I see what Big Bobby is pointing at. Some of the books that usually sit in the miniature shelves are scattered all over the floor.
‘What’s going on, Bobby? Who could have done this?’
I don’t know, he writes, but it’s really creepy. His pen pauses for a moment, then he adds in a flurry, I might sound crazy, but I feel like something bad is happening in Dell Hollow.
I stand up, relieved that it’s not just me.
‘Yesterday the town library was closed when it’s usually open, then I saw Mr Arnold and Mr . . . wait, did you say Mr Canon’s shop and Mr Arnold’s butchery were coming unstuck?’
He nods.
‘That’s weird because they almost got into a fight.’
And the eagle, he writes.
‘And the brighter than bright shooting star I saw with Petal. And the new boy,’ I say. I don’t mention the silver beast. I feel like saying it out loud will bring it here, after me.
He writes again, Do you think all the weird stuff going on has to do with Raffi?
I’m quiet for a moment. ‘It does seem like a coincidence that everything’s happening just as he turns up,’ I say. I step away from the table. ‘If all this has to do with the new boy, I’m going to find out.’
How? Big Bobby mouths.
‘I’m going to spy on him.’
Raffi comes to school today in a pale blue loose-fitting shirt over grey trousers. He’s wearing sandals again. I’m wondering when Principal Poole will ask him to dress like the other boys.
He answers questions and joins in class activities and I discover that he can speak English well. I feel him always watching me though, especially when he thinks I’m not looking. But he doesn’t try to talk to me: he seems aloof, even wary. Or am I imagining it?
At lunchtime he’s invited to play soccer on a team against Harry Arnold, Macka and Chris. Raffi’s team wins easily now they have him on their side. Again he reminds me of a leopard as he moves swiftly and silently around the field. He seems to be everywhere at once: dribbling, kicking and passing.
Miss Cubby spends the rest of lunchtime catching him up on history and geography. When he’s with her he laughs a lot, which I never see him do with anyone else.
I find out that he lives with his grandfather by Green Lake, and decide to go there after school. I wish I was brave enough to go by myself, but I’m not. I ask Big Bobby, but he’s going to mend his paper town and make sure nothing else is being eaten. So I ask Petal.
‘It’s miles away and we’ve got homework,’ she says. ‘We can go on the weekend.’ She gives me a quizzical look. ‘Why Green Lake all of a sudden?’
‘I want to find out more about the new boy,’ I admit.
‘By spying on him? Why don’t you be normal and talk to him? You’ll probably find out much more that way.’
‘I don’t know . . . there’s something scary about him,’ I say.
‘You’ve got a crush,’ Petal says, giving me a playful nudge.
‘I have not!’ I say, feeling myself blush.
‘You have too. In which case, I will definitely help. Race you there!’ And she runs to get her bike.
Petal’s bike is pale blue with a wire basket attached to the handlebars. My bike is a hand-me-down from Jake. It’s a boy’s bike with a bar and no mudguards. I like that I can carry an extra person on the bar if I need to, and it goes much faster than Petal’s bike. For that reason she hates racing me, but she’s competitive so she’ll take any chance at a headstart.
As we ride the four miles to Green Lake, she stands up on the pedals, long legs pumping, to make her bike go faster. But I overtake her easily as we climb the steep dirt road. My legs are strong from walking the woods.
At the top of the hill I wait for her to catch up, then I ride no hands down towards the lake. I can see the blue shimmer of it like a mirage.
‘Show off!’ I hear her yell behind me.
The road is dead straight so I close my eyes. I love this feeling of total freedom with the wind brushing my face and whipping my hair. For a moment I forget my approaching birthday, my nightmares, the new boy, the beast in the woods.
We hide our bikes under some bushes and walk through the forest of white pines. Green Lake looks like a painting in the afternoon sun with its surface flecked in orange and gold. The scent of the pines makes me think of Grandpa Truegood. Once a day at his nursing home, they spray pine air freshener around the whole building. All they need to do is open the windows – but they’re worried some of the patients might climb out and go wandering, so the windows are always closed and locked.
We see a caravan in a small clearing beside the lake. It’s the colour of pale green lichen and has a rounded roof made from wooden shingles. Hanging in the window are colourful silk curtains that move as someone walks around inside. The smell of cooking wafts out through the open door. I wrinkle my nose. It’s pungent and spicy. So foreign.
A shadow moves in the doorway. I touch Petal’s arm and we crouch behind a bush. A man comes down the steps, hugging a basket. He’s about Grandpa Truegood’s age, and he’s wearing a small round embroidered hat on his head. Like Raffi, he has on a long white collarless shirt that hangs down to his thighs over loose brown trousers.
He tips whatever’s in the basket out onto a small wooden table and sits down. They look like stones collected from the lake. He holds one up to the light and begins working on it with a needle-like instrument. Then he rummages around in his basket and pulls out what looks like a cord made from plaited hair.
We hear the crackling of twigs and footsteps coming from the direction of Green Lake. Petal and I both tense.
Raffi comes out of the trees. But he’s not alone. By his side, like a well-trained dog, steps a leopard. I can’t believe it. It’s beautiful, with pale yellow fur and spots like black velvet. I glance at Petal with wide eyes, but she seems calm.
The leopard lies down underneath the caravan and pants softly. Raffi’s grandfather greets him in a language I don’t recognise. It sounds soft and lilting. I wish I knew what they were saying. I’m wondering if this leopard is the beast that’s terrorising my sleep and stalking the woods. But it couldn’t be. The beast in my nightmares is silver.
Raffi’s grandfather holds up what looks like a necklace. Raffi says a few words, smiles, and walks up the steps into the caravan.
Petal whispers. ‘Those spices are making my nose itch. I’m going to sneeze . . .’ She holds her nose.
‘Quick, let’s go,’ I whisper urgently. And we sneak off through the trees to our bikes.
The sun rides along beside us, winking through the trees as we head back to town.
‘I can’t believe he has a leopard for a pet,’ I say.
‘What leopard?’ says Petal.
‘The leopard that was with Raffi.’
Petal stops in the middle of the road. I stop too and look back at her. She stares at me as if I have some kind of disease. ‘There was no leopard, Ziggy. You are my best friend, but you are really scaring me.’
‘But it was as tame as Mystic. Surely you saw it?’
She snorts crossly. ‘Oh, I give up. I’m tired of your weirdness. This is going too far.’ She puts her feet on the pedals. ‘I just want the old Ziggy back.’ And she rides past me, looking dead ahead, her back straight and cross.
I follow slowly, walking my bike. Am I going crazy like Grandpa Truegood? Harry Arnold says Grandpa Truegood is mad and that it runs in our family. But I saw a leopard. I know I did.
I am tired of being different. How easy it would be if I were like all the other kids in Dell Hollow. I once said that to Grandpa Truegood and his face furrowed. ‘No, Ziggy. The Dell Hollow mould does not fit you. One day you may be called upon to do a great thing. You need to keep your eyes and mind open.’
As I’m about to throw my leg over my bike, a green dragonfly buzzes close to my face. At once the heaviness in my heart lifts.
‘Oh, hello,’ I say. ‘You are very beautiful.’
The bright green segments on its body reflect the colours of the rainbow. It follows me for a while as though it wants to keep me company. Then it buzzes off into the woods.
‘There’s a lot of talk around town about that new boy.’
It’s the first thing Momma says when I sit down to dinner.
For a moment I think someone must have told her I was spying on Raffi.
‘I don’t have anything to do with him, Momma,’ I say. I’m not going to tell her about how I fainted and how he is always watching me. And I’d already told her that a tree branch scratched my face. ‘What are they saying?’
‘They’re wondering why he and his grandfather would come to Dell Hollow. People are growing suspicious.’
I mash peas with my knife against my fork. What exactly are they suspicious of? I want to ask. But I know that there won’t be an answer.
‘People are beginning to lock their doors. I think we should do the same. You just never know with outsiders.’
‘We don’t have a key,’ I say, shocked she would even consider it.
‘I’ll have some cut,’ she says. ‘And I hear he dresses oddly and wears sandals to school.’
‘I wear pants instead of a dress, Momma,’ I say. ‘And nobody says anything about that.’ I can’t believe I’m defending Raffi, when he gives me the creeps. But I also can’t believe what she’s saying. She sounds just like everyone else in town.
‘That’s not the same,’ she says. ‘Dell Hollow is your home. You belong here. They don’t.’
What about Papa? Did he ever belong here? I want to say. But I don’t.
Momma’s attitude towards anything different was better when Papa was here. But now he’s gone it’s like she’s changing before my eyes.
We eat the rest of dinner in silence.
That night I stand at my bedroom window, looking out across the garden and into the woods.
And there it is again – two yellow eyes by the sycamore tree, staring at me.
I switch off my light and pull down the blinds.
Go away. Please, go away.
How I wish everything was like it used to be before my nightmares, before all these strange things started happening, before Raffi arrived. I want my beloved woods back.
But you can have them back.
I look around, startled. There’s nobody in the room but Mystic and me. I am going crazy. First, I see a leopard that was not there. And now I’m hearing voices.
The silver beast is your trouble, Ziggy, not the new boy. Trap the beast, get rid of it, and you will have no more nightmares. Everything will be back to how it was.
The voice is not coming from the room. It’s coming from inside me.
Go on, Ziggy. You will be free.
I shake my head. No, I can’t. I love animals . . .
All you have to do is get the trap from the shed. If you don’t stop it, it will come for you, and it will drown you. Remember, Ziggy, you are fighting for your life now. It is you or the beast.
The paws of the silver beast push me under. Its yellow eyes are wild. Claws rake my skin. Water gushes into my mouth.
I gasp for air.
‘You are mine now, Ziggy,’ the river sings.
When I wake up, hot and sweating, there is still an echo of that whispery voice in my head.
It’s you or the beast, says the voice. Remember your dream. The beast drowns you.
The voice has to be my subconscious trying to warn me of danger, but it doesn’t feel like me. It’s a taste that is all wrong, like ashes in my mouth.
I rise with the sun. The trap. It’s the only way, I decide. I am fighting for my life.
The grass is slick and shiny, covered with dew and patterned with silvery snail trails that all seem to lead to the sycamore tree.
A dragonfly glints bright emerald as the light catches it in flight. For a moment it looks familiar and I watch as it darts over the vegetable garden towards the shed.
A woodchuck ambles across my path. He lives under our house so he’s not scared of me. He’s fat and flat with short legs and two big front teeth. Momma would like to get rid of him because he eats the spring flowers she plants. But I always remind her that the woodland animals were here first. And she shrugs. The woodchuck is safe for another year.
But not the beast.
I squat down by the trunk of the sycamore tree and inspect the ground. There are large paw prints in the mud. And three huge claw marks down the tree.
Mystic is wary. All his senses are on the alert – ears pricked, nose sniffing the air, his tread soft and slow. He snuffles around the base and sneezes. Then he lifts his leg to cover the scent of the beast with his own urine. He does this several times.
I look back at the house, to my bedroom. There’s a clear view of my room, and at night with the light on it would be like a movie screen. I shiver at the thought. Then another horrifying thought comes to me – the beast could smash right through the glass and attack me.
The trap, Ziggy. Get the trap.
Yes, the trap, I say to the whispery voice inside me.
The blue paint on the walls of the garden shed has blistered. It’s peeling like sunburn. The small window beside the front door is overgrown with ivy and covered in spiderwebs.
I slide the metal bolt to the side and open the door. As I do, Mystic growls and I jump back. There, on the splintered doorframe, is a clump of long silver hairs.
At first I don’t want to touch it. Could it hold some kind of magic? I just stare at it for ages until Mystic puts his nose to it. Nothing happens so I pick it off the wood. It feels oily between my fingers like sheep’s wool. I bring it to my nose and the musky wild smell makes me shiver.
I open the door to the shed. I haven’t been in here since Papa left.
A wooden work table is pushed up against one wall. Tools of different kinds hang in neat rows above it. On a smaller table are cans of oil, turpentine and tins of paint. The ride-on lawnmower sits in the corner along with rakes, shovels, brooms, flowerpots and other stuff for the garden. A spider’s web, like a fine fishing net, stretches across the corner.
I’ve always known where the trap is – hanging on the wall beside the ivy-covered window – but I’ve never wanted to look at it. It can cut through bone with a snap of its jaws. It makes me shudder.
But now everything is different. Now I’m fighting for my life . . . mine and Mystic’s. If I can get the beast before my birthday, then it would be impossible for the beast to drown me.
I have no choice.
I take a deep breath and push from my mind all thoughts of how cruel a trap can be. Standing on tiptoe, I lift it off the wall. Jagged teeth run along both sides of the metal jaws that are now safely shut. It looks like a monster’s smile. There’s a spring lever and a tethering chain for attaching the trap to a stake or tree so that the captured animal can’t run off. Jake and Pete showed me how to use it. That was three years ago. I wonder if it still works. It looks pretty rusty.
‘Mystic, out,’ I say, pointing to the door. Traps are dangerous and temperamental things. Mystic leaves with his tail between his legs.
I step on the spring to open the jaws but they won’t budge. To set the trap you need to open the jaws wide so that they lie flat on the ground. I look around and see a can of oil. Perfect. I spray the hinges and all the moving parts with oil several times. Then I work the jaws back and forth until everything swings freely. I’m feeling kind of proud of myself. A little more oil and a little more movement and before long I have the jaws spread wide open like someone waiting for the dentist.
Now to test it.
With the end of a broomstick I press down on the small plate in the centre of the trap. The two jaws snap around the handle, splintering the wood.
When I step outside in the late afternoon, with the trap in my hands, a deathly silence stretches across the grass like witches’ fingers. It’s as if the woods know what I’m about to do.
Finding a firm spot b
etween the roots of the sycamore tree, I drive the metal stake in deep and attach the chain to the stake. The last thing I do is cover the trap with leaves and put one of my dirty T-shirts near it as a lure.
Papa built the tree house when I was only little. Back then I could stand, even stretch my arms above my head, without touching the roof. Now I’m nearly twelve I have to stoop, which gives me cramps in the neck. I feel like Alice down the rabbit hole. If only tree houses grew with their owners.
Momma doesn’t mind me sleeping in the tree house. I’ve been doing it since I was small. So after school, when I told her I wanted to sleep out, she wasn’t too happy, but she agreed. Lately, we’ve been moving around each other like strangers.
I tell Mystic to stay in my room, then, with a stash of food and the rope ladder safely hauled up onto the landing, I settle in for the night. Pale grey shadows dance and dart, dappling the ground where I hid the trap. I’m scared, really scared, and there’s a sick fluttery feeling in my stomach, but I try to focus on what I have to do. Momma’s patchwork quilt helps, the one she made for me when I was a toddler. It’s like having her warm arms around me again, like she used to do when I was little.
I wish Grandpa Truegood was here. I wish the restless feeling in my legs would go away. It’s like the beast is inside me, pacing up and down, not letting me be still.
I’m so tired but I don’t dare close my eyes, not even for a second, in case I fall asleep.
A stick cracks. I must have drifted off. I sit up, staring into the dark, my eyes wide with fear.
The trap snaps with a metallic clang.
A horrible scream fills the night.
As I cover my ears with my hands, a startled bird flutters through the window, hits the back wall and falls to the floor, stunned. I want to help it, but terror has paralysed me.
The tree house shakes as the beast pulls and jerks at the tethering chain that’s wedged between the roots. I hope it is the beast and not some other wild animal I’ve trapped.
The Beast of Hushing Wood Page 4
