The Key to Finding Jack by Ewa Jozefkowicz (best classic books to read TXT) 📕

not perfect,’ she told me, ‘but I think I did a pretty good job.’

I looked down to see a beautiful black and white photo of Jack. His head was tilted back and he was laughing at something. In the background I could see the shelves of Sutty’s shop.

‘Thank you,’ I said, hugging it to my chest.

‘And an evening of Jack would not be the same without his favourite snack,’ said Sutty, taking a huge box of chocolate frogs from his rucksack.

‘It doesn’t matter if your theory is wrong, you know,’ said Simon. ‘You’ve done so much. Look at this.’ He’d brought a print-out of the spreadsheet which listed all the schools he’d contacted. There were almost fifty on there.

‘It was you who called them,’ I corrected him.

‘Yes, but only because you asked me to. And you would have done it yourself if you could speak Spanish. I bet you’ve done more than the police have to find Jack. It’s incredible.’

I felt warmth rising in my face despite the freezing weather.

‘Promise us you won’t give up hope,’ said Manfy. ‘We won’t if you won’t.’

I looked around at all of their faces staring at me anxiously, and I said, ‘I promise. Of course I do.’

Then we sat eating chocolate frogs and drinking tea from Keira’s thermos. Finny continued to play and the snowflakes swirled around us. The tiny drummer in my head had not made a reappearance the entire time that I’d been there, and I had stopped frantically checking my phone.

‘I said that we’d call your grandma,’ said Keira, passing me her phone, where Grandma Sylvie’s face appeared on the screen.

‘Hello, darling,’ she said. ‘I wanted you to know how proud I am of you. I probably didn’t tell you enough when you were small, but there it is. I think your brother would be amazed at how far you’ve come with your search.’

‘Who is it, Sylvie?’ I heard a man’s voice in the background.

‘It’s my granddaughter, Martin. Do you want to see her?’

And then a large face filled the screen.

‘You can’t go that close,’ Grandma said, ‘pull it away a bit so she can see you.’

‘Ah yes, hello there. I’m Martin. Your grandmother always talks about you. Maybe we can meet in reality one day?’

‘I hope so,’ I told him.

‘Hello, Mr Percy,’ said Manfy, looking at the screen over my shoulder.

‘Samantha! Lovely to see you again. What are you doing there?’

‘I’m with Flick. We’ve had a gathering of Jack’s biggest fans.’

‘Ah, that’s fantastic. Everyone at St Austin’s misses him, me especially. I hope so very much that you hear from him soon. Stay warm!’

The sky was almost entirely dark now and the light from our phones wasn’t enough to see by.

As we started to head home, I asked Manfy, ‘How do you know my grandma’s boyfriend?’

‘Mr Percy? He does the gardening at St Austin’s nursing home. I used to go there with Jack every Thursday afternoon after he’d finished his exams. We would play guitar to the residents. It was nothing like I imagined. The men and women who live there have such interesting lives. We could listen to them talking for hours. And they seemed to love us playing to them. Sometimes they would put in requests for songs that they hadn’t heard in years. Jack would play them the octopus song – the one that Finny was playing. One old man even brought out sheet music for a piece that he composed back in the sixties. He really wanted us to play it. We practised for a few weeks to try and get it exactly right…’

But I was no longer listening to what Manfy was saying, because an idea had formed in my mind which I needed to act on straight away.

Eighteen

Nursing homes. Why hadn’t I thought of it earlier? It all made sense. Jack serenading Grandma and getting her together with Mr Percy, his love of the Rolling Earth schools employing older teachers, and now, the visits to St Austin’s that Manfy described.

His words came back to me: ‘I sometimes feel like we forget about older people.’ But maybe in Peru they did things differently? Maybe there was some sort of organisation for the elderly that he’d found and wanted to visit? It was a long shot, but it was definitely worth a try.

‘Sorry,’ I said to Manfy, ‘I’ve got to dash. Simon, would it be all right if I came to yours on the way home? Just for ten minutes?’

‘Yeah, of course,’ he said, surprised. ‘What is it?’

‘Let’s look up old people’s homes near Llave,’ I said, as soon as we got through his front door.

I was glad to see that his parents were out. I felt I couldn’t waste time explaining anything.

We ran up to his room and Simon switched on his laptop. But the search in Spanish brought up no results.

‘Nothing at all?’

‘Nothing in the immediate area. Remember that it’s a remote town. I reckon that most families in rural Peru are able to take care of the elderly themselves. They probably don’t use nursing homes as much as we do. Hold on, let me try the search in English, just in case,’ he said, seeing my disappointed face.

We saw the top search result at the same time.

Oro Homes – free accommodation in return for your time.

Simon clicked on the link.

Why not stay in one of our breathtaking treetop hostel rooms nestled among the Chila mountains, in return for your voluntary work?

Oro is a retirement community with a difference. Apart from our core team of regular staff, we rely on voluntary support provided by tourism. Our residents come from all over the world to enjoy our wonderful setting in the Chila mountain range.

We encourage volunteers from a host of different countries to stay with us and spend time with the men and women who have made Oro their home. Voluntary work can include reading, playing games, listening to music and sharing life experiences.

In return we offer beautiful treetop accommodation with unforgettable