by Lorna Gray
A pause, then a reluctant growl, “No. But he’s in here somewhere, I know it. They dived behind the trees just as I got the gun aimed and knowing that slippery little devil, I’ll have missed.”
The answering voice gave a sympathetic curse and then, puzzled; “They?”
There was a crack of dead wood under foot as Simon stepped cautiously closer. “They,” he confirmed gruffly. “Some young lad by the looks of him.”
Still that horrible rasping breath grated near my ear. He didn’t move; he seemed to have stopped and it took every ounce of my remaining self-control to suppress the flinch of apprehension that threatened to betray us. My cheek was stinging where it pressed tightly into the rough fabric of Matthew’s shoulder.
Then suddenly and with a great angry roar, Simon unleashed another two shots.
“CROFT! Show yourself!”
He fired wildly and at random into the silent trees. His guttural challenge was resoundingly brutal and it seemed for a moment that it was impossible for anything to be worse than this. But then, appallingly, I knew I was wrong. His voice dropped to a hoarse whisper:
“What was that? Did you see that?”
A long pause filled with that terrible breathing. And then, at last, a low triumphant growl:
“Got him…”
I almost didn’t manage to stop the panic that time. But somehow, through the living heat of his body and sheer power of thought, Matthew managed to urge me to stillness. With my forehead pressed into his shoulder and my eyes kept tightly shut, I forced my wavering mind to concentrate my ragged breathing, and waited.
It seemed an eternity. Every nerve stretched almost to breaking before I realised that the coarse echo of my breathing was fading and receding. It seemed impossible, a fantasy of terror, but the sound did indeed gradually become softer and more muffled as whatever he had seen led him away from us in an endless sweep, moving further and further until eventually they were both gone and we were left perfectly alone in the shocked woodland.
We waited a long time before Matthew released me enough to cautiously look out from behind the tree, although his arm never left my shoulders.
He turned back to me and gave a little smile but I didn’t notice; my gaze was fixed and unmoving on the deep gouge of fresh wood which gleamed whitely against the darker bark of the trunk barely inches from where his head had been. His eyes followed mine and instantly his body shifted to cover the mark but I stood as if transfixed, just staring, trembling and shivering uncontrollably.
“Look at me,” he urged gently. “Eleanor, look at me.”
I couldn’t move. For the first time in my life, I think I was very near breaking down completely. But then his finger touched my cheek and he lightly tilted my head until I had no choice but to do as he asked. His eyes were very dark and they broke through the blinding chaos in my mind to hold my gaze steady in determined reassurance.
“Hey.” His voice was very gentle. “You’re all right. You’re all right, my love.”
I blinked and it was like I was drawing breath for the first time in minutes. I felt a roaring in my ears as the blood rushed back to my limbs and I almost fell but his arm held me secure. I blinked again and managed a very weak smile.
“That’s my girl,” he said softly. “Do you think you can manage to move?”
I nodded slowly.
“Let’s get away from here, shall we?”
And he shifted his arm to hold me gently around the waist, and helped my clumsy limbs carry me up the slope, through the trees and on towards home.
Chapter 19
It took an age to reach the lower limits of my land. I think I was a terrible hindrance to him but he bore it all patiently as he nursed me across tumbling walls and swollen streams on our route to safety.
I was exhausted and very cold, and I felt that I had never appreciated the warmth of a wood fire as much I did that night when we finally opened the kitchen door onto the reassuring comfort of my peaceful home. Freddy was already in bed and while I suspected that he had fully intended to wait up for us, I was thankful for it; I desperately wanted to be allowed to just rest and sleep, although I feared that the rough sound of Simon’s heavy breathing would haunt me even there.
“Sit,” Matthew said, ushering me over to the settee. He knelt down and tugged at my sodden boots and I am afraid to say I just sat there like a lemon while he fussed around me, wrapping me in blankets and stoking up the fire.
“Drink,” he said firmly, thrusting a steaming cup into my frozen hands. I drank it automatically, uncaring and unthinking, and it was only when I finished the second cup that I finally came back to life sufficiently to make my brain formulate words into a sensible order.
“I’m sorry,” I eventually said. “You must think that I’m an idiot.”
“There are many things I think of you,” he replied gently, adding a smile, “but that is definitely not one of them.” He stretched his feet before the fire and looked so utterly relaxed that it seemed impossible to believe that we had just been within a hair’s breadth of total disaster. “Hungry?”
Even the idea of feeling anything so mundane as hunger was inconceivable after all that fear and exhaustion but just as I was about to decline, my stomach forced me to admit that actually, I was ravenous. “Has Freddy left us anything?”
Matthew climbed to his feet and went over to peer into the pot which stood by the side of the stove. “Some left. It’s not very hot though.”
“At the moment, I really couldn’t care less.”
We ate in silence. Conversation was impossible; to re-live the night’s events was a terrifying prospect and to chatter about anything else seemed nonsensical, but eventually the tasteless meal was finished and with it, grudging warmth began to creep back into my frozen limbs. My mind, however, was still entirely numb; I would probably have dropped my forgotten bowl as I slipped back into staring vacantly into the fire except that, with unvarying kindness, Matthew climbed to his feet once more and took the dish away to set it down upon the table.
When he came back, however, he surprised me by sitting next to me on the settee rather than on the armchair where he had been before. He stretched his arm out along the back of the chair in comfortable ease and it felt only natural that I should shuffle closer to lean my head on his shoulder. Oddly, there was a very brief moment of what seemed like caution in spite of this having evidently been his intention but then his arm gently came around me and, at long last, I felt myself begin to relax as the warmth of his body seeped slowly into mine.
I almost jumped when he spoke, the stubble of his chin brushing lightly against my hair. I had been fiddling absentmindedly with the fraying edge of the blanket, barely thinking of anything at all, and it was a shock to be forced back from comfortable oblivion by the unwelcome intrusion of memory and reality.
“How are you holding up?” he asked gently, preserving the dreamy haze after all.
I leaned a little closer, tucking my damp feet up under the blanket. “I’m fine, actually,” I admitted with perfect honestly. It was impossible to feel anything else when in the warm protection of his arm.
“I shouldn’t have let you come. I’m sorry.” His hand tightened momentarily where it rested above my elbow. “Are your feet thawing yet?”
“Getting there,” I said, wondering if the evening had almost been worth it if it meant I got to be so close to him without the usual accompaniment of awkwardness or impossible arguments. “Anyway, I asked to come. I don’t think I quite realised what would be involved.”
Suddenly and unavoidably the night’s events flashed back through my mind; the long wait and the listening, the smell of the timber and Simon’s rough voice as he spoke from the darkness. I sat up with a gasping breath and fixed him with a wide-eyed look that betrayed my very real fear, “You don’t think they’ll come after us, do you? Do you think that they’ll come here?”
His arm tightened as he gently pulled me back down into his embrace. “No, th
ey won’t,” he said firmly against my hair. His hand gave me a reassuring squeeze. “I didn’t get the impression that he recognised you; he thought you were a boy, do you remember? And I suspect they’ll be rather preoccupied with finding a new hiding place for whatever it was that they were guarding.” His cheek brushed lightly against my hair. It was extraordinarily comforting, and his voice had a lovely soft timbre to it that was warm and soothing as he added, “You were incredibly brave, my dear. I’ve seen hardened troops show less nerve than you.”
There was a pause and then he spoke again, this time in quite a different tone; “I know I promised I wouldn’t fling unreasonable demands at you, and I won’t. But I will just say this: I’m very proud of you. Do you know that?”
Suddenly shy, I gave something that was halfway between a nod and a shrug, but a smile could not help breaking the dry line of my lips.
Matthew seemed to be smiling himself and his hand tightened briefly in affirmation of his words on my arm. Then he gave a funny little sigh and allowed his head to fall back against the cushions, saying in a more regular tone of voice, “More than ever now, I refuse to believe they were simply waiting there just in case I turned up. I wish we had found a clue as to what it was.”
“I think you’ll find that it was me that thought they were hiding something, actually,” I said, with a trace of my usual self putting in a brief appearance.
He tutted. “You can say that as much as you like but it doesn’t change the fact that you’re wrong, I was definitely the one that came up with that idea. Ouch—” He laughed. “Langton was right, you have changed. You used to be such a delicate little thing. But don't worry; I like this version too.”
I could have prodded him again for that but that, still laughing, he deftly fielded the next blow and then, ignoring my token resistance, firmly returned my hand to the warm straightjacket of my blanket once more.
“So you were listening,” I said accusingly from within my cosy little bundle. “I thought you were. I could have fainted when Freddy took me literally and started telling the truth.”
“I suspect, my dear, that you’re not the fainting kind,” he said cheerfully, giving my thoroughly entrapped hand a condescending pat. “Anyway, it’s your own fault. Freddy has only learnt what you’ve taught him. Hoist by your own petard I believe is the appropriate saying.”
I grinned, relaxing happily into the curve of his arm. The fire flickered gently and, staring into its depths in a comfortable silence, I found my mind drifting wonderingly on to this surreal discovery of sudden ease. It seemed incredible now to think that only a week ago I had still been cursing his name, if I could be brought to mention him at all. Only seven days ago I had been struggling out into the snow to find him injured and raving, and tonight…Tonight, here I was nestling cosily into the turn of his neck while fantasising about the kiss he had stolen in the car earlier…
“My dear, you’re snoring,” he said gently, jerking me guiltily out a confused but pleasant dream. I hadn’t even realised that I had fallen asleep. “Time you were in bed, I think.”
For a wildly nervous moment I thought he was suggesting that he should follow me. But then my brain clicked out of that particular haze and I walked dreamily past him to the stairs. At the door I handed him the blanket and then, without really knowing what I was doing, I turned, stepped closer and in one breathless movement, reached up and kissed him lightly on the mouth. The touch was soft and very fleeting, but his lips were warm and, I thought, not entirely displeased.
When I stepped away he looked thoughtful, but it seemed to me as if some other expression was beginning to lighten the surprise behind his eyes.
Instantly flushing crimson, I flung a hoarse farewell at him and fled for the stairs. “Goodnight,” he whispered softly after me, and there was a smile in his voice.
Chapter 20
I woke to bright sunlight. Not actually that bright, as it was overcast and still vaguely misty, but what I mean is the bright light of a day well into the morning, and not the dull lightening of dawn that it ought to have been. With a cry of horror, I leapt out of bed and grabbed what clothes I could, and very nearly tripped headlong into the door over the pile of still damp clothes that I had sleepily discarded in the night.
Kicking them carelessly out of the way, I dashed down the stairs only to find when I got there that Freddy and a young boy were sitting at the table sipping hot milk with as much ease as if they did this every morning.
“Why didn’t you wake me?” I cried, trying to pull on my boots and only succeeding in hopping about crashing into things.
“Because he said to leave you,” Freddy said calmly, infuriatingly unconcerned. “He left you a note.”
I stopped hopping as it finally dawned on me that Matthew wasn’t there. The boy was staring at me as if I were a madwoman and, feeling rather flushed and more than a little flustered, I snatched up the paper and carried my boots over to the settee where I perched on an arm to read it.
To the lovely Miss Phillips,
When I knocked on your door this morning with a cup of tea, you were so completely dead to the world that I hadn’t got the heart to wake you. So Freddy and I have fed the ponies (even the fiery Miss Beechnut – I’ll let Freddy tell you about that one), and milked the goat.
Fearing your wrath if any harm should come to it, I’ve gone to retrieve the car if I can and I thought I’d take a look inside my house – see if I can work out what our friends from the farm were doing there. I’ll also see if our theory is correct and they’ve moved their “treasure”.
Unfortunately, this all means that I probably won’t see you before you go to the dance so I’ll wish you a good night now, and I promise not to be too bad tempered on your return.
M.
P.S. If Freddy has remembered my instructions he should be handing you a cup of tea about now.
I looked up to find Freddy hovering with a steaming cup in his hand. Sheepishly returning his grin, I took the tea and thanked him before giving the letter another read. I would have liked to have treasured it always as if it were a disclosure of his undying love, but the sensible person in me remembered that technically I did not know where he was and so instead I put it in the fire.
“Go on then,” I finally said. “How on earth did you manage to feed Beechnut?”
Freddy giggled smugly and squared his shoulders as he sat at the table in a remarkably passable imitation of Matthew’s straight posture, “It was brilliant! We hung the bucket on the end of a pole and dangled it near her nose until she sniffed it. Then he just dived in and slid the bucket through the door before she noticed.”
“And that actually worked?”
He giggled again at my incredulous tone. “I think she was so surprised that she didn’t remember to kill him until he had got away and then I think she just decided to make the best of it, seeing as the food was already there.” Then he added with an admirable burst of honesty, “It was all Matthew’s idea really, I was too scared.”
At the mention of Matthew’s name, I suddenly recollected the boy sitting very quietly at the table and felt an instant sharpening of concern for our carelessness. But Freddy saw my look and in an abruptly adult moment seemed to understand. “This is Charlie. His mum sent him down, said you’d asked him to come. He’s only been here for about half an hour …”
Good, so he wouldn’t have seen Matthew and it could be hoped that he would not remember the name enough to give us away. I smiled. “Good morning, Charlie, pleased to meet you.”
He shook my hand with all the gravitas of a boy trying very hard to be grown up and I suppressed another smile before adopting a more serious tone as befitted one adult speaking to another; “I’m glad you could come down today. You can help us turn out the ponies and then I’d like you to take Whisper around the fields on a little hack, Freddy will go with you on Fly. Once you’ve ridden, you can get started on the mucking out. Think you can manage all that?”
He nodded
mutely.
“Good. If your mother can spare you, and you do a good job, you can come and help out on every Saturday if you’d like to. I’ll pay you three shillings a day, how does that sound?”
Three shillings may not sound much but believe me when I say that to a boy of his age it was a princely sum only to be dreamed of. Suddenly his face cracked a bright smile, “Ooh, yes please!”
The telephone rang and for once I was able to drift over to answer it with casual cheerfulness. It felt like today was going to be a good day. “Hello?”
“Hi Ellie, it’s Lisa.”
“Lisa!” I exclaimed, realising to my shame that I had completely forgotten about her, “How is it going in the world of telephones?”
“Not too bad, thank you. I’m ringing about that number you asked for.”
“Yes?” I prompted eagerly, barely keeping the excitement out of my voice. “Did you manage to trace it?”
“No, not yet I’m afraid.”
“Oh,” I said, instantly deflated. Realising how rude this sounded, I hastily tried to cover my disappointed gloom and said lightly enough; “Never mind, thank you for trying though.”
I don’t think Lisa was convinced by my tone; she spoke with motherly reassurance. “Well don’t give up just yet. The one remaining girl that may have taken the call is in later today, so I’ll ask her just in case she remembers. Is it important?”
I was going to be polite and say no, but instead I said, “Actually it is rather. If she has any ideas I’d be really grateful to hear them.”
“Okay Ellie. I’ll see what I can do. Oops, better go – the boss is coming over. Byeee!”
In the end, I wasn’t entirely sure the day exactly satisfied all my ideas of a good one, but it did at least prove to be busy. Apparently, now that the weather was improving, all the other mothers in the neighbourhood were equally keen to send their children out for the day and at about midday a cluster of children arrived on my yard, demanding their long neglected riding lessons. This ought to have meant an afternoon spent barking instructions to confused children on bored ponies as they trudged or sometimes, inadvertently, careered around the school but with half my mind half a valley away, I couldn’t face it and so instead we invented gymkhana games. These probably didn’t quite satisfy the remit of informing the innocent mind of the child and moulding them into the prim little riders they were supposed to be, but it was fun and thankfully no one fell off or burst into tears, so in many respects the session could be counted a resounding success.
