Little Exiles

by Robert Dinsdale

  Suddenly, there is a different sound in the darkness, a tread that is certainly not spiders or scorpions or lizards or snakes. He tenses. The spiders and snakes are fleeing, because this is a man in black, and even the scuttling creatures of the scrubland would run from Judah Reed.

  ‘Mr Reed,’ he says. ‘I’m … sorry.’

  He realizes he is only hoping that this is Judah Reed. Worse things happen to a boy alone in the woods than being staked out like some miserable animal. He thrashes from side to side, but he cannot see. He wants to know: is it Judah Reed, or is it somebody else?

  ‘I promise,’ he says. ‘I’ve learnt my lesson.’ He stops. ‘I’ve had my medicine.’

  It is true. If Judah Reed stepped out of the shadows now, he would follow him back to the Mission. He would drop his own trousers and climb on his knee and take as many rounds with a belt as the old man cared to give. He would do it gladly, not to be here when honoured guests descend on the woodland to spirit him away. If there are worse places than the Mission, he does not want to know them. He would not follow them there. Not for anyone. Not for Luca. Not for Peter and George. Not for his mother and sisters, who sent him here, deep into the woods.

  He knows, now, what lengths the Crusade will go to make you a good, dependable boy. It isn’t just hazings and beatings with sticks. They’ll crush you inside if they have to. They’ll sell you if they fail.

  The footsteps grow louder, somewhere on his right-hand side. He twists, can just about make out a shape, a different texture in the darkness.

  ‘Please,’ he breathes. ‘I won’t do it again.’ And then, for a reason he doesn’t quite know, ‘I won’t tell anyone. I swear I won’t.’

  ‘Shut up, Jon,’ comes a whispered voice. ‘Oh, damn it, Jon Heather. I knew it would be you. It’s been coming for a whole fucking year.’

  That voice — it’s Tommy … Tommy Crowe! Desperate to know for sure, Jon thrashes to his right, but the rope snaps taut and the pain whips all the way through his body.

  The shadow moves, slowly coming into view. Jon’s eyes, alive to the darkness, pick out his features. It’s Tommy Crowe, all right — but he stands at a distance, drops onto a jagged rock, running both hands viciously through his hair.

  ‘I watched them coming out. There was five of them, all fanning out in different directions. Knew it couldn’t be anything else. Had to be a runner. Tried to ignore it, but here you are, just bleating away like any old little boy. What in hell’s got into you? I thought you was one of the clever ones. I thought you were like me. Like you could make something out of … this …’

  Make something out of this? Like a boy could just roll over and take what’s given to him and be proud of it, when it wasn’t even his to begin with?

  ‘Tommy,’ he croaks. ‘Tommy, please …’ He flicks his body, gestures with the ropes as best he can.

  ‘You don’t get it, do you, Jack the lad? If I untie you, they’ll know you’ve been untied. Then they come looking. I’ve never taken a beating from them, Jon … and I don’t think I want to take it just because of you …’

  It isn’t just because of me, Jon thinks. It’s because of Luca. It’s because of every boy in that Mission. It’s because of you, Tommy Crowe.

  ‘Why did you even come out here, if you’re not going to help me?’

  Tommy Crowe is cornered. Softly, he says, ‘I didn’t want it to be you, Jon Heather. Should have been any one of those stupid boys in there, thick as sheep shit, just knuckling on until they can be out there laying railroads or shearing sheep or …’ He pauses, comes closer. ‘You can’t run, Jon.’

  ‘I’m not running!’ Jon screams. ‘I ran before, Tommy. I ran and I came back.’

  Tommy Crowe hesitates, one foot in the air. ‘When?’

  ‘When George got his beating,’ he writhes. ‘I came back for George.’

  Tommy barely remembers. It could be any of a hundred beatings the boys have received in the last twelve months.

  ‘They won’t come back for you until morning. Then they’ll bring some of the baddest boys, and they’ll help carry you back.’

  Tommy steps forward, bends down, muttering incessantly.

  Before his fingers touch the knot, he stops. ‘You’ve got to be back here before morning. And you’ve got to tie yourself up, best as you can, ’cause otherwise, they’re coming looking for Tommy Crowe. You got it?’

  The rope slackens around Jon’s ankles. There is a rush of feeling, and for a moment he thinks he might faint.

  ‘I got it, Tommy,’ he breathes.

  Tommy Crowe stands up, fiddles with the ropes behind Jon’s back until, at last, they come free. ‘I don’t care where you sleep tonight, Jon. Bunk with McAllister’s goats for all I care. But, if you’re not here at sun-up, acting like you stood the whole night through, sobbing how sorry you are for ever betraying the Children’s Crusade, I’ll tie you up myself.’

  With that, Tommy Crowe is gone, just another scuttling in the scrub.

  Jon remains for a moment, gathering breath, making certain he can stand. One hour, two hours, three hours, four — however long he has been here, it might already be too late.

  Peter careens around the landing, taking the stairs three at a time. He has gone only halfway when the foreman appears at the foot of the hall and starts to climb up. It’s too late to stop now. Peter ducks right, evading the foreman’s meaty grasp, and slides along the banister, landing in a heap of arms and legs below. By the time the foreman has swung around, he is back on his feet.

  His only thought is — Cormac Tate taught me how to drive, and the foreman doesn’t know it. Surprise, Peter. You can use that surprise — but first you’ll need keys. He darts past the room where the men are dining, bursting out of the ranch at the rear. From the fence, the horses he only recently shod eye him suspiciously.

  He freezes. He is looking straight into the eyes of the man in black.

  ‘Peter,’ he begins, a measured, fey voice. ‘We must speak about this.’

  Peter hurtles to the right, beating a path down the side of the station, scrub chickens squawking manically as he passes.

  ‘You can’t help little boys run away!’ the man in black calls. ‘You’re older than them, Peter. You have responsibilities.’

  He pounds into the front yards. One of these utes has to have the keys still sticking out of the ignition.

  There are three in a row, a fourth jacked up. Peter races to the first, cups a hand and peers through the window. No keys. He slides over the bonnet to reach the second — but still no keys. By the time he has reached the third, the foreman thunders at him from the veranda.

  Peter freezes. At the side of the station, the man in black appears again. He lifts a placatory hand at the foreman, but still the stupid bastard advances.

  ‘I asked you a question,’ he barks. ‘Did Cormac Tate put you up to this?’

  Peter hurtles to the other end of the ute, skirts around its engine. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ he cries. ‘I don’t even know where in hell Cormac Tate is.’

  ‘You’re going to come inside and talk about this, like a man.’

  Peter shakes his head. ‘I’ve been shovelling your shit for a year,’ he says. ‘You treat me like a man, and maybe I’ll talk to you like one …’

  He rushes at the third ute, climbs inside and slams the door. The foreman is almost upon him when he remembers to reach out and click the lock.

  He shunts into the driver’s seat, feels for keys in the ignition — but there is nothing there. Through the windshield, he sees the foreman rounding the cab. Quickly, he kicks the driver’s door open, slamming it into the bastard’s chest. When he reels backwards, Peter jumps out.

  He isn’t going to drive out of here. His eyes dart in every direction.

  Maybe he could ride.

  He has rarely ridden a horse, but if old Cormac can do it, it can’t be that hard. He is about to take off when a hand clamps around his shoulder. He turns and see
s the foreman bearing down.

  ‘I didn’t do a damn thing!’

  ‘Well then, you can talk to the priest like a good little lad.’

  He fights it, but the foreman is stronger. Legs kicking, he is dragged back across the yard.

  They are rising to the veranda when a thick voice bellows from the side of the building. Peter knows those tones well, though the words still sound impenetrable. With a sudden flourish, he rips his way out of the foreman’s grasp, takes a shoulder to the man in black and belts back towards the utes.

  At the edge of the station house, Booty draws his horse around. Wildly, he gesticulates, screaming at them in a language none understand.

  Between the utes, Peter looks back. Booty’s eyes fix on him, big and white — and, in that instant, he knows what he is saying. Run, boy, run! Fly, you fool!

  Peter vaults a low railing and thunders onto the dirt track, snagging his tucker bag on a post. When it rips open, all the little things he has collected go flying. He claws them back but picks up only one of them: the picture of Cormac Tate and Judah Reed, little boys of the Children’s Crusade.

  A hundred yards on, and he sees lights. He stops, dazzled. Another wagon is approaching, swinging from the main road to follow the station track. He hears footsteps behind him, Booty bellowing out — a flash of yellow in the corner of his eye.

  The approaching ute skids to a stop, slewing in the loose dust. The door flies open and light spills out.

  ‘Get in, kid!’ yells Cormac Tate.

  Before Peter can move, the engine revs, the ute backs sharply and pulls around. Dirt kicks up, swallowing Peter whole.

  He hurtles forward, dives into the cab. Grappling out to close the door, he feels something thudding into the back of the wagon. Looking back, he can see the foreman thundering down the track, with Booty somewhere behind. A face looms in the glass. He rears back, smashes his head into the windscreen — but it is only Dog.

  Cormac pounds his foot to the ground and the wagon takes off.

  ‘You OK, kid?’

  ‘What in hell’s going on?’ Peter snaps. ‘Where in hell were you?’

  ‘They sent one of their clerks to meet me,’ Cormac returns. His face flushed, he takes his eyes off the road and the wagon starts to veer. Peter thrusts a hand across and rights the wheel. ‘In those black robes, just like when we were mites. There was a copper with him. Your lad’s found out, Peter!’ he cries. ‘And he ratted us out. Told them we were helping him run off.’

  It doesn’t sound like Jon Heather. Jon Heather wouldn’t lie.

  ‘He told them what they wanted to hear, Pete.’

  Peter shakes his head. ‘We’ve got to go get him. Him and George.’

  ‘Are you listening to me, Pete?’ Cormac says. Something must be funny, because he lets out a deep, belly laugh. ‘We go poking around their little playschool, and do you know what happens to me? They got me numbered as a dirty old man, tempting kiddies away from their parents with bags of toffee …’

  ‘Then what?’ Peter cries. ‘Just leave him? He’s waiting for me! What if he knows about Rebekkah?’

  Cormac takes his foot from the accelerator, grinds the wagon to a slow rumble. ‘He’s found out, Pete. He isn’t waiting for anything. Only a strap across his bare backside.’ Cormac guides the wagon on. ‘He’s on his own, Pete. Same as you and me.’

  Jon Heather bursts into the camp, eyes blurring. Luca’s swag is strewn everywhere, like a ransacked house. Jon bites back the scream that comes to his throat; surely, the men in black haven’t been here too.

  Jon prowls the edge of the camp, kicking at the stray titbits he has brought Luca over the past weeks and months. He is about to send his foot flying at a heap between two skeletal scrubs, when he sees the bare feet sticking out of the bottom. He drops to his knees and drags back the ragged canvas. He shakes and shakes and, when he is so tired he thinks he can shake no more, Luca opens his eyes.

  ‘Luca,’ Jon breathes. ‘It’s time …’

  ‘Jonny, Jonny …’ Luca begins. Rolling eyes. The ghost of a smile. ‘I waited, just like you said. Are they coming for me?’

  He means Cormac Tate and his wagon, but Jon hears it differently. ‘They came for me, Luca. Judah Reed and men in black. So we’ve got to run.’

  ‘I can’t run, Jonny Jonny Jonny …’

  Jon is on his knees. ‘I know,’ he says, forcing his hands under the wild boy’s shoulders.

  It takes him an age to force Luca to stand. When, at last, he is draped over Jon’s shoulder, he turns, tries to gauge the direction and distance by familiar sights in the scrub. But even in the bright light of day, he wouldn’t be certain which way to go.

  There is only one way he can know how to reach the rendezvous. He fixes himself on the Mission, and starts to walk.

  He plods. He dares not lie Luca down, nor take any rest, for he pictures Peter and Cormac Tate waiting at the rendezvous, the world paling to dawn all around them. When he is weary, he swallows his weariness. When his shoulder burns, he does not let it burn. An interminable time later, he sees the thick scrub that runs around the Mission, turns to follow it around, until he hits the shadow wood that hides the dairy and the untilled fields. The vaults above are still the deepest black of night, but he has watched the sun rising countless times, and knows how suddenly dawn comes. He pushes on.

  Along the way, Luca lolls on his shoulder. Jon asks him questions, the same ones over and over again, anything to keep the boy talking. He starts stories — We Didn’t Mean to Go to Sea, the Mystery at Witchend — and leaves them hanging, so that Luca might parrot them back.

  At last, they stumble onto the bend in the track. He slumps down, careful to ease Luca to the ground. ‘They’ll be here,’ he promises. ‘Did you hear me?’ he asks. ‘I said they’ll be here!’

  Jon pats his face. It is clammy and cold.

  ‘All I ever wanted was to go home, Jonny Jonny Jonny … But these men, these men you’ve brought to get me, they won’t take me home, will they?’

  The question fells Jon. ‘They’ll take you to a doctor …’

  Even as he says the words, he falters. The question glimmers in Luca’s eyes: what then? If a doctor’s even any use, what happens to me after that?

  ‘I used to think I could run and run. I’d leave footprints behind me, but footprints the trackers couldn’t follow, things not even the bush men could see — because only little boys and girls could follow. Like breadcrumbs, Jonny … And there’d be a big damn procession, just like that picture in Judah Reed’s office.’ He stops. He wears that strange, bewitching smile again, and his head rolls. ‘Have you been in Judah Reed’s office, Jonny?’

  Jon nods. Of course he’s been there. He isn’t clever enough not to.

  ‘If I carry on running, Jonny, they’ll all follow me, every boy and girl, no matter how old or horrid they’ve grown … And everyone can go home. That’s the real Children’s Crusade. Everyone to follow me and grow up, big and strong, in England and Malta and London and Leeds, the boys they’re meant to be. I’m right, aren’t I?’ Jon nods, vigorously. ‘Everyone to be the boy they want to be, and not a single boy left behind …’

  He sits there, stars wheeling — and he knows, for certain now, that Peter and Cormac Tate have been here already, given him up for lost and gone, and disappeared.

  At his side, Luca’s eyes are closed.

  ‘Luca,’ he says, striking the boy’s face with as much ferocity as he dares. ‘Luca, wake up!’

  He bellows it as loudly as he can — but still Luca sleeps, his breath rattling.

  Jon stands up. Teetering, he looks once at the dirt road, and then at the stars. He puts an arm in the crook of Luca’s knees, tests his weight. He won’t be able to carry him far — but the Mission has made him stronger than he used to be. He’ll get there somehow.

  ‘I’m sorry, Luca,’ he whispers. ‘Don’t hate me.’ He turns around. There, over the low scrub, lies the shadow wood.

  One
yard, and then another. That is the way they came from England. Little steps can get you anywhere, even the worst places your mind can dredge up — so he takes the first one.

  Long past the midnight hour, George lies awake.

  Outside the window, there are footsteps. It is too late for boys to be visiting the latrines, so it can mean only one thing: a mess has been made. George studies the ceiling with more concentration. He doesn’t want to know.

  A hand reaches out, shakes him as if attempting to wake him up, but George keeps staring straight ahead.

  ‘I don’t care, Martin,’ he whispers. ‘Clean yourself up.’

  ‘It isn’t that, George!’ the little one snaps, most affronted. ‘Something’s happened.’

  Against his better judgement, George puffs his way out of bed. The rest of the boys are already awake. In the cloakroom, stinking of harsh white powder, they open the door a crack and peek out. Across the Mission, other doors are opening. Cottage mothers stand on verandas; boys press faces to windows; brave ones come out of their dormitories and stare.

  A boy is walking through the compound, brazen as if it was day. In his arms, another boy is folded, long and angular, wild hair hanging down. The boy walks tall, but each step is an enormous effort.

  ‘It’s that boy Jon Heather!’ says Martin.

  George is crying, but for the first time in his life he cries without sound. It is, indeed, Jon Heather. Jon Heather is, indeed, a very bad boy.

  He tries to wriggle back inside the dormitory, but the horde of little ones at his back won’t allow him. He stares. He wants to shout out. He wants a mother and a father and lots of brothers and sisters who’ll play with him every day and never once get cross.

  At first, it looks as if Jon Heather is heading for his own dormitory — but then he turns. The lights flare in the sandstone building where the men in black sleep. Jon sets his eyes on it and walks.

  When he is almost at the door, men in black appear from side entrances. Among them, George sees the man in black who looks over the bedwetters’ dormitory, plays them his guitar and brings them Coca-Cola. He shuffles behind the little ones, refusing to watch.