Tunnels 05 - Spiral

cooped up after his tenure at Wormwood Scrubs.”
    “Right,” Drake said, as if none of this came as a surprise. “Give him my best if you do happen to bump into him.”
    “Not likely,” the Professor replied, closing the front door.
    As Will and Chester trailed after Drake on the way back to the Land Rover, they were peering at the area of woodland and wondering what Jiggs had been in prison for, and also what sort of man would sleep in a tree.
    “You won’t spot him, you know. Not even if he was ten feet away from us,” Drake said without looking at the boys as he strode over to the car. “That’s what Jiggs does. He hides. And he’s very good at it.”

BARTLEBY HAD FAILED to return for two full days, and Will and Chester went on yet another outing to look for him, this time accompanied by Mrs. Burrows.
    “He could be anywhere,” Chester said, walking on the muddy path beside the bulrushes at the edge of the lake. He stopped to peer at the water. “And if he’s fallen in and drowned, we’ll never find him. He might have been after the fish.”
    “He’s not that careless — and anyway, he can swim. I’m sure he’s OK, wherever he is,” Will said hollowly. He was trying his best to remain positive, but Chester was unconvinced.
    “If you say so,” he murmured.
    Will was nodding slowly to himself. “I bet he just shows up at the house again, like nothing’s happened.”
    “No,” Mrs. Burrows said abruptly.
    Both boys looked at her as if she was about to deliver some bad news, but she was referring to her new sense, which she’d been using in an attempt to shed some light on the Hunter’s whereabouts. “Maybe a few echoes of where he’s been before, where he’s marked his territory, but I’m not picking up anything fresh.”
    Turning to the east, Mrs. Burrows held her head high and then moved it slowly around until her unseeing eyes were gazing out at the island in the middle of the lake. She was wearing a long dress of white cotton that Parry had found in a trunk of clothes in one of the spare bedrooms. As the breeze caught it and also ruffled her hair, there was something saintly about her, standing there on the bank.
    “So you don’t think Bartleby just dumped Colly and ran for the hills?” Chester posed. “He’s a cat, after all, and cats are sort of unreliable.”
    “Like husbands,” Mrs. Burrows replied distantly, then suddenly turned her head to the west as if she’d heard something.
    The boys waited, hoping she’d picked up on the Hunter’s scent, but she remained silent.
    “Mum, is it him?” Will asked eventually.
    “Something else . . . a long way off . . . can’t tell . . . maybe deer,” she said quietly.
    Chester took hold of one of the bulrushes and broke it off. “Parry said Old Wilkie’s drawn a blank, too, while he’s been doing his rounds.” Chester was thoughtful for a second as he tapped the brown seed head against his open hand. “Say . . . you don’t think
he
might have had something to do with it?”
    “There might be insects in that,” Will said mischievously, knowing his friend’s almost phobic fear of anything that crawled. “And what do you mean? Why would Old Wilkie do anything to harm Bart?”
    Chester immediately dropped the bulrush and rubbed his palms together, then examined them carefully. “Well . . . Parry said Old Wilkie’s spaniel went missing, and you just know who was to blame for that.”
    Will was dismissive of the idea. “You think he’d lie to Parry? Old Wilkie’s worked for him for years. That’s not likely.”
    Mrs. Burrows was still facing in the same direction, to the west where the pine forest covered a small mountain like a green blanket. Where the Limiters had had their observation post. “Yes . . . deer . . . must be deer,” she decided. “I’m going back now,” she announced, turning toward the house and starting up the slope.
    “OK, Mum,” Will said. “We’ll try a few more places.”
    Chester waited until Mrs. Burrows was out of earshot, then spoke. “You know this is a total waste of time, Will. We’re not going to find him. Why don’t we lure him back with a rabbit or a chicken? Or we could tie a live goat up in front of the house and wait for him to sniff it out. That would get him home fast enough.”
    “I’ve got a bad feeling about all this,” Will replied, not giving his friend’s suggestions any credence. “Let’s take a quick look up that hill.” He set off along the side of