Cold Shoulder Road

by Joan Aiken

  “No, sir. The Admiral’s got ’em. Admiral Fishskin. He has them in his cave,” Arun said stolidly.

  There was a short silence. Is wished very much that she could see de la Twite’s face.

  Then he said reflectively, “Ah, yes. I think I have heard of him. Admiral Fishskin. A cousin, is he not, of our own esteemed Denzil Fishskin, the dental practitioner. And, I believe, a most excellent, worthy old gentleman. No doubt he will take the best possible care of the pictures. In his cave, you say? Ah – were there any portraits among the paintings, did you say?”

  Is could feel the leader’s thoughts hammering like knuckles on Arun’s mind. Let me in! Let me in!

  No, Arun, no! Don’t you let him in! Is silently urged.

  After a pause, Arun said, “No, there wasn’t.” Is sent him an urgent message, and he added slowly, “Not unless the portraits was fixed up so as to look like flowers.”

  “Ah, indeed. Now that is a very interesting notion,” said de la Twite thoughtfully. “But now, my dear lad, we must – must we not? – go in search of your deeply esteemed Mother. You, most naturally, wish to be reunited with her. And I . . . am intensely anxious to resume our friendship.”

  Arun said nothing.

  “So . . . all we have to do – I am sure – is put our heads together. And, without a shadow of doubt, we shall come up with the answer.”

  “The answer,” repeated Arun flatly.

  “Wind for music and seagulls for dancers!” exclaimed de la Twite, suddenly changing his tone to a high and fluting one as he broke into verse. “Soon or late, we’ll discover the answer! Ah hah! my boy, you didn’t know that I, too, am a poet! As well as being the Leader of the Silent Sect, I too, in my humble way, have a right to be considered a Creator. Not on the same level as your wonderful Mother (I do wonder where she is?) but still, an artist.” And he recited several more lines of verse. “What do you think of those, my boy?”

  “Very nice,” said Arun lamely.

  “But now, to our task. I understand, from various sources, that your Mother has been seen in the company of some female relative. Can you attest to that?”

  “Some say so. I dunno,” said Arun.

  “A female relative called – if I mistake not – Penelope Twite. Such an interesting, varied family, the Twites! I look forward with the liveliest pleasure to meeting another member of it.”

  Now, how the pize did he hear that? wondered Is.

  “Do you think it might be safe to conclude that your dear parent has gone to reside with this Miss Twite?”

  “As to that I can’t say,” said Arun.

  “So, all we have to do is discover the whereabouts of Miss Twite’s rural abode!” concluded the Leader in a voice of triumph. “And that – most likely – is something that you have at your fingers’ ends? Eh?”

  All the time, while he talked, Is could feel de la Twite’s thoughts, like plucking, prying fingers, teasing, twitching at the network of Arun’s mind, as if they meant to push their way to its extreme innermost core.

  No, Arun, no! Don’t let them in!

  Is sent her own thoughts whizzing like darts cross the beach. He means harm, I’m sure of that! Your Mum didn’t trust him. She thought he was the Devil’s boyo. Don’t you tell him anything.

  Anyhow you don’t know where Penny lives. Which is just as well.

  But Arun, plainly, was beginning to give way to this continuous, relentless pressure. His voice became drowsy, his thoughts were slowing down as if he were in a helpless drift towards sleep.

  “No . . .” he said, half-yawning. “No, I don’t know where Penny lives. But Is knows. Is used to live with Penny. Penny’s her sister.”

  “Is? Ah! Your cousin. Your companion? That shabby girl I saw outside the inn?”

  Great Scissors, mister! thought Is huffily. You’d look a mite shabby if you’d crawled through a cave on your stummick for seven hours.

  But the Leader was saying, “Let us go in search of her directly. We shall need a carriage, I presume, to travel to Miss Twite’s abode?” And Arun was answering, “My cousin will be in Mr Swannett’s house, sir,” – meek as a perishing choirboy, thought Is, enraged – so there was no time to be lost.

  Keeping low to the ground, Is darted away, screened by boats and piles of net, until she had put a safe distance between herself and Dominic de la Twite. Then she took her way back to the Swannett house, gloomily enough, and plumped down on a chair by Window, who was sorting through her and Arun’s ruined clothes.

  “They’re a-coming here,” said Is in thought-speech, in answer to Window’s look of query. “I wish we’d never come to Seagate. That big feller’s properly put the come-hither on Arun . . . got him hoisted and hog-tied.”

  “Oh, that is a terrible pity. Yes, I was afraid that would happen. The Leader has great mental power over people.”

  “What’ll we do? They’re a-going to ask me where my sister Penny’s ken is, in the woods. They believe that’s where Arun’s Mum might be hiding out with the Handsel kid. And maybe it is! What’ll I do? Where can I take them?”

  Mrs Swannett thought for a minute.

  “You could lead them astray? Does Arun know your sister’s house?”

  “’Tis only a barn. No, but he does know that it’s on Blackheath Edge. I’d have to take ’em that-a-way.”

  “How far?”

  “Matter o’ forty mile from here, I reckon. It’d take three or four hours in a chaise.”

  Window Swannett reflected.

  “I have a syrup made from poppies and belladonna that I gave to my Hiram when he had the fever; there’s a good half of the flask left. If you could get the Leader to drink that on the journey – in a flask of tansy tea, say – then, before you had reached the place, he’d be drowsy, you and your cousin could perhaps slip away from him and run off into the woods. It is all forest round there, is it not?”

  “Yes, for miles and miles.” Is felt a spark of hope light in her. “And if he was drowsy-like, maybe he’d loose his grab-hold on poor old Arun’s wits.”

  Mrs Swannett walked swiftly into the back kitchen.

  “I will put you up a few oatcakes and dried plums as well, for the journey,” her thought came back. “Then the flask of tansy tea will seem natural enough. But, mind! Do not you or your cousin touch any of it—”

  To their dismay, though, when a chaise drawn by two horses presently drew up outside the front door, and Dominic de la Twite jumped down from it, they saw there was a driver as well – a big, wooden-faced fellow with ginger hair.

  “Oh, mercy! That is Will Fobbing – the Leader’s bodyguard. I should have thought of that . . . I doubt there will not be enough cordial for two—”

  “Bodyguard? He has a bodyguard? What for, in Hengist’s name?”

  “Oh, there have been various threats against him – from the Merry Gentry, we are told – and from people of Seagate who resent the Silent Sect—”

  The front door burst open and the Leader strode in without troubling to knock. Arun, behind him, looked like a sleepwalker.

  “Where is Micah?” demanded de la Twite.

  Mrs Swannett made gestures as of wheels turning and pointed northward. She curtsyed politely as she did so, but Is, catching her thoughts, found them full of mutiny and dislike.

  “Oh. A pity. He could have come too and been of use. Never mind. You – girl – shift yourself. You must ride with us now to show where your sister lives.”

  His commanding eye rested on the air about a foot over Is’s head, as if she were not worth a direct look. Seems he don’t think much of females, excepting Arun’s Mum, thought Is, and had a warning thought-message from Window Swannett:

  “Watch out! The Leader is no fool! Keep your thoughts well away from his. And – make no mistake about this – he hated Ruth Twite.”

  Now Mrs Swannett was handing Is a parcel of food, neatly wrapped in brown paper, and a stone jug with a cork in it. “Provisions for your journey,” she mimed to de la Twite,
and he acknowledged the things with a gracious nod.

  “Thank you, that was well thought of.”

  “And these things were in your pocket – a penknife and some acorns and hazel-nuts and the silver coins,” Window told Arun, gently touching his arm. He took the things dazedly, not seeming to catch her thought-message. She gave him a look full of worry and concern.

  “How far to your sister’s?” The Leader asked Is, pushing her impatiently towards the waiting chaise.

  “Couldn’t reckon to get there afore sundown,” she answered shortly, climbing into the carriage. The only vacant seat was facing Arun and de la Twite, with her back to the driver. She sat down. De la Twite kept his hand on Arun’s neck in what seemed a friendly, fatherly gesture, but, Is guessed, was no such thing; it was to maintain total control over him.

  She kept trying, over and over, to make contact with Arun’s thought-stream, but could get nowhere near. He was locked away from her.

  But – as they drove away from the house – she had a sudden picture, painfully clear, of Window Swannett walking wearily back into her empty room, sitting down at the table, and bowing her head on to her folded arms in a terrible seizure of grief and loneliness.

  Now she hasn’t even got their clothes, thought Is.

  The chaise bowled briskly out of town.

  Chapter Four

  DOMINIC DE LA TWITE WAS A TALL, BULKY MAN, grey-haired, but with a smooth, youthfully rounded, high-coloured face. His hair, long, coarse, thick, and wavy, curled and swept about his head; a lock of it kept falling forward, which he constantly swept back. He wore no hat. There were deep dimples in his chin and cheeks, and when he smiled – which happened every time he spoke to Arun – his large round face sparkled with warmth and interest, two curved grooves flashed out on either side of the big, jutting nose, the eyes crinkled, and the nose itself appeared to tilt eagerly forward.

  And it’s all as big a sham as a tin sixpence, thought Is, coldly regarding him. Aunt Ruth was dead right in what she said about this cove; he’s as bent as they come.

  She remembered what the Admiral had said about de la Twite: “Impressive presence. Godlike—” pursing up his thin lips. “I would never choose a man with eyes that colour to be my first officer.”

  Though – thought Is fairly – I wouldn’t take the Admiral’s advice either, if I was buying a pony; not if he stood to gain by the sale. I reckon him and Dominic are a pair.

  When he was angry, the Leader did not scowl, but his face went curiously blank, as if a light had been blown out. This happened several times on the way out of Seagate, when the carriage passed a wall or stretch of fencing on which the word LOMAK had been written. Sometimes it was just MAK. Each time he noticed this inscription, de la Twite made Will Fobbing stop the horses, get out, and wipe off the offending letters.

  “What’s it mean, Mister – that word?” Is enquired, the third time this happened. “Why does it rile you? Is that somebody’s monacker? Who is Lomak?”

  The Leader glanced at Is coldly but did not deign to reply, except to say, “Girls should be seen, not heard.”

  “I ain’t a member of your sorbent Sect,” Is pointed out. “Nobody can’t stop me speaking.”

  “Then why did you put on our raiment?”

  “Mrs Swannett kindly give ’em to me and Arun ’cos ours was in shreds and her boys drownded.”

  And it was your fault they drownded, Is recalled. She glared at the Leader, who ignored her glare. It was then that Is noticed, under his seat, a gleam of something wrapped up in sacking. Something that looked uncommonly like pistols and pairs of handcuffs.

  “Hey! Arun! They’ve got duke-irons aboard! What kind of a havey-cavey start is this? What do they want famble-snickers for?”

  She poured out these messages to Arun, but he was not receiving anything she sent him.

  Arun had curled up against the Leader, fast asleep, like a cat; even the whites of his eyes had turned up, as those of cats do, when they are stretched out in really deep slumber.

  Dominic de la Twite gave Is a cold, sharp glance, and she wondered if he could be catching some restless movement, some kind of mental draught, from the thoughts she had been hurling at Arun. Better not chance it any more just now, she decided. Instead she turned and gazed out through the glass, thinking sadly how pleasant it would have been to ride through the country like this, travelling towards her sister Penny – if only she were certain that Penny would be there at the end of the journey, and – to be sure – if the carriage held different travelling companions.

  On either side, the fields of Kent rolled past. Sometimes there were orchards, coming into bud. Sometimes, marshy meadows. They struck into a straight Roman road and made better speed. Now the meadows were replaced by hop-fields, where men were striding to and fro on stilts, setting up the high spindly framework of poles and fine cords needed for the summer’s hop harvest.

  They passed a tiny hamlet, just two or three houses nestling among trees, about a quarter of a mile from the highway.

  WOMENSWOLD, said the sign pointing to it.

  Where have I heard that name lately? wondered Is, as the horses trotted on. Somebody spoke of it in the last day or two; now who? A place where something right odd happened; now what?

  As they drew away from the village and entered the forest, which lay very close by it, she remembered. It was Captain Podmore. A thirty-three-gun frigate had been blown inland by the gale and came to roost in a chestnut tree.

  As the memory returned, she had a far-distant glimpse of what might be the ship itself – something bulky and black, lodged in a huge tree, among a clump of other huge trees. She would have liked to rouse Arun and draw his attention to the interesting sight, but they had drawn past it before there was time to do so. And anyway, poor boy, let him sleep, she thought. Maybe it wasn’t the ship after all. Maybe somebody just took a fancy to build a house in a tree. Would be a fine way to keep out of wolves’ reach. Recalling various battles that she and Penny had fought to prevent wolves entering their forest dwelling, she drifted into a light sleep.

  When she woke she found that the hop-fields with their spiky poles had given way to dense forest on both sides – the great oak-woods of Kent. Mighty trees crowded close to the road. Mostly they were leafless and bare, still, but just the presence of the forest round her made Is feel at home and comfortable.

  After all, she thought, I know these parts well; it’d be a rare rum go if I couldn’t contrive to give these nikeys the slip . . . But Arun? How will I ever rouse him? What about Arun?

  She looked up from her considerings to see the Leader giving her a cold, assessing stare.

  After a few minutes, he asked, “Do you know your aunt Ruth Twite?”

  “Never met her,” Is told him promptly. And she added, “But she sounds a real nice lady. And clever, too.”

  “Your uncle Hosiah? Did you know him?”

  “Met him only the once.”

  Is did not mention that she had given her uncle Hosiah, on his death-bed, a promise to find her runaway cousin Arun and see him safe back to his sorrowing Mum; Dominic de la Twite certainly had no right to that piece of family information.

  Anyway – was Arun’s Mum still sorrowing?

  Arun continued to sleep; she had never known him sink into such a deep slumber. Maybe he was still tired out from their struggle through the cave last night, or maybe it was something to do with the Leader’s baneful presence.

  De la Twite went on with his catechism.

  “Did you see Ruth Twite’s pictures, girl?”

  “Sure did, Mister.” Since Arun had already told the story, there would be no point in concealment. “Arun and me shifted ’em all into the old Admiral’s cave. There he thought they’d be safe from neighbours.”

  “All of them?” said de la Twite. “The portraits as well?”

  “There wasn’t no portraits, Mister. Maybe,” Is added, consideringly, “the owd Admiral had took those already,” and got a very s
harp look from the Leader. This feller must certainly be acquainted with the Admiral, Is thought, if he lived right next door to the Twites in Cold Shoulder Road. For they was right matey with the old boy, Uncle Hose used to mend his brogans and play golf, and Aunt Ruth looked after his Missus. So . . . stands to reason this Mr Dominic musta been acquainted with him, or at least know him by sight.

  But the Admiral’s a pretty rum customer, a mighty rum customer; he’s tough and I reckon he’s sly. In fact – come to think – he and this Leader cove are two of a kind . . .

  “So – where is this cave?” asked de la Twite carelessly, “this cave of the Admiral’s?”

  Is decided to be economical with the truth.

  “Well, Mister, that I can’t rightly tell you. We was only there in the dark, see, a-stowing the pictures away. But it’s somewhere not too far from the Admiral’s house.”

  I reckon the Leader is just dying to get his paws on those pictures, she thought. Let him just try, that’s all. He’ll come up against Rosamund maybe, that’ll surprise him.

  Soon after this they passed a signpost pointing to Eltham. All this time the horses had been keeping up a very respectable pace. Sixteen-mile-an-hour tits they must be, thought Is.

  But we’re getting mighty close to home, now, she realised. Time I took a hand.

  Aloud she said, “How about a bite of prog, mister? Care for an oatcake or a dried plum? Arun! Stir your stumps, boy! How about a bite to eat? Or a sup of tansy tea?”

  Arun woke up drowsily and accepted a dried plum. His thoughts were still screened away from Is, she could not tell what was going through his mind, and she hoped he remembered that the tea was drugged. The Leader carelessly accepted an oatcake and a morsel of cheese.

  “How about the driver?” suggested Is. “Isn’t he peckish? Won’t he want summat?”

  She hoped that they might pull to a stop, for dusk was now beginning to creep through the trees. Once they came to a standstill, surely it would not be hard for her and Arun to give these men the slip and vanish from view. If only she could transmit her plan to Arun! But he was looking dazed and bewildered, hardly seemed to know where he was.