Joe noticed a flash of blue. A branch had been pulled back and tied to the one next to it with a blue thread. He untied it and showed it to Beckett.
“Strange. Have you ever seen the like?” asked Beckett.
“Never. It’s so strong.”
Beckett tried to snap it but he couldn’t, even though it was as fine as a hair. “You could wind up a mile of that and still hold the ball in one hand.”
A prickle bush had been chopped off at knee height; some person had definitely cut this trail, and that someone was ahead of them. They came to another deliberately tied-up branch, and another.
“It’s got to be the Solemn men,” Joe said. “That thread is totally scientific. And it must mean that at least some of the Solemn men are behind us. Brilliant!” said Joe.
“Except maybe the following Solemns have already passed here and just not bothered to untie the threads,” said Beckett.
“Oh. That’s true,” said Joe sadly. “I think my brain’s slowing down because I’m so hungry.” The delicious full-up feeling from the hot chocolate had long since worn off.
But at least the track was easy to follow and soon they were walking along the bank of the Golden River again. Late in the afternoon the trees thinned out and they came into a clearing. The sun was bright, but there was a cold wind scouring the valley. Joe shivered and crouched by the water’s edge for a drink. He didn’t immediately notice the booted foot that stuck out next to some crackerjack vine.
When he did, he nearly fell backwards into the river. He stood up quietly. There was another boot, and both boots were attached to legs, brown-knitted legs, and above that a brown-knitted jersey. And a head. It was one of the Solemn men. Asleep? Or dead?
Joe coughed loudly but the man didn’t stir.
He called, “Hello? Hello?” and looked around. Definitely no one else there. He held his breath and crept nearer. He’d never seen a dead person before. He touched the man’s hand. It was cold as snow.
Then the man groaned and Joe’s heart started thumping again.
“So you’re not dead, then? That’s good.” He squatted down. The man looked like the leader, Keith Skinner, though it was hard to tell as a lot of his face was covered in a new beard and moustache. His face was blue-tinged in the places that weren’t deeply tanned, like his eyelids, behind his ears and below the hair on his neck. His eyes opened—even the whites were blue.
Carrot landed on one of the man’s boots. “Dearie me.”
“Are you hurt? Where’s the rest of your team?”
“Nearly there,” Skinner mumbled through clenched teeth. “Steak for protein, iron, more hydrogen …”
Joe touched him on the arm. The man’s clothes were sopping wet. “Did you fall in the river? I think you’ve got hypothermia.”
There was a slasher lying near Keith Skinner’s rucksack. Inside the rucksack was a ball of the blue thread, a scarf, which Joe wrapped round Skinner’s head and ears, some chemical-looking jars and packages, a cup and a plate. No food, and no dry clothes.
Joe took off his own jacket and tucked it over Skinner. “Lucky for you the cavalry’s coming.”
“What have you found?” Beckett came down the river bank, bucket in one hand and a dead pigeon in the other. “It’s a Solemn! Is he by himself?”
“Seems to be.”
“He can’t be lost, surely?”
“Don’t know. He’s freezing.”
They quickly dragged dry wood into a pile and made a fire. When Keith Skinner’s lips were less blue, he whispered, “Food.”
“Can we spare anything?”
Beckett lowered the bucket. There were eight small eggs in it. “Pigeon’s eggs. He can have one, I suppose.”
Keith Skinner’s eyes were huge in his bony face. He grabbed an egg, broke it into his mouth and swallowed it raw.
CHAPTER TWENTY
THE SCUMBAG CRUMB-BAG
It wasn’t until they’d all finished eating their roast pigeon meat with scrambled pigeon eggs and rice that Keith Skinner deigned to talk.
The first thing Joe wanted to know was, “What happened to your magic clouds?”
Skinner scowled. “Rain.”
“And where’s the rest of your team?” asked Sal.
He jerked his head towards the mountains, looked round uneasily and didn’t say anything. He finished his cup of tea and held it out to Beckett for a refill.
Humphrey poked Skinner’s leg. “What happened to your friends? You got to tell.”
“Fever.”
“Fever?” Sal jumped up and lifted Humph further away from Skinner. “You mean they’re sick? Are you sick, too? I thought you were just starving.”
Skinner’s eyes flashed. “Gold fever. They found a fist-sized nugget. Then they lost it. But they found some evidence of ore in the river on the other side of Skinner’s Pass and they refused to continue.”
“Skinner’s Pass? I don’t think so,” said Beckett.
“They are suffering from an addiction,” Skinner sneered. It was clear he didn’t think much of such unscientific behaviour.
“But what about your magic clouds?” said Joe.
“The nebulism failed when we experienced precipitation. Plotkin’s fault. Bags were insufficiently waterproofed. Consequence was, we were forced to carry our provisions. In order to expedite our progress, I ordered my men to abandon some of the weight, and gave Sanchez responsibility for rearranging the loads. His decision-making was faulty and the outcome was an inadequately nutritious calorific supply.”
“Which I think is science talk for ‘the clouds got wet and stopped floating so they had to leave stuff behind and they didn’t take enough food’,” Sal explained to Humph.
Keith Skinner glared at her. “Then Buxton, my draftsman, failed to secure the seal on the map cylinder with the consequence that when I became briefly submerged crossing the River Keith, the contents were rendered indecipherable.”
Humph looked at Sal.
“The maps got wet and too soggy to read,” she translated.
“Then Cranshaw thought he found a streak. Started hunting. Plotkin found a nugget. Determined to stay there, do geological survey, mine gold.” He narrowed his eyes and glared at a point in the distance as if he could see his men there, and snarled bitterly as though they could hear him. “They considered the odds of success likely to be more profitable; without maps, there was no longer any possibility of winning anything but ‘first team back’ and we’d been so delayed they assumed other teams to be ahead of us. They promised they would follow me, so I went ahead to cut the trail. But it appears they were lying.”
Joe felt a bubble of excitement growing inside him. “You mean your team has stopped racing? We might be in the lead?”
“I doubt it,” Skinner snapped. “I observed that Sir Monty has abandoned many of his mechanical horses, but his men are experienced mountaineers and will have been making rapid advances, and Cody Cole’s Cowboys will undoubtedly be progressing at maximum velocity. Their horses are muscular and they have sufficient manpower to maintain a system of scouts. They never have to retrace their steps.” He spat on the ground. “The women’s team have abandoned the race, and Roger Rumpledown is more interested in the brandy that comprises the bulk of his supplies. No. Cody Cole will win. Or possibly Sir Monty.”
“We’ll see,” said Beckett. “Still three days to go.”
In the morning, Keith Skinner watched Beckett smother the fire and Sal tie the donkeys’ baskets on.
“Are you coming with us now?” asked Joe.
“Maybe,” said Skinner. He looked shifty.
“Stay there a minute,” said Joe. He went into a huddle with the others, except Humphrey who was practising somersaults.
“I don’t trust him,” said Sal.
“Whatever happens he mustn’t see you drawing, Francie,” Beckett said. “And keep tight hold of the maps.”
Francie nodded. Joe could see that she was worried. She didn’t trust Skinner any mo
re than Sal did.
They decided that Skinner should go ahead with Joe.
“It’s a trial,” Sal told him fiercely. “If you are any kind of trouble, we won’t share our food.”
With Skinner helping Joe cut the path, they travelled fast. Skinner said that he thought New Coalhaven was only a day or two away. And then they came to a bend in the river. Instead of going straight to the ocean, it turned to the east; if they stayed next to it, it could take them miles in the wrong direction.
“I don’t believe it—I thought we were so close!” Joe hurled a stone into the water.
He beckoned to Sal and Francie and spoke very quietly. “We should probably go over the hill there, not keep following the river. But I don’t know. And you can’t fly with him around, Francie.” He jerked his head towards Skinner. “I need to see where we’re going though. I’m going to climb up to that lookout.”
Sal nodded. “See if you can take him with you, then Francie can work on the maps.”
“I think I’ll go up there, by myself, and see how far we’ve got to go,” Joe announced, pointing up the hill to a rocky outcrop above the trees.
“I’ll come, too,” said Skinner, as Joe guessed he would.
“Come on then,” he said, trying to sound reluctant.
He exchanged a secret smile with Francie. Some people were so easy to trick.
It was hot work going up the hill, but Skinner kept up and in half an hour they were out in the open again and clambering over the last rocks to a brilliant 360-degree lookout.
Their journey was nearly over. There was the gleaming sea, and the haze of the chimneys of New Coalhaven. There were farmhouses in the distance, and what looked like a village. Civilisation! In the valley ahead, some of the forest had been cleared, and those white dots were surely sheep. Joe looked across the valley; there on the opposite ridge, not half a mile away, was a man on horseback, a man wearing a Stetson hat. Something flashed near the man’s face—sunlight on a lens. A uniscope, perhaps, directed straight at Joe and Skinner. Then the watcher turned his horse and galloped away towards a line of horses in the far distance. Cody Cole and his Cowboys must have rescued all their horses from the thieving Mountaineers. And they were behind the Santanders.
“He saw us, but we’re ahead by at least an hour, maybe two. Come on!” Joe leapt off the rock and down the hill, but Skinner didn’t follow. Joe yelled at him to hurry, but when he still didn’t appear, he climbed back up to the lookout, expecting to see Skinner holding a twisted ankle. But there was no sign of him. Then Joe saw a figure hurtling downhill on the other side of the spur, leaping over bushes and rocks, heading for the coast.
Joe cursed him as he ran down the hill.
“It’s not far to go,” he shouted to the others, “but you’ll never guess what that man did! He let us save his life and then he raced off the minute he saw a chance to get ahead.” He saw Sal’s face and stopped. “What is it?”
“He’s stolen the oats and the raisin jar, and today’s bread,” said Beckett.
“One pudding left,” Sal said. “He didn’t see that. We’ll just have to go as fast as we can tomorrow and beat him.”
“What a scumbag!” said Joe.
“What a crumb-bag!” said Humph.
They urged the donkeys on and didn’t stop until it was so dark they couldn’t see their feet.
There were only two more days to go.
*
Something woke Joe. He’d been dreaming of drumming hoof beats. It was still dark, but there was a glow from the fire and the first light of very early morning. As he was trying to get comfortable he noticed that the shape that should have been next to him wasn’t there. No Humphrey? Probably cuddled up with Francie. He was nearly asleep again when something in his brain made him sit up and squint at the other sleeping-bag bumps. Humphrey wasn’t cuddled up with Francie. Nor with Sal, nor with Beckett.
Peeing? He called out softly and when there was no answer he wriggled out of his sleeping bag. He crept round the designated pee bush—no Humph. Over to where the donkeys were sleeping—no Humph.
“Humph? Humphrey? Where are you?” He was panicking now and called louder.
The others stumbled out of their sleeping bags.
“But where…?”
“He can’t have gone far.”
“Sleep-walking?”
Sleep-walking! Joe ran to the river; in the grey light it was pale stones with a channel of black water on the far side. Humph had gone to sleep in his red jersey. Joe scanned the stones for anything red, but there was no colour anywhere.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
DESPERATION AND DESPAIR
“Humph?” Joe called. “Humph!”
They blundered about in the dark, calling in voices that became more and more desperate. Sal lit the lantern and crawled under bushes while Beckett searched the track to the river.
Joe found a candle stub. “Are you hiding? Come out, this isn’t funny.” But he knew Humph wasn’t hiding—he liked his sleep too much. The blood was thumping in his ears so loudly that he could barely hear his own voice screaming. “Humph! Humphrey?”
This was the worst fear of all.
Francie was scouring the edge of the clearing, bending, peering, feeling into dark spaces, when she straightened up and beckoned Joe urgently. She took his candle and showed him a patch of trampled grass. Had they done that? Sal ran over and held up the lantern. Past the trampled grass was some mud with the clear outline of a horseshoe impressed into it.
Beckett came running when Sal yelled. He took the lantern and peered at a branch. “A horse was tethered here. The bark’s been scraped off. And not long ago, because this dung’s still warm.”
“You mean—” Joe thought he was going to throw up.
“He’s been stolen,” said Sal, collapsing against a tree.
“Cody Cole,” Joe whispered, as if the Cowboy might be listening. “His scout saw me.”
“Follow the hoof prints, quick.” Beckett held the lantern up and Francie scouted for the next print and the next.
“If they hurt him …” Sal and Joe snatched up strong sticks as they ran.
They followed the trail to an open hillside. It was lighter here; the sun was rising. Which way had the horse gone? They ran in every direction but couldn’t find any marks on the short grass.
Sal’s eyes were huge and her voice was panicky. “He mustn’t get away!”
“Which way? Which way?”
Francie lay down and prepared to fly.
Low trees leaning into the hill; nowhere to hide a horse. Around the hill, up a little, round again, up. Where is he? Where is he? Sun rise. Bright light, long shadows. North first, where mist’s floating over fields, fences, farmhouses.
Red jersey. Red jersey. Looking for a red jersey. Red? No just a bush. Red? No—washing on a line. Red? No, a barn door.
Strange shapes on the eastern hills, Castles? Closer. Not castles. Giant chimneys. Huge, clanking wheels hanging from towers, and people walking to work. No horse, no rider, no red, no Humphrey.
Turn south and west. No buildings, just forest and open moorland on hilltops. Nothing moving except morning birds and a lonely goat.
But there! It’s the Cowboys, by a small lake. Loading their horses. Cody Cole, already in the saddle, and one, two, three, four—five other men. No Humphrey, and one man and one horse missing.
As soon as he saw Francie’s face, Joe knew it wasn’t good. She drew the Cowboys on their horses and a sketch-map that showed where they were, and which direction they were going in.
“Six. There’s a horse missing?”
Francie nodded and carried on drawing. She put the sun going down—and showed the horsemen in New Coalhaven.
“So Cody Cole will get to New Coalhaven tonight, and—” Sal broke off as Beckett ran towards them, shouting.
“Over there! I’ve found where the horse went into the trees.”
The signs were a little way into the forest. Some sna
pped-off twigs, a hoof print. Further on, some more dung. The trail was easy to follow until they came to a shallow stream where it seemed to vanish.
Francie said she’d fly again, even though she was trembling and had grey shadows around her eyes. She hadn’t flown twice in one day before.
“What happens if you don’t sleep after flying?” Joe had never felt so much worry piling in on him. “Promise you’ll come back and rest before you get too tired?”
She nodded. He made her come with him to their camp, drink some water and put her socks on. She really needed to eat but there was no food left, nothing. He cracked three pugnuts that he’d been saving in his pocket and gave them to her, and the last mouthful of Doctor Sopworth’s Restorative Tonic from Ma’s lotions and potions bag, then they went back to the open hillside.
“You’ll find him. I know you will.” He hugged her.
Round and round in widening cirles. Everything is green and brown and black shadow. Red? red? No red. Where are you, little Humph? Where?
And then—
And then he’s there.
That way. Down through the trees, this is hard. A hidden path. A horse, a cave, too dark to see properly. Humphrey?
Yes! Francie, Francie!
I’m here.
It’s a crack in the rock, a tiny space. The Cowboy’s sprawled asleep, boots sticking out of the entrance and his head on his arm. Behind him, Humph tied with a rope around wrists and ankles.
He can’t move.
But there’s a knife. Think a picture. Knife, Humph, knife! Under the loaf of bread on the Cowboy’s pack.
The Mapmakers' Race Page 14
