Читать книгу The Navigator - Eoin McNamee, Eoin McNamee - Страница 8

A shuddering sigh flowed through the hall. Owen stared blankly at the Sub-Commandant. How could time flow backwards? What sort of machine were they talking about? He didn’t know how long he stood there until the Sub-Commandant stepped forward and gripped him by the shoulders.

“It’s a lot for you to understand and I won’t trouble you with any more tonight. You’ll have questions and we’ll answer them as best we can. But for now, I think it is best if you rest.”

“Wait!” The man they called Samual rose to his feet. “I have a few more questions.” He moved up close to Owen and walked round him, studying him, his eyes glittering with dislike. “What is your understanding of your father’s death?” he barked.

Owen froze. It was something he tried not to think about. “There was an accident…” he stammered.

“Suicide,” Samual said. “Wasn’t that it?”

“No…” said Owen.

“Is there a point to all of this?” Contessa asked, her voice cold. She obviously didn’t approve of Samual’s questioning, but he ignored her.

“Have you ever heard of Gobillard et Fils?” he demanded sharply, his face almost pressed against Owen’s now, his eyes eager.

Gobillard et Fils, Owen thought. That’s what was written on the trunk in his bedroom! How did this man know about that? He could feel Chancellor and the others watching him intently.

“No…” he stammered, “no… I’ve never heard that name before…” The lie was out before Owen knew what he was saying. Why had he not admitted that he’d heard the name before? The blood rushed to his face. Would someone notice?

He was saved by the Sub-Commmandant. “The boy is not a prisoner to be interrogated, Samual. That is enough.”

Samual looked for a moment as if he would defy the Sub-Commandant, then he thought better of it and turned away.

“You may go, Owen,” the Sub-Commandant said gently.

Owen’s mouth was dry and his head was spinning, but he knew that there was one question he must ask before he was made to leave the hall. He turned towards the Sub-Commandant and his voice was no more than a whisper.

“Please,” he said, “what has happened to all the people?” There was a long silence then Contessa spoke.

“You are thinking about your mother, of course. I will explain it as we understand it. In turning back time, the Harsh intend to go back to a time before people. The minute they started the reversal, the people disappeared as if they had never been. So nothing has happened to them, but they have never been. Except for us, stranded on an island in time – as you now are.”

“If we stop the Harsh you’ll get your mother back!” It was Cati’s voice. She had somehow evaded the watchers on the door. “You’ll get her back and it’ll all be the same again!”

Contessa gave Cati a stern look, but Owen thought he could see the ghost of a smile hovering around her lips. “That is true. We have stopped them before.”

“But this time is different,” Chancellor said. “The Harsh are stronger than ever and we are weaker. I cannot see how we can overcome them.”

“We are the Resisters,” the Sub-Commandant said softly, “and it is our duty to resist, come what may.”

Chancellor looked as if he was about to say something more, but in the end he only shook his head and sighed.

“Cati,” Contessa said, “you should not be here, but as you are I would like you to take Owen out of the Convoke. We have many other issues to discuss.”

Cati took Owen gently by the arm and the crowd parted again for them as they walked towards the door. Owen wanted to ask more questions. What was the Starry? And what had the Mortmain – whatever it was – to do with him? And why were the Resisters so interested in him anyway?

Owen glanced towards the armchair beside the fire. To his surprise, the owner of that harsh voice was much younger than she sounded. Pieta was slim with blonde hair and a girlish face. She was asleep, snoring gently, and wearing a faded uniform similar to his own, but attached to her belt was an object unlike anything he had ever seen before. It looked like a long, coiled whip, but this whip was made of light – a blue light shot through with pulses of energy so that it seemed a living thing. Beside the woman was an empty bottle and a glass. As Owen stared, she opened one eye and looked directly at him. Her eye was bloodshot and bleary, but Owen felt instantly that she knew everything there was to know about him.

Pieta’s lips curved in a brief smile, weary and sarcastic, then her eyes closed again and Owen felt Cati haul him towards the door, which opened for them as they reached it and closed gently but firmly behind them.

Owen felt numb. He had never thought about time before, or the fact that it might possible for it to go backwards. “What did Contessa mean by an island in time?”

“That’s where the Workhouse is – on an island in time,” Cati said. “Time is like a river flowing around us, but the Workhouse never really changes. And we don’t change either.”

“You mean you don’t get older or anything?”

“’Course we get older,” Cati said with a heavy sigh, as though she was explaining to an idiot. “It’s just that we grow old at the same rate as normal people, no matter what time does. You look like you need air.”

“I need…” Owen began. But what did he need? A way to understand all of this? Sleep to still his racing mind? A place to hide until it all went away and things returned to as they were before? He was tired, his eyes felt grainy and his limbs fatigued, but an idea was beginning to take shape.

Outside, a mild, damp wind was blowing drizzle in from the direction of the town and you could smell the sea on it.

“Do you want to talk?” Cati sounded anxious.

“No,” he said. “No thanks, I’m really tired. I need to sleep, I think.”

“You can sleep here. Contessa will find you a bed.”

“No!” said Owen, more sharply that he intended. “I want to go back to the Den.”

“I understand,” she said. “I’ll walk there with you.”

“I want to be on my own,” he said stiffly.

Cati watched as Owen turned abruptly away and walked towards the path to the Den. He felt bad. He didn’t want to offend her, but there was something he had to do. As soon as he had rounded the first corner in the path, he dived off it into the trees.

Owen climbed steadily for ten minutes. He knew the landscape well, but it was dark and the rain made it murky, and there seemed to be trees where no tree had grown before. By the time he reached the swing tree, his hands were scratched from brambles and there was a welt on his cheek where a branch had whipped across it. He got down on his belly and crawled to the edge of the drop. He looked across the river, but it was shrouded in gloom. Down below, could just make out what seemed to be trenches and defensive positions which had been dug the whole length of the river.

As Owen looked closer, he saw that they were hastily dug in parts and in other places there were none. He studied the defensive line and saw that it was at its weakest under the shadow of the trees, in the very place where he had crossed that morning. Silently, Owen slipped over the edge and began to slither down the slope, any noise that he made smothered by the insistent drizzle.

At the bottom of the slope he made his way quietly through the trees. Almost too late Owen realised that there was now a path running along the edge of the river. He shot out of the trees into the middle of the path and as he did so he heard a man clearing his throat. Quickly, he dived into the grass at the verge and held his breath. Two men rounded the corner. Both were bearded and carrying the same strange weapon as the Sub-Commandant. They looked alert, nervous even, and their eyes kept straying to the river side of the path – which was just as well, as Owen was barely hidden by the sparse grass at the edge of the trees. They walked past him as he held his breath and pressed his face into the wet foliage. Within seconds, they had rounded the next corner and were gone.

Owen stood up, shaking. He took a deep breath. He had avoided the patrol through luck and he realised that it might not be long before another one came along. He darted to the other side of the path and plunged through the undergrowth towards the river.

It was dark on the riverbank; only the sound of the water told him where it was. He felt his way along the bank until he found the old tree trunk that he had climbed across that morning. Suddenly, he felt sick and dizzy at the thought of crossing the black water. He grabbed the tree trunk firmly. If he didn’t start across now, his courage would fail him completely.

Breathing hard, Owen swung himself on to the log. It was wet and slick to the touch. Inching forward, he glanced down and saw the water glinting beneath. He shut his eyes and moved again. The sound of the water grew louder and louder. He opened his eyes. With a start, he realised that he was halfway across.

Owen fixed his eyes on the far bank. He had started on his hands and knees, but now he found himself on his belly, slithering along the wet trunk. It was when he was three quarters of the way across that he felt it – a slight flexing of the tree trunk, barely noticeable, as if there were now some extra weight bowing the wood. He risked a glance back over his shoulder. There was something on the trunk behind him; something small and fast-moving. Panting, Owen tried to move faster, scrambling for grip. He looked behind again. It was halfway across now and gaining fast. He gulped for air and it sounded like a sob. Then he got to his feet and tried to jump the last couple of metres. Just as he jumped, Owen was hit hard and fast from behind. He felt himself gripped and turned in the air, and as he hit the muddy bank with an impact which drove the air from his lungs, a small powerful hand grabbed him first by the hair, then covered his mouth and his nose so that he couldn’t draw the shuddering breath that his aching lungs needed.

“Stupid boy!” Cati hissed furiously. “Where do you think you’re going?”

It was several minutes before Owen could get enough air to enable him to talk. Cati crouched beside him, staring intently into the dark.

“We have to get away from here,” she whispered urgently.

“I’m not going back,” he said. “I’m going home.”

“It’s not there any more! You’ll be caught or killed looking for something that’s gone. Listen to me.”

“That’s the problem,” said Owen. “I’ve been listening to everyone about time turning back and people sleeping for years and great engines and people disappearing. But I have to see. I have to see that my house is gone. I have to see that… that…” He gulped and turned his head away, hoping that she wouldn’t see the tears in his eyes. Stumbling to his feet, he wiped his eyes with the sleeve of his jacket.

“I have to see,” he repeated.

Cati gave him a long, level look, then seemed to come to a decision. “All right, but I better come with you.”

“You can’t,” he said. “I’m going on my own.”

“Don’t be silly. You made enough noise going through the trees to wake the whole Starry, and you left a trail a blind man could see. If I come with you, at least we have a chance of getting back. Not much of a chance, mind you.” Cati seemed almost cheerful about the prospect.

“Come on then,” she said. “Might as well get it over with.” And set off at a crouch, moving fast and silent. Owen had no choice but to follow her along the riverbank.

A few minutes later he thought he had lost her, then almost tripped over her. Cati was squatting on the ground.

“Careful,” she hissed. “Get down here.” She had a twig in her hand. “Look.”

Owen squinted in the darkness. He could just about see the two parallel lines she had drawn in the earth.

“This line is the river,” she said, “and this one is the Harsh. We’re in between, here. And the place where your house used to be is here, just in front of their lines. We can get to it, if we’re really quiet and really lucky. But you have to do what I tell you, all right?”

Owen nodded dumbly. He hadn’t really thought through what he had set out to do, and now he was feeling foolish and headstrong. Cati had called him a stupid boy and he was starting to feel like one.

“Let’s go!” Cati said. He followed her, moving slowly now. They turned left and started to climb the hill towards the Harsh lines. There was more cover than he had expected. Where once there had been open fields there were now deep thickets of spruce and copses of oak and ash trees. Progress was slow. Cati whispered that there might be patrols about, and more than once she glared at him as he stood on a dry twig or tripped over a low branch. He did not recognise anything in the place where he had once known every tree and ditch, although sometimes he stumbled over something that might have been the crumbling foundation of an old field wall.

After what seemed like hours, Cati turned to him and held her finger to her lips. They stepped into a clearing – a patch of low scrub. With a start, Owen looked around him. There was no real way of telling, but his heart said there could be no doubt; he was standing in the place where his house had been.

Was that flat piece of ground with saplings growing in it the place where the road had been? And was that young sycamore the same gnarled tree that had stood outside his bedroom window? Owen moved forward carefully until his foot struck something. Pushing back the vegetation he found the remains of a wall. He moved along the wall until he reached a corner and then another corner. It was the right size and shape as his own house. In fact, he was standing underneath the window to his own room, if it had been there. The room with the model hanging from the ceiling, and the guitar, and the battered trunk he had stood on to climb out of the window.

“I don’t understand,” he whispered. “If time is going backwards, how come the sycamore tree is getting younger, but the house is getting older? Surely the house would turn back into bricks and stuff.”

“Living things get younger as time goes backwards,” Cati said, “but things built by man just decay. It has always been like that.”

Owen began to notice that the grass and weeds were criss-crossed with scorch marks, and that the leaves of low-hanging trees were blackened and dead. Cati reached up and broke off a leaf which crumbled in her hand.

“The Harsh have been here,” she whispered fearfully, “searching for something by the look of it. We have to go.”

But Owen wasn’t ready. He moved his foot and something clanked against it. He put his hand down into the undergrowth and groped around until his hand closed on an object. He held it up. It was the hand mirror that his mother used when she brushed her hair. The brass back was tarnished and the glass was spotted and milky in places, but it was the same mirror, and as he looked at it, he could picture his mother brushing her hair, her lips pursed, whistling tunelessly to herself. The glass was becoming yet more faded, until he realised that his eyes had misted over.

Cati said something, but he didn’t hear her. And he was only barely aware of the cold that started to steal over him. It wasn’t until he heard a faint crackling that Owen glanced up at a small twig which hung in front of him. As he looked, it seemed that hoar frost crept up the leaf from the tip, then to another leaf and then another, until the stem itself froze and cracked with a gentle snapping sound as the sap expanded.

Owen looked around. The crackling sound was caused by dozens of leaves and twigs snapping in the same way. He turned to Cati, but she was staring off into the trees and her face was a mask of fear. He followed her terrified gaze. Far off, but moving inexorably closer, were two figures, both white, both faceless, and seeming to glide without effort between the trees. Cati’s voice when it came was no more than a whimper.

“The Harsh,” she said. “They’re here.”