Wild Jack

by John Christopher

  He was a big man and fatter than he ought to be, heavily jowled, though he seemed to be only in his thirties. A few weeks in the Outlands, I thought, would melt away that surplus flesh. His manner showed the typical policeman’s mistrust of the unusual. He snapped on his memocorder and said, “Right. Details. Name?” I told him. “Where do you come from?”

  I was not going to tell the true story just yet; I needed to get in touch with my father first. I told him that I had gone out into the forest on a dare. That was something boys occasionally did, even though it was forbidden. Then I had got lost.

  “Are you from this city?”

  He probably knew most of the boys in the city. I shook my head.

  “From London.”

  “You came seventy miles through the Outlands on your own?”

  He was skeptical; it was not something which would have convinced me easily. I said, “I was given help.”

  “Help? How? Are you telling me you were helped by savages?”

  Outlaws, I thought, not savages; but I had the sense not to say it. I nodded.

  “They gave me food. And they were coming this way and let me travel with them.”

  “I should have thought they’d be more likely to cut your throat.” He felt between his teeth with a fingernail. “It’s a bit of a tall story. I suppose you don’t know anyone in Southampton who would vouch for you?”

  I was ready for that. “Mr. Sherrin. He’s . . .”

  “I know Mr. Sherrin.” He looked less hostile, even impressed. Mr. Sherrin was obviously respected in police circles. He pointed to the visiphone.

  “You can call him from here.”

  • • •

  To my surprise and delight, Miranda came with her father to pick me up. I asked how she had managed to get away from school, and she told me it was a holiday, the anniversary of the birthday of the first president of the Southampton Council.

  We traveled back in their car, a better one than I would have expected, scarcely inferior to my father’s limousine. I was a bit surprised by their house, too, which was a mansion standing in impressive grounds. Mr. Sherrin did not say much in front of the chauffeur, and I did not volunteer anything except to ask about my parents: had they been very worried? He said they had and would be relieved to get news of me.

  From time to time I glanced at Miranda, and she smiled back. Her hair was arranged in a new style, piled up in whorls over her head. It was pretty, but I wondered for the first time if the gold was real, then disliked myself for thinking it.

  The Sherrins’ butler was about Wild Jack’s height and about his age; but there was nothing wild about him. He walked with a stoop, as though a small but heavy weight rested permanently on the back of his neck. Mr. Sherrin asked, when he opened the door for us, “Any messages, boy?”

  Boy, I thought. The butler shook his head.

  “No, master. No messages.”

  Mr. Sherrin said, “Come along into my study, Clive. We’d better have a talk. No, not you, Miranda. There’ll be plenty of time for you and Clive to talk later.”

  She smiled and shrugged and went away. I followed Mr. Sherrin into his study, a large well-­furnished room with a view across a wide lawn where a gardener was trundling a mower. There was a visiphone fitted on the desk and I said, “Could I call my father first? Since they’ve been worried.”

  “No point.” He showed me a chair and sat down himself. “I called before we came to get you, but he wasn’t available. I’ve left a message for him.”

  His face was gray, I thought, as well as his hair. His skin had a soft, tired look.

  I said, “I could try my mother, then.”

  “I’ve done that, too. She’s out. Don’t worry. They’ll call you here as soon as they can. Tell me what’s been happening to you.”

  I told him, and he listened without interruption. He nodded in sympathy when I was indignant about the way I had been treated by the police and later on the island. It wasn’t until I reached the part about our being found by the tribesmen and taken to Wild Jack that he started asking questions. He seemed quite interested in the outlaws.

  I told him how well they had looked after us and how different the Outlands were from the stories about them. I explained that the savages were not really savage, while the outlaws, in their own way, were as civilized as we were.

  Mr. Sherrin smiled. “You’re very enthusiastic about them.”

  “There’s no real reason, is there, why the world should be divided the way it is, with some people living in cities behind walls and others in the wilds? It doesn’t really have to be like that?”

  “It’s a complicated question, but there’s a lot in what you say.” He pressed a button on his desk. “You look as though you could do with a bath and clean clothes. And something to eat.”

  I shook my head. “They fed us very well.”

  The butler came in. Mr. Sherrin said to him, “Show Master Clive to his room and see that he has everything he wants.” He smiled. “When you’ve tidied up, you can have lunch with Miranda. I have to go out, but I’ll see you later.”

  I was taken to a room on the first floor. The butler offered to carry Rusty’s cage, but I refused. I put the cage down on a table near the window, from which there was a view across the city to the massed green of the Outlands beyond. The butler showed me the bathroom and told me clothes would be sent up. He asked me if there was anything else I wanted.

  “No, thank you, boy.”

  I spoke without thinking, falling back naturally into the use of the term. He showed no resentment, and, of course, there was no reason to think he felt any. There had always been masters and servants and always would be. It was part of the nature of things—no one’s fault. All the same I was confused. I stared out the window toward the distant, different world I had just left.

  But there was no point in brooding; the important thing was that I would soon be home. Something occurred to me. Mr. Sherrin had said both my parents were out when he called. There were several places my father might be, but if my mother were away from home at this time of day, she would almost certainly be at her ladies club at Blackfriars. I could visiphone her there.

  I turned off the bath the butler had started running and headed downstairs. There was no one about. The door of Mr. Sherrin’s study was open, and I heard voices inside. I was hesitating when I heard my name in a woman’s voice—Mrs. Sherrin’s.

  “Even though he’s not very bright,” she said, “he’s bound to start suspecting something soon. When he doesn’t get a call from his parents, for instance.”

  Mr. Sherrin said, “We can stall him for an hour or two. I want Miranda to talk to him—that’s why I hauled her out of school. It’s this one who calls himself Wild Jack I’m interested in. I didn’t want to ask him too many questions myself, but he’ll talk to Miranda.”

  “That’s not as important as the main issue,” Mrs. Sherrin said. “Things are still tricky. Now that he’s turned up like this . . .”

  It was incredible at first, and then I thought it must be some kind of lunatic joke. But as they went on talking, it all fell into ugly but convincing shape, and I began to understand. Being picked up by the police and sent to the island had been no mistake. It had been done deliberately. And yet my part was only incidental; the real plot was directed against my father.

  Plots and intrigues, I knew, were nothing unusual in city politics; it was one such that had resulted in Mr. Sherrin’s banishment from London. In this case the idea had been to involve me with a subversive group who were supposed to be agitating for improved conditions among the servants. Since I was his only son, this in itself would weaken my father’s position, but there was also an ulterior motive. His impulsiveness was well known and would, it was hoped, provoke him to the kind of rash action which would enable his enemies to trip him up.

  This was the e
xplanation of my being denounced and taken to the island. I was to be kept there, well away from London, while a case was prepared against me. Then I would be put on trial, along with others. They were sure my father would take illegal action to free me, and when he did, they were ready to take counteraction to destroy him.

  That was the word Mr. Sherrin used: “destroy.” I had a feeling it was meant precisely. He was too big a man merely to be banished.

  I tried to think clearly. I was supposed to be having a bath and changing. There was not much time before they would start looking for me, and I must not waste a second of it. If I could get as far as the wall. . . .

  I turned to go, but realized as I did that someone was coming through the hall toward me. It was Miranda. I saw the look in her face, uncertain and wary. The silly, irrelevant thought went through my head that I had been right about her hair—it was dyed, not natural.

  And with that, I knew something else. I remembered the scene in the police building in London—that string of accusations from some informer who must have been present on the night of Brian’s party. I had been sure it was Gary; now I was even more sure I had guessed wrong. Miranda had been there, too. It was Miranda who had told those lies.

  Any lingering doubt I might have had went when she called out, “Father! Clive’s out here. He’s been listening at the door.”

  • • •

  This time I was taken upstairs under the close escort of two servants, and the door of the room was locked after me. I went to the window and looked out. The ground was more than twenty feet below, and the garden was full of servants working. There was no chance of escape.

  I stared over the city at the Outlands and thought of Kelly and Sunyo and what a fool I’d been. They were free, with Wild Jack, while I had come back to treachery and the prospect of imprisonment—the prospect also of being the means by which my father’s enemies would bring him down.

  I felt afraid and sick and angry. I was angry with the Sherrins but even more with my own stupidity. Having been lucky enough once to get out of a trap, I had walked right back into it. I knew what would happen. I would be taken back to the island, and they would make quite sure I had no opportunity of escaping again. They would keep me there until they were ready to put me on show in London.

  A car drove through the grounds and stopped by the front door. Two policemen got out. Mr. Sherrin must have called them in, anxious to get me off his hands and in proper custody now that I knew the truth of the situation. He didn’t want the risk of keeping me in his house.

  I turned and saw the cage on the table. They would never let me take Rusty to the island. What do you do with an unwanted pigeon—wring its neck?

  Even if I had thrown away my own freedom, I could give Rusty his. I took the cage over to the window and opened the little door in the side.

  Rusty did not want to come out at first. I put my fingers inside, and he pecked them. So I lifted him out and he sat undisturbed on my hand.

  “Off you go,” I said. “Back to your forest.”

  With a flick of my wrist I threw him forward, and he dipped and then flew up into the sky. I saw him circle once and afterward fly in a straight line across the town and out over the wall. I watched until he was out of sight.

  10

  THE POLICE BUILDING IN SOUTHAMPTON was smaller than the one in London but very similar in other respects. The room to which I was taken was almost identical with that in which I had been quizzed about the party. There were two policemen again, and again one did the talking while the other listened.

  The questions were all about Wild Jack and the outlaws. This confirmed what I had guessed from the conversation between the Sherrins—that the men in green were taken a good deal more seriously than contemptuous remarks about savages might indicate. It only reinforced the intention I had already formed not to tell them anything which could possibly be of value.

  The interrogation was amiable to begin with but became distinctly less friendly when my answers proved unsatisfactory. No, I had no idea of the direction we had come in getting to Southampton. And no, I had no idea how many men were in Wild Jack’s band. More than twenty? More than fifty? A hundred? I shrugged helplessly.

  The policeman doing the talking—like the one in the gatehouse, a bit flabby, I thought—advised me to be more cooperative. In the morning I would be taken back to the island. That was no concern of theirs—it was his turn to shrug—but they were in a position where they could help me. I was due for severe punishment—the stockade for a certainty—because of the escape. It might make a considerable difference in the way I was treated if I went back with a commendation from them for doing my civic duty while in custody. An adverse report, on the other hand, was likely to make a bad situation worse.

  I just went on acting dumb, and in the end they got tired. The talking policeman remarked that I might be more sensible after a night in a cell; I would be interrogated again before being taken to the airship.

  The cell was on the second floor—a small gray cube of a room with an iron bed fixed to the wall and a sanitary unit at one end. Apart from that, nothing. I sat wretchedly on the bed while the afternoon light darkened into dusk. The single window of the cell did not open and was at least thirty feet above the concrete pavement. Even if I smashed the glass and got out, I would break a leg in jumping or more probably kill myself.

  From this small window, too, I could see the forest beyond the city’s wall. It was gray in the evening light—gray like the walls of the cell. But the morning light would turn it green again; Kelly and Sunyo would wake up to sunlight bursting through a screen of leaves. I wondered what they would be doing tomorrow: fishing, perhaps, or riding. There was a chance, Wild Jack had said, that they might be able to go with the men on the next deer hunt.

  I thought of Joan, too, and then of Miranda. Acting dumb to the policemen was really only appropriate. It was stupidity which had put me here.

  Supper was brought on a tray: some kind of concentrate with a slice of tasteless bread and a synthetic drink to wash it down. I would rather have had Wild Jack’s bread and water. I ate and drank, to pass the time as much as anything, and afterward lay on the bed.

  Unhappy and unhopeful thoughts chased each other’s tails in continual miserable chase through my mind. The cell was lit by a single light in the center of the ceiling, irritating both by its dimness and the fact that it could not be turned off. I stared at it, or at the darkening square of the window, and tried to go to sleep, but eventually I abandoned hope of that, too.

  In the end, though, tiredness overcame me.

  • • •

  My sleep was disturbed by dreams, of which I remembered nothing except that they were the sort you would not choose to remember. I woke out of one particularly unpleasant one, hearing my name called. It must have been part of the dream, I decided, feeling sweat cold on my body. Then, properly awake, I heard it again.

  The light still burned in the ceiling, but beyond the window there was moonlight. The call had come from there. It came again: “Clive. . . .”

  The voice was Wild Jack’s. But that was impos­sible. I jumped off the bed and ran across to look out.

  Horsemen, half a dozen or more, were milling about in the street. I broke the window with my elbow and heard glass tinkle down the wall. Shoving my head through the jagged hole, I called back, “It’s me, Jack! I’m here.”

  Faces stared up in the moonlight, and I saw a familiar black beard. Wild Jack shouted, “Are you happy there, lad, or would you rather come with us?”

  His teeth gleamed as he laughed. I felt exhilarated, but it was a long way down to the ground. I cried, “I’m locked in.”

  Instead of replying, Wild Jack took a coil of rope from his saddle and tossed the free end up toward me. His throw was accurate enough, but I missed it the first time. He sent it snaking up the wall again, and I caught it.
r />   “Make it fast,” he said.

  The bed was the only piece of furniture, but at least it was fixed to the wall. I tied the end of the rope around a leg of the bed in a double clove hitch, one of the things I had learned among the outlaws. I went back to the window.

  “I’m ready.”

  “Down you come, then.”

  I knocked the rest of the glass out of the frame and eased myself through, holding onto the rope. I slid down, burning my hands a bit by going too fast. Wild Jack hauled me onto the horse’s back behind him, with one hand.

  To his men he said, “Right! Back to the gate.”

  The sound of hooves echoed loud in the streets. I saw a few heads looking from behind windows, but no one came out, I wondered why the police on duty at the police building had not done something. How had Wild Jack got into the town, for that matter, and how did he propose to get out?

  As we got near the gate, I suddenly saw figures of uniformed men in the streets ahead of us and a moment later heard the sharp crack of guns. In reply there were other sounds: a soft swish of arrows through the air. I saw one policeman drop, collapsing onto the shaft of the arrow which went through his chest, and others scurry back into the shadows. Someone else fired from the open door of the gatehouse. Wild Jack’s arrow took him, and he did not fire again. Seeing him fall, I had a good idea what had happened to the men from the police building.

  Jack rode his horse up to the open door of the gatehouse. He said to the guard at the control panel, “Open up.”

  There was another arrow in his bow. The guard did not argue but pressed a button, and there was the hum of the gates sliding apart.

  Jack gestured to the guard. “Now, out.”

  We rode away from the city, a few futile shots fired in our rear. As we crossed the empty land outside the wall, I looked back and saw it, high and gleaming in the moonlight. It did not seem possible that the outlaws could have ridden in there and brought me out. And yet it had happened. This was not dream but reality. I heard the thud of hooves, felt the ripple of the horse’s stride beneath me.