Free The Petitioners by Sheila Perry Page B

first light again. This time I really had been asleep.
    ‘Declan’s gone,’ she said.
    The words didn’t make any sense until I had heaved my mind out of the chasm between sleep and wakefulness. Once that had happened, I sat up in bed and said, ‘Where?’
    ‘We don’t know yet. He disappeared in the middle of the night, apparently, but neither of the men on watch saw him leave. If we were a military team I’d have had them both court-martialled. Do you have any idea where he might have got to?’
    ‘Me?’
    ‘Gavin, you’re the only one who knows him at all well. If you had no idea of what he was planning…’
    ‘What he was planning? You think he’s gone off under his own steam?’
    She glared at me. ‘Can you imagine anyone in their senses trying to abduct Declan? They’d be mad to try. No, he’s been up to something all along. I had a feeling he might be. Come along, let’s get going.’
    ‘Going?’
    ‘We’ve got to get after him.’
    ‘Why?’
    I suppose my mind wasn’t quite as fully in the realms of wakefulness as I had imagined. I resolved to try not to ask any more stupid questions. Or at least, not in every sentence.
    Tanya made a sort of hissing sound like an angry cat, and stalked out of my presence. Maybe she’d feel better once she’d caught a few voles.
    I got up and got dressed anyway. I had no real intention of going to look for Declan. Of all the people I knew, he was the one who was most able to take care of himself. I even wondered for a moment if he had faked the whole thing with Dan’s and Fiona’s disappearance. Maybe they were waiting for him just out of reach, ready to gang up with him again and escape to their friends in the Highlands. The rebel base there must surely be still active. On the other hand, I mused, moving slowly in the direction of the camp kitchen, did they really have anything to rebel against now? From all we had seen in recent weeks, the government seemed to have fallen apart, and instead there were various conflicting authorities vying for control over their little fiefdoms. Perhaps there were other private enterprises like Fairfax Consulting operating in other parts of Scotland.
    I had really hoped to spend my time on things I thought were important, instead of wasting it thinking about politics again.
    ‘You took your time,’ said Tanya when I finally arrived in the kitchen and claimed my morning drink of coffee-substitute made of God knows what.
    ‘I was thinking,’ I said reluctantly.
    ‘Thank goodness for that,’ she said. ‘Now maybe we’ll get somewhere. Have you had any ideas?’
    ‘Ideas? Oh, you mean about Declan? No, not really.’
    I wasn’t going to confide in her about the rebel stronghold and my suspicion that they were all heading in the same direction. Let her work it out for herself.
    ‘Sit down,’ she said.
    I sat gingerly on the edge of one of the long benches. She put her hands on the table and leaned forward.
    ‘Is there any chance he’s gone to join another group somewhere? Say in the Highlands?’
    Had she been reading my mind using a modern gadget I had never heard of before? Or, more likely, she had glimpsed Declan’s files in security HQ or whatever it was called. They probably had a whole virtual filing cabinet dedicated to him.
    ‘He didn’t say anything,’ I offered cautiously.
    ‘But you were thinking it, weren’t you?’
    ‘Isn’t it against the law to read somebody’s thoughts?’
    She laughed. ‘Not only against the law of the land, but against nature, I’m afraid. I just put myself in your shoes – abandoned by your son and now by your friend – and worked out what you might be thinking.’
    ‘Dan hasn’t abandoned me,’ I said.
    She raised an eyebrow. ‘Don’t tell me you haven’t considered that possibility.’
    ‘Why should I? Everybody went to great lengths to prove he’d been taken by marauding raiders, or raiding marauders for that matter.’
    ‘I don’t know why you’re being