Hollow City (14 page)

We tiptoed around the hollow’s reeking carcass. Charged down the mountain as fast as we could, given the limits of the treacherous path and Bronwyn’s volatile cargo. Once we’d reached flat land we were able to follow our own tracks back through the squishy moss of the forest floor. We found the lake again just as the sun was setting and bats were screeching out of their hidden roosts. They seemed to bear some unintelligible warning from the world of night, crying and circling overhead as we splashed through the shallows toward the stone giant. We climbed up to his mouth and pitched ourselves down his throat, then swam out the back of him into the instantly cooler water and brighter light of midday, September 1940.

The others surfaced around me, squealing and holding their ears, everyone feeling the pressure that accompanied quick temporal shifts.

“It’s like an airplane taking off,” I said, working my jaw to
release the air.

“Never flown in an airplane,” said Horace, brushing water from the brim of his hat.

“Or when you’re on the highway and someone rolls down a window,” I said.

“What’s a highway?” asked Olive.

“Forget it.”

Emma shushed us. “Listen!”

In the distance I could hear dogs barking. They seemed far away, but sound traveled strangely in deep woods, and distances could be deceiving. “We’ll have to move quickly,” Emma said. “Until I say different, no one make a sound—and that includes you, headmistress!”

“I’ll throw an exploding egg at the first dog that gets near us,” said Hugh. “That’ll teach them to chase peculiars.”

“Don’t you dare,” said Bronwyn. “Mishandle one egg and you’re liable to set them all off!”

We waded out of the lake and started back through the forest, Millard navigating with Miss Wren’s creased map. After half an hour we came to the dirt road Addison had pointed to from the top of the tower. We stood in the ruts of an old wagon track while Millard studied the map, turning it sideways, squinting at its microscopic markings. I reached into the pocket of my jeans for my phone, thinking I’d call up a map of my own—an old habit—then found myself tapping on a blank rectangle of glass that refused to light up. It was dead, of course: wet, chargeless, and fifty years from the nearest cell tower. My phone was the only thing I owned that had survived our disaster at sea, but it was useless here, an alien object. I tossed it into the woods. Thirty seconds later I felt a pang of regret and ran to retrieve it. For reasons that weren’t entirely clear to me, I wasn’t quite ready to let it go.

Millard folded his map and announced that the town was to our left—a five- or six-hour walk, at least. “If we want to arrive
before dark, we’d better move quickly.”

We hadn’t been walking long when Bronwyn noticed a cloud of dust rising on the road behind us, way in the distance. “Someone’s coming,” she said. “What should we do?”

Millard removed his greatcoat and threw it into the weeds by the side of the road, making himself invisible. “I recommend you make yourselves disappear,” he said, “in whatever limited way you are able.”

We got off the road and crouched behind a screen of brush. The dust cloud expanded, and with it came a clatter of wooden wheels and the clip-clop of horses’ hooves. It was a caravan of wagons. When they emerged clanking and rumbling from the dust and began to pass us, I saw Horace gasp and Olive break into a smile. These were not the gray, utilitarian wagons I’d gotten used to seeing on Cairnholm, but like something from a circus, painted every color of the rainbow, sporting ornately carved roofs and doors, pulled by long-maned horses, and driven by men and women whose bodies fluttered with beaded necklaces and bright scarves. Remembering Emma’s stories of performing in traveling sideshows with Miss Peregrine and the others, I turned to her and asked, “Are they peculiar?”

“They’re Gypsies,” she replied.

“Is that good news or bad?”

She narrowed her eyes. “Dunno yet.”

I could see her weighing a decision, and I was pretty sure I knew what it was. The town we were heading for was far away, and these wagons were moving a lot faster than we could ever travel on foot. With wights and dogs hunting us, the extra speed might mean the difference between getting caught and getting away. But we didn’t know who these Gypsies were, or whether we could trust them.

Emma looked at me. “What do you think, should we hitch a ride?”

I looked at the wagons. Looked back at Emma. Thought about
how my feet would feel after a six-hour walk in still-wet shoes. “Absolutely,” I said.

Signaling to the others, Emma pointed at the last wagon and mimed running after it. It was shaped like a miniature house, with a little window on each side and a platform that jutted from the back like a porch, probably just wide and deep enough to hold all of us if we squeezed tight together. The wagon was moving fast but not faster than we could sprint, so when it had passed us and we were out of the last driver’s sight, we leapt out of the brush and scurried after it. Emma climbed on first, then held out a hand for the next person. One by one we pulled ourselves up and settled into cramped positions along the wagon’s rear porch, careful to do so quietly lest the driver hear us.

We rode like that for a long time, until our ears rang with the clatter of wagon wheels and our clothes were caked with dust, until the midday sun had wheeled across the sky and dipped behind the trees, which rose up like the walls of a great green canyon on either side of us. I scanned the forest constantly, afraid that at any moment the wights and their dogs would burst out and attack us. But for hours we didn’t see anyone—not a wight, not even another traveler. It was as if we’d arrived in an abandoned country.

Now and then the caravan would stop and we’d all hold our breath, ready to flee or fight, sure we were about to be discovered. We’d send Millard out to investigate, and he would creep down from the wagon only to find that the Gypsies were just stretching their legs or reshoeing a horse, and then we’d start moving again. Eventually I stopped worrying about what would happen if we were discovered. The Gypsies seemed road-weary and harmless. We’d pass as normal and appeal to their pity.
We’re just orphans with no home
, we’d say.
Please, could you spare a morsel of bread?
With any luck, they’d give us dinner and escort us to the train station.

It wasn’t long before my theory was put to the test. The wagons pulled abruptly off the road and shuddered to a stop in a small
clearing. The dust had hardly settled when a large man came striding around back of our wagon. He wore a flat cap on his head, a caterpillar mustache below his nose, and a grim expression that pulled down the corners of his mouth.

Bronwyn hid Miss Peregrine inside her coat while Emma leapt off the wagon and did her best impression of a pathetic orphan. “Sir, we throw ourselves at your mercy! Our house was hit by a bomb, you see, and our parents are dead, and we’re terribly lost …”

“Shut your gob!” the man boomed. “Get down from there, all of you!” It was a command, not a request, emphasized by the decorative-but-deadly-looking knife balanced in his hand.

We looked at one another, unsure what to do. Should we fight him and run, and probably give away our secret in the process—or play normal for a while longer and wait to see what he does? Then dozens more of them appeared, piling out of their wagons to range around us in a wide circle, many holding knives of their own. We were surrounded, our options dramatically narrowed.

The men were grizzled and sharp-eyed, dressed in dark, heavy-knit clothes built to hide layers of road dust. The women wore bright, flowing dresses, their long hair held back by scarves. Children gathered behind and between them. I tried to square what little I knew about Gypsies with the faces before me. Were they about to massacre us—or were they just naturally grumpy?

I looked to Emma for a cue. She stood with her hands pressed to her chest, not held out like she was about to make flame. If she wasn’t going to fight them, I decided, then neither was I.

I got down from the wagon like the man had asked, hands above my head. Horace and Hugh did the same, and then the others—all but Millard, who had slipped away, unseen, presumably to lurk nearby, waiting and watching.

The man with the cap, whom I’d pegged as their leader, began to fire questions at us. “Who are you? Where do you come from? Where are your elders?”

“We come from the west,” Emma said calmly. “An island off the coast. We’re orphans, as I already explained. Our houses were smashed by bombs in an air raid, and we were forced to flee. We rowed all the way to the mainland and nearly drowned.” She attempted to manufacture some tears. “We have nothing,” she sniffled. “We’ve been lost in the woods for days with no food to eat and no clothes but the ones we have on. We saw your wagons passing but were too frightened to show ourselves. We only wanted to ride as far as the town …”

The man studied her, his frown deepening. “Why were you forced to flee your island after your house was bombed? And why did you run into the woods instead of following the coast?”

Enoch spoke up. “No choice. We were being chased.”

Emma gave him a sharp look that said:
Let me do this
.

“Chased by who?” asked the leader.

“Bad men,” Emma said.

“Men with guns,” added Horace. “Dressed like soldiers, although they aren’t, really.”

A woman in a bright yellow scarf stepped forward. “If soldiers are after them, they’re trouble we don’t need. Send them away, Bekhir.”

“Or tie them to trees and leave them!” said a rangy-looking man.

“No!” cried Olive. “We have to get to London before it’s too late!”

The leader cocked an eyebrow. “Too late for what?” We hadn’t aroused his pity—only his curiosity. “We’ll do nothing until we find out who you are,” he said, “and what you’re worth.”

*   *   *

Ten men holding long-bladed knives marched us toward a flatbed wagon with a big cage mounted on top of it. Even from a
distance I could see that it was something meant for animals, twenty feet by ten, made of thick iron bars.

“You’re not going to lock us in there, are you?” Olive said.

“Just until we sort out what to do with you,” said the leader.

“No, you can’t!” cried Olive. “We have to get to London, and quick!”

“And why’s that?”

“One of us is ill,” said Emma, shooting Hugh a meaningful look. “We need to get him a doctor!”

“You don’t need to go all the way to London for no doctor,” said one of the Gypsy men. “Jebbiah’s a doctor. Ain’t you, Jebbiah?”

A man with scabrous lesions spanning his cheeks stepped forward. “Which one of ye’s ill?”

“Hugh needs a
specialist
,” said Emma. “He’s got a rare condition. Stinging cough.”

Hugh put a hand to his throat as if it hurt him and coughed, and a bee shot out of his mouth. Some of the Gypsies gasped, and a little girl hid her face in her mother’s skirt.

“It’s some sort of trick!” said the so-called doctor.

“Enough,” said their leader. “Get in the cage, all of you.”

They shoved us toward a ramp that led to it. We clustered together at the bottom. No one wanted to go first.

“We can’t let them do this!” whispered Hugh.

“What are you waiting for?” Enoch hissed at Emma. “Burn them!”

Emma shook her head and whispered, “There are too many.” She led the way up the ramp and into the cage. Its barred ceiling was low, its floor piled deep with rank-smelling hay. When we were all inside, the leader slammed the door and locked it behind us, slipping the key into his pocket. “No one goes near them!” he shouted to anyone within earshot. “They could be witches, or worse.”

“Yes, that’s what we are!” Enoch said through the bars. “Now let us go, or we’ll turn your children into warthogs!”

The leader laughed as he walked away down the ramp. Meanwhile, the other Gypsies retreated to a safe distance and began to set up camp, pitching tents and starting cookfires. We sank down into the hay, feeling defeated and depressed.

“Look out,” Horace warned. “There are animal droppings everywhere!”

“Oh, what does it matter, Horace?” Emma said. “No one gives a chuck if your clothes are dirty!”

“
I
do,” Horace replied.

Emma covered her face with her hands. I sat down next to her and tried to think of something encouraging to say, but came up blank.

Bronwyn opened her coat to give Miss Peregrine some fresh air, and Enoch knelt beside her and cocked his ear, as if listening for something. “Hear that?” he said.

“What?” Bronwyn replied.

“The sound of Miss Peregrine’s life slipping away! Emma, you should’ve burned those Gypsies’ faces off while you had the chance!”

“We were surrounded!” Emma said. “Some of us would’ve gotten hurt in a big fight. Maybe killed. I couldn’t risk that.”

“So you risked Miss Peregrine instead!” said Enoch.

“Enoch, leave her be,” said Bronwyn. “It ain’t easy, deciding for everyone. We can’t take a vote every time there’s a choice to be made.”

“Then maybe you should let
me
decide for everyone,” Enoch replied.

Hugh snorted. “We would’ve been killed ages ago if
you
were in charge.”

“Look, it doesn’t matter now,” I said. “We have to get out of this cage and make it to that town. We’re a lot closer now than if we hadn’t hitched a ride in the first place, so there’s no need to cry over milk that hasn’t even spilled yet. We just need to think of a way to escape.”

So we thought, and came up with lots of ideas, but none that seemed workable.

“Maybe Emma can burn through this floor,” Bronwyn suggested. “It’s made of wood.”

Emma swept a clear patch in the hay and knocked on the floor.

“It’s too thick,” she said miserably.

“Wyn, can you bend these bars apart?” I asked.

“Maybe,” she replied, “but not with those Gypsies so close by. They’ll see and come running with their knives again.”

“We need to
sneak
out, not
break
out,” said Emma.

Then we heard a whisper from outside the bars. “Did you forget about me?”