Deeper Than Blood



  Deeper Than Blood

  Antony Bennett

  Copyright 2012

  Chapter 1

  _______________________

  The old farmhouse, once such a familiar part of my childhood, has been devastated by the blaze. The thick stone walls are scorched and fatally cracked, there are deep oblong gaps where the windows used to be, and all that survives of the roof are smouldering rafters, picked clean of their slates, jutting black and naked into the pale dawn sky.

  This was a bad one, all right. Admittedly, after ten years with Red Watch, I've seen worse blazes than this, but never one that had such a painful claim on my emotions, never one this personal.

  The rest of the Watch stand over by the fire engine, weary after last night's efforts, their helmets tipped back on their heads. They speak gravely about the old couple who perished and hand round a pack of cigarettes.

  I'm the only one in front of the farmhouse. For the moment, thankfully, the others appear to have forgotten me.

  The front door yawns open, enticing me inside.

  I walk nervously towards the house, my boots crunching on fragments of slate and shattered glass. This is a bad idea and I know it - I'm breaking every regulation in the book - but at the same time, I can't help myself.

  For the first time in years I picture Hillie's worried face and hear her voice in my head. "I beg of you," she says, "don't go in there. Why dig up the past? What good can it do?"

  But the house has an irresistible pull. I have no choice. And besides, from what I can recall, Hillie's advice was largely unreliable anyway.

  Unseen, I cross the threshold and enter the gloomy hell of another world. It's hard to believe that a few hours ago this was someone's home. The air is chokingly warm and every surface is thick with grime. Filthy water bleeds through the ceiling, dripping on the brittle linoleum with a sharp tick, tick, tick.

  The hallway is long and narrow. If I remember correctly, the door to my left leads into the sitting room. I turn the tarnished handle and push, but the door is stubborn - its hinges have seized. Not easily dissuaded, I throw my shoulder against the bone-dry paneling, and with a loud crack the door quite literally falls open, crashing to the floor and sending up a gloomy cloud of soot.

  The sitting room is a ruined version of the one I knew.

  Nothing has actually been burnt - the fire ignited upstairs and spread ravenously up to the roof - but the damage down here is considerable just the same. The intense heat burst the pane from the window, and the smoke and smothering foam have tainted everything else. The walls are cluttered with dozens of different picture frames, their contents obscured by soot. They didn't used to be here. I know they didn't. The sitting room was always fairly Spartan. On the mahogany mantelpiece yet more frames stand in rank, these presumably the most cherished.

  Curious, I pick one up and rub its glass clean with my thumb.

  Revealed is a photograph of a scrawny blond-haired boy aged about nine or ten, grinning squintily in bright sunshine. I know him - or rather, I knew him. His name was Leo Blake, and back in the summer when this photograph was taken he was my best friend.

  Unsettled, I return the picture to its place on the mantelpiece.

  I should have realised. I don't know why I didn't.

  Every frame in this room will contain a photograph of Leo.

  This is his shrine.

  Chapter 2

  _______________________

  Leo Blake was weird. Anyone who knew him would tell you that. Of course, he had other qualities too - he was clever, kind-hearted, sensitive and wildly imaginative - but most people were blind to all but his weirdness.

  They never took the trouble to scratch beneath the surface.

  Leo, to borrow his own description, was something of a midget. He was dwarfed by his classmates at school and his head looked disproportionately big on his spindly body. He had the palest eyes that I have ever known - almost colourless - and stubborn, wheat-textured hair that no amount of combing would persuade to lie flat. He was incurably shy, and was so reluctant to draw attention to himself that he steadfastly refused to speak in company; which, coupled with his odd appearance, effectively rendered him an outcast.

  We first got to know one another after I saw him being bullied in a school corridor. Two older boys were roughing him up - shoving him back and forth, kicking at his ankles, tipping his books out of his bag - and he was suffering this indignity quietly and without complaint.

  It would give me a warm glow of pride to say that I charged in like some kind of hero, but that wasn't what happened. Instead, heeding a cowardly instinct for self-preservation, I hung back until the bullies got bored and wandered away before offering to help Leo pick up his books.

  "You OK?" I asked him.

  He nodded, eyes down. His chest wheezed asthmatically.

  "You should fight back," I told him. "Stand up for yourself."

  "It makes things worse," he mumbled.

  He tucked his bag under his arm (the strap had broken during the tussle) and started to walk away from me down the corridor. Then he paused and looked back. For a moment, I thought he might be about to thank me. Instead, he asked me a question so bizarre and so completely incongruous that I almost laughed.

  "Want to see a two-headed cow?"

  He took a cautious step back towards me, and then, with a surprising torrent of words, he explained that he lived on a dairy farm and that late last night one of the cows had given birth to a malformed calf. "Two heads," he emphasised, his eyes ablaze with rare excitement. "Want to see it?"

  How could any self-respecting schoolboy refuse an offer like that?

  To my disappointment, when we got to the farm later that afternoon the calf was dead. It had survived only a few pitiful hours before being put down. I had somehow expected to find it frolicking in a meadow, its twin heads lowing in unison. Instead, I was shown a cold carcass in a dank, foul-smelling cow shed. The calf's first head was normal in appearance, but the second was an undernourished horror: a blind lump of flesh, only half the size it should have been, hanging like a tumour from the poor creature's neck.

  A man's hand clasped my shoulder. It was Leo's father.

  "Shame the little chap had to die," he said. "One of God's creatures, after all. But the vet insisted. And who am I to argue with the vet?"

  He paused, and then asked: "Will you be staying for tea? We've scones and strawberry jam on the table."

  Chapter 3

  _______________________

  The flag-stoned kitchen, where I ate countless scones during that unforgettable summer, is the least damaged room in the Blake's burnt farmhouse.

  The pine table stands where it always did, as does the range, a motley collection of pots and pans dangling above it. In the deep, old-fashioned sink, waiting to be washed, are two baking tins, a wooden spoon and a mixing bowl.

  They make me think of Mrs Blake. No doubt she left them there to soak, not knowing that she would never be able to finish them off.

  She used to tease me about the amount of time that I spent at the farm. "You're getting to be one of the family," she would say, smiling fondly. "Leo's long-lost brother."

  I have to admit, the idea had a certain appeal.

  It's strange, but now I think about it, I can no longer recall the process of becoming such firm friends with Leo. It just happened. Perhaps new relationships are easier to forge when you're young. Certainly, the farm itself was a major attraction - it was a boy's paradise, all that open space, dirt, and machinery to revel in - but there was more to our friendship than merely that.

  Although Leo and I were roughly the same age, Leo, despite his stunted growth, always seemed much older than me. His mind was constantly active, challenging the
world around him, forming ideas and opinions far beyond his years. And he was blessed with a remarkable imagination. He could conjure up the most fanciful stories on the spur of the moment, and even when relating the truth, he had a gift for exaggeration that could twist the dullest tale into something funnier and more interesting to hear.

  Some people grow tiresome when you spend too much time in their company. With Leo, it was the opposite. The more I got to know him, the more I liked him. He was a complete one-off.

  His parents were clearly proud of him. They cared for him with a passion which at times seemed overwhelming. They did everything in their power to shield him from harm, and from the outside world in general, providing him with a secure cocoon in which he could grow up untroubled by pain.

  Ironically, it was that very air of protectiveness that nurtured Leo's fateful need to rebel. Leo hated to be cosseted. Absolutely hated it. And he responded by developing a secret desire for risk. He was never more alive than when flirting with danger.

  He always carried a pen-knife. To impress me, he used to splay his hand on the ground and stab the blade into the gaps between his fingers, going faster and faster until injury seemed unavoidable. Finally, perhaps inevitably, he misjudged the trick. The blade sliced into the little finger of his left hand, pinning it to the ground. He instinctively yanked his hand back in agony, ripping his finger so badly in the process that it later had to be amputated just above the knuckle.

  Leo was remarkably unconcerned about the loss. When the bandages came off, he displayed his three-fingered hand to me with evident pride.

  Mrs Blake, though, was horrified by the accident.

  Not only did she confiscate the pen-knife, but she also put every knife on the farm into a locked drawer and kept the key with her at all times. If anyone wanted to cut anything, they had to ask her permission first. She was determined that nothing like that would ever happen to her son again.

  Chapter 4

  _______________________

  "I hate them," Leo said one afternoon, the wind ruffling his blond hair.

  "Who?

  "Mum and Dad."

  "Rubbish," I said.

  "You don't know them like I do. They treat me like I'm four years old. Don't do this, don't do that. I'm ten. I can look after myself."

  We were sitting astride the corrugated-iron roof of the cow shed.

  Needless to say, Mr and Mrs Blake were not around to see us. They had gone into the village for half-an-hour, leaving us alone on the strict understanding that we would not stray from the farmyard. Well, we had complied with that request. Leo's cunning mind had worked out a route up to the roof - a route which made use of a conveniently parked tractor, a drainpipe, and an overhanging sycamore tree.

  The view alone was worth the effort. In one direction, the grey slate roofs of the village huddled together in the valley, and in the other, the shimmering sea could be seen in the gap between two distant hills.

  "Anyway," Leo said, picking tiny flecks of moss off the roof, "they're witches."

  "What?" I grinned at him, sensing the beginning of one of his imaginative tales.

  "Well, not proper witches. I mean, they don't fly around on broomsticks or anything. But sometimes, now and again, they use black magic to get what they want."

  "Yeah, right. Like what, for instance?"

  "Like me." A gust of wind buffeted us, briefly rippling our T-shirts.

  "They wanted a child," Leo explained. "And, I mean, they wanted one really badly. But they couldn't have one. At least, that's what the doctors said. All the experts gave up. So, when science let them down, they turned to sorcery instead - and hey presto, along came little me. If you ask me, that's what made me so funny-looking. I'm a runt. Nature never meant for me to be born."

  I gazed at Leo, for once stuck for words. His odd appearance was no longer noticeable to me, but evidently it was something that troubled him deeply - and he appeared to blame his parents.

  "You're not funny-looking," I said. "You're just … special."

  It was corny, I know, but it was the best I could manage, and amazingly it did the trick. Leo laughed. Then he spat into the palm of his hand and offered it to me. "Deeper than blood," he said.

  I spat into my hand, too, and we shook.

  "Deeper than blood," I repeated.

  It was an oath we we had initiated early in the summer. I can't remember now which of us thought of it, but it seemed a perfect symbol of our loyalty to one another.

  Suddenly, galvanised by some unspoken inspiration, Leo sprang to his feet. I thought he was going to climb back down to the ground, but instead he held out his arms like a tightrope walker and set off along the apex of the roof, placing his feet with theatrical poise, heading away from the overhanging sycamore branch that had delivered us here.

  "Leo, what are you doing?"

  "Getting a rush!" he said. "Adrenalin! You should try it some time!"

  A knot of dread tightened deep within me. The wind was in a playful mood - calm for minutes on end, then blasting at us out of nowhere. And the cow shed roof raked steeply away on either side without hope of a soft landing.

  "Be careful, Leo," I warned him, nervously.

  I should have known better.

  He threw me a furious glance, one that stung at my heart and made me wish I hadn't spoken. "You sound like my mum," he said, accusingly.

  Then, one perilous step after another, he continued on his way.

  The roof was unsafe, I was convinced of it. The small bolts securing the various corrugated panels had been weakened by rust, and the panels themselves had never been intended to bear weight - I could hear them creaking as he walked.

  As if seizing its chance, a strong gust rushed up the sloping roof and caught Leo at his most vulnerable - in mid stride. He instinctively planted both feet and swung his arms, trying to resist the breeze and maintain his balance. My heart froze as I watched him.

  His feet slipped and skidded.

  "Leo!" I yelled.

  To my surprise, Leo inexplicably regained his composure and looked back at me, his hands perched casually on his hips. He was grinning, quite unperturbed.

  "Gotcha!" he said. "Ha! You should see your face! You practically wet your pants!"

  "Oh, yeah?" I said, my face reddening, overcome with relief and ashamed by my display of fear. "Well, I take back what I said, Leo Blake. You're not special at all. You're weird - you're the weirdest person I know!"

  Leo laughed. "And proud of it!"

  In the distance, on the road leading to the farm, a bright flash caught my eye. It was a car windscreen glinting in the sun. Mr and Mrs Blake were coming home.

  "Leo! It's your mum and dad!"

  Leo glanced at the approaching car, then turned with impressive agility and hurried back towards me, his feet scarcely making a sound on the iron roof.

  I turned around too and shuffled in a clumsy panic towards the sycamore branch. My whole body was trembling. My pulse was racing. I didn't see how we could possibly get down in time. Then, just as I grabbed hold of the branch, I heard a noise - gunshot loud - that scared me to my core.

  I knew instantly, even without looking, what it was. As if to confirm my worst fears, there followed a muffled clanging din as a broken roof panel clattered to the floor deep inside the cow shed.

  I looked over my shoulder.

  Leo was nowhere in sight.

  The shock of that moment lives with me still. Sometimes, completely out of the blue, the awfulness of it will revisit me, seizing my heart, draining my limbs of strength, and I have to put aside whatever I am doing and wait for the feeling to pass.

  I remember every tiny detail.

  I wish I didn't.

  It was a hot day, the hottest for a long while, but high up there on that roof, suddenly alone, my skin was as cold as winter. I hardly dared move - hardly dared breathe - for fear that the roof would collapse beneath me too. I just sat there, stunned, probably in the early stages of shock, star
ing fixedly at the spot where Leo had dropped through the roof.

  I could hardly comprehend what had happened.

  There was a dark rectangular hole where the broken panel had been. At the bottom edge of the hole, I suddenly saw something move. My body jolted in surprise. There, hanging on - literally, for dear life – were three small fingers.

  "Leo!" I yelled.

  Instinct kicked in.

  I crawled frantically back along the roof, bruising my kneecaps and grazing my hands as I scrambled over the corrugated surface. But when I reached Leo, it quickly became apparent that my hurry had been pointless.

  There was nothing I could do for him.

  The hole measured a neat four feet by three. Not large, by any means, but too wide for me to reach across and grab Leo's hand. His fingers were bleeding, I noticed, his skin torn by the sharp-edged metal. Blood described a thin snake down his arm and dripped from his elbow.

  Incredibly, Leo made no sound.

  I remember thinking, if it were me, I would be screaming in terror and begging for some kind of miracle. But Leo simply hung there, perhaps already resigned to his fate. He slowly craned his neck and looked up at me. Our gazes locked for what felt like an age. And though it shames me to this day to admit it, I couldn't think of a single thing to say to him.

  Nothing. Not even an offer of false hope.

  We simply stared at one another.

  The Blake's car pulled into the farmyard, its tyres rattling over the cattle grid.

  A loud metallic snap startled me.

  The panel that Leo was hanging from had bent under his weight.

  It had creased downwards in an ominous V shape, and Leo's fingers were sliding, lubricated by their own blood, dragging agonisingly across the metal.

  More than anything else, in that last moment I wanted to reach out and grab his hand and somehow lift him to safety. But I couldn't do it.

  The distance between us was too great. There was no way to save him without putting my life in jeopardy too.

  He never took his eyes off me.

  I heard the Blakes get out of their car.

  I saw Leo slip and disappear.

  There was a terrible, breathless moment of stillness, as if the whole world had ceased to move - and then a hard, dull thud.