Before the Storm Read online

  ‘Gosh!’ exclaimed the youth.

  ‘Daniel!’ his mother exclaimed. ‘Language, please! Fox, I can tell the maid to prepare the bed in the garret for you. Would you like to stay here for the night? You must be exhausted.’

  ‘My thanks, no.’

  ‘Daniel, kindly show Fox to his room … oh! Sorry, did you say no?’

  ‘Tonight, expected, at lodgings. Friends, worried, will be.’

  ‘Oh. I see. Well, ah, would you come here for lunch tomorrow? We have a roast on Sundays, you would love it. We might even be able to give you introductions to people, you know, help you become established in Melbourne.’

  Fox considered this carefully before answering. It was not yet late in the evening, but the last train was due soon.

  ‘Shall return, tomorrow, if clothing wet.’

  Half an hour later Fox went to the laundry with Mrs Lang, to check on the progress with drying his clothes. Daniel had already been out of the room for some time. Emily and Daniel had spent their lives reading about heroes in the classics that they studied at school, and in adventure novels. Now they had actually met one, and he had rescued them. Fox was everything that a hero should be, as far as Emily was concerned: brave, strong, well-mannered, modest, yet … there was something very strange about him. His manner was distant and withdrawn, like that of a dog that had been beaten too often, and had learned to avoid trouble. He was highly intelligent, yet he took a lot of care to disguise the fact. He said nothing funny, and even missed jokes made by others. Fox did laugh, but only when others were laughing. Emily felt sure that the mistakes he made were not really those of a foreigner. Try as she might, however, she could not think of anyone that he resembled.

  As Emily sat staring into the fire, she found herself daydreaming about BC. Annoyed with herself, she switched her thoughts to Fox. Moments later her thoughts drifted back to BC. He was shooting at dark shapes in the smoke, his skin pale, and his hair dark and wavy. Again Emily tried to think about Fox. It was he who had rescued her, after all. Moments later she found herself dreaming about nursing the wounded BC back to health. Slowly the day began to catch up with Emily, and she caught herself starting to doze. Daniel came back into the room with a book.

  ‘I was just checking what Fox said about the names of the planets,’ her brother announced. ‘He got them right, except that he put in three make-believe names at the end.’

  Once again something unsettling began batting about like a moth at the back of Emily’s mind. She shivered.

  ‘Can I see?’ she asked as casually as she could.

  ‘Yes, but be quick about it. You know how Mother and Father feel about girls learning science.’

  Emily quickly turned to the book’s chapter on astronomy. She was surprised to learn that some planets had not always been known. Uranus had been discovered in 1781, and Neptune in 1846. There were many asteroids, but the first had only been discovered in 1801. Charon, Cerebus and Terminus were definitely not mentioned.

  ‘Tomorrow’s Sunday,’ said Daniel. ‘You know what we do on Sunday?’

  ‘We go to church, have a roast for lunch, then spend the rest of the day being bored.’

  ‘Well, I think that if Fox’s clothes are not dry, he might have to come back for them. If he returns early, he could come to church with us before lunch. Mother did invite him … well, sort of.’

  ‘Why not ask him, silly?’

  ‘It … it sounds, er, sissy, a boy asking another boy to go to church. I thought you might ask him instead.’

  ‘No!’ exclaimed Emily. ‘He might think that I had, ah, an interest in him. Danny, just make the suggestion yourself.’

  ‘But only girls make those sorts of suggestions.’

  ‘Oh, nonsense.’

  ‘I still think a girl should ask that sort of thing.’

  ‘No!’

  ‘Look, why don’t we both ask him? That way I don’t look like a sissy, and you don’t look like you’re courting him.’

  Emily considered this. Push Daniel too far, and he would drop the subject. Daniel clearly wanted to be more of a friend to Fox, while Emily was intrigued by him. Now Daniel was offering a compromise. With careful, casual questioning, Fox might talk about BC, and the very thought of that quickened Emily’s pulse.

  ‘I’ll go with you, but only if you actually speak to him,’ she conceded.

  ‘Can I say that it was your idea?’ asked Daniel eagerly.

  ‘You can say it was our idea,’ Emily said firmly.

  ‘I suppose that will have to do … but I still say boys are not supposed to ask other boys to church. Girls do that sort of thing.’

  ‘Fox was brave enough to rescue us, so you must be brave enough to ask him to church.’

  The mention of bravery changed everything as far as Daniel was concerned.

  ‘All right, all right, I’ll do it.’

  Just then they heard Fox returning from the laundry with Mrs Lang.

  ‘I cannot think why the clothes were still so wet,’ Mrs Lang was saying as they entered. ‘It’s almost as if they had been rinsed again.’

  Emily shot a suspicious glance at Daniel, who looked sheepish.

  ‘No matter, shall return, for lunch,’ responded Fox.

  ‘Fox will be returning tomorrow, his clothes are not dry yet,’ Mrs Lang announced as she and Fox entered the room.

  Emily tried hard not to smile. ‘Oh Fox, seeing that you will have to return, Daniel had something to ask you,’ she said.

  ‘Yes, yes, of course,’ said Daniel at once. ‘Ah, Emily wanted to ask you to church with us. But she didn’t want to embarrass you, in case you, um, don’t go to church. I thought I’d ask, er, in case you did. I mean, if you don’t go, then just forget I asked.’

  Emily bristled at Daniel’s little betrayal, but she said nothing. Once again, Daniel looked sheepish.

  ‘Chapel, yours, will attend,’ said Fox. ‘For invitation, thanks.’

  Soon after that Fox was gone, hurrying away to catch the last train. Later, lying in her bed, Emily thought over the day’s events, and of what she had learned about Fox. Her father was always saying that modern sailors were too soft, and that the flogging should be brought back as shipboard discipline. Brought back. On Fox’s ship flogging was still practised. Fox had been flogged. Perhaps they still do that sort of thing on Norwegian ships, she decided.

  Fox’s accent was really odd, too. It was curiously cold, hard and precise, and everything that he said was always perfectly clear. It was almost like some dialect of English, she thought. Fox also knew a way to bring drowned people back to life. Some person in the crowd on the river bank had said that it was a Chinese trick. Perhaps Fox’s ship had visited China. Perhaps the strange cinema device from Fox’s trousers also came from China. Perhaps the fighting in which BC had died had been in China … yet the soldiers who had shot BC did not look like Mr Wu at the laundry shop. Emily’s thoughts returned to BC, and for a time she again fantasised that he was not dead and that she was nursing him back to health.

  Emily sat up in bed, trying to regain control of her mind. Whenever she thought of her rescuer, she was as suspicious as Sherlock Holmes investigating a murder, but when it came to the dead BC, her heart began to hammer and she felt feverish. BC had done nothing for her. BC had died before they had even met. Fox had saved Emily’s life, on the other hand, so why could she not worship him? Emily visualised Fox’s face. Somehow his neat hair and sad, serious eyes did not spark any sort of romantic feelings in her. BC was a leader, Fox was not. Being a leader was what made BC so special, she decided. Emily knew that she was a good leader, too, but she had nobody to lead. Every time she told Daniel to do something sensible, he did the opposite unless she forced him to do otherwise.

  ‘You’re being just like the silly girls at school,’ Emily whispered to herself. ‘Especially the artistic ones with put-on French accents like Muriel Baker. They lose their hearts to boys from the grammar school just because they dance well, or ar
e sporting heroes. Stop it! Girls like you don’t do that.’

  It was a hopeless fight. For the first time in her short life, Emily had toppled, and was now falling out of control.

  ‘Well at least I am losing my heart to a brave, handsome, young man, not some stupid schoolboy,’

  Emily muttered to herself presently. ‘Why, oh why, does he have to be dead?’

  At last Emily gave up the battle with the obsession, turned up the wick of her bedside lamp, and gazed at her collection of dolls and bears. Much to her mother’s distress, more than half the dolls were of sailors, soldiers, or knights in cardboard armour. Emily did not like dolls, but her mother insisted on giving them to her, so she fought back by dressing them in ways that would annoy her mother. Taking a purple scarf, Emily began cutting out the pattern for a pair of trousers and a coat. Within half an hour one of the dolls was dressed in a hastily stitched purple uniform, and with a scar inked onto its forehead. Emily bandaged its stomach, giving the implication that BC was wounded, not dead.

  Finally, with bandaged doll placed at the centre of her collection, Emily blew out the lamp and drifted into sleep.

  2

  VICTIM

  Daniel was out of bed long before his parents the following morning. To his dismay, however, Emily was dressed and having breakfast when he reached the kitchen.

  ‘You’re up early,’ he said suspiciously as he cut a slice of bread for himself.

  ‘I am always up before you,’ she replied. ‘You just get up so late that you never know when I am up.’

  Daniel said no more. His sister always won all the arguments. If a question had five possible answers, he was sure that she would have all five ready. Nothing he could say ever caught her off guard. His only defence was to have friends that she did not like, otherwise she would quickly introduce herself, prove that she was more interesting than he was, then make them her friends instead. He did his best to annoy her, but even that seemed to go wrong all too often. He had stood up in the boat only because he knew she would be annoyed. She had certainly been annoyed, yet his triumph had lasted only about five seconds.

  As he sat munching his toast, Daniel thought about trying to visit someone for a while, someone that Emily disliked, so that she would not go with him. On the other hand, Fox had said he would return before the church service. The service was at eleven, but Fox had not said just how early he would arrive. Visiting a friend might mean he would be away when Fox returned, and for Daniel that was unthinkable. He was determined not to lose Fox to Emily. Suddenly Emily stood up.

  ‘I am going to check on the state of Fox’s clothes,’ she announced.

  Daniel said nothing, but a moment later he realised that she was going to claim the credit for getting Fox’s clothes clean. He hurried after her.

  ‘You never worry about clothes, except if they’re for your stupid dolls and bears,’ said Daniel as he caught up with his sister. ‘Why are you interested now?’

  ‘Everything must be perfect for Fox, because he saved us after your stupid antics in the boat! I’ll not have you splashing water over his uniform again.’

  ‘How did …’ began Daniel before he caught himself.

  ‘Daniel Lang, I can read you like a very simple book for very young children,’ replied Emily.

  As usual, Daniel decided to say nothing. He had never yet won an exchange with his older sister. They were taking Fox’s violet uniform out of the drying closet when the maid arrived with a basket of washing.

  ‘Oh Miss Emily, I’se so glad ter see yer!’ she hissed urgently, ignoring Daniel.

  Daniel felt vaguely annoyed. Everyone always went to Emily first.

  ‘What is it, Martha?’ asked Emily as she draped Fox’s coat over her arm.

  ‘That coat. It ain’t nattyrel.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘There’s a stray thread on the left sleeve. I tried to cut it orf, like to be neat, an’ … an’ it broke me scissors! It’s like a bit o’ balin’ wire.’

  ‘This one?’ asked Emily, twirling the strand of thread in her fingers. ‘Oh come now, Martha, it is as soft as a kitten’s fur.’

  ‘That’s not the ’arf of it,’ continued Martha. ‘Give it ’ere, an’ lookey.’

  Martha led them outside, and around behind the laundry. The woodpile was located here, along with a chopping block and axe. Martha was what their mother described as a robust girl in rude health; that is to say, she was broad-shouldered and probably the equal of most men in physical strength. She dusted the splinters from the chopping block with the hem of her skirt, then folded Fox’s coat and put it there. Next she picked up the axe.

  ‘Martha, what do you think you are doing?’ cried Emily. ‘Martha, stop!’

  But Martha did not stop. She brought the axe around in one mighty, full-bodied swing and chopped down squarely on the folded coat. The axe bounced off. Emily dashed forward at once and snatched the coat away. Daniel stood watching silently.

  ‘Martha, you evil woman!’ cried Emily. ‘What do you think you’re doing, ruining poor Fox’s only …’

  Emily’s voice trailed away as she held up the coat. There was not the slightest sign of damage on it. Daniel was astounded, and realised that he was standing and staring with his mouth open. He closed his mouth, and hoped that nobody had been watching him.

  ‘Maybe the axe is blunt,’ he suggested.

  Martha now put a folded sack on the block and picked up the axe. This time the axe head chopped right through the fabric and buried itself in the wood.

  ‘Like I says, ain’t nattyrel,’ she concluded.

  Emily carried Fox’s clothes back to the house in silence, and Daniel noticed that she was even frowning a little. That was good, Daniel concluded. It seemed as if Fox might turn out to be one of those people that Emily did not approve of. Were that the case, he just might become friends with Daniel.

  ‘There is something about Fox that does not add up,’ said Emily as she began folding the clothes and putting them on the parlour table.

  ‘What have you got against him?’ demanded Daniel. ‘He saved us, and he’s polite and respectable.’

  ‘But his coat! Martha’s axe did not even leave a mark on it.’

  ‘So? It could be like chain mail. A sort of cloth that’s armour too. I bet it can stop swords and bullets.’

  ‘But chain mail is made of iron rings.’

  ‘So? Ships used to be made of wood, but now they’re made of iron.’

  Emily held up the coat and looked at it closely. ‘I do not see any rings.’

  ‘They might be visible under a microscope.’

  ‘Well, don’t just stand there. Get your microscope.’

  ‘No!’

  ‘What?’ exclaimed Emily. ‘Why not?’

  ‘Because you’re trying to spy on him, even though he saved us.’

  ‘Oh, Danny, I’m just curious.’

  ‘Well I think it’s only some sort of armour, like chain mail.’

  ‘Why make armour that feels like ordinary cloth?’

  ‘That’s so Fox can be protected at all times, like if a mutinous sailor tried to shoot him,’ replied Daniel, with a feeling of authority that came from reading more adventure novels than Emily.

  For the first time since he could remember, Emily had no answer. I beat her in an argument! thought Daniel. Must write that in my diary.

  ‘There he is now,’ said Emily, looking past Daniel through the window to the front gate. ‘You must ask him about the coat …’

  ‘I’ll do no such thing!’ retorted Daniel. ‘If you want to play Sherlock Holmes questioning a criminal, do it yourself. Anyway, you forgot his boots, and I’m going back to the laundry to fetch them.’

  To Daniel’s relief, Emily did not follow as he marched back out to the laundry. Fox’s boots were dry, and the groom had cleaned them. He examined them closely, and concluded that they were probably not made of leather. Just as well Emily didn’t notice, he thought as he returned to the
house. Emily was waiting at the back door.

  ‘I told Fox that he could change in your room,’ she announced. ‘I did not think you would mind.’

  Daniel said nothing. Emily tried to take the boots, but Daniel snatched them back and pushed past her. Even when she knows I would agree, she does something to make me argue, he thought. Maybe that’s why she always wins.

  They trod the carpeted stairs softly and slowly. Above them, they could hear Fox singing softly, yet his voice was suddenly like that of the old cockney carter who delivered the firewood. The song was familiar, too.

  ‘He sings like he’s English,’ whispered Emily.

  Slowly and silently, they approached the open door of Daniel’s room. Odd, thought Daniel. Fox did not close the door to change his clothes. Fox had his back to them as he stood buttoning his shirt and singing.

  When will you pay me,

  Say the bells of Old Bailey?

  When I grow rich,

  Say the bells of Shoreditch.

  Pray when will that be,

  Say the bells …

  Daniel and Emily had made no sound, yet Fox whirled around and flung a small knife. It thudded into the door frame beside Daniel’s left ear. Daniel shrank back with a gasp of fright, dropping the boots. Emily darted behind him.

  ‘Daniel!’ exclaimed Fox, hurriedly snapping to attention, then bowing. ‘Emily, also. Apologies.’

  ‘I … I’m sorry, I startled you,’ was all that Daniel could think to say.

  Fox strode forward and retrieved his knife from the door frame.

  ‘Fault, is mine,’ he said. ‘Rustle of cloth, I heard. Of Death’s robes, is sound, some places.’

  ‘Oh,’ gasped Emily, her voice still unsteady. ‘And where might those places be?’

  ‘Long ago, far away.’

  ‘You have been to such horrible, rough places, yet you are so polite,’ said Emily, her voice suddenly sympathetic. ‘I thought that sort of thing made people rough.’

  ‘Not everyone. For damage, from knife, to woodwork, apologies.’