Too Much Trouble Read Online Free PDF Page A

‘er’ cold?’ Dave cracked a broad smile at us both, then started at our grave expressions. ‘Oh, you must be very ill. I never see you without a smile, Prince.’ At this, he walked on past us. ‘Come on then, boys.’
    My heart stuttered back to life and breath returned to my lungs.
    â€˜Thanks, Mr Williams,’ I voiced, and Prince smiled weakly as the caretaker pressed his passagainst the sensor. He pulled the gate open as a voice crackled over his walkie-talkie.
    â€˜Hello, Dave?’ Miss King’s voice was clearly strained and I could feel our luck ebbing away.
    â€˜What’s up, Judy? I’m just down by the gates.’
    I grabbed Prince’s arm and hurried through the open gate, putting ourselves the other side of the black metal bars that surrounded the school.
    â€˜Come on, Prince,’ I hissed and broke into a trot.
    I could hear the conversation continuing over Mr Williams’ radio as our trot became a run and in a few steps, an all-out sprint. As we reached the end of the short stretch of road that the gates stood on, we heard the caretaker’s voice pursuing us.
    â€˜Hey, you two, what are you playing at? Get back here!’ Dave was a big guy, not huge, but big enough and slow enough that we weren’t scared he was going to catch us. I’m not sure what we were actually scared of, but I know that every step I took in that frantic dash was fuelled by fear.
    For the second time that day I ran until my legs or my lungs gave out. This time it was my lungs. We found ourselves sandwiched between a tall, garden fence, a gate set in it every four or five metres, and the backs of what I guessed were garages.I crouched on the pebble-strewn path, my body screaming for rest. I had thrown our bags down and the contents of one had spilt out. Prince leant against a fence, his hands on his knees, the ice-pack long since discarded, and his head down.
    â€˜What. . . are. . . we. . . doing?’ Gasped breaths punctuated Prince’s question as he tried to re-fill his lungs.
    I didn’t answer for ages. I collapsed further on to the path, my head resting on one of Prince’s school books. I looked up at Prince before I answered.
    â€˜I don’t know what we’re doing, but I do know that they weren’t about to drop that one. Mrs Marshall was gonna keep going until Uncle Victor turned up. Did you want to hang around for that?’
    Prince looked down at me, then up at the top of the fence. He didn’t answer my question but asked, ‘Do you know where we are?’
    I had no idea. We walked back to the end of the alley and looked for a road name. Gillott Road. We still had no idea where we were. We could have been on any one of a hundred roads around our area. We turned round again and followed the alley to the other end. It came out on to another road that we didn’t know, Lords Lane.
    We had no intention of retracing our steps, we didn’t know who might be searching for us, so we took some aimless turns, hoping to find something familiar.
    After about fifteen minutes of wandering we found one of the entrances to the park. As we went through the gate I pulled out the loose change, all the money we had in the world, from my jacket pocket. Prince ran ahead as I counted it slowly, down to the last penny. There was not enough.
    Not enough for anything much.
    I loved our park. In the middle was a huge, open space. A field of green, defined by white lines and football goals. It was pretty much on top of a hill, so it seemed like the sky went on forever. A concrete path ran all the way round the grassed area and paths led off this into the woods around it. One path led to a play-park, another to a BMX track, where me and Prince had often had foot races, jumping over the obstacles and charging up and down the ramps. We took another path to a smaller and more secluded field where the park-keeper rarely went.
    This field was sloping and