by Ned Reardon
It is dark. Very dark. Darker than he’d ever known the night to be. Yet, strange as it may sound, he can plainly see the distinctive form of a huge man drifting in and out of the mist. At least 10 feet tall, hooded and cloaked in black and eclipsing a strange fluorescent glow, the faceless phantom stands perfectly still.
‘Are you Death?’ asks the boy.
The thing does not reply but it is there. He can hear it breathing, struggling for air as though its throat and chest are heavily congested with snot and mucus.
‘Have you come for me?’ pursues the boy.
Following a short spell of reckoning it replies slowly through rattling phlegm. ‘No, I’ve not come for thee, but for another.’
‘Who?’ Pleads the boy, ‘Who have you come for?’
‘That is not for you to know.’ It concludes, spitting globules of yellowish-brown bile. Then, turning its back on the boy, it looks towards the far end of the foggy marshes where a tiny beacon of light has suddenly appeared.
The boy thinks that it’s perhaps a lighted candle in somebody’s window. Once again he asks, ‘Who have you come for Mr Death?’
‘Go home young whippersnapper!’ It retorts, clearly irritated by the boy’s inquisition. ‘Now is not your time…But rest assured, one day I’ll come back for you too!’ And then it almost chokes, laughing hysterically.
The boy inches back and watches apprehensively as the spectre glides across the long, wet grass towards the speck of light burning in the village on the hill. He prays for the candle’s owner and hopes that he or she has at least lived a long and purposeful life. Then suddenly it is gone.
Chapter 14
A peal of church bells resonating across the marsh gently reminded the boy that is was Sunday morning. He’d awoken to the sound of these enchanting chimes with a sense of pride and of a new belonging for he’d survived the night. And although he had to admit to himself that he hadn’t slept very well, mainly due to the midge’s and gnats which had driven him half mad with torment, he was still here, contrary to expectation, safe and sound in body and soul. Any doubts he’d harboured regarding the prudence of his daring enterprise had simply melted into nonexistence. He’d conquered his fear of the desolation of night and finally felt at peace with himself, free of all fear and sorrow.
The birds were busy chattering amongst themselves and the bright blue sky was void of any cloud. As he’d suspected it seemed as though it was going to be another very hot day. A thick, moist layer of muggy air had already descended upon the marsh and he began to feel sticky and uncomfortable. He felt thirsty and readily scolded himself for squandering his orange squash during the night. He stared down at his empty lemonade bottle and at the pool in which there must have been thousands of litres of water. His throat was so dry he had a crazy notion to dive into it and drink every last drop. He could have boiled some of the pond water last night, he supposed and waited for it to have cooled. But he hadn’t had anything to boil it in. He’d also exhausted his food supply but now that was only a minor hiccup compared to his water shortage. He never envisaged such a serious setback but he knew that in order to maintain his sustainability the problem needed addressing urgently. His priority today was to go in search of some fresh, clean water. Where to begin though? He knew that there was a public fountain up in Milton High Street near the old Court Hall but if he dared to go there he was bound to be noticed. No, he sighed, the risk was too great. He would just have to try his luck elsewhere.
As a matter of interest, the boy was fond of this adorable old building and had become quite familiar with its history. It has stood at the very heart of the village since around the mid 15 th century during the reign of Henry VI. Indeed, like the quaint medieval church, he considered it the essence of Milton Regis which, incidentally is now a popular museum housing a collection of antiquated items of local historical and archaeological interest. Ever since Saxon times however, up until perhaps around the turn of the century, this important monument had always served as a court house. It was used by the Lord of the Manor of Milton whose prestigious position it was to maintain law and order throughout the town and district, occasionally enforcing court orders for the placement of disorderly Miltonians such as pickpockets, footpads and unruly, promiscuous whores into the stocks located just outside in the courtyard, for misdemeanours such as drunkenness or breach of the peace.
The curator had let slip that he believed a few of these residing magistrates may have also been responsible for condemning one or two undesirable characters to their untimely deaths. Possibly sentenced to be hanged by their necks till they be dead at Maidstone or Eastchurch gaols. The boy had been horrified to learn that their corpses were encaged in iron gibbets and hung from gallows situated around the marshes and forsaken to rot, swinging to and fro in the bitter winter wind as a stark warning to cutthroat pirates and smugglers, murderous thieves and any other would-be outlaws.
Chapter 15
The sun burned intensely through a hazy, sultry atmosphere. Visibility was poor. The breeze had died away to a feathery whisper and the tide had receded to a harmless stream trickling its way back to the sea. Several swifts and swallows were showing off their aerobactical skills in a magnificent flying display and down at the ebb of the outgoing tide a dozen or so egrets were wading silently through the mud.
The boy had walked the entire length of the creek’s coastal path from its mouth westside where it joins the Swale at Kemsley, all the way up to its head where the paper mill’s concrete water tower stood, unsuccessful in his search for something to drink. His situation was becoming insidious and he began to debate whether he should ask the gypsy man if he could spare some of his drinking water. It might also be, he reasoned, an ideal excuse to get acquainted with him. Here, at the end of the sea wall, he got the feeling that he was being followed, the fine hairs on the nape of his neck felt prickly and his heart again began to drum with fear. He spun round sharply to investigate. But there was nobody there.
Before returning to the marsh, he took refuge for a while in the shade under the light railway viaduct. This unique construction, twenty feet high in places, belonged to Bowaters papermill. To the boy it rather resembled a giant concrete centipede, winding its way through the town on the back of which puffed steam locomotives hauling heavy goods and workmen along the narrow gauge line between the two paper-making mills sited at Sittingbourne and Kemsley.
Soon he began worrying again about the likelihood of being noticed by either the wise ones or any of his fellow parishioners, for here he was far too exposed. Without warning he was forced to duck down out of sight after noticing across the way someone who he needed to avoid at all costs. The person in question was Mrs Bertha Musgrave, a grey-haired, sour-faced woman. Fat with enormous wobbly arms who possessed the black eyes of a vulture, ravenous for any hint of a scandal. She was returning home from the town carrying bags full with shopping. She was also a blatant snitch. Deciding to leave sooner rather than later, he stripped to his waist and promptly headed back to the relative safety of the sea wall.
Later he heard the sounds of laughter coming from across the creek. When he looked over he noticed a small crowd of drinkers whom had gathered outside the Brickmaker’s Arms. The public house stood facing the creek between the old cement mill and the brickworks. Naturally its patrons consisted mainly of mill workers and brickmakers. The men from mill were permanently plastered in grey cement dust, each looking like a different version of Jacob Marley’s ghost. The brickmakers, especially the sorters whom handled the rough bricks day in day out, were reputed to have no fingerprints. Listening to their merriment and watching them supping their ale, he felt thirstier than ever.
A little farther along he saw a man in a blue boiler suit working alone on the bridge of the old paddle steamer. The boy noticed that he had a thermos flask which he guessed was probably full with hot tea. If the tide had been in, he knew he’d h
ave no qualms about swimming across and asking to borrow some, such was his raging thirst.
Rather than admit defeat, he obstinately stuck to his plan and made for the potdigger’s home over in the washbacks. Like earlier, he had a vague feeling that somebody or something was stalking him. Again, his heart rate increased and so did his pace. But out on the open marshes, again exposed to the merciless heat of the sun, he soon began to feel unwell. He was now sweating profusely and becoming weaker by the minute. An unnatural silence panned out across the hinterland as though some inexplicable phenomenon had sucked the day empty of time, cocooning everything that existed in a vacuum of space. He thought it the queerest feeling, as if the earth had stopped ticking like a broken clock. Feeling dizzy and nauseous he became unsteady on his feet. The stifling air began to strangle the life out of him and the unforgiving world about him began to spin. Now he felt certain that something catastrophic was about to occur. The lids of his eyes felt like heavy weights and he couldn’t manage another step. Both his legs began to wobble before he finally collapsed to the ground.
Struggling to remain conscious his vision seriously began to blur and therefore he was only half aware of the dark figure fast approaching him. He believed it to be a man who was carrying something. A pole maybe…or an axe. This was the end, he thought. He was doomed and could offer up no resistance or opinion of voice when the stranger suddenly grabbed hold of him under his arms, scooping him up from the ground and slinging him over his broad shoulders like the dead carcass of an animal shot for trophy. Hanging helplessly he was now resigned to his fate. He could barely focus the skin on the back of the man’s hands which seemed scaly, like that of a reptile’s and he smelled of ashes and damp earth. Dehydrated, exhausted and totally disorientated, the boy tried to speak but the only sound his mouth could form was incoherent gobbledygook.
Chapter 16
The boy was so tired he felt he could have slept for a month. He hadn’t even the strength to raise his eyelids but welcomed both the darkness and the silence. He was tucked up in between the cool sheets in his own sweet bed, of that he was convinced. How he’d got here and whom had fetched him remained arcane. But none of this abstruseness was troubling him. He didn’t care. He felt safe and sound and that was all that mattered right now. He just wanted to sleep… and sleep…
And then suddenly he sees the baldheaded man. The one with the kind, scarlet face standing behind the steaming tea urn on the serving counter. The boy’s lips are arid, cracked and peeling. His throat feels as dry as sandpaper. The man opens a bottle of ice-cold fizzy cola and hands it to him.
‘But I haven’t any money to pay for it,’ explains the boy, earnestly. The man smiles and gives him the drink free of charge.
He thanks the café proprietor and then sits down at one of the Formica tables. Gratefully, he quivers with delight sipping the cool, refreshing cola up through a red and white striped paper straw. Thousands of bubbles explode on his tongue and it tastes of America. He imagines Cowboys and Indians, drive-in movies and hot dogs, popcorn and Malborough cigarettes, elongated convertibles with real cow horns on the bonnets, Las Vegas and tictactoe fruit machines and Elvis Presley.
He believes he’s in the Hasty Tasty café, situated in Milton High Street next door to the undertakers and he very much hopes that Christopher Crispin is safely hidden away indoors out of the way of prying eyes where he cannot unwittingly give him away. The Beatles latest hit record ‘Hey Jude’ is playing on the Wurlitzer Jukebox.
An old tramp that frequents the village is seated on the opposite table. Rodger the dodger reminds him of a scarecrow with his thick, oily, bedraggled mop of hair and long Father Christmas beard. The tramp is wearing a great heavy coat which hangs from his ears to his ankles and on his feet, surprisingly, are a pair of highly polished brown English gentlemen’s brogues which the boy assumes he’s probably cadged off of some poor unsuspecting widow. The vagrant sleeps wherever he can. In shop doorways or dark alleyways or under the stars in pleasant weather. Sometimes, he’d even fallen unconscious whilst leaning up against the old Court Hall in a drunken stupor. Scratching at his flea bites, he coughs and splutters and curses his ailments for all to hear with particular reference to his poor old bunions.
The café owner, stretched to the limit of his patience, reprimands the old man and issues him a final verbal warning and this time he promises, he really means it!
Rodger the dodger bows his head, groans a little quieter, slurps up his tea which he has poured into a saucer and then munches noisily on his cold buttered toast.
A middle-aged woman with a blue rinse hairdo plays the one-armed bandit. She’s dressed smartly in a black and white dogtooth coat and a pair of white patent stilettos. She is also wearing a pair of light blue plastic framed spectacles with the side parts curled up like an Edwardian man’s moustaches. Protruding from the centre of the gaming machine is a sculptured brass head of a Native American Indian chief. Portraying a staunch expression, he fiercely guards the glittering prize on display beyond a small glass panel below. Five pounds worth of brand new shillings represents the jackpot to tempt the punter into parting with her own hard earnt shillings.
The boy remains watchful as the lady yanks down the handle which sets the three reels of chance spinning. The first reel clunks to a halt and the jackpot bars are shown. The second reel follows suit and again the jackpot bars have dropped into position. The blue rinse woman shrieks with excitement for she is on the verge of landing the Red Indian’s sparkling reward.
The boy looks on with as much anticipation. Alas, all of the gambling woman’s expectations are abruptly and most misfortunately shattered when the third and final set of jackpot bars slide tantalizingly by and is replaced by a worthless cherry displayed in a final klunkclick!
‘Oh fiddlesticks!’ cries the disappointed woman, ‘fiddlesticks and damnation!’ she adds, as she makes her hurried and premature exit.
He continues to observe the woman in disarray through the café’s large bay windows as she crosses the road and enters Barclay’s Bank, to replenish her lost shillings no doubt.
He finishes his drink and gets up to bid the kind proprietor farewell. After he closes the café door behind him, he remembers that he has forgotten his straw hat. But curiously, when he tries to regain entry, he discovers the door now to be locked. Even more bizarre, when peering back through the glass panel in the door, he can plainly see that the café is in darkness and there is nobody there. He also notices the sign hanging down on the inside that says CLOSED.
He proceeds along the high street somewhat puzzled before he then accidently bumps into shell-shocked Lonny. The old man is holding a grimy handkerchief against his jaw-locked open mouth which continuously dribbles saliva. Lon’s gaze is fixed permanently towards the open sky in search of German doodlebugs. From his austere bedsit room above the chip shop he roams to and fro the recreation ground where a Second World War siren stands before some disused, boarded up air raid shelters, constantly in a state of nervous readiness to escape Hitler’s bombs. The boy listens caringly to the old man’s superfluous apocalyptic warnings that nobody else nowadays ever pays any attention to. He feels sorry for the poor, wretched man and his suffering and so attempts to greet him a hearty good day but suddenly the forgotten hero is nowhere to be seen.
As the boy passes under the town’s clock it strikes twelve o’clock noon. Midday, but oddly enough there isn’t another pedestrian present and neither is there any traffic. All the shops are open and their billboards are on the pavements advertising their business. But where are the customers? On closer inspection he also notices that there isn’t anyone serving at the cash registers either. A thief could have himself an away day, stealing anything his heart so desired and nobody would have been any the wiser. The situation seems preposterous to the boy.
Where is everybody? He asks himself, a little worryingly for the high street poss
esses the forlorn air of a ghost town. Even on a Sunday there was usually someone around to talk to. But there is nobody at all. Not even a stray dog or a prowling cat. And where have all the birds gone?
Now he yearns only for the sanctuary of the boy’s dormitory. He must make haste and get back to Greenporch and so without any further hesitation he sprints off home as fast as he can. Shooting down Cross Lane by the old Court Hall, into Brewery Road past the Butts School and down on to the marsh road. He never lets up his furious pace until he reaches the garden gate of his faithful orphanage.
Suddenly his heart leaps up into his throat. Impeding the way is the man they call Blackberry Bill. He seems awfully angry and there are fresh blood stains around his mouth. He is yielding a sharp looking dagger which he menacingly sways to and fro as he edges towards the terrified boy.
The boy shuts his eyes in disgust for he feels his own slaughter is imminent. Without warning the ground beneath his feet begins to shake and crumble. Suddenly it implodes and the next thing he is aware of is lying face down on a heap of rubble, coughing acutely in a cloud of brown dust. After the powdery dirt settles, he begins to understand that he has by chance discovered the secret passageway, albeit by some very timely and miraculous intervention.
Surprised by the fact that he has suffered no ill effect through this extraordinary occurrence he interprets this strange situation as something divine. He peers down the shaft of the tunnel that is illuminated by burning candles fixed intermediately all along the route. Excited by the challenge it invites, he quickly brushes himself down and sets forth.
