VIII
i
Burnt Yarley was too small to merit a policeman of its own; on the few occasions police assistance was needed in the valley, a car was dispatched from Skipton. Tonight the call went out at a little before eight—a thirteen-year-old boy missing from his home—and the car, containing Constables Maynard and Hemp, was at the Rabjohns residence by half past. There was very little by way of information. The lad had disappeared from his bedroom sometime between six and seven, approximately. Neither his temperature nor his medication were likely to have induced a delirium, and there was nothing to indicate an abduction, so it had to be assumed he’d left of his own volition, with his wits about him. As to his whereabouts, the parents had no clue. He had few friends, and those he had knew nothing. The father, whose condescending manner did nothing to endear him to the officers, was of the opinion that the boy had made for Manchester.
“Why the hell would he do that?” Doug Maynard, who had taken an instant dislike to Rabjohns, wanted to know.
“He hadn’t been very happy recently,” Hugo replied. “We’d had some hard words, he and I.”
“How hard?”
“What are you implying?” Hugo sniffed.
“I’m not implying anything; I’m asking you a question. Let me put it more plainly. Did you give the lad a beating?”
“Good God, no. And may I say I resent—”
“Let’s put your resentments over to one side for now, shall we?” Maynard said. “You can resent me all you like when we’ve found your kid. If he is wandering around out there then we haven’t got a lot of time. The temperature’s still dropping—”
“Would you kindly keep your voice down!” Hugo hissed, glancing toward the open door. “My wife’s in a bad enough state as it is.”
Maynard gave his partner a nod. “Have a word with her will you, Phil?”
“There’s nothing she knows that I don’t,” Hugo replied.
“Oh you’d be surprised what a child will tell one parent and won’t tell the other,” Maynard replied. “Phil’ll be gentle, won’t you, Phil?”
“Kid gloves.” He slipped away.
“So you didn’t hit him,” Maynard said to Hugo. “But you’ve had some words—”
“He’d been behaving like a damn fool.”
“Doing what?”
“Nothing of any significance,” Hugo said, waving the question away. “He went off one afternoon—”
“So he’s run away before?”
“He was not running away.”
“Maybe that’s what he told you. ”
“He doesn’t lie to me,” Hugo snapped.
“How would you know?”
“Because I can see right through the boy,” Hugo replied, giving Maynard the weary gaze he usually reserved for particularly slow students.
“So when he went off for the afternoon, do you know where he went?”
Hugo shrugged. “Nowhere, as usual.”
“If you were as communicative with your son as you’re being with me it’s no wonder he’s a runaway,” Maynard said.
“Where did he go?”
“I don’t need a lecture on parenting from the likes of you,” Hugo replied. “The boy’s thirteen. If he wants to go traipsing the hills that’s up to him. I didn’t ask for details. I was only angry because Eleanor was so upset.”
“You think he went onto the fells?”
“That was the impression I got.”
“So tonight he could be doing the same thing?”
“Well he’d have to be completely out of his mind to go up there on a night like this, wouldn’t he?”
“It depends how desperate he is, doesn’t it?” Maynard replied. “Frankly if I had you for a father I’d be suicidal.” Hugo began an outraged retort, but Maynard was already on his way out of the room. He found Phil in the kitchen, pouring tea. “We’ve got a hill search on our hands, Phil. You’d better see what help we can get locally.” He peered out of the window. “It’s getting worse out there. What state’s the mother in?” Phil made a face. “Out of it,” he said. “She’s got enough pills in there to sedate the whole bloody village. She must have been quite a looker too.”
“So that’s why you’re making her tea,” Doug replied, nudging him in the ribs. “You wait till I tell your Kathy.”
“Makes you wonder, eh?”
“What?”
“Rabjohns and her and the kid.” He stirred a spoonful of sugar into the tea. “Not a lot of happiness.”
“What’s your point?”
“Nothing,” Phil said, tossing the spoon into the sink “Just not a lot of happiness, that’s all.”
ii
It wasn’t the first time a search party had been organized in the valley. At least once or twice a year, usually in the early spring or late autumn, a fell-walker would be late returning to a rendezvous and, if the situation was deemed sufficiently serious, a team of volunteers would be drummed up to help with the search. The fells could be treacherous at such times—sudden mists swept in to obscure the way, scree and boulders could prove unreliable perches. Usually these incidents ended happily.
But not always. Sometimes a body came down from the hills on a stretcher. Sometimes—rarely, but sometimes—no trace was ever found, the victim gone into a crevice or a pothole and never retrieved.
At a little after ten Frannie heard cars in the street and got up out of bed to see what was going on. It wasn’t hard to guess.
There was a knot of perhaps twelve men—all bundled up against the blizzard—conferring in the middle of the street. Though they were some distance away and the snow was thick, she could name a few of them. Mr. Donnelly, who had the butcher’s shop, was recognizable (there wasn’t a bigger belly in the village, and his son Neville, with whom Frannie went to school, was shaping up the same way). She also recognized Mr. Sutton, who ran the pub, his big red beard as distinct as Mr. Donnelly’s stomach. She looked for her father, but she couldn’t see him. He’d broken his ankle playing football the previous August, and it was still giving him trouble, so Frannie assumed he’d decided (or been persuaded by her mom) not to join the search party.
The men were dividing up now; four groups of three and one group of two. She watched while they all trudged back to their cars and, with much shouting back and forth, got in. There was a small traffic jam in the middle of the street while some of the vehicles turned around and others came alongside one another so that drivers could exchange last minute instructions, but the street finally emptied, the sound of the car engines receding into silence as the searchers went their separate ways.
Frannie stood by the window watching the snow erase the crisscrossed tire marks in the street and felt faintly sick. Suppose something were to happen to one of the men, how would she feel then, when she’d watched them set off into the storm all the time knowing where Will had gone? “You’re a creep, Will Rabjohns,” she said, her lips touching the icy glass. “If I ever see you again, you’re going to be so sorry.” It was an empty threat, of course, but it comforted her a little to rage against him for putting her in this impossible situation. And for leaving her—that was even worse, in its way. She could bear the responsibility of silence, but the thought that he’d run off into the world and left her here when she’d gone to all the trouble, and the indignity, of making friends with him was unforgivable.
As she got back into bed, she heard her father’s voice downstairs. He hadn’t gone. That at least was some comfort to her.
She couldn’t catch what he was saying, but she was reassured by the slow, familiar rhythms of his voice and, soothed by them as surely as by a lullaby, she let her unhappiness go and fell asleep.
IX
i
The climb was not arduous for Will, not with Jacob at his side.
All the man had to do when the way became too steep or slippery was to lay his bare hand lightly on the back of Will’s neck, and a portion of Jacob’s strength would pass from fingers to nape, en
abling Will to match him stride for stride. Sometimes, after a touch like this, it seemed to Will he was not climbing at all, but gliding over the snow and rock, effortlessly.
The wind was too strong for words to be exchanged, but more than once he felt Jacob’s mind moving close to his. When it did, his thoughts went where they were directed: Up the slope, where their destination could be glimpsed on occasion; and down, into the valley they’d escaped, its petty perfection visible when the gusts dropped. Will was not shocked by this intimacy, mind with mind. Steep was unlike other people; Will had realized that from the very beginning. Living and dying, we feed the fire—that was not a lesson that just anybody could teach. He’d joined forces with a remarkable man, whose secrets would slowly be uncovered as they grew to know each other in the years to come. Nor would there be any limit to their knowing: That thought was clearer in his head than any other, and he was certain Steep had read it there. Whatever this man asked of him, he would supply. That was how it would be between them from now on. It was the least he could do, for someone who had already given him more than any other living soul.
ii
Down in the Courthouse, Rosa sat in the dark and listened. Her hearing had always been acute, sometimes distressingly so.
There were times—days, weeks even—when she would deliberately drink herself into a mild state of befuddlement (usually on gin, but scotch would do) in order to muffle the sounds that came at her from every direction. It didn’t always work. In fact it had backfired on her several times, and instead of dimming the din of the world it had simply stripped her of her power to control her own wits. Those were terrible times, sickening times.
She would rage around, threatening to do herself harm—pricking out her ears or plucking out her eyes—and might have done it too, if Jacob hadn’t been there to soothe her with a fuck. That usually did the trick. She’d have to be careful with the drinking in future, she mused, at least until she found someone to couple with her in Steep’s place. It was a pity the boy was so young, otherwise she might have toyed with him for a while. She’d have worn him out, of course, all too quickly. When on occasion she’d taken any man besides Steep to her bed, she’d always been disappointed. However virile, however heated they appeared to be, none of them had ever shown a smidgen of Jacob’s staying power.
Damn it, but she would miss him. He had been more than a husband to her, more than a lover; he’d been a goad to excess, calling forth all manner of behavior she’d never have dared indulge, much less enjoy, in any other company, man or beast.
Beast. Now there was a thought. Maybe she would be wiser looking for a fuck-mate outside her own species. She’d dallied with this before, a stallion called Tallis had been the lucky creature. But she hadn’t given the affair full rein, so to speak; it had seemed at the time a cumbersome way to be serviced, not to say unsanitary. With Jacob gone, however, she would certainly need to broaden her palate. Maybe with a little patience she’d find a creature the equal of her ardor, out in the wild.
Meanwhile, she listened: to the snow, falling on the Courthouse roof and on the step, on the grass, on the road, on the houses, on the hills; to a dog, barking; to cattle, lowing in a byre; to the babble of televisions, and the bawling of children, and somebody old and phlegmatic (she couldn’t tell whether it was a man or a woman; age eroded the distinctions) talking nonsense in his or her sleep.
Then, somebody closer. Footfalls on the icy road; a breath, snatched from chapped lips. No, it wasn’t one breath, it was two, both male. After a moment, one spoke.
“What about the Courthouse?” It was a fat man’s voice, she judged.
“I suppose we could take a look,” said the other, without much enthusiasm. “If the kid had some sense, he’d get out of the cold.”
“If he’d had some sense, the little bugger wouldn’t have run away in the first place.”
They’re coming in here, Mrs. McGee thought, rising from the judge’s chair. They’re looking for the child—compassionate men, how she loved compassionate men!—and they think maybe they’ll find him in here.
She brushed the hair back from her brow and pinched some color into her cheeks. It was the least she could do. Then she started to unbutton her dress, so as to hold their attention when they entered. Perhaps after all she would not have to stoop to barnyard couplings; perhaps two would replace the departed one, at least for tonight.
iii
The worst of the storm had cleared to the southwest by the time Will and Jacob came within sight of the summit. Through the thinning snow, Will saw that up ahead there was a stand of trees. Leafless, of course (what the season had not taken the night’s wind had surely stripped), but growing so close together, and sufficiently large in number that each had protected the other in their tender years, until they had matured into a dense little wood.
Now, with the gale somewhat diminished, Will asked a question out loud, “Is that where we’re going?”
“It is,” said Jacob, not looking down at him.
“Why?”
“Because we have work to do.”
“What?” Will asked. The clouds were coming unknitted over the heights, and even as he put this question a patch of dark star-pricked sky appeared beyond the trees. It was as though a door were opening on the far side of the wood, the sight so perfect Will almost believed it had been stage managed by Jacob. But perhaps it was more likely—and more marvelous, in its way—that they had arrived at this moment by chance, he and Jacob being blessed travelers.
“There’s a bird in those trees, you see,” Jacob went on.
“Actually there’s a pair of birds. And I need you to kill them for me.” He said this without any particular emphasis, as though the matter was relatively inconsequential. “I have a knife I’d like you to use for the job.” Now he looked Will’s way, intently. “Being a city boy you’re probably not as experienced with birds as you are with moths and such.”
“No, I’m not,” Will admitted, hoping he didn’t sound doubtful or questioning. “But I’m sure it’s easy.”
“You eat bird-meat, presumably,” Jacob said.
Of course he did. He enjoyed fried chicken and turkey at Christmas. He’d even had a piece of the pigeon pie Adele had made once she’d explained that the pigeon wasn’t the filthy kind he knew from Manchester. “I love it,” he said, the notion of this deed easier when he thought of a barbecued chicken leg. “How will I know which birds you want me to—”
“You can say it.”
“Kill?”
“I’ll point them out, don’t worry. It’s as you say: easy.” He had said that, hadn’t he? Now he had to make good on the boast.
“Be careful with this,” Jacob said, passing the knife to him. “It’s uncommonly sharp.”
He received the weapon gingerly. Was there some charge passed through its blade into his marrow? He thought so. It was subtle, to be sure, but when his hand tightened around the hilt he felt as though he knew the knife like a friend, as though he and it had some longstanding knowledge of one another.
“Good,” Jacob said, seeing Will fearlessly clasping the weapon. “You look as if you mean business.” Will grinned. He did; no doubt of it. Whatever business this knife was capable of, he meant.
They were at the fringes of the wood now and, with the clouds parted, the starlight polished every snow-laden twig and branch until it glittered. There remained in Will a remote tic of apprehension regarding the deed ahead—or rather, his competency in the doing of it; he entertained no doubts about the killing itself—but he showed no sign of this to Jacob. He strode between the trees a pace ahead of his companion and was all at once enveloped in a silence so profound it made him hold his breath for fear of breaking it.
A little way behind him, Jacob said, “Take it slowly. Enjoy the moment.”
Will’s knife hand had a strange agitation in it however. It didn’t want any delay. It wanted to be at work, now.
“Where are they?” Will whispered.
Jacob put his hand on the back of Will’s neck. “Just look,” he murmured, and though nothing actually changed in the scene before them, at Jacob’s words Will saw it with a sudden simplicity, his gaze blazing through the lattice of branches and mesh of brambles, through the glamour of sparkling frost and starlit air, to the heart of this place. Or rather to what seemed to him at that moment its heart: two birds, huddled in a niche at the juncture of branch and trunk. Their eyes were wide and bright (he could see them blinking, even though they were ten yards from him) and their heads were cocked.
“They see me,” Will breathed.
“See them back.”
“I do.”
“Fix them with your eyes.”
“I am.”
“Then finish it. Go on.”
Jacob pushed him lightly, and lightly Will went, like a phantom in fact, over the snow-decorated ground. His eyes were fixed on the birds every step of his way. They were plain creatures.
Two bundles of ragged brown feathers, with a silver of sheeny blue in their wings. No more remarkable than the moths he’d killed in the Courthouse, he thought. He didn’t hurry toward them. He took his time, despite the impatience in his hand, feeling as though he were gliding down a tunnel toward his target, which was the only thing in focus before him. If they fled now, they still could not escape him, of that he was certain. They were in the tunnel with him, trapped by his hunter’s will. They might flutter, they might peck, but he would have their lives whatever they did.
He was perhaps three strides from the tree—raising his arm to slit their throats—when one of the pair took sudden flight.
His knife hand astonished him. Up it sped, a blur in front of his face, and before his eyes could even find the bird the knife had already transfixed it. Though strictly speaking it had not been his doing, he felt proud of the deed.
Look at me! he thought, knowing Jacob was watching him.
Warn’t that quick? Warn’t that beautiful?