The Tunnel Behind the Waterfall

by William Corlett

  Meg had been dozing in the only comfortable seat in the room. This was a battered armchair that looked as if it had once been part of a three-piece suite. The springs had long ago collapsed and the stuffing was coming out through a hole in the back, but it had aged with its occupant and moulded itself to Meg’s shape and it was here that she often dozed away the daylight hours when she wasn’t looking after her few animals.

  The children had called her name through the front door in vain. They thought perhaps that she was out. But Spot had pushed past them and led the way into the kitchen. And so, when she woke with a start from a dream that was immediately forgotten, she found three faces staring at her through the gloom.

  ‘What’s this?’ she said, getting up quickly, as if she were embarrassed to have been discovered sleeping. ‘I didn’t hear you.’

  ‘Sorry, Meg,’ William said. ‘We didn’t mean to give you a shock. We called from the door . . .’

  ‘I was probably . . . miles away,’ Meg said, filling a kettle from a jug of water. ‘You’ll have a cup of tea?’ she asked, striking a match and lighting a primus stove. ‘I’m using this paraffin stove at the moment. Too hot to light the range. I told Phoebe she should get one . . .’ then, in the middle of fussing about, clearing a space for them to sit and trying to find three mugs that weren’t too chipped, she suddenly caught sight of the bruise on Mary’s forehead. ‘Lord’s sake, child! What’s happened to your face?’ she exclaimed and, peering closer, she saw the scratches and cuts on Mary’s arms and legs and then the ugly gash on Alice’s hand.

  Meg pulled back, looking at the three children, frowning.

  ‘You didn’t come for a cup of tea, did you? What’s been going on?’

  ‘We . . . fell down a cliff,’ William spluttered.

  ‘We got in a fight,’ Alice said at the same moment.

  ‘And did these two events take place at the same time – or one after the other?’ Meg asked, quietly. ‘Come out in the light. I’d better take a look at you all,’ and, leading the way, she went out along the dark hall to the front door.

  After Meg had inspected Mary and Alice’s cuts, she looked at the stings on William’s back.

  ‘Oh dear!’ she said, tutting sympathetically. ‘These are not so good. I’ve got some cream that might help. Hornets, you say. Pretty rare, hornets. What makes you think that’s what they were?’

  William shrugged.

  ‘I’m surprised you can tell a hornet from an ordinary wasp. And these scratches and cuts, Mary – how did you say you got them?’

  Mary hung her head and was silent.

  Meg looked quietly at each of the children in turn.

  ‘Why don’t you tell me what’s really been going on? Just wait while I get my medicine chest,’ and she hurried back into the house, returning almost at once with a big leather Gladstone bag. ‘I keep everything in here. When I need something for one of the animals I can carry it to them. Now, let me see, William, turn round,’ and she dabbed cream on each of the sting marks. ‘You might have to go to the doctor, you know. So I’d get a good story together, if I were you!’

  After Meg had finished treating William’s back, she applied other lotions to Mary and Alice. First an antiseptic that stung painfully when it went into any open cuts and then creams and lints and elastoplast. She worked quickly and silently and, when she had finished she dabbed Spot’s shoulder with salt and water because he pleaded and whined until she asked what was wrong with him and Alice told her that he had also been stung.

  ‘Get away with you, you great baby!’ Meg said, stroking his ear. ‘You’ll live, I expect.’

  Then, shutting up her medicine bag, she turned once more and looked at them.

  ‘I was born in this valley, you know. I was once your age here. I know a lot that goes on. Now, are you going to tell me?’

  William shook his head.

  ‘We can’t, Meg,’ he said.

  ‘I’ve told you once before, William, told you all – there are things that go on here that can destroy you,’ Meg said in a quiet, urgent, voice. ‘How many times must I warn you? How many times?’

  ‘When you were younger, Meg,’ Mary asked, ‘did you see . . .’ she shook her head, unable to finish the sentence.

  ‘I saw nothing,’ Meg answered severely. ‘But I know what can be seen. And I know what can happen to people who get involved with these matters. Golden House. Golden Valley. Goldenwater. Gold. Gold. Gold. It destroyed my grandfather; ruined my father’s life; and it’s left me alone and lonely. All in the name of gold. I was once foolish enough to believe that there were stronger feelings than greed. Feelings that could overcome greed. I was wrong . . .’ she shook her head, as if trying to rid herself of an unhappy memory.

  Mary stared at her thoughtfully.

  ‘There was a man here, Meg. Someone you must know. He said you wanted to see him.’

  ‘A man?’ Meg whispered. ‘What man?’

  ‘Sir Henry Crawden,’ Mary answered.

  Meg was silent for a long time – so long, in fact, that Mary thought she hadn’t heard her.

  ‘Sir Henry, Meg. He was in a wheelchair. He was with his son and that solicitor you went to see. They said you’d asked to see him. But he wouldn’t come. Why Meg?’

  Meg wasn’t looking at them now, she was staring into the distance. Her voice, when she spoke, had a faraway tone.

  ‘I wanted him to face me. I wanted him to tell me to my face that Goldenwater belongs to his family.’

  ‘But it does, doesn’t it?’ William asked her.

  ‘If they say so. You can never argue with a Crawden. But there was a time when they didn’t think so. Oh no. There was a time when plain Mr Henry Crawden came knocking on my door – and why?’ Her voice grew increasingly bitter as she spoke. She stared into the distance, shaking her head. ‘Why? Why did he come? Because his family wanted the lake – that was the only reason.’ She sighed. ‘They believed the land belonged to us. They sent him to get that land. He’d have married me for it. That’s how much they wanted it. They’ve always wanted it. Always, through time. There’ll be no peace here until they have it. Well, let it go, I say. My daddy said Henry didn’t want me – only the land. He was right, of course. But, if I hadn’t listened to him, Henry could have had both the land – and me. I think he’d have been glad of that. And I . . .’ She shook her head again. ‘But my daddy said a Lewis could never marry a Crawden.’ She shrugged. ‘Well, there . . . Too late now, of course. But I just thought . . . if he came to see me, there could at least be some truth between us.’ She shook her head and brushed her hand down her skirt. ‘Let the Crawdens have the land . . .’ she said, emphatically.

  ‘But, if they take the land, Meg, they’ll destroy it,’ William explained.

  ‘Good riddance to it! Let it go!’

  ‘The badgers, Meg,’ Alice pleaded with her. ‘Your badgers. They’ll put them on show. They’re going to chop down the tree house . . .’

  ‘The badgers will survive,’ Meg said with a sob. ‘Besides, I won’t be always here to look after them. Nature must adapt. You can’t stop progress.’

  ‘Meg!’ Alice cried, fighting back tears.

  ‘You can’t beat the Crawdens,’ the old woman said. ‘Believe me. I know.’

  ‘Meg,’ William said, trying to make his voice strong and firm, ‘just tell us one thing. Does the land belong to you really?’

  ‘I don’t know. No one knows now,’ Meg replied. ‘My grandad could have told you. He and old man Crawden made an agreement. They both signed a paper, each keeping a copy. But my grandad lost his. The Crawdens didn’t know that at the time. Maybe they expected me to produce mine. Perhaps that’s the real reason why I was written to by that solicitor. Of course, there’s still the question of access. They need this bit of land – Four Fields. But there’s more to it than that. Now – I think they know they’ve got me. Now that agreement is useless, because I think they know that they have the only copy . . .’

&nb
sp; ‘But – how could your grandfather lose something so important?’ William exclaimed.

  ‘Lost, stolen, or strayed. That’s what he used to say,’ Meg replied quietly.

  ‘And he never told anyone what the agreement was?’

  ‘Honour among thieves, he used to say. Honour among thieves!’

  ‘So there’s no way we’ll ever know what the Lewis family and the Crawden family agreed about the ownership of Goldenwater and the land around it?’ William exclaimed. ‘I don’t believe it. There has to be a way.’

  ‘Well, I dare say if you could go back in time you’d find out,’ Meg said, making light of the statement. ‘But there’s no other way I can think of.’ Then she frowned and turned towards William. ‘Forget I said that!’ she said severely. ‘Forget all about Goldenwater! Please, William. Please, all of you. If you don’t, it will destroy you as well.’

  ‘But just think, Meg,’ William said, speaking as if in a trance, ‘we might win – in which case this place would be safe for ever – and Morden would be defeated.’

  ‘Morden?’ Meg asked, in a horrified voice.

  ‘I mean the Crawdens,’ William said hurriedly.

  ‘Morden!’ Meg sighed, ‘I haven’t heard that name for a long time. You sound just like my grandfather.’

  ‘You have to help us, Meg. You’re the only one who can. Please, Meg,’ William pleaded.

  ‘When I needed help, you were there,’ Meg said, quietly. ‘The badgers would tell me to help you. But I’m afraid for you.’

  ‘It’s all right, really,’ Alice said, brightly. ‘We have the best Magician on our side.’

  ‘Have you seen him?’ Meg asked them, looking at each of them closely.

  Their silence was all the affirmation that was required.

  ‘My daddy spent his life regretting not seeing him – what is it you call him? The Magician? My grandfather called him The Magus, I think. As for me – I didn’t really believe any of it.’

  ‘He’s a good man, Meg,’ Mary said, putting an arm round the old woman and hugging her. ‘But he’s old – and he’s so afraid of what will happen to the valley if the Crawdens get their hands on it.’

  Meg nodded.

  ‘He’s right to be afraid. The Crawdens are pure greed. That’s all that interests them. They’re as rich as they can be – and yet they always want more.’

  ‘We must help the Magician, Meg. We must,’ William said, pressing the point.

  ‘He’s told you all this? This man from the past. I find it so hard to believe. If I could see him . . .’

  Then she took a great gulp of air and breathed deeply.

  ‘I’ll do what I can to help,’ she said.

  19

  Miss Prewett Comes to Lunch

  MISS PREWETT CAME to lunch on the following Sunday, bringing with her the book she had promised from the museum library.

  The days between ‘The Battle Over Goldenwater’ (as the event was now called by the children) and the Sunday were spent in a relatively low-key way. Phoebe was worried by William’s stings and insisted on taking him into the town to see the doctor. The doctor seemed less concerned. He prescribed a stronger ointment to put on them and a course of antibiotics in case, as he said, any bugs were lurking.

  Mary managed to keep most of her wounds a secret by wearing jeans and a long sleeved shirt. But the bruise on her forehead and the angry, inflamed scratch on the back of Alice’s hand were noticed by Phoebe and had to be explained away as climbing accidents.

  The girls were anxious to get on with something – anything – that would further the task the Magician had set them, but William was sullen and depressed and didn’t want to spend time with them. On Saturday afternoon as Alice was coming in through the front door to get a glass of lemonade she discovered him emerging from the fireplace in the hall.

  ‘You’ve been up to the room. You went without us, William,’ she accused him.

  But her brother simply shrugged and walked towards the stairs.

  ‘Go, if you want to,’ he said. ‘No one’s stopping you. But it’s a complete waste of time. He’s not there. I’ve tried every way I can think of to get him – but it’s no use.’ And, miserable and dejected, he stumped up the stairs and out of her sight.

  That night Mary and Alice decided to tackle him in earnest, and went to his room after he’d gone to bed.

  ‘I don’t know what we’re supposed to do,’ he told them. ‘It’s no use asking me.’

  ‘But you’re the one who works things out, William,’ Mary had protested.

  ‘Yes – well, I don’t now, do I? I’ve been told not to, haven’t I? I have to stop thinking, haven’t I?’ He spat the questions at her in a petulant tone.

  ‘You don’t have to stop thinking altogether,’ Mary snapped. ‘You’re so stupid sometimes.’

  ‘All right, Mary – you tell us,’ her brother rounded on her. ‘If you’re so clever – you tell us what to do.’

  There was a long silence broken only by Alice’s sniffing, as she scratched her cheek, deep in thought.

  ‘You mean, we’re not going to try to help Mr Tyler any more?’ she whispered. ‘Is that what you’re saying?’

  ‘Oh, Alice!’ William hissed, bad-temperedly. ‘What are we supposed to do? I’ve tried everything. I’ve tried not thinking, thinking, willing the Magician to come, waiting in the secret room . . . Nothing happens. If only we hadn’t lost the pendulum. If only . . .’

  He looked so miserable now that Mary felt sorry for him and went and sat on the side of his bed.

  ‘I suppose we could ask Lutra,’ she said. ‘He might find the pendulum.’

  ‘How? How do we get Lutra? I’ve tried.’

  ‘When?’ Mary asked. She could feel herself getting angry again.

  ‘Yesterday morning. Before you were both awake . . .’

  ‘You went up to the lake on your own?’ Mary exploded, crossly. ‘You left us behind?’

  ‘I just wanted to see if I could find Lutra,’ William wailed.

  ‘Well, of course, if you’re going to go off doing things on your own, we haven’t a hope,’ Mary said, flouncing towards the door impatiently.

  ‘Oh, Mary, please!’ William pleaded. ‘Don’t lose your temper. I wouldn’t have done anything serious without you. I just had to try. It was my fault that we lost the pendulum. I shouldn’t have left it on top of the standing stone. I had to try to get it back.’

  ‘If we had it,’ Alice said, scratching her cheek, ‘what good would it do?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ William said, shrugging. ‘But the Magician said it was important.’

  ‘It could be anywhere on the bottom of the lake, couldn’t it?’ Mary observed, thoughtfully.

  ‘Or, worse still, it could have been sucked by the current through that opening in which case it could be miles away by now.’

  ‘How d’you mean?’ Mary asked.

  ‘You didn’t go, of course,’ William remembered. ‘When Al and I went down with Lutra, we saw where the water exits from the lake. It gushes through a narrow opening and then . . . sort of disappears into caves, underground.’

  ‘But where does it go eventually?’ Mary asked.

  William shrugged.

  ‘I don’t know. If the pendulum has gone into the caves, it could be anywhere by now. We’ll never find it. It’s gone,’ William said, and he sighed and closed his eyes. ‘Go to bed! There’s nothing we can do about it. We’ll have to think of another way.’

  Later, as Alice was going to sleep, she remembered Blackwater Sluice and how frightened she had been when Lutra had taken her there and left her alone in the dark cave.

  ‘I don’t ever want to go there again,’ she thought and then she trembled, remembering how she had felt about the Dark and Dreadful Path. She hadn’t wanted to go back there either, but circumstances had made it necessary. ‘Oh, no!’ she thought, and she closed her eyes, willing herself to go to sleep.

  Miss Prewett arrived at mid-day, driving a sm
all, old-fashioned car, with pale blue paintwork and gleaming metal trim.

  ‘It’s called Daisy,’ she called, tooting the horn. ‘And I love it to death!’ Then, climbing out of the car, she closed the door carefully, and crossed round to the passenger side. From the seat she took a wicker basket and a square parcel and carried them with her into the house.

  The basket contained a jar of crab-apple jelly, a root of a plant and a box of chocolates.

  ‘The jelly I made myself and it hasn’t really set – but you can pour it over things. The plant is rather spectacular double geranium from my garden and the chocolates are absolutely trust-worthy – because I bought them in a shop!’ Then, unwrapping the parcel, she produced the book that they had seen before, at Christmas.

  On the title page, in fine handwriting, were the words:

  ‘The Alchemical Writings of Jonas Lewis, of The House in Golden Valley. Being completed this last day of the last year of the century, 31st December, 1899’.

  ‘Shall we look at it now?’ Miss Prewett said, eagerly.

  ‘Well,’ Phoebe sounded a bit doubtful, ‘lunch is almost ready.’

  ‘Then we must wait,’ Miss Prewett declared, cheerfully. ‘Mmmh!’ she enthused, ‘what a wonderful smell! Roast lamb with rosemary?’

  ‘No, I’m afraid not,’ Phoebe said hurriedly, noticing Alice shaking her head with a grim expression on her face. ‘We’re vegetarians.’

  ‘All of you?’ Miss Prewett demanded, sounding surprised.

  ‘Well, we are when we’re here,’ William explained.

  ‘And I am now most of the time,’ Mary said.

  ‘Mary is my true convert,’ Phoebe added.

  ‘And what about you, my dear?’ Miss Prewett asked, looking quizzically at Alice.

  ‘Alice is still taking some persuading,’ Phoebe said with a smile. ‘But she’s coming round, I think.’

  ‘Well I think it’s a jolly good idea,’ Miss Prewett beamed with pleasure. ‘Trouble is I’m too lazy to work it all out. Being on my own, I don’t do much cooking. You’ll usually find me with my head in a book and a dish of bangers and mash, I’m afraid.’