The Cockatrice Boys

by Joan Aiken

  “But there’s one advantage,” said the mayor, Walter Herdman. “Granted they’re not handsome, but they do serve as a useful warning to folk not to loiter about the streets after sunset. And they save the expense of putting up municipal statues—all free, gratis and for nothing.” He considered, and added, “Free except for the loss of life, that’s to say. But any folk that’s ganning about in the streets after dark is most likely to be foolish young harum-scarums and have got only their selves to blame.”

  He said this to Colonel Clipspeak at the civic welcoming party, which was given for the crew of the Cockatrice Belle as soon as she had managed to creep across the reconstructed bridge over the River Tyne.

  Newcastle, like Lincoln, had not suffered so severely as Manchester, for the inhabitants had managed to maintain risky contacts with the continent by submarine and so they were not short of food, but the citizens were hungry for news of the south country, and very grateful too for the restoration of their bridge.

  Lieutenant Upfold, who was a chemist, had devised a gas made of mustard, ipecacuanha and daffodil juice, which had proved lethal to hordes of Kelpies when they climbed out of the Tyne and hindered the bridge-building crews. The Kelpies had been routed and their numbers greatly reduced while the work was in progress; but, unfortunately, just before the job was finished ingredients for the gas had run out, so it was almost certain that the Kelpies would soon begin to multiply again.

  “Daffodil juice is the difficulty,” said Upfold. “Now there isn’t any chance of restocking until next spring.”

  “Just think,” sighed the mayor, “of the days when we used to be able to import kiwi fruit and daffodil juice from New Zealand. We’re really cut off here; we might as well be at the North Pole. But at least now we’ll be able to get across the bridge to Gateshead. We are really obliged to you and your men, Colonel.”

  Sauna was allowed to go off on her nostalgic excursion with Lieutenant Upfold, but it proved a sad disappointment. Firstly, the handsome, busy streets of Newcastle where she had skipped happily along on shopping errands with her mother, or played hopscotch and relievo with friends, were now silent, empty and half overgrown with nettles and grass, lined with dead leaves and crumpled paper. Very few people were to be seen. But there were many ugly, menacing stone facsimiles of Trolls who had been overtaken by daylight at the end of their nightly marauding.

  Then, when they reached Dry Dock Street, where Sauna had been born and lived all her life until the plane crash, she found the little row of houses half demolished.

  “Looks like Basilisks have been on the rampage here,” said Upfold gloomily, staring about at the burnt woodwork and blackened bricks, broken windows, crumbling walls and scorched garden patches.

  “Oh! Our house!” wailed Sauna. “Half of it’s not there.”

  It was the one at the end of the row. The roof had fallen in and the interior, which could be seen through broken windows, was heaped high with rubble and masonry; the door hung jammed on its hinges; Sauna had hoped to get inside, but this was not possible.

  “I’m glad Mam and Dad can’t see it,” she said, gulping and wiping her eyes. “Mam used to keep it so nice! And Dad used to paint the door and windows each spring … and he grew leeks and sweetpeas in the garden. Oh, why did all this have to happen?” she asked Lieutenant Upfold.

  “I don’t know, ducky,” he answered her sadly. “Dr. Wren says it’s human wickedness coming to a head—like a boil that wants lancing—and that things have got to get worse before they can get better.”

  “I don’t see how they can get worse.” Sauna’s tone was despairing. She took a few steps into the tiny front garden, peering rather hopelessly at the muddle of broken bricks and smashed timbers, old bits of rusty iron, draggled cloth and fragments of china that were piled there, higgledy-piggledy.

  “I wish I could tidy it up a bit. I hate to see it like this.”

  “No time for that, dearie. We’d best be getting back to the Belle.”

  “Oh! What was that?”

  A snapping sound, followed by a rumble of falling stones, had come from inside the house.

  “Lieutenant! Some person’s in there!”

  “Most likely a rat. Or it could be Echidna or Hydra—come on, lovey, let’s get out of here. The colonel would have my teeth for tiddly-winks if I let you run into danger—so would Dr. Wren.”

  But as he caught her hand, almost pulling her away, Sauna cried out, “Wait! Just a moment!” Under a piece of dirty rag her eye had caught a gleam of red and blue—she pounced and dragged out a small bundle which she hastily tucked into her pocket as Upfold whisked her off along the deserted street.

  “We dassn’t take chances in these parts,” he apologized, glancing quickly around the ruined neighbourhood as they hurried along. “But what was that you picked up?”

  “Two things I was very fond of—I’ll show you back at the station.”

  When they were under cover, Sauna displayed her reclaimed treasure. It was a pair of tiny old-fashioned dolls, with China heads and cloth bodies, each of them not much longer than a hand-span. The female had a striped skirt and red crossover shawl, the male a black hat, white shirt, and black trousers, with a blue cravat.

  “To think I’ve come across them!” Sauna said, cradling them fondly. “I was telling Dr. Wren about them only yesterday.”

  “Well, I’m glad our trip wasn’t quite wasted,” Upfold said kindly. “They’ll be something to remind you of home—”

  “But I wonder who stuck this nasty great pin right through them? I never did that!”

  The pair of small dolls were skewered together by a kilt-pin, a kind of outsize safety-pin, which was red with rust, and pierced clean through their stomachs.

  “It’s stuck,” said Sauna, tugging at it as they crossed the station.

  “I expect it’s because the dolls are so damp. They are probably filled with sawdust. You’d better wait till you’ve dried them off, and then grease the pin a bit,” Upfold suggested.

  On the platform where the Cockatrice Belle had halted they were overtaken by Tom Flint, also returning, it seemed, from a trip round Newcastle. He was out of breath and gulping, as if he had run from some pursuer.

  “Are you all right?” Upfold asked him.

  “Who—me? Oh—yes—yes; there’s naught amiss with me. But this place is a bit of a dismal dump though, ain’t it? I see you found something pretty, though, love, didn’t you?” he added alertly, catching sight of the two little dolls in Sauna’s hand. He was about to say something more when a volley of snarls from Uli, who was being exercised up and down the platform by Dakin, caused him to change his mind and hurry off to his own end of the train.

  “I can’t fathom that fellow?” said Upfold, looking after Tom Flint. “Why doesn’t he take a ship home from Newcastle? Instead of coming all the way to Scotland with us?”

  “Maybe he has an aunt in Scotland he wants to visit,” panted Dakin. “Hey, Sauna! If you’ve done gadding about Newcastle, d’you want to run Uli for a bit? He’s just about worn me out.”

  “In just a minute. I want to put these in the galley to dry off.”

  “Well, don’t hurry yourself, Your Royal Highness!” Dakin called after her. He felt aggrieved because he had not been included on the excursion to Dry Dock Road.

  And when Sauna came back, which she did very speedily, and was greeted by Uli with loving enthusiasm as if she had been away for weeks, Dakin walked huffily away instead of staying to jog up and down the platform with her as he would normally have done.

  “What’s up, Dakin?” Sauna called, but he did not answer.

  He went off sulking to practise his drum, with a blanket spread over the skin to muffle the sound. Sauna looked after him frowning faintly, but then forgot his crossness in her wonder at the discovery of the two small dolls. But who in the world could have stuck that great rusty pin through them? And why? And when?

  She must be sure to show them to Dr. Wren. She thought th
ey would interest him very much.

  * * *

  The Cockatrice Belle set out on her way again at twilight in order to miss the Kelpies and Trolls. Extremely wild country lay ahead, the Borders and the Cheviot Hills; the people of Newcastle had warned the crew that they would find the track in very bad condition. A lot of repair work would need to be done before they reached Edinburgh and crossed the Forth to the Kingdom of Fife. The Forth Bridge was totally devastated—so it was said—and they would need to turn inland and make a crossing further west.

  They began by following the course of the Tyne valley, and then the Upper Tyne, proceeding rather slowly and shining watch-lights ahead up the track. The weather was windless, and very cold; snow lay on the high hills to either side of the railway, and the tracks themselves were furred with frost, although at present there was no snow in the valley.

  “But when she do come, she’ll be a one-er,” said Ensign-Driver Catchpole, shivering in his sheepskin boilersuit. “Ground’s so hard, snow’ll lie on her like a blanket, and there’s bound to be drifting. I wish we could make better speed—that I do.”

  Unfortunately, arriving at the wayside halt called Falstone, they discovered a big gap in the line.

  “The track’s been took clear away, sir,” Catchpole told the colonel. “For a matter of a quarter-mile ahead. Who could ’a done it, dear only knows. Nor what they’d want it for, in drodsome parts like these. It beats me altogether. Lucky we brought a bit o’ spare track with us—but it’ll take a while to lay.”

  “Well, there’s nothing for it but to start on the work at once,” sighed the colonel. “It is fortunate that this area seems to be fairly free from monsters. Set up the arc-lights and tell the plate-layers to get going.”

  The arc-lights on poles were fuelled by stellar power, and cast a brilliant radiance along the stretch of permanent way from which the tracks were missing. On either side rose steep heather-covered banks, and behind them were the black hills.

  “Funny thing,” said Bellswinger, staring along the empty stretch of road-bed. “I’ve seen tracks mangled and I’ve seen ’em chawed and bent and rusted and burned, but I’ve never seen ’em took away altogether. Maybe a Bandersnatch come by—I’ve heard they’ll swallow anything. Work as fast as you can, lads.”

  The men at work on the track needed no urging. The extreme cold was enough on its own to keep them dashing about. Mrs. Churt made gallons of blackberry tea; Dakin and Sauna ran in and out with trayloads of steaming mugs.

  “Uli doesn’t like it here,” said Sauna. “He’s nervous. Hear him growl.”

  “It was because Tom Flint walked by,” Dakin said snubbingly. “And because he doesn’t like the cold.”

  Sauna shrugged, and hurried off with hot drinks.

  It had been many years since there were station staff at Falstone Halt. The booking-hall stood deserted and dusty. Alongside the station building was a roomy, open-fronted storehouse or cart-shed. Its entrance faced away from the track on to the grass-grown station yard. None of the men at work on the track had been round to that side of the building, or had noticed that in its cover a light carriage and two horses were silently waiting.

  At a moment when all attention was focused on the repair work, two hooded men came darting out of the shed, snatched Sauna as she returned to the train with a trayload of empty mugs, dropped a heavy cloth over her head, hauled her into the carriage and whipped the horses into a gallop. Two minutes later they were out of sight, going up the northbound track towards the Cheviot Hills.

  The dog Uli set up a fusillade of barking. But he was tied to a rail on the observation platform.

  Dakin had witnessed the whole affair and started forwards to do something, help Sauna, prevent what was happening. But a flock of huge, hairy black birds descended on him, pecking, croaking, flapping their heavy wings in his face, clawing at his eyes and impeding his vision; when, scratched and bleeding, he had beaten them off with crossbow and Kelpie knife, it was too late; the station yard was empty.

  “Hey! Was that a carriage?” said Corporal Nark, arriving the moment after. He was followed by Catchpole who said, “I thought I heard horses’ hoofs?”

  Dakin got his breath back and wiped the blood from his eyes.

  “Sergeant!” he yelled. “Sergeant! Someone’s snatched Sauna! Grabbed her. In a carriage! Two fellows in masks—they ran off with her!”

  At first he was not believed.

  “Go on, lad, you’re imagining things. You’re in a proper miz-maze. It was having those ravens come down on you. Take it easy, now. A carriage? Horses? In this godforsaken spot? Is it likely I ask you?”

  But there were the hoof tracks, Sauna was not to be found anywhere and Uli was howling his head off.

  “Colonel’s going to be in a rare taking over this,” said Bellswinger at last, when all search proved vain; and he was right.

  “They have got to be followed. The child must be found and brought back,” said the colonel.

  “But, sir, how? It’d be no manner of use trying to follow them on foot. Not a horse-drawn carriage—they could do fifteen miles an hour. We’ll have to wait till the rail track’s repaired, and then make inquiries as we go—at Hawick and Melrose and Galashiels.”

  Gloomily the colonel at last agreed that they had no alternative.

  “I wouldn’t have had this happen for ten thousand pounds,” he said.

  At breakfast next morning, when the next section of the track had been completed and the Belle crept carefully on her way, it was discovered that Tom Flint, too, was missing from the train.

  “I could have told anybody not to trust him,” said Mrs. Churt, impatiently folding up her cross-stitch.

  Chapter six

  When Sauna woke she knew that a lot of time must have passed. Days, perhaps. Days and days, even. In some indefinable way, she felt older. Her head ached, her mouth tasted dry and queer and there was a sweet, strong, unpleasant smell in her nostrils, like the smell of the white powder that Auntie Floss used to sprinkle to keep away moths and mice. Somebody had been dreaming, a long, sad, complicated dream, and somebody had been crying bitterly over what had been said in the dream.…

  After much pondering she realized that the person who had been crying was herself. But I can’t remember who said what, she thought, only that it was someone I knew very, very well. And that it was heartbreakingly sad.

  Breathing was difficult, and seeing anything was out of the question, because her head was wrapped in thick cloth. And her hands were tied tightly together. And she felt sick, partly because of the heavy, stuffy cloth and its disgusting smell, partly because of the motion. Jog, jog, jiggle, joggle, joggle.

  I can’t be on the train, she thought. The train runs smoothly. You just feel it vibrate. Can I possibly be on a ship?

  What happened?

  Over and over, painfully, she sent her memory back. It was like sending a lazy child to school. She remembered the train slowing down. Because of the missing track. And Mrs. Churt making pints of blackberry tea. Then what? Memory, like the train, slowed down and came to a stop.

  Her hands fought against the cords that tied them. She arched her wrists and pulled, and bent her little fingers backwards to push and scrabble, poke and rub at the rope, trying to stretch and loosen it. She would have pushed with her thumbs, which were stronger, but they were too short to be any use and, besides, they bent inwards not outwards. But slowly, slowly, she did begin to feel the cords give a little. Sauna’s fingers and wrists were very strong from all the chopping and shredding she had done in the galley with Mrs. Churt, all the grinding and churning, the grating and kneading, and pounding of dough.

  She worked away at the cords. It was all she could do.

  But still it was a slow and discouraging business. When she grew tired, she tried to push the cloth away from her face with her tied hands. That, too, was a painfully unrewarding job. But she was at last successful in drawing in a sniff or two of air that did not reek quite so powe
rfully of moth- and mouse-powder. And a blink of grey light showed below the darkness.

  The snatched breath of sharp cold air made her more conscious of the rest of her body and its problems. First, her feet were freezing; they were completely numb and for a long time she wondered seriously if they had been cut or burned off. But her thighs and knees were there, she could feel them. She was sitting uncomfortably on a broad, flat, hard seat, with her legs stuck out straight in front, leaning against a hard seat-back, probably made of wood. Her elbows were pressed against hard objects on each side. A cold draught was blowing on to her chest and shoulders.

  Slowly she became aware that she was listening to two voices conducting a kind of dialogue. She was unable to grasp what they said, for they spoke in some unknown language. One spoke much more than the other—an urgent, obstreperous, pleading gabble, on and on and on, like a kitten mewing or a baby crying to be fed.

  From time to time, not very often, the second voice would reply with one cold drawling statement on a high note, like the clang of a ship’s bell, or the cry of a seabird.

  Then the other would start pleading again, gabble-gabble-gabble-gabble. Babble babble.

  Can’t that one see it’s no use, thought Sauna. She was reminded of how, long ago, she used to go to church service on Sundays with Mam and Dad, and some Sundays, not very often, thank goodness, there would be something they called the Litany. She had never liked it; it made her feel unhappy inside, because it seemed to go on and on, asking and asking, and there never seemed to be any answer to all those pleading requests.