The Runaways

by Ruth Thomas

  It was hot and steamy in the chip shop and Nathan, not thinking, had pushed back the anorak hood. He had even taken off the silly Brighton cap, not thinking he was going to need it since he had the hood of Julia’s coat.

  And there, standing behind him in the queue, was – not the pink woman, but the young man with the long nose and the red hair. The young man who, by all calculations, should have been safely behind his counter in the grocery shop. But who, alas, had chosen that minute to come out and buy his lunch.

  Nathan made a rush for it. The young man was thinking his own thoughts, and if Nathan hadn’t been so obviously in a hurry, and so obviously alarmed, the young man might not have noticed him, even with his head uncovered. As it was, he couldn’t help but notice. And recognize.

  ‘Hey – you! You’m that runaway kid!’

  But Nathan was gone. Pounding through the rain, speeding along the Esplanade, away from the red-haired young man and back to Julia. Nathan’s eyes might be weak, but there was nothing wrong with his legs. The young man was a good runner too, but Nathan had a start on him, and it was as much as he could do not to lose distance. At the end of the Esplanade, Nathan hesitated a moment. Which way? The last thing he wanted to do was to lead the young man up the cliff steps and into their hide-out. Nathan charged straight ahead, across the railway line, past a little red light and into a deep dark lane, which looked as though it had been cut out of the hillside.

  As Nathan reached the lane, he heard a shrieking and clanging behind him and turning, he realized the significance of the red light. A great steam train had just turned the corner, and was ploughing towards the station, puffing and clanging its way across the level crossing. The man from the grocery shop was the other side of the train. He would have to wait for the light to turn green, and that gave Nathan an extra precious minute.

  Nathan pulled the anorak hood over his head again. There were other people in the lane, but they only thought he was running because of the rain, or perhaps to get home with his take-aways before they should get cold. He was just another small boy running.

  The lane carved its way steeply between high walls, and at the end was a providential choice of roads. To the right, to the left, straight on, or parallel with the deep one, but on a higher level. The red-haired man would never know which way he had gone. There were a few people with umbrellas to see, but by the time the young man arrived at the crossroads, they would no longer be there to tell him.

  Nathan chose the path that doubled back. It wasn’t a road, just a muddy lane. Soon there was another turning to the right and Nathan took that, sloshing through the mud along a path which skirted the backs of other peoples’ houses, and which led to a large field with football posts in it. Across the playing field, all by himself in the rain, Nathan drove his flagging legs, and tried to ignore the pain in his chest.

  He was winded! He couldn’t run any more. But he was out of the wide open field now, and safer in the shelter of another lane. To his left, Nathan could see the grassy cliff-top. He had come round half a circle.

  Julia and the hide-out must be to his left again. The cliff-top was quite deserted, as well it might be in this weather. Nathan paused a few moments to get his breath, then started once again, head down, chugging along the cliff-top with the sea on his right and the railway line on his left. The young man from the grocery shop was long since outdistanced. He would never find him now, Nathan thought.

  In the dug-out, Julia was fretful. ‘Why did you take so long?’ she wanted to know.

  ‘There was a long queue in the chip shop,’ said Nathan.

  ‘These chips are nearly cold,’ she complained, wolfing them down nevertheless.

  Nathan was ravenous. He ate as though he had not had a proper meal for days, as indeed he had not. A day and a half, anyway. He felt good in the dug-out. It was cosy with the rain lashing down outside, and the two of them dry and safe and well-fed. It was not until he had almost finished eating that the true nature of the situation dawned on him. ‘But he’s going to tell the police!’ he said out loud, dismay in his voice, and suddenly clouding his face.

  ‘Who?’ said Julia. ‘Who’s going to tell the police?’

  ‘That man from the grocer’s shop. He saw me. I wasn’t going to say.’

  ‘How do you know he’s going to tell the police? He might not?’

  ‘He chased me. He called me runaway kid. He knows. The police is going to be here soon. Any minute probably.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘You don’t care, do you!’

  ‘Yes I do, I do care,’ said Julia loyally, trying to rally a bit. ‘How will they find us here, though? In this hiding place?’

  ‘It’s a obvious place, innit! It’s probably the first place they’ll look. Everybody in this town must know about this place. We’ll have to go somewhere else.’

  ‘In the rain?’

  ‘It might be too late anyway. The police might be here already.’

  He crawled out to see. The rain had stopped, almost, but the cliff-top was still deserted. Wherever the police were, they had not yet arrived here. Nathan stood up cautiously, and peered across the dockyard to the Esplanade, seeking striped cars and blue-uniformed figures. But the distance was all a blur. If the police had been there, he would not have been able to identify them. His gaze travelled over theharbour towards the harbour mouth. And there was something that even his defective eyes could not fail to see. Coming into the harbour, on the afternoon full tide, was a beautiful big ship!

  ‘Ju – come and look!’

  She came out of the hide and stood beside him. ‘I suppose now you want us to stow away on that.’

  ‘It’s a miracle,’ said Nathan, in awe. ‘It’s a miracle. It came just in time. There’s got to be a way. There’s got to be a way.’

  Frantic with excitement, he tried to assess the possibilities. The ship was there, making for the dockside, only a few metres from where the children stood. But they couldn’t just go and jump on it. For one thing it was broad daylight, and they would be seen. For another thing, there was no way into the dockyard for them, except down the cliff, glaringly exposed to view, and in any case too steep. If it were dark, on the other hand, and they were already hidden, somewhere in the dockyard. . . .

  Perhaps there was another way down, an easier way. Across the cliff-top, next to the sea, it looked as though there might be steps. ‘Come on!’ Nathan grabbed Julia’s wrist, and dragged her towards the steps he thought he saw.

  The steps led down to the beach, skirting the far end of the dockyard. Down below were great piles of new wood, and Nathan could smell their fragrance as he ran. Halfway down the steps, he paused. One of the piles of wood was stacked close to the cliff. Between the wood and the cliff was a space. That would be a good hiding place. Nathan peered over, and he couldn’t see to the bottom of the space, because the cliff was overhanging just there. If he and Julia were in that space, and the police were coming down the steps looking for them, he didn’t think they could be seen.

  How to get down?

  To his left as he looked, there was a steepish slope of grass and wet earth, and then a wall, perhaps a metre and a half high. Not a very big drop. He could manage it easily. Even Julia could manage that little drop, surely.

  Nathan looked to see if they could be seen, climbing down. A long shed jutted from the harbour, almost right across the dockyard. On their side of the shed there were no work people, not one. It was now or not at all, there would never be another chance like this.

  ‘Come on, Ju. Down here!’

  Julia followed Nathan without question. She was too tired, and too dispirited to think for herself. She would do whatever Nathan said. He slithered down the cliff slope, on his feet, balancing with practised ease. He vaulted the last drop, landing lightly on the ground, with flexed knees and ankles. Julia tried to do likewise.

  She tripped, half way down the slope, and pitched on to her side. She slid and rolled the rest of the way, falling over
the wall to the ground with a sickening thud. Her left leg took the full force of the fall.

  ‘Come on, Ju,’ said Nathan, who was already crawling into the hiding place.

  ‘I can’t.’

  ‘What you mean “I can’t”? We have to hide.’

  ‘I hurt my leg. I can’t move.’

  ‘Course you can move!’ Impatiently, Nathan grabbed Julia by the shoulders and dragged her into the lovely little space, between the pile of wood and the cliff. Julia screamed.

  ‘Don’t make such a fuss! They’ll hear you!’

  But Julia’s face was white with pain. Her pale eyes were screwed into little slits, and she was biting her lips.

  ‘Are you really hurt, then?’

  ‘Yes I am.’

  ‘Why didn’t you come down more careful?’

  ‘I tried to. I ain’t good at climbing like you.’

  Nathan considered. ‘Shall I bandage it for you? Like you done my arm?’

  ‘We haven’t got no bandage.’

  Nathan took off his tee-shirt, and tried to improvise with that, but Julia screamed again when he touched the leg, so he put his shirt back on again.

  ‘Lie still and rest it, Ju. I expect it’ll be better by this evening.’

  ‘It won’t.’

  ‘Yes it will. How do you know it won’t?’

  ‘I think it’s broke.’

  ‘It can’t be. It can’t be broke.’

  ‘I think it is though.’

  There was a heavy silence.

  ‘Nathan,’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I can’t come on the ship, can I!’

  Silence.

  ‘I can’t, can I, Nathan.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Are you going to get a ambulance for me?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘What are you going to do then?’

  Silence again.

  ‘What are you going to do, Nathan?’

  ‘Ju – I have to go on that ship, I have to! It’s my only chance! It’s my best chance in the world.’ He didn’t like himself particularly while he said this, but he said it nevertheless.

  ‘And leave me here?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘All by myself?’

  ‘You’ll be all right, Ju. They’ll come and put you in a nice hospital, and look after you. You’ll be all right.’

  ‘Oh it hurts, it hurts,’ wailed Julia. ‘Don’t leave me, Nathan.’

  ‘Sh-sh-sh-sh – somebody’s going to hear. I ain’t leaving you yet. . . . Not till it’s dark. . . . We got hours yet.’

  Julia turned her face to the wall. Two tears of pain and lonely desolation trickled across her cheeks.

  ‘Julia,’ said Nathan, suddenly anxious.

  ‘What?’

  ‘You won’t tell of me, will you? When I’m gone on the ship. You won’t tell them where I am!’

  ‘No,’ said Julia, in a small flat voice.

  ‘You sure?’

  ‘I said. I won’t tell of you. . . . You better take the money, didn’t you.’

  ‘I’ll have half of it.’

  ‘You might as well have all of it. I shan’t need it no more. You better have it for your chance.’

  ‘All right,’ said Nathan, feeling indescribably mean and horrible. ‘What will you do, Ju? When I’m gone on the ship? Will you call somebody?’

  ‘I suppose so. Won’t I have to wait till the ship sails away? Will it be a long time? . . . Perhaps I shall die,’ she added with some satisfaction.

  ‘Don’t be silly. You’ve only hurt your leg. People don’t die because their leg’s broke.’

  ‘What do you know about it? Actually, I think my heart’s broke too.’

  ‘Oh don’t be stupid! Don’t be stupid, Rat-bag! You only thought of that out of them rubbish stories you been reading!’

  What did she want to do it for? What did she want to break her stupid leg for? Nathan kicked at the wood in front of him, his face like thunder. Across the dockyard came the sounds of shouting men and clanging metal as the ship came to the harbour wall. His ship. What could have been his ship.

  He looked at Julia, still lying with her face to the wall. He gave the wood a final kick, and with one great painful wrench, he made up his mind. He crawled into the open, and stood up, in full view of the police, who were at that moment searching the cliff-top. They had found the remains of the children’s lunch, and very excited they were about it too.

  ‘You can come and get us,’ Nathan yelled. ‘We’re down here. You can come and get us!’

  Then he squatted down beside Julia, who was gaping in wonder at this extraordinary behaviour.

  ‘What you do that for?’

  ‘I ain’t going to leave you, am I, stupid Rat-bag! I’m going with you, aren’t I?’

  He glowered at her, still furious, but the look she gave him back was one of pure, shining love.

  About the Author

  Ruth Thomas was born in Wellington, Somerset, in 1927. She received a BA Honours Degree in English and a Diploma in Education from Bristol University and went on to teach in a number of primary schools in the East End of London. Ruth began writing soon after she retired in 1985. Her first novel The Runaways won The Guardian Children’s Fiction Award. This was followed by four further critically acclaimed novels including The Secret, which was televised by Thames Television. She died in 2011.

  Also by Ruth Thomas

  The Class that Went Wild

  The New Boy

  The Secret

  Guilty!

  Hideaway

  The Paper Bag Baby

  THE RUNAWAYS

  AN RHCP DIGITAL EBOOK: 978 1 446 45380 3

  Published in Great Britain by RHCP Digital,

  an imprint of Random House Children’s Publishers UK

  A Penguin Random House Company

  This ebook edition published 2011

  Copyright © Ruth Thomas, 1987

  First published in Great Britain

  Hutchinson edition published 1987

  This Red Fox edition published 2002

  Red Fox 9780099596601 2002

  The right of Ruth Thomas to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorized distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

  RANDOM HOUSE CHILDREN’S PUBLISHERS UK

  61–63 Uxbridge Road, London W5 5SA

  www.randomhousechildrens.co.uk

  www.totallyrandombooks.co.uk

  www.randomhouse.co.uk

  Addresses for companies within The Random House Group Limited can be found at: www.randomhouse.co.uk/offices.htm

  THE RANDOM HOUSE GROUP Limited Reg. No. 954009

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.