Broken Voices

13

‘I’m scared,’ Faraday said. ‘I’m so scared.’

In the darkness his voice seemed to come from very far away. I had not realized what a difference that little lantern made.

‘It’s all right,’ I said, though it felt all wrong. ‘Find the other candles. Light one of those.’

I heard a scrabbling sound. Then silence. Then ragged breathing and more scrabbling.

‘Hurry up,’ I said. ‘Come on, Rabbit, we haven’t got all night.’

‘I… I can’t find them.’ He sounded further away than he had been.

‘Don’t be stupid.’ I heard the panic in my voice. I swallowed it. ‘The ones from the choir vestry. Remember?’

‘I put them down when I was looking for the key. I must have forgotten to pick them up.’

I bit my lower lip and tasted blood. ‘We haven’t time for jokes.’

‘It isn’t a joke. I’m sorry.’

I nearly shouted at him. But I knew there was no point. ‘You’ve got matches,’ I said. ‘Light one and find where I am. Walk towards me. When the match goes out, I’ll say something. Come towards the sound.’

There was another delay. Then a scrape and a flare of light, shocking in its intensity.

‘It’s the last one,’ he said.

Faraday rose to his feet as he spoke. He was in the centre of the ringing chamber, I saw, which might well be the very place where the trapdoor was. He moved too quickly. The flame guttered and died.

For the first time we were in complete darkness. I felt dizzy again. The tower sensed our new weakness. It seemed to shift beneath my feet like a sleeping giant making a minute adjustment to its position.

Faraday whimpered.

‘Come towards me,’ I whispered. ‘Keep together.’

I heard him crawling. A moment later the sound stopped.

‘Hurry up,’ I hissed.

‘I can hear it.’

‘What?’

‘The music.’

‘For God’s sake — shut up about that damned music. Come here.’

‘It’s beautiful,’ he murmured. But he started to crawl again.

I turned round, stretched out my hands and tried to find the door. I knew it wasn’t far away. But the darkness had disorientated me. Faraday was still shuffling towards me.

‘Where are you?’ he said. ‘Where are you?’

‘Here, you fool.’

He sounded much nearer than I had expected. Something brushed the skirt of my coat. I jumped back and screamed like a girl. Something rattled in my coat.

‘It’s me,’ Faraday said. ‘Oh, I’m so glad we’re together.’

So was I, though I didn’t say so.

‘What was that?’ he said. ‘When I touched you… it sounded like—’

‘Matches,’ I said. ‘Matches.’

I fumbled in the pocket of my overcoat. Hours ago, in another lifetime, I had stood on top of the little wooded hill with Faraday and smoked two Woodbines. Afterwards I had hidden both the cigarettes and the matches in my coat. I had a hole in one of the pockets, which made it possible to push contraband items deep into the lining.

My fingers were cold and shaking. The hole in the pocket was small. It took me an age to find and extract the matches. I shook the box. It sounded hollow, nearly empty.

I opened it, first making sure it was the right way up, and counted the remaining matches. There were only six left.

‘I can still hear it,’ Faraday said. ‘The music.’

‘Shut up. If we’re careful we can just do it.’ I calculated that we would have to use the matches only when we really needed them; for most of the time we would have to rely on our sense of touch. ‘Hold on to my belt again.’

He obeyed. I scraped the first match on the side of the box. It misfired, the head crumbling to nothing.

‘Are they damp?’ Faraday said.

I didn’t reply. That was what I was afraid of. I tried again: this time the match fired up. I turned. The door was on my right, perhaps three yards away. I took a step towards it. The movement made the flame flicker and die.

My fingers brushed against the wood of the door.

‘Light another match,’ Faraday said.

‘Not yet. Just follow me. We’ll go down the stairs very slowly. Don’t hurry. Keep your right hand on the wall.’

Faraday was so close to me I felt his breath on my neck. The stairs were steep. I concentrated on the wall, on finding the rise of each stair with my foot, on keeping Faraday from going too quickly.

The archway leading from the landing to the arcade was just visible ahead of us. I reached the landing and stopped. Faraday bumped into me. I took out the box of matches. Just as I was poised to light one, he said, ‘It’s not quite dark.’

I ignored him. I thought that, after the confined space of the ringing chamber and stairs, it was naturally a little less dark in the body of the Cathedral.

I struck the third match. The flame burst out, dazzling me. Beyond the archway was the passageway behind the arcade and, at the end, the open door to the next staircase. All we had to do was keep to the wall on our right and not think about what lay on our left.

‘Boys?’ a man shouted far below. ‘Boys?’

Faraday said something I couldn’t catch. I held onto the pillar of the arch and looked down into the church. Light was moving in the nave.

‘Boys! Where are you?’

It was Mr Ratcliffe. His voice sounded younger and more vigorous than usual but very far away.

‘Up here, sir,’ I called. ‘In the west tower.’

I heard his hurrying footsteps. He came out of the south aisle and into the nave. He tried to run but couldn’t manage it. He slowed to a fast walk. He was carrying a lantern, which swung wildly to and fro in his hand.

Mr Ratcliffe reached the space under the tower. He stood panting in a puddle of light.

‘I can’t see you,’ he called. ‘Where are you?’

I struck a match.

‘Good God — you idiotic children! Stay where you are. Don’t move an inch.’

It was a relief to be told what to do. Mr Ratcliffe’s footsteps hurried across the floor. The sound changed as he mounted the staircase but we could still see him.

‘We never found it,’ Faraday said. ‘The anthem, I mean.’

‘If you don’t shut up about that bloody anthem, I’ll bloody kill you,’ I hissed.

He started to cry, irritating little sniffles. It enraged me that he could be such a self-centred little beast. I was about to be in the worst trouble I had ever been in and it was his fault. I saw now what I should have seen earlier, that being caught didn’t matter to him, because he was already in disgrace. But it was different for me.

The footsteps were nearer now. I heard Mr Ratcliffe’s laboured breathing. Light glowed at the far end of the arcade, growing stronger every minute.

There he was, in the doorway, gasping for air, holding the lantern high.

‘Don’t — move—’ he said again, sucking in breath between words.

It was Mr Ratcliffe but it did not look like him. He had taken his teeth out for the night, and his face had collapsed in on itself, making him a stranger with a familiar voice.

‘I–I shall come over — to you. Bring you back — one by one.’

He was hatless, his hair unbrushed. He wore his overcoat, which hung open, revealing a dressing gown and striped pyjamas.

‘Don’t move,’ he repeated yet again. ‘Please. Please.’

He edged onto the passageway and staggered slowly towards us. ‘Don’t move,’ he muttered. ‘Don’t move.’

‘Look,’ Faraday said loudly and urgently. ‘Look—’

Mr Ratcliffe’s head jerked to the right. His body twisted after it. He fell heavily against the railing. There was a moment when nothing happened, when everything simply stopped moving. Then the railing gave way.

The lantern clattered to the floor of the passage. The candle guttered but the flame lasted another second or two.

Time enough and more for Mr Ratcliffe to fall into the darkness.