Black Feathers

33



Each day, under her father’s protective gaze, Brooke cleaned the wound in Gordon’s thigh and redressed it. Once he was eating he was soon able to sit up, and the day after that, when the camp sounded quiet, he slipped into his clothes, put his boots on without lacing them up and put his head outside the shelter. The air smelled of winter but the day was bright, dry and almost warm.

He took a few moments to take in the camp before trying to stand. The fire under the pot was mostly ash, having not been tended for a while. The blackened cookware was stacked neatly at the base of the tree which formed one of the anchors for his shelter. To his left was one large all-conditions tent, pegged out tightly and camouflaged like all the rest of the gear. Nothing was left lying around, and the clearing they were in was small. To find the camp you’d have had to be looking for it. Gordon felt a slight weight lift from him at that.

He crawled into the daylight and tried to stand. It was only then that he found out how much his body hurt. His lower back ached and was stiff. His right thigh had limited movement, as though the muscle fibres were gummed up. His knees, elbows, hips and shoulder joints complained, and he felt flashes of fever jolting through his spine and neck. Still, he was alive and he knew he was mending. When he reached his full height, the world turned grey for a moment and he had to bend towards his knees to avoid fainting. Once the dizziness had passed he was able to stand upright. If someone had pushed him he’d have collapsed, but for the moment it felt like progress.

A few yards away was a smooth-barked beech tree, the grey skin of its exposed roots lit up by the sun. Gordon stepped carefully towards it and sat down in the V where two roots joined the trunk. There his back was supported by the wood and the sun illuminated him. The warmth seeped into him and he felt its comfort and charge.

It was a still day and the trees were silent above him. Nevertheless he felt their presence. They seemed to stand guard. Far away he heard rooks calling to each other across the fields, optimism and energy in their cries. From time to time a leaf fluttered to the already well-littered ground. He thought about his parents and his sisters. He thought about Skelton and Pike, who would surely be looking for him even now. He thought about Brooke and the way she cared for him. He thought about what she and her father might be running from.

For once, none of these thoughts bothered him too deeply. Right now there was nothing he could do about any of it. If a dozen Wardsmen burst into the clearing now, he hadn’t the strength to fight, or even to run. Right here in this instant he had no power over anything at all, and that was fine. What he had was a moment of peace, a moment which might prove to be very short; he had the sun and the trees and the sound of rooks, he had a place to rest.

For once, giving in was easy.



They ate rabbit, pigeon and pheasant. They ate wild mushrooms and sloe berries. They drank tea of mint or lemon balm. Gordon’s strength returned quickly and soon he was helping around the camp: collecting wood, cleaning the pots and bowls after meals, fetching water from the stream.

He was so grateful to them that he didn’t mind the wary way in which Brooke’s father still watched him. He’d had to ask her to tell him the man’s name in the end. He doubted John Palmer would ever have introduced himself otherwise. Each time he left the camp to check his snares, he lingered before leaving, watching his daughter and watching Gordon. It was uncomfortable not to be trusted and yet not know exactly why.

Since he’d recovered so quickly after they started feeding him, there’d been no more “bed” baths and the only time Gordon had been close to Brooke was when she changed his dressings. There had been opportunities to talk but Brooke had been evasive ever since the day her father had come running back into camp. The mood between her and her father remained tense, somehow on hold.

What little talk there was between the three of them was usually reserved for discussing the practicalities of the camp. When she was able to, Brooke shared long, open smiles or happy glances with Gordon, but that was all. He knew that John Palmer was suspicious of him. If that didn’t change, he might have to leave these people before he was made to.

There was one last thing he could do, though. One morning, as John Palmer collected his hunting gear and began his routine of mistrusting, regretful glances at him and Brooke, Gordon approached him.

“Can I come with you?” he asked.

John Palmer couldn’t hide his surprise.

“Hunting?”

“Yes. I know about snares and I’m good at being quiet. I won’t get in your way.”

It only took a moment or two for Brooke’s father to register that if Gordon was with him he wouldn’t be with his daughter.

“It could be a long walk. Can you manage it?”

“I feel fine. If I get tired, I’ll just turn back.”

John Palmer shouldered his gear and moved off without saying goodbye to Brooke. He turned back once.

“Are you coming or not?” he asked, and before Gordon had answered he was out of the clearing and moving out of sight.

Gordon looked at Brooke, their first private moment in many days.

“He’s not a bad man,” she said. “He’s just frightened.”

“I know.”

Brooke put her hand to Gordon’s cheek and smiled. He wished he could understand what she was thinking. The sound of John Palmer’s footsteps was almost gone. Gordon leaned forwards and kissed Brooke, just a peck really and a quick one, but on her lips. He turned away before he could see the reaction.

“I’ll see you later,” he said.



John Palmer’s route took them along the edge of the wood but just inside its boundary. It was an old wood with many huge beech trees, their muscular trunks sheathed in leathery grey bark. Smaller trees and shrubs gave the camp good cover, but out here the trees were large and well spaced. John Palmer moved through them not like a hunter but like prey, eyes watching the open spaces all the time. Gordon walked behind him, silent as a panther, and often John Palmer would turn – pretending to check far behind them but really, Gordon knew, to see if he was still there. The more Gordon watched John Palmer, the more he wondered what could have scared him so much that he would bring his daughter out to the forest to live wild.

Finally, John Palmer broke from the protection of the beech wood. There was an expanse of lumpy land in front of them, broken by patches of deep green, spiky marsh grass. To their left was the River Usk, which, like most of the rivers in the country, now constantly threatened to breach its own banks. Its waters swirled by, muddy and spiralling with currents. Fortunately, there had been no rain for a few days – at least, Gordon didn’t remember any – and the grass of the hummocked flood plain wasn’t too waterlogged.

John Palmer got as close to the river as he could, descending the bank a little to maintain cover as they crossed the exposed field. They had to jump across runnels of water draining from the land, the muddy bank sucking at their boots. Gordon, so confident and fleet of foot through woods, began to tire, his strength caught and washed away with the passing eddies.

When they reached the opposite side of the marshy land, Gordon’s lungs heaved for air and his muscles burned. He struggled up the bank behind John Palmer, but where the bank ended another rise began. His legs began to shake and when he reached the top he fell to his knees. John Palmer turned and Gordon saw great concern in the man’s eyes. This he had not expected. The man ran back to him and helped him into a sitting position.

“You all right, Gordon?”

“Fine. A bit weak, that’s all.”

The man looked annoyed with himself.

“I shouldn’t have brought you. You’re not well enough.”

“I’m OK. I just need to rest for a minute.”

“You’re trembling all over. Here, I brought a snack.”

John Palmer handed him a dozen or so sloe berries and Gordon chewed them hungrily. They were bitter but what little sweetness they possessed cooled the burn and soothed the ache in his legs.

“More?” asked John Palmer.

Gordon nodded.

When he’d eaten a second handful of berries, John Palmer handed him a strip of meat.

“What’s this?”

“Smoked rabbit.”

Gordon bit into the wrinkled meat and chewed fast. It tasted good and it must have been obvious.

“Not bad, is it?”

“Tastes amazing.”

“It lasts for ages too.”

John Palmer sat down beside Gordon and joined him in chewing a string of rabbit meat. For a long time the only sound was the swollen rush of the passing river and the distant calling of rooks.

“It doesn’t take much for people to become animals, Gordon. Just a bit of hunger and discomfort and fear. Then it all breaks down.”

Gordon didn’t say anything but he agreed. He’d seen it all over the news every night as the country ran short, first of luxuries and then of necessities.

“Seventy-two hours from anarchy, that’s what they say.”

Gordon stopped chewing.

“What does that mean?”

“It’s a social theory, I guess. If you cut off the food, the water, the power and the fuel, it will take seventy-two hours for people to turn into savages. Civilisation breaks down. Remember the floods in Cumbria last year?”

Gordon didn’t remember any floods in particular. Hardly any areas had escaped the consequences of storm rainfall.

“There were parts of the Lake District unreachable by any means. Areas where water and power were cut off for weeks. Lots of people didn’t manage to get to the supply drops. It wasn’t reported on the news but I heard every abandoned house was ransacked for food and water. They took the valuables too. When the tins and dry goods ran out, people ate their cats and dogs – raw if they didn’t have means of starting a fire.”

Gordon was pale at the thought of it.

“Is that true?”

“I can’t say for certain, but that isn’t the point really. Far worse things have already happened in this country.” John Palmer stared out across the landscape beyond the small ridge where they sat. “Things no one will ever talk about.”

Whatever had lifted John Palmer’s barriers now brought them down, hard. He stood and looked down at Gordon.

“It’s very hard not to like you,” he said. “You certainly seem like a decent boy. But you’re not a Palmer, Gordon. You’re not… one of us. Don’t forget that.”

The man turned and walked down the ridge into the area of untidy brush and shrub that stretched to the base of the hills. Beyond, the land rose into heath and heather, more forest and higher peaks beyond. Gordon stood too. He was unsteady, but the food had returned much of his strength to him. When he felt able, he followed John Palmer.