I sat there thinking for a long time and then decided I was going to go get George myself.
When I got to the river I couldn’t find Mr. McKenzie’s canoe anywhere. I trudged up and down the banks, pushing through the bulrushes, until my shoes were soaked. He must’ve moved it and hidden it somewhere different. Back at number one O’Callaghan Street the men from the search parties were coming and going all the time, so there was no way I could get Clarence’s canoe without them seeing me. Then I remembered how Buddy kept a rowboat on the landing near the railroad bridge that him and Brenda used to go on picnics sometimes.
At first I thought I wouldn’t be able to shift it. It was made of heavy, varnished pine, with 3BBB painted in gold on the side. I heaved and heaved, until eventually I managed to turn it over. There were two frogs sitting underneath and, beside them, two oars.
I don’t know how long it took me to drag it to the water. It felt like it took forever. Every few minutes I had to stop and catch my breath and when I looked I’d still only be a couple of inches further on than the last time I checked. The line in the sand where I’d dragged it was like the beginning of a word I couldn’t spell – I didn’t know how I was going to get the pencil to the end of it. And it seemed like the sun was getting higher and higher and at any moment someone was going to walk past and see me.
The moment I got the bow into the water I heard a voice behind me: ‘Why are you stealing our boat, Eli?’
I turned around and found Billy sitting there, grinning, near the side of the old bridge. He must’ve been watching me for a while.
‘I’m not stealing it,’ I said.
‘It sure looks to me like you’re stealing it.’
‘I’m just borrowing it,’ I said. ‘I’m going to bring it back.’
‘Why are you stealing it?’
‘I’m not stealing it.’ It was getting later. It was getting close to lunch and since George went missing Nana said I had to be back for lunch at the right time. When I didn’t she came out to look for me.
‘I need it for fishing,’ I said. ‘I’ve got a new spot.’
‘Where’s your rod, then?’ Billy said. ‘Can’t go fishing without a rod. I’m going to tell my dad you’re stealing our boat.’ He looked real pleased with himself when he said that.
‘Please,’ I said. ‘Don’t tell him. I’m not stealing it. I’ll bring it right back. I promise.’
‘That’s our boat,’ he said, walking down to the bank and grabbing hold of the oarlock. ‘And you’re stealing it and I’m telling.’
I could hear the sound of one of Buddy’s planes taking off in the distance. I didn’t know what to do then – I felt like if I didn’t go get George right that second I’d never get the chance again – so I picked up one of the oars and whacked Billy on the shin with it. He gave a loud yelp and started hopping around, holding his leg.
‘You crazy fucking retard,’ he was shouting. ‘Now I’m definitely telling. About you stealing and you hitting me. My dad’s going to have you put in jail.’
I hit him on the other shin and he fell onto the ground and rolled up in a ball, clutching both knees close to his chest. He was trying to say something but there was only a kind of squealing noise coming out of his lips. Then I pushed the boat the rest of the way into the water and started rowing as fast as I could.
Out on the river the current carried me quickly downstream. The melt water had swelled it after the thaw and it was still running strong. After a while I hardly needed to use the oars at all, except for steering, and in a few minutes the town was behind me.
In some places dead trees and branches had got snagged in the middle of the current, and when I swerved to avoid them I could see the reeds and rushes unfolding themselves and getting their colour back after all the months frozen in the snow and ice, and below me, in the shallows, the long underwater weeds called mermaid’s hair because they looked like hair blowing in a breeze. It seemed like a long time since I’d first come this way with George. Sometimes the shore would seem familiar and then I’d look again and it wouldn’t. Sometimes I’d steer the boat in towards the bank, thinking I’d reached the spot, but it’d turn out to be just another bed of reeds and rushes and outcrops of rock; and then, in front of me, a bend in the river would appear and I’d think I recognized it from before. In the end I was lucky. I spotted a little piece of orange in the trees. George’s marker was still hanging from the branch he’d put it on.
Making my way over the outcrop of rock and into the woods, I kept expecting to see George. I reckoned he’d probably be out exploring or something. I called out his name a few times but there wasn’t any reply.
In the clearing it was still and quiet. The only sounds were the cawing of some ravens, hopping from branch to branch above me. Watching them I noticed how the clearing had been cut real carefully: it was only the smaller trees that’d been cleared – the taller ones, with the longest branches, had been left standing. You would’ve never been able to spot it from above. Someone had covered the whole mound with dead brush so it looked just the same as a pile of blowdown. If you didn’t know it was there you’d probably never have found it. When I went to check I found the bear trap still there and still set, with its teeth gone all rusty like old pine needles.
I called out George’s name and again there wasn’t any answer. There were no signs of anything anywhere. No footprints or nothing. The place where the door used to be was hidden beneath the brush and when I cleared it I found a big rock there instead. It was then I began thinking I’d made a mistake.
I checked a second time for signs, more closely this time. If there’d been footprints then somebody must’ve rubbed them or something because I couldn’t find them. Or not recent ones, anyhow. There were a few marks in the moss and pine needles but they could’ve been anything. If George was here he would’ve been stomping around everywhere. I would’ve seen something. I would’ve known. Sitting down on the moss I tried thinking hard, like one of George’s detectives, while the ravens kept up their cawing above me as if they reckoned I was too stupid to figure anything out. I felt mad at myself for being dumb and it got hard to breathe, like the cord was around my neck again. Nobody was here. Nobody had been here for a while. It didn’t make any sense to me. My thoughts were like the ravens’ calls – hoarse and ragged and teasing.
And then I had an idea.
If Mr. McKenzie was in his house then maybe George was tooMaybe he was just hiding him so he couldn’t go back to school or live at Gracie’s. It suddenly made sense. That was why Mr. McKenzie wasn’t here. That was why he’d built his fence so high and everything. To hide George. I got up then to go. I was going to tell Virgil and Gracie and everybody. I was going to tell them I’d figured it all out and I wouldn’t have to say about the underground place or nothing. I wouldn’t be breaking any promise. As I was leaving I stopped for a second to throw some pine cones at the ravens. ‘See,’ I shouted at them. I figured it. I figured it out on my own. They flew off pretty quick.
And it was then I heard it.
It was hardly anything. It was a tiny scratching, scrabbling noise, the same as a squirrel makes when it runs across a roof. If it hadn’t been so quiet in the clearing I would never have heard it. I listened for it again.
It was coming from behind me. Turning around, I began walking back towards the mound and could hear it clearer. Scratch, scratch, scrape, scrape. It was getting louder and more frantic. I followed it. It was coming from under the big rock.
‘George,’ I shouted.
It got louder and louder.
It took all my strength to move the rock. I wrapped my arms around it and pulled and pulled until the sweat was dripping into my eyes and I’d finally moved it clear of the wooden door beneath.
At first, after I’d opened the door, I could hardly see nothing on account of the sweat in my eyes, just
a blurry dark square beneath my feet. A draft of damp, musty air rose up and crept into my nostrils; it smelt stale and stinky like the inside of an old outhouse. And then a white, watery circle appeared in the dark square. I rubbed my sleeve over my eyes. There was George’s face, staring up at me. His eyes were wide, pink discs.
‘I heard you shouting,’ he whimpered. ‘But I thought you were dead. I thought everyone was dead. He left me here. He said everyone was dead and he left me down here. I couldn’t get out. I couldn’t get out.’
When he reached up to me from the steps I could see the blood on his fingernails from where he’d been scratching at the door.
Outside in the clearing George leaned against a tree for a while, blinking and taking quick, short gulps of breath, like he was tasting the air, like he didn’t trust it enough to take a long deep breath. He kept saying, ‘I couldn’t get out. I … couldn’t g … g … get out.’
But after a bit he managed to get enough air inside him and told me what’d happened.
He said his dad and him had set out early in the morning, when it was still dark, and almost as soon as they’d arrived his dad had said he had to go back to fetch the final batch of supplies. As he was leaving he told George that the end of the world might happen any moment now – it was imminent – and he was going to tell Gracie everything, including about how they’d prepared a safe place. He said he was going to bring her back with him so they could all live together again. He said she’d understand everything then, and why things had got difficult like they did. She’d be real pleased that George and him had been smart enough to have made preparations. But it was very important that George didn’t leave the bunker, not even for a second. He said there might be poison in the air. Fallout. He had a special mask to protect himself, but only the one, and if George breathed the poison then he’d probably get sick, so sick there’d be nothing they could do.
George said to begin with it was okay. He thought it’d only be a few hours. He waited and waited, reading some magazines and comics he’d brought with him, using the light of the flashlight. He’d wished he’d brought a watch then, because there wasn’t a clock in the bunker and after a while he didn’t know how much time had gone by. It felt like a lot but he didn’t know. He waited and waited. He fell asleep and when he woke up he didn’t know whether he’d been sleeping for hours or minutes or seconds. He tried counting the seconds, to keep track of how much time was going by, but that just made him fall asleep again and when he woke up it was worse. He didn’t even know if it was daytime or nighttime. It felt like he could have been waiting for an hour or ten hours or a hundred hours – he didn’t know anymore, he didn’t know what an hour felt like anymore.
And then his dad had come back. When the door opened he could see it was dark so he thought it was the next night or something. His dad never said how long he’d been gone for. Gracie wasn’t with him.
When George asked where she was Mr. McKenzie told him things were terrible out there. Everything had happened just like he’d said it would. The poison was falling from the sky and everybody in town had got sick with it. They wouldn’t make it, he said. From now on it was just them. ‘We have to concentrate on our own survival now,’ he told George.
‘But what about Mom?’ George asked.
‘Oh … she’s fine,’ Mr. McKenzie told him. ‘She’s just packing a few last things.’
‘But what about the poison?’
‘That’s not a problem. She’s got my mask.’
‘What about you?’
‘I found another one.’
‘Where is it?’
‘It’s outside. Look George, it’s vital we concentrate on the important things right now.’
Mr. McKenzie told George that the most important thing was that he didn’t go outside, not even for a second. The poison was falling everywhere. The only reason he’d come now was to check George hadn’t and warn him. He said he had to go straight back to town to collect Gracie. She’d probably be finished her packing any moment. And then he was gone.
The waiting started again, except it was much worse this time because the batteries in the flashlight died and he couldn’t find new ones because it was too dark – it was pitch black. He didn’t bother trying to count or nothing this time. When he was tired he slept and when he was hungry he fumbled around in the darkness until he found a can. He never knew what was inside the cans till he tasted it. His dad had left a bucket in the corner for him to do his business in and it started to smell real bad. Then he knocked it over in the darkness and it smelt even worse.
Inside the bunker it was damp and cold and once he started shivering he couldn’t stop. And he’d begun hearing things.
At first he thought they were voices calling for him. He thought he heard his dad. He thought he heard his mom. He called back and waited. And waited. Nothing happened. The voices went away. When they came back he listened more carefully. It was only sometimes they sounded like voices – other times they just sounded like owls or ravens or animals. He stopped calling back then and even when they did sound like voices he didn’t believe in them anymore.
It was around then that George decided he was going to go out, just for a second, just to peek, just to see. The poison didn’t seem as bad as the darkness and the shivering and the smell. He said the underground place felt like it was getting smaller and smaller around him, like it was shrinking – he felt like he could hardly move, he felt like he could hardly breathe. He’d wrap one of his T-shirts over his mouth just in case.
The door wouldn’t open. He pushed it again. It wouldn’t budge. George took a deep breath and sat down on the steps to think. What was wrong? Why wouldn’t the door open? What would an explorer do about a door that wouldn’t open? But the only thing he could think was, I must get it open. I must get it open. I can’t breathe. I can’t move. I can’t get out. He pushed and pushed until he didn’t have any strength left and then he started scraping and scratching at the door like an animal. He was scraping and scratching and outside he could hear the voices again and this time they sounded like me. But he knew it couldn’t be me. Because of the poison. Because of the fallout. And then the door had started opening and he’d taken a few steps back down. Then he saw me but for a second or two he didn’t believe it.
I told George that nothing had happened: it wasn’t the end of the world and there was no poison falling. Gracie and everyone was fine. The only thing that’d happened was him going missing and everyone looking for him.
‘How long?’ he asked. I looked at him. His eyes were still blinking in the light. They were pinker then I’d ever seen them. His skin and hair were as white as snow.
‘How many days?’ he said. ‘How many days have I been down there?’
‘This is the fourth,’ I said. ‘It’s Sunday.’
‘Where’s my dad?’
‘He’s at your house.’
George started looking around him then – at the trees and the ground and the sky – as if he’d only just noticed they were still there. He took a long, deep gulp of air.
‘He was lying,’ he said. ‘He lied to me.’
George and me were about halfway back to the boat when we spotted the canoe coming down the river. We ducked behind the outcrop of rock and watched it. I thought maybe it was one of the search parties. Or Buddy come to find his boat: Billy had seen me take it; he’d probably told everybody already.
‘It’s him,’ George whispered.
I looked again. It was Mr. McKenzie.
George crept slowly back from the outcrop, staying on his hands and knees.
‘Come on,’ he hissed.
‘Where you going?’ I asked.
‘We’ve got to get out of here,’ he said. His face was set hard in fright. ‘He’ll make me go back in there, Eli. He lied to me. He’ll make me go back and I won’t go. I wo
n’t.’
He’d made it to the edge of the trees and I followed him, staying low and keeping behind the outcrop.
‘Where should we go?’ I whispered.
‘I don’t care,’ George said. ‘Anywhere.’
When we were both in the cover of the trees we started running. We ran and we ran. We tripped over blowdown and rocks and roots. Branches hit our faces. But we never stopped. We ran and we ran until at last our breath ran out.
We were by the side of a creek that ran into a wide swamp. Following the creek, we came to a bunch of high cattails and pushed our way into them. It was like being in a cocoon or something. We waited there for a long time, getting our breath back, listening, not saying a word.
‘I don’t think he’s following us,’ George said at last.
‘He’d never find us in here,’ I said.
We waited some more, though, just to make sure.
‘Where do you think we are, then?’ I asked.
‘I don’t know,’ George said.
‘I reckon we’re lost.’
‘I think you’re right,’ George said.
And I could’ve sworn then I saw the ghost of a smile beginning to shape his lips. He peeked out of the reeds.
‘I’ve never been here before,’ he said. ‘Not ever.’
X Marks the Spot
‘There’s no need for that, you know,’ Buddy said from over the fence.
I was pulling up the rotten boards from the porch and piling them in the garden. I’d already taken out the old screens and bought some new ones.
‘There’s really no need. I never said anything about you not staying on at the Poplars. I never said anything about that, Eli. You’re welcome to stay on there. I don’t like this business any more than you do.’
‘I’m just fixing it up,’ I said. ‘It’s not so bad. It just needs some work.’
Eye Lake Page 15
