Fraud at Snowfields Read online

  Meanwhile the presents had disappeared, and there was no trace of them left in the snow. Contractus looked pleased, and led Will and Annabel over to the house. There he waved his wand again in the pattern of a complicated spell that Will did not know, and part of the wall in front of them turned transparent, so they were looking directly at the Christmas tree inside the living room and could see that the presents were arranged neatly underneath it.

  ‘Wow,’ Annabel said. ‘That’s a fabulous spell. I’d like to learn that one!’

  Contractus smiled. ‘Yes, it can be very helpful indeed. But it’s quite complicated, and unfortunately has much potential for misuse, so I’m afraid it will be some time before you’ll learn it.’

  ‘Oh.’ Annabel looked rather disappointed.

  ‘Let’s go back. We’re done here, and we already have the next job waiting.’

  Will was the first to climb back onto the sleigh. He quickly closed the current job and opened the next one.

  ‘The next job is in Area F7, and again a blue-3,’ he told the others.

  ‘Okay, let’s go,’ said Contractus, and shook the reins. They took off and rose into the air again. Soon they had reached their next destination. This job was similar to their first one, and they encountered no problems. After they had finished, there was no new job waiting for them.

  ‘Good. A break is most welcome,’ said Contractus. He flew them back into the centre of their area. He landed the sleigh on a small, remote hill where they could rest without the risk of being seen. They rested for perhaps fifteen minutes, and Will and Annabel used part of the time for an impromptu snowball fight that left them both panting and slightly wet. Then Contractus called them back to the sleigh.

  ‘Hurry up. We’ve got an urgent red-5! We’ve got to leave immediately.’

  Will and Annabel ran back to the sleigh and quickly climbed up onto their seat. Contractus took off as soon as they were settled.

  Will looked at Annabel. ‘Red means someone has discovered the presents that have been delivered to the wrong location. But what does five mean?’

  ‘The same as with the other codes: the wrong location is another building within five hundred to a thousand yards of the intended destination.’

  ‘Oh, I know that, but I thought it had a different meaning with a code red.’

  ‘No, it hasn’t. You thought wrong there,’ Annabel replied snootily.

  Will let it pass. They were flying over the countryside at high speed, and Contractus still urged the reindeer to go faster. Then he took the sleigh downwards so rapidly Will could feel his stomach protesting. Soon they had landed on the lawn in front of the house that was marked with the red dot on the screen. Contractus hastily performed the covering spells on himself, the sleigh, and the reindeer, and covered Will and Annabel far faster than they would have been able to.

  Contractus jumped down from the sleigh as soon as it touched the ground, with Will and Annabel right at his heels, and jogged over to the house, pulling his wand out while running. He stopped right in front of the main entrance and quickly spelled it. He glanced at his hand-held screen, then quickly opened the door and walked inside with Will and Annabel close behind. Contractus passed through the hall and went up the stairs. At the top he glanced at his screen again, then backed up against a wall as a door opened and a boy about the age of twelve came out. The boy went past Contractus and then Will and Annabel, who had pressed themselves against another door, without taking any notice of them, and skipped down the stairs. When he was gone, Will took a deep breath, realising he had been holding it while the boy had walked past them.

  But the spell had worked! There was no indication that the boy had noticed anything unusual at all. Will felt quite relieved now that he had experienced this for the first time. There was quite a difference between being told that the spell worked and actually seeing it work so well.

  Contractus directed a short spell at his hand-held screen, glanced at it again, then waved his wand at the door of the room from which the boy had come and performed the secrecy spell on it. Then he opened it, motioned for Annabel and Will to follow him, and went in. When Will entered he could see it was the typical room of a teenager, with lots of posters stuck on the walls, clothes lying around everywhere, magazines scattered around—all in all the usual mess of a growing boy. He had to think briefly about his own bedroom at home; he felt slightly guilty, but quickly decided his had not been too bad—and he certainly had never made such a mess, had he?

  But then Annabel quietly said, ‘There.’ And she pointed towards a corner in which several presents had been discarded.

  Contractus checked his screen again and said, ‘There should be seven presents there.’ He stepped over to the heap, picked up a parcel, and handed it to Annabel. Then he picked up the next one and also passed it back. ‘One, two, three…seven. Good, they’re all here. The boy must have found them outside and brought them home.’ He turned back to Annabel and Will. ‘Okay, we’re finished here. Let’s take them to the house next door, where they belong.’

  ‘Er, Mr Contractus?’ asked Will. ‘Wouldn’t it be faster and easier to move them there with a spell?’

  ‘Hmm,’ replied Contractus. ‘You might be right. It definitely would be faster. Okay then, put the parcels down here on the floor.’ Annabel and Will placed the presents where he had pointed. Contractus pulled out his wand again, waved it at the parcels, and performed the transfer spell. They shimmered blue for a brief moment, then they were gone. Contractus aimed his wand at his screen again, performed a brief spell, and nodded in satisfaction.

  ‘All good, all done. They are exactly where they belong. Let’s get out of here,’ he told Annabel and Will, and led them from the room. ‘On our way out, we still have to spell the boy and modify his memory so he doesn’t remember the presents. Otherwise it would be very awkward, and he would be wondering what happened here.’

  ‘Sure,’ Will replied.

  They walked down the stairs. Then Contractus checked his screen and pointed at another door, performing the hiding spell once again. He went inside the room. Annabel and Will followed, and Will saw they were in the kitchen of the house. There was the boy they had seen upstairs, standing by the open fridge and rummaging through its contents. Mr Contractus looked at Annabel and Will, then raised his wand, pointed it at the boy, and waved it in the complicated pattern that Will recognised as the mind-modifying spell. The spell had been demonstrated to them, but they had not been taught how to perform it yet.

  The boy froze for a second, looked around in disorientation, then shook his head and started rummaging in the fridge again. Contractus nodded, winked at Will and Annabel, and led them out of the kitchen, through the hall, out through the main entrance, and back to the sleigh.

  When they were climbing up into the sleigh, Will finally asked the question he had wanted to ask for some time: ‘Mr Contractus? Inside the house you spelled your hand-held screen several times. What did you do to it?’

  ‘Oh, nothing special. I checked what people were in the house and where they were located. The other time I ascertained that the presents were in the right place. And then I used a spell to find the boy. You know, this hand-held is really a great tool if you know how to use it.’ He grinned at them. ‘And you can look forward to it. You two will receive your personal screens next year at school, and then you’ll start learning all the tricks and spells.’

  Will was stunned. ‘Oh, that’s fantastic!’

  Even Annabel looked amazed.

  Contractus laughed. ‘Yes, it'll be great, you’ll see. I can’t even imagine anymore how we were able to manage without them. Well, I see we don’t have a new job waiting at the moment, so we’d best go back to a more central position,’ said Contractus, and gathered the reins in his hands.

  Then suddenly a loud and piercing whistling noise made Will and Annabel jump.

  ‘Oh no,’ groaned Contractus, ‘what now?’ He let go of the reins and touched his screen. Thankfull
y the piercing noise ended. Will and Annabel also looked at their screen. A large, red-bordered rectangle had appeared and flashed quickly. Inside of the rectangle, Will could read in large, red letters: ‘2-black-black—All Units Respond Immediately!’

  ‘Oh dear!’ said Contractus. ‘That one’s really bad.’

  He pressed the confirmation button, swiftly picked up the reins, and jerked them abruptly. He barked a quick ‘hold tight!’ back at Will and Annabel, who did not really know what was happening, and took off at high speed. Only when they were high up in the air, moving fast, did he turn around to Will and Annabel, who were hanging on to their seats, rather bewildered by this sudden take-off.

  ‘Sorry to frighten you. I don’t suppose you know what a double black is, do you?’ he asked. They both shook their heads, and Will was a bit surprised that even Annabel did not know. ‘A double black is the worst that can happen on this particular day,’ explained Contractus. ‘It’s a complete failure of Cloudy’s Transportation network with a total disruption of the present distribution! I’ve never experienced that before, although there have been simulations and plans for this case. We’ve got to leave here immediately and head for the nearest distribution hub of Cloudy’s.’ He urged the reindeer on even faster.

  Annabel clung to the railing of the sleigh. ‘But wouldn’t it be faster if we used the transfer system—you know, like via street lanterns?’

  ‘Yes, normally it would,’ replied Contractus, ‘but with a double black, that system is also down.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Yes, that sums it up pretty well,’ replied Contractus dryly.

  ‘But what about our work? What about the wrongly delivered presents? Are we going to leave them just lying about?’ asked Will.

  ‘They are not so important right now. The double black comes first. We’ll have to take care of the presents after this is sorted out,’ answered Contractus.

  ‘And the code-red jobs?’ pressed Will. ‘I thought they must be dealt with at once, before anyone messes about with the presents.’

  ‘Yes,’ answered Contractus, ‘they do need to be taken care of immediately. And for this reason not everybody gets called back, so one of the teams located in the adjacent areas is going to cover our area for the code red jobs.’

  ‘Ah, I see,’ replied Will.

  By then they were high above the ground and nearing the clouds. Will looked at the screen in front of him. He saw that Contractus had entered their destination, and that they were getting closer fast. That was fine, for he had looked down a moment earlier, which had not been a terribly good idea, as his stomach was telling him quite pointedly. An enormous cloud loomed right in front of them.

  Contractus turned slightly back to Will and Annabel. ‘We’re getting near to Cloudy’s regional hub, but we have to pass through some clouds to get there. I’m afraid it might get a bit wet. Sorry.’

  And he flew the sleigh right into the huge white cloud. Will held his breath and closed his eyes, as he did not quite know what to expect. But all he could feel was a slight cold mist on his face, so he opened his eyes carefully and saw—nothing. Only white fog that was wet on his face. It was so thick he could not even see Contractus on the seat before him, or Annabel at his side. He could only make out vague shapes.

  ‘We’ll soon be there, no need to worry,’ Contractus called back to them, his voice slightly muffled by the fog.

  Suddenly the mist parted, and they were flying into a large, open area that looked like a hangar. And in fact that was what it was: a hangar for sleighs, with a roof and walls made out of cloud. As Contractus flew their sleigh in, Will could make out about a dozen sleighs already standing there. Students and teachers hurried from them over to the main entrance on the far side of the hangar.

  Contractus landed the sleigh quickly but smoothly in a free space near one of the walls. He grabbed his hand-held screen and turned around to Will and Annabel. ‘Let’s get inside quickly and see what’s going on here!’

  He jumped down from the sleigh and hurried over to the entrance where the others had already disappeared. Will and Annabel followed right behind him. While they were running across the hangar, Will could see a few other students and teachers he knew from the school, but none of his immediate friends or classmates. They passed through the entrance and hurried down a corridor. The walls, floor, and ceiling were all made out of cloud. To Will it looked exactly like the facility he had passed through on his way to Snowfields less than a year earlier.

  Contractus called to another teacher: ‘Inventus! Do you know what’s happening?’

  ‘Not any more than you. We just received the double black and left immediately. Now we’re here.’

  ‘Well, I thought delivery was a bit slow this year. At least I remember having to do a lot more jobs in the last several years than I’ve had this year so far.’

  ‘Hmm, yes, now that you mention it…I might have had fewer jobs this year too. But I’m sure we’ll soon hear what the problem is.’ He barked a short laugh. ‘Not that Cloudy’s ever was without a problem!’

  Contractus laughed too. ‘That’s true for sure!’

  Will and Annabel hurried along behind the two teachers, together with the two students who were working with Inventus. Will did not know them.

  ‘Hi, I’m Will,’ he said to the two boys, who were slightly older than he was. ‘And this is Annabel.’

  ‘Hi. I’m Peter,’ said the boy beside Will.

  ‘Justin,’ said the other, and nodded to them.

  ‘Your first year at Snowfields, isn’t it?’ Peter asked.

  ‘Yes,’ Will replied.

  ‘Well, you’re certainly getting right into it now. We’ve never experienced anything like this in our time here,’ Justin offered.

  ‘And I’m not quite sure I want to experience anything like this at all,’ said Will.

  Justin laughed easily. ‘Ah, don’t worry. The teachers are good at what they’re doing. They’ll sort it out.’

  By then they had reached the end of the corridor and followed Contractus and Inventus into the central operations room of the distribution centre. About fifteen students and teachers had already gathered in there. Contractus and Inventus went straight up to the front. Annabel and Will, as well as Justin and Peter, stood right behind them. Then a member of the staff of Cloudy’s Transportation Service climbed up onto one of the desks in front of them. He cleared his throat loudly.

  ‘Ladies, gentlemen! For those of you who don’t know me, I’m Lektrorus, your obedient va—sorry for that.’ He grinned nervously. ‘Unfortunately we had to call you in for an emergency. Our entire distribution system for this sector has broken down. We’re still trying to find out what’s happened. It looks to be something serious, not just some minor computer error or anything like that.’

  Will saw that Contractus was nodding knowingly to himself, as if he had thought as much already. Will turned his concentration back to Lektrorus, who continued: ‘We’ll divide you up into several teams to help us investigate the source of this disruption. You’ll be joined by members of my staff.’

  He jumped down from the desk and hurried through the crowd. He assigned the tasks to the teachers, who immediately left with their students in tow.

  Contractus turned around to Will and Annabel. ‘Come on, follow me. We’ve been assigned to investigate one of the temporary storage rooms.’

  Inventus stood right beside them and talked to Peter and Justin: ‘And we’ve been assigned to another of those storage rooms.’

  Contractus nodded. ‘Let’s go. We need to get this solved as fast as we can. The distribution has to continue as quickly as possible. As you know we’ve only got this one day.’ And he led them down one of the corridors. In places, branches led off to other parts of the distribution centre. Will got the impression that Contractus had been there before, since he led the way so surely and quickly.

  Finally they reached a large door. Contractus pulled it open and went inside. Will and
Annabel followed him. Then Will stopped abruptly and stared: they were standing in a very big room, and it was nearly completely filled with presents. Some were stacked high against the walls, and there were lots of small, movable cloud platforms with parcels on them.

  ‘Wow,’ he said.

  An employee of Cloudy’s looked up from sorting through parcels. ‘Thank the stars. Finally some help. Oh, it’s you, Mr Contractus.’ He smiled. ‘It’s good to see you again.’ His smiled faded. ‘Though it might have been under better circumstances.’

  Contractus nodded in greeting. ‘Hello, Lektroror, good to see you too. And good having you to help.’ He pointed at Will and Annabel. ‘These are Annabel and Will. Two very bright students of mine.’

  The employee put down the box he had been holding in his hands, turned to Will and Annabel, and bowed: ‘Nice to meet you both. I’m Lektroror, your obedi—’ He interrupted himself with an embarrassed smile. ‘Sorry, force of habit.’ He looked back down at the packet in front of him. ‘If you’d please join me over here, I’ll show you what we are looking for.’

  ‘Sure. If there’s something here, we’ll find it,’ said Contractus. He led Will and Annabel through the maze of bundles over to Lektroror. There he joined the goblin behind a workbench that was also made out of cloud.

  ‘Right then, this is what we know so far,’ Lektroror said, and put a hand on the present. ‘In one of the last batches we received, there was an unusual shipment. It didn’t contain anything that was to be delivered for Christmas Eve, so its contents are likely to be illegal. What exactly could the contents be? We don’t know. Our detectors just registered an unusual, unauthorized shipment and triggered the alert. But these detectors we’ve got are only there to detect major disruptions in the delivery system, and aren’t sophisticated enough to show us what exactly is wrong, or which the faulty parcel is. That’s why we had to call you all in. We have to sort through all the packages that have arrived in the last batches and find the faulty one. Fortunately all the delivery systems were shut down immediately by the alert, so no more presents have arrived and none were sent out. Therefore the parcel has still got to be in our centre somewhere.’ He smiled wryly. ‘That leaves only thousands of boxes to sort through!’