“Frankie!” Frankie hears her boss calling her from across the room. “What’s this I hear about you messing with the monitors?”
Frankie stands up, turns around, and blocking the television with her body, attempts to turn the channel back.
“Ah—” Her colleague tuts. “They were just about to announce the value. That’s the best bit.”
“Step aside.” Her boss frowns.
Frankie moves to display the stock market figures racing across the screen. She smiles brightly, showing all her teeth, and then sprints back to her desk.
Back at the waiting room, Justin is glued to the television, glued to Joyce’s face.
“Is she a friend, love?” Ethel asks him.
Justin studies Joyce’s face and smiles. “Yes, she is. Her name is Joyce.”
Margaret and Ethel ooh and aah.
On-screen, Joyce’s father, or at least that’s who Justin assumes him to be, turns to Joyce and shrugs.
“What would you say, love? How much lolly for Dolly?”
Joyce smiles tightly. “I really wouldn’t have the slightest idea how much it’s worth.”
“How does between one thousand five hundred and one thousand seven hundred pounds sound to you?” the expert asks.
“Sterling pounds?” the old man asks, flabbergasted.
Justin laughs.
The camera zooms in on Joyce and her father’s face. They are both astonished, so gobsmacked, in fact, that neither of them can say anything.
“Now, there’s an impressive reaction.” Michael laughs. “Good news from this table. Let’s go over to our porcelain table to see if any of our other collectors here in London have been as lucky.”
“Justin Hitchcock,” the receptionist announces.
The room is quiet as everyone looks around at one another.
“Justin,” she repeats, raising her voice.
“That must be him on the floor,” Ethel says. “Yoo-hoo!” she sings and gives him a kick with her comfortable shoe. “Are you Justin?”
“Somebody’s in love, ooohey-ooohey,” Margaret sings while Ethel makes kissing noises.
“Louise,” Ethel says to the receptionist, “why don’t I go in now while this young man runs down to Banqueting House to see his lady? I’m tired of waiting.” She stretches her left leg out and makes pained expressions.
Justin stands and wipes carpet lint from his trousers. “I don’t know why you’re both waiting here anyway, at your age. You should just leave your teeth here and come back later when the dentist’s finished with them.”
He exits the room as a year-old copy of Homes and Gardens flies at his head.
Chapter 22
ACTUALLY, THAT’S NOT A BAD idea.” Justin stops following the receptionist down the hallway as adrenaline once again surges through his body. “That’s exactly what I’ll do.”
“You’re going to leave your teeth here?” she says drily, in a strong Liverpool accent.
“No, I’m going to Banqueting House,” he says, hopping about with excitement.
“Great, Dick. Can Anne come too? Let’s be sure to ask Aunt Fanny first.” She glares at him, killing his excitement. “I don’t care what’s going on with you, you’re not escaping this time. Come now. Dr. Montgomery won’t be happy if you don’t show for your appointment again.”
“Okay, okay, but hold on. My tooth is fine now.” He holds out his hands and shrugs like it’s all no big deal. “All gone. No pain at all. In fact, chomp, chomp, chomp,” he says as he snaps his teeth together. “Look, completely gone. What am I even doing here? Can’t feel a thing.”
“Your eyes are watering.”
“I’m emotional.”
“You’re delusional. Come on.” She continues to lead him down the corridor.
Dr. Montgomery greets him with a drill in his hand, “Hello, Clarisse,” he says and bursts out laughing. “Just joking. Trying to run off on me again, Justin?”
“No. Well, yes. Well, no, not run off exactly, but I realized that there’s somewhere else I should be and…”
All throughout his explanation, the firm-handed Dr. Montgomery and his equally strong assistant manage to usher him into the chair, and by the time he’s finished his excuse he realizes he’s wearing a protective gown and reclining.
“‘Blah blah blah’ was all I heard, I’m afraid, Justin,” Dr. Montgomery says cheerily.
He sighs.
“So you’re not going to fight me today?” Dr. Montgomery snaps two surgical gloves onto his hands.
“As long as you don’t ask me to cough.”
Dr. Montgomery laughs as Justin reluctantly opens his mouth.
The red light on the camera goes off, and I grab Dad’s arm.
“Dad, we have to go now,” I say with urgency.
“Not now,” Dad responds in a David Attenborough–style loud whisper. “Michael Aspel is right over there. I can see him standing behind the porcelain table. He’s looking around for someone to talk to.”
“Michael Aspel is very busy in his natural habitat, presenting a live television show.” I dig my fingernails into Dad’s arm. “I don’t think talking to you is very high on his priority list right now.”
Dad looks slightly wounded, and not from my fingernails. He lifts his chin high in the air, which I know from experience has an invisible string attached to his pride. He prepares to approach Michael Aspel, who is standing alone with his finger in his ear.
“Must get waxy buildup, like me,” Dad whispers. “He should use that stuff you got for me. Pop! Comes right out.”
“It’s an earpiece, Dad. He’s listening to the people in the control room.”
“No, I think it’s a hearing aid. Let’s go over to him, and remember to speak up and mouth your words clearly. I have experience with this.”
I block his path and leer over him in the most intimidating way possible. Dad steps onto his left leg and immediately rises near enough to my eye level.
“Dad, if we do not leave this place right now, we will find ourselves locked in a cell. Again.”
Dad laughs. “Ah, don’t exaggerate, Gracie.”
“I’m bloody Joyce,” I hiss.
“All right, bloody Joyce, no need to get your bloody knickers in a twist.”
“I don’t think you understand the seriousness of our situation. We have just stolen a seventeen-hundred-pound Victorian wastebasket from a once-upon-a-time royal palace and talked about it live on air.”
Dad looks at me quickly, his bushy eyebrows raised halfway up his forehead. For the first time in a long time I can clearly see his eyes. They look alarmed. And rather watery and yellow at the corners—I make a note to ask him about that later, when we are not running from the BBC. Or the law.
The production girl with the headset gives me wide eyes from across the room. My heart beats in panic, and I look around quickly. Heads are turning to stare at us. They know.
“Okay, we have to go now. I think they know.”
“It’s no big deal. We’ll put it back.” He tries to sound casual. “We haven’t even taken it off the premises—that’s no crime.”
“Okay, it’s now or never. Grab it quick so we can put it back and get out of here.”
I scan the crowd to make sure nobody big and burly is coming toward us, cracking their knuckles and swinging a baseball bat. Just the young girl with the headset so far, and I’m sure I can take her on. If not, Dad can hit her on the head with his clunky corrective shoe.
Dad grabs the wastebasket from the table and tries to hide it inside his coat. The coat barely makes it a third of the way around, and I look at him bizarrely. We make our way through the crowd, ignoring congrats and well-wishes from those who seem to think we’ve won the lottery. I see the young girl with the headset pushing her way through the crowd too.
“Quick, Dad, quick.”
“I’m going as fast as I can.”
We make it to the door of the hall, leaving the crowd behind, and start toward the main
entrance. I look back and catch the girl with the headset talking urgently into her mike. She starts to run toward us but gets caught behind two men in brown overalls carrying a wardrobe across the floor. I grab the wooden bin from Dad’s hands, and immediately we speed up. Down the stairs, we grab our bags from the cloakroom and then up and down, down and up, all the way along the marble-floored hallway.
As Dad reaches for the gold oversize handle on the main door we hear, “Stop! Wait!”
We stop abruptly and slowly turn to look at each other in fear. I mouth “Run” at Dad. He sighs dramatically, rolls his eyes, and steps down on his right leg, bending his left as a way of reminding me of his struggles with walking, let alone running.
“Where are you two going in such a hurry?” asks a man, making his way toward us.
We slowly turn around, and I prepare to defend our honor.
“It was her,” Dad says straightaway, thumb pointed at me.
My mouth falls open.
“It was both of you, I’m afraid.” He smiles. “You left your microphone packs on. Worth a bit, these are.” He fiddles around the back of Dad’s trousers and unclips his battery pack. “Could have gotten into a bit of trouble if you’d escaped with this.” He laughs.
Dad looks relieved until I ask nervously, “Were these turned on the entire time?”
“Eh.” He studies the pack and flicks the switch to the off position. “They were.”
“Who would have heard us?”
“Don’t worry, they wouldn’t have broadcast your sound while they went to the next item.”
I breathe a sigh of relief.
“But internally, whoever was wearing headphones on the floor would have heard you,” he explains, removing Dad’s mike. “Oh, and the control room too,” he add, turning to me next.
After he shuffles back with our packs inside, we hurry to place the umbrella stand back by the entrance door, fill it with broken umbrellas, and exit the scene of the crime.
“So, what’s new?” Dr. Montgomery asks.
Justin, who is reclined in the chair with two surgically gloved hands and apparatus shoved in his mouth, is unsure of how to answer, and decides to blink once, having seen that on television. Then unsure of what exactly that signal means, he blinks twice to confuse matters.
Dr. Montgomery misses his code and chuckles. “Cat got your tongue?”
Justin rolls his eyes.
“I might start getting offended one of these days, if people continue to ignore my questions.” He chuckles again and leans in over Justin, giving him a good view up his nostrils.
“Arrrgggh.” Justin flinches as the cool prong hits his sore point.
“Hate to say I told you so,” Dr. Montgomery continues, “but that would be a lie. The cavity that you wouldn’t let me look at during your last visit has become infected, and now the tissue is inflamed.”
He taps around some more.
“Aaaahh.” Justin makes some gurgling sounds from the back of his throat.
“I should write a book on dentistry language. Everybody makes all sorts of sounds that only I can understand. What do you think, Rita?”
Rita, the assistant with the glossy lips, doesn’t care much.
Justin gurgles some expletives.
“Now, now.” Dr. Montgomery’s smile fades for a moment. “Don’t be rude.”
Startled, Justin concentrates on the television suspended from the ceiling in the corner of the room. Sky News’s red banner at the bottom of the screen screams its breaking news, and though it’s muted and too far away for him to read, it provides a welcome distraction from Dr. Montgomery’s dismal jokes and calms his urge to jump out of the chair and grab the first taxi he can find, straight to Banqueting House.
The broadcaster is currently standing outside Westminster, but as Justin can’t hear a thing, he has no idea what it’s related to. He studies the man’s face and tries to lip-read while Dr. Montgomery comes at him with what looks like a needle. His eyes widen as he catches sight of something on the television. His pupils melt into his eyes, blackening them.
Dr. Montgomery smiles as he holds the tool before Justin’s face. “Don’t worry, Justin. I know how much you hate needles, but it’s necessary for a numbing effect. You need a filling in another tooth before that gets an abscess as well. It won’t hurt—it will just feel slightly odd.”
Justin’s eyes grow wider at the television and he tries to sit up. For once, Justin doesn’t care about the needle. He must try to communicate this as best as possible. Unable to move or close his mouth, he begins to make deep noises from the back of his throat.
“Okay, don’t panic. Just one more minute. I’m nearly there.”
He leans over Justin again, blocking his view of the television, and Justin squirms in his seat, trying to see the screen.
“My goodness, Justin, please stop it. The needle won’t kill you, but I might if you don’t stop wriggling.” Chuckle, chuckle.
“Ted, I think maybe we should stop,” his assistant says, and Justin looks at her with grateful eyes.
“Is he having a fit of some sort?” Dr. Montgomery asks her and then raises his voice at Justin, as though his patient has suddenly become hearing-impaired. “I say, are you having a fit of some sort?”
Justin rolls his eyes and makes more noises from the back of his throat.
“TV? What do you mean?” Dr. Montgomery looks up at Sky News and finally removes his fingers from Justin’s mouth.
All three focus on the television screen, the other two concentrating on the news while Justin watches the background, where Joyce and her father have wandered into the path of the camera’s angle, with them in the foreground, Big Ben in the background. Seemingly unaware, they carry out what looks like a seriously heated conversation, their hands gesturing wildly.
“Look at those two idiots.” Dr. Montgomery laughs.
Suddenly Joyce’s father pushes his suitcase over to Joyce and then storms off in the other direction, leaving Joyce, alone with two bags, to throw up her hands with frustration.
“Yeah, thanks, that’s very mature,” I shout after Dad, who has just stormed off, leaving his suitcase behind with me. He is going in the wrong direction. Again. Has been since we left the Banqueting House but refuses to admit it, and also refuses to get a taxi to the hotel, as he is on a penny-saving mission.
He is still within my sights, and so I sit on my case and wait for him to realize the error of his ways and come back. It’s evening now and I just want to get to the hotel and have a bath. My phone rings.
“Hi, Kate.”
She is laughing hysterically.
“What’s up with you?” I smile. “Well, it’s nice to hear somebody is in a good mood.”
“Oh, Joyce—” She catches her breath, and I imagine she’s wiping her teared-up eyes. “You are the best dose of medicine, you really are.”
“What do you mean?” I can hear children’s laughter behind her. “Do me a favor and raise your right hand.”
“Why?”
“Just do it. It’s a game the kids taught me.” She giggles.
“Okay.” I sigh, and raise my right hand.
I hear the kids howl with laughter.
“Tell her to wiggle her right foot,” Jayda shouts in the background.
“Okay,” I laugh. This is putting me in a much better mood. I wiggle my right foot, and they laugh again. I can even hear Kate’s husband howling, which suddenly makes me uncomfortable again. “Kate, what exactly is this?”
Kate can’t answer, she’s laughing too much.
“Tell her to hop up and down!” Eric shouts.
“No.” I’m irritated now.
“She did it for Jayda,” he begins to whine, and I sense tears.
I quickly stand and hop up and down.
They howl again.
“By any chance,” Kate wheezes through her laugher, “is there anyone around you who has the time?”
“What are you talking about?” I frow
n, looking around, still not sure of the joke. I see Big Ben behind me, and as I turn back, only then do I see the camera crew in the distance. I stop hopping.
“What on earth is that woman doing?” Dr. Montgomery steps closer to the television. “Is she dancing?”
“Oo han ee ha?” Justin says, feeling the effects of his numbed mouth.
“Of course I can see her,” he responds. “I think she’s doing the hokey-pokey. See? You put your left leg in,” he begins to sing. “Left leg out. In. Out. In. Out. Shake it all about.” He dances around. Rita rolls her eyes.
Justin, relieved that his sightings of Joyce aren’t all in his mind, begins to bounce up and down in his seat impatiently. Hurry! I need to get to her.
Dr. Montgomery glances at him curiously, pushes him back in the chair, and places the instruments in his mouth again. Justin continues to gurgle and make noises.
“It’s no good explaining it to me, Justin, you’re not going anywhere until I have filled this cavity. You’ll have to take antibiotics for the abscess, then when you come back I’ll either extract it or use endodontic treatment. Whatever I’m in the mood for,” he says darkly. “And whoever this Joyce lady is, you can thank her for curing your fear of needles. You didn’t even notice I’d injected you.”
“Aah haa ooo aaa aa ee a.”
“Oh, well, good for you, old boy. I donated blood before too, you know. Satisfying, isn’t it?”
“Aa. Ooo aaa iii uuuu.”
Dr. Montgomery throws his head back. “Oh, don’t be silly, they’ll never tell you who the blood has gone to. Besides, it’s been separated into different parts, platelets, red blood cells, and what have you.”
Justin gurgles again.
The dentist laughs again. “What kind of muffins would you want?”
“Aa.”
“Banana.” He considers this. “Prefer chocolate, myself. Air, please, Rita.”
A bewildered Rita puts the tube into Justin’s mouth.
Chapter 23
I SUCCEED IN HAILING A black cab, and I send the driver in the direction of the dapper old man, who is easily spotted on the pavement, swaying in horizontal motions like a drunken sailor amid the crowd’s vertical stream. Like a salmon he swims upstream, pushing against the throngs of people going in the opposite direction. Not doing it just for the sake of it or to be deliberately different, and not even noticing he’s the odd one out.