She could see Mole up ahead of her now, drinking in the pool below the waterfall. Jessie’s legs ached. She wanted so much to stop, but she knew that she mustn’t, that rhythm was everything. She passed Mole and laughed out loud at him. ‘Haven’t you read the one about the hare and the tortoise?’ she cried. ‘See you at the top.’ This was the spot where she’d come to grief the week before, the part of the track she most dreaded. The track rose steeply beside the waterfall, curling away out of sight and around the back of the hill. Every stone was loose here and until she reached the waterfall, if she reached the waterfall, the track would be more like a stream, the stones under her feet more like stepping stones. From now on she would have to be careful, very careful.
She was standing now on the very rock where she’d tripped last time. She punched the air with triumph and staggered on, on and up. She was in unknown territory now. Only on her father’s back had she ever gone beyond this point and that was a long time ago when she was small. She felt her legs weakening all the while. She fought them, forcing them on. She breathed in deep, drawing what strength she could from the air, and that was when the mist filled her lungs. She coughed and had to go on coughing. Still she tried to go on.
She felt herself falling and knew she could do nothing about it. She threw her arm out to save herself and was relieved to see she was falling into the water. She would be wet, but at least she wasn’t going to hurt herself. But she hadn’t accounted for the stone just beneath the surface of the water. She never even felt the cold of the stream as it covered her face. There was an explosion of pain inside her head and a ringing in her ears that seemed as if it would never end. Then the world darkened suddenly around her. She tried to see through it, but she couldn’t. She tried to breathe, but she couldn’t.
She was dreaming of her father’s ‘creature’ sculptures. They were all in the cottage and Smiley was telling them a story and they were laughing, cackling like witches. She woke suddenly. She was sitting propped up, her back against a boulder. Mole was grazing some way off, his tail whisking. Jessie’s head throbbed and she put her hand to it. There was a lump under her fingers, and it was sticky with blood. There was more blood in her ear and on her cheek too. She was soaked to the skin. She wondered for some moments where she was and how she had got there. She remembered the climb up the Big Hill, and how she had fallen; and she realised then that she had failed yet again. Tears filled her eyes and she cried out loud, her fists clenched, her eyes closed to stop the tears.
She tasted the salt of her tears and brushed them away angrily. ‘I’ll get there, Mrs Burke,’ she shouted. ‘I’ll get there, you’ll see.’
From nowhere came a voice, a woman’s voice, but almost low enough to be a man’s. ‘Course you will, Jessie,’ it said. ‘But not if you sit there feeling all sorry for yourself.’ Jessie looked around her. There was no one there. Mole glanced at her quizzically. He had stopped chomping. For one silly moment, Jessie imagined it might have been Mole talking, but then the voice went on. ‘So you’ve a bit of a knock on your head. Are you going to let that stop you?’ Mole was browsing again, tearing at the grass. So it couldn’t be him talking. ‘I’m not the donkey, Jessie. And I’ll tell you something else for nothing, there’s no point at all in your looking for me. You’ll not find me. I’m just a voice, that’s all. Don’t go worrying about it.’
‘Who are you?’ Jessie whispered, sitting up and wiping her nose with the back of her hand.
‘Is that what they teach children these days? Can you not use a handkerchief like a proper person? Have you not got a handkerchief?’
‘Yes,’ said Jessie, still looking all around her, but frantically now.
‘Then use it, why don’t you?’ Jessie searched out her handkerchief and blew her nose. ‘That’s better now,’ the voice went on. ‘I’ve always thought that you can tell a lot about folk from the way they treat their noses. There’s pickers, there’s wipers – like you – there’s snifflers and, worst of all, there’s trumpeters. You’ll not believe this, but I once knew a queen, a real queen, I’m telling you – and she was a trumpeter. Worse still, she’d blow her nose on a handkerchief and she wouldn’t throw it away like you or me. She’d use it again, honest she would. She’d use the same handkerchief twice. Can you believe such a thing? And herself a queen! I told her straight out. I said: “There’s no surer way to catch a cold and die than to use the same handkerchief twice.” She was no one’s fool, that queen. Oh no, she listened to me. She must have, because she lived on and into a ripe old age, just like me. She died sitting up. Did you know that?’
Chuckling now, the voice seemed to be coming closer all the time. ‘That queen, she wouldn’t lie down for anyone, not even death. A lady after my own heart she was. English, mind, but she couldn’t help that now, could she? Listen, Jessie, are you just going to sit there or are you going to get up on your feet and climb the Big Hill, like you said you would?’
‘Who are you?’ Jessie asked again. She was hoping against hope that maybe she was still asleep and dreaming it all. But she was bleeding and there was real blood on her fingers, on her head. So the voice had to be real too – unless she was going mad. That thought, that she might be going mad, frightened Jessie above everything else.
‘It doesn’t matter who I am,’ said the voice, and it came from right beside her now, ‘except that this is my hill you’re walking on. I’ve been watching you these last weeks, we all have, the boys and me. They didn’t think you’d make it, but I did. I was sure of it, so sure of it that I’ve a wager on it – five gold doubloons. And, Jessie, if there’s one thing I hate losing, it’s money. And here you are, sitting there like a pudding, crying your eyes out and wiping your nose with the back of your hand. I’m ashamed of you, Jessie.’
‘I’m sorry,’ said Jessie. ‘I didn’t mean to . . .’
‘So you should be. I tell you what.’ The voice was whispering in her ear. ‘I’ll make it worth your while. I’ll leave a little something for you at the top of the hill. But if you want my little something, then you’ll have to go up there and fetch it for yourself. How about it?’
Jessie was still thinking about what she should do when she felt strong arms under her shoulders, lifting her on to her feet and then holding her for a moment until she had steadied herself on her legs. Then someone tapped her bottom. ‘On your way, girl.’ And Jessie found herself walking on, almost without meaning to, as if her legs were being worked by someone else. She looked behind her again and again to see if anyone was there. There was no one, only Mole ambling along, head lowered, ears back.
‘Did you hear her?’ Jessie whispered, as Mole came alongside. ‘She’s watching us, I know she is. Come on Mole, we’ve got to get to the top, we’ve got to.’ And she lurched on up the Big Hill, rejoining the track beyond the waterfall.
The grass under her feet was spongy here; easier walking, easier falling too, she thought. She remembered how her father had galloped her on his back along this same grassy path, and how they’d fallen over and rolled down the hill together and into the bracken. She remembered too the rockstrewn gully ahead, and wondered how she was ever going to get past it. She went down on her hands and knees. It would be painful and slow, but it was the only way. There were brambles across the path that had to be pulled away, endless lacerating rocks to be negotiated. Jessie kept crawling until her wrists couldn’t take it any more and she had to crawl on her elbows. That was when her knee slipped and her fingers wouldn’t grasp and she slid backwards. She ended up in an ungainly heap, wedged against the rocks, knees and elbows barked and bleeding, and a vicious thorn stuck in the palm of her hand. She drew it out with her teeth and spat it on to the ground.
Mole