The Red Judge (16 page)

A long, black, twisting, turning
snake
!

I cried out in a panic, unable to understand quite what was going on. And after that it's hard to put anything in order. It happened so very quickly. I remember the dogs rearing up. I remember the way the river shook as the snake passed by. I remember the sled being struck, and the snake running under it like black lightning, and then carrying on upriver. I remember it reaching the village and the ferries bobbing up and down.

But it was only when I saw the water rising up like black blood all around me, that anything made sense. It came bursting out of the snake and, suddenly, I understood. The sunny day, the dripping trees, the spring-like weather – of course.
This was a thaw!

Suddenly there wasn't just the one snake on the river. There were hundreds of them running about in every direction. As far back as the footbridge, I could see – and hear – the frozen river breaking into pieces. And I could see it ahead too: the ferries at the hotel careering round like fairground rides, and a network
of chasms opening up around them.

Everywhere I looked, the river was rising up. Only last night it had saved me, but now it felt like an enemy. I couldn't believe that it was the same river. The power that the thaw had unleashed made it unrecognisable.

I tried to get away, steering the sled across what remained of the ice. But it was impossible to stay upright, let alone escape. Water slopped over me as I tried to right the sled, and over Harri and Mari too, as they tried to help. We did our best, aiming for the shore, but the river was impossible to navigate.

When a chasm opened up beneath us, there was nothing we could do. The sled went one way, me clinging on to it, and Harri and Mari went the other. All that connected us were ropes and harnesses. I struggled to pull them back, and the dogs struggled to reach my outstretched hands. They nearly did it, too, but suddenly a pair of massive ice floes crashed between us like heavy-duty pincers, cutting through everything that bound us together and sending Harri and Mari down through the black water.

I couldn't save them.

All that I could do was watch it happening.

It was over very quickly. One minute Harri and Mari were flailing about in the freezing water, and then they were gone and I had no time to mourn them because I was nearly gone myself. I was still clinging on to the sled – goodness only knows how – but the river rose to greet me and I slipped beneath its surface. I could feel the sled pulling me down, and realised that, if I didn't let go, I would sink with it.

And so I did. Let go, I mean. I let the sled slip away
from me, and sink without a trace. My grandmother's red wicker sled, inherited by Pawl along with Harri and Mari. I never saw it again, and I never saw them either. All that was left was a broken plank from the high bench seat, which I found bobbing on the water and grabbed for dear life.

It must have been what saved me. I've no memory at all of how I got out of the river – just a dim recollection of black figures running up and down the hotel car park in the distance. One minute I was treading water, wondering what had happened to my boots and surrounded by ice floes. Then darkness fell, and the one clear thing I do remember is swearing that, if I survived, I would never swim again.

And ever afterwards I've always hated water. It took me years to break that vow. Years to swim again, and even then I hated it. And this is why.

What happened that day changed me. Ever since, in small ways and large, I've been different. Something died in me when the dogs went down, but something else was born. No longer did I look for happy endings as if I stood a chance of finding them, or believe in the power of my imagination to make my dreams come true.

But a new determination came over me. Life was a battle for survival – and one that I would win! I've been a fool, I thought. A stupid fool on a stupid journey, going nowhere and not even knowing it. And now, because of me, Harri and Mari are dead.

I became tougher after that. Sharper, and less squeamish about things like right and wrong. Take stealing, for example. Once I'd break out in a sweat at the thought of doing anything like that. But now something dogged and determined got hold of me. The thing that mattered most was staying alive. And I'd do whatever it took. Take whatever I found. Find what I needed and stay alive at all costs!

‘Nothing in the world,' I told myself, ‘not hunger, cold, exhaustion or some trifling matter of who owns what, is going to get in my way!'

My first theft took place in the village, up the road from the hotel. A house stood on its own, without lights and surrounded by trees. I walked straight in, dripping all over the floor, grabbed a handful of clothes off a drying rack, stuffed them into a bin bag and walked out again. Nobody saw me. Maybe the owners of the house were down by the river watching the pantomime on the ice.

I even helped myself to a fridge full of cold meats and a camouflage jacket hanging on the back door. Then I did the same at the next house that I came to, only to find that I couldn't get beyond the conservatory and would have to make do with a pair of gardening boots tied up with string.

It wasn't much but, in the forest afterwards, changing into dry clothes, I told myself it was enough. I left behind my old clothes, buried in the snow, but hung on to Pawl's coat even though it was too wet to wear, stuffing it into the empty bin bag because it was all that I had left of my old life. Then I started through the forest, climbing up the gorge without a clue where I was heading, but thinking that anywhere would do, just as long as it was out of here.

I didn't like this dripping gorge. The snow was disappearing fast, and the ground beneath it was boggy and grey. Streams of melted snow ran everywhere and the trees hung sadly, as if the carnival was over. I knew I'd never have another journey like the one I'd just had with Harri and Mari. Everything was ordinary again. Everything was disappointing.

I reached the top of the gorge at last, and the river lay beneath me. For a moment I stood watching it twisting and turning out of sight, then I turned away. I walked all that day without knowing where I was going. Ahead of me lay a sodden, never-ending forest where everything seemed dead. If the sun shone, it was always high up among the treetops, never reaching the forest floor. Even when it sank, it didn't reach the forest floor, just faded slowly somewhere off between the trees until there wasn't anything left to lighten my path.

I was in deep forest, lost in the night. Once or twice I heard cars in the distance, but I never saw any headlights or came across a road. Gradually my eyes grew accustomed to the dark, and I made out forest paths and old abandoned railway tracks, which I followed for miles. I passed deep streams, buried in banks of peat, and ponds that would have been frozen over only hours ago, but now they rippled in the evening breeze.

Later that night, I hit a road with houses on it, and streetlights. It was the outskirts of a town. I passed along its pavements, picking food out of bins. Nobody was about, streets empty and pubs closed. But curtains twitched as I walked by, and a couple of cars slowed down so that their drivers could take a second look, checking on this foreigner in their town.

It was a relief to reach the other side, and return into the forest. Its huge old trees threw their shadows over me and I walked freely again without fear of being observed. I was shattered by this time, but had worked myself into a frame of mind where stopping was unthinkable.

‘I'll carry on for ever,' I told myself. ‘Nothing's
going to stop me. Even if I found the sea, I'd carry on until its waves broke over me. And then I'd carry on. I'd never stop. I'd walk for ever and never give up.'

It was crazy, of course. In the end, of course, I
had
to stop. Somewhere in the darkness, my body said enough's enough. I don't remember where it was, or what exactly happened, but I woke up in the morning to find myself lying under a huge old sump in an oily-smelling corrugated hut. This, I discovered when I staggered outside, was part of an abandoned coalmine, overgrown with moss and bracken. Piles of slag lay outside the hut. Bits of broken railway track disappeared into the forest and I even found a couple of chipped coffee mugs sitting on a tree trunk as if the miners might come back.

Perhaps this mine wasn't as abandoned as I'd first thought. It didn't look very likely, but I hurried off just in case, my legs like rusty pistons cranking into action. I didn't have a clue where I was going or what would happen next, but I didn't care. The thing that mattered was the doing. The getting up again. The going through the motions.

I walked for hours, just like the day before. Mostly the forest was silent, but occasionally birds cried out warnings as I approached, or a little breeze got up and whispered through the trees. A couple of times I passed houses where I sneaked in and grabbed food.

Once I even climbed up to a viewing point where I could see the forest stretching away to the horizon. There would be roads beneath those trees, and towns and villages too, but I couldn't see them. I couldn't see a single sign of life.

It was a gloomy prospect. I set off again, wandering
aimlessly for hours and ending up in a vast boggy region where all the melted snow in the forest, it seemed, had drained into a natural sink. A network of peat ditches lay beneath my feet. I tried to keep out of them, looking for higher ground, but the boggy region stretched on and on. Brambles caught me in their branches, and huge old holly trees pressed in on every side. I sank up to my ankles and even left my boots behind and had to dig them out.

Finally the forest fell silent and the sun began to sink. Soon it would be dark again, and I'd be stuck here for another night. I forced myself on, but the going got no better. I couldn't even see where I was putting my feet any more and, to make matters worse, a little bit of mist was beginning to drift my way.

I veered away from it instinctively, and it was then that I started hearing things. To begin with the sounds were too far off to care about but, as I edged away from the mist, it seemed to me that they grew. Then I started seeing things as well – little bits of light that came and went like waves on a moonlit sea. And the sounds were like the sea too. They drifted towards me and faded away like waves washing over pebbles.

I forced myself forward, hope springing to life again against all odds. What if, despite everything, I'd reached my journey's end?
What if the sea lay ahead of me?
The ground became drier and the trees thinned out. I made my way between them, my heart pounding. But it wasn't the sea that I found waiting for me when I stepped out from between the trees. It was a road.

It stretched before me, bright with headlights making their way home. I had got it wrong about the
waves and pebbles. What I'd heard were tyres on wet tarmac, cutting through the forest at high speed. I stood watching cars disappearing one after another, cross with myself for expecting anything else. Finally nothing else came along and the road emptied.

Then I stepped on to it, and started walking. It was a long road, and perfectly straight, stretching away in either direction for as far as I could see. Trees grew right up to the edge of it and their darkness pressed in around me. In the distance I could see a solitary light, but I didn't take much notice until I drew level with it and saw that it was an illuminated road sign advertising hotel accommodation.

THE SPEECH HOUSE HOTEL
AA THREE-STAR RATED
FOUR-POSTER BEDROOMS AVAILABLE
OLD FOREST OF DEAN HOSTELRY
ESTABLISHED 1676

I couldn't actually see a hotel, but a short walk further down the road brought into view a fine old country house, its tall chimneys standing against the night sky. Tiled across its entrance porch was the word WELCOME, and through its leaded windows I could see guests moving about from one bar to another, carrying drinks. They were all dressed up, the men in black bow ties and the ladies in cocktail dresses, as if for a grand gala occasion. I wondered what they were celebrating until I noticed a banner in the reception area wishing everybody a HAPPY NEW YEAR.

This came as a surprise. Christmas was hardly over in my mind, and now it seemed that the year was almost over too, and a new one on its way. Where had all the time gone? I stood staring at the banner, feeling
strangely confused. A car came along the road, and I had to step out of the way. When it had gone, I noticed a gathering of mist down in a dip. Then a ripple of breeze came running up the road from nowhere in particular. It caught my hair and carried on through the forest. Trees murmured to each other and I saw their topmost branches swaying.

I found myself shivering. I looked along the road again, and it seemed to me that the mist was growing. It was getting longer, and thicker too, forming itself into white fingers that almost looked as if they were reaching out for me. There was something in the mist too – something stealthy and moving my way.

‘What's going on?' I whispered.

Almost as if in answer, something flew overhead. Where it came from I'd no idea, but it cried out as it flew away, and brushed my hair, and suddenly I felt as if I was back on Plynlimon with some crabbing crow flying over me. I spun round, only to discover that the mist was there as well. It had crept up behind me. The forest was full of it.

‘No!' I cried. But yes, the mist was there – and suddenly I felt as if everything I'd ever done had led me to this moment. Not just the long miles of my journey, but everything else. Don't ask me why, but that's how I felt. Back it all went, even past my fateful bet with Cary. It was as if this lonely spot, buried in the heart of the forest, was where everything, finally, caught up with me. And what could I do to save myself? Where could I hide?

There was only one answer.

The Speech House Hotel
.