by Tom Holt
Well, one day I was down there, just mucking about, and I saw one of her big fat geese waddling up the road. It must’ve got out somehow. Maybe she’d left a gate open, or the fox had got in and scared them all stupid, and this one had flown out of the yard, I don’t know. But there it was — huge great thing, all muddy brown and grey — and I suddenly thought, we could have that for dinner.
I looked round, and there was a nice round stone, just the right size to slip in my hand, so I picked it up and chucked it at this goose, and as luck would have it I got it right in the head. It went down and’ started flapping about like crazy. I nearly panicked and ran for it, but thought, Well, I’ve bashed the stupid thing’s brains in, if I leave it now it’d be such a waste. I jumped up, grabbed the goose round the neck and tried to throttle it. But it’s not as easy as it looks, necking a goose. I yanked and twisted and pulled, but the bugger wouldn’t die, it just thrashed and honked and struggled, so I pulled harder and harder, until suddenly its head just, came off in my hand.
I let go of it — I could see the windpipe sticking out of its neck — and I wanted to throw up, but somehow that made me even more determined to get it home and cooked. So I jumped up again, slung it over my shoulder and ran for it. But that bloody goose, I don’t know what it must’ve weighed, but I was only little. I lugged it on my back until my neck hurt so much I couldn’t stand it any more. I wrapped my arms round it and tried carrying it that way, but that was worse. I even dragged it along by its feet for a bit. But the time came when I was so tired out I couldn’t go another step, not even crawling on my hands and knees.
It was quite simple. The goose was too big for me. I’d have to dump it. So I looked at it, and a right old mess it was by then — all covered in blood and dust, feathers all tangled and busted up where I’d been dragging it. It looked comic and disgusting and stupid, and I hated it for being all spoilt. I hated the thought that I’d killed it and worn myself out getting it that far, and now it would all go to waste. But I was too tired. I was too small to do the job I’d set myself. It just wasn’t possible. So I dragged it under a hedge and left it, and went home.
It was that same feeling, I suppose. There was this big thing I could do. That I could’ve done, rather, if I hadn’t been tired out and all carved up where it’d bitten me. Which is just another way of saying, if I’d been big enough to get the job done, I could’ve talked to it, reasoned with it, explained things. I could’ve found out the things about Them that we don’t know, and told it about us. And then, maybe—
But God help me, I was so tired, and my arm hurt, and I was scared, and it was so much easier the other way.
‘How many more of you are there down here?’ I asked.
‘Just one,’ it said. ‘It’s just me and my son.’
‘The one who came with you to the village today?’
‘Yes.’ It looked up at me. ‘What happened to him? Do you know?’
I looked at it. ‘No,’ I said. I could tell it knew I was lying. But it’d told me what I needed to know. There weren’t any more of them down there. I believed what it told me. Somehow, I don’t think They can tell lies, like we can. ‘Keep still,’ I said.
I went round behind it, and you know what? It didn’t move, not at all. When I was in position, I leaned forward against the back of its neck, and stabbed the knife into the side of its head, right through the bare patch of skin directly under its ear. It jerked away from me, twisting the knife out of my hand, and fell forward. I jumped back. It stretched right out, then folded up. I watched it shiver a couple of times, and then it made a sort of very soft, gentle sighing noise, and that was that.
I counted up to twenty before pulling out the knife, just in case, but there wasn’t any need.
I really wanted to sit down and rest, but I couldn’t stick the thought of looking at it any more, so I set off walking, back into the dark. I wasn’t thinking about what I was doing or where I needed to go. I was too busy not thinking, if you see what I’m getting at. Call it fool’s luck if you like, but I took all the right turnings this time. How long it took me I can’t say, but eventually I wandered out of the tunnel back into the light.
Once I was out, I dropped down on the ground and lay there for a bit, just staring up at the sky. But it was getting dark, and you don’t want to be outside at night anywhere They might be prowling around. I got up and headed back to the village. First door I came to, I bashed on it and kicked and yelled till some old woman opened it. She told me to piss off. I think I may have threatened to cut her head off if she didn’t let me in, I can’t remember too clearly.
Next morning, the village people came to see me. They told me they thought I was dead, and I was a hero, and was there anything they could do for me? I said yes, I needed to get the body of the one I’d killed back out of the tunnel, because if I didn’t have a body to show to the Board I wouldn’t get paid. I explained that it’d be perfectly safe, because there were just the two of them down there and I’d killed them both. I said I’d have gone myself, only I was too badly chewed up. They said they were very sorry about my arm and they’d send for the doctor, but they weren’t going down any tunnels, not for anybody. Not their job, they said. That’s what we pay people like you for.
People like me, they said. Fair comment.
I’ve quit the trade now, of course. No choice. I’m getting some feeling back in the arm, but I’ll never be able to work again. For a long time, I wanted to tell someone about what I’d found out the fact that They can talk, but in the end I thought, The hell with it. It ought to make a difference, of course, in an ideal world. But the world’s not ideal, is it? No way. How could it be, when it’s got things like Them, and people like me?
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