fierce intensity of a rally driver, wrenching the wheel as each fresh obstruction sprang up from the darkness. The road, with its pot-holes, its ruts and ridges, would have been hazardous for a careful driver. Now, under Rolf’s brutal handling, the car jumped and lurched, swaying the three tightly wedged back passengers from side to side.
Miriam struggled free to lean forward, and said: “Take it easy, Rolf. Slow down. This isn’t good for Julian. D’you want a premature labour?”
Her voice was calm, but her authority was absolute, its effect immediate. Rolf at once eased his foot on the accelerator. But it was too late. The car juddered and leapt, swerved violently and for three seconds spun out of control. Rolf slammed his foot on the brake and they jerked to a stop.
He said, almost under his breath: “Bloody hell! A front puncture.”
There was no point in recriminations. Theo undid his seat belt. “There’s a spare wheel in the boot. Let’s get the car off the road.”
They clambered out and stood in the dark shadow of the hedge while Rolf steered the car on to the grass verge. Theo saw that they were in open rolling country, probably, he thought, about ten miles from Stratford. On either side ran an unkempt hedge of high, tangled bushes broken by torn gaps through which they could see the scarred ridges of the ploughed field. Julian, wrapped in her cloak, stood calmly and silently, like a docile child taken on a picnic and waiting patiently for some minor mishap to be remedied by the adults.
Miriam’s voice was calm, but she could not disguise the underlying note of anxiety. “How long will it take?”
Rolf was looking round. He said: “About twenty minutes, less if we’re lucky. But we’ll be safer off the road, where we can’t be seen.”
Without an explanation he walked briskly ahead. They waited, their eyes staring after him. Within less than a minute he was back. “About a hundred yards to the right there’s a gate and a rough track. It looks as if it leads to a clump of trees. We’ll be safer there. God knows this road’s practically impassable, but if we can drive down it so can others. We can’t risk some fool stopping and offering to help.”
Miriam objected: “How far is it? We don’t want to go further than we need and it will be tough on the wheel rim.”
Rolf said: “We’ve got to get under cover. I can’t be sure how long the job will take. We have to get well out of sight of the road.”
Silently Theo agreed with him. It was more important to remain undetected than to cover the miles. The SSP would have no idea in which direction they were travelling and, unless they had already discovered Jasper’s body, no name or number for the car. He got into the driver’s seat and Rolf made no objection.
Rolf said: “With all those supplies in the boot we’d better lighten the load. Julian can ride, the rest of us will walk.”
The gate and the path were closer than Theo had expected. The rough track ran gently uphill along the edge of an unploughed field, obviously long ago left to seed. The track had been rutted and chevroned by the heavy tyres of tractors; the central ridge was crowned with tall grasses which shook like frail antennae in the headlights. Theo drove slowly and with great care, Julian in the seat beside him, the three silent figures moving like dark shadows alongside. When they came to the clump of trees he saw that the wood offered denser cover than he had expected. But there was a final obstacle. Between it and the track was a deep gully over six feet wide.
Rolf banged on the car window. He said: “Wait here a moment,” and again dashed ahead. He came back and said: “There is a way across about thirty yards on. It looks as if it leads into a kind of clearing.”
The entrance to the wood was a narrow bridge compounded of sliced logs and earth now covered with grass and weeds. Theo saw with relief that it was wide enough to take the car, but waited while Rolf took the torch and inspected the logs to make sure they hadn’t rotted. He gave a wave and Theo manoeuvred the car across with little difficulty. The car bumped gently forward and was enclosed by a grove of beech trees, their high boughs arched into a canopy of bronzed leaves, intricate as a carved roof. Getting out, Theo saw that they had come to a stop in a mush of dead and crackling leaves and split beech nuts.
It was Rolf and Theo who together tackled the front wheel, with Miriam holding the torch. Luke and Julian stood together and watched silently while Rolf lugged out the spare wheel, the jack and the wheel brace. But removing the wheel proved more difficult than Theo had expected. The nuts had been screwed very tightly and neither he nor Rolf could get them to move.
The torchlight moved erratically as Miriam squatted to a more comfortable position. Rolf said impatiently: “For God’s sake, hold it steady. I can’t see what I’m doing. And it’s very dim.”
A second later the light went out.
Miriam didn’t wait for Rolf’s question. She said: “There isn’t a spare battery. Sorry. We’ll have to stick here until morning.”
Theo waited for Rolf’s explosion of irritation. It didn’t come. Instead he got up and said calmly: “Then we may as well have something to eat and make ourselves comfortable for the rest of the night.”
Theo and Rolf elected to sleep on the ground; the other three chose the car, Luke in the front seat and the two women curled up in the back. Theo scooped up armfuls of beech leaves, spread out Jasper’s raincoat and covered himself with a blanket and his own coat. His last consciousness was of distant voices as the women settled themselves for sleep, of the crackle of twigs as he wriggled deeper into the bed of leaves. Before he slept the wind began to rise, not strong enough to agitate the low boughs of the beech above his head, but making a far-off, distant sound as if the wood was stirring into life.
Next morning he opened his eyes to the pattern of bronze-and-russet beech leaves broken by thin shafts of pale milky light. He was aware of the hardness of the earth, of the smell of loam and leaves, pungent and obscurely comforting. He struggled from under the weight of blanket and coat and stretched, aware of an ache in his shoulders and the small of his back. He was surprised that he had slept so soundly on a bed which, initially wonderfully soft, had compacted under his weight and now felt like a board.
It looked as if he was the last to wake. The doors of the car were open, the seats empty. Someone had already brewed the morning tea. On the flattened ridge of a log were five mugs, all from Jasper’s collection of coronation mugs, and a metal teapot. The coloured mugs looked curiously festive.
Rolf said: “Help yourself.”
Miriam had a pillow in each hand and was shaking them vigorously. She carried them back to the car, where Rolf had already started work on the wheel. Theo drank his tea, men went over to help him, and they worked together, efficiently and companionably. Rolf’s large, square-fingered hands were remarkably dextrous. Perhaps because they were both rested, less anxious, no longer dependent on a single beam of torchlight, the previously intractable nuts yielded to their joint effort.
Gathering up a fistful of leaves to wipe his hands, Theo asked: “Where are Julian and Luke?”
It was Rolf who replied. “Saying their prayers. They do every day. When they come back we’ll have breakfast. I’ve put Luke in charge of the rations. It’s good for him to have something more useful to do than saying his prayers with my wife.”
“Couldn’t they pray here? We ought to keep together.”
“They aren’t far off. They like to be private. Anyway, I can’t stop them. Julian likes it and Miriam tells me I’m to keep her calm and happy. Apparently praying keeps her calm and happy. It’s some kind of ritual for them. It doesn’t do any harm. Why don’t you go and join them if you’re worried?”
Theo said: “I don’t think they’d want me.”
“I don’t know, they might. They might try to convert you. Are you a Christian?”
