by Chloe Mayer
‘Let me see!’
But I wouldn’t let him touch me. The pain was in my nose, between my eyes, in my whole head. I couldn’t see for the pain.
I kept my hands held out in front of me, to make sure he wouldn’t touch my face.
I sensed rather than saw him moving around, changing his angle to get a look at my nose.
‘It’s not broken … Daniel? It’s not broken, yes? It only hurts. I’m sorry.’
‘Just a nosebleed?’ I asked incredulously. The pain was unbearable. ‘You hit me.’
‘No, I’m sorry. The tree – it was an accident. We were running so fast. I’m sorry. All is good, all is good – it’s not broken.’
But I didn’t want to run any more. I sat down, and the dry little leaves and twigs on the earthy floor dug into my thighs as my short trousers rode up. I tipped my head back, because I’d heard that’s what you were supposed to do to stop the blood. But it felt better to tip my head forward, over my crossed knees, and let the blood drain out onto the forest floor and wait for it to stop.
I felt a mean sense of satisfaction at the amount of blood dripping to the earth. That would show him, I thought.
And it did.
He held his warm hand on my back, just above the bag, as he bent over me.
‘I’m sorry.’
I said nothing. But tears now fell onto the leaves along with the drops of blood and I fought to stop them. Nobody likes a crybaby.
‘Sorry, Daniel,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry. I know it hurts like hell.’ He patted my back.
I sniffed, and wiped blood away from my lips. I stared at the back of my hand, smeared with red.
How had everything gone so wrong, so quickly? We’d only left the orchard about an hour ago.
Gently, I used my fingertips to touch my nose. The slightest pressure made me wince and brought tears to my eyes again, but Hansel was right. My nose felt normal. No bones poking out.
I shrugged the bag off my shoulders to rest for a moment. It was a relief to have the weight removed. It left behind a sweaty patch on my shirt – like the patch of a PoW – and the air was nice and cool on the wetness.
He moved over to a tree and leaned against it. I sniffed and stood up to face him.
He looked at me hard.
‘You can’t buy me a train ticket now,’ he said, eventually. ‘Your face …’
I gaped at him, hurt. That was all he cared about!
‘Sorry, Daniel,’ he said quickly. ‘Are you all right? I didn’t mean to hurt your nose.’
I nodded.
‘Can you continue?’
‘I can’t run so fast,’ I said. ‘Everything hurts.’ There was a bit of a wobble in my voice.
‘I know,’ he said, a bit too eagerly – he was pleased I hadn’t refused to carry on helping him. ‘We’ll go slower. We’ll go slower this time, yes? I promise.’
‘All right.’
‘All right then.’ He patted my back.
I tried to smile.
‘We just need to … we do need to hurry. Probably no one knows I’m gone yet, but this afternoon they will, and they will look for me. Do you understand?’
‘Yes; we have to run while we can.’
‘That’s right.’
I felt like crying again, but I picked up my bag and began to move again, past Hansel, ducking beneath the branch that had so brutally smashed my face. And a second or two later, I heard him following me. Gradually, I picked up the pace, but I didn’t run, because I no longer felt like it. I just walked as quickly as I could.
He must have been impatient, but he didn’t try to rush me any more. We stopped a couple of times to have a drink of water. If he noticed I’d already drunk from the canteen, he didn’t say anything.
After a while, we heard the river. We were not far from the spot where I’d seen the Troll watching the boys playing.
A breeze ruffled my shirt and I shuddered. I didn’t want to cross the river at that spot, so I led us further on. I spotted a fallen tree that we could use as a bridge to avoid getting wet.
We made it across then scrambled down the bank and filled the flask by letting the river flow into its open mouth. The water looked clean enough, but it wasn’t the same as tap water so I thought I’d try not to drink any more until I was back home again.
My thoughts began to turn towards saying goodbye to Hansel. I was feeling more and more relieved that I hadn’t mentioned my plans for a hideout camp to him. I was glad I was leaving him at the train station; this had been enough for me.
We kept on for what felt like hours, and the afternoon began to drag. We were deep in the woods by now and I was tired. I hadn’t thought to bring any food for myself but I didn’t like to ask if we could stop for a snack. My whole body felt heavy and it was an effort to keep moving, but he showed no sign of slowing down.
Sweat mingled with the dried blood on my face and stung my eyes.
Hansel kept switching between manly ‘you can do its’ to friendly ‘come ons’ to sharp digs like ‘hurry, hurry’, that did nothing to hide his frustration at being stuck with me. He wasn’t making me feel like his brother-prince; he was making me feel like a little boy who was slowing him down. Even though I was supposed to be the one in charge.
‘How much further until Densford Station?’ he asked.
‘Er,’ I looked around and realised I had absolutely no idea where we were any more. ‘Not much further.’
It had been a terrible mistake to leave the path, but I was too frightened to tell him I’d got us both lost. I had never been this far into the forest before – why would I? For all I knew we were walking in circles; everything certainly looked the same. I hoped we’d stumble back upon a trail or path so I could pretend everything was going perfectly to plan.
The problem was, ever since having my silly idea about a hideout camp, I hadn’t really thought about how to lead him out of the woods.
Dreading his discovery of my confusion, I kept my lips sealed and stopped begging for rest stops and toilet breaks. I hadn’t a clue whether we were anywhere near Densford or not, and I began to worry he’d ask to check the maps; he’d know how to read them and might discover I’d got it all wrong. He’d be so angry. No, the best thing I could do was to keep acting with confidence and hopefully we’d end up in the right place eventually.
I desperately scanned all the stories I knew for help. Children were always getting lost in the woods. Hansel and Gretel had left a trail of breadcrumbs – but that was so they could find their way back to where they’d come from (which didn’t work anyway).
Then I remembered.
The greatest story of all.
The wise men found the baby Jesus by following a star and the sun was a star, so as long as I kept that directly in front of us, we must be following a straight path at least, and if we kept walking in a straight line for long enough that was bound to take us somewhere. Hansel had no idea, but now all we were doing was following the sun.
That was my plan and for a good part of the afternoon we followed it.
I began to regret my decision to help Hansel escape. To think I’d been so excited about this just last night! I couldn’t sleep with excitement as I watched the moon gradually glide across the window, shining on me through the magnolia tree.
With a sickening lurch in my gut I suddenly thought: hang on a minute, no, that can’t be right! Because the moon was moving … and the sun is always moving too, isn’t it? We’re following a moving target. We really are walking in circles.
Desperately, I tried to think of a way to rescue the situation. Hansel was getting impatient and kept asking me where we were, and how soon we’d be out of the woods.
Surely he was going to suspect I didn’t know as much as I’d made out. I was just pretending. I’d been pretending the whole time. That was the whole point of the game. From the day we met. It was all just a game.
I felt a bit angry. What sort of adult would believe a small boy?
The a
nswer popped into my head the same moment the question was formed: a desperate one.
Why, though? Why was he so desperate to escape? His life was wonderful in Bambury – working in the sunshine, and with my mother and me for friends.
It was when I heard the sound of running water up quite far ahead that I began to run.
‘Ah, yes,’ I called behind me, ‘the river does a big loop so this is, er, very good! We’re nearly there!’
In truth, I was trying to get as far ahead of him as possible in case we had somehow come out at the part of the river we’d been at earlier, where we’d used the tree as a bridge. Then the game really would be up. He’d recognise the place and know I’d been leading him nowhere all this time.
I charged forward, crashing through the forest, to find the source of the running water before he did.
‘Stay back!’ I shouted. ‘I’ll just make sure it’s safe.’
He was quite far behind me – my sudden burst of speed must have taken him by surprise.
But he didn’t stay where he was; he was running too. He was following me. I wasn’t sure why; my shouted warning about possible danger was a good point. Why wasn’t he listening to me? Why wasn’t he staying back? I wondered if he thought I was running away from him? Perhaps he thought I was leaving him to fend for himself.
Actually, I had thought about telling him I wanted to go home and that he’d just have to figure out how to get to Densford Station by himself. I’d thought that when the game stopped being fun, and when I was hurt, and when he was shouting at me, and when I realised I was the leader of a journey – a leader who didn’t know the way.
‘It’s all right!’ I shouted, ‘I’m just checking the river’s safe!’
I kept running, but he was running full force too now, and was catching up.
‘Stay back!’ I called over my shoulder, and it was in that tiny moment, just as I was turning away, that I saw it happen.
Of course, the whole thing took just a second or two and it was done. I was running, he was running, and I only saw it out of the corner of my eye, in the length of time it took to turn my head. Everything was happening so fast. But with a horrible snag, time suddenly slowed down as though split seconds were full minutes. So I saw every terrible detail. It looked as though Hansel was performing a curious dance.
First his arms flew up, then his eyes widened and his mouth opened in surprise.
He was suspended like that for a second. And then it seemed his knees buckled, and his arms circled as though trying to grab hold of the air itself. But it wasn’t his knees; it was his feet that were disappearing. Down, down.
They fell through the forest floor, which furiously sucked in the rest of him. His whole body was snatched down and those circling arms, and those scrabbling fingers, were the last I saw of him.
25
The poor girl thought: ‘I can no longer stay here! I will go and search for my brothers.’ And when night came, she ran away and went straight into the forest.
From The Six Swans
The wicker basket slung in the crook of Annabel’s elbow gently batted at her hip as she strolled along. The air was alive with birdsong and butterflies. It had been a glorious summer. Her thigh muscles ached pleasantly.
She went straight to the greengrocer’s and meticulously checked each Granny Smith for blemishes before placing half a dozen in her basket. Some blackberries laid out in simple wooden bowls caught her eye and she took a punnet.
She smiled as she watched the elderly grocer, Sid Mitchell, put three apples into a brown paper bag and hold the corners before expertly spinning it over a couple of times, sealing it closed.
It was as he repeated the process with the remaining three apples, and just as she was about to dig out her purse from her basket, that he said: ‘Terrible news.’
She glanced behind her, but there was no one else in the shop. ‘I … I beg your pardon?’
‘I said, “terrible news”. Isn’t it? About the missing Kraut?’
A prickle of fear, but still just a prickle. ‘What missing—? A PoW?’
‘Oh, you haven’t heard then?’ He passed her the bag of apples. ‘Yes, yes, it’s the talk of the village.’
‘What PoW?’
‘They’re all out looking for the bugger now. Excuse my French.’
‘But, I mean, what happened?’
‘One of the prisoners has upped and gone. Vanished.’
‘Vanished?’
‘Into thin air.’
She was stunned into silence and realised she was just standing there gawping at the grocer, the apples still in her hand. She dropped the bag into her basket and scrabbled once more for her purse so she could get out of there and find Hans to speak to him about it.
Her fingers shook slightly as she handed over the coins. Mr Mitchell must have noticed because he said: ‘Nothing to worry about, dear. He’ll be long gone by now.’
‘Oh, yes, I’m sure you’re right.’
Either a PoW had run away, as Mr Mitchell seemed to think, or something had been done to him.
The till’s bell rang out as Mr Mitchell slid the money drawer shut with a flourish, but he still had her change in his hand.
‘Dreadful business.’
‘Yes.’
‘It was the fella who worked for Ray Dawson clearing the orchard.’
Annabel felt as if she’d been punched in the stomach and she suddenly thought she might be sick. She rushed from the shop and was on the pavement beneath the striped awning outside when an arm pulled her back.
She cried out as she spun around.
‘You forgot your blackberries – and your change, Mrs Patterson! You’ll be needing that! Look after the pennies, as they say.’
‘Oh, my, yes. Thank you.’
She threw everything into the basket and tried to pull away from his grasp. But he had more he wanted to say.
‘Look, you mustn’t be worried. I’m sorry I was the one to tell you now! He’ll either be long gone, or the Home Guard will catch him and stick him in prison, a proper military prison, so there’s really no need for you to be frightened.’
‘No.’ Her voice was just a whisper. ‘Thank you, I—’
‘The word went out some time ago, so they might even have him by now. Ray Dawson went to speak to him and he wasn’t there, and he waited and waited – he always gives everyone the benefit of the doubt, that one – but he never came back. So he went to the camp to see if he was there, or if the colonel knew anything about it, and that’s when they raised the alarm. Like I said, for all we know, they’ve already got him as we speak!’
She wriggled out of his grip, which was like a vice around her upper arm.
‘Thank you,’ she said again, as she backed away from him.
She turned and began marching down the High Street, desperate to break into a run, but managed to restrain herself until she’d turned the corner.
Then she was bolting towards her lane, towards the orchard. Her hair streamed out behind her as she ran, her white sandals slapping on the paving stones. She wished she could let her basket fall to the ground, but it would raise suspicion should somebody find it, so she held on to it as she ran, holding back tears.
He had spoken of leaving, but only so they could be together; he wouldn’t leave her, surely? Maybe he was trying to get to her somehow. Perhaps something had happened, some sort of emergency, and he was looking for her, or waiting for her somewhere. But he didn’t know where she lived; the two of them had never left the orchard and all he knew of Bambury was his route from the PoW camp to Dawson’s orchard and back again.
Oh God, what if he hadn’t run away at all but had been hurt? The same men who beat Erik so savagely that they killed him could have attacked him as he worked. Everyone knew he was there alone.
No – surely not – there must be some other explanation.
There might be a clue nobody else would be able to interpret at the orchard. A note for her perhaps, hidden in the
ir shed? The orchard first then, and she’d decide what to do from there.
Annabel was forced to slow down to a brisk walk as the country road became her lane, dotted with cottages. She hurried as much as she dared and simply dumped her basket inside her front garden as she rushed past.
Once she was out of sight of the last house in the street, she broke into a run.
26
He might scream as much as he liked; it was of no use.
From Hansel and Gretel
The way Hansel was suddenly gobbled up by the woods was like a series of strange events caught up in one dramatic movement. One minute he was there, running towards me on solid ground – and the next he wasn’t.
His helpless arms thrown up; his buckling knees; his feet plummeting down followed by the rest of him; his splayed fingers clawing at the air in a pointless attempt to save himself.
It was like that, and it happened silently. Because it seemed to me that the noise came a second later.
A sort of crashing, tearing sound, and his shocked cry as he disappeared. Then his scream as he hit the bottom. Followed by the screams of pain as things fell on top of him where he lay.
I stood for a moment trying to make sense of what I’d seen.
I had just run across that same part of the forest myself – Hansel was practically in my footsteps as he tried to catch up with me.
I wanted to run over to look down into the gaping hole that had just opened up in the earth. But I was frightened. I was afraid the forest would eat me up too.
I could hear his groans. He was calling my name.
I wasn’t sure how long it took for me to pick my way to where he’d fallen. The hole wasn’t very big. Maybe I wasn’t heavy enough to break it open, or maybe I’d just dodged the danger zone.
I could see bits of rotting wood ripped clean through, pointing with jagged teeth down into the dark cave that now held Hansel.
It was an old mine shaft. I’d heard rumours of them – and of a network of tunnels underground – but never paid much attention because I’d never been this deep into the woods before.
I bent down carefully.
The hole was so dark and deep I couldn’t see him clearly. It was more like a suggestion of him, a smudge of his white face at the bottom of the gloom. There was a wet earthy smell of rotting timber and a nasty damp feel to the thick air slowly leaking out of the hole for the first time in a long time.
