The Tunnel of Dreams

by Bernard Beckett

  Alice tapped Arlo’s leg and signalled they should go back up the stairs. Arlo expected to be led back to the kitchen, to return the way they had come, but Alice’s courage took them instead to the simpler option. She quietly pulled back the front door, and they slipped into the street and ran. Arlo gulped in great lungfuls of air, tasting the relief of freedom.

  They didn’t slow until they reached the forest’s edge, and did not speak of what they had seen until they were safely inside their tree.

  ‘What happened to him?’ Arlo asked.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The man, in the hood. How did he just disappear?’ ‘Magic,’ Alice said.

  ‘But not normal magic,’ Arlo decided. ‘Not like moving a stick. That was different.’

  Alice nodded. ‘Yes, powerful magic. Dangerous magic.’

  It didn’t make Arlo feel any better, seeing Alice unnerved like this.

  ‘He changed, didn’t he?’ Arlo said. ‘He turned himself into a rat.’

  ‘Or the rat was just there,’ Alice answered.

  But it wasn’t, Arlo was sure of it. He had changed, from one form to another, in front of their eyes. ‘Haven.’ He whispered the name to himself. He had a feeling he would never forget it.

  Before crawling into his sleeping bag Arlo went back outside to pee. The night had caught up with him and he was barely awake, paying no attention to the ground beneath him. Until it moved.

  ‘Oi, do you mind?’

  Arlo jumped. He looked around, but could see nobody. He wondered if he should call out for Alice. He wished he’d brought his headlamp.

  ‘Down here, you giant watering can. I was perfectly happy sleeping beneath this bush, and you had to come along and pee on me? How would you like it, if I came and pissed on your face while you were sleeping!’

  Arlo peered into the dark undergrowth. There was bird there, about the size of a chicken, with a plump body and comically long legs. And angry, blazing eyes, although whether that was the bird’s personality, or the result of having been so rudely woken, Arlo couldn’t be sure. He was almost certain, however, the bird in question was a pukeko. Or swamp hen, as his grandmother used to call them. He bent down to look it in the eye, feeling absurd. Perhaps he was already asleep and this part was a dream.

  ‘I’m very sorry,’ he whispered. ‘I didn’t know you were there.’

  ‘You should have looked first.’

  ‘Well I didn’t, and I’ve said I’m sorry.’

  The bird shook its angry head. ‘I’m going to be smelling of pee, tomorrow.’

  ‘Perhaps you could clean yourself in the stream,’ Arlo suggested.

  ‘Then I’ll be cold,’ answered the bird. ‘I can’t sleep when I’m cold.’

  Arlo noticed the pukeko’s beak didn’t move when it spoke, as if the words were simply forming inside his head. Like when he received a thought message from Stefan.

  ‘You’re not from around here, are you?’ the bird asked.

  ‘What makes you think that?’

  ‘Most people don’t bother talking to birds,’ the pukeko said. ‘They pretend they can’t even hear us, a lot of them.’

  ‘Perhaps they can’t,’ Arlo replied.

  ‘Oh no, I test them,’ it said, and even though Arlo knew it was impossible, he was sure he saw the bird smile. ‘I follow the children, and sing rude songs to them, and they can’t help but giggle. And when their parents ask them what’s so funny, they say “Nothing”, little liars.’

  ‘Oh, I see,’ said Arlo. ‘Well look, I’m very tired. Maybe I can see you later.’

  ‘Look out next time, before you pee,’ the pukeko answered, before rustling back beneath the bush.

  Arlo crept back to the tree, where Alice was already snoring. He wished Stefan was with them. Stefan would have loved the pukeko.

  IT WASN'T UNTIL Stefan watched the twenty eliminated competitors leaving that he understood how much this competition meant to people. They waved goodbye, offering their bravest smiles, but it was easy to see the pain in their eyes, the great lonely sadness that a certain kind of failure brings.

  Harriet explained that many of their families would have spent every cent of their savings for the last five years, preparing for the competition, all in the hope of their child becoming part of the Royal Guard.

  The days that followed were packed with endless instruction and testing. The contestants were woken without warning in the middle of the night and taken on brutal runs through the countryside. They were given long passages of text to memorise and then made to recite them while standing in icy water. They were starved of food and then made to wrestle with one another for rations. And every night, as they crawled exhausted into their beds, they would not know how long they would be allowed to sleep for, or when the next elimination trial would be called.

  Throughout it all Harriet kept Stefan close. He could not say why it was she had chosen him as her confidant, but through every task she would be beside him, repeating the same mantra in his ear: ‘The harder they push you, the stronger you get.’ She knew he was different from the others. He could tell from the little hints she dropped, the questions she asked, the way her brows came together in a puzzled frown at the lies he spun, and maybe that’s what made her curious. It didn’t frighten him, though. He had a strong sense Harriet could be trusted. Maybe that was the magic talking to him, maybe just hope.

  Malcolm Strawbridge watched him too. Often Stefan would feel eyes on him, digging beneath his skin in search of hints of weakness, and when he looked around he’d see Strawbridge slinking back into the shadows. Perhaps, in any other circumstance, this would have worried Stefan, but he was too busy surviving to think about much else. Competitors began to leave. A couple packed their bags silently in the night and sneaked off, another few were left weeping in their beds come morning, unable to push their aching bodies into one more round of punishment. So, when the second elimination was announced, there were only twenty-five exhausted, determined souls, nervously waiting to hear what skill would be used to sort them.

  ‘You may think of it,’ the Major shouted that fateful morning, ‘as the great leveller. For as you all know, no child is permitted to fly until they have been fully trained, and the only institution accredited with training facilities is the Academy, which means, unlike the other challenges, you can be sure everybody else is in the same position. You will all be learning from scratch, and will have the very great privilege of being schooled by the world’s finest and most famous flying instructor, Madame Amy Johnson.

  ‘You have exactly one week to learn the fine art of staying away from the ground, at the end of which you will pit your skills against each other. The ten finest performers will progress to the next stage in the hunt for this year’s five Royal Guard positions. The rest will be going home.

  ‘And, to make things more interesting, there is an extra incentive. The overall winner of this particular test will be given the right to pass up on any one task or challenge, a lifeline which may prove invaluable. Good luck to you all, although, as Madame Johnson will explain, luck is the least of it. She will meet with you all in the exercise yard immediately after chores. That is all.’

  That morning flying was all anyone could talk about. Stefan was puzzled by Harriet’s reaction. He thought the news he would finally be able to compete on an equal footing was excellent, and he imagined Harriet would feel the same. Instead, she moved through her chores with her head down, lost in thoughts she would not share.

  Stefan, who had already finished loading the kitchen slops onto the pig farmer’s cart, stayed back to help Harriet clean down the benches and as soon as he was sure they were alone he asked her what was happening. ‘Isn’t it is a good thing, that nobody will be able to beat us just because they’ve had better training? This time it will just be our magic against theirs, and if Madame Johnson is as good as the Major says she is, we’ll be ready for them. It’s going to be a fair contest!’

  ‘There are two problems
with that,’ Harriet replied. ‘I didn’t want to have to tell you this, but my family, well, we are very rich. I’ve had the very best training money can buy, whereas you, well sometimes it seems to me you haven’t had any magic training at all. I’ve come this far because of my privileged upbringing. If it does ever become a fair contest, then I’m in trouble.’

  Harriet turned to Stefan and he could see her eyes had turned watery with the mere thought of failure.

  ‘You’ve still made it this far,’ he offered. ‘Your family will still be proud of you.’

  Stefan’s parents were proud of him just for remembering to say please and thank you, or for being kind to people at school if they looked unhappy. He couldn’t imagine what it might be like to have to work to make your parents proud.

  ‘If you could have seen my father’s face,’ Harriet said, ‘when I got the letter, saying I’d been invited into the Academy, you’d understand. I’ve never seen him so happy. Never.’

  Stefan nodded.

  ‘You see, there’s another problem, and it’s even worse,’ Harriet said. ‘Although my father is very wealthy, he deplores cheating of any kind, and so he never let me take flying lessons, because they are forbidden.’

  ‘But other people have had lessons, haven’t they?’ Stefan asked, understanding immediately.

  ‘I watched Malcolm Strawbridge on the last night run,’ Harriet said. ‘His feet barely touched the ground. There are tutors who will teach you, if they are paid enough. Half the students here have had illegal flying lessons. We’re going to be starting far behind.’

  She stopped then, as if embarrassed that the next thought had only just occurred to her. ‘You haven’t had flying lessons, have you?’ she asked in a low voice.

  Stefan shook his head. ‘No, I can’t fly. Not yet.’

  Harriet gave him a weak, apologetic smile. ‘I’m sure you’ll do very well in the lessons,’ she said.

  ‘And I’ll help you.’ Stefan added. ‘Just like you helped me at the wall. We’ll find a way.’

  This seemed to cheer Harriet up a little, but that was soon crushed out of her by Madame Johnson.

  Madame Amy Johnson was a short woman with a strong jaw and jet black hair that was cropped above her ears. Instead of wearing the traditional robes of the Academy, she wore a brown leather jacket, the sort you might see on a pilot in an old war movie. She had a habit of leaning against the nearest available wall, slouching into it. If there had been gum in this world, she would have been chewing it. Stefan liked her immediately.

  The remaining candidates lined up in the courtyard as instructed and stared straight ahead with their chins held high, as Madame Johnson strolled up and down, inspecting them. When she passed Stefan he pulled back his shoulders and thrust out his chest, eager to impress her. The flying instructor stopped in front of him and peered into his eyes. Her own eyes were as black as coal, and gave the impression of being able to see right inside a person’s head, to the place where their dreams lay hidden.

  ‘What is your name?’ Madame Johnson asked.

  ‘Will, Madame,’ he replied. Stefan had grown so used to answering to Will that he answered automatically.

  ‘Will who?’

  ‘Will Feeney, Madame.’

  ‘Feeney, eh?’ She tapped her chin with her finger. ‘I don’t think I know the Feeney’s. Where are you from?’

  ‘Um, the name is Irish, I think,’ Stefan replied, knowing at once that this was a mistake. Was there even an Ireland in this world? Surely they called it something else.

  ‘Irish, eh?’ Amy Johnson smiled, and Stefan couldn’t tell if it was friendly or not. ‘I’ve never heard of that place. So, tell me this, Will. Can you fly?’

  ‘Um, no, not really,’ Stefan said.

  ‘Not really?’

  ‘Well, I’ve never tried,’ Stefan answered. ‘But I’m sure you could teach me.’

  At this, the teacher laughed. It was a delightful laugh, hearty with delicate, tinkling notes. ‘I am sure I could too. All right!’

  Madame Johnson stepped back from the line and addressed the whole group. ‘As you know, it is forbidden to learn to fly without going through the proper channels, and I am the proper channels. As you also know, and as I certainly know too, a great many of you have cheated in this matter, and have been taking secret lessons. So, shall we at least start by being honest? I would like everybody who has taken forbidden lessons to hover in the air for a moment, so that I may see what skills you have.’

  There was deathly silence all along the line. Nobody dared to even think about flying. Surely this was some sort of trick.

  ‘Liars,’ Harriet hissed through her teeth.

  Unfortunately, Amy Johnson had particularly acute hearing. ‘I beg your pardon?’ She stared straight at Harriet. ‘Are you calling me a liar?’

  ‘No,’ Harriet replied, horrified. ‘Not at all.’

  ‘I distinctly heard you say liar. Or do you say I’m lying about this too?’

  ‘No, I said it,’ Harriet admitted, turning red with shame. ‘But I didn’t mean you are a liar.’

  ‘Oh, so somebody else is lying? About what? About not having had secret flying lessons?’ Amy Johnson advanced on Harriet and stared her down. ‘Are you saying that in this line we have some cheats?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Harriet back-pedalled. ‘Maybe. Maybe some of them.’

  ‘Which ones? If you know there is a liar, then you must surely know who it is doing the lying. Otherwise you are just guessing. And that is a terrible thing to do, smearing someone’s reputation by guesswork. Can you name them, these cheats, or not?’

  ‘No,’ Harriet admitted. ‘I cannot.’ Her head stayed down.

  Stefan saw Madame Johnson’s nostrils flare in time with her furious breathing. ‘But you said so yourself,’ he called out. ‘You said you certainly know there are cheats.’

  ‘Yes, I did,’ Madame Johnson agreed. ‘But I can back up my words. You see, I know exactly who has lied and who has not. What I did not do is make an unfounded accusation. Or make an accusation under my breath that I was not prepared to follow up in public. When it comes to flying, nothing is more important than behaving honourably: none of you will manage to get your feet off the ground if you are not first able to raise your gaze to the skies.’

  Madame Johnson pointed at Harriet. ‘You, girl, come out here. You will be my example.’

  Harriet moved reluctantly into the centre of the courtyard.

  Stefan saw Malcolm Strawbridge smiling, but without his usual unbreakable confidence. There was something nervous and uncertain about him today. In this regard, for once, he looked exactly like everybody else.

  ‘Now Harriet,’ continued their teacher.

  Stefan wondered how she could have known their names, when she’d only just met them. Did she know he was lying about his? Perhaps she was able to read names simply by looking at people.

  ‘Harriet wishes to be a Royal Guard. Now, if she has what it takes, she will not only be able to use her magic to do familiar tasks, she will also be able to turn it to new tasks, like flying. So, let us find out, shall we. Harriet, close your eyes.’

  Harriet closed her eyes.

  Stefan watched intently, willing his friend to succeed.

  ‘In a moment I am going to ask you to leap into the air. Most of us when we jump, do not really leap into the air at all. We have no intention of meeting with the air in this way, it is not our destination. Most of us, when we leap, are merely stepping off the ground. It is the ground our mind turns to, and so it is the ground to which our body returns. Like this…’

  Madame Johnson leapt into the air and promptly fell back to the ground, landing softly, like a cat might. Stefan was sure that if she ever had to fight someone, she would be very good at it. But this was only the beginning of the demonstration.

  ‘What you need to do, if you are to use your magic to fly, is to truly jump into the air. The air is the place you wish to be, and so you must visit it wit
h an open heart, and hope it welcomes you in return. Flying is not an activity, it is a relationship. It is not a lack of magic that will let you down in this task, but a lack of belief. So, Harriet, think of nothing but the air. Crouch down, that’s right, and believe the air will welcome you. On one, two…’

  Stefan watched Harriet scrunch up her face, trying too hard not to think of the ground.

  ‘Three!’

  Harriet leapt, and gravity replied, returning her to the ground with an undignified thump.

  The other students openly laughed.

  ‘Yes, so you see, at first it can be very difficult, although before long, it will be as natural to you as picking your nose.’

  With that, Madame Johnson reached her arms gracefully above her head, arched her back and completed a slow backward somersault before hovering in front of her awestruck audience.

  ‘May I have another volunteer. Does anybody think they might fare a little better than Harriet?’

  Malcolm Strawbridge raised his hand.

  Stefan looked at Harriet, who he had never seen so miserable. He had barely opened his mouth when she snapped at him. ‘Don’t say anything. Don’t make it any worse.’

  Stefan wondered how it could possibly get any worse, given that right before them, with a supercilious smile etched into his face, Malcolm Strawbridge was gently floating above the ground.

  It was a full three hours before Stefan could get Harriet to speak. And even then it was only to say ‘No, I don’t want any salt, thank you,’ after he had offered it to her at the dinner table for the fourth time.

  ‘You can’t sulk all night,’ he told her.

  ‘And you can’t cheer me up, so don’t even try,’ Harriet replied, which he took as a challenge. So when Harriet was chosen to wash the dishes after dinner, Stefan volunteered to join her.

  He scraped a metal plate free of scraps and passed it to her to wash in the large copper of warm water. ‘The thing is that you want to win this competition, and so do I, and the best way we can do that is by being as clever and as strong as we possibly can, and by helping each other. And, I’m sorry to say this, Harriet, but I don’t think you’re being any of those things right now. You’re just feeling sorry for yourself.’