Read Online Triskellion by Will Peterson - Free Book Online Page A

and walked purposefully towards them. The walk was laboured and without saying anything to one another, both Rachel and Adam came to the conclusion that he wore a false leg.
    The man stopped about a metre in front of the children and stood, casually tossing a cricket ball into the air.
    “I’m Commodore Gerald Wing,” he said. “You must be Celia Root’s grandchildren.”
    Rachel and Adam nodded, and Rachel managed a nervous hello. The man seemed friendly enough, but despite the smile there was something about him that made them both extremely nervous. Adam thought he was like the crusty old headmaster he’d seen in an old English movie one rainy afternoon.
    “And as for you…” Commodore Wing’s steely gaze settled on Gabriel. Gabriel stared right back, still chewing. “That was one
hell
of a catch, young man.”
    Gabriel nodded, the strange half-smile on his face once again.
    “One hell of a catch.” The commodore threw the cricket ball a little higher, his eyes never leaving the boy’s, then as soon as he’d caught it, he launched it hard and fast towards Gabriel, grunting with the effort of the throw.
    Rachel gasped, and watched as Gabriel reached out and the ball smacked into his palm. He looked at it, turning it inhis hand as if he were unsure what it was or where it had come from, before lobbing it lazily back to the commodore.
    Rachel looked across at Adam. They realized suddenly that the entire room had fallen silent and that all eyes were upon them.
    “Amazing reflexes.” The commodore was red-faced, something tense around his eyes, but his voice was calm and measured. “Absolutely amazing,” he said, before turning quickly away on his good leg.
    It was as though someone had turned a radio on, with the conversation in the pavilion suddenly resuming as though nothing had happened. The children watched the commodore move back towards his table, one or two of the other players murmuring to him as he walked past them.
    “Nutjob,” Adam muttered.
    Rachel hissed. “Adam!”
    “Not as nuts as one or two others, mind you,” Adam said. He moved towards the door, in search of a toilet. “But still weird…”
    Adam was still drying his hands on a wad of paper towel when he walked out of the door behind the pavilion and all but collided with the Bacon brothers.
    Gary and Lee stared at Adam, and the taller one smiled. It was anything but friendly.
    “Excuse me,” Adam said.
    Gary and Lee were both carrying cricket bats, and it didn’tlook as though they were there to practise their shots. Adam could feel his heart jumping against his chest. “Why, what have you done?” Gary Bacon chuckled at his feeble joke, and his brother joined in.
    Adam stepped left, and then right, but could find no way past the two, bigger teenagers. “I don’t want to miss the match,” he said.
    Lee hoisted his bat up on to his shoulder. “You won’t miss anything. Game can’t start until we’re out there.”
    Gary raised his own bat and slowly swung it, as though despatching an invisible ball to the boundary. “We’re opening the batting, see.”
    “Look, you’d better move out of my way,” Adam said, suddenly. He was as surprised as anyone that his words sounded so aggressive; at the anger he could feel rising up quickly inside him.
    “Or what?” Lee said.
    Adam had always been the same. Got the hot temper from his dad’s side of the family, that was what his mom had said. Rachel had been on the receiving end of that temper more than most, but then Adam reckoned that she usually started the trouble by saying the wrong thing.
    Rachel and Adam. Big mouth, bad temper.
    “Yeah.” Gary took a step towards him. “Or
what
?”
    Not that Adam’s mouth wasn’t plenty big enough…
    “Or … or the pair of you might find yourselves tied to a tree again.”
    The colour drained in an instant from the faces of the two Bacon brothers. They looked at one another and then back at Adam. This time, there was no smile,