La Belle Sauvage, Page 28

  "No, you can't have it," he said. "I'm going to find some wood and make a fire. You'll like that. When we're warm, we can..."

  He didn't know how to finish the sentence. He had never felt so frightened. But why? The danger was gone.

  "Alice," he said, "are you scared?"

  "Yeah. But not much. If it was just me, I would be. But not so much with us both...."

  He set off up the little slope towards the wood. The trees clustered so close and thick that he could hardly force his way between them, and when he did, the leaves scratched his hands and his head; but this was a relief. Any activity was a relief. And there were dry branches enough on the ground, and dry sticks, and soon he'd gathered an armful.

  But when he came out of the trees, he found Alice on her feet, desperate.

  "What is it?"

  "They're coming back--"

  She pointed. In the direction they'd come from, there was a light on the water--the searchlight--and although it was still some way off, the boat had the air of something official, the police, the CCD; it was searching for something or someone. It was coming, not fast but inexorably, and it would see them very soon.

  And at that there was a rustling among the leaves, and the branches parted, and a man stepped out.

  "Malcolm," said the man, "get your boat further in the trees, quick. Bring the baby in here out the way. That's the CCD down there. Come on!"

  "Mr. Boatwright?" said Malcolm, utterly astonished.

  "Yes, that's me. Now hurry up."

  While Alice ran with Lyra up to the shelter of the trees, Malcolm untied La Belle Sauvage and, with George Boatwright's help, pulled it up the slope and under the low branches before taking Bonneville's rucksack and turning the canoe upside down in case it rained again.

  Meanwhile, the boat with the searchlight was getting closer.

  "How d'you know it's the CCD?" he whispered.

  "They been patrolling. Don't worry. If we keep still and quiet, they won't stop."

  "The baby--"

  "Drop o' wine'll keep her quiet," said Boatwright, handing something to Alice.

  Malcolm looked around. There was no one to see but Boatwright and a score of shadows, but then the moon went in again and the shadows dissolved in a deeper darkness. The boat with its searchlight moved closer.

  "Where's Alice?" Malcolm whispered to Asta.

  Almost inaudibly his daemon murmured, "Further in. Giving Lyra a drink."

  The men in the boat had seen something that interested them. The searchlight was turning towards the shore, and then shining straight up into the trees. Malcolm felt as if every inch of him was visible.

  "Keep still and they won't see a thing," muttered George Boatwright from the darkness.

  A voice from the boat said, "Is that footprints?"

  "Where?" said another.

  "On the grass. Down there--look."

  The searchlight swung down. The voices spoke again more quietly.

  "Will they--" Malcolm began to whisper, but Boatwright's hard smoky-smelling hand shut his mouth.

  "Don't bother with it," one of the voices said. "Come on."

  Then the light swung away and the engine noise rose, and the boat steadily moved away. A minute later it had vanished on the flood.

  Boatwright took his hand away. Malcolm could hardly speak. He was shaking in every limb. He stumbled, and Boatwright caught him.

  "When'd you last eat or sleep, eh?" he said.

  "Can't remember."

  "Well, thassit, then. Come along here and have a bit of stew. Eh, your mum'd be proud of a stew like we got in the cave. Want me to carry that?"

  The rucksack was heavy, but Malcolm shook his head, and then said, "No," realizing that subtle gestures were lost in the dark. He struggled to put his arms through the straps, and Boatwright helped him. A few paces further on there was a little clearing, where Alice was sitting on a fallen tree trunk with Lyra, who was fast asleep on her lap. She'd been feeding her with a teaspoon from a bottle of wine.

  When Alice saw Malcolm, she got to her feet at once and came to his side, Lyra tight in her arms.

  "Here, take Lyra. I got to pee...."

  She thrust the child at him and darted into the undergrowth. Trembling or not, Malcolm held on to the child as firmly as he could and listened to her contented breathing. "We ought to've given you wine before," he said to her. "You're sleeping like a baby."

  Boatwright said, "Five minutes' walk, lad. You want to bring anything else from the canoe?"

  "Will it be safe?"

  "It's invisible, son. Can't get safer'n that."

  "Good. Well...there's things for the baby. Alice knows what they are."

  She came back at that moment, brushing her skirt down, and having heard what they said, she gathered an armful of things: a pillow, blankets, the saucepan, a packet of nappies, a box of milk powder....But she was trembling as much as Malcolm.

  "Spread that blanket out on the ground," said Boatwright, and when she did, he packed everything in the center, gathered in the four corners, and swung the bundle over his shoulder. "Now follow me."

  "You all right carrying her?" Alice whispered.

  "For a bit, yeah. She's fast asleep."

  "We oughter tried wine before...."

  "That's what I thought."

  "I dunno what effect it'll have on her insides. Here, let me take her. You got that rucksack. Where'd you get it anyway? Is it his?"

  "Yeah," said Malcolm. "From his boat."

  He was glad to hand the child over, because the rucksack was heavy. He had no idea why he'd taken it, except as something to bargain with. Perhaps they wouldn't need it now. Maybe Bonneville was a spy, in which case Dr. Relf would be interested in it.

  But that made his throat catch. Just the thought of those cozy afternoons in that warm house, talking about books, hearing about the history of ideas! And he might have to be a fugitive for the rest of his life, an outlaw, like Mr. Boatwright. It was all very well in the flood, when everything was upside down, but when the water retreated and normal life emerged...Well, actually, nothing would be normal and safe ever again.

  After some minutes' walking, they came to a larger clearing in front of a rock that rose sheer from the ground. The moon had come out again, and in its silver light they saw the entrance to a cave half hidden behind the undergrowth. The smoke of a fire was drifting through the air, with various good smells of meat and gravy, and the sound of quiet voices.

  Mr. Boatwright lifted a heavy sheet of canvas and held it open for Malcolm and Alice. They went in, and all conversation stopped. In the light of a lantern, they saw half a dozen people, men and women and two children, sitting on the floor or on wooden boxes, eating from tin plates. Beside the fire was a large woman whom Malcolm recognized: Mrs. Boatwright.

  She saw Alice first and said, "Alice Parslow? That en't you, is it? I know your mam. And you're Malcolm Polstead from the Trout--well, God bless me. What's going on, George?"

  George Boatwright said, "Survivors on the flood, they are."

  "You can call me Audrey," said the woman, getting to her feet. "And who's this? He? She?"

  "She," said Malcolm. "Lyra."

  "Well, she needs a clean nappy. We got warm water over here. You got food for her? It'll have to be milk powder--oh, you got some. That'll do. I'll put a saucepan on to boil while you change her and clean her. Then you can both have a bite to eat yourselves. You floated all the way from Oxford? You must be worn out. Eat, then sleep."

  "Where are we?" said Malcolm.

  "Somewhere in the Chilterns. That's all I know. Safe for the time being. These other folk, they're all like us, in the same position kind of thing, but you don't inquire too close--it en't polite."

  "All right," said Alice.

  "Thank you," said Malcolm, and went with Alice to a corner of the cave away from the people who were eating.

  Audrey Boatwright brought a lantern and hung it up. In its warm light, Alice set about undoing Lyra's s
opping clothes and handing the stinking bundle to Malcolm.

  "Her dress and everything's all...," he said.

  "I'll wrap her in the blanket for now and dress her properly when it's aired out a bit or washed if we can."

  Malcolm took the soggy bundle and carefully separated what was to be thrown away and what was to be washed. He looked around, wondering what they did with rubbish, and found a boy of about his own age looking at him.

  "You want to know where to throw it?" the boy said. "Come with me. I'll show you. What's your name?"

  "Malcolm. What's yours?"

  "Andrew. That your sister?"

  "What, Alice? No..."

  "I mean the baby."

  "Oh. We're just looking after her in the flood."

  "Where you from?"

  "Oxford. You?"

  "Wallingford. Look, you can throw that in the pit there."

  The boy seemed to want to be helpful, but Malcolm wasn't inclined to talk. All he wanted to do was sleep. Still, on the principle of not making enemies, he let the boy guide him back to the cave and exchanged a question or two.

  "Are you here with your parents?" Malcolm asked.

  "No. Just my auntie."

  "Did you get flooded out?"

  "Yeah. Lots of people in our street got drowned. There's never been such a flood since Noah's time, prob'ly."

  "Yeah, I wouldn't be surprised. It won't last long, though, I don't suppose."

  "Forty days and forty nights."

  "You reckon? Oh--yeah," said Malcolm, remembering his Bible lessons.

  "What's the baby's name?"

  "Lyra."

  "Lyra...And who's the big girl? Did you say her name was Alice?"

  "She's just a friend. Thanks for showing me the pit. G'night."

  "Oh, g'night," said Andrew, sounding a little put out.

  Alice was feeding Lyra, sitting under the lantern light, looking exhausted. Audrey Boatwright came over with two tin plates heaped with stew and potatoes, steaming hot.

  "Give her to me," she said. "I'll finish her off. You need to eat."

  Alice handed the child over without a word, and started to eat, as Malcolm had already done. He had never felt so hungry, never felt his hunger so gratified, not even in his mother's kitchen.

  He finished the stew and almost immediately felt his eyes closing. But he managed to force himself awake enough to take Lyra from Audrey, who was patting her back, and carry her to where Alice was already curling up on the floor.

  "Here," said Mr. Boatwright, handing him a bundle of blankets and canvas bags roughly filled with hay. With the last of his wakefulness, Malcolm pushed them into shape and laid them side by side, and then, putting Lyra between them, lay down next to Alice and fell at once into the deepest sleep of his life.

  --

  And it was Lyra who woke them when the gray light of a wet dawn crept into the cave. Asta sleepily nipped Malcolm's ear, and he came awake like someone struggling to swim to the surface of a lake of laudanum, where the strongest delights were the deepest and there was nothing above but cold and fear and duty.

  Lyra was crying, and Asta was trying to comfort Pan, but the little ferret wouldn't be comforted and burrowed closer around Lyra's neck, only irritating her further. Malcolm, heavy-eyed, forced himself up and rocked the child gently to and fro. That didn't help either, so he picked her up.

  "You been productive in the night," he whispered. "I never knew such a fountain of manure. I'll have to see if I can do the changing of the guard myself. Alice is still asleep, see."

  She was a little happier in his arms, but not much. She whimpered instead of crying fully, and Pan looked out and let Asta lick his nose.

  "What you doing?" mumbled Alice, and instantly her daemon was awake and growling softly.

  " 'S all right," said Malcolm. "I'm going to change her, that's all."

  "You can't," said Alice, sitting up. "You'll do it all wrong."

  "Yeah, I prob'ly would," said Malcolm with some relief.

  "What's the time?"

  "About dawn."

  They spoke in the quietest of whispers; neither wanted to wake the other sleepers. Gathering a blanket around her shoulders, Alice crawled to the fire and put another log on the ashy heap, stirring it until she found a few red embers, and put the saucepan on to heat. There was a cask of fresh water nearby; Audrey had said that anyone who used some had to refill it from the spring outside, so she made sure to do that while waiting for the saucepan to heat up.

  Meanwhile, Malcolm walked up and down with Lyra. They went to the mouth of the cave and looked out at the rain, heavy, incessant, falling straight down through the sodden air. They looked back into the cave, where sleepers lay on both sides, some alone, some snuggled up together. There were more of them than he'd been aware of the night before; perhaps they'd already been there, fast asleep, or perhaps they'd come in later on. They might have been poaching. If the flood had forced deer and pheasants as well as people high up above their usual dens and nests, there should be plenty of them around to catch.

  He whispered all this to Lyra, rocking her from side to side as he walked about. At one point, Asta whispered, "Look at Pan," and Malcolm noticed that the little daemon, kitten-shaped, was unwittingly kneading the flesh of Malcolm's hand with his tiny claws. Malcolm felt astonished, shy, privileged. The great taboo against touching another's daemon was not instinctual but learned, then. He felt a wave of love for the child and her daemon, but that made no difference to them, because Lyra was still grizzling and Pantalaimon soon let go of Malcolm's hand and became a toad.

  And then the fear came back. What they'd done to Bonneville...When the CCD men in their boat found the daemon with the shattered leg and the man with a wound in his thigh, they'd have one more reason to hunt Malcolm and Alice down. Was the knife still in the wound? Was Bonneville actually dead? He couldn't remember. Everything had passed with such nightmarish speed.

  "Ready," said Alice very quietly behind him, and he nearly leapt in the air with shock. But she didn't laugh. She seemed to know just what he was thinking, and to be thinking the same herself. The look they exchanged in the mouth of the cave before going back to the fire was something Malcolm never forgot: it was deep and complex and close, and it touched every part of him, body and daemon and ghost.

  He knelt beside her, and he and Asta occupied Lyra's attention while Alice washed and dried her.

  "You can see her thinking, even though she hasn't got any words," he said.

  "Not this end," said Alice shortly.

  One or two sleepers were beginning to stir as the light grew stronger. Malcolm took the bundle to be thrown away and tried to move very quietly as he carried it out to the pit the boy had shown him.

  "I didn't see him in the cave," Asta whispered.

  "Perhaps he sleeps somewhere else."

  They found the rubbish pit and hurried back because the rain was drenching. When they got there, Audrey was holding Lyra, who seemed comfortable enough, even if a little doubtful, while Alice prepared the milk.

  "Who's her mother?" Audrey said, settling herself next to the fire.

  "We don't know," said Malcolm. "She was being looked after by the nuns at Godstow, so she must be someone important."

  "Oh, I know the ones you mean," said Audrey. "Sister Benedicta."

  "Yes, she's in charge. But it was Sister Fenella who looked after her mostly."

  "What happened?"

  "The priory collapsed in the flood. We just got her out in time. Then we got swept away."

  "So you don't know who her family is?"

  "No," said Malcolm. He was getting better at lying.

  Audrey handed the child over to Alice, who had the bottle ready. A little way off, Mr. Boatwright stood up and stretched and went out of the cave, and others were stirring.

  "Who is everyone?" said Malcolm. "Is it all your family?"

  "There's my son, Simon, and his wife and two little kids. The others are...just others."
<
br />   "There's a boy called Andrew. I spoke to him last night."

  "Yes, he's Doris Whicher's nephew. That's Doris over there by the big rock. They come from Wallingford way. My, she's hungry, en't she?" she said admiringly, watching Lyra's lusty guzzling.

  Doris Whicher was still asleep. There was no sign of Andrew.

  "I don't suppose we'll stay long," said Malcolm. "Just till the rain's stopped."

  "You stay as long as you need to. You'll be safe here. No one knows about this place. There's a few of us got reason to be careful who knows where they are, and we en't lost anyone yet."

  Mr. Boatwright came out of the rain carrying a dead chicken.

  "Know how to pluck a chicken, Malcolm?" he said.

  Actually, Malcolm did, because of watching Sister Fenella doing it in the priory kitchen. He'd done it once or twice in his mother's kitchen too. He took the bird, a scrawny item, and set to work while Mr. Boatwright sat down and stirred the fire up before lighting a pipe.

  "What'd they say after I vanished, eh?" he said. "Anyone guess where I'd gone?"

  "No," said Malcolm. "They all said you were the only person that had ever got away from the CCD. And the officers came back the next day and asked a lot of questions, but no one said anything, except one or two said you had evil dark powers, like making yourself invisible, and the CCD had no hope of finding you, ever."

  Mr. Boatwright laughed so much he had to put his pipe down.

  "Hear that, Audrey?" he wheezed. "Invisible!"

  "I wish you was inaudible sometimes," she said.

  "No," he went on, "I been preparing for summat like that. You got to have an escape route, no matter where you are. Always have an escape route. And when the time comes, don't hesitate a single second. Eh, Audrey? We had our escape route and we took it that same night the bastards come to the Trout."

  "Did you come straight here?"

  "In a manner of speaking. There's hidden pathways and hidden refuges, all across the woods, all across Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire and Berkshire and beyond. You could go from Bristol to London by them hidden pathways and no one'd ever know you were doing it."

  "What happened when the flood came?"

  "Ah, all we done was go up higher. This spot where we are now is the highest piece of land in Berkshire. We know all the shortcuts and the shallow ways and the deep ways. We can always slip away and they'll never catch us. And the water's on our side, not theirs."

  "I don't understand," said Malcolm, turning the chicken over.

  "The creatures in the water, Malcolm. I don't mean fish neither, nor water voles; I mean the old gods. Old Father Thames, I seen him a few times, with his crown and his weeds and his trident. He's on our side. The bloody CCD, they won't never win against Old Father Thames. And other beings as well. There was a man with us, he saw a mermaid near Henley. The sea was so full she come right up the river, even that far from the coast, and this chap, he swore to me that if he saw that mermaid again, he'd go off with her. Well, two days later he disappeared, and chances are he did just that. I believe it, anyway."