Black Feathers Read online

  She smiled through crystal-tinted lashes.

  “It’s a boy, Lou. Our very own boy.” She held the oblong parcel up high. “Say hello to Gordon Louis Black.”

  2

  The girl erupts from the cover of the woods, scattering leaves, her face whipped by vines and tendrils. She feels no pain, only the imperative of flight and the animal will to survive.

  Was it real? she wonders. Was he even there?

  There are no answers.

  To look back will waste vital moments. Focussing ahead she sprints for home through the cornfield, the stalks high and green around her, hearing nothing now but the rustle and snap of leaves as she passes, the tramp of her feet on the moist earth, the pounding circuits of her breath. She dare not even cry in case it saps her strength.

  Her foot catches a fallen cornstalk. She takes long ungainly steps in an attempt to right herself and slides face first into the dirt. She’s running again before she feels the pain of the soil-hidden flints which have pierced her palms and knees. Moments later the cuts make their presence known. The pain tightens her skin, slows her down.

  She spits earth from her mouth and wills more speed to her legs.

  The girl bursts from the cornfield, taking a few stalks with her into the meadow. The uprooted greenery falls away. Horses, cattle and sheep look up as she passes, before continuing to graze unconcerned. She’s running uphill now, her thighs beginning to burn. At the top of the meadow there’s a gate. She’s already certain there won’t be enough time to stop and open it. Not knowing exactly how, she vaults the gate, ecstatic to leave a barrier between her and it. Him.

  She’s in the village now, scattering chickens as she pounds down the main street. Faces look up and watch her pass. Someone shouts:

  “Hey, Megan! You alright?”

  But she’s already left them behind.

  And then she’s at her parents’ front door and through it and bolting it and leaning back against it. Panting, sagging to the floor. Crying.

  Her mother wipes her floury hands on her apron and rushes to her daughter.

  “Megan? Whatever’s the matter?”

  Sobs and gulps for breath have muted her. Megan’s mother eases the girl to her feet and guides her to a chair. She ladles water from a stone ewer and hands it to the girl in an earthenware cup.

  “Calm yourself down, Megan. I’m going to fetch your father.”

  Megan gasps and shakes her head.

  “No, Amu… don’t leave me.”

  “I’m not going anywhere, Meg. I’ll ring the bell for him.”

  Megan’s mother pushes open the kitchen window and uses a poker from the fireplace to whack a rusted metal tube hanging just outside. It releases a resonant, melodious clang. Three short peals, the sign to come home quick. And soon enough, Megan’s father is entering through the back, also panting, his face creased with concern.

  “What’s happened?”

  “I don’t know yet. She’s barely got her wind back. Came in here like Black Jack himself was after her.”

  At that, the girl looks up and weeps anew.

  Her father, a bear of a man with kind eyes and a gentle smile that even a chest-length beard can’t hide, comes to sit with his daughter at the table.

  “It’s all right now, petal. You’re safe.” He puts his huge hand over hers and squeezes gently. “Tell me all about it.”

  “I saw something… someone… in the woods.”

  “Who did you see?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “What did they look like?” he asks.

  She looks at her mother again and puts her hand over her mouth.

  “Come on, Megan. If it’s someone dangerous we need to send people after them as soon as we can.”

  “Black.”

  That’s all she says at first.

  “What?”

  “Black. All in black from head to toe.”

  Her mother and father exchange a brief glance.

  “What else?”

  “He…”

  “It was a man?”

  Megan nods and her blond hair shakes with the vigorousness of the movement. Her father’s frown deepens.

  “He had a hat. A tall hat. It was flat on top – like a chimney. And his clothes were all black. A long black coat that poked out at the back. And black trousers and big, fluffy black boots.”

  “Fluffy?”

  She nods again.

  “Like… feathers or something. Black feathers. They came out of his sleeves and his collar too.”

  “And what about his face, Megan,” asks her mother now. “Did you see his face?”

  The girl nods. More slowly this time.

  “It was like a bird’s face. Pointy. And his eyes were grey. Like storm clouds.”

  Again, her mother and father look at each other. The father nods.

  “You mustn’t be frightened, petal. I’m going to fetch Mr Keeper.”

  “Mr Keeper? Why? I’m not sick, Apa.”

  “Mr Keeper has other responsibilities than tending the poorly. He knows things most folk don’t.”

  “I thought he was a healer.”

  “He’s that and more,” says Apa.

  “He can see into the weave of things,” says her mother. “He’ll know what’s best.”

  Mr Keeper looks very odd.

  Megan’s never been this close to the man before but he’s always been an object of fascination. He wears what Amu and Apa call a “boilasuit”. For the winter there’s a fur lining that buttons inside the boilasuit but in the October sunshine there’s no need for it. The boilasuit is faded green and either it’s too small for him or he’s cut a few inches off the cuffs and legs. He wears no shoes and his hands and feet are always dirty. Mr Keeper wears a dun-coloured sack strapped over his shoulders which gives him a big humped back. The sack has many pockets sewn onto it and there are always interesting things poking out – strange plants that don’t grow near Beckby village, small woven pouches with unknown contents, the bones of animals and the occasional brightly coloured feather. Megan always thought his bag was full of medicines but, now that he’s been summoned to their cottage and knowing there’s nothing wrong with her, she wonders what other purpose they might have.

  Apa ushers him in, closes the door with a loud crash and then follows. A few folk have gathered outside the cottage, attracted by Megan’s odd behaviour and the coming of Mr Keeper. Amu opens the door and makes eye contact with the bystanders. They all retreat.

  Mr Keeper has had to duck to enter and now he shrugs his cumbersome pack to the floor. When he stands straight he’s even taller than Apa and his hair is longer but much dirtier, matted and clumped together in what Megan thinks are called deadlots. As soon as he is inside their home she can smell him too. He doesn’t wash, that much is clear, and yet he doesn’t smell bad like the diseased, unwashed lunatics who wander from village to village begging scraps before moving on. He smells of work-sweat and of the very earth itself. He smells of dried wildflowers and wet sap. The whites of his eyes flash like lightning when he glances around and the wrinkles at their corners are deep and kind when he smiles – which he does as his gaze falls upon her.

  “Megan,” he says.

  Is it a greeting, an accusation, a question? In her panic she doesn’t know.

  His tones are deep and soft, rumbling like the purr of a wildcat, soughing like wind through the trees. And she has a strong sense that Mr Keeper has not come alone. Even though there’s nothing to see, she feels the lives of many things, or perhaps their spirits, moving around him as though he were their hub. She wants to trust him because she can see that trust is what Mr Keeper is all about. She wants to but–

  “It’s all right, little thing,” he says. “I only want to talk with you. And after that… we’ll see.”

  So saying, Mr Keeper approaches the heavy wooden table and sits on a small stool in front of Megan. His face is now about level with hers and she can smell his breath, all mint and wild fenn
el and smoke. The smell makes her pleasantly dizzy and a smile comes to visit the corners of Mr Keeper’s mouth.

  He turns to her parents.

  “Do you wish to stay or would you rather be… elsewhere?”

  Apa says, “I think she’ll talk more easily if we’re not here to distract her.” He smiles at Amu and holds out his hand. “Come on, hen. Let’s go for a walk.”

  When they reach the door, Amu turns back to Megan.

  “Don’t you be afraid now, Meg. Mr Keeper’s here to help. You can tell him anything. Anything at all. Understand?”

  Megan nods, but her stomach flutters.

  3

  On a Saturday morning near the end of October, when Gordon was two weeks old, the Black family were all outside in the rugged back garden. The scent of wild roses from the last blossoms lingered in the air. Aside from the snow flurries and gales of a fortnight earlier – events no one mentioned – it had felt like an endless summer. Mornings and afternoons were chill by now but it was still bright enough that none of them wanted to be indoors at the weekend.

  Sophie sat in a deckchair reading a thriller. A wide-brimmed, floppy white hat kept the sun out of her eyes. Behind her on the terrace, well-insulated in his pram, Gordon slept. Angela was reading a magazine on a blanket on the grass and Judith was alternately running, skipping and dancing or stopping and losing herself for long moments in the tiny details of the life of the garden. For a full fifteen minutes she had been on her stomach watching wasps eat their way through a fallen pear. Each of them wore a skin-tight yellow and black uniform and walked with an agitated mechanical twitch. Their black antennae wavered unceasingly and their yellow mandibles cut through bite after bite of pear flesh.

  Louis, walking past with a wheelbarrow full of hedge trimmings and fallen leaves, saw what she was doing.

  “You be careful, Jude.”

  She looked up at him.

  “They’re like soldiers, Daddy. Look how pretty.”

  “They’re not so pretty when they sting you. Don’t get so close.”

  Mesmerised by the wasps and their work, she rested her chin on the backs of her hands.

  “Judith.”

  “What, Daddy?”

  “Back away from them a little, would you?”

  Not looking up, she scooted backwards, somehow keeping her head on her hands. Her skirt rucked up, exposing the backs of her smooth thighs and white knickers. As young as she was he could already see her mother’s shape in her. As he walked on towards the compost heap the wheelbarrow bumped up and down over the uneven grass, eliciting tinny rumbles. He wondered if Judith would still be so unselfconscious in ten years and dreaded the complexities that time would no doubt bring.

  When he’d dumped the load, he abandoned the wheelbarrow and walked over to Angela’s blanket. She too was lying on her front, bending one leg up until the heel of her sandal touched her backside and then letting the leg straighten until the toe bounced off the grass. Louis squatted beside her and glanced at the article she was reading.

  “Sports day diets?” He struggled to register the implications. “I’m sure we’ve got some Bunty annuals in the loft. Mighty Mo and Watson the Wonder Dog were great.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Dad.”

  “Wholesome children’s books, Angela. Instead of pre-teen Cosmopolitan.”

  “It’s not like that.”

  “How would you know?”

  Angela tutted.

  “It’s just a magazine, Dad. I’m not turning anorexic.”

  When she said nothing else, Louis stood up.

  “Fine.”

  He wandered over to Sophie’s deckchair and sat down beside her on the grass. She didn’t acknowledge his arrival.

  “You still love me, don’t you, Soph?”

  He waited a long time for the reply.

  “Hmm?”

  “I asked you if, out of all the females in this family, you were the one who still loved me.”

  After a few moments, Sophie managed to turn her head from the seductive pages of her book.

  “Female family what?”

  “Forget it.”

  Rising, he walked the last few paces to the terrace where Gordon was warmly swaddled. He wanted to look into the lodestones of his eyes but the boy was deeply asleep, one tiny fist held beside his head in a baby power-salute. Louis smiled.

  “I’m glad you’re here, mate. Balances things up a bit. One day, we’ll be able to discuss rugger and you can come home from school knowing there’s a safe haven in your old man’s study.”

  Louis thought about the suggestion. Half joking, he added:

  “Don’t take that too literally, by the way. I may be working and not able to stop straight away. And you must always knock – everyone has to. But once you’re in, well, then you’ll be in the safe haven.”

  Suddenly content, Louis backed quietly towards the rear wall of the house and took in the scene; everyone who mattered in his life was arranged in this perfect landscape. He wished he could have had a painting, not a photograph but a unique painting, some rendering of his perspective that would seal in the satisfaction he felt in this moment of pre-autumnal perfection. Here was his family, his land and his life in silent rapture under a cerulean October sky.

  Scanning the blue, he saw the tops of the trees and noticed one in particular, the horse chestnut that rose up to his left. It was the nearest tree to the house and had taken its share of damage over the years. Each winter it looked like it was dead and each spring the leaves came back leaving more and more branches bare. As he looked now, he caught sight of a large black bird sitting on the topmost barren branch. His satisfaction turned to ire and disgust. A haughty black crow was looking down on his son. A filthy carrion-eater.

  An English vulture.

  The crow hopped down to a lower branch, fixing Louis with a single obsidian eye. Louis frowned. Bold and unheeding of the presence of humans, the bird dropped from its perch and flapped to the lowest branch of the horse chestnut. The branch reached directly over Gordon’s pram.

  “Sophie.”

  When she didn’t answer Louis didn’t let the pause draw out.

  “SOPHIE!” he shouted.

  All of them turned around when they heard the command in his tone. Gordon woke up. Sophie struggled out from the sagging canvas of her deckchair.

  Louis pointed.

  “Have you seen this?”

  “What? What is it?”

  “It’s a bloody enormous crow. They’re evil. Have you seen them around here before? It’s acting like it owns the place.”

  “I… I don’t know. I suppose so. I think they’re always around.”

  The crow floated down onto the edge of the pram like a kite of black silk rags, its talons curling over the navy-blue, waterproof fabric. For a moment, no one moved. Unconcerned, it regarded each of them without expression. Only when it lowered its head to test Gordon’s blankets with its sharp beak did Louis rush at it, flailing his arms and screaming.

  “Get away. Get out of it, you fucking vermin!”

  The crow bated at the air but didn’t take off until Louis was less than a couple of paces away. Finally it let go of the pram’s rim and flew up. Gaining height fast, it rose once more to the topmost branch. There it perched, cool and untouchable, its tiny black eyes fixed not on Louis but on Gordon.

  “Don’t tell me you’ve left him out here alone, Sophie. Don’t tell me you’ve just popped into the kitchen to put the kettle on and left him out here on his own for even a moment.”

  “I don’t remember doing that. I might have, but only–”

  “Don’t say any more.” Louis tried to hold on to his anger. His face was sick and grey. Gordon was crying now: a wail of fear and shock. It moved Sophie to run to him but Louis didn’t even hear it. “You don’t have any idea, do you?”

  “Any idea of what, Louis? It’s only a bird.”

  In the garden, both the girls had returned from the reve
ries that had so recently allowed them to ignore their father. They lay still in the places where they had been, but now they were jack-knifed on their sides and silent for other reasons than simple absorption. They shrank into themselves, hoping that their father wouldn’t notice them and make them the target for his anger. Louis Black’s rage was a rare thing but that didn’t make it easy to forget. They watched as his eyes drove spikes into their mother, a figure who could usually ward off any of Louis’s moods. He approached her and pointed again into the top of the horse chestnut tree as she knelt beside Gordon, trying to placate him. He spoke quietly and clearly, containing his fury.

  “That ‘bird’ is a killer. At the very least, it is a maimer of the defenceless. Crows, ravens, rooks, jackdaws, magpies – all of them – are carnivorous opportunists. They peck the eyes from the heads of newborn lambs given half a chance. And ravens are hunters; they’ll attack and kill small animals. And yet you let our child, our only son, lie out here unprotected, with one of them just waiting for us to turn our backs.”

  “Oh, come on, Louis. I’m sure it wouldn’t–”

  “Sure?” he screamed. “You’re sure? What the hell would you know? You may enjoy the countryside, but you don’t understand the first thing about it. I grew up on a farm and I’ve seen newborn lambs wandering blind with blood pouring from their empty eye sockets. Lambs with crows still sitting on their backs, waiting for another peck of flesh. Don’t tell me what you’re bloody sure of, right?”

  Sophie was crying now, dismayed by his ire and terrified by the images. Angela and Judith cried their tears as silently as they could, fearing what might come next and not moving in case they caught his attention. The shouting didn’t stop.

  “Take the baby in the house right now and don’t you ever leave him unattended in the garden. Never. Understand?”

  “But Louis, I never knew–”