The Door In the Tree

by William Corlett

  Then William pointed.

  ‘Look over there,’ he said.

  The distant hillside which he indicated sprang up out of the landscape, billowing with a froth of green and white.

  ‘Blossom,’ said Mary, delighted with the sight of it.

  ‘Real trees,’ said William.

  ‘How it used to be,’ said Spot.

  ‘Can we go there one day?’ asked Mary.

  ‘You can go anywhere,’ replied the dog. ‘Only it’s best not to go alone and it’s best not to stray too far from the known paths.’

  And the children remembered Alice again.

  ‘Help,’ murmured Mary. ‘She could be anywhere.’ Then she gasped. ‘Hey!’ she said, ‘isn’t that a sort of a path down there?’ and, as she spoke, she pointed to where a brown line cut between the trees, straight as an arrow. This cleft climbed the steep escarpment further along from where they were standing and then disappeared out of sight in amongst the trees behind them.

  ‘And there’s another one over there,’ said William, pointing to where, distantly, a sliver of paler green parted the dull uniformity of the forest. This narrow ride also climbed up to their level and then was lost in the trees behind them.

  ‘The light path and the dark path,’ growled Spot. ‘You must never go down the dark path. Not ever.’

  ‘Where does it lead?’ asked Mary, staring at the straight brown track.

  ‘Deeper and deeper into the forest. It’s not a good place. We never go there.’

  ‘And the other one?’ asked William, looking at the green way.

  ‘It goes deeper into the forest as well.’

  ‘Is that one safe?’

  ‘You must ask the Magician,’ Spot replied.

  ‘The Magician,’ said Mary wistfully. ‘If only he was here. We’re never going to find Alice in all those trees. She could be anywhere.’

  ‘Isn’t there any way we can call him up, Spot?’ William asked.

  ‘Oh, so you believe in him again now, do you?’ the dog said, looking up at him with unblinking, staring, eyes.

  ‘I didn’t not believe in him,’ William protested, sounding a bit peeved. ‘It was just . . . oh, I can’t explain to a dog. What am I doing talking to a dog, anyway? The guys at school would think I was off my rocker.’

  ‘Is that what you think?’ Spot asked. ‘That you’re off your rocker?’

  ‘No, he doesn’t,’ Mary said firmly, cutting in before William had a chance to reply. ‘Now please, Spot, answer William’s question. Is there any way that we can call the Magician up? I mean make him come to us?’

  ‘I dare say he’d come – if you needed him enough,’ replied the dog. And, as he spoke, he looked up into the sky, his tail slowly beginning to wag.

  ‘But how would we call him?’ Mary insisted.

  ‘You wouldn’t,’ Spot replied. ‘He’d just arrive. . . . Listen!’ and he barked the last word, straining forward with his head, one foot raised off the ground, as he listened to a distant sound.

  ‘Kee! Kee!’

  ‘What is it?’ asked Mary, searching the sky for the source of this strange, sad, call.

  ‘Kestrel,’ said William. And as he spoke he saw the bird wheeling in the air far above them.

  ‘Kee! Kee! Kee!’ it cried again.

  Then, as William and Mary watched, the hawk dropped out of the sky and disappeared from sight, down into the trees, somewhere behind them.

  ‘Come on,’ said Spot, setting off at a trot back into the forest.

  ‘Where are we going?’ asked William, following him.

  ‘You really don’t understand anything, do you?’ said Spot. Then he started to bark and a moment later, distantly but distinctly, they heard a voice, calling their names.

  ‘That’s Alice,’ said Mary excitedly.

  ‘Of course it is,’ said Spot. ‘Come on.’

  ‘But which way?’ insisted William.

  ‘Kee! Kee! Kee!’ the kestrel called, appearing above the trees once more. And, as they watched, it slowly circled, higher and higher, its mournful call growing fainter as its shape gradually merged into the blue of the sky.

  ‘Mr Tyler!’ William shouted involuntarily, and as he did so, he ran forward, stretching out his hands in front of him, as if willing the bird not to depart.

  ‘Where?’ asked Mary, looking round hopefully.

  ‘The kestrel,’ William replied.

  ‘But – it’s gone,’ said Mary.

  ‘William! Mary! Spot!’ Alice’s voice sounded, nearer to them now.

  ‘He showed us where she was,’ said William quietly.

  ‘Oh,’ said Mary. ‘Then he did come to help us.’

  Ahead of them Spot was barking excitedly as he dodged between the trunks and across the soft brown ground, making for the distant glint of green where a thin ray of sunlight was showing them the clearing where Alice was waiting for them.

  4

  Brock

  THEY FOUND ALICE sitting on a pile of logs at the side of the clearing, her hands stuck into the pockets of her anorak, looking really fed up.

  ‘What took you so long getting here?’ she demanded, reproachfully.

  ‘Honestly, Alice!’ Mary snapped. ‘You could at least show a bit of gratitude.’

  ‘I’ve been lost in this stupid wood for hours,’ her sister said and she kicked the ground in front of her petulantly.

  Mary and William exchanged a look and remained silent. There were times when Alice’s moods were better left unchallenged.

  ‘We’re not out of here yet,’ Spot growled, sounding far from confident, as though he knew they were still lost.

  But at the sound of his voice Alice jumped up delightedly, her mood changing at once.

  ‘Spot!’ she exclaimed, forgetting all about her misery and fear. ‘Oh, Spot! You just talked!’

  ‘So?’ the dog asked her wearily.

  ‘Well, you wouldn’t earlier. You didn’t say a thing to me. No matter how much I pleaded.’

  ‘I was talking to you all the time,’ the dog growled. ‘You just weren’t listening.’

  ‘Not listening!’ Alice protested. ‘I wanted you to talk to me more than anything in the world.’

  ‘Well then, you weren’t listening properly,’ the dog replied, gruffly. ‘I could hear you. But you were so busy trying to make me answer you that you missed it when I did.’

  Then, seeing how dejected his reprimand made Alice look, he felt sorry at once and nuzzled his nose into her hand and licked her palm.

  Alice stroked the dog’s head as he sat on the ground in front of her, with his nose on her knee. William and Mary came and sat on the pile of logs beside her. They were all silent, lost in their own thoughts.

  ‘It really is very odd,’ Alice said at last, looking at her brother and sister. ‘Not at all how I imagined. I mean . . . I thought we’d come back to Golden House . . . and the magic would start . . . and the Magician would be here . . .’

  ‘He was here,’ William told her, sadly. As he spoke he looked up at the patch of blue sky above their heads.

  ‘Where?’ Alice cried.

  ‘William thinks the bird was Stephen Tyler,’ Mary told her.

  ‘Which bird?’ Alice demanded.

  ‘The one that flew above the clearing here,’ Mary replied.

  ‘The kestrel,’ William said, quietly.

  ‘You saw it?’ Alice asked.

  Mary nodded.

  ‘It was as if it was showing us where you were,’ she told Alice. ‘At least, it was just after seeing the bird that we heard you calling.’

  ‘I don’t think that bird was Stephen Tyler!’ Alice said. ‘It really scared me. Like those things in the desert . . . What are those birds called that wait for people to die?’

  ‘Vultures,’ Mary replied.

  ‘Well, it had that sort of look to me,’ Alice said. ‘It had really peculiar eyes. They seemed to stare right into me. I’m sure it was waiting to eat me.’

  ‘But t
hat’s it,’ William said. ‘Don’t you remember? That’s how the fox used to look. . . . Really deep.’

  ‘And the owl,’ Mary agreed.

  Then they all turned and looked at Spot, who glared back at them with the same, unblinking stare.

  ‘And Spot,’ Alice said quietly. ‘You stare like that as well. Does that mean the Magician is in you now? Is he, Spot?’

  But the dog merely put his head on one side and wagged his tail a little.

  ‘Sometimes,’ Mary said, thoughtfully, ‘it’s as if he’s just an ordinary dog, isn’t it?’.

  ‘Well, maybe that’s because I am,’ Spot growled. ‘Just ordinary. It’s you lot who’re strange, not me!’ And the dog yawned and stretched his legs out in front of him and licked one of his feet.

  They were silent again. All around them the forest watched and waited.

  ‘Oh!’ Alice said at last, shivering as she spoke, ‘I really hate this place.’

  ‘Yes,’ William agreed. ‘We’d better get going. It must be nearly lunch time.’ Then he turned, looking slowly round the glade. ‘But . . . which way, Spot?’ he asked.

  Spot also looked round, sniffing the air.

  ‘Oh, fishcakes!’ Alice said, scratching her cheek. ‘I’m really hungry now.’

  ‘It’s quite late, actually,’ Mary said, looking at her watch.

  Alice hadn’t got a watch. Or rather she had had one. It had been given to her by her mum and dad for Christmas one year. But it had never kept very good time and, after they’d had it repaired a few times, it was decided that she was one of those people who couldn’t wear a watch because they had too much electricity in their bodies. She’d tried lighting a lamp bulb by rubbing it in her hair after this revelation – but with no success. The most she could achieve was a mild electric shock from the car door or a crackling sound when she took off her school shirt, neither of which phenomenon, even she had to admit, was exactly a world-shattering scientific breakthrough. However, as far as knowing the hours of the day was concerned, she claimed that her stomach was as good as any watch and that by it she could always tell precisely what time it was.

  ‘It is now lunch time,’ she announced, ‘and I’m really hungry. I could eat at least seven sausages.’ Sausages were her favourite food. ‘Oh, Spot!’ she wailed, ‘please get us out of here,’ and she crossed to where the dog was sniffing the ground with immense interest and put an arm round his neck.

  ‘Badger!’ Spot said, looking up at her and grinning. Then they both turned back and snuffled the ground again with their nose.

  At once Alice could smell the sharp, acrid scent. It was so strong that, for a moment, she thought she was going to be sick. She pulled away from the dog and turned to face William and Mary.

  ‘Oh!’ she shuddered. Then, realizing what had just taken place, she sat back on her haunches.

  ‘William!’ she whispered. ‘It just happened again!’

  ‘What did?’ He sounded a bit irritable. William didn’t like being lost. He felt it cast a slight on his manliness and made him look a bit wet. These problems had only recently begun to affect him; in fact until almost this precise moment being manly and not being wet had not mattered to him a scrap. But now, for some unaccountable reason, he felt personally insulted by the predicament in which they found themselves. He was therefore in no mood to listen to Alice, who had jumped up off the logs and was facing them both, her face alight with excitement.

  ‘I went inside Spot,’ she said. ‘I smelt through his nose!’

  ‘Oh, Alice!’ William groaned, dismissively.

  ‘But I did, Will,’ Alice protested.

  ‘No you didn’t,’ Mary said. ‘I was watching you the whole time. You just knelt down beside him.’

  ‘I smelt through his nose, Mary,’ Alice insisted. ‘I really did. Like before. You remember? Like when you flew with the owl . . .’

  ‘I was watching you, Alice,’ Mary told her. ‘You just knelt down beside him.’

  Then, before Alice had a chance to reply, Spot suddenly bounded forward, his tail wagging and his nose close to the ground.

  ‘Come on,’ he barked. ‘This way.’

  The children had to run to keep up with him. They dodged round trees and pushed through branches. They crossed occasional dingy glades, similar to the one that Alice had found. Sometimes they had to skirt round pools of dark, stagnant water or jump across sodden tracks, oozing with mud. They slithered down into hollows and climbed, panting, up steep banks. All the time the brown, half-light engulfed them and the motionless trees surrounded them on all sides. The only sounds were their own footsteps as they pounded the dank earth and snapped dead twigs under their feet.

  At last they came to a place where a broad path cut across their way. Here the trees, which leaned together across the divide, were festooned with creeper and the ground beneath them was carpeted with rank weeds and rotting wood. Lurid toadstools grew out of the decaying stumps of trees and dead branches stuck up out of the undergrowth, like the blackened bones of animals.

  Spot stopped at the side of this track. He paced up and down in the space between two trees, without putting a foot into the opening in front of him. The hairs on his neck stood up, bristling with apprehension. A low growl rolled in the back of his throat. His tail hung low and swished angrily.

  ‘What is it, boy?’ William whispered, sensing the dog’s unease.

  ‘Don’t you feel it?’ Spot growled, not taking his eyes off the track in front of them.

  William looked round. He could see nothing unusual.

  ‘Feel what?’ he asked, and, as he spoke, he walked out of the shelter of the trees into the centre of the track.

  Spot barked once, springing back away from the track and knocking into Mary who was standing just behind him.

  ‘What’s the matter?’ she said, putting a hand on the back of his neck to steady him. The dog trembled beside her.

  ‘Come on,’ William called. ‘It’d be easier walking up this track. It must lead somewhere.’

  ‘No!’ Spot barked. ‘It isn’t a good place.’

  ‘Is it the track we saw from the cliff?’ Mary asked, suddenly feeling shivery. ‘The one you called the Dark Path?’

  ‘You must feel it,’ Spot pleaded with them.

  ‘I do feel a bit . . . cold,’ Mary said at last.

  ‘But it’s no worse than the rest of this vile forest,’ William called.

  Only Alice remained silent. She hung back away from the side of the track and put her hands back into her pockets for comfort.

  ‘You feel something, don’t you?’ Spot said to her, pushing his nose up close to her.

  ‘It’s true I don’t like it very much,’ she told him, in a small voice. ‘What is this place, Spot?’

  ‘The Dark and Dreadful Path,’ the dog said, quietly. ‘No animals come here. Not from choice.’ Then he sniffed the ground again, puzzled. ‘But Badger crossed here,’ he said at last, and he lifted his head, staring across the track to the woods beyond. Then, eerily and unexpectedly, he let out a long, high wail. It was the sort of howl a wolf might make in the night, chilling and sad.

  ‘Oh, Spot,’ Alice cried, throwing her arms round his neck to comfort him. ‘What’s the matter?’ And she felt so full of love for the dog that it made her want to cry.

  A moment later William found the reason for the dog’s distress. At the other side of the track, he discovered, partially hidden by a mound of loose twigs and undergrowth, the lifeless body of a badger. It was as though the creature had tried to crawl into the mound for warmth and protection. There was blood on the back of its neck and it looked as though it had been attacked by some ferocious animal.

  ‘Oh!’ William called out, aghast. Then he turned his back, not wanting to look at the pitiful sight any more.

  ‘What is it?’ Alice asked, running forward.

  ‘Don’t look,’ William said, stopping her. ‘It’s a badger, I think. Only it’s dead.’

  Spot ran quic
kly across the track to where the body lay. He nosed at it sadly, whimpering as he did so.

  ‘Brock,’ he cried, giving the sound the most tragic air. Then he barked loudly, angrily, and he snarled at the surrounding forest, as though, in some strange way, he blamed the trees or the place they were in for the fate of the badger. ‘It’s happening again,’ he growled. ‘It’s happening again,’ and, still muttering and barking he set off once more into the forest on the other side of the track.

  ‘Well, come on,’ the dog yelped, ‘if you want to get back for feeding,’ and it disappeared from view amongst the trees. Mary hurried across the track, joining William and Alice.

  ‘I’ve never seen a badger before,’ she said, staring at the lifeless body.

  ‘How did it die?’ Alice asked, in a sad voice.

  ‘I think it’s been attacked,’ William said.

  ‘Poor thing,’ Alice sobbed, fighting back tears. ‘I don’t like this forest at all, William,’ and she reached out and took hold of his hand.

  ‘I don’t like it much either,’ her brother agreed.

  ‘Come on,’ Spot barked impatiently in the distance. ‘There’s a way down here.’

  ‘We’d better go,’ Mary said. ‘We don’t want to be late on our first day,’ and she followed the sound of the dog’s barking.

  As William pulled her away, Alice gave one last, lingering, look at the dead badger, then, hand in hand, they hurried away from the Dark and Dreadful path.

  5

  The Writing on the Floor

  PHOEBE WAS AT the range, stirring a pan, when they came in.

  ‘There you are,’ she said, looking up. ‘Did you have a good walk? Lunch is nearly ready.’

  William hurried upstairs and Alice went in search of Jack who was ‘somewhere in the house,’ Phoebe told them. ‘I’m never quite sure where. I get hoarse shouting for him, sometimes. Tell him lunch is on the table, will you?’

  Stephanie was in her cot and woke up suddenly at the sound of their voices. Mary crossed to her and, without asking for permission, picked her up and hugged her.