Midnight Blue

by Pauline Fisk

  But they didn't move. The passage opened out and Bonnie, unprepared, found herself spat onto the smooth white stone where Edric was meant to brood over his domain, hidden by clouds or mist.

  The Throne was empty. He wasn’t there. Bonnie hardly had time to take this in, however, before a blast of stormy wind knocked her sideways and she almost fell over. It whistled like an angry ghoul, forcing its way through cracks in rocks and out the other side of them and over the top. Jake clung to Bonnie’s side, lifting his head, sniffing the angry air. She tried to step forward, but he rushed in front of her, blocking her way.

  'What is it, Jake?'

  Bonnie tried to get past, but Jake howled and howled and wouldn’t let her, and suddenly the clouds parted and she realized that she was standing on the edge of a chasm, with only him between her and the hillside below.

  'Oh...!' Bonnie cried. The wind buffeted her and she could hardly stand up. She turned to get away. Edric’s Throne was no place for her, but it seemed to have her in its grip. Clouds swirling between her and the hillside below. Long fingers of storm reaching out for her from a cloudy cauldron that was awful in its emptiness.

  'Oh, Jake, oh…!'

  The lightning cracked above Bonnie’s head. Jake's ears flattened and he let out a low, demented yell. In her panic to get away, to squeeze back between the rocks and onto the open hill where she’d be among growing things again - bracken, hawthorn hedges, grassy meadows, orchards - Bonnie turned. The wind got hold of her. It tottered her towards the chasm. She felt herself begin to fall.

  And then a pair of arms reached out and grabbed her...

  13

  They ran over stones and down through furious, shaking bracken. Bonnie stumbled and fell, and the shadowboy pulled her up and dragged her on. She cried and the wind lashed her hair across her face so that she couldn't see where she was going. Jake wove a path around them, and the boy stumbled over him and they all fell down. The storm was overhead now. It was so close you could reach out a hand and almost drag it down.

  'Get up,' the boy said. 'Come on. Quickly.'

  'I can't.' Bonnie said, gasping for breath.

  'Yes you can. Come on.'

  'I can't.'

  He dragged her down to the edge of the holly grove. Behind them, Edric's Throne was electric with livid greenish lightning. Where everything had been dark before, it was suddenly illuminated. Thunder crashed right over their heads. Jake howled. The boy grabbed Bonnie from behind and pushed her straight into the tangle of holly leaves, down on the ground among the earth and roots and last late foxgloves. She screamed. Her face was scratched, her hair was dishevelled. He caught and pushed again until they were through. The three of them tumbled onto the moss in a heap of sweat and skin and arms and legs and fur.

  The ground was soft. Unlike the hill, the grove was very, very still. It could have been a moonlit midsummer night with not a blade of grass stirring and a faint sheen of dew on the moss. Out on the hill, the storm roared on, but the grove… Inexplicably the grove was safe.

  Bonnie sat up. Her breath came evenly again. 'You saved my life,' she said to the boy. 'I don't know how to thank you.' She reached out to touch him. He looked down at her hand, all heavy and hot and human, drawing back as if its touch might make him cumbersome and earthbound too, as if it could contaminate him with — what was it — humanity? Bonnie didn't seem to notice. She put her hand on his arm and he felt the weight of it even through his sleeve. On top of the hill, the lightning cracked again.

  'It would have struck us if we’d been up there.'

  'Not quite.' The boy shook his head.

  'What do you mean?'

  'It wouldn't have struck me.'

  Bonnie let go of the boy. Beyond the grove, sheets of rain fell as loud as thunder down from the sky. She drew her knees up to her chin, hugged her legs and, ignoring the storm, tried to make the boy out. He seemed to flicker as she looked at him. He seemed to come and go. She remembered thinking he was twenty men. Even now she could understand why.

  'What are you?' she said, cautiously.

  'I don't know,' he answered.

  'You're not a person, are you?'

  'People feel the cold,' he said with distaste. 'They feel the heat. They're heavy and solid and they get wet in the rain. They can't get out of themselves. They can't stop feeling. Their feelings make them do things and then they're not free.'

  'You think you're free?' Bonnie wanted to laugh, but what he said had touched her somewhere all the same. 'You're just a genie in a lamp. Someone digs the right pit, or makes the right balloon, and you appear.' She got up. Shook off his words. Looked around her at the hollies.

  'What do you know about this hill?' she said.

  'Nothing,' he answered simply again.

  'But you must know where we are,’ Bonnie said, ‘and why we came here. I can't get off this hill, you know. I've tried my hardest and yet I can't.'

  He shook his head. He was sorry, he said. But that wasn’t good enough for Bonnie. 'You brought me here,' she said. 'Not just anywhere, but here. Can’t you even tell me how long I’ll be staying?'

  'No.'

  'You don't know much, do you? You're not as different from me as you'd like to think. And you must have feelings. Everyone has feelings. Don't you get lonely?'

  It was only a small stupid thing, but he thought of her fleeting touch on his arm.

  'I'm lonely,' she said. 'I've got everything I could ever want, and yet I know I don't belong. You must get lonely too. Out here all on your own, not knowing where you are or why you do the things you do.'

  'Of course I don't.'

  But Bonnie wasn't listening any more. At least not to him. The rain stopped beating and the wind dropped and she turned her head, her whole body stiffened.

  'What's that?' she said.

  The boy listened. He heard something too, but it was hard to be sure.

  'Horses' hooves!' Bonnie said. 'Can't you hear them? Down there by the house.' She got to her feet. 'I've got to go,' she said, and then she was gone, running down the sheep's path and through the lower rim of hollies. 'Thank you,' she called back. 'Thank you for rescuing me.'

  The boy looked around him. The holly grove was shadowy and grey and still and lonely now. Lonely… She'd planted the word and now she'd gone.

  'I wouldn't want to be like them,' he said. 'Always wanting, always feeling things.'

  But her human hand had touched his arm and his words sounded thin and hollow.

  The hill was sodden and the grass flat. Battered branches littered the ground like the debris of a major disaster. Bonnie squelched and stumbled her way down the meadow. Her ears strained for the sound of horses' hooves again. The sky was clearing and she stopped and looked all around her. Rainwater babbled in rivulets down the field. But whatever she had heard was gone, and the noisy wind was gone as well, both disappeared like conjuror's rabbits back into their hat. Gone!

  Dejectedly, Bonnie made her way down towards the house, over the stile, into the orchard. She threaded her way between the fruit trees and Jake scrambled after her. She hardly noticed him, however, because something had caught her eye shimmering like a dewy spider's web between the smallest finger branches of an apple tree.

  What was it? Bonnie walked on and it grew brighter. In the dark orchard it seemed to have a light of its own. She tripped over the stones of the covered well. The thing was right above her now, hanging from a branch. She squinted and reached up and took it in her hand. Everything, the storm, the shadowboy, horses' hooves, Wild Edric and the Lady Godda, even her own plight, were momentarily forgotten.

  It was a silver chain, with a glittering flower pendant hanging from it. Jewels were set in the chain like a string of stars. Bonnie cupped her hands around the flower, spread out the chain, touching it, stone by stone. It was hard to see what they were in the dark. Were they diamonds? Were they rubies or emeralds? They were so light, and yet she'd always thought that jewels were heavy and solid and weighed you down. S
he turned it over. Its clasp was a tiny pair of silver hands.

  Bonnie slipped it round her neck and joined the hands together. She fingered the flower as it settled over her t-shirt. She'd found a treasure and she felt like a queen.

  Jake stirred impatiently. Jewels meant nothing to him. 'All right. I know. It’s getting light. Come on, then.' Bonnie tucked the necklace under her t-shirt where nobody would know it was there but her.

  'Whose is it?' she thought. 'Why was it hanging in a tree? I hope it's not something Arabella's lost. She's got everything. I want this to be mine.'

  She crept down to the orchard gate. It creaked as she opened it and she stopped and looked up at the front windows, but no lights came on. She tiptoed along the terrace, past the living-room window, past the bulge of the kitchen, round the side to the scullery door. Here a pair of silvery eyes glinted at her in the first glimmer of dawn. Bonnie stifled a scream. Dad shifted slowly from one foot to the other. He was leaning against the kitchen wall.

  'Good morning, Bonnie.'

  'Oh. You made me jump. I never saw you. You frightened me.'

  The last of the moon shone on Dad and he looked so much like Michael that Bonnie couldn't believe, just for a moment, that he wasn't. Then he drew on his pipe and nodded down into the valley in a way that was totally his own.

  'They're getting ready for the Show,' he said. 'I thought the storm would ruin it but it's cleared up now. Everything’s going to be all right.'

  Bonnie followed Dad’s gaze. Tiny lights were moving up and down. A Land Rover was throbbing. A pale marquee rose between hammering men.

  'Never can sleep,' Dad said, 'before the Show.'

  Bonnie looked again. Tractors squelched. Lamps bobbed on long poles. Far away it might be, but she heard voices carried in the clear air. Dogs barked and cocks crowed. 'Is that a fair down there?' she said. Can I see swings, a big dipper and a roundabout?'

  'That's right,' said Dad. 'And over there, do you see, that’s the judging marquee where people exhibit their paintings and poems and home-made produce and home-made wine. And next to it, there are the pens where the animals are kept. And there’s the showing ring. Do you see? '

  'You'll be going?'

  'We always do.'

  'Can I come too?'

  'Why ever not?' Dad looked from the distant fields to the wet, rain-sodden yard and then to Bonnie. 'What a strange thing,' he said. 'It’s been raining all night, but you're not wet.'

  Before she could think what to say, he tapped out his pipe and stretched himself.

  'Don't know about you, but I'm cold and stiff. I'm going to make breakfast. It's nice eating early. It sets you up for the day. I hope you're not going to make a habit of wandering off up the hill every night. '

  Bonnie sat out on her own. Dad had gone. The kitchen light shone onto the terrace. She hardly noticed it. Jake sat by her side. She hardly noticed him. What would happen if, when they attempted to go to the Show tomorrow, none of them could get off the hill? If they all finished up in the yard again, or up by the holly grove?

  Bonnie looked down at the bustle in the valley. Tents were springing up like August mushrooms in the field. She fingered the necklace beneath her t-shirt. It chafed slightly against her skin, and there was something about those tents that chafed her too. What was it? She couldn't explain, even to herself. The boy's words came back to her. 'Feelings make you do things and you're not free.' And she thought — what made her think it? — 'I could do something really terrible. I know I could. It's why I ran away from Grandbag. I could have killed her. People read in newspapers about children doing things like that and they can't believe it's true. They think it's all made up. But I could have. And to Arabella too. In fact, I still could…’

  Oh, she was tired. She'd been out half the night and she'd thought and felt and done and seen so much. She got up to go in, and then she noticed Jake. His ears were flattened. His body was stiff and still.

  'What's wrong with you, Jake?' she said. He stared down at the valley. He didn't move. 'You're tired too. Silly dog. The storm's over now. Everything's all right,' she said. But he still didn't move.

  'You can stay here if you want to, but I'm going back to bed.'

  PART FOUR

  Grandmother Marvell

  14

  There were four bars. It was dark and there they were, yes, four of them between Bonnie and the door with the strip of light under it. She reached out a hand. Why was it so small? Why was it so hard to reach the bars? She stretched and wriggled and at last got her fists round them. They were so large. It was difficult to hold them. She tried to pull herself up. Her legs felt weak. It was hard to stand. What was wrong with her? She heard footsteps outside. They came closer, closer.

  Then Bonnie knew. This was a dream. She'd dreamed this bit before. She was a baby in a cot, but it was only a dream - she was all right. She didn't need to struggle, to be afraid. Still locked in the dream, her tiny legs gave way. She fell onto her back. The door opened and the light clicked on. It was all right.

  In the dream room, two beds faced each other in the corner, discarded clothes heaped all over them. A chest of drawers stood between them with nappies piled on top. Bonnie saw a dressing-table with a pair of tights over the mirror and pots of cream and make-up and bottles and brushes scattered everywhere. Next to the dressing-table a metal painted desk was cluttered with piles of magazines and pens and homework books. Above it, a poster was tacked onto the wall. A school uniform was draped over a chair.

  Two girls came in. The girls who shared Bonnie’s room - the thin, nervous one she didn't like, the soft, pink, nice one who played with her. The thin one sat before the mirror. She fiddled with her hair and unscrewed the pots and made up her face. The pink one sighed.

  'I wouldn't do my hair like that,' she said. 'And the make-up's all wrong, you know. Oh, I wish I was as old as you. I wish I could go out.'

  'Well, you can't. You've got homework to do.'

  'I never have any fun.'

  'You know what Mother said.'

  'It isn't fair.'

  'Oh shut up, Maybelle. Life isn't fair.'

  'You’ll be sorry you’re so mean one day.'

  'If you don't get on with your work, I'll tell.'

  The pink one settled reluctantly at the metal desk. The thin one pulled a limp, grey, sagging frock over her head, frowned with dissatisfaction at herself in the mirror and went out. As soon as she'd gone, the pink one came over to the cot and poked her soft, warm fingers through the bars. She leaned over and lifted Bonnie out and held her close against herself. 'Doreen can have her going out. Least I've got you. I love you, Bonnie, love you, yes I do.'

  The door opened.

  'What do you think you're doing?'

  'Oh, Mother…’

  A black-garbed, solid woman pounded across the room. She removed Bonnie from the soft arms and put her back behind the bars. Her voice was cold and angry.

  'I've fed her,' she said. 'She's meant to be asleep and you've got work to do. Haven't you wasted enough of your life already? You'd better come downstairs where I can keep an eye on you. You're not to be trusted. You'll never change. Come on. Downstairs.'

  The pink girl held the side of the cot.

  'I'll have her one day,' she said in a low, shaking voice that even a baby could recognize as frightened. 'I won't always be too young to make a home for us, you wait and see.'

  The woman's eyes glinted. 'You're such a fool,' she said. 'God help her if you ever had her to yourself. You're useless, Maybelle. Useless.'

  'I know I'm useless,' the pink girl said. 'I know I've made a mess of things, but…'

  The woman wouldn't wait for any more. She whisked up the school books from the table, took Maybelle's arm and propelled her sharply through the door. She turned off the light and shut the door behind them. Bonnie heard their footsteps fading. She was on her own again. She began to cry. She wanted the pink girl to come back and play. Nothing happened and she cried louder. She di
dn't like the dark.

  Suddenly the door reopened. It was the woman again. She didn't turn on the light this time. She came across the room like a fast, black shadow. She leaned over the cot and this was the moment… this was the moment when Bonnie knew it wasn't all right, that she didn't want to dream this dream. It wasn't all right at all… She struggled to wake and couldn't. She struggled to get away from the woman and couldn't. She stopped crying. It dried up somewhere inside of her. She shuddered instead. She couldn't stop shuddering.

  The woman in black reached out a hand. She had such a big hand and the skin was so hard. She thrust a bony, pointy finger into Bonnie's side and began to tickle her with it. Only it wasn't a gentle, friendly tickle that comes in play. The finger prodded ferociously. Bonnie squirmed. She tried to get away from it, but she couldn't. Then the face leaned over her, closer and closer. She could see right inside the mouth and smell the breath. 'I've brought you up this far,' she whispered. 'You're good as mine. Don't think I'll ever let you go.'

  Bonnie saw a small, wet dribble trickling down the woman's chin.

  'No, Grandbag, Grandbag no!'

  The words screamed inside her head. Then the bony finger tickled her again and she screamed out loud this time and the mouth was laughing…

  Bonnie sat up. The bed was wet. She could feel it underneath her in a warm patch. She clambered out and surveyed the patch in horror. It was ages since she'd done that. But it was ages since she'd had the dream. She dragged the sheet into the bathroom, rinsed it out, dragged it back into the bedroom and hung it over a chair in the sunshine. It was only a dream. It wasn't real. She mustn't get upset. She looked around her. Reality was sunlight bursting through curtains and pretty dolls in a row over the fireplace and rugs on shiny oak floors. It was Arabella's empty, neat bed. It was Arabella.