4. When the night wind howls.
After what seemed like hours they reached the entrance to the cave.
The adjudicator strode up to a van that was standing nearby. Another
man dressed like the guards was standing by it, and from his
conversation with the adjudicator Ruth gathered that the others had not
yet been caught, but the guards were closing in on them. The
adjudicator opened the back doors of the van.
“In here,” she said, pointing her baton at the monsters. “You too,
girl.” Ruth looked at her miserably, her bravado gone. “Why do you
want me?” she said.
“Get in,” the adjudicator repeated. She produced her gun again, and
threatened Ruth with it. “Do as I say. You” -this was aimed at
Patrick- “help her in, and get in yourself.” They did as they were
told.
“Please, at least untie me,” Ruth pleaded, but to no avail. The
doors were slammed shut and they were trapped with the Fantoms.
She heard doors slamming and the engine was started. Now it was
noisy as well as everything else. She sat trying to balance herself
against the van wall, afraid and uncomfortable. Her wrists hurt where
the rope chaffed. The van went round a sharp corner and, unable to
steady herself, she almost fell into one of the Fantoms. They were
sitting hunched up, inactive, but Ruth could feel that they were still
aware, and likely to react to any perceived threat.
They seemed to be driving very fast. Another sharp bend, and Ruth
lost her balance and fell over. She didn’t bother trying to get up but
lay there, facing the side of the truck.
“Ruth?” Patrick spoke to her for the first time since he had stopped
her climbing the stairs to escape. She lay still and quiet. She was
afraid, but also angry with him. Why had he done this?
“Are you ok?” Patrick asked in a whisper. Still she didn’t reply.
“Ruth? Are you all right?”
She stared at the wall. “Am I all right?” she said. “Well, apart
from being betrayed, threatened with a gun, tied up, thrown in the back
of a van and locked up with those- things! Other than that I’m fine,
except perhaps knowing that I’m being kept prisoner by a mad woman with
some plan to take over the world with monsters that I helped bring into
existence. Oh yes, I’m fine.”
“I’m sorry,” he said.
“Sorry?” she said. “You betrayed us.”
“I didn't know she was planning to do this! She just asked me to get
you all to go to the cave and sing Thespis- she said she’d heard we’d
found an original score and she wanted to hear it.”
“Didn’t you think that it was odd she wanted us to sing it in a cave?”
“She said it had to be somewhere secret so that no one else could
hear it and claim they’d discovered it. She said she’d make sure we got
the credit for having found it and that if we kept it quiet to start
with we could make money from selling the score.”
“So that’s what made you do this,” Ruth said bitterly. “Money.”
“I thought all she wanted us to do was to sing!” he protested. “What’s wrong in that? I didn’t know about all this.”
“But after she’d made us create those- those things-” she glanced
fearfully at the silent Fantoms- “After you knew what she was doing, you
still chose to stay with her, and stopped me escaping with the others.”
She turned over and glared at him. “I hope you think what you’re
going to get out of this is worth it.”
He looked uncomfortable. “I’m sorry,” he said again. “But...look at
me. I’ve got no future as it is. Even in G&S I get passed over in
auditions, let alone any hope of getting a decent job, of success in
the real world. She offered me hope, told me she could help me get
parts professionally. Of course I wasn’t going to turn it down.”
“But she threatened you along with the rest of us, when we thought
those things were going to attack us. You were as scared as I was then.
Wasn’t all she promised you just a trick to get you to bring us to
her?”
He shrugged, not meeting her eyes. “What have I got to loose?”
Ruth did not reply.
They had no idea where they were going. The journey seemed to go on
forever, weary afternoon leading on to wearier evening, and even wearier
night. Ruth lay in a corner, too scared to sleep. It was dark in the
van, only occassionally illuminated as they passed streetlights. She
could not see the Fantoms but knew they were there, lurking, in the
darkness. She was hungry, thirsty and uncomfortable. She tried not to
think of the remains of the picnic in the rucksack she still wore, but
in the end thirst got the better of her pride.
“Patrick?” she said. He had retreated to the other side of the van
and not spoken since their last exchange. She heard a rustle and felt,
rather than saw, him come towards her in the darkness.
“Yes?”
“There’s some food and drink in my rucksack, but I can’t get it off with my hands tied. Can you get it?”
“I’ll have a go.” She heard the zip and felt him rummaging around inside the bag.
“I think there’s a torch in there too,” she said. A moment later a
flash of light illuminated the darkness, and made her screw up her eyes.
Soon they were both eating and drinking what was left from their
picnic. Ruth wondered what had happened to the others. Had they
escaped? Or were they also captives?
The story continues...
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