Don't be silly, Elinor, she told herself as she made for the pale yellow building that was the police station. There's a storm coming, that's all. Not getting as superstitious as that man Basta, are you?
There were two officers in the small police station. They had hung their uniform jackets over their chairs. Despite the big fan whirring around under the ceiling, the air was so muggy it could have been bottled.
The younger of the two men, who was broad and snub-nosed like a pug dog, laughed at Elinor when she told her story, and asked whether she looked so red in the face, Perhaps, because she liked the local wine a little too much. Elinor would have tipped him off his chair if his companion hadn't calmed her down. The second officer was a tall, thin man with a melancholy expression and dark hair thinning above his fore head. "Stop that, " he told the other policeman. "At least let her finish her story. " He listened unmoved as Elinor told them about Capricorn's village and the Black Jackets, frowned when she started talking about fire-raising and dead roosters, and when she came to Meggie and the planned execution he raised his eyebrows. She said nothing, of course, about the book and just how the execution was to be carried out. Only two weeks ago she wouldn't have believed a word of it herself.
When she had finished, the tall man said nothing for a while. He rearranged the pencils on his desk, tidied some papers, and finally looked at her thoughtfully. "I've heard about that village before, " he said.
"Naturally, everyone's heard of it!" mocked the other officer. "The devil's village, the accursed village, even the snakes avoid it. The walls of the church are painted with blood and Black Jackets, who are really ghosts and carry fire in their pockets, haunt the streets. You only have to get near them and you go up in smoke – whoosh!" He raised his hands and clapped them above his head.
Elinor looked at him icily. His colleague smiled, but then rose with a sigh, laboriously put on his jacket, and signed to Elinor to follow him. "I'm going to take a look at this," he said over his shoulder.
"Might as well, if you've nothing better to do!" the other man called after him, laughing so uproariously that Elinor felt like going back to tip him off his chair after all. A little later she was in the passenger seat of a police car, and the road along which she had come was winding its way through the hills. Why on earth, she kept thinking, didn't I do this before? Everything will be all right now, everything. No one will be shot or executed, Meggie will get her father back, and Mortimer will be reunited with his daughter. Yes, everything will be all right, thanks to Elinor! She could have sung and danced (not that she was much of a dancer and she was sitting in a car). She had never in her life felt so pleased with herself. Now, who could say she didn't know how to cope with the real world?
The policeman beside her said nothing. He just kept his eyes on the road, taking bend after bend at a speed that made Elinor's heart beat painfully fast. Occasionally, he absentmindedly kneaded his right earlobe. He seemed to know the way and never hesitated when the road branched or passed any turning. Elinor could not help thinking how long it had taken her and Mo to search for the village. Suddenly, a disturbing thought came into her mind.
"There are quite a lot of them, " she said in an uncertain voice, just as they were taking another bend so fast they came alarmingly close to the abyss yawning on her left. "I mean, this Capricorn has a lot of men. And they're armed, even if they're not particularly good shots. Might it be a good idea to ask for reinforcements?" That was what people did in stupid films about cops and robbers – the police were always asking for reinforcements.
The policeman with her ran his hand through his sparse hair and nodded as if he had already thought of that. "Yes, of course, " he said, reaching for his radio. "Reinforcements won't hurt, but they'd better keep in the background. The first thing is to ask a few questions."
Over the radio, he asked for five men. Not many against Capricorn's Black Jackets, thought Elinor, but better than nothing, certainly better than a desperate father, an Arab boy, and an overweight book collector.
"There it is!" she said as Capricorn's village appeared in the distance, gray and insignificant looking amidst all the dark green.
"Yes, that's what I thought, " replied the policeman, after which he was silent again. When he just nodded to the guard in the parking lot Elinor simply refused to believe the worst. Only when they were standing in front of Capricorn, and he was handing her over like lost property being restored to its rightful owner, was she forced to admit to herself that nothing was going to turn out well after all. Everything was ruined now – and oh, how stupid she had been, how dreadfully stupid.
"She's spreading slander about you, " he heard the police man tell Capricorn, avoiding Elinor's eyes. "Something about child abduction. And there was talk of fire-raising…"
"All nonsense!" replied Capricorn, answering the unspoken question in a bored voice. "I love children – as long as they don't come too close to me. Children and business don't mix. "
The policeman nodded and looked unhappily at his hands. "And she said something about an execution…"
"Did she indeed?" Capricorn looked Elinor up and down as if amazed by such fantasies. "Well, as you know, I have no call for anything of that nature. People do as I say without my having to resort to such drastic measures."
"Of course, " murmured the policeman, nodding. "Of course. "
He couldn't wait to leave. As his rapid, clipped footsteps died away Cockerell, who had been sitting on the steps, laughed. "He has three small children, right? It ought to be compulsory for all policemen to have small children. That one was a pushover! Basta just had to stand outside the school twice. What about it – should we pay him another visit, to refresh his memory?"
Capricorn shook his head. "I don't think that will be necessary. Let's just think about what to do with our guest here. How should we deal with someone who tells such shocking lies about us?"
Elinor felt weak at the knees as he turned his colorless eyes on her. If Mortimer offered to read me into some book now, any book, she thought, I'd accept. I wouldn't even want to pick and choose.
Three or four black-clad men were standing behind her, so trying to run away was pointless. All you can do is submit to your fate with dignity, Elinor, she told herself. But reading about such a thing was much easier than doing it.
"The crypt or the sheds?" asked Cockerell, strolling up to her. The crypt, thought Elinor. Dustfinger said something about that. And it was nothing nice.
"The crypt? Why not? We have to dispose of her, or who might she bring here next?" Capricorn hid a yawn behind his hand. "Very well, we'll give the Shadow a little more work to do this evening. He'll like that."
Elinor wanted to say something – something bold and heroic – but her tongue wouldn't work. It just lay there in her mouth, numb. Cockerell had already hauled her as far as that ridiculous statue when Capricorn called him back.
"I quite forgot to ask her about Silvertongue!" he cried. "Ask her if she happens to know where he is at the moment."
"Well, come on, out with it!" growled Cockerell, seizing her by the nape of the neck as if to shake the answer out of her. "Where is he?"
Elinor tightened her lips. Quick, Elinor, quick, she told herself, think of a good answer. And suddenly her tongue was working again.
"Why ask me?" she said to Capricorn, who was still sitting in his chair as pale as if he had been left in the wash too long or the sun burning down out in the square had bleached him. "You should know! He's dead. Your men shot him – and the boy. " Look at him, Elinor, she thought. Look him straight in the face the way you used to look at your father when he caught you with the wrong book. A few tears would come in useful, too. Go on, just think of your books, all your burnt books! Think of last night, the fear, the despair – and if none of that works pinch yourself!
Capricorn was gazing at her thoughtfully.
"There!" Cockerell called to him. "I knew we'd hit him!"
Elinor was still looking at Caprico
rn, a blurred sight through the veil of her false tears.
"We'll see, " he said slowly. "My men are searching the hills for an escaped prisoner. I don't suppose you're going to tell me where they should look for the two bodies?"
"I buried them, and I'm certainly not saying where." Elinor felt a tear running down her nose. By all the letters of the alpha bet, Elinor, she told herself, there's a great actress lost in you!
"Buried them. Well, well. " Capricorn played with the rings on his left hand. He was wearing three at once, and he adjusted them, frowning, as if they had gotten out of line without his permission.
"That's why I went to the police, " said Elinor. "To avenge them. And my books. "
Cockerell laughed. "You didn't have to bury those books, right? They burned beautifully, like the very best firewood, and their pages – ah, they quivered like pale little fingers. " He raised his hands and imitated the movement. Elinor hit him in the face with all her might, and she was quite strong. Blood flowed from Cockerell's nose. He wiped it away with his hand and looked at it as if he were surprised to see something so red coming out of him. "Look at that!" he said, showing Capricorn his bloodstained fingers. "You wait, she'll give the Shadow more trouble than Basta."
When he led her away Elinor walked beside him with her head held high. Only when she saw the steep stairway disappearing into a bottomless black hole did her courage forsake her for a moment. The crypt, of course, now she remembered – the place where they put the condemned. That was what it smelled like, anyway, damp and moldy, just as one imagines the odor of death.
At first, Elinor couldn't believe her eyes when she saw Basta's wiry figure pressed up against the iron bars. She had thought she must have misheard Cockerell's last remark, but sure enough, there was Basta shut up in the cage like an animal, with all the fear and hopelessness of a trapped beast in his eyes. Even the sight of Elinor did not cheer him. He looked straight through her and Cockerell, as if they were two of the ghosts he feared so much.
"What's he doing here?" asked Elinor. "Have you taken to locking each other up now?"
Cockerell shrugged. "Should I tell her?" he asked Basta, who responded with nothing but the same glazed stare. "First he let Silvertongue escape, and now Dustfinger. That's a sure way to ruin your chances with the boss, even if you do think you're his personal pet. And, of course, it's been years since you managed to light a decent fire." He smiled maliciously at Basta.
Signora Loredan, it's time to think about making a will, Elinor told herself as Cockerell pushed her into the crypt. If Capricorn intends to kill his most faithful dog, he's certainly not going to stop short at you.
"Hey, you might look a bit more cheerful!" Cockerell told Basta as he fished a bunch of keys out of his jacket pocket. "You've got two women for company now!"
Basta pressed his forehead against the grating. "Haven't you caught the fire-eater yet?" he croaked. His voice sounded as if he had shouted himself hoarse.
"No, but the fat woman here says we did hit Silvertongue. Says he's dead as a doornail. Sounds like I winged him after all. Well, I have had plenty of practice on the cats."
Behind the door with the grating that Cockerell unlocked for her something moved. A woman was sitting there in the dark, leaning back against something that looked suspiciously like a stone coffin. Elinor could not see the woman's face, but then the figure straightened up.
"Company for you, Resa!" called Cockerell as he pushed Elinor through the open door. "You two can have a nice chat!" He was laughing uproariously as he trudged away. As for Elinor, she didn't know whether to laugh or cry. She would rather have seen her favorite niece again anywhere but here.
51. A NARROW ESCAPE
"I don't know what it is, " answered Fiver wretchedly. "There isn't any danger here, at this moment. But it's coming – it's coming. "
Richard Adams, Watership Down
Farid heard footsteps just as they were making the torches.
The torches had to be larger and more solid than those Dustfinger used in his shows, for they would have to burn a long time. Farid had already cut Silvertongue's hair with the knife Dustfinger had given him. It was short and bristly now, and at least that made Silvertongue look slightly different. Farid had also shown him the kind of earth he needed to rub on his face to darken his skin. No one must recognize them, not this time – but then he heard the footsteps.
And voices: One was speaking angrily, the other laughed and called out. But they were still too far away for him to make out the words.
Silvertongue picked up the torches, and Gwin snapped at Farid's fingers as the boy pushed him roughly into the back pack. "Where can we hide, Farid? Where?" whispered Silver tongue.
"I know a place." Farid threw the backpack over his shoulder and led Silvertongue over to the charred wall. He climbed over the blackened stones where there had once been a window, jumped down in the dry grass behind the wall, and crouched low. The metal cover he now pushed aside had buckled in the fire and was overgrown by alyssum. Its tiny white flowers rambled like snow over the opening. Farid had found the metal plate while he was exploring during the long hours he spent here with the silent and ever-reserved Dustfinger. He had jumped off the wall and noticed the hollow sound. Perhaps the space under it had originally been a store for perishable foodstuffs, but at least once before it had also been used as a hiding place.
Silvertongue recoiled when he touched the skeleton in the darkness. It looked small, scarcely big enough for an adult, and it lay there in the cramped, underground space quite peacefully, curled up as if it had lain down to sleep. Perhaps it was because it looked so peaceful that Farid was not afraid of it. If there was a ghost down here, he felt sure, it could be only a sad, pale creature, nothing to be frightened of.
There wasn't much space when Farid drew the metal cover across again. Silvertongue was tall, almost too tall to hide here, but it was reassuring to have him close, even if his heart was beating just as fast as Farid's own. The boy could feel every single beat, as they crouched there side by side, listening for sounds from above.
The voices were coming closer, but it was difficult to make them out, for the ground muffled them as if they came from another world. Once a foot stepped on the metal cover, and Farid dug his fingers into Silvertongue's arm and wouldn't let him go until all was quiet again overhead. It was a long time before they dared trust the silence, such a very long time that once or twice Farid turned his head because he imagined that the skeleton had moved.
When Silvertongue cautiously raised the metal cover and looked out it did seem as if they really had gone. Only the grasshoppers were chirping tirelessly, and a bird, startled, flew up from the charred wall.
Whoever it was had taken everything with them: the blankets, the sweater that Farid had curled up in at night like a snail going into its shell, even the bloodstained bandages that Silvertongue had tied around the boy's forehead the night they'd been shot at.
"Never mind, " said Silvertongue as they stood beside their cold fireplace. "We won't be needing our blankets tonight. " Then he ran his fingers through Farid's dark hair. "What would I do without you, master scout, rabbit-catcher, finder of hiding places?" he asked.
Farid stared at his bare toes and smiled.
52. A FRAGILE LITTLE THING
When she expressed a doubtful hope that Tinker Bell would be glad to see her, he said, "Who is Tinker Bell?"
"O Peter, " she said, shocked; but even when she explained he could not remember.
"There are such a lot of them, " he said. "I expect she is no more. "
I expect he was right, for fairies don't live long, but they are so little that a short time seems a good while to them.
J. M. Barrie, Peter Pan
Capricorn's men were looking for Dustfinger in the wrong place. He hadn't left the village. He hadn't even tried. Dustfinger was in Basta's house.
It was in an alley just behind Capricorn's yard, surrounded by empty houses inhabited only by cats an
d rats. Basta did not want neighbors. Indeed, he wanted no other company but Capricorn's. Dustfinger knew Basta would have slept on the threshold of Capricorn's room if he had been allowed to, but none of the men lived in the main house. They stood guard there, that was all. They ate in the church and slept in one or other of the many abandoned houses in the village; that was the rule and it could not be broken. Most of the men kept moving around, living in one house and going on to another when the roof began to leak. Only Basta had lived in the same place ever since they came to the village. Dustfinger suspected he had chosen that house because St. John's wort grew beside the door, and there is no other plant with such a reputation for keeping away evil – leaving aside the evil in Basta's own heart.
Like most of the buildings in the village the house was built of gray stone, with black-painted shutters that Basta usually kept closed and on which he had painted the signs he believed would keep bad luck away, just like the yellow flowers of St. John's wort. Sometimes Dustfinger thought Basta's constant fear of curses and sudden disaster probably arose from his terror of the darkness within himself, which made him assume that the rest of the world must be exactly the same.
Dustfinger had been lucky to make it as far as Basta's house. He had run into a whole crowd of Capricorn's men almost as soon as he stumbled out of the church. Of course they had recognized him instantly – Basta had long ago made that a certainty. But their surprise had given Dustfinger just enough time to disappear down one of the alleys. Fortunately, he knew every nook and cranny of this accursed village. He had meant to make for the parking area and go on into the hills, but then he'd thought of Basta's empty house. He had forced his way through holes in walls, crawled through cellars, and ducked down behind the parapets of balconies that were no longer used. When it came to hiding, even Gwin had nothing to teach Dustfinger. A strange sense of curiosity had always driven him to explore the hidden, forgotten corners of this and any other place, and all that knowledge had now come in useful.
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