The Changes Trilogy (33 page)

She remembered the pub from her first exploration—a large white square building with broken windows. It hadn't looked as if anyone lived there, but she slowed to a casual trot as a gentle curve brought the bridge into view. The whole narrow world—the world between the enclosing banks of the canal—seemed empty of people, but who could say what enemies mightn't be about beyond them? As she wound at the handle she felt the blank windows of the ruined inn watching her, she felt the vast silence of the Vale listening like a spy to the slow clack of the cogs beneath her. This bridge was slightly different from the others: even though it opened from the “good” end, it turned on a pivot so that when it was open she was left with an awkward leap down to the bank. She decided it was safer to close it, but by the time she had watched
Heartsease
pass and had cranked the bridge shut she was shivery and sweating.

The next bridge was already open, and now the land fell away on either side of her so that she could feel the teeth of the wind out of Wales—and the banks would no longer hide the tug. Now they would be parading their wicked engine before all the watching Vale, twenty miles wide. At the bridge after that all went well, though it opened from the wrong side, but as Margaret was cantering on she heard a shrill cry and looked back to see a woman brandishing a saucepan while an arthritic old man hobbled away down the lane—for help, probably, for somebody young and strong to pursue them. Margaret bent over Scrub's neck and let him stretch to a full gallop; she was sure they could outrun any pursuit, provided they weren't halted in their flight. Hungry, she felt into her saddlebag as soon as they were past the tug, and found a hunk of Rosie's bread to gnaw.

It was two miles to the next bridge, a flimsy affair for foot traffic, where the canal crossed the narrow little barge canal from Stroud, all reeded and silted. Then a short stretch to Sandfield Bridge, which opened from the “good” side; then nearly a mile more to the bridge between Frampton and Saul. That one lay amid brooding woods which screened the next expanse of country, and it was already open. Frampton, she remembered, lay only a furlong from the canal, and beyond the woods was a long straightaway through windswept and shelterless country; so, as she was now well ahead of the tug, she took Scrub down the embankment, dismounted and led him along by the overgrown gardens of Saul Lodge. The canal here ran ten feet higher than the land. She was completely under cover as she walked below the stretching arms of the pine trees to a point, thirty yards on, where the curve was finished and she could climb up again until only her head showed as she spied out the long straightaway.

For five endless seconds she peered around a clump of withered nettle stems.

Then she had wrenched the startled pony around and was running back along the awkward slope. Up onto the path the moment it might be safe; into the saddle; galloping back and reaching at the same moment for the square of red cloth.
Heartsease
was only fifty yards the other side of the open bridge; desperately she waved her danger signal.

The water creamed under the stern as the propeller clawed at it to slow the tug down, but already they were through the bridge and Margaret could see that the momentum would take the tug around the curve before she could be stopped. Jo twirled the wheel and the bow swung toward the towpath; two seconds later it slid into the bank with a horrid thud. She jumped from her pony and ran along the path, but before she came to the place the still-churning engine had lugged the boat out into midstream again. Jonathan moved the lever to the stop position and opened the wheelhouse door.

“I hope that was worth it,” he called.

“Oh, Jo, we're done for! Come and see! Can you turn the engine off without making smoke?”

He fiddled with the lever and the wheel, so that a quick spasm of power sucked
Heartsease
backward to lie against the bank. Margaret caught the rope he threw and tied it to a thornbush; he scuttled down the engine room hatch, and almost at once the puff-puff-puff from the funnel died away. Lucy came up behind him, her face all mottled with oil and dirt, but stayed on the deck while he leaped ashore. Caesar fidgeted with his tether in the stern.

Margaret led Jonathan along under the embankment. The children peered again around the hissing nettle stems, down the mile-long line of water which rippled grayly in the sharp wind, to where Splatt Bridge sat across the dismal surface like a black barricade.

There were people on the bridge, about a dozen of them, tiny with distance but clearly visible in the wide light of the estuary. Above them rose a spindly framework with a hunched blob in the middle.

“What on earth have they got there?” said Jonathan.

“Mr. Gordon's litter.”

Chapter 8

KNIFE AND ROPE

There was no mistaking it. The freshening northwester had cleared every trace of haze from the fawn-and-silver landscape.

“Bother,” said Jonathan. “It's strange how you never expect other people to be as clever as you are yourself.”

He spoke in an ordinary voice, but looking at him Margaret could see the hope and excitement fading in his eyes as the colors fade from a drying seashell.

“Oh, Jo,” she cried. “What are we going to
do
?”

“If we can't think of anything else we'll turn round, go back and hide again. Where's that bull you told me about?”

“Bull?” whispered Margaret.

“Yes. You said you were chased by a tethered bull at Splatt Bridge.”

“We can't see him from here, if he's still where he was then. We might if we go further along the wood.”

“Wait a moment. Let's watch them a little longer. It all depends whether they've seen us.”

Margaret's heart was beginning to bounce with a new dread, the terror of her remembered nightmares. The palms of her hands were icy patches. To stop herself from thinking about the bull she screwed up her eyes and peered along the narrowing streak of water until the bridge seemed to dance and flicker. But between the flickerings, the tiny people appeared lounging and unexcited. There was a small flurry, and the litter tilted, but it was only a change of bearers.

“All right,” said Jonathan. “Let's find your bull.”

The children crept along the edge of the leafless wood, away from the canal; it was difficult not to walk on tiptoe.

“There he is,” said Margaret.

Even at this distance the bull looked dangerous, tilted forward by the weight of his huge shoulders and bony head. The cruel horns were invisible, but Margaret knew their exact curve.

“No cows with him,” said Jonathan. “He'll be in a real temper.”

“What are you going to do?” whispered Margaret.

“I don't want to turn round and go back if we can help it,” said Jonathan. “Some people must have seen us pass, even if they couldn't get out in time to try and stop us, so they'll probably be hunting down the canal after us. And even if we do get through, they'll probably stir up enough people to hunt us down in Gloucester. But if I can cut the bull's tether and bait him toward the bridge, he'll clear the men off for long enough for me to open the locking-pieces, and then you could simply barge the bridge open. They haven't brought horses. They won't catch us after that.”

“You'll have to borrow Scrub. Caesar would be hopeless at that sort of thing.”

“So would I. I'll do it on foot.”

Margaret felt cold all over, a cold not from the bitter wind but spreading out from inside her. She knew Jonathan hadn't a chance of beating the bull on foot, any more than she had a chance of managing
Heartsease
. The plan was the wrong way around.

“I'd rather do the bull,” she said. “I can ride Scrub. We'd both be better at our jobs that way. How do I cut the tether?”

Jonathan tilted his head sideways and looked at her until she turned away.

“It's the only hope,” she said.

“Yes. It's better odds. And if it goes wrong at least you've a chance to get away. We'll try it like that. I found a carving knife in the ironmonger's in Gloucester—I liked it because it was so sharp—and if you can slash at the rope when the bull has pulled it taut you should be able to cut it in one go.
Heartsease
will make a tremendous cloud of smoke when she starts again, and they'll all be watching the canal after that. Then it will be six or seven minutes before I reach the bridge if I come down flat out. You'll have to time it from that, because you don't want to clear the bridge too early, or they'll simply dodge the bull and come back.”

“What about Lucy and Tim?”

“I'll need Lucy to control the engine.”

“Couldn't we cut a pole for Otto to do that with? Then Lucy and Tim and Caesar could come down after me, and get away if things go wrong. I'm going to ride down behind that long bank over there—it's called the Tumps on the map—so that I can't be seen from the bridge. If it all works, the men will be on the wrong side after the bridge is open, so we could wait for Lucy and Tim beyond it. If it doesn't, they might be able to escape.”

“Um,” said Jonathan. “I'll go and talk to them. And Otto. But I'll need Lucy to help me start the engines, so she won't be able to leave until you're almost in position—they'll be a long way behind you.”

“Never mind,” said Margaret. “At least it means Tim won't try to stop me teasing the bull.”

Jonathan laughed.

“He doesn't look as if he needed much teasing,” he said. “You move off while I show Lucy where to go. I'll give you twenty minutes before I start up.”

“The knife,” said Margaret.

“Yes, of course.”

They went back to the boat. Lucy was sitting on the bulwark with her head in her hands; Tim was tickling Davey's stomach on the foredeck. Jonathan scampered aboard while Margaret looked over Scrub's harness and tightened the girth a notch. He came back with a knife which was almost like a scimitar, with a knobby bone handle made from the antler of a deer; she tried it with her thumb and found that it had the almost feathery touch of properly sharpened steel. Too scared to speak, she nodded to her cousin, raised her hand to Lucy and led Scrub away under the trees.

After a hundred yards they worked through a broken fence into an overgrown lane, with another small wood on their left; beyond that she turned south, still screened by trees, parallel with the canal but four hundred yards nearer the great river. At the far corner of the wood she found she could see neither Splatt Bridge nor the bull, so, hoping that meant that none of her enemies could see her either, she mounted and cantered on over the plashy turf. Scrub was still moving easily, his hooves squirting water sideways at every pace as he picked the firmest going between the dark green clumps of quill grass that grew where the ground was at its most spongy. Two furlongs, and their path was barred by a wide drainage ditch, steep-banked, the water in it flowing sluggishly toward the Severn. Scrub stretched his pace, gathered himself for the leap and swept across. Now they were riding along the far side of the Tumps.

This was a long, winding embankment, old and grassy, built (presumably) to stop the Severn from flooding in across Frampton long before the canal was dug. The map showed that it dipped sharply in toward Splatt Bridge. They reached the place far sooner than she wanted, but she dismounted at once and whispered to Scrub to stay where he was and taste the local grass. Then she wriggled to the top of the bank.

The bridge was three hundred yards away, straight ahead but half hidden by the patchy saplings of a neglected hedge. Much nearer, more to her right, stood the enemy of her dreams. The bull was already disturbed in his furious wits by the crowd on the bridge, and had strained to the limit of his tether in the hope of wreaking his anger and frustration on them. The best thing would be to snake through the grass and cut his tether while he fumed at Mr. Gordon and his cronies. Surely he wouldn't notice if she came from straight behind. There was plenty of time.

But she couldn't do it. To be caught there, helpless, too slow to escape the charging monster … She lay and sweated and swore at herself, but her limbs wouldn't take her over the bank.

Suddenly a savage cackling and hooting rose from the bridge. Through the bare branches of the hedge she could see arms pointing upstream. She looked that way herself. Clear above the distant wood rose a foul cloud of murk, that could have come only from some wicked engine.

She ran back to Scrub, mounted and trotted him along the bank until she thought they were opposite where the bull was tethered; then she nudged her heel into his ribs and he swept up over the bank, and down the far side. She'd been hoping to catch the bull while he was straining toward the shouting voices; but he must have heard the drub of hooves, for his head was already turned toward her and even as Scrub was changing feet to take the downward slope the horns lowered and the whole mass of beef and bone was flowing toward her as fast as cloud-shadow in a north wind. She could see from the circle of trampled grass how far his tether reached; she was safe outside it, but she could never cut the rope unless she took Scrub inside it.

Scrub saw the coming enemy and half shied away, but she forced his head around and touched his ribs again to tell him that she knew what she was up to. When the bull was so close that she could see the big eyes raging and the froth of fury around the nostrils, she jerked sideways at the precise moment in Scrub's stride which would whisk him to the right, and as the bull belted past she leaned forward to slash at the tautening rope.

The first slash missed completely, and the second made no more than a white nick in the gray hemp; then the enemy had turned.

The bull was dreadfully quick on his feet, considering how much he weighed; he seemed to flick his mass around and be flowing toward her before she had really balanced herself back into the saddle. But Scrub was still moving toward the center of the trampled circle, and even before she asked him he accelerated into a gallop. She knew he didn't like this game at all.