Dash.
T
Dash – dash – dash.
O
My hand trembles as I write down the rest of the letters, the message making no sense until I reach the end of the line.
“So what does it say then?” Johnny asks.
My heart thumps in my chest as I check the code again – wanting to make sure I’ve not made a mistake. But I haven’t.
I look up from the book, the yellow torch beam wobbling slightly as Dizzy and Johnny wait for my reply. I take a deep breath before I speak, the sound sharp in the silence.
“A storm is coming.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
In the sickly glare of the torch beam, Johnny’s expression looks angry and strange, the shadows falling across his face in all the wrong places.
“I don’t know,” I say, the same question running through my brain. “I’m not the one who sent the message.”
Sweat drips from my face on to the open page of the exercise book, smudging the letters I’ve marked there. The air feels almost thick enough to touch, the sweltering heat of the day still trapped beneath the roof of leaves even though night has now fallen. I reach up to wipe my face with my hand, the bandage now sticky against my forehead.
“A storm is coming.” Dizzy repeats the words softly, almost under his breath, as if weighing the truth in them. “You don’t want to be in the woods in a storm.”
“Why not?” I say, almost wishing that a storm would come to puncture this heat. “The trees will keep us dry from the rain.”
“It’s not the rain you need to worry about in a storm,” Dizzy replies. “It’s the lightning.”
He sweeps his torch around so it’s now aiming at the tree that lies fallen behind us. The stumps of its broken branches cast eerie shadows as the torch’s yellow beam plays across the deadwood, but then on its underside I see a dark scar running along the length of the trunk. It looks like the bark has been torn from the tree here, exposing charred wood underneath.
“Lightning always strikes the highest point,” Dizzy says. “And in a wood that’s always a tree.”
I suddenly realise that this blackened crack is a lightning scar. That must be what brought the tree down.
“Beware the oak; it draws the stroke,” Johnny says, his words coming out in a sing-song fashion. “Avoid an ash; it courts the flash.” Shadows flash across his leering face as Dizzy swings the torch round again. “Everyone knows that, especially birds.”
Frowning, I close the exercise book, stuffing this and the pencil back into Dizzy’s bag as I clamber to my feet. I didn’t know that. They didn’t teach us stupid songs about the countryside at my school in London. Away from the torch beam’s dazzling glare, the woods seem even darker than before. I wish I was back there now. It’s never this dark in London.
“So we need to get out of here,” I say, holding out my hand for Dizzy’s torch. “Can I borrow that?”
Reluctantly Dizzy hands the torch over. Its metal case feels slick to the touch, but the weight of it in my hand makes me feel just a tiny bit better. With this, I can keep the dark at bay.
I sweep the torch around in a circle, trying to work out which way to go. Its fuzzy beam illuminates the trees, sculpting them into leafy statues. Beneath their tangled limbs, several narrow tracks head off in different directions, each one trailing into the same inky dimness.
“So which way do we go?” Johnny says.
I don’t know.
The torch beam wavers as I try to trace each trail through the trees, trying to decide which track to choose. I can see the broken branch where Johnny pushed his way out of the trees. No chance of finding the path that way if what he said is true. And no point in climbing over the lightning-scarred trunk to head back the way we came.
I hold the torch steady, its yellow light falling along a narrow track that lies halfway between the two. This crooked trail looks the same as all the others, wildflowers and ferns sprouting in the leaf litter as it winds between the trees. Perhaps it’s my imagination but the torch beam seems to shine a little brighter here. Maybe that’s a sign.
“This way,” I say, trying to make my voice sound more certain than I am. “Follow me.”
Striding forward, I start to make my way along the trail. Behind me, I hear Dizzy and Johnny hurrying to catch up.
“Wait for us!”
The track is so narrow we have to walk in single file, the spaces between the trees completely shut in by the surrounding undergrowth. I can hear faint rustling sounds, the tread of tiny unseen creatures scurrying for cover as we pass. I keep my eyes fixed on the yellow beam of light as it splashes along the track, illuminating the exposed tree roots lying in wait to trip me up. I step over these, brushing past an overhanging branch that reaches out to bar the way.
“Watch out,” Dizzy shouts as the branch snaps back behind me.
“Sorry,” I call back, but there’s not much I can do as I have to push my way past another low branch, its bark rough against my fingers.
In the yellow light thrown by the torch the trees look reassuringly solid, but away from this they melt again into shadow. Dead sticks snap beneath my feet, making my heart skip a beat. I can’t help feeling as if someone’s watching me – just out of sight in the trees. I keep my eyes fixed to the ground, so easy now to stumble and fall.
In the distance I hear the sound of a sudden bark and freeze, gripping the torch tightly.
“Is that a dog?” I say, turning round to find Dizzy right behind me. “Maybe someone is out looking for us?”
Screwing up his eyes, Dizzy flinches as the torch light shines in his face.
“Sorry,” I say, quickly lowering the torch.
The bark comes again, further away this time.
Blinking, Dizzy shakes his head.
“No,” he says. “That’s a fox.”
Dizzy’s reply snuffs out the flicker of hope that had sparked inside my chest. There’s no search party out there. Nobody even knows where we are.
I grip the torch more tightly as I turn to push on again. All we can do is keep following this track. Above my head the twisting branches are close enough to touch, making me feel as though I’m tunnelling through the woods. As I walk, the wavering torch beam drives the darkness back foot by foot. I only hope that I’ll find light at the end of this tunnel.
“What makes you think this is the right way?” Johnny calls out, as the track begins to twist.
I don’t know, so I pretend I haven’t heard him.
As I duck beneath another low branch, the track begins to narrow again as it turns left and then sharply right. I feel as though I’m being squeezed as the trees crowd ever closer. Then the path turns sharply left again and suddenly opens out into a small clearing.
“What is it?”
“Have you found the path?”
Dizzy and Johnny’s questions trail into silence as they join me in the clearing. I sweep the torch beam round the circle of trees, the bushes and thickets between these forming an impenetrable wall. There’s no way forward. There’s no way out. It’s a dead end.
“I thought you said this was the right way,” Johnny explodes, his anger as hot as the sweltering air.
I take step back, the glow of the torch catching a glimmer of white on the ground.
“What’s that?”
Stepping forward I aim the torch beam down, Dizzy and Johnny crowding round to see what I’ve found.
There are dozens of sticks laid out on the ground. Some are pointing like arrows in different directions, others set at right angles or arranged into squares. But every single stick is smooth and white, the bark stripped off each one.
I look up at Johnny, a fresh surge of anger rising in my chest.
“You left these here,” I say, the torch in my hand shaking as I fight the urge to hit Johnny with it. “You’re trying to trick us again.”
But Johnny’s face is deathly pale as he stares down at the sticks on the gr
ound.
“I didn’t,” he says, his voice barely louder than a whisper. “I wouldn’t dare. I swear. This stuff is secret.”
“What do you mean ‘secret’?” I ask, reluctant to believe a word that Johnny says.
Johnny shakes his head.
“I can’t tell you. My dad would murder me if I did.”
“What’s your dad got to do with this?” I glance down again at the sticks on the ground, noticing for the first time the smooth white pebbles that are placed between some of them. “Your dad’s a butcher – not some spy leaving secret messages.”
Dizzy crouches down next to the sticks, his notebook open again as he starts to sketch the symbols. But before he’s even finished the first line, Johnny snatches the book out of his hand.
“Hey!”
“My dad’s not just a butcher,” Johnny growls, ripping the page from the book and screwing it up in his fist. “He’s a Freemason and this stuff is secret.”
Beneath the sweat-soaked bandage, my head aches. I’m so mad at Johnny now. All I want to do is find the way home but he’s more bothered about keeping secrets.
“It’s the only clue we’ve got,” I say, keeping the torch trained on the strange symbols on the ground. “We’re lost in the woods and this might help us to find a way out. If you know what it means then you’ve got to tell us.”
Still holding his pencil in his hand, Dizzy climbs to his feet. The three of us stand in the small circle of light that’s reflecting off the ground, but beyond this the darkness surrounds us.
“Please, Johnny.” Dizzy’s voice cuts through the gloom. “I just want to get home. Don’t you?”
Johnny looks from Dizzy to me and then back again. The shadows cast across his face fall upwards, almost making it look as if I can see the skull beneath his skin.
“OK,” he says, reaching out to take the pencil from Dizzy, “but if you tell anyone that I showed you this, I’ll kill you.”
“This is the Freemasons’ code,” Johnny says, resting the open book on his knee as we all crouch down to inspect the strange symbols laid out on the ground.
In the torchlight, the sticks and pebbles shine bone-white against the golden-green leaves.
“Aren’t the Freemasons some kind of secret society?” I say, remembering what I’ve read about them in one of my dad’s Sherlock Holmes stories.
Johnny nods his head solemnly.
“All the important people in our village are Freemasons,” he says, keeping his voice low as if he’s afraid of being overheard. “Doctor Hazell, Sergeant Burrows, even Twiggy, our headmaster.”
The shadows are edging closer, but I can’t stop myself from smiling at the thought of Mr Twigg belonging to a secret society. He’s never mentioned this in assembly.
“My dad’s in charge of them all,” Johnny continues, his dark eyes gleaming in the torchlight. “He’s the Master of the Lodge and keeps all the Freemasons’ secrets written down in this code.”
I glance down at the symbols on the ground.
“Tell us what this says then.”
Johnny hesitates for a second, the pencil twitching nervously between his fingers, before he starts to sketch out a grid on the page. It looks like he’s getting ready for a game of noughts and crosses, but then Johnny draws the same grid again, this time placing a dot in each square. Beneath these grids he draws two crosses, adding more dots to the second of these.
“In the Freemasons’ code, each letter of the alphabet is shown by the part of the grid that it’s found in,” Johnny says, filling in each of the blank spaces he’s made with a different letter until the alphabet is complete.
Looking up from the page, Johnny points at the first symbol on the ground: two sticks laid out in the shape of an arrowhead.
“This is the letter ‘T’,” he explains, holding up the book and tapping the page where this symbol can be found.
“So what do the rest say?” Dizzy asks.
Holding the torch steady, my eyes quickly flick between the bone-white sticks and the grids that Johnny’s drawn, decoding the symbols letter by letter as Johnny scribbles them down on the page.
We reach the end of the line at exactly the same time, both of us speaking the message out loud.
“The way forward is the way back.”
Instinctively, we cross our fingers to ward off the jinx of saying the same words at the same time. But then, from the darkness that surrounds us, comes the sound of laughter.
We jump up as one, a prickle of fear spiking my skin as I swing the torch around the clearing. The seesawing beam illuminates the bushes and trees, the dense thicket looking even thicker than it did before. No way in or out, except the way we came.
“Who’s there?” I call out.
The high-pitched laughter trails into silence, the darkness hiding its secrets once more. Beneath my bandage I can hear the blood pounding in my ears, the sound of this like a thunderstorm inside my head.
I turn towards Dizzy, his face frozen in fear.
“What was that?”
“I – I don’t know,” Dizzy stammers. “It could be a green woodpecker, maybe. Sometimes its call can sound like somebody laughing.”
The manic laugh rings out again, the sound coming from every direction. I swing the torch round like a sword, its yellow beam scything through the darkness. But all I see is a maze of impenetrable branches, the sound of madness dripping from their leaves.
Johnny swears.
“That’s not a bird,” he says, his fists clenched ready to clobber anything that moves out of the trees. “Don’t you see – it’s the person who left this message for us. They’re laughing because they’ve got us trapped in this dead end.”
I glance down at the symbols on the ground, the sticks scattered by our panic when we leapt to our feet. In the ghostly glare of the torchlight they almost look like bones. With a sickening lurch, I realise who the laugh belongs to.
Ha – ha – ha – ha…
Old Crony.
“Come on,” Johnny shouts into the darkness as the laughing call comes again. “Show yourself.”
I shake my head in fear. Please don’t.
The raving laughter is getting louder now, each cackling laugh accompanied by the sound of a crack, like a branch being torn from a tree. As quickly as I swing the torch round in the direction of each sound, I catch only glimpses of shadows in the trees.
“I don’t like this,” Dizzy says, grabbing his notebook from the ground and stuffing it into his school bag. “We’ve got to get out of here.”
The sound of another laugh right behind me makes me spin round. In the torch’s flailing beam I glimpse the dark shape of a figure fading into the trees.
“It’s over there!”
But as Dizzy and Johnny turn to look in this direction, only the imprint of the dark remains and all we can see is the twisting track leading through the trees.
The way forward is the way back.
Snatching the torch from my hand, Johnny heads in this direction as the laughter rings out again.
“Follow me!”
Dizzy does what he’s told, hurrying to catch Johnny as the torch beam lights up the trail. For a second, I stand here, frozen to the spot as the darkness grows around me.
Then I hear the sound of a gentle laugh and a single word whispered in my ear.
“Charlie.”
I run.
I don’t know how long I keep running for, following the flickering torch beam as it cuts through the trees. Long enough for a stitch to start burning in my side. Long enough for the track to turn to mud beneath my feet. Long enough to leave the sound of laughter behind, but not the memory of the voice whispering my name.
“Charlie!”
The torch beam’s blinding glare swings back in my direction. I stagger to a halt, my breath coming in juddering gasps as Johnny and Dizzy loom out of the gloom. Pushing past me, Johnny aims the torch back the way we came.
“Has it followed us?”
I turn to look, my heart still pounding in my chest at the thought of Old Crony on our trail. But when I look back all I can see are the trees. It’s as if the track was never there, the yellow glow of the torch illuminating only a maze of tangled branches.
“This can’t be right,” Johnny says, shaking his head in confusion. “Where’s the track gone?”
I don’t know the answer to this. I look around, my eyes searching the darkness for any kind of clue. There are no paths to choose, just a solid rise of tree trunks that cut across any kind of view.
“How are we going to get out of here?” Dizzy asks, his voice almost despairing.
The torch flickers, its yellow beam fading slightly as the darkness creeps closer.
I just want to go home.
If I close my eyes I can almost imagine I’m there, curled up in bed with a book in my hand. But then against my skin I feel the cold breeze that’s blowing through the trees, the rustling leaves sounding like a single word being endlessly repeated.
Lost… Lost… Lost…
My eyes snap open as I realise what we’ve got to do.
In Scouting for Boys there’s a whole section on what you need to know if you ever get lost when out on patrol. Most of this is completely useless now, as there’s no point looking for landmarks when all we can see are trees. But there’s one way we can find our way in the dark.
“We can use the stars to guide us,” I say, the words rushing out in my excitement. “All we need to do is find the North Star and then we can follow this out of the wood.”
“How can we follow a star?” Johnny asks. “This isn’t the Nativity.”
“The North Star is called the North Star because it lies directly above the North Pole,” I say, remembering the explanation from Dad’s scouting book. “All the other stars move around the sky during the night, but the North Star always stays in the same place. If you walk directly towards it – wherever you are – you know you’ll be heading true north. That’s how we can find our way out of the woods. Just keep heading north until we hit the road that skirts the top of the wood and then we can follow this back to the village.”
The Longest Night of Charlie Noon Page 4