Lucy Lockhart: The Awakening

by Bryce THOMAS

  As Loanne looked back through the hole, Ackley, arms flailing, was already plummeting towards the solid ground. She sucked in an involuntary gulp of air as his face hit the paving. There was a loud thud and a humph sound as the wind left Ackley’s lungs, and then a groan as Lucy knocked her shin heavily on the post and rail fence, followed by a scrambling, scratching sound as she, too, plunged through the grasping hawthorn hedge. Once again, curled like a ball, Lucy rolled forward and then came to a halt, lying on her back as she straightened her legs. Without a word, Loanne’s hand had already grabbed Lucy’s arm and pulled, helping her up onto her feet. For a brief second they both looked at each other. Their eyes connected, linking them like two souls blended into one, as they both began to run.

  The noise behind them made them stop in their tracks. There was a crunching, crackling sound as Ackley burst into the hole, snagging on the thorns and coming to a dead stop as the thicker trunks of the hawthorn blocked his shoulders and his progress. A bloody, creased and angry face glared at them; a grasping hand reaching out into empty space in front of them, much too far away from the girls to get any purchase. His pursuit had come to an abrupt end.

  Linked arm in arm and watching the flailing and ineffectual grasping hand, Lucy and Loanne backed away from the distraught figure. Loanne chuckled to herself, but Lucy, feeling not the slightest elation, heard and turned her head to look at her companion. Loanne was smiling broadly at Ackley, taunting him, but she never uttered a word. Instead, she moved forward to within an inch of Ackley’s hand. She drew her foot back.

  Now it was Lucy’s turn to see what was going to happen, but she wasn’t psychic. It was quite clearly written on Loanne’s face. As Loanne swung her boot upward, Lucy pulled her away.

  ‘Come on,’ Lucy shouted, as Loanne’s foot swung clear of the hand. ‘I’m out of here!’

  Still smiling, still with her eyes locked on Ackley’s, and with Lucy still tugging at her arm, she unlocked her gaze, swivelled her head in the direction of home, and together, they ran for their lives.

  CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE

  ‘I wonder where the girls are,’ Mrs. Lockhart said casually as she stood by the rear patio window. She and Doctor Murray had heard Lucy get up and go down the stairs and then head out to the stables where Loanne had been all morning, but they had expected her to come back in for some food, despite it being well into the afternoon. As the day drew on, however, there had been no further sight of their daughters.

  ‘Probably riding,’ Doctor Murray replied from the kitchen.

  ‘Oh, right,’ she said and then a moment later, ‘Well, actually… they can’t be. The horses are still in their stables,’ she said, noticing Ebony’s head appear briefly over the half door inside the stable and then disappear just as suddenly, as the horse walked around her stall.

  ‘Maybe they’re playing football?’

  ‘I can’t see them.’ Mrs. Lockhart went to the back door in the kitchen and opened it. Leaning her head slightly to one side, she listened for the tell-tale sounds of children enjoying themselves, but after almost a minute of listening and then another minute or so stepping out and peering into every corner of the back yard, she shook her head. She came in through the doorway, a resigned look on her face.

  ‘Well?’ asked Doctor Murray.

  She shrugged. ‘No girls out there as far as I can see,’ she said and then added, ‘But I expect they are enjoying themselves somewhere. They seem to get on so well together.’

  She was just about to go across the yard and look around the paddock at the rear when, through the gap where the gate opened into the paddocks, she caught sight of the two girls away down the field, running, hand in hand, towards the stable block. Loanne looked tired, and Lucy seemed to be limping and urging her on.

  She breathed out a soft sigh of relief. They must have been exploring, she thought, as she heard a loud knock at the front door.

  –––––––

  Like Lucy, Loanne was tired, but Lucy held her hand and encouraged her to keep going.

  ‘Come on. We won’t be safe until we get back to your house,’ Lucy panted.

  With their hair tousled and their clothes all soiled and dishevelled, they staggered up through the paddock and on towards the open gate. As they got closer, the safety of the farm yard seemed welcoming. Ebony was standing with her head over her stable door and she gave out a gentle whinny as her keeper ran up to the stable block. Gasping for breath, they both went into the stables and stopped beside Ebony’s face letting her sniff at them whilst they, in turn, stroked her and enjoyed the sheer relief of reaching safety.

  ‘Daddy’s going to wonder why we have got ourselves so dirty,’ Loanne said eventually, not so much worried as trying to work out a plausible explanation. After all, there were limits to what one could divulge under these circumstances.

  Lucy looked at Loanne and, watching her friend pace around in a small circle and, seeing her rubbing her chin with the tips of her fingers and, in doing so smudging yet more dirt on her face, she contemplated how she would have managed to escape from inside that terrible house without the help of this skinny, almost care free waif of a girl. But apart from the smudges of soil on her face, a few grass stains on her jodhpurs, something she could have gained from a simple tumble off her horse, and a rather becoming new-look, untidy and spiky hair style, with wisps of hair floating across her pale face in the afternoon breeze, she looked rather more healthier than she had done in the calm and peaceful surroundings of her home the previous evening. In fact, Lucy couldn’t help thinking that Loanne seemed to bloom into a completely different person when confronted with danger; and it wasn’t as if she was changing into a bad character or anything like that; more like she was adding new dimensions to her friendly and sociable nature. And discovering everything about her new friend was as exciting and intriguing as discovering things about her hitherto unknown self.

  ‘You look like you’ve just been for a hard gallop,’ Lucy assured her.

  Loanne smiled her infectious smile. ‘No, well it’s you I was thinking of,’ she said, her broad grin revealing the brace on her teeth. Now she seemed totally at ease with revealing her dental work, totally unfazed by any self consciousness or nervousness that she had shown when first meeting Lucy. She too was feeling the bond of comradeship that only total trust brings to a relationship.

  She took a little white handkerchief from her pocket and handed it to Lucy. ‘You’ve got blood on your face,’ she stated. ‘You must have cut yourself coming back through the hedge.’

  Lucy watched Loanne’s eyes, and realized that she was glancing at her left cheek. She raised her hand and rubbed the side of her face, lowering her hand again and considering the smear of blood on her fingers. ‘Didn’t feel a thing,’ she said with a shrug. ‘Is it bad?’

  Loanne gently wiped the cheek with her handkerchief.

  ‘No, it’s just a scratch,’ she said, a look of relief breaking her frown. ‘But it will need a wash.’ Her eyes dropped to Lucy’s clothes. ‘You’ve got a few hawthorn spikes in your sleeves,’ she said, picking at them with her finger nails.

  Lucy felt a sharp pain as one of the thorns tugged at her upper arm. She hadn’t realized it in the heat of the moment, but the hawthorn bush had simply done what hawthorn bushes and such armed plants do; protect itself. And, in doing so, it had embedded a spiky dagger deep in her flesh. Pulling away from Loanne with an involuntary jerk, her right hand went up to the offending spike. For some reason, knowing it was there suddenly made her whole arm ache. Taking a deep breath, and clenching her teeth together so hard that her whole face tensed, carefully, she gripped the end of it between her finger and thumb and then, after sensing just how deep it had penetrated, with a single tug, she pulled it sharply, freeing it from the wound and her sleeve. Removing it didn’t seem to hurt as badly as she had expected, but as soon as the spike was free, her arm began to ache even more. A small patch of blood appeared on her sleeve where the tiny hole had be
en made.

  ‘We’d better go in and get that seen to,’ Loanne said, taking hold of Lucy’s hand. ‘Come on, we’ve got all the kit in the kitchen,’ she stated, matter of factly, referring to the well stocked first aid box that her father kept in the kitchen cupboard. ‘Operating time,’ she chuckled, and led the way.

  Lucy wondered what Loanne’s father would say, hoping desperately that he wouldn’t ban her from coming to visit his daughter again, when he saw what a mess she had got them both into. She blamed herself completely, and now, limping slightly as the bruise on her shin began to throb where she had banged it on the fence in her clumsy vault to freedom, she walked towards the kitchen door behind her friend.

  She was hoping that they could gain entry to the house and get cleaned up, before their parents saw them, but it wasn’t to be.

  CHAPTER TWENTY SIX

  When Loanne pushed open the kitchen door, Lucy’s heart sank as they came face to face with Detective Chief Inspector Norton standing beside Mrs. Lockhart and Doctor Murray. Lucy sucked in a sharp breath. She had been right about them when she saw them blocking their way on the farm lane; Norton was obviously dressed for some form of social engagement. Her hair was down on bare shoulders above a low cut, long, evening gown. She was wearing diamond and emerald stud ear rings, a distinctive pearl drop necklace and lots of makeup. Lucy sincerely hoped that she and Loanne had really spoilt her day.

  For a moment, she considered turning and running back the way she had come, but on quick contemplation, that wouldn’t achieve anything. And besides which, Sergeant Albright, the inspector’s trusty lapdog, had stepped out from behind them and, smiling at them as if he were greeting old friends, was already moving around behind them to close the outer kitchen door.

  It crossed Lucy’s mind, only fleetingly, but somehow the thought got through, despite the sudden shock, that the tumble-off-the-horse excuse was way out of the window. The game was up.

  Neither girl spoke. Lucy glanced sideways at her friend. Loanne’s eyes were as wide as Lucy had ever seen them, a look of surprise and apprehension cutting across her face; her mouth slightly open as she held her breath. And then suddenly Loanne breathed out the resigned sigh of a fugitive caught red handed, and with a slight shrug of resignation that perhaps her father didn’t see, but was quite clearly noticed by Norton, she walked casually over to the kitchen sink and, with her back to the visitors, took a drinking glass off the drainer and began to fill it from the tap.

  Lucy looked back up at Norton, the Dirty Looker as she had first come to know her. But that look wasn’t there anymore. In its placed was a sick smile, an ingratiating look of greeting across a mask, a look that Lucy could not read. She clenched her jaw, compressed her lips so tightly that they became thin pink lines of defiance, and gazed steadily into the inspector’s eyes. She was going to face her down if it was the last thing she would do. She didn’t even care if the look of detest and revulsion was obvious for all to see.

  But Norton kept on smiling. Suddenly, she bent her knees and leaned forward, arms out, reaching towards Lucy who recoiled instinctively. ‘Thank goodness you are safe,’ she said, so pleasantly, so unexpectedly that Lucy felt inclined to puke. Who did this woman think she was kidding? She was a good actress, though; Lucy had to grant her that. The sickly smile was there and so was the outward demeanour of relief and friendship, but as she gazed almost adoringly at Lucy, there was something at the back of the woman’s eyes that no one else could see; something dark and dangerous.

  ‘Oh yes, thank goodness you’re here,’ Mrs. Lockhart said, a sound of total relief in her voice. ‘Oh darling, we were so worried when they said…’

  ‘What’s she doing here?’ Lucy blurted out, breaking into her mother’s gush. ‘What have they told you?’ Her eyes bored into Norton’s face. She thinned her lips again, suppressing the anger that was welling up inside her.

  ‘Now, now,’ Norton assured, condescendingly.

  ‘Everything’s all right now. You’ve just had a bit of a shock, that’s all.’ Her mask hadn’t slipped one little bit. That smile was still plastered across it, fooling everybody except Lucy and Loanne. This woman was a hard nut, Lucy thought. But, of course, she already knew that.

  ‘Well, anyway, it’s a great relief,’ Norton repeated, breaking the gaze that the youngster had held on her for what seemed to Lucy like for ever. ‘You look like you need a couple of dressings on those scratches, though, young lady.’

  ‘Oh, we’ll see to that,’ Mrs. Lockhart said, relief still seeping into her tone, and beginning to fuss, like mothers do. She stepped forward and put her arms around Lucy’s shoulders, her hand just above the spot of blood on Lucy’s sleeve. Her mother hadn’t seemed to notice anything unusual. It was as if she was well accustomed to seeing her daughter in such a dishevelled state.

  With the pressure of her mother’s hand, Lucy’s arm began to ache again. For a brief moment all pain had dissipated, but now it was back with a vengeance. Surprisingly, the safety of her mother’s arms seemed to trigger a feeling of confidence and euphoria that suddenly began to remind Lucy of her past. It was a cuddle that her mother had given her more than once, in a life before the accident, before the blank spaces of lost memory.

  Norton straightened up and, still smiling, spoke to Mrs. Lockhart and Doctor Murray, both still seemingly transfixed by the whole scene. ‘It’s such a relief that they got away from him,’ she said as if it were part of a bigger explanation, in which neither Lucy nor Loanne had been involved. The whole way that Norton had reacted to the situation, had thrown Lucy off balance. Lucy had expected her to be adversarial, pointing an accusing finger at her and Loanne, but instead, this woman, this person Lucy knew she detested more than anything else, was gushing over them in a sweet sickly way.

  There was a brief silence, and then, before Lucy could gather her thoughts and ask what that explanation was, Doctor Murray broke in. ‘Well, thank you for being so concerned,’ he said condescendingly. ‘I think what the girls need is time to recover from their ordeal and then if you want to talk to them, then you can perhaps return at another more convenient time for yourself.’ He lifted his arm as a sign to lead them back towards the front door, from whence they had obviously come. ‘You’ll be eager to get to your function, I should imagine,’ he continued. ‘Not the best time to suddenly get called out. Please allow me to show you out so that you can be on your way.’

  As if cut off by a dam, Norton’s sugary smile dried up and dwindled back into the mask. ‘We will need to talk to you all again,’ she insisted. ‘Please remember what we’ve said.’

  ‘And what was that?’ Lucy asked, a look of belligerence clearly showing on her face as she tried to regain the momentum of the conversation. She wanted to know just what had been said. These two officers, the two she and Loanne had clearly seen blocking their escape in the driveway of the farm next door, had obviously sped around to Doctor Murray’s house to intercept them. And it was quite obvious that they had succeeded in carrying out a pre-emptive strike, getting there before the girls and telling their version of events before anyone else could say anything about what they had done. Lucy needed to keep the conversation going, overwhelmed by the feeling that she needed to have it out with them there and then. But it wasn’t to be.

  Norton and Albright were smiling once again at Loanne’s father who was already leading them to the front door. Neither of the visitors responded to her question, although it was obvious that they had heard. They couldn’t possibly have missed it. And Norton’s pleasant smile had returned and still held her face in an unnatural grin. ‘You’ve been most understanding,’ she said loud enough to indicate that no one was taking any notice of Lucy. ‘We’ll pop back when we know whether any serious damage has been done.’ She carried her smile across to Lucy’s Mother. ‘Don’t worry Madam, I’m sure they didn’t mean to do any harm, and in a way they might have actually done some good.’

  Ugh! Now Lucy really did feel sick. Slimy wasn’t the
word. This horrible woman had both their parents eating out of her hands! She glanced across at Loanne, looking for some kind of support, but she was leaning casually against the kitchen sink, with one arm folded across her stomach and her other elbow resting on it, as she nonchalantly sipped at a glass of water. Their eyes met and Loanne gave a little shrug of resignation, but said nothing.

  Lucy could see the two visitors disappearing into the hallway, Norton gliding along like some enchanting fairy queen from The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe. Albright trotted along behind her like the obedient fawn.

  In an instant, Lucy was on her way after them. She wasn’t going to let the matter end there, not where Norton wanted it to, anyway. ‘Just what…?’ She began to shout.

  But her mother didn’t let her finish. ‘Come on, sweetheart,’ Mrs. Lockhart said, slightly louder than she might have, but with a reassuring authority that told Lucy that the battle was over. She kept a tight hold of Lucy’s shoulders and, with the surprising strength of a mother defending her child, gently prevented her from following the rest of the adults to the door. ‘Let’s get your cuts seen to,’ she said, breaking into Lucy’s protests. ‘We’ll talk about it later when we’ve all got time to think about what’s been said.’

  Lucy watched as the door was closed behind them. There was no more she could do now, not at this particular moment, anyway. Norton and Albright had outflanked them. It was one nil to them. But the game wasn’t over. And even if her mother didn’t realize it, Norton wouldn’t leave it there. She couldn’t. There was too much to lose.

  CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN

  Mrs. Lockhart had seen the puncture hole in Lucy’s sleeve and the small patch of blood that had seeped into the fabric around it and, without saying a single word, she helped Lucy remove her sweater and began to examine the point on her arm where the hawthorn spike had stabbed into it. ‘What did this?’ she asked, pressing around the puncture gently with her fingers.