***
‘Becca! Becca, girl! Where you at, maid?’
Emmett stamps through the brush, heedless of the jabbing needles of the twisted larches that scratch at his hands and face. The great black dog gallops ahead, like a bear on the hunt for honey. Emmett flops onto a large moss-covered rock and, taking a handkerchief out of his back pocket, wipes the sweat dripping down his face.
Where you at, Becca? Didn’t I tell you to watch out for those little people? They goes after children like you. They wants you as their own, you see. You wouldn’t’ve heard them singin’, so they must’a showed themselves to you. I told you not to follows them, didn’t I, Becca? Why’d you follow them? You didn’t even takes the bun with you to keep them away. You has to keep some bread on you, maid, or they’ll come after you.
Dropping to his knees, Emmett clasps his hands and looks up through the branches to the patch of blue sky above. Holy God, I knows the fairies are your angels fell from Heaven. Can you have a word in their ear, God? Tells the little people not to hurt Becca? Keep her safe, will you, God? Help us find her. Please, Holy God. Please.
***
When Sophie and Sam reach the clearing in the woods, they find Emmett sitting on a fallen log by the brook, his head in his hands, Rupert curled on the moss by his feet. Sam stomps through the long, dry grass towards him. Emmett looks up as they approach, his cheeks wet under his dishevelled grey hair. His faded blue gaberdine jacket is turned inside out and he holds one of Florie’s currant buns, the crumbs dusting the grass at his feet. The dog lumbers to its feet and saunters though the meadow grass towards Sam.
‘I’m so sorry, Sam, b’y.’ Emmett shakes his head. ‘I found me a good patch of partridgeberries over there.’ He points to a stand of bushes dotted with crimson berries. ‘I thought Becca was right behind me. Then Rupert starts barkin’ and fussin’, and then the next thing I knows she’s gone.’
Sam grasps the collar of Emmett’s jacket and hauls him to his feet. ‘Where was she the last time you saw her?’
Emmett points towards a clump of orange hawkweed near a stand of silver birches that border a dense wall of larches and thick-branched conifers. ‘Just there. She said she was pickin’ some flowers for her.’ Emmett jabs his finger at Sophie. ‘I’s looked everywhere, Sam. Been through the woods, alls the way down to Joe Gill’s field where he keeps that old horse.’
‘You couldn’t have looked everywhere or you’d have found her.’ Sam pulls his phone out of his back pocket and taps out a number. ‘Ace? Becca’s gone missing out by Pickersgill’s Woods. Get the boys together. Get here as soon as you can.’
‘It’s the fairies, Sam,’ Emmett says as he wipes at his wet face with his handkerchief. ‘The fairies musta taken her, just like they took that child down in Colinet all those years ago.’
***
Sophie picks her way through the bushes under the grasping branches of the larches. She calls out Becca’s name, even though she knows it’s fruitless. Becca could be just out of sight, around the next rock or fir tree, but she’d never hear the call.
Rupert lumbers past her, his muscular body and giant webbed feet smashing a path through the undergrowth. ‘Good boy, Rupert. Find Becca. You can do it.’
She follows Rupert through the scrub. How is it possible that she’s only been in Tippy’s Tickle for three days? The place has taken hold of her. She already feels closer to these islanders than any of the people she’s worked with for years. A fear grows inside of her. Bad things can’t possibly happen here. Not in this place. Not with these people. Her people.
‘Becca! Becca!’ she screams into the forest. She can’t stop herself.
After a few minutes the scrubby larches thin out and give way to a carpet of moss and green rootless liverworts where the branches of the firs and the spruce trees form an umbrella over the forest floor. A silence as thick as the moss engulfs her, broken only by the panting of the dog and the thud of its feet as it lopes deeper into the forest. The firs close around her like an enemy army. She squints into the shadows.
‘Rupert! Wait! Come back!’ She turns her ear in the direction Rupert has disappeared, but the forest has swallowed him just as it has swallowed Becca. ‘Rupert! Come here!’ But the dog is gone.
She stands on the moss, peering into the darkening forest. If she continues, she’ll get lost too. Becca. Becca. Where are you? She presses her hands to the top of her head and yells.
‘Becca! Rupert!’
The forest swallows her cries, smothering them in its velvet darkness. Her shoulders dropping in defeat, she turns and stumbles back to the clearing, following the path the dog’s huge paws have forged through the underbrush.
***
Florie enters the kitchen from the hall. ‘Any news yet?’
‘No, Florie,’ Ace says. ‘Sam’s still out with Zeb and Lloyd. Thor and I’s gotta get back to Wesleyville. We’ll come back tomorrow if we needs to. Just get Sam to call me.’ He pokes his brother on his shoulder. ‘C’mon, b’y. Sooner we go, sooner we can come back.’
Sophie watches the screen door slam behind them. Florie plods over to the coffee pot and pours herself a cup of coffee and joins Sophie at the kitchen table. Out by the tickle the motorcycles roar to life.
‘Finally gots Ellie asleep,’ Florie says as she yawns and rubs her eyes. ‘She’s right upset. Blames herself. Said it was a school day and she should never have let Emmy take Becca out.’
Sophie sets down her mug. ‘Emmett’s
