Madonna Park[e-book: рассказы]

Published by

Ghostwriter Publications

Dorchester, Dorset, England

www.thepennydreadfulcompany.com

© Rhys Hughes 2009

BIG GAME

"There's a jaguar in the hills."

Julia knew it was going to be a stressful day as soon as Karl spoke those words. He had been out all night; foliage and damp earth had left green and brown stains on his jacket.

"Yes dear? And how do you know that?"

"I heard it." Karl gave her a knowing wink. "The sound is quite distinctive. What's for breakfast?"

"Nothing." Julia pulled open the larder door and peered inside. "We've run out again. Why don't you let me drive into town and buy some food from a grocery store?"

Karl shook his head. "We agreed to live entirely by hunting. I'll just have to go out again tonight and see what I can find. Perhaps if the jaguar comes back…"

Julia wrinkled up her nose. "Do you think we could?"

Karl shrugged. "Why not? The meat's just the same as any other. Isn't it?"

Julia sighed. They had been living the frontier-style life for two months now. It had seemed a good idea at first to reject the comforts of modern civilization and retreat into the wilds, but lately she had been nagged by doubts.

As for Karl, he was in his element. It was still as exciting for him as it had once been for her. It was Karl who had developed their own special brand of hunting, a brand that was highly illegal, of course, but also more productive than trying to snare rabbits or spear fish.

"I'm going to clean my trophies," he suddenly announced. He was becoming increasingly obsessive. Soon, she realised, he would care more about his trophies than about her.

Feeling in need of fresh air, she opened the kitchen door and stepped out onto the porch. The sun had not yet risen over the hills. A chill fog filled the valley. The pine trees on the highest slopes seemed to hang in space.

As she clattered across the wooden boards, she muttered to herself. Suppose Karl was going insane? After all, his talk about a jaguar was rather dubious. Jaguars simply did not exist around here.

She shivered and squinted up at the hills. When the sun finally cleared the peaks, the fog would lift. And then she might be able to see, like a silver thread snaking through the trees, the road that was her only link with the outside world.

For her, this road was the source of all hope. It was seldom used, except by young couples. They would return night after night to presumably enjoy more than the scenic view. Julia envied their innocence.

Our days are numbered, she thought gloomily. Her worst fears were surfacing again. Surely it would not be long before someone reported them?

She tramped down the steps of the porch and across the sodden ground to a large shed. Inside stood the sausage machine, unused since their last kill over a week ago. The machine had come with the cottage: the previous tenant had kept pigs. Julia entered the shed, took out her wire brush and set to work.

As some of the original sparkle began to return to the rusty contraption, her reflection became clear in the metal. She was shocked by her haggard appearance. Her eyes had become deep-set, her cheeks sunken, her long auburn hair tangled and dirty.

After she had finished cleaning, she turned her attention to all the other mundane tasks that were necessary to keep their little homestead going. There was wood to be cut for the fire, water to be drawn from the well, knives to be sharpened. She even had to oil Karl's rifle. At least when he ran out of ammunition they would have to go into town, if only for more.

She looked forward to that day.

She did not see Karl again until dusk. He crept up behind her and placed a hand on her shoulder. He was armed with a sack and a rifle.

"Don't worry." He smiled at her. "It will be like any other hunt. Just a better trophy."

"But how long can this last?" she cried. "How long before we are stopped?"

"The locals like us. We help rid the area of pests."

She nodded. It was probably true. Most of the locals were farmers and eager to shoot things themselves.

She stretched stiff joints and walked to the house without looking back. Karl scratched his head, bewildered. He wondered if she was growing soft or whether this was just a special case. Perhaps she merely thought a jaguar too noble to destroy?

"Little fool," he called after her. He knew that if he did miss this opportunity, both their stomachs would regret it. With a peculiar chuckle, he loped off into the gloom.

Julia reached the kitchen, placed the kettle on the stove and spooned coffee into a cup. Caffeine always gave her courage. If Karl was successful in his hunt, she would need to be brave.

She heard the shots during her fourth cup. They were distant and sounded unreal, as if they came from the depths of a dream. She did not bother to look when Karl returned and held up his sack.

"I was right," he said. "A jaguar. Quite rare around here I should imagine. Now even rarer, eh? This will take pride of place in my study."

Her reply was a mumble: "Food?"

"In about a minute. Take out your knives." He grinned and left the kitchen for his study. He was only halfway there, still in the hallway, when he heard the frantic pounding on the kitchen door, the click as Julia opened it and the desperate voices.

"We saw your house in the dark. We need your help!"

"There's a madman out there. A madman with a gun!"

And moving into his study, Karl found a suitable space on his wall. Then he selected nails and hammer, opened his sack and drew out his prize: a gleaming chrome hub-cap.

THREE FRIENDS

The three friends were mountain climbers who had trekked to the roof of the world. They had encountered many dangers on the way and each had taken a turn to plunge down a crevasse. Bound together by ropes as well as friendship, it seemed they had all escaped death by the narrowest of margins. One by one, they had praised their luck and had agreed that teamwork was wonderful.

After the end of one particularly difficult day, as the crimson sun impaled itself on the needle peaks of the horizon, the three friends set up their tent on a narrow ledge. The first friend, who had survived the first crevasse, boiled tea on his portable stove and lit his pipe. Stretching his legs out as far as the ledge would allow, he blew a smoke ring and said:

"The wind whistles past this mountain like the voice of a ghost, shrill as dead leaves. The icy rock feels like the hand of a very aged corpse. Those lonely clouds far away have taken the form of winged demons. Everything reminds me of the region beyond the grave. I suggest that we all tell ghost stories, to pass the time. I shall go first, if you like."

Huddling closer to the stove, the first friend peered at the other two with eyes like black sequins. "This happened to me a long time ago. I was climbing in Austria and had rented a small hunting lodge high in the mountains. Unfortunately, I managed to break my leg on my very first climb and had to rest in the lodge until a doctor could be summoned. Because of a freak snowstorm that same evening, it turned out that I was stuck for a whole week. The lodge had only one bed. My guide, a local climber, slept on the floor.

"Every night, as my fever grew worse, I would ask my guide to fetch me a drink of water from the well outside the lodge. He always seemed reluctant to do this, but would eventually return with a jug of red wine. I was far too delirious to wonder at this, and always drank the contents right down. At the end of the week, when my fever broke, I asked him why he gave me wine rather than water from the well. Shuddering, he replied that the 'wine' had come from the well. I afterwards learned that the original owner of the lodge had cut his wife's throat and had disposed of her body in the obvious way…"

The first friend shrugged and admitted that his was a very inconclusive sort of ghost tale, but insisted that it was true nonetheless. He sucked on his pipe and poured three mugs of tea. Far below, the last avalanche of the day rumbled through the twilight. The second friend, who had survived the second crevasse, accepted a mug and nodded solemnly to himself. He seemed completely wrapped up in his own thoughts. Finally, he said:

"I too have a ghost story, and mine is true as well. It happened when I was a student in London. I lived in a house where another student had bled to death after cutting off his fingers in his heroic attempt to make his very first cucumber sandwich. I kept finding the fingers in the most unlikely places. They turned up in the fridge, in the bed, even in the pockets of my trousers. One evening, my girlfriend started giggling. We were sitting on the sofa listening to music and I asked her what was wrong. She replied that I ought to stop tickling her. Needless to say, my hands were on my lap.

"I consulted all sorts of people to help me with the problem. One kindly old priest came to exorcise the house. I set up mousetraps in the kitchen. But nothing seemed to work. The fingers kept appearing on the carpet, behind books on the bookshelf, in my soup. I grew more and more despondent and reluctantly considered moving. Suddenly, in a dream, the solution came to me. It was a neat solution, and it worked. It was very simple, actually. I bought a cat…"

The second friend smiled and sipped his tea. Both he and the first friend gazed across at the third friend. The third friend seemed remote and abstracted. He stared out into the limitless dark. In the light from the stove, he appeared pale and unhealthy. He refused the mug that the first friend offered him.

The first two friends urged him to tell a tale, but he shook his head. "Come on," they said, "you must have at least one ghost story to tell. Everybody has at least one." With a deep, heavy sigh, the third friend finally confessed that he did. The first two friends rubbed their hands in delight. They insisted, however, that it had to be true.

"Oh, it's true all right," replied the third friend, "and it's easily told. But you might regret hearing it. Especially when you consider that we are stuck on this ledge together for the rest of the night." When the first two friends laughed at this, he raised a hand for silence and began to speak. His words should have been as cold as a glacier and as ponderous, but instead they were casual and tinged with a trace of irony. He said simply:

"I didn't survive the third crevasse."

THE BIG LICK

After all, it was a magnificent house. They could feel no regrets as they received the key from the plump fingers of the estate agent. A large detached modern dwelling; the house of the future.One kind of future, at any rate. As a light breeze ruffled the fur on the walls, Tony smiled and opened the door. The house purred. They had been accepted.

Inside, they saw that everything was waiting for them exactly as they had arranged. The old battered sofa was there; the one they had bought for their first flat. And the little ornaments from their many travels to exotic lands. And the books and musical instruments scattered over the floor. What more could they ask for? What doubts could they have now? They would be happy here, they would be safe.

Tony turned to Claire and embraced her. "Our new home," he said simply. And then, as if determined to wax lyrical before the wax melted, he added, "Debt where is thy sting? Ground Rent where is thy victory?"

It was essential to satisfy a few outmoded traditions. Tony attempted to carry Claire over the threshold; he grunted but could not obtain sufficient leverage. So it was Claire who carried Tony over, dumping him in a contented heap before the inglenook of the authentic hearth, on an indigo rug all knotted with abstract designs in colours that should have clashed but did not.

They spent the rest of that evening watching the television, snug beyond good taste in each other's company, nibbling shortbread or lobes or upper lips, while some cartoon rodent raced across a landscape as harsh and surreal as any by Dali. The house began to chatter and crouched low, as if ready to spring. With a sudden flash of terrible insight, Tony reached for the remote control and switched channels. Almost at once, the house lost interest.

"It's the mouse," Tony explained, referring to the cartoon. "The house was getting excited. We'll have to be more careful."

Claire nodded vaguely, her mind too frantic with serenity to pay much attention to his words. She had already hung her needlework above the mantelpiece over the grate, and was already planning a sequel. HOME NUTRASWEET HOME would be a project worthy of a six-month energy package, made up of lots of little delicate motions and more thought. The votive lights in her eyes were at once bright and distant.

They had first chanced upon the house while gliding on a picnic quest down the road that led out of the city and into the hills. There it had napped, curled up tight, tail wrapped round the trunk of an old tree that lurched out of mossy ground. They had fallen in love with it immediately; the glistening black fur with the white ruff, the delightful expression and endearing sundries. They had stopped, noticed that it was for sale and had made enquiries.

The estate agent was a large oily man with an absurd hairstyle. ArnieTroppmann had been selling state-of-the-art houses for more than a decade. His experience revealed itself every time he smiled; a gold tooth encrusted with diamonds. He mopped his forehead with a contract, shook rancid buttery hands and showed them around the building, pointing out features with an enthusiasm that was not only infectious but positively septic.

"These latest models are self-regulating. They have a nervous system based on that of the domesticated cat. As you can see, the fur covers the inside walls as well as the whole exterior, minimizing heat loss. The house is extremely sensitive to outside changes and will warn you of the approach of intruders or rain. It has a superb sense of balance guaranteed to withstand the most violent earthquakes. Also it is self-cleaning. Every Monday night."

And now as Claire and Tony blinked in surprise, two enormous eyes appeared on the ceiling from nowhere, flooding the room with soft yellow light. This was another fixture designed for the conservation of energy: reflected starlight amplified and focused wherever it was needed most. The house, they also quickly discovered, had a wonderful sense of smell and hearing. The rose garden seemed constantly within, rather than without, the enclosed lounge, and the music of the wind playing the kazoo on separate blades of grass charmed them to sleep with Aeolian lullabies.

The following evening, at roughly the same time, the fur on the walls pricked up alarmingly and the house arched its roof. Tony and Claire were instantly aware that trouble was afoot. Bounding into the kitchen, Tony snatched a garlic crusher and bore it to the front door, which he threw open with a flourish, at the same instant daring any intruder to approach closer. He was startled by a mangy hound that — though no clove — was sufficiently impressed by the unlikely weapon to beat a hasty retreat.

"Scat!" cried Tony, which was both completely unnecessary and unnecessarily complete. He pumped the garlic crusher handle a few times in sullen victory. "A stray," he explained to Claire. "An unkempt mutt. Reminded me a little of Toasted Muffin." And he fell into a redundant fugue, a nostalgic slice from the melon of his youth: his dog, his air rifle, the heel of a loaf, the nettle-itch and the doc leaf wrap. Toasted Muffin, he recalled, had been run over by a tractor.

On Monday night, they decided to stay indoors yet again. It was cleaning night, after all. The estate agent had warned them to absent themselves at this time, but they were too curious to see what would happen. Besides, Troppmann had also suggested that if any problems arose they should come to see him and he would put matters right. So there was nothing to worry about. They waited for the show to begin. They waited and watched.

Thus it was that when Troppmann himself was pulled out of bed in the early hours, cursing and sweating, to answer the door, he knew that it would soon be time to start breaking promises. But at first he did not recognise the raw-red couple who leered through the glass door at him and he refused to let them in. They seemed to be covered in some sticky substance and they pounded on the door with a disturbing sort of squelch.

"Please may we have our skins back?"

MADONNA PARK

At dawn, they set out with hooks and chains. They followed the rutted road as far as the dry riverbed. They wove between desiccated trees and cut a swath through the grasses of the veldt.

"There's one!" cried Travis, squinting into the rising sun. A flash of blue raced across the horizon, a tiny figure with billowing mantle. Travis stood up and grasped the handrail as the tall grasses closed in around them. "A miracle!"

Eliot clutched his stomach and groaned. The stench of petrol, the rotting odours of the veldt, left him feeling vaguely disappointed. So far his chief impressions of the hunt were lurching terrain, the glare of sun on metal, the smell of boiling sap.

He peered in the direction of Travis's finger, seeing nothing but the flicker of sun through grass. For three days all prey had eluded them. Eliot suspected the priest who blessed their Jeep had skimped on the holy water. "What?" he mumbled.

"Do you believe in them?" Travis was in high spirits. He bared his yellow teeth and adjusted his fedora over his eyes. His rugged looks, his stoicism, were all second hand. Eliot frowned as he gazed upon the younger man's hair, dyed blue-grey at the temples. The lustrous black of his emerging beard gave the lie to his image. He was probably an avid reader of Hemingway novels.

"Miracles? But of course!" The driver nodded his head. A dubious fellow, he claimed to be a Jehovah's Witness. Again, this was all part of the act: you paid your money and the illusions shimmered at your feet, refracted by the hot air of the promoters. "Do we not owe all this to one? Tears of blood!"

Travis had chosen the role of a Lutheran. He struck the floor of the Jeep with the stock of his rifle. "Hurry!" The package had included the malaria that varnished his forehead with perpetual sweat. The skin cancer cells, grown in culture and grafted onto his cheeks, were not unlovely — they formed an archipelago of dark colour on his bland features and raw-red complexion.

The Driver thrust a pungent cheroot between his lips and changed gear as they bumped over something that squealed. Abruptly, they burst out of the long grasses into a flatter area of savannah. Ahead, a herd of blue figures looked up in alarm and began stampeding across the wide landscape. "Mothers of God!"

Eliot shook his head in amazement. He had never expected to see a whole herd. Even though his role of extremist Quaker had originally seemed a poor fit, he felt his heart swelling with anticipation of the kill. His stomach forgotten, he joined Travis at the rail.

Travis was mumbling a prayer beneath his breath. His fingers were busy slotting silver bullets into his magazine, like the beads of a lethal rosary. The blue tide surged away from them, the fleetest of foot leaving the older ones behind.

It was not long before they reached their first target, a toothless crone, her mantle and halo both faded with age. Travis loosed a shot and caught her in the neck. She fell without a groan.

"Bravo!" The Driver roared his approval and Travis's eyes lit up with pride. He began firing carefully into the general herd, saliva dribbling down his chin. Eliot took aim but the Jeep lurched and a puff of dust bloomed at the feet of his target.

After the crones came the youngsters, the children, who screamed as they fell, with irritating high-pitched wails that offended the ear. Splashes of red on blue showed Eliot he was learning to handle his weapon with greater efficiency — and these were too small to be easy targets. The ones they did not hit they tried to run down.

As the victims mounted, the Driver fixed tiny crucifix transfers to the door of the Jeep, steering with one hand and exhaling cheroot smoke through his flaring nostrils. They skidded on a patch of blood; Eliot lost his balance and fell back with a thud. Travis laughed. "Die, papist swine!" His eyes, glazed with blood lust, fluttered.

One of the figures did not attempt to flee. She merely stood and awaited their approach. Eliot blinked. Although all these beings were just aspects of a single entity, there seemed to be something special about her. Travis signalled for the Driver to stop. He jumped down from the Jeep, stalked across to the target, placed the rifle against her head and fired. The gun jammed: he had paid good money for this. He licked his lips and drew his knife.

As he did so, the figure opened her mouth and said something. Eliot was unable to hear her words, but the tone had a strange effect on him. He wanted to weep. He turned away and hid his face until Travis returned to the Jeep. "Is she dead? How did she die?"

Travis showed him his knife. "Like a virgin."

"What did she say?"

"She forgave me." Travis grinned. "Forgave all my sins. You should have come down too. Saved your soul as well."

Later, they drove back to the clubhouse to have their photograph taken. The Madonnas would be stripped of their mantles and thrown into pits — the mantles taken to a nearby processing plant for lapis lazuli extraction. On the way back, they passed a bus taking a coach-load of pensioners on a guided hunt. The Tannoy system blared at them, fading in and out of audibility as they lurched past:

"Welcome to Heaven-on-Earth…latest extravaganza of Prejudice Inc… utilising techniques of modern science…the perfect opportunity to settle scores… Thanks to a statue of Our Lady in Verona which has started weeping blood…top scientists have succeeded in isolating the DNA of Mother Mary herself… In the confines of this park…no less than a thousand Madonna clones…different ages…"

"Dilettantes!" Travis snarled. Senile faces peered at them from the tinted windows of the bus, eyeing their catch with dim jealousy. Behind them in the dust, on the hooks and chains, forty Madonnas bounced along the rutted road — a respectable hoard by any standards.

Travis was flushed. Eliot felt it was only partly with excitement. "There are no males loose in the park are there?" he ventured. The Driver scowled.

"Of course not! This is a moral outfit. A Lutheran should know this. Ask your complimentary pastor for more details."

Travis frowned and pulled out his knife. He looked at the blade. "If I take the trip again, I'll have to come as an atheist."

"What are you talking about?"

Travis shrugged. "The one I killed with my knife." He abruptly broke down, though it was difficult for Eliot to tell whether his tears were those of despair or mirth. "She was pregnant."

SUTTEE AND SWEEP

"I need more space," said Mr Sweep to his wife.

Martha gritted her teeth. At first she had tolerated his growing introspection, his reversion to a childlike state, because she believed it was only a temporary reaction to stress. But six months had passed and he still showed no sign of emerging back into the adult world. On the contrary, he now wanted more time alone, not that he considered himself to be isolated in the basement he had converted into a private playroom. They had argued about that many times.

"Your puppets aren't real!" she kept insisting.

A crafty look would come into his eyes. "Of course they're real. What you mean is that they aren't alive, but you're wrong about that too. They are alive, all of them, Noddy is my favourite, he's my best friend and he listens to me."

"No he doesn't." She always felt too exhausted to reason with him.

"Noddy shows more understanding than you ever did. The other puppets are fine too, but Noddy's special. Some of the modern puppets are made of plastic but Noddy is wooden and his eyes are real glass. The others say stupid things in low whispers but Noddy only delivers nuggets of wisdom or remains silent. He never stops listening to me, though. He hears everything."

And so it went. She would throw up her hands in defeat and leave him to his own devices. Before moving to this house he had been relatively normal. Something about this place had changed him, started his obsession with puppets, compelled him to visit junk shops and jumble sales in an attempt to add to his collection. Now he had all the puppets he wanted and never went out.

Nor did he allow her to go down into the basement. Once, when he was fast asleep, she tiptoed down the stairs and switched on the light. The puppets stood in a large cardboard box in the centre of the room and she formed the distinct impression they were disappointed by her sudden arrival. A curious illusion.

"I need more space," Mr Sweep repeated. "You're getting in the way."

"You need a psychiatrist," responded Martha.

"No, I'm not mad, you don't understand. I know that puppets aren't normally alive, but mine are different, at least they are different here. My puppets can dance if they want to, and in fact they are constantly dancing in their souls, but they don't physically move for my sake. They told me why. Puppets build up a lot of resentment over the years, forced to move and jump at the whim of a human owner, with no choice in the matter."

"Puppets don't have souls, you fool!"

"Martha, listen to me. All that resentment eventually becomes a blind force. Provided the status quo isn't disturbed, everything will be fine, but if they are ever compelled or urged to move on their own all that pent up energy will be unleashed at once. That's when they will become truly dangerous. Imagine an avalanche of puppets! But it's fine right now, just dandy. They dance deep down inside only. This is a holy place for them. Our home, I mean."

She snorted in derision. "Why?"

"Because it has been built on the site of a puppets' graveyard!"

She wanted to beat her fists against the top of his head, but she restrained herself and plotted a more subtle revenge. She decided to use his own delusions against him. The following morning she went out for an hour, killing time in the park but returning with a great show of excitement, slamming doors and calling for him. He emerged reluctantly from the basement, his eyes full of annoyance but not suspicion.

"Something strange just happened!" she gasped.

"What was it?" he muttered.

"I went shopping and took a short cut through the park and I came across a group of puppets balancing in a tree. It was almost as if they were lost and trying to get their bearings by studying the landscape from a higher vantage. I could swear they were alive! I ran back as fast as possible to tell you."

"What did they look like?" Mr Sweep bellowed.

"One of them was a very old gnome, another was a policeman, a third was a clockwork mouse, and I also noticed a wobbly man, a set of anthropomorphic skittles, a pair of goblins and a sort of bunny-monkey hybrid."

Mr Sweep's eyes bulged. "Are you serious? Those are all Noddy's friends! His friends from the original Noddy books! They must be searching for him! I'd better go and find them."

"I'm sure they're still there," said Martha.

He hurried out and Martha grinned to herself. Then she set to work building a fire in the unused grate in the front room. For the first time in many months she felt alive, suffused with joy, vengeful, energised.

As for Mr Sweep, he scoured the park in vain, squinting up at each tree and shuddering with an unspecified fear. He had a touch of agoraphobia due to his long confinement indoors but he forced himself to continue until the light began to fade. He was bitterly disappointed and returned home slowly, imagining that the lost puppets had climbed down from the tree and gone off in the wrong direction. What was wrong with them? Couldn't they detect the emanations of the puppets' graveyard and use that to guide them?

But he cheered up when he reached his front door and saw the note taped there. He read the first two lines of it and was so delighted he snatched it into his hand, entered his house, slid the bolt and piled the hallway furniture against the door. He was scared Martha might change her mind and return.

The beginning of her note said: "I have gone forever. You wanted more space and so I now give you all the space you could ever need…"

He danced into the front room. Alone with his puppets at last! He was laughing so hard, his eyes were so blurry with tears of happiness, that it was a full minute before he understood there was a fire in the hearth. He blinked and his blood turned to acid. Then he was up and running to the kitchen for a pan of water. It took several trips to extinguish the abominable blaze.

Martha had ignited the entire box of puppets!

The individual figures weren't utterly consumed yet. Some of the plastic models had melted over the others and hardened under the impact of the cold water. Mr Sweep found himself gazing at a monster composed of many charred and twisted limbs and mutant heads, the vilest abortion in the history of puppetry. And it moved! The level of resentment was simply too high to repress any longer. The disgusting mess in the grate was alive and it wanted revenge on the nearest human!

Only Noddy had been spared, his favourite puppet, because Mr Sweep had taken him to the park. Noddy fell out of the wide pocket of his jacket and lay on the floor, idiotic head bouncing on its spring.

The rest of Martha's note said: "You are married to those damn puppets but you are dead to me. Do you know what happened long ago in India when a man died? His wife was burned alive on his funeral pyre. Our marriage is dead and so I have incinerated those who you loved. There is no puppets' graveyard here, only a crematorium!"

Mr Sweep was too terrified to move, but even if he had run it wouldn't have done him any good. His exit was barred.

Noddy kept nodding at his feet, still loyal but helpless.

Mr Sweep groaned. Why had he asked for more space? Space was terrible, a place where nobody was there to offer help.

The malevolent mass reached him. His mouth opened and something came out. A sound.

In space, Noddy can hear you scream.

THE GUNFIGHT

"The English are coming," said Hopkins.

"Following us, they are," confirmed Jones. He frowned and tapped his commander on the shoulder. "I thought you said we won the battle?"

"So I did," responded Williams, "and so we have."

"Then why are the English chasing us?"

Bullets zinged into the undergrowth on all sides. The moonlight streamed through the holes in perforated leaves. The spores of shredded mushrooms floated.

"And firing at us!" squeaked the other Jones.

"Because we didn't win the battle in the right way. Instead of winning it in the style of a victory, we won it in the style of a defeat," explained Williams. "That's why."

"Daft, that is," commented Hopkins.

The first Jones said, "If that's the way it is, we're done for. Here's a bloody ravine with no way across."

"Doomed, we are," agreed Hopkins.

"Not at all, boyo. Look here!" cried Price.

"An abandoned cottage is what that seems to be," said Williams, "and maybe we can knock on the door to see if anyone's at home?"

"Who would live in an abandoned cottage," wondered the first Jones, "on the edge of a ravine? That's daft."

More bullets pinged around his head, striking sparks from the stone wall. He was about to speak again but Hopkins interrupted him:

"Maybe we can live there? At least until the English go away. What do you think about that?"

"Perfect place for a redoubt," said Thomas.

"What's a redoubt?" asked Price.

"Something that is doubted more than once," ventured the other Jones, but Williams clucked his tongue and shook his head.

"Don't be daft. A redoubt is a kind of stronghold or sanctuary."

"That's clever," commented Thomas.

Bullets continued to whiz. Williams tried the front door and realised it was locked, but Hopkins noticed that a window was open. "Someone help me and I'll climb through," he said.

"That's smart," said the first Jones.

Hopkins stood on Price and clambered inside. "Dark in here. Come and join me. Hurry up!" he hissed. Williams sighed and said:

"Don't be daft. Pull us through. Give me your hand."

One at a time they were drawn into the interior of the deserted cottage. Williams groped with outstretched hands but the room was bare. Then he remembered his electric torch and turned it on. There were no furnishings of any sort but a broken light-bulb dangled from a cord in the middle of the ceiling.

Williams rummaged in the pocket of his jacket for a spare bootlace and used it to suspend his torch from the light-bulb cord. He had to ask for a volunteer to crouch down on all fours so he could stand on his back and reach. It was Thomas who finally agreed to do this. As Williams jumped down he said:

"A fine bloody pickle we're in, boyos. We can't retreat any further and if we make our last stand here, a few grenades chucked through the window will finish us all off. We've only gained a few minutes of safety. So we must counter-attack!"

"Why don't we just surrender?" asked the first Jones.

In the cone of dim light Williams displayed an ugly grin. "Don't take prisoners, the English. Heard all about it from my dad. He told me what they were like. No quarter is what we can expect from them. Blot us out, they will! We have to go back out and take the fight to them. But we'll prepare ourselves properly. Make ourselves immune to their bullets. I know a way of doing that!"

"Is it a magic dance?" asked Price.

"Daft, that is," commented Thomas, but Williams spoke over him:

"Not a dance, no, because there's no such thing as magic. Science is the only way to make things work. My uncle went to college to learn medicine, he did, and he brought back lots of those oblong things called books. I remember them well. I was only a child but I knew how to read because my mam taught me. Uncle Dewi let me read his college books and I learned secrets from them. Such secrets!"

"That's lucky," said Hopkins.

Williams nodded. "One of the secrets I learned was called vaccination. Sounds like a magic word but it's not, it's a scientific word. It means curing a disease in advance by being infected with a weaker version of that disease. The body fights the weaker version and beats it and in the process develops the ability to take on and defeat the bigger disease. We can vaccinate ourselves against the English, see?"

"How will we do that, boyo?" blinked the second Jones.

Williams smiled faintly. "Listen carefully and tell me what kind of ammunition the English are using."

The bullets continued to hiss and clang outside.

"I think it's.45 calibre," said Price.

"That's correct. Fired from semi-automatic pistols. And now tell me what kind of cartridge we use in our own guns," continued Williams.

"The size is.22, isn't it?" answered Hopkins.

Williams nodded and reached for his holster. With a deft motion he drew out his pistol and waved it in front of his men. "The English have got the bigger ones. So we can vaccinate ourselves against them, but how can they vaccinate themselves against us? They would be daft to try. One shot of this for all of us and we'll become immune to their bullets. Then we can go out and kill the lot of them. Easy when you know how…"

"That's logical," said Thomas without any conviction.

"Come on, form a queue. Not a request but an order. Want to beat them properly, don't we? You first, Jones."

"Not me, boyo," cried the first Jones but Williams shot him anyway.

"Daft!" objected Hopkins but he also got a bullet in the face. So did Price, Thomas and the other Jones. Williams licked his lips. His men sprawled on the floor in ungainly postures. Blood trickled.

"A bit sore, I suppose," he said sympathetically.

He waited a whole minute, then he frowned. "Come on, get up. We have to go out and face the English. No need to be scared, you're immune now. What's the matter? Having a rest first, are you? Fine, but don't make it too long. Be here soon, the English will."

His men still didn't stir. Their eyes held a glazed look.

Williams sighed. "I'm going to vaccinate myself now and the moment I've had my shot, the time for resting is over. Serious, I am. You must be ready to leave when I'm done. Supposed to be fighting the English, we are. The bloody English. Do you hear me?"

He jammed the barrel into his open mouth and pulled the trigger. He fell down. His own blood poured out of his head and joined the spreading puddle on the floor. It might have been nice if that puddle had formed a significant Welsh shape, a red dragon perhaps, or a daffodil, or even a leek, but it didn't.