Read an Excerpt

JO ALMOND had finally worked out that she was not lovable when she was just fourteen.

It had hurt. But, after the first searing shock, Jo was philosophical about it. She'd known she had other things going for her. She was practical. She had found she could be brave. She didn't give up easily. She was energetic, clear-headed and calm. But lovable? Nah.

The man who finally taught her this painful lesson was her language teacher—a French student on teaching practice. He'd been twenty-three, with kind eyes and a passion for learning. For a while he'd believed in her. He'd been the only person in the whole world who had.

He'd also listened to her. Not for long, of course. But for a precious few hours she'd seen what it could be like if someone was on your side.

She ran away again. That time she'd got as far as Dover. She'd been just about to step on a ferry when a kindly policeman had caught up with her and organised her return home. Well, to her aunt's house. Jo would not call it home.

Jacques Sauveterre asked her to stay behind after French on her first afternoon back in school. By that time, Jo was good at keeping her own counsel. She stood there, not meeting his eyes, fidgeting.

"But why, Joanne? I would really like to understand this." 'I wanted to go to France," muttered Jo. "But of course."

She did look up at that. "What?" His kind eyes were twinkling. "Everyone in their right mind wants to go to France. France is paradise. It is only natural. But maybe it would be easier if you waited until the school holidays?"

For a moment she stared at him, disbelieving. He wasn't shouting. He didn't think she was next stop to a criminal. He was laughing at her, but very gently.

She gave a tiny, cautious smile—just in case this was real. He sat on the corner of the teacher's desk and looked at her gravely. "You know, people keep telling me that you are a tear-away. You don't care about school. You hardly ever do your homework. But you don't seem like that in my class, Joanne."

No one had looked at her like that before. So interested. So warm.

"Oh." 'Now, why don't you tell me why you really ran away from home, hmm? The real reason?"

Well, that was impossible, of course. What could she say? My so-called aunt hates me and her husband is a drunk who hits me? No, she couldn't say that. Carol and Brian Grey were pillars of the community, and Jo had just demonstrated how irresponsible she was. No one would believe her if she said that.

But she told him a tiny bit of the truth. "My aunt won't let me do Latin."

He was utterly taken aback. "Latin?" 'I asked if I could. She said no."

Just as she said no to anything that Jo might enjoy or that might make her feel normal. It was not that Jo refused to do homework. Her aunt insisted that she do housework every night. And she had to make little Mark's tea and wash and mend his clothes. Jo didn't mind that. She loved Mark, who was the closest she had to a brother, in the same boat as she was and who loved her back. They took good care that the Greys didn't find out, though, and always growled at each other when Brian or Carol was around. If she knew they were close, Carol would find a way to use it against them. As she used everything else; even Jo's love of cars.

When Jacques Sauveterre called to protest about the block on Jo taking his extra new class in Latin, Carol was all concerned interest.

"Jo is a natural linguist, Mrs. Grey,'he told Carol earnestly in his melting French accent. "It's a crime to keep her out of Latin."

Carol widened her pansy brown eyes. "But of course, Jo must do whatever she wants at school. She told us she wanted to do car maintenance classes." She gave that tinkling, treacherous laugh and added, "I suppose poor Geoff Rawlings isn't the pin-up he was, now that you've arrived."

She didn't have to say it. The message was loud and clear. Clumsy, plain teenage Jo has got a crush on you.And, as so often with Carol, there was just a hint of truth among the lies. Jo was good with cars. She did like them. And everyone knew it.

It was Jacques's first job. The whole staffroom was warning him about the risk of teenage emotionalism. Carol Grey was pretty and appealing—and she sounded so sensible. He believed her. Of course he believed her.

Standing there listening, Jo was helpless. She burned with shame.

"Maybe it's adolescence,'Carol Grey told him sadly, glancing at Jo with spurious kindness. "She's such a great gangling thing, poor child, and with those shoulders. Like a wardrobe. I suppose a man can't really understand that, Monsieur Sauveterre."

Jacques blushed. In the face of this gentle female mockery he forgot all his campaigning zeal and nodded.

"Oh," he said, avoiding Jo's eyes. "Well, I'm sure you know best, Mrs Grey."

And he fled. Leaving her to deal with the fallout on her own. Carol's mask dropped frighteningly the moment the door closed behind him. "So you thought you'd run away with the pretty little Frog Prince, did you?" Carol said softly. "Think again. Who would want a giraffe like you?"

Jo put her head down and didn't answer.

It maddened Carol. "If you've got time to do bloody Latin, you've got time to help me in the business. You can start filing tonight."

So there was the end of ever doing homework again. "No point in getting ideas above your station," Carol said, again and again. "The next thing we'd know, you'd be wanting to go to college or something.'And she laughed heartily. "Much better if you stay here and learn to do as you're told. That's all you're good for. All you'll ever be good for."

Jacques Sauveterre did not talk to Jo after that. Never singled her out in class again. Never so much as smiled at her when she took Mark to the under-elevens football game that he coached. He was kind to Mark, though. Jo tried to be grateful for that.

And his example also inspired someone else. The car maintenance teacher was more streetwise than Jacques Sauveterre.

"She just doesn't fit in," he said to Carol. "The others are tough kids in combats. Jo isn't. But she soon will be if you aren't careful."

That night, every garment disappeared from Jo's wardrobe except two pairs of army surplus trousers and some khaki tee-shirts.

"See if Monsieur le Frog looks at you now," said Carol, gleeful.

"I'm sorry, Jo,'said Mr Rawlings. "Hope I didn't make things worse. Well, at least I can give you the history of the combustion engine."

He started lending her books on classic cars. Jo read them at school in the breaks. She also became a first-class mechanic.

Carol never knew. She thought she was keeping Jo fully occupied, caring for Mark and working in her home sales business. It gave her a whipping boy and she enjoyed that. She even laughed when Brian Grey came home drunk and hit out at Jo. "Life isn't all pretty Frenchmen, kid. Get over it." On her sixteenth birthday Jo ran away for the fourth and final time.

Oh, the Greys looked for her. They were being paid good money for her keep. Anyway, Carol didn't like her victims to get away. It spoiled her fun for weeks.

But this time, Jo had planned well. She knew where her papers were because Carol had taken delight in showing her the betraying birth certificate.

"There you are. "Father unknown". You're a little illegit. Nobody wanted you. They paid us to take you off their hands."

Jo had looked at it stonily. The one thing she would not do, ever, was cry. It drove Carol wild with frustration.

So she'd just taken note of where Carol had put it away. And that night she took it, along with her passport and an oddly shaped envelope she had never seen before. But it was addressed to her, in unfamiliar handwriting.

Inside there was an old book—a hardback with cheap card covers. It had pen and ink drawings on the printed pages and smelled of old-fashioned nursery sweets—liquorice and barley sugar and mint humbugs. It was called The Furry Purry Tiger. It was a present for a child.

Maybe someone had wanted her after all, thought Jo. For a while, anyway.

She didn't get too excited about it. She had enough to do just surviving in the next three years. And making sure that Mark did not have to pay for her defection.

She went on the road—moving from place to place, doing casual jobs, finding new places to stay every few weeks. One way or another, though, she always managed to call Mark once a week. They got adept at making contact without Carol finding out. They always ended by saying, "See you soon."

When she ended a call Jo always thought: I'll get Mark away. I will. And then we'll go to France, which is earthly paradise, and be happy.

Another thing she'd managed to do was keep in touch with Monsieur Sauveterre. Whether he'd seen the marks Brian's fists left or whether he was just kind-hearted, she never knew. Maybe it was because he coached Mark's football club and it was nothing to do with Jo at all. But before he'd gone home, he'd pressed his address in France into her hand.

"You and Mark. When you come to France, you must look me up. You will always be welcome. I promise you."

For Jo, it was like insurance. Every so often, when she was settled somewhere for a few months, she sent him a postcard with her address. It was a way of saying, Remember your promise.

Jacques always replied. He'd even invited them to his wedding. And then one day, when she spoke to Mark, she knew they could not put it off any longer. He was still only fifteen, but that couldn't be helped. One Saturday morning, on a borrowed cell-phone, Mark's voice sounded odd. More than odd. Old. Very, very tired. Or ill.

At once Jo knew what had happened. Drunken Brian Grey had beaten him. Badly this time. Just as he had once beaten Jo.

Only once. The second time he'd tried, the night before her birthday, Jo had got him in an arm lock, ground his telephone under her heel and locked him in the cupboard under the stairs. That had been the evening she'd taken her papers and the money she had saved, from the babysitting that Brian and Carol did not know about, and melted into the night.

Now, she knew, Mark would have to do the same. "Get out of there now," she said, ice cool now that the worst had happened. "Do you know where he keeps your birth certificate and your passport?"

"Yes. I saw him put them in the old biscuit barrel the last time he changed the hiding place."

It figured. As well as being violent, Brian Grey was sly and secretive. But nobody ever said he was bright. What an uncle I have, thought Jo.

Aloud, she said, "Get them, and meet me at the bus station as soon as you can."

"But—"Mark sounded ashamed. "I'm not like you. I haven't got any money, Jo."

Her heart clenched with pain for him. "Don't worry, love," she said gently. "I have. I've been saving for this a long time."

She waited at the bus station for hours. When Mark came he was limping, and one side of his face was so badly bruised that his eye was closed. Jo's heart contracted in fierce protectiveness. But he grinned when he saw her.

"Got them," he said, waving the small red book at her. She hugged him swiftly. "Did you have trouble getting away?" He shrugged. "Brian's out cold and Carol was shopping. They think I haven't got anywhere to run to."

The adult world didn't believe Mark any more than it had believed Jo.

"Where are we going?" 'First the ferry. Then, France," said Jo, out of her new, beautiful certainty.

Mark sucked his teeth. "To Mr Sauveterre?" 'Yes."

Mark looked at her oddly. "Oh." It looked as if Carol had told him the tale about her adolescent crush. Jo winced inwardly, but aloud she said in a steady voice, "Jacques is married now. He said we'd always be welcome."

She bought their tickets at the big bus station and they embarked on an adventure of long-distance buses and ferries, crowded with families going on holiday. Mark talked cricket with a father and son, while Jo tried out her careful French. She was astonished to find the crew speaking back to her as if they understood.

After Boulogne there were more buses, slower and cosier—and a lot chattier. Then a lift from a kindly lorry driver. By that time Jo was rattling away easily in French. Even Mark was inserting a grunted comment or two.

This is going to work, Jo thought.

She had not realised how deeply pessimistic she had been. Not for herself, so much. After four years she knew she could survive pretty much anything if she kept her head. And she'd had a lot of practice in keeping her head by now. But she was scared for Mark. After all, he was a source of income for the Greys. Carol did not lightly let money pass out of her hands.

All through their journey Jo was alert for any sign of pursuit. But once they reached the Lot et Garonne she accepted it at last. No one was chasing them. They were home free.

In the little village they got directions to the Sauveterres'organic smallholding.

They walked along a small winding path that climbed a hillside, golden in the evening. The French countryside opened green arms to them. The sun turned the quiet road to gold dust between the hedges.

And when they got to the Sauveterres' property Jacques hugged them as if they had just got back from Antarctica.

"I have always had such a conscience about leaving you two behind in that rainy place," he said, ruffling Mark's hair.

Though he smiled, Jo thought from the look in his eyes that he meant it.