Johnny Mackintosh and the Spirit of London (7 page)

Mr. Jennings had confirmed that hair was meant to be a good
source of DNA (so long as it had the roots). Johnny had taken some from inside the “Clara” ribbon in the locket and also pulled out a few of his own. He wanted to compare the two but he needed to do it properly so he'd asked Mrs. Irvine for a few of hers. These long gray follicles were his control sample. He looked at the timer counting down on his games console. It had seemed a long process but in three hours' time he should be able to take a first look at the results. He started running, Bentley struggling alongside to keep up.

Johnny was impatient for the results and arrived outside the Manager's office long before the countdown was over. For ten minutes he and Mrs. Irvine stared at the complicated array of glassware, sensors and DVD writer, with no indication of anything happening, while she quizzed him about the visit to St. Catharine's the week before. Johnny was desperate to change the subject, and the parting words of the journalist were still ringing in his ears. Besides, Mrs. Irvine had said a reporter was asking questions—maybe it was the same one? He needed to find out, so he told her an edited version of what had happened earlier that evening. Quickly he realized it was a mistake.

“Waiting for you in an alley?” Mrs. Irvine exploded. “I don't believe it. That's harassment, that is. It's my duty to protect you and I will not stand for this any longer.”

“It's all right,” Johnny said. “I just wondered if it was the same person. And if he said anything in particular. That's all.”

“It most certainly is not all right,” said Mrs. Irvine. She picked up the business card that Johnny had shown her. “I want you in my office at eight-thirty tomorrow morning. I shall be calling the newspaper first thing and will make quite sure neither this Mr. Watchorn nor his associates bother you again.”

Johnny thought the way Mr. Watchorn had acted suggested
he wasn't going to be deterred by a phone call, even if Mrs. Irvine could be rather scary sometimes. He wished he knew what the journalist had been talking about. He stole a glance at the handheld—five minutes to go. Johnny walked over to the window. A train whizzed through Castle Dudbury station without stopping. Behind him, Mrs. Irvine had calmed down a little and fell silent. A couple of black London taxis were waiting hopefully outside the station entrance, but there was no one going in or out. This was taking forever, and now it was quiet it seemed even worse than when Mrs. Irvine was asking questions. Finally, Johnny allowed himself another look at his little screen—there were ten seconds to go. Silently he counted them down. The alarm on his games console started beeping. Time was up. The experiment was complete. He could take a look at the results.

Johnny took the DVD from the writer and followed Mrs. Irvine out of the office, down a flight of stairs onto the ground floor and into the computer room corridor. At that moment, Mr. Wilkins emerged from the kitchens and began walking toward them, whistling as he came nearer. Mrs. Irvine took a little card from out of her handbag, swiped it through the reader beside the door and turned the handle. The whistling stopped and the cook quickened his step, hurrying over.

“Can I help you, Mr. Wilkins?” asked the Manager.

Underneath his bushy beard the cook's face was turning pink. “Excuse me, ma'am, but you can't … you can't let the boy in there. He's up to something. I know it.”

“Mr. Wilkins—Ben Halader is a happy house and I intend it to remain so. That will only happen if we trust all the charges in our care.” She turned to Johnny and said “Jonathan, in you go. You may do your homework on your own.” Johnny didn't need telling twice. “Mr. Wilkins, come with me. Next door to my office there's some equipment for your dishwasher.” Mrs.
Irvine did an about turn and walked away, leaving the cook no choice but to follow. Johnny couldn't believe his luck. He walked over to the computer table and inserted the DVD into the drive. The gene sequences were so large it took a full two minutes for Kovac to copy them into its memory core. It seemed like an eternity. Finally the results started to scroll across the screen, long streams of the letters

going on seemingly forever. Mrs. Irvine's DNA was the first to be displayed. Johnny wasn't interested in the letters themselves—he'd programmed Kovac to look at sixteen specific points on each of the genomes and compare them. They were places between genes where the DNA was meant to be more variable. He didn't understand how he and Clara could be brother and sister as the locket suggested but, if they were, then almost all sixteen of the points should match.

“Kovac—display DNA results for test sample Clara,” Johnny said.

“Results anomalous,” said the computer. “Regenerating DNA profile. Estimated time to completion 97 seconds.”

At least it wasn't long thought Johnny, though he didn't understand what might be wrong. He'd set up the experiment very carefully and did hope Mrs. Irvine hadn't interfered with the sample containers when he wasn't there. In the meantime he might as well take a look at his own. “Kovac—display DNA results for test sample Johnny,” he told the computer.

“Results anomalous,” said the computer. “Regenerating DNA profile. Estimated time to completion 62 seconds.” Kovac must have already been working on the problem.

After a short time the computer spoke again. “Anomaly confirmed. Displaying DNA results for test sample Clara.” Another string of letters started scrolling across the screen, but something didn't look quite right:

There were gaps. Somehow Kovac hadn't been able to read the DNA properly. And not just little bits—about half of it. The test was a failure.

“Anomaly confirmed. Displaying DNA results for test sample Johnny,” said Kovac and more letters started to scroll across the screen:

“Calculating DNA correlation for subjects,” said Kovac in full flow.

Johnny stared at the screen. The match between the Clara and Johnny samples was over 97%. All sixteen sites examined revealed practically the same sequence, including blanks. None of the sites matched Mrs. Irvine's DNA, but again that must be because of the gaps. What did it mean? It looked as though he'd found himself a sister, but he couldn't be sure and had no idea how it was possible. He was only two years old when his parents first went to prison, but he was sure he'd remember having a sister. Frustrated, Johnny shut Kovac down, thought about going off to the common room but remembered his stupidly early start the next day and decided to turn in.

Johnny was being chased by a T. Rex as he ran along a clifftop toward the London Gherkin. He wasn't going to make it. The roars of the dinosaur were almost deafening—right next to his left ear—louder and louder. Finally, Johnny woke up. He'd set his alarm to the deep growl he used when he really needed to get up—the radio would never have woken him so early on a Sunday. It was already half-past eight. The noise must have been going on for ten minutes. Johnny threw on his jeans and the T-shirt from the night before, checked under the bed to find Bentley snoring quietly, and made his way through the sleepy corridors of Halader House toward the Manager's office. He wasn't looking forward to this at all. He knocked quietly on the wooden door with the plaque. Maybe Mrs. Irvine had overslept too and wouldn't be there?

“Come in,” came a wide-awake sounding voice from inside. “So tell me, Jonathan—how was the experiment?”

Johnny wondered how Mrs. Irvine could seem quite so alert first thing in the morning. “I'm not sure,” he mumbled. “It wasn't what I expected.”

“No? Why was that?” Mrs. Irvine pointed for Johnny to sit down in the chair in front of the desk.

“It was sort of incomplete. You didn't touch anything did you?”

“Heavens no. I didn't dare go anywhere near it.” Mrs. Irvine pursed her lips together and stared into space for a second as though thinking something over. “Well that's a shame. And now Mr. Wilkins has cleared everything away. But of course that's not why we're here.” Johnny's heart sank. He should have known it was stupid to mention the journalist to anyone else. “I'm going to put a stop to this nonsense right now,” Mrs. Irvine continued. “They should leave you alone to get on with your life.”

Johnny nodded and sank lower into the chair, wishing he was
back in his bed. Mrs. Irvine began to dial the number and Johnny closed his eyes. He could picture the look of triumph in the journalist's face as he'd told Johnny that soon “everyone will know.” Everyone will know what? It was clearly important to the man—it was as though he was disappointed when Johnny hadn't responded. Of course he might have got the wrong boy. Johnny thought he would know if something about him mattered that much to someone else.

Mrs. Irvine was asking to speak with Mr. Watchorn. Then she was demanding to speak with Mr. Watchorn's superior. Then she fell silent while she listened to a voice on the line for a while. Finally, she said, “I'm so sorry,” and replaced the receiver.

“What did they say?” Johnny asked, bracing himself for the news.

Mrs. Irvine took a deep breath. “That journalist … Mr. Watchorn … he's …”