Black Queen Read Online Free Page A

be the best of thirteen matches. If he wins, Greg McInley stands to win five million pounds. Not a penny, if he loses.”

    “He’ll do it, you’ll see,” my father said. “I’m telling you, that man’s a genius, a pure genius.”
    A shiver went right through me as I watched. I knew! At that moment I knew. You could say I put two and two together. Number 22 next door. The Black Queen. Greg McInley was her son, he had to be. Hadn’t she said he was nuts about chess, a “chess nut”? That was why there were chessboards everywhere. They were
his
, all
his
. And hadn’t she said she was going to New York to be with her son, and for two weeks as well? It fitted. Everything fitted, fitted perfectly. That lady next door, Mrs Blume (a false name for sure), the Black Queen, was the mother of the world chess champion! She
had
to be.
    It was all I could do to hold it in. I wanted to blurt it all out, tell everyone. But I knew I couldn’t. I knew I mustn’t. If I did that, I’d have had to tell the whole story, confess to everything, all the lies and the dressing up, all my play-acting.
    The news came to an end, and my father turned off the television. “Well, Billy?” he said, turning to me. “That could be you in ten years’ time, if you practise. Five million quid for a fortnight’s work. Not bad. And he’ll do it, I’m telling you he’ll do it.”

    The next few days were not good, not good at all. I found it more and more difficult to find the right moment to sneak off and feed Rambo. It wasn’t that anyone was suspicious, it was just that there was someone else in the house. Gran had come to stay with us in our new home for the first time, so that meant there was another pair of eyes I had to dodge. But somehow I managed to sneak away unseen each day, slip in behind the garden shed and scramble over into the Black Queen’s garden. Once inside her garden I felt safe enough. But now every time I went into Number 22 I was troubled by a terrible temptation. I had this deep urge inside me to sneak about the house looking for evidence to confirm my theory about her son. I longed to peek into one of the front rooms, or even creep up the stairs into the bedrooms. But I just didn’t dare. I was too frightened – frightened that someone might see me through a window; but more than that, I was frightened of the house. I didn’t like being in there. It was dark and empty and cold – just like the haunted house of my dreams. Every time I went inside I just wanted to feed Rambo and get out as quickly as possible.

    Feeding Rambo was never a problem. As soon as I was dressed up in the coat and floppy hat with the glasses on, he seemed to accept me totally as Mrs Blume, as the Black Queen. He loved me to bits. He’d even try to follow me back up the steps into the house. I had to shoo him away. I kept an eye out all the while for Rula. But I think I must have succeeded in frightening her off, for her face never again reappeared over the fence.
    The news from New York was not good. Purple had won the first four matches. I kept thinking how disappointed the Black Queen must be, going all that way to New York just to watch her son lose.
    Every time Greg McInley lost my father became more depressed. He’d read about it in the newspapers and come away miserable. “It’s not like him, Billy,” he’d say, “not like him at all. He keeps making mistakes, elementary mistakes. Greg McInley never makes mistakes.” Then he’d blame Purple. “It’s that lousy computer fazing him out somehow. He’ll do better tomorrow, you’ll see.”

    But tomorrow was always just as bad. Soon it was six matches to nil. If Greg McInley lost the next day, then that would be the end of it.
    But the next day the real action moved from New York to back home. I was feeding Rambo late that afternoon when I saw Matey sitting in the long grass of Number 22, nibbling busily. He must have found another way through. Rambo hadn’t even seen him –