The Standing Water (50 page)

‘Did you like the
guy?’ Jonathon said.

‘It was
brilliant
!’
I said. ‘Weirton’s heart and head exploding! Wish that could happen in real
life!’

For some reason, I
felt shy of what I wanted to say next, but still I went on.

‘Then again, maybe
it will! Perhaps the magic will just take time to work. We’ll just have to
wait.’

‘Can’t wait too
long!’ Jonathon said. ‘If that magic
does
ever work, by then it might be
too late and we could have another Marcus or Lucy! Wish we could find a way to
get rid of Weirton
right now
!’

The fireworks
banged, flashed and crackled as we stood and thought. They were let off from a
place to the side of the crowd where two men worked, fetching the fireworks
from the open boot of a car parked in the dimness where the firelight flickered
less. They’d kneel on the ground and position the rockets in empty milk
bottles. After sparking the fuse that hung over the bottle’s rim, they’d trot
back as light fizzed up that tail before launching the rocket skywards. The
Catherine wheels they nailed to posts. They lit their fuses, retreated as those
discs of frantic fire spun. I moved my gaze from them, look over at Weirton,
who was chatting to Suzie Green’s dad.

‘Bit common the Greens,
aren’t they?’ Jonathon said. ‘My mum says Mr Green just works on a farm and
they live in a council house. No wonder Suzie’s so dim!’

I nodded, but kept
my eyes on the headmaster. After he drifted away from Mr Green, there were no
families left to talk to. Weirton went to the food stall, where he was invited
to the queue’s front, beaming in mock modesty as he was swiftly served. Then
taking his cup of soup, he walked a good few metres from the crowd and stood,
staring into the fire as the steam from his soup drifted up. Just a bunch of kids
were near him; they rushed about to his left, playing with sparklers. They
weren’t from our school, hence their lack of fear. A hand clasped my shoulder, shook
it. I turned, saw Jonathon’s scrunched eager face.

‘I’ve got an idea!’
he said, ‘Something I reckon will work much better than magic! Come with me.’

Jonathon beckoned;
I followed him. We walked till we were in the blackness, to where we weren’t
lit by the blazing mountain. We squatted on the hard-ridged earth. I was glad I
was with my friend; otherwise I’d have been scared to meet any ghosts stumbling
on their way to the fire’s warmth.

‘Right,’ Jonathon
said, ‘first part of the operation, I’ll creep up to that car, grab what I can
out of the boot.’

Before I could ask
any questions, Jonathon scampered off into the gloom. The car was sometimes
illuminated, sometimes not, by the dancing fire, the explosions in the sky. A
firework flashed and I saw him crawling along the ground; the fire shifted,
something in it fell, one side of it blazed out and I saw Jonathon at the car,
reaching into the boot. Another minute and he was jogging back to me. My heart
boomed as I saw he held two rockets and one Catherine wheel, along with a box
of matches and milk bottle.

‘What you doing?’ I
hissed. ‘What did you nick those for?’

‘Look, Weirton’s on
his own, isn’t he?’ Jonathon said, panting after his run.

‘Yeah,’ I said, ‘except
for those kids playing near him.’

‘Well –’ Jonathon shrugged
‘– sometimes in war.’

‘What the hell are
you going on about?’

‘It could be easy.’
Nervous gasps jolted Jonathon’s whispers. ‘I just have to know exactly where
Weirton’s standing. I’ll aim the milk bottle at him, put a rocket in it and
light the fuse, just like those blokes were doing. Then the rocket will shoot at
Weirton through the fire!’

‘OK.’ Though my
body shook, some evil resolve within made me agree at once to Jonathon’s plan.
‘What about the Catherine wheel?’

‘We’ll save that
for last, in case the rockets don’t hit him. I’ll just chuck it at Weirton
through the flames. I reckon I can est-imate all the angles. All you need to do
is …’

Jonathon jogged
around the blaze till he was opposite the teacher. He gathered some stones,
leant the cannon of the milk bottle on them. He fiddled with it till he’d got
it tilted at more or less the correct angle then slid the stem of the first
rocket inside. I walked round the blaze until I stood where I could see both my
friend and the crowd on its other side. Weirton was still alone; the kids now
played further off, but weren’t completely out of the range of danger. The
teacher gazed into the fire, his soup resting on his folded arms. He didn’t
move; he seemed hypnotised by the flames: he stared as if hoping to find
something in them. A sudden sense of his loneliness rose up in me – after all
the laughter and back-slapping, he stood by himself, just him and the inferno,
with nothing more to say. But I banished pity by summoning pictures from his
long record of crimes, images from all those years of humiliations and
thrashings. Like seething acid, my hatred bubbled. I pretended to yawn and
stretch, extending one arm towards the teacher. My heart raced and bashed; I
shivered violently as Jonathon made minute adjustments to the tilt of the rocket.
A match sparked; the fuse fizzed; the rocket whined and took off. It flew into
the fire, hurtled out the other side – a flaming comet of vengeance shooting
straight at Weirton. A shudder jerked the teacher; he flung his arms; hurled up
his soup. He turned, ran; the rocket rushed after him, propelled by its wicked
whine. The teacher flung himself at the earth; the rocket whizzed over his
diving body, flew low into the darkness before erupting in bangs and sparks.
Weirton lay flat and trembling; the nearby kids dropped their sparklers, ran
screaming to their parents. The headmaster clambered up, stood with body
tensed, jolting his head around. The crowd hummed with rapid chatter; fingers
jabbed and pointed. I also thrust my finger at the teacher. My heart thudded
faster; my throat gulped as Jonathon adjusted the milk bottle, lit the fuse of
the next rocket. It screamed into the fire, screeched out blazing at Weirton.
He leapt back, stumbled then sprinted as that flaming brand chased him. He
hurled himself to the ground as just two metres above the missile ripped itself
apart with an ear-shattering bang, showering the teacher with stars. Weirton
rolled on the grass to snuff the sparks; jumped up and patted his coat to get
rid of any last flickers of flame. The crowd gasped; chatter rose – a chatter
that buzzed with anger, shock; a chatter that built upon itself like a hastily
flung-up house. More fingers flew, pointed at the teacher, who was still slapping
his coat, jerking his head around, pointed to where the ghostly smoke of that rocket
hung. I also pointed at that missile’s victim. Like a discus thrower, Jonathon
took the Catherine wheel in his right hand. The fuse was sparked; as it fizzed
he moved his weapon forward once to check his aim. He hurled it into the fire.
Out flew a burning disc – its gunpowder popping in snarls and snaps. It spun in
a curve, but whirled too high over Weirton. The teacher gazed up – body stiff,
feet rooted, mouth hanging – as that wheel arced. On its downward sweep, it
sped towards the crowd. Another gasp went up; the crowd parted – people
sprinting in different directions, women crying, kids screaming. The one figure
that flaming ring made for was Dennis Stubbs. It flew down at him, but – as he
pelted away – it levelled its flight and chased him at the height of his head.
His arms pumped as he powered across the frozen soil, bawling and weeping.
Stubbs flung himself on the earth, the discus blazed above him and a few metres
on scudded to the ground, where it shuddered with fizzes and pops before its
flames died. Stubbs pulled himself up, and – when clear no further explosions
were coming – the crowd drew together. Angry chatter rose again; Weirton paced
through the throng, flinging his arms and yelling. Jonathon kicked away the
stones he’d used to prop his cannon, pitched the bottle far into the darkness and
sneaked over to me. We sloped back to join the others. My heart still hammered;
my eyes shot around – nobody was looking in our direction. We were soon close
to the teacher, who still strode and shouted, the fire flickering over his red
face.

‘This is an outrage!’
Weirton yelled. ‘I’ll get something done about this! People come here to enjoy
a family bonfire and are nearly
killed
by stray fireworks!’

Burn holes pocked the
teacher’s fine coat and scarf. Due – I guessed – to one of his dives, a streak
of shit had added a brown band to that coat’s front. He marched over to the men
who’d been setting off the fireworks. His fist wobbled, his finger thrust as
they waved palms and wagged heads.

‘I bet those fireworks
came from that blasted guy!’ Weirton shouted. ‘Bet you thought you were so
clever putting them inside him! But you need to know
exactly
what you’re
doing! How
dare
you play with people’s safety! You very well nearly
killed
a boy and his headmaster! Let
that
be a lesson to you!’

Weirton waved his
fist in the men’s faces. He turned and stamped off, twisting back to point and
shout he’d get something done. The crowd, after much discussion and arm-waving,
started to break up as people trooped home, their faces screwed in anger, their
feet kicking the ground. Dennis howled and snivelled; sobs shuddered through
him. As his family walked from the blaze, his dad cuffed him round the head,
told him not to be so soft.

There was a good
hoo-hah about the Bonfire Night fiasco in the local paper, for which Weirton
was even interviewed. But the council apologised, promised to make changes, and
– after a couple of weeks – things settled down as the order of facts hardened
into legends: ‘Weirton and the Rockets’, ‘Stubbs and the Burning Wheel’. Kids
had a good time in the playground – aping Weirton’s run and dive, miming
Stubbs’s tears and terror.

Jonathon and I
still wanted to kill Weirton, but didn’t know how. Now our need for the ark had
gone, and our plot with the guy had failed, we tried resurrecting Jonathon’s
robot. We tugged it from under the dusty sheet that shrouded it in Jonathon’s
shed. I have to admit my first reaction was disappointment. What had seemed
just over two months ago a gleaming and powerful machine now looked like a
roughly strung-together, almost primitive figure made of bits of rusty iron and
mismatched steel. The wastepaper-bin head stared at us, its mouth and eyes
crudely gouged. Perhaps the robot seemed this way because of what we’d learnt
while building our ark. But though the robot lacked the beauty, the smooth
sanded perfection of our boat, I could see that ramshackle automaton would be
able to carry out its task. The arms looked strong enough to squeeze the life
from Weirton. The only problem was animating it.

‘We could always
try magic,’ I said. ‘You know, like the rabbi did in Prague.’

‘Not so sure,’
Jonathon replied. ‘Of course, magic can work
sometimes
– I just don’t
think it works very often. It didn’t with the gauntlet in spite of all the
legends! It didn’t with your guy. Reckon we’d be better off stealing a computer
to be the robot’s brain.’

‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘Though
computers must be sort of magic too if they can control a robot. But the school
hasn’t got a computer yet and we don’t know any families that have either.’

‘Maybe we should
sneak over to the posh part of Emberfield one night, try to steal one!’

‘Yeah, could do,’ I
said. ‘We nicked the gauntlet so I can’t see why we shouldn’t nick a computer.’

But whatever our
words, we didn’t manage to get our hands on one of those enchanted devices. We
just had to content ourselves with filing the rougher parts of the robot’s body
down, with Jonathon studying what his encyclopaedia had to say about brains so
he’d know how to connect our mechanical mind when we got it.

At school, our
headmaster thrashed his way through the last frosty days of autumn and into
early winter, whacking us even more than at the height of the deluge. He’d say
some weird things afterwards, pointing out of the windows at the sky, telling
us that only through the strictest punishment of sin could we hope to avoid
triggering God’s rage, stop the Lord sending fire or flood upon us. When the
headmaster said that stuff, Perkins would sigh, shoot up her eyebrows, pucker
her lips, but this just made Weirton scowl more, shout louder about the Lord’s anger.
Weirton really must have been worried about God’s vengeance because around that
time he aged astonishingly. Though still sculpted into its rigid style, by the
start of December half his hair had gone from blond to grey, and the teacher
was also expanding round the middle. This didn’t stop him flinging down the
most enormous hidings though he’d sweat and pant afterwards for a longer and
longer time before he could straighten up. He’d often clutch his chest as agony
screwed his face. In those darkening weeks, as the sun sailed lower in the sky
and the tired year staggered towards its end, I copped six massive wallopings,
Jonathon got five.

But soon Christmas
was coming so – by Christ’s good grace – we’d have two weeks’ rest from the
headmaster. The vicar came and talked to us in assembly about that great
festival. The dark clouds lay low over the bleak land outside; his greying
curls wobbled as his bald head jerked with quiet enthusiasm. He spoke about the
three wise men: their gifts of gold, frankincense – not Frankenstein, I
reminded myself – and myrrh. I wouldn’t have minded getting such presents,
especially the gold, but – according to the vicar – each had been a kind of
prediction of Jesus’s future: gold for His role as king, frankincense for His
duties as a priest and myrrh for His destiny as a sacrifice. I wondered if all
three had to be connected. Our vicar was a priest yet – despite his mighty
magic – he was no king and no one – thankfully – wanted to make him into a sacrifice.
I supposed Christ had been very special, having that trinity of functions. The
vicar also told us about the angel appearing to the shepherds at the time of
Christ’s birth, reminding me I wasn’t the only one to glimpse such beings at
that time of year. That got rid of the slight doubts I’d been having that I’d
really seen those angels. Of course, the visit of the shepherds to Jesus in the
manger was also a prediction as Jesus would grow up to be a shepherd of men,
the Church being his sheepfold.

I saw no angels
that year though I scanned the black sky for them. The boughs of our tree hung heavy
with baubles and lights, which – along with the fire in our grate – I hoped
would remind the sun of his duties. Though such lights were smaller and more
subtle than the immense Guy Fawkes Night blaze, they were more suited to the
sun in the festive period – a weak disc shining bravely through the gloom. And
our lights and baubles gleamed from midway through December to the sixth of
January – lights glowing all across the world to send out their soft
encouragement to the sun at his weakest point and in the earth’s darkest
season, lights which wouldn’t be taken down till that lamp in the sky was
strengthening once more.

Thankfully – due, I
had no doubt, to our help – the sun was soon edging a little higher on his
daily curve, his faded fire burning more vigorously as he orbited our globe.
The time came for us to tramp back to school. That spring term would be a
strange one, a period that would change much in our lives. But first we were
plunged back into the pounding rage of Weirton. The teacher thrashed on through
January. After his whackings, as his face glowed and sweated, as his victim
sobbed and grasped for breath, he’d make his dark pronouncements, pointing out
of the window to the clouds massed in the heavens, conjuring balls of fire with
dramatic movements of his hands, talking of the need to ‘appease the Lord’s
righteous fury’. There was certainly lots of fury in the school – around that
time the teacher was dishing out a couple of hidings most days. On some, there’d
be three or four; on one occasion there was even a record-breaking five!
Jonathon – branded by his Cain’s mark – caught plenty. He was still an eerie
mirror image of his brother as both still bore their scars of God’s justice.
Maybe it was those scars that encouraged Weirton to wallop those boys so:
seeing the marks of their sin upon them, the teacher perhaps felt the need to
show God he could penalise their misdemeanours, without the need for any more divine
punishments.

I too caught my
share of thrashings. I tried not to think about it, but I couldn’t force the
unbearable thought from my mind that I had more than two years left at the
school. And, after the next summer holidays, two years would be spent in
Weirton’s class, right under the red face and glowering stare of the headmaster.
The brother and Darren Hill would at least escape to the Big School. I envied
them though there were plenty of sinister legends about that establishment.

‘Compared to the
Big School’ – Darren liked to boast – ‘this place is about the size of its cane
cupboard. And watch out for the cream cakes in the canteen that give you the
shits for a week!’

There was also the
supposed initiation of all first years by the dunking of their heads in the
toilet. But even such a torture sounded preferable to Weirton. Jonathon and I
were desperate to get rid of him, but – with no computers appearing that could
spark life into our robot – we couldn’t think how. I tried to draw strength
from all the spooks in Emberfield and Salton, hoping that with their magic they
could help us withstand the teacher. We’d still look for the witch’s hand –
seeing whether or not it chose to show itself that day. I’d still think of all
our friends on the way to Salton – Henry VIII, the Knights Templars, the
sleeping Scots, the Drummer Boy. Particularly, that lad’s ghost was a help.
Many were the nights when I’d lie in my room, having been thrashed that day,
sobbing quietly into the blackness, wondering how I could go on. Then those
soft beats would float over to me – the patters, thuds, rattles and clanks –
and I’d be comforted, know at least there was someone out there, though long
dead, who understood our plight.

But even our faith
in our ghostly friends would be shaken. One wet day in early February, Jonathon
and I were trudging home from school when we saw a man standing in front of the
gap with the witch’s hand. Amazed someone dared stay there for so long rather
than just grabbing a glimpse and sprinting away, we crept near to him. The man
wore blue overalls and held a long pole topped with a small rake. We gaped when
we saw him daring – actually daring – to stick the pole into the crack. The
first time he did this, he brought out a mouldy stack of leaves and rubbish. As
my heart thumped, he raked out more leaves and litter. My mouth dropped, my
eyes swelled as he moved the pole up to about the height of the hand and
readied his body to thrust that stick into the gap.

‘Is he crazy!?’
Jonathon whispered.

‘She’ll kill him
with her magic!’ I hissed.

The man turned to
us.

‘You lads all
right?’

‘Please, Sir,’ I
stammered, ‘what are you doing?’

‘Oh, I’ve come over
from Goldhill to do some work on this house. Right now, I’m clearing out this
gap. Bit crazy, having a space this small between buildings – all kinds of
rubbish is bound to end up in there.’

‘But … the hand!’ I
said.

‘Oh yes, I’ve seen
it.’ He nodded gravely. ‘Funny looking thing – almost looks human, doesn’t it,
wedged in there? Take a look, shall we?’

Before our hanging
mouths could stutter words of protest, he shoved his stick into the gap then
moved it down to scour the narrow floor. As I shivered, as my heart pounded, as
the man made his raking motions, I saw fingers then a thumb emerge. With one
more vigorous sweep, the man jerked the whole hand out into view. There it lay
on the pavement – withered, black, radiating evil.

‘Yep, just as I
thought.’ The man nodded at the ground. ‘Thing must have been down there a few
years – look at the filth it’s caked in! Bet some brickie or roofer dropped
that glove and couldn’t be bothered to get it back.’

I gulped down my
fear, forced myself to peer at that hand and saw he was right. Beneath the
cracked dirt that looked like shrivelled skin were the faded colours and worn
grips of a builder’s glove.

‘So it’s not a
witch’s hand!’ Jonathon blurted.

‘A witch’s hand!?’
The man’s lips curved into a smile. ‘Aren’t you lads too old to be believing in
stuff like that? Mind you, you know what they say about Emberfield folk! Like
stepping back into the bloomin’ Middle Ages sometimes, coming here.’

The man shook his
head, went on muttering and chuckling to himself as we drifted off down the street.

‘So much for the
witch’s hand!’ said Jonathon.

‘And we honestly thought
it might help us!’ I said.

‘Well, I suppose
we’ve still got Marcus –’ I shrugged ‘– and the Drummer Boy and the buried
Scots and the others.’

We trudged to our
homes. Sadness settled on me in the way the rain and mist so often settled on
Emberfield. And my mind was no brighter than Emberfield’s black soil. I had a
sudden vision of lying under it – perhaps outside the church at Salton or in
the graveyard on the way to Goldhill. I imagined a pleasant stone above me; my
family and mates coming to lay flowers. How peaceful it would be – no stress,
no worries, no Weirton, no Dennis Stubbs, just the rustle of yews, the songs of
birds. No swooping palms, no playground fights. Just years of peace and slumber
beneath a quilt of grass. Who could not prefer it to life with its endless
troubles, with the bullying of its tyrants who couldn’t be overthrown? But how
could I get there, how could I make the jump from my walking breathing state,
the state that forced me to wake up in the morning, go to face Weirton? I shook
these thoughts from my head, tried to chase all that gloom away, bring myself
back to the present. Jonathon and I had a lacklustre talk about how to kill the
headmaster. Neither of us could come up with any new schemes.

A little later, one
damp dripping day, something even more upsetting happened. My family were
driving to Goldhill when – due to a road being closed – we took a different
route. Salton’s castle came into view across the flatlands. Next to it was the
church – ringed by its ancient wall, the tips of the gravestones peeping above,
its tower standing strongly over the boggy plains. I saw Salton’s dark woods,
the spike of its mysterious water tower, the tiny dip a mile or so further on
where the murky Bunt gurgled. I thought of the Drummer trapped in his tunnel,
though, of course, during the day we rarely heard his beats. But then –
strangely – the beats started up. Clicks, clanks and rattles swelled over the
marshes though I did find it odd that the patters and rolls got louder as the
car sped away from Salton.