Long Lankin (46 page)

“But your leg —”

“It’s all we can do, but we must do it now. Move!”

“Right. Give me the axe!”

I grab it from Auntie as we run towards the pile. It’s so heavy, the head hits the ground with a clunk. Long Lankin looks down at us and tips his chin to the side and stops grinning.

Roger starts at the bottom of the heap, furiously tearing out leg bones, ribs.

I lift the axe as high as I can, then strike at the tangled mass, thrusting the metal head deep inside, turning it around with all my strength, and yanking it towards me. A couple of little skulls drop to the floor.

I claw at the pile with both hands, pulling out a shredded sock, bones, a dirty blue rag, bones, and more bones.

Cora is struggling. I snatch the axe from her and bring it down once, twice, into the heap, and once again. Mrs. Eastfield drags out a piece of a ragged blanket, and with it comes a large bundle of bones knotted together. They dislodge and shoot across the floor. The heap is creaking. It’s beginning to move. Where the axe head falls, bones spill out and roll away. A space opens up in front, stretching back into the middle of the pile, overhung with the platform of bones on which Long Lankin sits.

He leans over, snarling. Dangling Mimi under one arm, he starts to crawl down towards us. The shifting sound becomes louder, more urgent. As his weight presses down on the front of the heap, the tangled bones under his feet begin to slip.

Lankin and Mimi are sliding down the pile. There’s a mighty rushing sound. Bones clatter onto the floor all around us. There’s no stopping them. Lankin loses his balance. He’s tumbling down amongst the unravelling bones. Mimi is slithering down with him. She wakes. I hear her cry.

He’s falling towards us. Mimi is entangled in his legs. Everything is rushing. The bones are spilling over our feet. Roger is shouting. We are all caught up in the bones. Lighted candles are toppling on their sides. Thin lines of smoke rise to the roof.

Mimi will be crushed. Lankin’s great stinking body is in the way. His legs are sprawling, his arms flailing.

Where is Mimi? I can’t get to her. The long bones are twisting around one another. The ribs are sharp. My leg hurts. There is barely room to stand.

Beneath the pile of bones, a hem of Mimi’s pyjamas appears.

Roger snatches her ankle.

Lankin’s long feet lurch towards my face. I can see through the shredded skin to the flesh underneath. He is covered in sores. He stinks. The bones are sliding on top of him. He is howling.

The crypt is filling with dust. The candles are going out. I step on the axe handle and drag it up in my hands.

Mimi clings to Roger. Her arms are about his neck.

We stumble out of the mess. We dash behind the pillar in the corner to the hole in the wall, but the huge crash of the bone pile has dislodged the earth in the tunnel roof. It caves in and falls so quickly that soil flies into the crypt in a thick, filthy cloud. We cough out the dirt and, choking, try to rub it from our eyes.

I look in every direction, trying to see through the clouds of earth and dust.

Through my stinging eyes, I spot a dark oblong like a small door in the back wall. I throw myself at it. It moves a little but doesn’t open. I feel for a latch, but I can’t find anything. I can’t see.

“It’s all right, Mimi. It’s all right,” I say over her wailing. “We’ll get you out. We just have to open the door.”

Auntie Ida grabs the axe back from me. I hear a noise, look behind, and through half-blind eyes see a large shadowy shape beginning to rise up from the scattered bones on the floor.

“He’s coming, Auntie Ida — hurry, hurry!”

“Move back! Move back!” she yells.

Mrs. Eastfield swings the axe and —
wham!
— splinters the door. The axe head is stuck in the wood. She drags it out —
wham! wham!

Lankin is standing, tottering, shaking his head —
wham!
— Mrs. Eastfield’s made a hole, the edges jagged and sharp. Panting, she tugs at the broken pieces and throws them down, then hits the door with the axe again. The hole is bigger.

Cora yanks Mimi out of my arms and pushes her through the broken door. Mrs. Eastfield leans towards me, gets hold of my shirt with her filthy, sweaty hands, and pulls me up to the doorway. I climb through, tearing my sleeve and cutting my arm on a splintered edge of wood. There is a dark stone staircase curving upwards. I climb after Cora and Mimi. Mrs. Eastfield hobbles up behind, groaning and gasping for breath, dragging the axe. It clangs up the steps —
bang! bang! bang!
— one at a time.

There’s a small door up there, worm-eaten and rotten at the bottom. I shift Mimi onto my hip, crouch forward, and, with all my might, push at the door over and over. It shudders against my fists. Roger squeezes past me and starts kicking at the decaying wood. Auntie Ida passes up the axe. There is no room to swing it. He bangs relentlessly at the bottom of the door with the top of the shaft. It cracks and splinters, but there is no room for me even to push Mimi underneath.

“Move back!” cries Roger. “The bolt on the other side’s rusty. Don’t you remember? It’s the little door behind the curtain in the tower. Most of the screws have gone. Move back!”

He thumps the door halfway up with the back of the axe head. Suddenly, at one thud, the door moves out a few inches. Behind it, something metal clatters to the floor.

“The bolt’s come away!” says Roger. He pushes the door a few inches. The long, heavy curtain hangs behind it. He forces his way through the gap, gathers up the folds of fabric, and holds the curtain to one side to let us out. The light stings my eyes.

On the wall above the door is the marble slab naming the rectors of Bryers Guerdon.

“Quick! Quick!” says Auntie Ida, pushing us forward as she turns. Then, with a huge effort, she shuts the door behind the curtain. I hear the slapping of Lankin’s feet as he comes up the staircase behind us, and I scrape my elbow on the font in my hurry to reach the church door. Roger yanks it open. We rush out into the churchyard and, breathless, start to run down the path. I hold Mimi’s head tightly against my shoulder, my hand over her eyes.

I hear her muffled voice: “You’re hurting me.”

“Come on, Auntie Ida!” I call. “Hurry up! We’ve got to get to the top of the hill!”

She falters beside the porch, leaning on the axe, breathing hard, kneading her chest with her free hand.

“Come
on
! We’ll help you!” Roger shouts.

“You go. Run! Go on!” she urges.

We hear the heavy church door creaking open.

“Auntie Ida. He’s coming!”

“Get away! Get away!” she grunts, pushing the air with her hand.

“You’re hurting me!” Mimi whines again.

Lankin’s repulsive form appears round the corner of the wall. I make a sound like a groan. His head turns towards me, but it is Mimi he sees. At the same moment, she wrenches my hand from her eyes and, for a second, gazes at his face. Then, taking me by surprise, she begins to writhe in my arms, pummelling my chest with her fists and kicking out with the soles of her feet.

“Let me go! Let me go!” she yells.

“Roger! Help me!” He is almost at the metal gate. He turns towards me. I grapple with Mimi, but she seems to have summoned up some furious energy. She beats me so hard on my rib cage, I am thrown off balance. Before Roger can reach us, she forces me backwards with one mighty shove, wriggles out of my arms, and begins to run through the graveyard, in and out of the tangles of weeds and grass, dodging the crosses and tombstones, past the tower, and up the shadowy side of the church. Roger and I give chase. I look back. Lankin is crawling swiftly behind us on all fours, twisting his long body this way and that around the graves. I can’t see Auntie Ida, but what I do see, gathering against the wall of the church, are the little ghostly children, their dark, hollow eyes following us as we run.

Mimi zigzags through the churchyard. Sobbing, she passes the last ragged crop of gravestones and jumps over the tufts of grass as she draws closer to the pool on the far boundary. Above the water soars the bare, white, double hook of the gypsy tree.

Mimi slows down, her bare feet sodden in the spongy ground this side of the tree. Trying to head her off, Cora and I find ourselves floundering in marshy water. I look behind. Lankin is no longer behind us. He is on another course altogether, avoiding the bog, taking a wide circular route onto the dry, higher ground at the back. I’ve lost sight of Mrs. Eastfield.