by Helen Slavin
“Yes.”
“Want a lift over there?” he asked. “We could pick you up. We’re picking up Ellie and Mina.”
They made arrangements and before long Mina and Ellie arrived and the conversation spread out and then it was time to go to the next lesson and Mark headed out with a girl on each arm.
Emz gathered her things and looked up to find Logan still there flicking through the copy of Wildwood. It was battered, she had read and re-read it in the last year, her means of being in the woods when she couldn’t actually go there.
“Look at what you’ve done to the spine.” He riffled the pages, ran a thumb along the creased binding of the book. Emz waited for him to give it back. He did not. She reached for it and there was a miniature tug of war, Logan unreleasing. And then he let it go. He said nothing more, except for his eyes, dark windows, before he looked away from her.
She was half way across the yard, could see the door to the English block opening as if to greet her but no, she couldn’t do it, she turned away, cut up through the staff car park and out through the side lane past the allotments. It was a half an hour walk to Prickles Sanctuary from school but that seemed only to add to the draw of it. The waxed raincoat gaped around her, felt like wings, felt like she could, if she just tweaked her mind, fly.
* * *
Emz kept a change of clothes at the centre for emergencies such as getting soaked, but since she’d come from school she was wearing those spares and now she wondered about getting dry. She didn’t feel cold, it was chill in the shade of the trees, but the bright Autumn sun warmed the black waxed raincoat as Emz walked the length of the shore. It was a chance to check out the water birds. There was often a cormorant or two in the bare tree that faced the eastern hide. She realised then that she had left her binoculars in the hide and she backtracked.
At the hide she took a moment to empty the water from her slightly sloshy boots. As she stood up she saw her grandmother on the other side of Cooper’s Pond. Emz put the binoculars to her face. It was definitely her grandmother, turning now into the trees.
It took her less than fifteen minutes to half run along the pond’s edge to where her grandmother had been standing. Except, Emz knew, she couldn’t have been there and there were no markings in the ground. Ghosts don’t have footprints, Emz. Except there were marks, fresh cut dents of a heavily cleated sole. Emz hadn’t been aware of anyone in the centre and the car park had been empty. A spate of vandalism had made Prickles rather more security aware of late and Emz felt alerted. The breeze caught the trees and the sound made Emz look up. Her grandmother was still there, paused now on the path up to the ridge. Waiting. Emz hurried up through the trees.
As she reached the ridge the trees fell away down the slope towards town. At the bottom a collection of haphazard gardens and cottages, the small terraced run of Laundry Lane. From here the traffic, such as it was, glinted in the sunlight. She could see the length of Dark Gate Street, the view only obscured slightly by the heavy arch of the castle wall.
“Emz.” Her grandmother’s voice was so clear, Emz turned. As she did so she saw the man. She watched him for a few moments. Was he looking for birds? There were peregrines around the castle, their nest, finished with for this year, high up in the keep tower. No. He did not look up as the jay burst from the trees and headed down to a garden below. Instead the man’s binoculars were trained on town. Emz watched his careful movements, making a slow visual sweep of the main street and now pulling in closer to the mouse maze of Laundry Lane, Shoot Street, Cooper’s Tun and the winding curve of Michaelmas Row. He pulled the binoculars from his face and looked down at a map in a cover around his neck. He made some marks on the surface of it, fidgeted with a GPS gadget, making small beeps, alien and mechanical in the quiet of the wood. He squatted down, leaned his back against a tree and taking out a pocket ruler he began to grid the map in front of him. He was intent on his task, cheery almost. Emz did not move. The man let the map fall as his mobile phone rang out.
“Hey. What have you got for me?”
He listened intently, looked displeased. “That’s not helpful.” His eyes closing tight in frustration. “Yeah. Well thanks for that. Yes, exactly. For nothing.” He hung up the phone, took a moment to gather himself and returned to his map. After a moment or two he cursed and, rising quickly to his feet, moved off into the trees.
Emz followed at a distance. He was not at home in the wood and all his gear was new she noted. His boots came in for particular abuse as they tripped him on every root and hollow. Further and further they moved until she could see his vehicle, parked in the service lane that ran off Mill Run Road. The man climbed over the locked gate. The scent of coffee drifted over to Emz as she watched him pour himself a drink from a flask, looking in deep thought and frustration along the narrow lane. He glugged the liquid down.
She had expected him to turn back towards the main road but instead he drove on, towards the fire road through the trees on the other side of the plantation.
* * *
Anna was attempting to change before heading back to work. It was proving difficult. She had a limited wardrobe at the best of times and tonight all her leggings seemed to have holes in them. Anna gave up, dragged on her afternoon shift clothing and crossed the landing. As she did so there was movement downstairs. Anna held her breath. She could see, once more, her grandmother’s black raincoat. The figure in it was moving down the hall. Anna almost slid down the shiny new steel bannisters.
The figure had moved off down the long thin corridor that led to the utility room. Anna followed. There was no voice this time and the figure looked different. What if the ghost wasn’t her grandmother? Could ghosts haunt places they had never lived? After all, this house had been built only last year on a bare parcel of land. Thoughts of ancient burials burst into Anna’s brain to try and spook her, but she was not listening.
“Grandma.” Anna kept her voice quiet but the figure in the black raincoat gave a shout of fear and appeared to jump a foot into the air. As the figure turned to look at her Anna recognised Emz, and at her feet, some soggy looking clothing.
“What the hell Anna… you scared the life out of me.” Emz glared. She was looking much muddier than usual and there was pondweed in her hair.
“You scared me… what are you wearing? Is that…?” She reached for the softly creased wax coat.
“Yes. It is. It’s practical at Prickles… oh my God. Couldn’t you have just yelled hello? Where were you? Upstairs?” Emz opened up the washing machine, there was a small stash of damp clothing inside. She sniffed it before shoving her own in too and reaching for the powder. “Where’s Charlie?”
“Not back from work.”
“You think she’ll be staying here tonight?”
Anna shrugged. Emz looked up, tried to speak and then stopped herself. She considered for a minute.
“Look. I saw…”
Anna heard the word “grandma” whisper in her head and as she did so she looked at Emz and understood that was the word Emz was about to use but didn’t.
“I did too.”
“You did too what?”
“Saw Grandma.”
Anna stated it as a bald fact. Emz didn’t move, locked eyes with Anna.
“What did she show you?” Anna asked when Emz did not continue.
“A man. In the woods.”
“Our woods?”
‘Our woods’ was how they always referred to Havoc Wood, not simply because their grandmother had owned it and now they did, but because, of all the people in Woodcastle and definitely all the people in Castlebury, the Way sisters knew that wood better than anyone alive.
“No. Leap Woods. He was scouting for something. And then he drove off up the fire road so it’s only a matter of a mile or so and he’s at the boundary of our wood.”
The two sisters considered the man. Emz could picture him very clearly, she was regretting not being brave enough to move nearer and thereby catch a glimpse of his r
eal face.
“Poacher? Grandma was the Gamekeeper. People know she’s not at the cottage. Think because she’s gone there’s someone who thinks he might chance his arm?” Anna questioned. Emz had to stop for a moment and catch her breath. This was the second longest sentence that Anna had spoken since last October. It was a sentence of thought and energy, Anna, back in charge. Emz wanted to cry, to hug her sister.
“Could be,” was all the answer Emz could manage.
“Maybe we should roll over there later, check around the woods…”
“Yeah. Wouldn’t want them lurking in the wood spooking our guest.”
They’d talked about Miss Lake. If Emz was honest she was itching for any excuse at all to go up to Cob Cottage and take a look at her. And if Anna was being honest she too wanted a chance to nosey in on their odd guest. Neither of them would ever admit that they just wanted an excuse to go to the Cottage. They shared a look and then a smile.
“We should ask Charlie in on it.”
“You should ask me in on what…?” Charlie asked, breezing in through the side door, manhandling a large cardboard pizza carrier emblazoned with the coat of arms of the castle and printed up with the name ‘WoodFired From WoodCastle’.
“About tracking down possible poachers up at Havoc Wood.” Anna put in, the scent of the pizza suddenly very savoury so that she remembered forgetting to eat today. And possibly yesterday too.
“We were thinking it might be wise to head off up there and do a recce. What do you think?” Emz asked.
“Can we scoff the pizza first?” Charlie’s face scrunched into the question.
In the kitchen Charlie grabbed plates and Emz simply opened the pizza box and helped herself as the doorbell rang.
“I can get it…” Anna breezed through to the hallway. Pizza. Sisters. Her stomach rumbled.
“Oh.” She couldn’t disguise her lack of delight from Aron who gave her a ‘whatever’ look.
“Charlie in?”
Anna was uncertain what the correct answer was, but she couldn’t lie now because Aron had heard Charlie and Emz arguing over the pizza. He raised an eyebrow.
“Can I come in?”
Anna looked at him. Charlie had said nothing about the other night and she had not come home, but then she had been home the night after and had been quiet where logic would have you think she might have been bubbling with news of Aron’s return. Anna’s brain was sifting through all the dirt to try and find the gold within all this information when Charlie stepped up.
“Hey.”
“Hey yourself.” Aron smiled. When he smiled like this Anna could see why Charlie might want to be with him. He smiled like she was the only woman on earth.
“I was tired Chaz… it wasn’t right the other night, let me make it right…” He took a step back, his arm sweeping back, showman-like. The Way sisters were drawn to look behind him.
His car was packed with cream flowers, hydrangeas, roses, chrysanthemums, Singapore lilies, tulips, all crushed their petalled heads against the windows and now he reached to open the boot. Inside it was a grotto of cream petals, green leaves frothed between. Anna thought he must have emptied the local florist shop.
“Let me try, Charlie…”
It was like some sort of magic trick, Anna thought, the way Aron appeared in the kitchen and was eating her share of the pizza. Charlie had fussed over him, gone to change out of her work clothes. The landline was ringing out in the sitting room.
“I’ll get it.” Emz hurried out of the kitchen, snaffling another piece of the excellent pizza as she did so. Aron was staring intently at Anna. She was struggling to face him down and then, something rose in her, a defiance. She wasn’t going to hand him the power. Take it back.
“You don’t like me much.” Aron stated, reaching to wipe his tomatoed hands on a nearby teacloth.
“Not much.” Anna smiled. “But Charlie loves you, so you’re safe.” And she headed out.
She popped her head in at the sitting room.
“Mum’s going to be staying at the lab again,” Emz said. “So, we could easily go up to Havoc wood later.” She put her pizza slice down on the coffee table. “Don’t suppose Charlie is coming now?” She looked disappointed.
“Probs not. We can go though.”
“I just need to tweak this essay…” Emz had her papers, already messy, on the work table by the window, “… it won’t take me too long.”
“I’ll be back by ten.” Anna reassured her sister, but Emz’s full attention was swerving towards her essay. Anna reached her keys from her pocket and without saying goodbye, headed off to work.
* * *
It was too quiet a shift of course and all Anna’s thoughts rolled and boiled in her head and were not helped by Lella’s anxiety and pessimism.
“I am not sure we can keep doing this.” Lella, her perfectly made-up face, finishing up at the till, the computer screen reflected in her eyes. Anna understood that possibly Lella was hoping for some sort of jolly reassurance from her that things could continue, that they could run the Castle Inn on fewer than ten covers a night, but Anna had nothing left inside her. This idea that her job might be in jeopardy felt as though Lella was standing on her fingers as she clung to a cliff edge. She couldn’t speak. Casey spoke up.
“Hey, the novelty will wear off at the leisure park… the special offers will dwindle away, and it will all balance out.”
“You’re very Zen this evening.” Lella looked up from the screen, popped the receipts from the till drawer into their special plastic box which she locked into the small desk drawer.
“And if we don’t… well, we can open a kebab van.” Casey’s face was a beacon of optimism, light beamed from her eyes and her smile was wide and genuine. For just a moment, Anna believed in the possible future joy of a kebab van. For just a moment.
* * *
She left the engine running in her mother’s driveway and hurried into the house. It was empty save for Emz, just putting away her essay notes and finishing up.
“Good timing. Want to take that wander over to Havoc Woods?” Emz yawned but she was already reaching for her Prickles hoody.
Only when they were driving up Old Castle Road did Anna unclench her fingers from the steering wheel.
11
Anna’s Mind: Corner No. 1 – Open Evening
Back then, no one could understand why Anna had jacked in her job at The Popinjay.
“I just don’t understand you,” her mother had said as if they hadn’t already had this conversation six times in the last week. Anna was leaning against the sink in the kitchen, a big cracked old Belfast sink, eating her cereal. If she sat at the round wooden kitchen table with her mother and sisters, her mother would simply continue the lecture full throttle.
“The Popinjay. I don’t get it. It’s the Popinjay.” Her mother shrugged and turned her glare onto the then ten-year-old Emz. “Did you remember to take your library book back?” It was clear from Emz’s face that she had not and so Anna could munch quickly through her cereal while poor old Emz bore the brunt of it.
“Oh Emz… think of the fines!”
Anna let her mother go on for a couple of sentences before saving her sister.
“Come on then Emz, time we were making tracks.”
Emz stood up from the table and started to pull on her shoes. Anna was already reaching down the side of the old dresser for her sisters’ book bag.
“Don’t forget it’s the open evening tonight…” Their mother was addressing both of them. They were going to check out the secondary school, Emz would be moving up there this September.
Charlie was not up yet due to the fact that her job entailed working behind the bar at the Castle Inn and allowed her to sleep in. Slightly.
“Charlie!” their mother called up the narrow little staircase that led to the first floor of their rather higgledy-piggledy home, or Way Towers as they called it.
“What did you do?” Charlie yawned at Anna as the
y crossed paths at the foot of the stairs.
“The Popinjay.” Anna grinned. Charlie grimaced.
“Oh, when is she going to let that go?”
Anna headed out and Charlie braved the kitchen. Before ten minutes were up she would have a list of errands and chores.
Anna had had to catch two buses to her former job as a commis chef at The Popinjay, a swanky establishment in Old Town in Castlebury. For her new and wonderful and amazing and brilliant job at the primary school kitchen, she only had a ten-minute walk and she walked there with her littlest sister.
The Brabazon First School was where all the Ways had been educated, including Vanessa, their mother. It was a small red brick Victorian building in the centre of town, the playground bounded by a high brick wall at the back and a cast iron fence at the front where it looked out onto Long Gate Street.
The Brabazon First School had recently taken a stance about their school dinners and Anna was part of the new project. Mrs Sutton had gone out on a limb for this and it was not entirely certain that the Council weren’t going to intervene.
Mrs Sutton had gone out on several limbs about sport, music, science and art and she could get away with it in Woodcastle because, on the whole, no one was looking. It was making the Brabazon First School into a go-to destination for parents, even for those families living on the edge of Castlebury.
Anna loved it. Charlie understood. Vanessa was exasperated.
* * *
The open evening was from six thirty so there was time to come home and prepare tea. Vanessa was going to be home in time tonight, this was important.
“I’m not going to be home…” Vanessa’s voice was harsh and informative on the other end of the phone.
“What?”
“I won’t be home in time. There’s a biohazard emergency here. Lazlo’s had a run in with one of the research baboons and it’s all very messy, I can’t get away.”