The Power of Five Oblivion by Anthony Horowitz Page B

swallowed up and suffocated. Even the leaves seemed to have changed colour. It had been such a slow process that it would have been hard to tell when exactly it had happened. But in the autumn they didn’t turn gold any more. They just died.
    “Stand where you are!”
    I heard the shout and grabbed hold of Jamie, dragging him behind the thick trunk of a horse chestnut tree. We had already reached the perimeter and there, in front of us, a watchtower rose six feet above the ground. Made of wooden beams and platforms with a ladder up the side, it stood level with the tops of the trees and was painted brown and dark green so that it would blend in with its surroundings. I knew the guard who had given the order. His name was Tom Connor and he was only a couple of years older than me, not that you would have guessed it seeing him in his khaki uniform, already scrabbling for the rifle that was slung across his chest.
    He hadn’t seen the two of us. It was Miss Keyland who had caught his attention. Not so long ago, she had been teaching him. Now he was aiming a loaded gun at her.
    “Hello, Miss Keyland!” he called out, more friendly once he saw who it was. “What are you doing?”
    “I thought I’d try and find some mushrooms,” Miss Keyland replied. Another lie.
    “Mushrooms? You’ll be lucky. But if you do find any, save some for me.” He raised his wrist. All the guards at the perimeter had watches. “You’ve got an hour and a half more light.”
    “Thank you, Tom. I’ll be back before then.”
    This was the tricky bit. We couldn’t pass the observation tower without being seen and if we tried and were caught, Tom would be sure to raise the alarm … he had a large bell attached to the roof just above his head. We had to wait long enough for Miss Keyland to have gone but not so long that she disappeared altogether. It was all a question of timing, and having judged the moment correctly – I hoped – I pushed Jamie forward and showed myself.
    “Is that you, Tom?” I called out.
    “Holly…?”
    “Have you seen Miss Keyland?” I asked in my most innocent voice. “Reverend Johnstone sent us to look for her. He asked us to give her a message.”
    I just had to hope that Miss Keyland was far enough away not to hear me. At least Tom didn’t question my story. “You just missed her,” he said. He turned round and peered over the treetops. “There she goes!” He pointed. “I can call out to her if you like.”
    “No. We’ll find her.” Jamie and I hurried ahead. Tom smiled and waved.
    The forest got thicker and more tangled. The leaves and the branches seemed to be tied together, as if they didn’t want to let us through. We could hear Miss Keyland fighting her way ahead of us, but looking back, I realized that the observation tower was out of sight. We pressed on for about ten minutes. This was never the way I came when I went hunting and I just wanted to stop, to go home, to forget all about it. What did it matter what Miss Keyland did? If Jamie was right, if she really was calling the police, he would just have to leave. He had been planning that anyway. And what exactly was she doing, stuck out here in the middle of this wilderness? What made her think she would find anything here?
    “There!”
    Jamie had seen it first and we both crouched down behind a bush with sharp, spiny needles instead of leaves. It was in a clearing, which made it easier to see. And it was bright red, the colour vibrant against all these greens and browns. It was a rectangular box and even the straight lines seemed alien in the middle of a wood. I knew exactly what I was looking at. I had seen pictures in books.
    It was an old-fashioned public telephone box, the sort that had been replaced by modern glass counterparts and then phased out altogether when people started carrying their own mobiles. What was it doing here? Of course, it would have once stood next to a road but the road had been carefully removed. The telephone