out loud. ‘But it was OK – he just let me off with a warning.’ I continue, tidying up some clothes. I do this sometimes. Tell Mum about my day.

I change from my school uniform into my pyjamas, hanging everything on the rails and placing my red beret in its box. What to wear tomorrow? I choose a silk scarf of Mum’s, a beautiful red floral Chinese one. I love pairing Mum’s old clothes with items I’ve picked up at jumble sales and charity shops, though some of them are too precious to wear out of the house.

Next, I go over to my desk in the corner and unearth my laptop, which is buried under a pile of clothes. I switch it on and log in. People at school think I don’t use social media, but I do. I might read a paper copy of The Times instead of scrolling down my phone, and write my notes with a pen. But I’m more interested in technology than they’d know. You can find out so much about people by looking at what they put online. Of course, I don’t have a profile under my own name. No – online, my name is Felicity Lemon.

Nobody seems to have noticed that Felicity isn’t real. Several people from school have accepted my friend requests, including all three of the CCs. None of them have realised that ‘Felicity Lemon’ is the name of Hercule Poirot’s secretary, or that my profile photo is a 1960s snap of French singer Françoise Hardy.

I scroll through Felicity’s feed, which seems to be endless pictures of Sarah Rathbone, Ruth Masters and Brianna Pike. They must have flown out to somewhere in Europe for a mini-break over half-term. They pose on sunloungers, dangle their feet in a hotel swimming pool and sit on the prow of a boat, hair blowing behind them like a shampoo commercial. Despite myself, I feel a twinge of jealousy and put the lid down.

Rummaging through my satchel, I take out the notebook that I started earlier in the day. I put it by my bed with my fountain pen, in case inspiration strikes in the night – that’s what a good detective does: they note down everything, because they never know what tiny detail might be the key to cracking a case.

Most of my notebooks have a black cover, but some of them are red – these are the ones about Mum – all twenty-two of them. They have their own place on a high shelf. My notes are in-depth – from where she used to get her hair cut to who she mixed with at the neighbourhood allotments. Every little detail. I don’t want to forget a single thing.

I look over at Mum’s picture in its frame on my bedside table. She’s balanced on her bike, half smiling, one foot on the ground. She’s wearing big sunglasses, a crêpe skirt, a floppy hat and a kind smile. There’s a stack of books strapped to the bike above the back wheel. The police had blamed the books for her losing control of her bike that day – but Mum always had a pile of books like that. I don’t believe that was the real cause of her accident. That’s not why Mum died. Something else had to be the reason.

I climb into bed and pull the sheet over me, then take a last look at the photograph.

A lump rises in my throat. ‘Night, Mum,’ I say, as I turn out the light.

‘Dad, will you stop letting Oliver walk all over the work surface? It’s unhygienic.’

I’m trying to wash up the bowl I used for breakfast, but our cat is sitting by the sink and keeps batting my hand with his tail. He’s purring loudly at the fun new game he’s invented. I turn to look at Dad, who is hunched over a bowl at the table. He shrugs and shovels in another spoonful of cereal. He’s running late, as usual.

‘I can’t watch him all the time, Agatha.’

Sighing, I scoop Oliver off the counter. He’s grey, and on the portly side from all the treats Dad feeds him. He causes so much trouble, but he has a special place in my heart. He’s middle-aged in cat years, and his main hobby is sitting – on the work surface in the kitchen, in front of the mirror in the hall or on the threadbare armchair that used to be Mum’s. I suppose he misses her too. When he isn’t sitting, he’s lying down.

Oliver rubs his face up against my chin and I scratch the soft fur of his neck. I can feel his low, rumbling purr in my chest. I think back to the day I first met him. It was a rainy afternoon, and I was sitting by the fire, reading. Mum had come in through the front door with a cardboard box, which she brought over and set down in front of me.

‘What is it?’

‘Why don’t you find out?’ she said, smiling and shaking the raindrops from her hair.

I opened the wet cardboard box. At first it seemed to be full of nothing but blankets. I looked at Mum, puzzled.

‘Keep searching – just be careful.’

I pulled back the layers of blanket, realising that there was a sort of hollow in the middle of them, like a nest. And there – curled into itself and barely bigger than my fist – was a kitten. My eyes widened with surprise, and I didn’t dare touch the sleeping creature.

‘Go on – you can stroke him.’

‘Him?’

‘Yes, he’s a boy. You’ll have to think of a name.’

I thought about this for a moment. ‘Why do I have to think of a name?’

Mum laughed. ‘Because he’s yours.’

‘He’s … mine?’

Something like a shiver passed through me as he opened two huge ink-black eyes and looked up at me.

Then Mum had put her arms round me from behind and held me while I held Oliver. I closed my eyes.

The memory was so clear – even though that kitten was fully grown now, Mum was still somewhere behind me, holding her arms round me. He might have been mine, but his heart always belonged to Mum.

I put Oliver down on the tiles and clear my throat. As I finish my washing-up and dry my hands, Dad brings his empty bowl over to the sink.

‘Are you OK, love?’

I nod and manage a smile. ‘I’m fine.’

‘It’s just, you look a bit …’ He puts his head on one side.

‘… of a genius?’ I suggest, trying to deflect the attention from myself and clear the lump in my throat, but he doesn’t laugh.

‘Is something wrong?’ Dad is more interested in things that grow in soil than things that live in houses, but sometimes he notices more than I expect.

‘I’m fine, Dad, really …’

‘Really?’ He puts a shovel-sized hand on my shoulder.

‘Yes, really, Dad. Now go – get to work before you’re late!’ I reach up on tiptoes and hug him. For Dad, actions make more sense than words. He softens.

‘Hold on,’ I say, ‘your collar’s all twisted.’ I sort out his polo shirt and he stands very still, like an obedient child.

‘Right – you’ll do,’ I say, giving him a kiss on the cheek. ‘Off you go.’

‘Have a good day, love.’

Dad goes, and I rush back upstairs to finish getting ready. I brush my teeth and pull on my blazer, brushing my hair until my dark bob shines. I tie Mum’s red silk scarf round my neck like a lucky charm and, finally, put on my tortoiseshell sunglasses – perfect for observing people without them noticing. Next, I pack my satchel – notebook, magnifying glass, sample pots for evidence, fingerprint powder and my second-best lock-picking kit. (My best one has been locked in the headmaster’s shiny desk since yesterday afternoon.)

Outside, the sun is bright. Dewdrops sparkle on the emerald-green lawns and the sun fades. It’s been hot today. I feel a swell of pride – the beautiful trees, the grass and flowerbeds, all lovingly tended by Dad and his wardens. I step through the wrought-iron gate of Groundskeeper’s Cottage and close it behind me, taking my usual route along the Serpentine lake. I’m looking forward to my morning chat with JP, who lives in the park. JP isn’t supposed to live in the park – he’s homeless – but Dad pretends not to notice when he’s still there at night-time. Dad says he scares off the occasional graffiti artist. This morning, as I approach, I see JP sitting with his eyes closed, looking pale.

‘Hey, JP!’ I hurry towards him. I have a premonition that he will fall forward as I reach him, a knife sticking out of his back. He would murmur something as he fell into my arms – ‘Agatha, you must avenge me.’ Then I would …

‘Morning!’ JP calls brightly, his eyes flicking open.

He’s not dead.

‘Were you comfortable last night?’ I ask.

‘Not too bad. I slept under the weeping tree in the Dell. Don’t tell your Dad, though.’

‘Did you make sure not to leave a trace?’

‘Not a fingerprint.’ He laughs and eyes my pockets hopefully. ‘Do you have anything to eat?’

I pull out two pieces of toast, sandwiched together with butter and marmalade.

‘Thank you, my dear.’ He takes a large bite, then speaks through a mouthful. ‘Now, by the way …’

‘Yes?’

‘Don’t you have a school to go to?’

I check my watch. It’s 8:37 already; school starts at 8:55. ‘Yup, I’d better run. Bye!’ I set off at a brisk walk.

‘Have a good day!’ he calls after me.

I walk along the path. There aren’t many people around at this time, but I nod to an old lady as I pass her, and she smiles back. She’s walking fast, wearing a light tan coat and matching hat.

As I pass under the canopy of beech and willow trees, I hear a roar ahead. Approaching me, far too quickly, is a motorbike. Motorbikes are banned from the park, the same as any vehicle. I feel cross, but I have no time to react as the bike shoots past me, down the footpath and out of sight. A moment later and I hear a screech of tyres, a loud thud, then nothing.

Before I know it, I’m running back in the direction that I’ve just come from, and as I round a bend in the path I see what I feared – the old lady in the tan coat lying on the ground. The bike is next to her, but only for a second – the rider revs the engine and speeds away.

‘Hey!’ I shout after the rider, rather pointlessly. ‘Stop!’

Of course, the bike does no such thing, and just disappears down the winding path. I rush over to where the woman lies on the ground. Her hat is askew, her eyes closed, and the contents of her handbag are strewn over the path.

I stand frozen for a second, stunned. I have to check myself – I haven’t Changed Channel. This is not a dream. This is really happening.

‘Are you all right?’ I ask, and she opens her eyes slightly, but just looks blearily at me, then blacks out.

‘Help!’ I shout. ‘Someone, help!’

There is hardly anyone around, but JP comes running over.

‘We need to call an ambulance. I’ll call nine-nine-nine,’ I say.

‘You have a mobile?’ He sounds surprised.

‘Well, of course,’ I say, a little peeved. ‘I’m just not glued to it all the time. We need to hurry.’

I reach into my satchel and take out the phone. I press the ‘on’ button, but it seems to take forever to power up.

‘JP, could you go and see if there’s a warden nearby?’

JP makes off across the lawns, the sole of one shoe flapping as he runs.

I turn my attention back to the woman. She looks almost too peaceful, and for a second I’m worried that she might have died while I was distracted.

My phone finally powers up; I call nine-nine-nine and ask for an ambulance. The woman keeps me on the line at first, asks about the lady’s breathing and pulse. Her right arm is twisted oddly under her and looks broken. Carefully, I unbutton the cuff of her coat sleeve and find her wrist. Pressing my fingers to her skin, I find a regular – if rapid – pulse.

The woman on the end of the line hangs up, telling me the ambulance is about to arrive and I should make sure they can see me. Taking my hand away, I notice something unusual on the old lady’s wrist – a tattoo of a key.

It’s very simple – one long line and three short, like the teeth of an old deadlock. Dad has a dozen keys like that on a ring, which open the old iron gates and grilles in the park, but it seems a strange thing to have tattooed on your wrist, especially for an old lady. The handle of the tattoo key is a circle with a dot inside, a bit like an eye. It’s outlined in white ink, which shines silvery on her dark skin. I start to put her scattered things back in her handbag, hoping to find a next-of-kin contact. There’s lipstick, some mints in a tin, a pen, a large set of keys (none of which are deadlocks) and a purse.

There’s no perfume in the bag, though I can smell that she is wearing some. I sniff again – I can’t help it – it comes instinctively to me. A waft of vanilla, a hint of leather and carnation. Tabac Blond, first made by Caron in 1919. An expensive perfume.

Her clothes are plain, but her blouse has the feel of silk. The mother-of-pearl buttons might be plastic, but I’m not so sure. I look in the purse for a contact telephone number, but find nothing except several business cards.

Prof. Dorothy D’Oliveira

Senior Fellow, Hydrology Studies

Royal Geographical Society

Hydrology? What does that mean? ‘Hydro’ is from the Greek for ‘water’. So, she studies water? Out of ideas, I go back to making sure she’s comfortable. I don’t risk moving her right arm, though it looks uncomfortable bent beneath her. But, as I fold my blazer and place it under her head, I spot something in her left hand. I don’t know how I missed it at first. With a glance at her peaceful face, I gently prise her fingers open to find a piece of folded pink newspaper – a page from the Financial Times. Looking around to see if anyone is watching, I open it out.

It has the usual stories – mergers of electronics companies, CEOs getting millions of pounds in bonuses, a story about London pollution. Without thinking, I fold the paper and slip it into my blazer pocket. JP hasn’t returned yet, so I’m left alone to watch over the professor. Somewhere nearby, a siren starts wailing. I have an idea – opening my satchel, I take out a small brown bottle, unstopper it, and wave it under her nose.

It was insanely difficult to find smelling salts in London chemists. Finally, a pharmacy on Old Compton Street had agreed to sell me some, on the condition that I leave my name and address.

After a moment, the professor starts to take deeper breaths, and coughs twice. She opens her eyes and looks at me. The sound of the siren is much louder now, and I can see the ambulance racing across the lawns towards us, churning furrows into the dew-soft grass. Dad won’t be happy. It stops right next to us. The two paramedics jump out and start to tend to their patient.

‘What’s that you’ve got there?’ A paramedic points to the bottle I’m holding.

‘Sal volatile.’

He looks blank.

‘Spirit of hartshorn?’

‘What?’

I suspect the man of being a little slow.

‘Ammonium carbonate with lavender oil.’

‘Ah, aromatherapy. New age.’

I sigh. ‘If you say so.’

They check the woman’s pulse and breathing, and shine a light in her eyes to check for concussion. Then they apply a sling before loading her on to a stretcher. The one who called my smelling salts ‘new age’ asks me some questions about what happened.

‘Hit by a motorbike?’ He shares a look with his colleague. ‘She’s lucky not to be more seriously hurt.’

‘Pretty unlucky to get hit at this time of the day in a park, mind,’ says the other paramedic.

‘Luck has nothing to do with it,’ I say. ‘This was deliberate.’

I give the paramedics my home address and say I’m happy to talk to the police. I think about offering to ride with the professor to the hospital, but before I get the chance the ambulance leaves, and I stand there feeling as though I’ve woken from a dream. But this was no dream, and when I reach into my blazer pocket – yes! – there it is – the folded sheet of newspaper.

‘Thank goodness for that,’ I breathe. There is a strange tingle behind my eyes. In the spotless blue sky above me, clouds are starting to form. Not just any clouds – they are spelling out words.

The clouds form and dissolve away just as fast. My heart is racing. I pick up my satchel and start to walk, replaying the events in my mind, and several images refuse to fade.

I think of the biker, whose face was hidden by the dark helmet. I think about the business cards from the Royal Geographical Society. And, most of all, I think about the key tattoo, in its silvery ink. I’ve never seen that symbol before. I pause – or have I? There’s something at the back of my mind, just niggling away at me …

I stop, feeling frustrated.

I’m already late for school, so surely it can wait another minute. I sit down on a park bench and open my satchel, taking out my current casebook. I’m so excited; it might as well be the first one – this is a new beginning. I flip open the notebook to the opening page and cross out the details about the local shopkeeper’s parking violations. I write the heading: ‘Hit-and-Run – Hyde Park’, underlining it a couple of times. Then I jot down some quick notes –

1. Old lady knocked down in Hyde Park. The path was wide. Was this deliberate? What could the motive be?

2. Her perfume was expensive, and she had an unusual tattoo (sketch overleaf). Something seems odd here – what is her story?

3. Business card says she is a member of the Royal Geographical Society – do they know more about her?

I look over all those exciting question marks for a moment, puzzling it over.

Something is afoot, of that I am sure.

‘So, you saw an old lady knocked down in the park by a motorbike, and now you want us to investigate?’

Liam is staring down at my notebook and frowning. We’re in form class, before lessons. ‘Don’t people get knocked down all the time? What makes this one any different?’

I glance to the front. Mr Laskey is behind his desk, reading the newspaper, and it’s hard to tell whether he’s sleeping or not. The rest of 8C are chatting noisily, so there is little chance of our conversation being overheard. Still, there isn’t much time to tell Liam everything that has happened. Brianna Pike, one of the three CCs, is sitting on the desk next to us, but she’s too wrapped up with doing her make-up to pay us any attention.

‘Not just an old lady getting knocked down,’ I whisper. ‘There was something funny about it. This didn’t look like an accident. There were … unusual circumstances. Comprenez-vous?’

‘You mean –’ he glances around at our classmates before continuing in a whisper – ‘you think someone might have targeted her?’ He sounds more excited than normal about one of my cases.

‘Exactly! And if you come with me to the Royal Geographical Society, I’ll prove it to you.’ I hold out the professor’s business card.

He takes it and reads. ‘Professor D’Oliveira, Senior Fellow, Hydrology Studiesd—’

‘We need to get going – now,’ I say, cutting him off. ‘Time is of the essence.’

‘Whoa, hold up! We’ve got school. What’s the hurry?’

‘I need to solve this before the police do.’

‘But we have a maths test! And you almost got expelled yesterday! Just wait till we’re finished.’ His voice is plaintive – Liam loves maths tests. He runs a hand through his hair, making it stick up at strange angles. I resist the urge to reach over and smooth it down. I catch the eye of two girls, who seem to be staring at Liam. That’s been happening a lot lately, since his growth spurt. They scowl at me and I shoot them a sweet smile as they start whispering to each other.

I lower my voice. ‘I’m going now. Are you coming or not?’ I hiss. I draw my notebook back towards me across the desk and stare down at it, trying not to be influenced by the pleading look in his eyes.