Unexpected Turns: Fair Exchange

and an electric blanket. The box was still there. It was very old. Grey. Cardboard. Stained. Every side was stuck with transparent tape, to hold it together and all the tape had gone dry and dull orange.

Kylie sat on the bed and fought a battle with her conscience. So what if it the box was forbidden? She was only going to look, after all. Besides, Mum shouldn't have any secrets from her very own, one and only, dear, sweet daughter. It wasn't right! How could Mum keep secrets from her own flesh and blood?

She lifted the lid. A book. Was that all? Yes. Just an old book. How boring. She pulled the book out and looked for something else under it. The box was empty. She dropped the tattered volume on the bed and slumped her shoulders in disappointment. It slipped over the edge and dropped to the floor where it lay like something from the rubbish dump. It was decrepit, like something from the back room in a museum. It was, she thought, almost disgusting.

Kylie nearly put the book back, but she was a keen reader and the instinct to scan words was strong. Perhaps there was a good story inside? Perhaps it was like a Dickens, with wonderful characters and convoluted plots. She liked that word. Convoluted. She said the word over and over in her mind as she picked the book up and opened it at the first page.

It was a good story. Half an hour went by before she realized how interested she was. She shivered, and realized the room was cold. She went to the living-room and stoked the fire. The cat turned its ears while it slept, and listened as Kylie sat with her back to it.

In the musty old book there was a story, about a girl called Alicia was caught up in a mystery. It was increasingly obvious to Kylie what me answer to the mystery was, but Alicia, the girl in the story kept missing the clues.

"Don't go that way!"" said Kylie in frustration as she read a paragraph in which there was a very clear piece of evidence. But in the story Alicia continued to walk across the street. Close behind her, the man with the green umbrella followed her. Kylie flipped the page over and read faster. "He's right behind you! Look the other way!" But Alicia had missed it. She went down another street and stopped at the gates to a museum. Kylie shouted at the book. "You idiot! Can't you see it's a trap!"

The man with the green umbrella kept close behind but remained in the shadows until Alicia was by herself in the room full of stuffed and mounted seagulls.

"Watch out!"