For Sale or Swap - Alyssa Brugman [33]
'Oh well, maybe another time,' Shelby replied, shrugging.
'Do you think you'll be allowed to come over anyway?' Hayley asked. 'We were just going to watch some old movies, but if you have to stay with your family, that's OK.'
'Why would I have to do that? It's holidays.'
'It'll be Christmas Eve, silly,' explained Hayley, smiling. Shelby had forgotten all about it. 'Do you want to ask your mum?'
Shelby grinned. 'Yeah, I will. That would be great.'
She could imagine them all sitting around in Hayley's big house, watching movies and giggling, sharing bowls of popcorn. She'd be one of them, if only for a few hours.
After the Crooks had gone, Shelby used her whole bottle of shampoo trying to get Brat clean. She scrubbed and rinsed, scrubbed and rinsed. She made some good progress on Brat's face, but in the end, the best she had come up with for the rest of her body was a deep strawberry blonde.
When she arrived home for lunch there was a message for her on the kitchen bench.
Ruth rang. Shelby frowned, wondering whom this Ruth could be.
She said to tell you that your bushranger is back???
Shelby snatched up the message. Of course! The lady from the classifieds. Could it be possible that the man was putting Blue up for sale or swap? She rang the number.
'We've just taken an order for a Mr Dan Morgan – text by email and payment from a company, the same as last time.'
'Who?'
'You don't know Mad Dan Morgan? What are they teaching you in school these days? It could be another co-inkydink.'
Shelby smiled. 'Can you tell me what the ad is for?'
'Quiet, sound, chestnut gelding, sixteen years . . .' she began. Shelby's heart started to race. It was Blue. The man had just dyed him like he dyed Brat. It had to be Blue. She held her breath.
'. . . fifteen hands high.'
Shelby exhaled. Blue was only thirteen hands. The man could lie about colour, but he couldn't lie about height – at least not that much.
'Did he give a phone number?'
Ruth cleared her throat. 'Yes, but I'm not going to give it to you. I've already overstepped the bounds for you. The magazine will be out in a few days. You've got a head start anyway.'
'I really appreciate it,' Shelby said.
Her mother was loitering in the kitchen, and gave Shelby an inquiring look when she hung up the phone. She explained that Ruth was the lady from the magazine, and that she thought it might be the same man. She would have a phone number. She wasn't sure exactly what she was going to do with it, but it was a start.
'That's great, Shel. But right now, I want you to clean up your room. Aunty Jenny will be here tomorrow.'
Shelby groaned. She hated cleaning her room. It was always so messy that she didn't know where to begin. Aunty Jenny's visit also meant Shelby sleeping on the lounge. For some reason, whenever her aunt came to stay, Shelby was the one who had to give up her space. Besides that, Aunt Jenny was old and a fuddy-duddy. She had beady eyes and watched all the children as though she was waiting for them to do something wrong.
Aunt Jenny always brought dumb presents too. She gave them lavender soap bags, or tins of boiled lollies – the kind of homemade craft things you can buy from school fetes and community fundraisers. Shelby wondered why her aunt bothered coming for Christmas when she always sat in the background just watching with her lips narrow and closed.
She trudged into the bedroom and used her foot to scrape a path from the door to her bed. First, she grabbed the dirty clothes and threw them in a pile near her bedroom door. She picked up her schoolbooks, putting them in a pile on her desk. She found a crumpled heap of clean clothes on the floor at the end of her bed and refolded them all.
After a little while she looked up and saw her dad peering at her from the hallway. He was carrying a plastic bag. 'Have you got a minute?' he whispered.
'Yep,' said Shelby,