Escape into Daylight

by Geoffrey Household

  ‘No, they are all right. But I’m shivering too much. The blanket won’t stay on while I work.’

  ‘I had a poncho when it was in fashion. That kept me beautifully warm,’ Carrie said.

  ‘What’s a poncho?’

  ‘Just like a blanket with a hole cut in the middle for your head.’

  ‘That’s an idea! I’ll go back to bed and see if I can cut a hole in two blankets. It shouldn’t be difficult if you hold them tight.’

  He snuggled down in bed while Carrie bent over him stretching the blankets. In fact cutting the hole with a blunt knife was a lot more difficult than picking out mortar, but at last it was done and they put on their ponchos. They could not run about to get warm for fear of crashing into pillars, so they danced opposite one another by the light of a candle with Carrie humming all the pop songs she knew.

  Mike was now ready for more work on the puzzling, bow-shaped column, and by the time that greyness had faded away from the cracks in the roof and the grating he had removed some thirty bricks from the face.

  When the whole cellar was pitch black the usual man, whom they now called Screw, came down with their supper – a pot of thick stew, buttered bread and cheese, and the bag of sandwiches for next day’s breakfast and lunch. Carrie tried to draw him out, thanking him politely for the excellent stew. That pleased him. He said he had made it himself.

  ‘Rabbit!’ Mike exclaimed with relish.

  He spat out a pellet and added:

  ‘Shot with an air rifle.’

  ‘Know a lot, don’t you?’ Screw replied sarcastically, and seemed a little uneasy.

  ‘Do you often do a kidnapping?’ Carrie asked with her mouth full. ‘It must need such a lot of work to plan it all.’

  ‘So it does. But they’ve got it down to a fine art in Italy.’

  ‘Is that where you learned it?’

  ‘Mind your own business!’

  ‘Sorry! I didn’t mean to ask questions. But it’s so very cruel to us.’

  ‘You’ll get over it. Do you good! You’ll see how the other half lives.’

  ‘They don’t live in a damp cellar in the dark,’ Mike said.

  ‘He means people like himself who want to get rich,’ Carrie explained. ‘Have you any children?’

  ‘No, and don’t want ’em.’

  ‘Then you’ll be glad to get rid of us. When are you going to let us go?’

  ‘Tomorrow if you’re lucky. Now you eat your food while I have a good look round!’

  He flashed his lantern round their prison and began to walk through the archway which led to the second cellar. Terrified that he would spot the pile of bricks, they watched him helplessly. Carrie was the first to react. She stumbled towards the steps as if to escape through the open grating.

  Screw rushed back and easily caught her before she reached the top.

  ‘Thought you’d lock me in with your young friend, did you?’ he exclaimed, marching her back to her place.

  ‘Just to let you see how the other half lives.’

  ‘None of your lip, baby!’

  He grabbed her shoulders, shook her and threw her roughly down on her sleeping bag. She began to cry pitifully, saying that she was only a little girl; but the trick didn’t work.

  ‘And don’t you try that one on me! No grub for you tomorrow morning!’

  He picked up the bag containing their meagre breakfast and lunch, went up the stairs and bolted the grating.

  ‘You couldn’t possibly have made it in time,’ Mike said.

  ‘I know. I just wanted to stop him looking round the Powder Room.’

  ‘Cor, that was clever! For a moment I was afraid you were going to leave me down here with him.’

  ‘You know I wouldn’t.’

  ‘Well, I suppose I do now that I think about it. And the same goes for me, Carrie. I’m not leaving you alone.’

  ‘Do you believe it’s true that they’ll send us home tomorrow?’

  ‘I expect so. You were sure your Dad would pay up.’

  ‘Then it doesn’t matter if we miss breakfast.’

  ‘Shall we go on with the bricks now?’ Mike suggested.

  ‘It doesn’t seem worth the trouble if this is our last night here. But I tell you what – we’ll put them all back loosely. Then nobody will ever notice.’

  They both slept well, persuading themselves that next day they would be home. When they woke up they knew it was morning from the grey streaks at the grating, but neither knew the time. Carrie had a tiny, very expensive watch which never worked but looked pretty on her wrist. Mike had a tough, cheap one which was always right, but in the excitement of the night before he had forgotten to wind it up. So they waited and waited, every ten minutes seeming at least an hour, but nobody came to fetch them. They had not even the heart to dance again to pass the time.

  It must have been late in the afternoon when they heard steps above them and the unbolting of the grating. They were sure that this at last meant release since they were never visited during the day.

  This time two masked men came down the stairs – Screw and a powerfully-built man whose black beard could just be distinguished. Mike said nothing. Carrie greeted them politely. Ignoring the children, Beard examined the cellar closely as if he wanted it for some other purpose than a prison. He stood in the archway flashing a torch all round the second cellar, but never spotted that there was anything wrong with the bricks. The two stood there talking in low voices and then prepared to leave.

  ‘Are we going home now?’ Carrie asked them at last.

  ‘Not for a few days,’ Screw answered.

  ‘Oh! Well, can we have something to eat?’

  ‘Not now. You must wait till it’s dark.’

  When they had gone, Carrie and Mike were very near to despair but neither was going to be the first to break down.

  ‘And I couldn’t hear a thing they said!’ Carrie complained.

  ‘I could – just a very little. They were standing near a pillar and the sound came down on my side like a whisper.’

  ‘Was he Italian, the man with the beard?’

  ‘I don’t think so. Nothing wrong with his English. Perhaps it was over there that he learned to kidnap.’

  ‘What did you hear?’

  ‘Not a lot. Something about police and a photograph and my mother being comforted, and then it faded out except at the end of a long bit of talking by Beard when I think he said: “never be found”.’

  ‘I don’t like it, Mike.’

  ‘Nor do I. And I’m hungry. Well, let’s get on with the bricks. I wish we had done some this morning.’

  ‘Better wait till Screw has brought our supper. He might go in there again.’

  It was long after dark when he arrived. He did not come down, but opened the grating and tossed their food on to the top stair, telling them to fetch it and slamming home the bolt. He had not gone to any trouble for them this time. No stew, no cocoa. Just a loaf of bread and a hunk of cheese.

  They ate it all ravenously and then returned to the half-moon of brickwork. When the pile of bricks was again back on the floor, Mike began picking away at the inner courses which were now laid bare. The mortar was not so rotten and the job harder. When his hands were tired, Carrie took over and it was she who broke through into the emptiness behind.

  ‘Nothing!’ she exclaimed, disappointed. ‘Nothing but blackness!’

  ‘Well, we thought it couldn’t be solid. Let’s have a look!’

  There was nothing to look at, only a brick-sized slice of night. He put his ear to the hole. There was no sound, or not more than if he had listened to a big sea shell.

  Mike took over and pulled out eight bricks from two courses – a useful hole but still revealing nothing. When he put his arm through and tried to light the darkness with a candle, it flickered and went out. All he could see was that they had broken into a round shaft which looked like a well. He threw down half a brick and heard it splash at the bottom of the shaft. That clinc
hed it. A well it was.

  ‘There must be an opening at the top,’ he told Carrie, ‘but I don’t see how we can ever get up there.’

  ‘Let’s make the hole big enough to get through, and then wait till there’s some light.’

  ‘All right. Want to have a go?’

  Carrie took the knife and did her best, but her fingers were not so toughened as those of a farmer’s son. They had been blistered by her earlier work and now were nearly raw flesh. She showed them to Mike in the light of the candle.

  ‘Oh, blast the bricks!’ he exclaimed, and gave them a furious kick more out of pity for her than frustration.

  The result was a zig-zagging crack running up from the floor to the side of the small hole they had made. Mike took hold of the top course and shook it, pressing inwards with his feet. A solid chunk of bricks came away into the cellar and more splashed into the well. They could now enter the shaft with ease, but all was still blackness and the candle was running low.

  ‘We’ll go to bed now and get up at the crack of dawn,’ Mike said. ‘Keep an eye on the grating whenever you turn over and wake me as soon as it’s light. And I’ll bring my bag over to your side of the cellar so that I can see the grating too.’

  Consequently sleep was very broken. Once Carrie, half dreaming, said it was morning when it wasn’t. Once Mike, feeling that the night was far too long, decided that the steps and the grating were not where he thought they were and lit the candle to find out; they had not moved and it was still night. After that he slept soundly until Carrie nudged him and said:

  ‘I can just see the stair.’

  No doubt about it. The light was growing somewhere above them. They quickly finished up the last of the dry bread and felt their way into the second cellar. The inside of the shaft was definitely lighter than it had been at night; they could see upwards but not downwards. The well seemed to be closed at the top. At some time in the past, however, it had been open, for an iron ladder was clamped to the bricks nearly within reach.

  ‘I think I can get a hand to it if you hang on to my feet,’ Mike said.

  ‘But how will you get back?’

  ‘Same way. I’ll stretch out an arm and you grab my wrist with both hands.’

  Carrie sat on his legs while he wriggled on his stomach over the edge, twisted and grabbed the upright of the ladder.

  ‘Got it! You can let go now.’

  But is it safe?’

  ‘It seems quite firm. Why shouldn’t it be? I’ll go up and see if we can make a way out at the top.’

  Mike swung himself on to the ladder and climbed up. It ended at a height hardly more than the height of the cellar. Two great beams crossed the top of the shaft and on top of them were paving stones. One of them had tilted where a big root had knocked out supporting bricks on the rim of the well. A little light came through the hole and the slight gap between the stones. One could probably break through given a pick-axe and something solid underfoot, but from the ladder it was impossible – nor would anyone dare to bring down a slab of stone while standing underneath.

  ‘I’ll go down to the bottom now,’ he said.

  ‘I wish you’d come back,’ Carrie answered nervously. ‘There can’t be anything at the bottom and it’s all no good.’

  ‘Well, you never know. Suppose there was a drain half way down big enough for us to get through. Light a new candle, Carrie, and pass it out to me!’

  The candle burned clearly, for there was plenty of fresh air now that they had opened up the hole. Mike went down, always carefully feeling every rung of the ladder before he put his weight on it and never letting go with his free hand till he was sure. He had been taught that while helping his father to prune overgrown apple trees.

  Far down he came to the inky black level of the water. It was quite still, though after he had watched it for a minute he detected a slight rise and fall. He had the impression that it was deep. Bitterly disappointed that all their work and hopes had come to nothing, he began to climb up again. Neither at top nor bottom was there any way out of the shaft.

  He was not far from the hole and Carrie’s helping hand when the topmost clamps of the ladder pulled out from the well-head. A brick whizzed past his head and another glanced off his shoulder. The ladder leaned out from the wall under his weight, then crashed into the other side of the shaft. One of the uprights broke; the other slowly bent while he watched it in horror. Then it cracked and he hurtled down the well, conscious of nothing but his terrible speed, but remembering to draw a deep breath before he hit the water.

  Carrie, too appalled to utter a word, watched Mike swing from the bending section of ladder and saw it break. The sound of his plunge to the bottom rolled and echoed up the shaft. She called again and again, but there was no answer. Far down the ripples and suckings of the unseen water died away and all was silent.

  She ran to the steps and screamed for help, knowing all the time that her voice would never be heard. Then she returned to the hole they had made, talking to the darkness and listening in case Mike had come to the surface and found something to hang on to. At last she lay down on her sleeping bag, numbed and shocked by the death of her dear companion. It was a long time before she began to shed tears which went on and on.

  Later in the morning or perhaps the afternoon – she only knew that it was not yet night – she heard footsteps above. Again two men were coming. She rushed to the top of the steps and called wildly to them to be quick, and that there had been an accident. She knew that it was far too late to rescue Mike, but perhaps there was something which grown men could do.

  Beard and Screw opened the grating and came down. Incoherently she began to explain what had happened. They did not listen to more than the first few words and went straight into the second cellar while she followed behind begging them to help.

  They looked into the hole and saw the broken ladder.

  ‘Poor little bastard!’ Screw said casually.

  ‘They don’t understand risks at that age,’ Beard remarked. ‘Well, it saves us trouble.’

  For the moment Carrie could not see what trouble it could possibly save them.

  ‘Can’t you do anything?’ she implored them. ‘Isn’t there any way you can get down?’

  They ignored her completely.

  ‘Are you able to get hold of some mortar, boss?’ Screw asked.

  ‘The gardener has some for repairs to the ruins.’

  ‘Then I’ll build that up again tonight.’

  ‘Not yet. The well might be useful.’

  ‘Blasted newspapers! Can’t keep their noses out of anything!’

  ‘Well, if it wasn’t for the photograph, we’d never have known that Falconer had gone to the police.’

  ‘Haven’t you – haven’t you got the money for me?’ Carrie asked.

  ‘No, sweetie, we haven’t,’ Beard answered.

  ‘It will come. I know it will come.’

  ‘So will Christmas.’

  ‘Please may I have another candle? I’m so afraid now in this darkness.’

  She dreaded the coming night when she would be alone again. Clearly the kidnappers’ plans had gone wrong. They seemed almost glad that Mike was dead and she was sure they no longer cared what happened to her. She loathed the cold way in which Beard called her ‘sweetie’.

  ‘I haven’t any more,’ Beard replied. ‘He’ll stay here with the lantern while you eat your supper.’

  ‘I don’t want any. I couldn’t eat.’

  ‘As you like.’

  ‘What’s the time?’ she asked.

  ‘About three.’

  ‘Did you hear me? Why did you come so early?’

  ‘To see how to arrange things, sweetie. We know now.’

  They went up and shut the grating. Carrie huddled into her bag and pulled Mike’s nearer to her for comfort. She fell into an exhausted sleep, and when she woke up the dim, grey light had turned to the velvet blackness of a grave.

  4

  The Path
of the Water

  Mike hit the water legs first, went straight to the bottom and fell over on to sand. Instantly he was swirled sideways and jammed under something solid which felt like stone. A current rushed past him as he fought to free himself and rise to the surface, but all his struggles only resulted in freeing his legs while the upper part of his body remained stuck in a slot. He tried to push himself back and stretched out his arms for something to shove against. The straightening of arms and streamlining of his slight body did the trick. The water carried him forwards under the sill. When he felt that his legs were clear he gave a kick to shoot himself to the surface. To his amazement he found that his legs touched bottom and he could stand with the fast-running stream only up to his waist.

  He coughed the water out of his lungs and very cautiously waded on through the unseen, feeling his way with his hands protecting his head. Sometimes he could stand upright; sometimes he had to bend; and once the stream deepened so that it was easier to swim a few strokes than to walk. After the panic which had seized him when he was trapped under the sill he was empty of fear and bewildered that he could be alive.

  Shivering with cold, he stumbled on until the passage became lower than ever. He was up to his chest in the stream, and the roof just above his head. As he ran his hands over it he could feel wide cracks. Once from the edge of such a fissure he knocked down a long sliver of rock. When he had passed it he heard a shower of stones behind him – a warning that the whole passage could be horribly unsafe.

  A little further on he had proof of it. Here a great chunk of the tunnel roof had collapsed. At the top of the dome left by the fall he could see a small, ragged triangle of sky, far out of reach. The fall had completely blocked the channel, piling up the water which foamed under it and leaving no easy way through or over for him.

  For the moment he was content just to use his eyes again. He sat down on a heap of boulders and gravel, drawing deep breaths of gladness and fresh air as he looked up at the patch of blue. Now that he could at last see around him, the whole scene of his escape was no longer such a mystery.

  Long ago – many centuries ago to judge by the church-like arches of the cellar – men had discovered the underground water and dug a well to tap it, starting at the level where he and Carrie had been imprisoned. Then they must have decided that it was inconvenient to go up and down stairs to fetch water, so they built up the brick casing and made a new wellhead higher up. Later on, the well was closed altogether by the beams and paving stones which he had seen. He knew a lot about wells, having watched fascinated the clearing of the old well at home and the sinking of a new one.