The Boy Who Flew

by Fleur Hitchcock

  It’s not Poll, it’s Tod.

  “Need your help, Athan,” he says. “Round at Mr Katz’s place. We’re knocking down a wall – bit heavy with just the two of us. He thought you might help?”

  “Thing is, Tod,” I say. “Poll’s out and I don’t want to leave Beatty on her own in the house with Grandma.”

  “I’ll be all right, Athan,” says Beatty. “You go and earn some money and gaze at Mary. I’ve got a sugar mouse to suck.”

  I carry her down to the kitchen and settle her by the range. Grandma’s there, stirring something.

  She glances up at me. “I’ll keep an eye on the fairy child, don’t you worry, boy.”

  For a moment I stand in the doorway, not sure if I should leave Beatty there, but she waves me away, picks up a scrap of newspaper and begins to fold a new bird.

  I follow Tod over the packed snow to New King Street. Although I’m wearing my new jacket and a muffler and my old leather boots, I’m still cold. The ice glitters like diamonds where there are house lights, and our feet crack through the top layer of snow into the dung underneath.

  In the distance something crashes.

  “Snow’s brought down a roof, I’ll guess,” Tod says, skidding on the ice.

  I think about the kite up there on the church tower, sagging with snow. “Do you think we could get the machine up into your loft?”

  “Tonight?”

  “We should move it as soon as we can,” I say.

  Tod pulls his jacket closer around his ears. “You’re right. After work?”

  The tiny pox-scarred woman I saw the first time is at Mr Katz’s house. She opens the door but disappears back down to the kitchen without saying a word.

  We stumble down the narrow stairs to what ought to be a kitchen, steam filled and well lit.

  Mary appears in the doorway opposite, her sleeves rolled up, a length of brass tubing in her arms.

  “Hello, Athan,” she says.

  I don’t know why I blush, I just do.

  Mary giggles and runs up the stairs.

  “Wilkommen, welcome, my good friend.” Mr Katz, now in shirtsleeves and a waistcoat, comes in through the garden door. As he does so, the steam floats out and the icy air rushes in to replace it. “How splendid. One minute and I’ll be back.” He grabs a hammer and dashes up the stairs.

  “Why’s he knocking down a wall?” I ask, closing the door.

  Tod takes off his jacket. “He wants to build a huge telescope, see further into the heavens than anyone’s ever seen before. Mary’s helping him build it – but the new one needs a space in the garden; there’s no room without knocking down the wall. If you go outside, you can take a look.”

  “D’you mean you’ve looked at the stars close up and you didn’t tell me?” I give Tod a shove. He staggers and shoves me back.

  “I didn’t see anything – it wobbled about and my eye hurt staring up at the black. But she spends hours out there. She’s lookin’ for comets.” Tod rubs his head. “Or meteors, or somethin’.”

  “Who?”

  “His sister, Caroline.” He nods over his shoulder towards the back door.

  “Go on, she won’t bite … much.”

  After the steam of the workshop, the outside air seems ferociously cold. I glance up. The sky glitters with stars and the moon hangs clear and impossibly clear.

  In the middle of the garden, a long wooden box points at the sky. I can’t see Caroline until a black bundle on the ground shuffles and a pale oval face appears.

  “You wish?” she asks me, and points at the wooden barrel. “Is good moon. Clear tonight, the sky?”

  I kneel down on the freezing snow, the cold soaking right through my breeches, and lay my head down on the wet ground so that I can get near the eyepiece. At first I can’t work out which eye I need to close, then I gaze into blackness before the end of the telescope explodes with silver light.

  I start. I stare.

  I’m amazed. This is the moon but it’s huge and pale, and as I gaze I see more lines and spots until it becomes like a mad embroidery of silver threads criss-crossing the circle of the lens.

  I stare until my eyes hurt.

  So bold in the blackness.

  So silver.

  So cold.

  I pull myself away so that I can look up at the sky without the tube. The moon’s just a pale white line in the sky now. Something far away and nothing to me. For a moment back then it seemed that I could touch it, understand its secrets. Fly to it.

  I’m about to have another look when Mr Katz and Tod appear beside me.

  “Right, boys, let us move this little wall out of the way. Ready?”

  Mr Katz doesn’t offer me work, but he does tip me a shilling. I slip the coin into my boot and wait for Tod on the doorstep.

  It’s cold and the gutters burn our fingers but we totter over the roof of the little chapel and into the church tower. The kite, sagging with snow, looks tattered and bedraggled. We’d put it up here to launch it but, as Mr Chen said, we’d need a gale from the right direction, and we don’t have the house as a workshop any more. There’s just no point in leaving it there.

  “Is it still all right?” asks Tod.

  I check the bamboo structure underneath. It weighs nothing, but it’s so strong it hasn’t even bent beneath the snowfall. “I reckon so,” I say. “I think we should drag it over to Mr Chen’s house, and then on down the row until the buildings get lower.”

  We shake the snow from the wings and I undo the ropes at the front of the kite so that the whole thing folds like an umbrella. Some of the fabric comes off, but we wrap it around and use the ropes to truss it all together.

  Tod scrambles across to Mr Chen’s roof and I feed the bundle over to him.

  “Shhh,” says Tod, and I look down to see a crack of light around the trapdoor below our feet. Then someone tries to open it.

  I’d forgotten that Mrs Love has let Mr Chen’s house again already.

  My weight is on the trap, so I lean a little and the person below gives up, presumably imagining the snow thicker and heavier than it is.

  We stand waiting as the square light fades, listening for footsteps. A candle makes its way down the house, reflecting off the wall all the way down until I see it shining into the back yard.

  “They’re in the kitchen,” I say. “Quick, let’s get this done.”

  It’s heavy, and cold, and soggy, but between us, dragging and pushing, we manage to get it over the high roofs until we’re able to drop down the lower ones. It’s all going really well until Tod moves too far ahead and loses his balance.

  He drops the kite and I watch his arms windmill. Then his whole body starts to tip.

  “Tod, no!”

  And he vanishes.

  I drop the kite and lean over the side of the roof.

  “Tod?”

  “Athan,” he calls from the darkness. There’s a sloshing sound.

  “Where are you?”

  “In the horse trough.”

  “Are you all right?”

  “Cold,” he says in answer, and I hear the shiver in his voice. “And stuck in this yard.”

  “There’s a pipe over the other side.” I point.

  Someone throws open a window.

  “What’s that racket? Someone there?”

  A dog begins to bark and another dog joins in.

  I hear Tod’s feet against the pipe as he clambers up and I move around the roofs until I can reach down and give him a hand.

  “Don’t tell Da,” he says, staggering to his feet on the roof.

  “Don’t tell Ma,” I say.

  We start again, slipping and skidding all the way, skinning fingers in the cold, pinching thumbs and swearing. Once we’re on the ground, we have to scuttle through the streets, lugging the folded kite, dodging sedan chairs and carriages until we reach the timber yard where we take it around the side, tiptoeing over the rotten wharf until we’re right below Tod’s loft built high above the river abo
ve the coffin shop and timber store.

  Tod shins up the back and drops a rope to me. I tie it around the tip of the kite and raise my hand. He pulls, and steadily the whole thing rises up the back of the building. Racing up the gutter I help him get it up the last few feet, pushing it away from the sides and then pulling it up.

  “One more heave,” he says.

  Together, we dig in our heels and drag, and apart from a distant sound of ripping, the kite glides obediently on to the flat roof.

  “Well,” says Tod, crumpling to the ground and letting go of the rope.

  “Yes,” I say. Taking off my jacket and muffler and letting out the heat.

  “We’ve got it,” he says. “Safe and sound.”

  “We have,” I say. “All we have to do is bring everything else up here. Fire her up and think of a way to launch her,” I say, remembering the showman and his felt balls. “Maybe we build a giant catapult.”

  “As easy as that,” says Tod, peeling off his wet breeches.

  “Yes,” I say, pushing all thoughts of the scarred stranger and the sharp-faced woman to the side. “As easy as that.”

  Chapter 14

  I’m thinking about catapults and moons and flight when I step into our shop. The door’s open and I stop to listen. A kind of wailing and grumbling rises up the kitchen stairs. I pull down the blinds and follow the sounds.

  It takes me a moment to work out what’s happening. In the centre of the room, Columbine Good is crouching between Beatty and the stove. On the floor is a jug of steaming yellow paste, and Columbine’s dipping lengths of bandage into it, then prodding them with a wooden spoon before hooking them out and draping them across Beatty’s legs.

  “Do you think it’s already working?” Grandma asks. She stands behind Columbine, her brown-spotted hands on her hips.

  “What’s she doing?” I ask.

  “Curing the fairy child – driving out the devils in her legs. Then we can swap her for the real Beatty. Send the changeling back.” Grandma moves between me and Columbine, who speeds up the wrapping.

  “Get off her. She’s not a changeling – she’s my sister.” I try to push Columbine away, but Grandma slaps me across my neck with the carpet beater.

  “Ow!” I push at Grandma, but she picks up a stool and jabs at me with the legs, driving it between me and Beatty. “The fairies are very clever, boy, they leave us with their cripple and take our strong baby to work as their slave.” She’s good with the stool, using it like a sword. “Now, you let us get on with it.”

  “No! This isn’t right – get off her!” I demand, just as Grandma swipes the stool up under my chin, sending me backwards across the kitchen.

  “Black mustard, iron filings and chillis,” answers Columbine. “S’worked afore, no reason to think it won’t. And the digitalis, she must drink the digitalis.”

  Digitalis, digitalis, what’s digitalis? I know I’ve heard of it. Shaking my head I get to my feet.

  “It stings,” says Beatty. Her face is red from tears.

  “Bound to,” Columbine says. “But it’ll be worth it to send you home. Mark my words.”

  “Take them off,” I say, finally getting a grip on the legs of the stool and shoving it and Grandma to one side. Leaning over, I grab at Columbine’s hands, trying to undo the knots holding the strips to Beatty’s feeble legs. Columbine stands back and I scrabble at the bandages. She passes Beatty a cup of something green. Beatty sips it and gags.

  “Don’t drink it,” I shout, and I remember what it is. “They’re poisoning you. It’s foxgloves.”

  Beatty leaves the cup on the side, but her legs twitch even as I yank at the swaddling. It’s burning my hands. The women stand back, waiting.

  “Get water, you silly old bat,” I say.

  “Work’s done, boy,” Grandma barks. “Your meddling won’t make any difference. Any minute now the fairies’ll come down and whisk this little devil away – along with all our bad fortune.”

  “But it burns, Grandma, it hurts. Athan, make it stop.”

  Grandma leans back against the stove, watching her handiwork. Watching Beatty squirm. “That’s right, child, we’ll burn you out, so hold your tongue. Salvation won’t be far away,” she says. “Then the imps as make you sick’ll be burned right out, and the fairies’ll want you back. That’s right, isn’t it?”

  Tears race down Beatty’s face, her cheeks aflame.

  “Just a little while longer,” says Columbine. “Drive out the demons, won’t we. Those nasty demons that stops you walking and suchlike.” She starts to sing.

  “There was thirteen imps all dancing in chains,

  She upped with her shoes and beat out their brains.”

  The knots are harder and harder to undo, my hands become slick with the burning mustard mixture and I struggle as Columbine laughs and subsides in a mustardy heap on the floor. She’s quite mad now.

  I manage to free one leg. “If you keep that up it won’t work, you idiot!” shouts Grandma, yanking my hair.

  “It isn’t going to work anyway,” I yell back.

  “Water, Athan, water,” Beatty shouts, dabbing the stuff from her knees with her pinny.

  Suddenly Polly’s on the stairs. “What’s going on?” she asks.

  Columbine sits at Beatty’s feet, rocking and singing to herself. Grandma thrashes my back with the carpet beater.

  “You cursed boy, you crack-brained nazzard.” She hits me again.

  “Oh, Beatty, what have the old fools done to you?!” Polly runs to fetch cloths to help wipe off the muck.

  “Oh, Poll – I think they’ve really hurt her.” I pour the lukewarm water from the kettle over Beatty’s shaking legs and my own burning hands but the poultice still won’t come off.

  Polly drags at Columbine, who sits limp on the flagstones, still singing. “Come on, you’re not wanted,” says Polly, hooking her hands under the old woman’s arms and pulling. “Look what you’ve done to Beatty, you old bat,” she shouts at Grandma.

  “No more than she deserves,” says Grandma, picking up some of the heap of yellow bandage on the floor and trying to drape it over Beatty’s leg. “Mark my words, she’s not of this Earth.”

  “Ooh, Athan, it’s getting worse,” sobs Beatty.

  In all the fuss, I don’t hear her coming in, but suddenly there’s Ma, dressed up to the nines.

  “Goodness My Lord, what is going on? Athan? Poll?”

  Grandma freezes but Columbine goes on singing. The kitchen’s spotted with yellow, and more yellow oozes from the bandage to snake around Beatty’s chair. She wails and sobs and dabs at her skin.

  “It hurts, Ma, it’s like fire,” she cries.

  “Oh, my poor love!” Ma comes over and presses Beatty’s head to her chest.

  “What’s all the fuss about?” says a soft northern voice.

  I turn and see the scarred man from the inn standing there in our kitchen, dressed like a lord.

  My heart stops. What’s he doing here?

  “Whatever must you think of us?” says Ma, patting her ringlets. “Athan, let me introduce you. This is Colonel Blade.”

  Chapter 15

  “How nice to meet you again. Athan, isn’t it?” The man holds out his hand.

  His cold eyes fix on mine and I choke on a greeting.

  First the sharp-faced woman and now him. Both of them in our house on the same day.

  “Help me get these things in the fire.” Polly rescues me and I stuff the oily bandages into the range while she wipes the last of the burning mustard from Beatty’s legs. Together we bundle Columbine up the stairs and tip her out into the road. Sneaking a glance at the Colonel as we go, I notice that he’s standing very close to Ma, touching her arm. Intimate, as if they’ve known each other forever.

  “Is that her fancy man?” I ask Polly when we’re standing in the shop together.

  “Yes,” Polly smiles. “Never thought she’d get one.” And she rushes back down the stairs to the kitchen.

&n
bsp; Following her, I scoop up Beatty and carry her upstairs to the drawing room only to find Ma settling the Colonel into a seat in front of our fire and giving him a cup of our tea. She wobbles on to the chaise longue, giggling and talking in a silly high voice. He’s wearing full finery and talking like a gentleman, with only a touch of coal in his speech and you could mistake him for the real thing.

  Dazed, I sit on a footstool, melting snow on my burning palms as Ma prattles on about Uncle. All the time the Colonel lies back in our chair as if it was his own. His black boots gleam in the firelight, his fingers play on the arm of the chair. Our chair.

  I’ve left Beatty on the other side of the room wrapped in her blanket, her burned legs resting in a pail full of snow.

  So all that stuff in the inn. It was for real. He really does know.

  If I could, I’d lift my entire family up and take them away, hide them somewhere a long way from this man. But instead I find him here at the heart of us and for almost the first time in my life, I can’t think what to do.

  “So tell me about this Mr Chen then.” The Colonel watches me as he speaks. He picks up a piece of our coal and throws it on our fire.

  “Oh, he was very nice, a very polite man, charming,” Ma babbles.

  “A heathen,” shouts Grandma from her armchair. “A disciple of Mephistopheles.”

  “Shush, Mother,” says Ma, a flash of real anger in her face. “You stay quiet. You’ve done enough damage today.” She turns back to the Colonel, all smiles. “He was a Natural Philosopher you know.”

  “Was he?” says the Colonel, as if he didn’t care.

  I watch him brush a flake of ash from the arm of the chair.

  “Oh yes, he made black powder and all sorts in his kitchen – always boiling things up.”

  “And blowing things up!” snorts Grandma. “Blew up the henhouse in October – feathers all over the shop – hens all to pieces. Never a word of sorry from him, just laughed and did it again.”

  “He paid for new hens and brought us a box of cherries, Grandma,” says Polly, offering more tea.