Bookweirder by Paul Glennon Page B

Rams shirt.
Norman wasn’t even much of a football fan.
    “You’re not from here,” the thug growled, bringing his face in close. The smell of his sour breath brought Norman back to the last time he’d been cornered by an angry enemy. It was wolves that time, but this was just as terrifying.
    “You’re from the other place. The real place, the future, and you’re taking me back with you,” the poacher fumed.
    Norman blinked and stared. What did he mean, the other place? A terrible thought began to occur to him.
    The beam of a flashlight blinded Norman. “Put him down right now,” George commanded.
    The thug turned and sneered, but now four new beams of light shone down from the path. A whistle sounded, followed by a shrill “Halt! Police!”
    It wasn’t the police, it turned out. It was only Gordon and Pippa, each holding two flashlights, but in the dark and chaos of Kelmsworth Wood, the poacher was hardly to know this. He could deal with two crazy kids, their dog and their lame traps, but the prospect of four policemen weighing in was a little much. He dropped Norman unceremoniously to the ground.
    Norman scrambled to the other side of the tree, lest the poacher change his mind. For a moment the bald man didn’t move, unwilling to leave even now. He stared at Norman for a long time, his eyes wide with anger and frustration. He looked more like a rabid animal than a man.
    The whistle sounded again. The bald man gave Norman one last wild look and went crashing into the forest.
    They knew better than to chase him. Norman and the Intrepids were relieved to have escaped without serious injury.
    “Are you sure you’re all right, George?” Pippa asked for the third or thirteenth time, handing over the mugs of cocoa she’d prepared back at the lodge.
    George furrowed his eyebrows but didn’t answer the question. Since they’d left the forest he’d been lost in thought, as if struggling with an impenetrable riddle.
    “Strange,” he mused to himself as he sipped his cocoa. “That ought to have worked.” He was genuinely perplexed that he had not been able to capture a criminal more than twice his size. He was so used to his schemes working, the failure was unaccountable. “I can’t explain it. First London, and now this.”
    Norman shifted uncomfortably in his chair. He had an idea why neither scheme had worked.
    “Just a run of bad luck,” Gordon opined cheerfully. “We’ll have him out in the next over.” He sat back and licked the cocoa moustache from his upper lip.
    Norman wasn’t so sure. George was used to coming up against a different kind of villain. The world of the Intrepids didn’t include opponents who were too smart or too tough for George. That wasn’t how it worked. But Mr. Todd didn’t play by these rules because Mr. Todd was Fuchs. Fuchs wasn’t from the world of the Intrepids. Fuchs didn’t care that their mouse distraction was supposed to work. The poacher didn’t care either, and Norman had a terrible suspicion that the reason was the same. Neither of them belonged in the pages of the Intrepids.
    “You ought to give me your jumper,” Pippa said, obviously trying to change the subject. “I’ll have it mended. George, you’ll lend him one of yours, won’t you?”
    George mumbled a distracted agreement.
    When Norman pulled his sweatshirt over his head, he noticed how badly it was ripped. The violence of the poacher’s grip came back to him and made him shiver.
    “By the way, Norman, what’s Rams?” Gordon asked blithely. “What’s that all about, then? Is it your school PE kit?”
    It took a while for Gordon to explain that PE was what Norman knew as Phys. Ed., and in the end it was easiest for Norman to agree that yes, it was his gym uniform.
    Gordon grinned, content with his perspicacity, and drained hismug. “So what do you think of our poacher, then, now you’ve heard him? Is old Dodgeworth right? Is he from New York?”
    Norman nodded, and lifted his cup to his