Land of the Yellow Sea

Chapter 3. THE BIRTHDAY PRESENT

THE VERY NEXT day, Rose and her mother were strolling onto the beach at Barton on Sea. It was her ninth birthday, a year to the day that her father disappeared.

Rose's mother had rung the police yesterday evening and told them that she and her daughter Rose had found a train ticket for Barton on Sea. A ticket their father had purchased on the day he went missing. She did not tell them of the mirror world. They probably would have put the phone down. They told her to stay by her phone while they made some urgent enquiries...

They soon rang Rose's mother back and confirmed that a pair of shoes that someone had left at the Barton on Sea shoreline had been found that day by an early evening dog walker. Rose's mother confirmed that the shoes found matched the pair that Mr Lavender had gone missing in. The police concluded that the Case of the Mysterious Suicide at Barton on Sea and the Case of the Missing Mr Lavender were one and the same. They felt they had solved two cases in one phone call. Of course, they knew nothing of the mirror world or any other mysterious world. And Rose's mother was never going to tell them. She was bright enough to know that if she did, it would lead to nothing but trouble for her and Rose and scupper their chances of ever finding Rose's father.

"Let's just find ourselves a nice pleasant spot," said Rose's mother perusing the beach. "We have no idea if this so-called other world really exists. It might simply be that your father was lured to his death by something like that mirror world creature."

"Maybe a monstrous sand creature chased him into the sea, Mum. Who knows, maybe this other world is a seaside world. Maybe he walked through some kind of invisible door, and the creature got him."

"I don't think that's quite what must have happened. Because how would you explain that his shoes were found? If I left my purse in the mirror world living room, who would ever find it? His shoes were found in this world. So he must have taken them off in this world."

"Not necessarily, Mum. The sand creature, or something like it, could have overpowered him. Yeah, maybe not even have chased him into the sea. The sand creature might have buried him beneath the sand of his seaside world. Anyway, whatever the creature did, it could have taken off Dad's shoes and brought them back through the invisible door, or whatever entrance there was, and put them down by the shoreline. The creature probably wanted to protect its secret world."

"I can't argue with that. But the mirror monster did say the entrance to the other world was a sophisticated entrance compared to its simple Mobius-mirror tunnel. Remember? I'm not sure an invisible door is a more sophisticated entrance, or one more complicated than a Mobius-mirror tunnel, are you?"

"Dunno. I'm only nine. And only just."

"Well, let's go and relax in the sun. Maybe some idea will pop in our heads. Your father obviously went missing in the late afternoon when the beach would have been emptied, or at least emptying out. But today, on this annual event of the day he went missing, we'll be on this beach, hoping for something as strange as what happened in our living room to happen on this beach."

"Okay, Mum. Let's at least have a holiday and enjoy the sea and the sunshine while the sun is still high in the sky."

"How are you enjoying your other birthday present? I got it online. There's so much choice these days. It's great not to have to sew on the polka dots for once. Not that I mind. It's just that I'm sure your dress is much more comfortable with no stitches to feel on your skin."

"My dress is fantastic, Mum. It feels very comfortable. And it's so sunny today that I feel my large black polka dots are sort of like sunspots. Mum, does the sun really have black spots?"

"It does. But I'm not sure they're actually black. They just look black because of the much brighter surfaces around them."

"Oh. I can't really understand that. Do you know what causes them?"