Matthew and the Chimney Sweeps: Book One (Completed, Editing)

Chapter Fourteen: Back to the Petersons'

  The sheets used to zip down the telephone wire to escape Terry were, to say the least, noticeably damaged. Apricot was not at all pleased by this. And being it had been Slink who had given her the bad news about them, she chased him all around her home.

  Not surprisingly, the others were horrified to hear of their run-in with Terry, the twins, and the Trolls. Although for Ramon his horror didn't last long as he got quite jealous after being told of their highwire act.

  'Ahh, lucky,' he said. 'That would have been fun.'

 'Fun? Norman replied. 'Have you seen this big red mark on my face? Slink almost got caught and we could have fallen to our deaths.'

  Everyone was petrified the Mongraw Gang would come after them. And even more so knowing the Westies were now possibly in cahoots with them.  Adding to that, the race was soon approaching, it constantly being on Matthew's mind.

  Even Matthew's dreams were about the races (Terry chasing him popped up now and again) and they weren't good. There was one dream where he forgot to take his foot off the brake at the start and he was laughed at. Another where his wheels went all wobbly for no apparent reason. But the worst dream of all was when he accidentally ran over White-spot and everyone chased him out of Spring Heights.

  Trying to find Mrs Grey also took up Matthew's time. He spied every single address in the Free Territory, and to his great sadness, he didn't find her. Now they really needed to win the race. 

  'Two days to go, guys' said Jennifer. All the racers were sitting around the table on the Harrower eating and studying maps of the track, having just woken up from a well-deserved sleep-in after a really long practice the night before. 'Two days to go before the race.'

  'I hope we're ready,' said Matthew, putting down a diagram of the track's third corner. 'Do you think we're ready?'

  'I don't think we've prepared like this for a race ever,' said Norman.

  Emily came barging into the cabin. 'Oh, it's just you lot?' she said. She was a bit winded.

  'That's nice,' Jennifer said jokingly. 'But yeah, everyone else is still out doing their chores.'

  'I didn't mean it like that.' Emily walked over to the table. 'It's just that Mr Peterson rang and he thinks his chimney's blocked.'

  Slink was about to take a bite of hashbrown. 'Why does he think that?'

  'He told me he and his wife were performing some musical that supposed to be set during wintertime last night and they thought starting a fire would help them get more into character. When they started the fire, their house filled with smoke.'

  'Yeah,' said Slink, 'sounds like the chimney's blocked all right.'

  Wiping his mouth with a napkin, Norman scrunched up his eyes. 'That's impossible . . . we cleaned their chimney extremely well.'

  'Well something has clearly happened since then,' replied Slink. 'We should go over and unblock it.'

  'Fine,' said Emily. 'But if you lose the race don't blame me for not pressuring you more not go to the Petersons'.'

  Once they had scoffed down breakfast, they got dressed and left for the Petersons'. Scared they might run into the Mongraw Gang or the Westies, their heads on top of their skulking bodies were twitching all over the place as they went.

  Sure enough, Norman spotted a couple of Westies, two tall skinny boys who had weasel-like faces, sitting on a bench. The two of them were intently eyeing all the people walking passed.