The Hangman's Lair Read Online Free

Cars growled past. A breeze
fluttered litter into the road.
    ‘Oi!’ called someone behind us.
    Bingo.
    We turned. All five of the gang were standing a couple of metres away. The one with the scar had pulled the hood of his coat up. Another of them, the tallest, took a step closer. I got the impression he was their unofficial leader. His head was so rectangular I half expected to have seen it in a maths lesson somewhere. His eyes were piggy and kind of squashed together, as if someone had got hold of his ears and pulled all his features forwards.
    ‘Who’re you?’ he grunted.
    ‘Ask ‘em why the cops are after them, Moz,’ said the one with the scar.
    ‘Shut up, Zippy, I’ll ask ‘em what I want,’ said Moz.
    ‘Don’t call me Zippy,’ muttered Zippy.
    Moz sniffed noisily at us. ‘Why the cops after you, then?’
    ‘Oh no, they heard you!’ cried Muddy suddenly. ‘It’s all over! We’re found out! We’re rumbled! We’re going to get got by the cops! Oh, you mad fool! They overheard everything you —’
    I interrupted him with a stare which could have turned milk sour.
    ‘It’s nothing, really,’ I said to Moz. ‘We’ll be going now, nice to meet you n’all.’
    I half-turned to leave, but Moz jabbed me on the shoulder and half-turned me back. T said, why are the cops after you? We don’t want police coming round here. What’s your name?’
    ‘I’m . . . Steve,’ I said. ‘And this is —’
    ‘Bond,’ piped up Muddy. ‘James Bond. Like the spy. It’s a bit embarrassing him having the same name as me, actually. But, y’know, it impresses the girls, and when I —’
    I interrupted him with a stare which could have knocked a charging rhino on its back.
    ‘That a code name is it?’ grinned Moz. ‘You doing undercover work?’
    My blood turned to ice. The rest of the gang sniggered.
    ‘Don’t pay any attention to him,’ I said, ‘he has to have a teaching assistant all to himself at school.’
    ‘Give ‘em a slap, Moz,’ said Zippy
    ‘Belt up, Zippy, I’ll slap who I like,’ said Moz. ‘You two looking for a slap? I want to know why the cops are after you.’
    ‘It’s his fault,’ I said, nodding at Muddy. ‘We went into Gamebusters the other day. We were going to steal that new one, Maximum Death IV. So I distracted the guy behind the till, I pulled a display over and made out I was hurt. He comes out from behind the counter, and Mr Brilliant here is supposed to nip round to the big drawers, find the right disc, stick a few in his pocket and run.’
    Moz eyed us. ‘But . . .?’
    ‘But my friend here decides to take the lot and dump them into his school bag. One hundred and forty games. Then we’re out the door before the shop assistant knows what’s happening.’
    ‘I don’t know what came over me!’ cried Muddy. ‘I went funny in the brain! Greed overtook my mind! I was mad for games and more games! The red mists descended and —’
    I interrupted him with a stare which could have melted concrete.
    ‘And now you think the police are going to come banging on your door?’ said Moz.
    ‘We’ve never stolen anything before, ever,’ I said. ‘And we never will again. Instead of harmlessly killing zombies, we’ve got a huge pile of nicked gear to worry about! We only wanted to nick Maximum Death IV because we had no money, and it’s rated adults-only, so the shop wouldn’t have sold it to us anyway, even if we did have the money.’
    ‘When was this?’ said Moz, suspiciously
    ‘A couple of days ago,’ I said.
    ‘Hey, Moz,’ said Zippy, suddenly. ‘I think I heard about that. My sister said she’d heard something about two kids who snatched a load of computer games.’
    ‘Yeah, I heard that too,’ said one of the others. ‘My mate’s girlfriend said.’
    ‘Looks like you two are going to be front page news around here,’ smiled Moz.
    ‘Oh no!’ I cried. (You know, I ought to give acting a go. I had just the right note of fear and panic in my