Chapter 22
Poppy thought she must be hallucinating. She shook her head, swivelled round on the boulder and looked again, expecting to see nothing but fog. Not so. Standing about five metres away was the head of a ghost horse, looking straight at her. Cloud? No, it couldn’t be. Poppy rubbed her eyes, but he was still there when she opened them. Squinting into the mist she could just make out the outline of his body. Not a phantom at all.
“Cloud!” Poppy whispered. She slid off the boulder and walked slowly up to him, her hand outstretched. He stood still, lowering his head as she came close, letting her stroke him.
Tears streamed down her cheeks.
“I can’t find Charlie, Cloud. He’s gone. I don’t know what to do,” she sobbed into his damp neck. She felt him begin to move away from her. “Please don’t leave me, Cloud. I’m so scared,” she hiccupped through her tears. The pony stopped. She walked towards him, but as soon as she reached him he set off again, walking a few paces into the mist before stopping and turning to look at her. It was as if he wanted her to follow him.
After about half a mile Cloud came to a halt. Poppy stood next to him, her right hand resting lightly on his withers. In front of them was a sheer drop, a cliff of granite left by quarrymen two centuries earlier and now as much a part of the Dartmoor landscape as the tors that towered, unseen, above them. In the mist Poppy couldn’t tell how deep the quarry was. She could hear Cloud breathing. She looked at him, hoping she wasn’t about to send him galloping for the hills. She took a deep breath and yelled as loudly as she could.
“CHAR-LIE!”
The sound reverberated around the old quarry. Cloud stiffened beneath her hand, but didn’t move. She called again, louder this time. As the echoes died away she thought she heard something. She called once more. This time she definitely heard an answering shout coming from the bottom of the quarry.
“Poppy! Is that you?”
“Charlie! I’m here! What happened? Are you OK?”
“I’m alright. I was looking for the big cat when I fell down this cliff. I haven’t hurt myself but I couldn’t climb back up again. I thought I might be here all night.” His voice sounded ragged and Poppy felt her heart contract.
“Don’t worry, I’m here now. And guess who helped me find you?”
“Was it Cloud? He was with me before. He came right up to me and I stroked his nose. I didn’t find the big cat but I did find Cloud for you.”
Poppy looked at the pony and then down into the quarry. Below her feet the rain-sodden grass gave way to a giant slab of granite which marked the edge of the quarry.
“Charlie, how far down did you fall, can you remember?” she called.
“Um. You know how high the roof of Chester’s stable is?”
Poppy thought, that’s not so bad.
“About four times as high as that.”
Oh.
“But the bottom was more of a slope than a drop. I was doing my stuntman roll, otherwise I would’ve probably stopped sooner.”
“Your stuntman roll?” she asked incredulously. Only Charlie could be thinking of stunts at a time like this.
“It’s to stop you breaking any bones. You tuck up, then roll down the hill.” Poppy could only assume her brother was giving a practical demonstration to the nearest sheep. But this wasn’t getting them anywhere.
“Charlie, listen. I’m going to come down to get you. I’ve got a couple of lead ropes to help get you up safely.” She looked at Cloud again. His solid strength was so reassuring she couldn’t face the thought of leaving him. It was probably the last chance she would have to catch him and return him to Riverdale before the drift. She couldn’t bear the thought of him back at George Blackstone’s farm. But she had to help Charlie.
Poppy clung to the pony’s neck and whispered, “Stay safe, Cloud.” He whickered softly and she reluctantly let him go. She took a couple of steps forward and sat on the edge of the quarry. She felt the unyielding stone beneath her as she turned onto her front and slithered down. For one terrifying moment she felt nothing but air beneath her feet as she dangled like a string puppet over the edge of the cliff. Her fingers curled around the root of an old gorse bush and she held on desperately while her feet struggled to find a foothold among the seams of granite.
“Poppy! Are you coming?” Charlie shouted from somewhere below.
“Yes. I’m on my way,” she called back, resisting the urge to look down. Her feet found a crevice and she edged her way along it until she felt a slab of stone sticking out like a shelf. She stepped onto it gratefully. Her arms and legs felt like jelly and her fingers were numb.
“Not far now!” she called to her brother in a voice that sounded a lot braver than she felt. Once more she turned over and inched her way over the drop.
“I can see your wellies!” cried Charlie.
If Charlie could see her feet Poppy calculated that she couldn’t have too far to fall. She took a deep breath and let go of the rock shelf, waiting for the ground to hit her. When she landed it was onto a gorse bush which ripped her waterproof coat. She felt its thorns tear her cheek as she tumbled onto the boggy grass beneath. Charlie ran up to her, appearing out of the fog like a tornado. He had painted his face with streaks of green and black and was wearing his camouflage trousers and a green waterproof coat. He would have been impossible to spot even on a clear day.
“Poppy!” He launched himself at her. She opened her arms and held him tightly. His face felt icy. He wriggled out of her grasp and looked at her, his blue eyes widening. “You’re bleeding!”
“Am I?” She felt her cheek. It was wet. She looked at her scarlet hand and back at Charlie. “I’m fine,” she answered. “But are you OK?”
“I ate the sausages I was going to use as bait for the big cat but they’ve made me really thirsty and I forgot to bring a drink. And I’m freezing. I think I’d like to go home now,” he said. Together they looked up at the side of the quarry. The sheer granite looked as impenetrable as the walls of a castle. Poppy thought carefully. Even with the two lead ropes she doubted they would be able to climb even half way up the cliff. How on earth were they ever going to get out?
“Hold on a minute. Did you say Cloud came to you when you were down here?” she asked.
“Yes. He came so close I was able to stroke him. He wasn’t frightened at all.”
“There’s no way Cloud could have made it down that drop. It means there must be another way out of the quarry.” Poppy rubbed her cheek again and considered. “If this was a quarry they must have got the granite out somehow. I bet there’s a path, maybe even an old railway track. We just need to find it.”
Shivering, Charlie looked at his sister. “Maybe we could look for Cloud’s hoofprints? They might show us the way.”
“Yes, that’s a good idea. Wait - I have a torch somewhere.” She fished about in the pocket of her waterproof. “Here it is. I thought it might come in useful.”
Together they searched for Cloud’s hoofprints, using the beam of the torch to light the ground. But the peaty soil was so waterlogged it would have been impossible to make out the footprints of an elephant, let alone a pony.
Poppy began to lose hope that they’d ever find their way out.
“I’m so tired. Can’t we find somewhere to sit down for a while? Just until the sun comes out?” Charlie wheedled. Poppy knew she had to keep her brother moving. She took his hand. His teeth had started to chatter.
“You’re freezing. Take my coat, that’ll warm you up a bit. Let’s sing a song to keep us going. You choose.” And so to Ten in a Bed they carried on tramping through the fog away from the granite cliff-face. Occasionally a startled sheep would leap out of their path and once they heard the plaintiff caw of a rook flying overhead. Progress was slow. Charlie, normally so full of bounce, was lethargic. Every now and then he would plead with her to stop for a rest. Finally she relented and they found a boulder to perch on.
“Just for five minutes,” she told him firmly, wrapping her
arm around him in an attempt to keep him warm. “I wonder if the search and rescue people are out looking for us,” she thought out loud. “Maybe they’re only minutes away. I expect they have one of those big St Bernard dogs with them with a barrel around his collar filled with chocolate.” She attempted a smile.
“Do you think they might be? I hope so. I miss mum.”
“So do I,” said Poppy, knowing it was true.
“Do you think we’ll ever get home?” he asked sleepily.
Poppy gave her brother a squeeze. “Of course we will. I promised mum I’d look after you, didn’t I?” She’d tried the word experimentally. It didn’t sound as awkward as she’d thought it might. A few minutes later, as she rubbed her hands together in a feeble attempt to warm her freezing fingers, she noticed his head droop forward.
“Charlie!” she said urgently. “Don’t fall asleep. We need to keep moving.” She pulled him to a standing position and held onto him as he started swaying. She took his hand and they stumbled on through the fog. Then suddenly she stopped.
“Wait a minute. Isn’t this the rock we had our picnic on? We can’t be far from Riverdale.”
Charlie, still shivering, shrugged his shoulders. He looked utterly defeated. “I don’t want to walk any more. I just want to go to sleep,” he whined, his bottom lip wobbling.
Feeling increasingly desperate Poppy tried to adopt Caroline’s calm manner. “Charlie, we are nearly home, I promise. Just a little bit further, then you can go to bed with a lovely hot water bottle. Think how nice that’ll be.”
A cry pierced the gloom but Poppy dismissed it as another rook, wheeling overhead. They continued trudging wearily on. But the call was followed by another, louder this time. Poppy listened hard with blood pounding in her head, her senses on full alert. Please let it be help, she thought. For Charlie’s sake.