Percy's Treasure Map

Theo woke before the alarm on his mother's phone, because the tent had turned the colour of weak orange juice. Outside, the campsite was still and grey, and the lake below the field lay flat as a plate. His mother was a lump in the other sleeping bag, breathing slowly, so Theo pulled on his trainers and unzipped the door as quietly as a zip allows.

It was the last morning of the holiday, and he felt it in his stomach like a missed step. Tomorrow there would be school shoes and a bus and Mister Grant's spelling tests. Today there was only damp grass, a smell of woodsmoke, and the long shadow of the caravan next door.

The caravan belonged to the man everyone called Percy the Pirate. He had painted it navy blue with white portholes around the windows, and a homemade flag hung from a pole by the steps. The flag showed a teapot with crossed spoons beneath it, which Theo had decided was either very funny or slightly worrying.

Percy was sitting on the steps with a mug in both hands and a rolled paper across his knees. He was usually the loudest person on the campsite, calling good morning to the ducks and to the bins. This morning he was not saying anything at all.

"You're up early," Percy said, when he noticed Theo.

"So are you," said Theo.

"I am always up early," said Percy. "It's the only time the showers are warm."

Theo waited for the next joke, but it did not come. Percy turned the paper over in his hands, and Theo saw that it was a map, drawn in brown ink, with little arrows and a dotted line.

"Is that a treasure map?" Theo asked, before he could stop himself.

"It was meant to be," said Percy. "My grandchildren were driving up this morning, Pip and Rosa. Their car broke down outside town last night, and now they're going straight home again. I spent two evenings hiding clues around this field."

Theo looked at the map and then at the field, as if the clues might wave at him. He thought about what he would say to his friend Sam about treasure hunts. He would say they were for little kids, and Sam would agree, and that would be the end of it.

"Treasure hunts are a bit young, though," Theo said. "Aren't they?"

He heard how it sounded as soon as it was out. Percy did not look cross. He only nodded, the way a grown-up nods when a train is late and there is nothing anyone can do.

"You're quite right," Percy said. "Pip is eight, so it would have suited him. Never mind, Theo."

There followed an awkward moment, the kind that sits on a conversation like a wet towel. Theo shifted from one foot to the other and looked at the teapot flag. Then he held out his hand for the map, because standing there was worse than doing anything at all.

"Can I see it?" he asked.

Percy passed it over without a word. The first clue was written along the top in careful capitals: Where the water sings but never swims, look underneath the lid.

Theo frowned at it. Water that sang sounded like a kettle, but nobody left kettles in a field. Then he thought of the shower block, where the old pipes groaned and whistled every morning like someone humming badly.

"The pipes," he said. "In the shower block."

"I couldn't possibly say," said Percy, but one corner of his mouth moved.

Theo walked across the wet grass to the shower block, and Percy followed at a polite distance. Beside the door stood a wooden box for lost property, with a lid that never quite shut. Under the lid, taped to the wood, was a small brown envelope.

Inside was the second clue. Count the boats that never sail, then take the one with the painted tail.

That one took longer, and Theo enjoyed it more than he meant to. He walked down to the jetty and back again, while the sun rose and turned the lake from grey to silver. At last he noticed the old rowing boats that had been turned upside down and filled with soil, so that geraniums grew out of them by the gate.

There were five of them, and only one had a red stripe painted on its stern. Tucked between the flowerpot and the wood, Theo found the third envelope. His trainers were soaked, and he had stopped caring.

The third clue sent him to the noticeboard, and the fourth to the bench where the swallows nested. Percy kept up with him, his mug long since empty. Each time Theo solved one, Percy made a small grunt, as if a sum had come out right.

The fifth clue was different. It was not written in capitals, and it had been crossed out and rewritten twice. The treasure sleeps where the lake keeps score, one stripe below the year before.

Theo read it three times, and nothing happened in his head at all. He tried the jetty, the boathouse and the steps down to the beach. Percy watched him with interest but offered no help whatsoever, which Theo thought was fair.

"Did you make this one too hard on purpose?" Theo asked.

"I made it for Rosa," said Percy. "She's twelve, and she complains if things are easy."

Theo sat on the end of the jetty and looked at the water, annoyed with himself. The lake keeps score, he thought. Lakes did not keep score of anything, except perhaps how high they came in winter. Then he turned round slowly and looked at the wooden post at the side of the jetty.

It was painted with white stripes, and each stripe had a year written beside it in black. The highest one said last year's number, and the stripe beneath it was the year before. Theo knelt on the planks and felt along the bottom of the post, where the wood met the stones.

His fingers found a tin, wedged into a gap and wrapped in a freezer bag. It was an old biscuit tin with a picture of a lighthouse on the lid. Theo stood up with it, and he was surprised by how pleased he felt.

"Well," said Percy quietly. "That was a proper piece of thinking."

Inside the tin were chocolate coins in gold foil, three small compasses, and a folded note. The note said: For the finest crew on the lake, with love from your grandfather. Theo looked at it for a long moment, and then he put it back exactly as he had found it.

"These aren't mine," he said.

"Nobody else is coming to collect them," said Percy.

Theo turned the tin over in his hands and looked back along the route he had walked. The shower block, the boat garden, the noticeboard, the bench, the jetty. An idea arrived, all at once, like the sun coming over the hill.

"Leave it all where it is," he said. "Every clue. When are you back here next?"

"In August," said Percy slowly. "For the whole fortnight."

"Then put them back for Pip and Rosa in August," said Theo. "I'll take photographs of every hiding place on Mum's phone. You can check nothing's moved before they arrive. And I'll write down which clues were too hard, so you can warn Rosa about the post."

Percy looked at him for a while without speaking. Then he laughed, properly, the way he laughed at the ducks.

"You'll tell her it was too hard?" he said.

"I'll tell her it was almost too hard," said Theo. "She'll like that better."

They walked the route again together while the campsite woke up around them. Theo took the photographs, and Percy tucked each envelope back into its place with great ceremony. At the jetty, Percy opened the tin and took out two chocolate coins, one for each of them.

"Crew's wages," he said. "Rosa will never know."

They sat on the end of the jetty and ate the chocolate, which had gone slightly soft from the sun. Behind them, Theo heard the tent zip open and his mother calling his name across the field. The lake was bright blue now, and a heron stood in the shallows as if it owned the place.

Percy stood up, brushed down his knees, and lifted his empty mug towards the morning.

"Good morning, Theo," said Percy the Pirate. "Best one of the summer, I think."