Читать книгу A Threefold Cord - Howard Goldenberg - Страница 13

Chapter Eight

Although it was still very dark outside Snoth suddenly woke up. He opened his eyes wide and listened hard: some sound had disturbed his sleep. He looked out of his window into the blackness. He saw the branches of the lilly pilly tree swing and sway in the wind. They danced madly across the window as if something was chasing them and they were running for their lives. Snoth knew that was silly: No-one chases trees; trees don’t run away. I’m just a bit nervous, a bit of a baby.

Snoth lay flat again and tried to be a sensible and mature ten-year-old. But it is not so easy to be sensible and unscared in the dark, even when you are ten.

He looked out once more. This time Snoth knew he wasn’t imagining things. He had heard something. He looked out the window. Someone was in his garden, someone tall, wearing a cape and a large floppy black hat and mirror sunglasses – in the dark! Snoth could see all these things in the blackness of night because the person in the garden carried a torch that flashed once or twice and showed the face and the clothes and those spooky glasses.

Snoth wanted to see but not to be seen. He jumped back into bed and lay still. He didn’t move in case the visitor in the dark heard him. He tried to breathe very softly. The flashlight moved from Snoth’s side of the house towards the front door. Snoth knew what to do: if he moved now the intruder would not see or hear. He tiptoed to Bruce’s bed in the kitchen. He opened the kitchen door so Bruce could hear and smell the person near the front door. Bruce ran to the door, barking furiously. Snoth ran back to bed and pretended to be asleep.

The barking went on for quite a while. Then Saba shouted: “Bruce! Be quiet.”

Bruce barked louder than ever.

“Bruce! Don’t you understand English? Shut up!”

Bruce was obviously a very stupid dog who didn’t understand English: he kept barking at the front door.

Saba came down the stairs, carrying a newspaper, all rolled up. Bruce knew Saba wasn’t bringing the paper for him to read; the newspaper was a sign he was in trouble, but still he barked and jumped and snarled at whoever or whatever was outside the door.

Saba saw the hairs standing up on Bruce’s neck. He saw Bruce’s teeth and he heard the snarling. Bruce looked like he wanted to bite the door down just to get at the visitor.

Saba held Bruce by the collar and opened the door just in time to see a black cape fluttering behind someone running through the front gate and away from the house.

On the ground in front of him Saba found a piece of pink notepaper with writing in big black letters. At the top he read the words:

THIS WILL BE YOUR ONLY WARNING. And at the end it was signed: O.V.

(It’s bedtime children. Sweet dreams.)