The Innocents

by Nette Hilton

  These were perfect.

  ‘Where’d you get them?’ Missie leaned over and took one. Faith’s breath, snot-filled and thick, hung heavily in the tiny gap between them.

  ‘Ma.’

  ‘They’re really nice.’

  Faith lifted the jack out of Missie’s palm. She held it up between them and studied it, looking first at the jack and then at the longing that Missie knew was written all over her face.

  ‘You want it?’

  It sounded innocent. The way she asked. But it didn’t match the cunning in her eyes. Missie longed to say yes, she wanted them forever and it would take five Sunday lunches to get a set like that and that was if they had lamb every Sunday which they probably wouldn’t. But that other look, that smile that lurked at the back of Faith’s eyes suggested that five Sunday lunches would be an easier way to get them.

  ‘They’re yours,’ Missie said. ‘I’ll get some of my own.’

  Faith dug around in her bag again. She produced another set. Five lovely knucklebones and a small stone collected from the station platform.

  ‘You play with me.’

  She handed over the second set and closed Missie’s fingers over them. She gripped hard so the bones and the pebble dug into the soft hollows of her palm and she was forced to bend lower to ease the hurt. She was almost on the floor by the time Faith released her.

  ‘Your turn,’ Missie said.

  Faith sat above her, knees splayed, blood-filled face beaming through them. ‘You do it!’

  Missie did. What she couldn’t avoid she might as well do. The others in the compartment weren’t doing anything to help. They knew what was happening. The small, upturned smiles on their faces gave them away as they sank deeper into their seats.

  She could almost taste their relief that this wasn’t happening to them.

  She threw the jacks in the air. They landed all over the place and continued to rattle about as the train lurched across the tracks.

  ‘Won’t work.’ It was hard to sound unhappy when every bit of her was cheering. She stood up, taking care not to take her eyes from Faith for too long. She wanted to be able to duck before she was grounded again. ‘The train’s too jumpy.’

  She handed the jacks back to Faith. Faith pushed them away. Her face was like a thundercloud, her arms folded hard across her chest and her legs kicking out across the floor.

  ‘We’ll play later.’ She’d seen Faith’s tantrums. Chairs. Desks. Kids. Whatever was in her path was flung about. She wasn’t sure what else to do. She just knew she didn’t want Faith to dig or twist and grab her again. ‘When we get there, eh?’

  She sounded like her mother. She was even sitting like her mother, wriggling back like she did and then picking up her comic as her mother liked to pick up the newspaper. The knucklebones that were still in her hands she placed firmly in her lap and ignored. ‘When we get there,’ she said firmly and prayed to God that Faith would forget, ‘we’ll play. We’re reading now.’

  Faith scowled across at her and lifted her knucklebones to shoulder height but there was no heat in it. Missie suspected she didn’t intend to let fly with them. She was holding her breath, though, when she looked down at her comic, half-expecting at any moment to wear a face full of bones. It wasn’t until she saw Faith’s hand fold into her lap that she breathed a little easier.

  She reached into her bag again. ‘Here.’ She leaned over and held out the copy of The Folk of the Faraway Tree that she’d slipped into her bag. ‘You can read this till we get there.’ Just like her mother.

  ‘You got jacks?’ Faith asked as she took the book.

  ‘Here.’ Missie held them out.

  But Faith was already engrossed in her book. She was examining the cover and trailing her fingers across Moonface’s shining smile.

  ‘It’s a library book,’ Missie said.

  Faith took no notice. As long as she sat there and didn’t want to play anything that involved touching each other, Missie didn’t care if she turned the pages into pirate hats.

  The thought of Mrs Edna Sleeves, the librarian, became too frightening. ‘Try not to bend up the pages too much.’ Kids had been ejected from the library and notes sent home to their parents.

  Faith went on with her picture study and Missie buried herself in her comic. She thought she may have fallen asleep for a little while which startled her when she surfaced. But Faith was still there, still with the book although she wasn’t reading. She was simply watching Missie.

  ‘Read your book.’

  Faith did.

  The rest of the journey passed easily. Kids came and went to the toilet and raced each other down the corridor. Mr Watson stuck his head in and so did Miss Martin. Missie thought it might be fun to go to the toilet but when she stood up and the train swayed her directly into Faith’s lap she changed her mind.

  There were so many things that would have been fun if Zill was here.

  Max went past once. He still had his satchel buckled to his back even though everyone else had left theirs in the racks above the seats.

  Other boys from St Pat’s went by. And kids from other schools that Missie didn’t know about.

  Some kids picked on other kids. Publics picked on Catholics and once Mr Watson and a man in a long black coat had to break up a proper fight just along from Missie’s compartment.

  Lots of kids bustling, pushing and arguing. All of them with flags. All of them going to see the Queen.

  And Missie keenest of all.

  The sooner she saw the Queen, the sooner they’d get back on the train and go back home.

  19

  3 MARCH 1954

  AFTERNOON

  A woman had sped by in a jeep.

  In all the thousands of flags and arms and jumping kids there’d only been a glimpse of her. And then it’d been the back view. Just a quick side bit.

  If Missie hadn’t been alone in the midst of it all someone might have told her which way to look. They might have pointed out that everyone else seemed to know that the Queen was coming. And which way she was coming from. And then it might have been fun to wave her flag at something other than the back of the kid in front.

  But she was alone.

  She’d ditched Faith back at the station. There was little chance of Faith reporting her lost as she was supposed to. Faith wouldn’t have noticed and if she did she’d have forgotten long before the plan to report her missing had ever formed in her head.

  If only Zill was here...

  Somehow she’d fallen into step and marched through the streets. Along the footpaths people actually cheered and clapped and for the shortest while Missie realised that this was the way she’d imagined it. Her and Zill. Boy oh boy, they’d be having some fun now. She could almost see Zill with her arms swinging and grinning at the crowds. She’d probably wave her flag and do a bit of a skip as well.

  Missie didn’t. Without Zill she wasn’t that brave.

  They’d swung into the showground and been marched to a grassy patch behind a picket fence. The teachers then had let them free. Like herds of cattle finally penned. Gate closed, backs turned, smokes out. And the kids safely rounded up into an area that was too small for all of them.

  Other schools were there as well. And all of them, every last one of them it seemed to Missie, was intent on finding their own place, facing front ready for when the Queen came by.

  Which she did.

  Quickly.

  In a jeep.

  Apparently.

  Missie never really knew. She knew something was happening. Flags went up. A cheer went up. Kids started jumping to see over the heads of the kids in front. She started jumping, but not high enough. And how long does a jump last?

  And the woman she glimpsed was just so ordinary.

  Did she have on her long white gown with a jewelled crown perched on her head? No. The woman had on a dress that looked awfully like the ones her mother wore when she was getting ready to go shopping.

  The woman in
that dress in the back of the jeep was never the Queen.

  Even when the kids around stopped, stunned that it was over and wondering now what do we do, she’d waited. It couldn’t be over, just like that. Surely that woman glimpsed in the back of a jeep was the lady-in-waiting. All queens have them. She was probably going on ahead to make sure everyone was ready.

  And they were.

  So where was the Queen?

  It was like being in a theatre with all the lights coming on and everyone standing up and leaving through the front doors before the film had started.

  ‘Right!’ Mr Watson’s voice was louder than the rest. Or may be it was just that she recognised it. ‘Everyone over this way!’

  Everyone who belonged to Lansdale West shuffled towards him. Everyone else was shuffling the same way so there was a big jam in the gate. By the time Missie got through, Lansdale West was already moving off in a straggling lump towards the entrance of the showground.

  ‘This is our area,’ Mr Watson said as soon as he’d got them all clumped together and down the road and into an enormous parkland. There were more gates leading further into the park but Mr Watson was indicating the outside grass. ‘We’ll eat our lunch here, then you can go. You can play in this area only.’ He pointed out trees and a road that acted as their boundary. ‘And listen for the whistle. It will tell you when it’s time to line up and go back to the train.’

  Kids shuffled themselves into little groups.

  ‘Did we all see the Queen?’ Mr Watson called before he set off to join the other teachers.

  ‘Yes!’

  Some kids didn’t look too convinced and there was more than one asking their friends what she’d looked like to double-check they hadn’t mistaken a teacher from another school for the Queen of England.

  Missie sat on the edge of a group of girls that included Joannie Melon and Mary. Leonie and Jude giggled with her and admired her dress and her ribbons but she wasn’t too sure they really meant it. Nobody else was wearing ribbons.

  Her mother was always doing it to her. Making her wear stuff that looked good at home, but made her wish it wasn’t attached to her once she got to where she was going.

  She’d finished her lunch and was drifting behind the girls when she noticed Faith.

  And Faith noticed her.

  Missie ducked through some hedges and into the trees. There were toilets further along and she scurried down the path, glancing behind her.

  The knucklebones were still in her bag and she knew she should give them back now but tomorrow would do. She didn’t want them. Not if it meant being with Faith.

  As she came back out of the toilet block Faith was still hovering around the hedge.

  She turned her face long enough for Missie to take off the other way.

  She saw the open, scrolled gateway of the park and ducked across the entrance. There was a shelter shed beyond it and she’d hide out there until it was time to go.

  At least, that was where she intended to go but as she ducked past the gate she saw a cage. A proper cage. Tall and zoo-like. It was huge and divided up into sections with lots of bushes in between.

  She paused.

  And there, in the centre of the parkland, was a pond. All around it were bushes and tall reeds that grew even taller out towards the centre.

  It was lovely.

  She looked back to the cage. A bird was calling. An exotic call that sounded like something from the ‘Jungle Jim’ films. It called again as if it was seeking its mates and Missie was drawn by something sad at the centre of its cry.

  She checked behind her. Just to make sure.

  Other kids were wandering around inside their boundary. They were sharing bags of lollies and chucking stones or playing tag. Nobody was taking any notice of her and she needn’t have hurried. She did, though. The thought of that cage and what might be in it put a quickness, a stealthiness in her step so she wouldn’t be called away before she had time to look.

  It was immediately quieter inside the gates. Almost as if the fence soothed any sound that dared to enter. Missie walked up on the grass. The sound of her footsteps on gravel seemed harsh and unwelcome.

  She wandered first to the bird. It clung by its claws to the mesh of the cage. A lovely black cocky that examined her before throwing its head back and howling a long mournful cry.

  She stayed with it until its cry forced her to see the open, red plains and dry places that should have been its home. It was too awful to stay and she drifted to another cage that was shielded by crops of densely leafed shrubs. More birds. Smaller this time and noisier. And more content with their imprisonment. They chattered and quarrelled and if Zill had been here they’d be cacking themselves laughing at the way those birds pushed each other off the perches trying to get a better spot.

  There were more bushes and another cage further around. They were in a circle, Missie could see now, with each cage separated from the rest by the stands of tightly packed bushes. To get to the open mesh side of the next one it was necessary to walk back out to the path and along and then back in again.

  And each time she did that there was more than a fair chance that she’d be seen by one of the teachers strolling, emu-like, across the gates. But if she wriggled beneath the bushes and the tree, she could see the cage right there.

  When she’d last looked kids were still messing around out there so the whistle hadn’t been blown.

  It’d be getting late, though, and she wanted to see the next cages before she had to leave.

  She grabbed her dress and wrapped it like a nappy and duck-walked under the bushes to the next cage.

  And saw Max.

  Not there under the bushes. He was standing looking across at something further away beyond her line of vision. He couldn’t see her but if she’d stood and walked around on the path she’d definitely have been spotted.

  He was puffing. And his face looked hot. And he was clutching at something being held as high above his head as possible.

  Missie wriggled into the centre of the bush. It was hollowed out under there, like the cubbies they’d built.

  Another boy was holding Buster!

  She double-checked. It was definitely Buster. Max must have hidden him in his satchel. Well, of course he would. He never went anywhere without Buster. The one time that Missie could remember Max being invited to sleep at his friend’s house, Aunt Belle had said Buster couldn’t go. So neither did Max.

  The boy refused to hand Buster across. Max leapt and tried to snatch it free. He didn’t cry or plead or do anything like that. While Missie watched he battled silently, pushing and tucking and failing.

  ‘Come on!’ Missie heard the call from boys who appeared from the other side of the pond. They were headed out to the gate. ‘You’ve got to come now! Sir said!’

  The boy pushed his hand into Max’s face, holding him back. He was tall and lanky and had glossy hair that swung in loose, sheeny white-blond strands across his face. He kept hold of Max with one hand and with the other sent Buster sailing into the pond in one long lazy movement.

  Then, he let go. He brushed his hands off, one against the other, and gave Max one last shove for good measure, ran his fingers through his hair, lifting it back from his forehead, and took off.

  Max, already clambering down the bank to try to reach Buster and bring him back to the safety of his satchel, was halted. A teacher appeared from the other side of the fence and was hurrying towards him. He had on the long, black gown that the teachers from St Pat’s wore.

  ‘You! Boy!’ The teacher sprinted across the grass. Missie ducked further back.

  ‘What do you think you’re doing?’

  Max had scrambled back up and was doing his best to meet the teacher before he spotted Buster. It wasn’t going to help if everyone at school knew he’d taken a felt bunny to see the Queen.

  ‘Everyone’s lined up ready to leave!’ The teacher went on, scooping Max’s arm with one hand and his satchel up from the ground with
the other. ‘We’ve been looking all over for you! Get a move on, lad, or we’ll miss the train!’

  Max actually dug his heels in. For a moment he looked like he might break free. But the teacher held firm, jerking him forward so he had no other choice than to keep going.

  Missie moved forward.

  She’d get Buster back. Max’d never say thank you and he’d probably just tell her to piss off but she was sorry for him. Even the bird with the mournful cry seemed to be sending calls of dismay.

  Off into the distance she thought she heard a whistle blowing. There’d be time, though, if she hurried. And the St Pat’s boys were ahead of them in the line so there’d be more time because they were still being rounded up. It took ages, didn’t it, for a whole school to get moving.

  She scurried across to the pond. Up close it wasn’t deep. The reeds crowded together, sprouting their arms in all directions once they’d found room for their feet down there in the mud. She didn’t even need to take her shoes off, not if she bent the reeds and kept her weight back here near the grass.

  Buster was caught, hung between the green arms of the reeds, the sky and the smug slop of water that waited beneath him.

  She snatched him and felt one foot disappear into the goop.

  But she had him.

  She hated the feel of mud in her sock and hated more the way it looked but there was no time to take her shoe off and try and dry her foot. And it’d never dry anyway. It’d stick and grab at her wet sock and feel even worse, if that was possible, once she tried to put it back on again.

  She hurried towards the gate, her mind full of Max and how surprised he’d be when she handed Buster back.

  He’d been in here alone. Like her. He’d come in to have his lunch with Buster.

  So not alone then. Not like her at all. Max never needed anyone else. Not if he had Buster. He’d been released once they’d reached the gate and she’d seen him straighten up, pull his blazer down and square his shoulders. When he walked away his head had been held high and his arms taut as his sides. He didn’t look like a boy who’d just lost his favourite playmate.