24

Clive instinctively turned towards the side of the building, heading in a lumbering run for the dirt track.

“No!” called Silas, who once more seemed to have assumed the role of leader. “Not that way. They’ll get us on the road. We need to go cross-country. Come on, this way.”

Without waiting for a reply, he started off at a run through the long grass to the side of the rear outbuildings. Mel and Clive followed, stumbling over the uneven ground, lit only by the fine gold slither of a new moon. The undergrowth was wet, instantly soaking into their trousers so that the material clung to their calves. Silas, with a glance over his shoulder to ensure the others were following, ran ahead with an unpredicted turn of speed and agility that left the others straining to keep him in sight.

“We’ll head for those trees over there,” commanded Silas, pausing briefly to allow them to catch up.

The row of trees outlined against the night skyline, under the force of the wind, bowed like ghostly gesturing arms summoning them forwards. Beneath the slender trunks dense vegetation, several feet high, offered the sanctuary of a hedge. Once beneath its cover, they would be able to get their breath back and plan their next move. The distance however, was deceptively greater than it looked as Mel and Clive, running with clumsy high steps to overcome the rough stubbles of grass, struggled to negotiate the uneven ground in the darkness. Adrenaline fuelled their desperate race to get as far away as possible from the old priory, its dark and silent structure looming behind them like a menacing fortress against the night sky.

Cramp gripped Mel’s calf muscles, suddenly resisting the demand for extreme exertion and her lungs screamed for air. With mouth open, she gasped with a rapidity that dried her mouth and ached in her throat. She could hear Clive’s lumbering, heavy footed stride behind her, his excess weight an encumbrance that slowed him down and she was aware of him falling farther and farther behind.

“Silas, wait,” she called into the wind. “Wait!” The row of alder trees looked hardly any nearer. She slowed, giving Clive time to catch up. As she turned to look back over her shoulder, her heart shot into orbit. Behind the doctor, dark shadows bearing torches, ran from the small rear doorway of the priory. The dancing lights scattering like a fan as they evacuated the building in pursuit of the escapees.

“Get down!” Mel grabbed Clive’s arm and pulled him roughly to the ground. Cold wet grass cushioned their fall as they lay face down on the coarse tangled undergrowth. It was too late to warn Silas and they could only hope that he was too far ahead to be picked up by the scanning torch beams. Paralysed with fear, Mel listened helplessly to the loud banging of her heart and the rapid heavy breathing of her companion, who tried desperately to stifle the sounds by burying his face into the tufted mounds. Moments passed, as they listened to the voices, running footsteps and the roar of an engine as the big van and a car sped out of one of the outhouses and careered away round the end of the building, apparently heading for the dirt track that led to the road. Silas had been right; they wouldn’t have got very far that way. But could they find their way to safety across the bleak wet fields at night?

Daring to lift her head, Mel watched as three torch lights explored the derelict outhouses and broken stone walls. The jerky and erratic flight of a pipistrelle bat, in a frantic explosion of energy as it gathered flying insects on the wing, made the night sky come alive. As the torch lights at least temporarily disappeared from view, Mel pulled again at Clive’s sleeve.

“Come on,” she whispered. Fear urged them forwards and they crouched as they stumbled on, praying that they too might now be beyond the range of the torch beams. Unable to resist a backward glance, the rutted ground snared Mel’s foot, catching her unawares and tipping her forwards into a head-long dive. She hit the ground with an unceremonious slap, knocking the breath out of her and causing her to utter an involuntary grunt from the force. Momentarily stunned, she lay still.

“Get up, quickly,” the deeper voice of Silas growled softly. “Come on, we must get beyond those trees before they start searching over here.”

Scrambling to her feet and wincing slightly at the ache that now racked her right ankle, she followed Silas who once more set off at a sprint. The going was hard. Twice more Mel jarred her ankle on the undulating ground, but fear spurred her on as they gradually gained on the line of skeleton trees which, clad in green algae on the trunks, now shimmered in the moonlight and gave a mystical unreality to the scene. Clumsily the uncoordinated trio blundered on. The widening distance between the three made it difficult to follow in each other’s footsteps so that with eyes only focussed upon the irregular terrain, each managed the trek in their own way. The pace began to slow to a more manageable rate as the distance covered allowed them a growing confidence. It was short-lived.

A shriek of horror, followed by a loud splash, momentarily stopped Mel and Clive in their tracks. Ahead of them, Silas was in trouble. Frantic splashing forewarned the pair that he had fallen into deep water and they rushed forwards in the darkness towards his cries for help.

“Mind the edge,” yelled Mel as the long grasses gave way to the deep abyss, hidden from view by the density of its camouflage. Silas’s momentum had propelled him forwards, plunging him headlong into its depths. What had appeared from a distance to be a thick hedgerow beneath the row of trees, revealed itself now to be a dyke of some ten feet in width with a profusion of reeds, tall and thick, disguising its steep banks. Shocked and spitting the freezing dirty water from his mouth, Silas thrashed wildly, grasping at the tough reed stems. Eager hands now reached out to grab at the sodden pullover, puffed out like a balloon and gathering a coat of slime from the stagnant water. As they hauled him back up onto firm ground, the trio collapsed to their knees, exhausted, wet and muddy. Silas shook uncontrollably, water pouring from his clothing. His breath came in gasps and he continued to repeatedly spit the foul water from his mouth.

For a few moments no-one spoke as they each came to terms with the latest frustration of their situation. Every painful step, as they had fled for safety with growing optimism as the distance increased, had merely led them towards this insurmountable barrier. The darkness, which had so far concealed their escape, would soon inevitably give way to a cold grey dawn. It could only be a matter of time before their captors, realising that they had not headed for the road, would turn their attention to the acres of flat marsh land which surrounded the great house.

“What the hell are we going to do now?” hissed Clive bitterly. “We’ll never get across that river, it’s too deep.”

“They’re dykes, Clive,” said Mel. “If we’re in the area of the Broads, they’re like a grid, bordering most of the fields. That’s why the farms are so big and don’t need fences. The animals can’t stray anyway.”

Looking back towards the silhouetted contours of the big house, the distant flickering of torches could just be seen, dancing erratically in an ever widening circle.

“But even farmers have got to get from one field to another. We must go on.” Clive tried to rally his colleagues. “There might be a bridge or a narrowing that we can cross. Come on, we can’t give up now and wait here to be found.” Clive set off slowly to his right, following the edge of the dyke. Cautiously he tapped his foot on the ground, every two or three strides, to establish its solidity. Clouds scudding across the sky repeatedly obscured the thin pale light of the moon. There was no discernable path. Tall grasses merged with the reeds, making the formation of the bank ill-defined with ridges and slopes ready to entrap a misplaced foot.

Tugging at Silas’s soaked sleeve, Mel helped him to his feet and maintaining a grip on his arm, pulled him along behind her. Yard by yard they worked their way along the bank following in the footsteps of Clive, whose crouched dark shadow against the skyline resembled a slow-moving sloth. The wind bit into their flimsy clothing. Like an obedient child, Silas allowed himself to be led, the wet and cold racking his body with a ferocity that reduced him to numbed submission. Progress was slow; too slow. But it was impossible to walk faster in the darkness. After what seemed an interminable time, but was probably only about ten minutes, Clive stopped, halting the little convoy in a neat row behind him.

“We can’t go any further,” he called over his shoulder. “There’s another dyke crossing this one. We seem to be at the corner of the field and there’s still no sign of a bridge.”

“What’s that black shape on the other side?” Mel looked beyond him. “Is it a barn or something?”

Clive studied the distant outline. “I think it’s that church down the track from the house.”

“So we’ve almost gone round in a bloody circle!” Silas castigated through clenched teeth. Dropping to his knees as he let out a despairing grunt. “I can’t go on like this, I’m freezing and wet through.”

“Clive, we’ve got to get him somewhere to dry out. He’ll die out here. It’s just beginning to get light and we need somewhere out of the wind where we can rest. We can’t stay here,” she pleaded.

“Just keep going,” Silas growled from behind her. He struggled once more to his feet.

Obediently they pressed on, slowly and carefully, fearfully aware that they were no longer increasing the distance from the house, but manoeuvring parallel to it and its ruthless occupants. Twenty yards on, a rotted wooden post signalled the breakthrough they needed. A plank, set low into the muddy bank, crossed the dyke just inches above the carpet of algae that concealed its watery depths. Mel held Clive’s hand for support while he tentatively prodded at the insubstantial bridge with his foot. It held fast. Testing it with his whole weight, he released Mel’s hand and edged sideways across the void to the far bank.

“Go on, you go next,” Mel instructed Silas.

“Well I can’t get any wetter if I fall in,” he grumbled as he stepped past her and reached down to the edge of the plank. She watched him balance across the narrow beam and without a backward glance, followed him across as soon as he had climbed the far bank.

A hundred yards separated them from the derelict round towered church. An equally neglected and overgrown churchyard surrounded the medieval monument. Names and dates of forgotten generations were no longer decipherable on its few remaining headstones, which leaned at obscure and precarious angles. The lack of any pathway made progress through the long grass and tangled gorse slow and difficult. Absorbed as they were in high-stepping the tangled undergrowth, Mel and Silas almost collided with Clive’s back when he stopped abruptly before the fragmented remains of the perimeter stone wall of the churchyard. The eerie ‘churring’ of nightjars, hunting for moths low over the heather had become silent.

“Get down,” he breathed, and threw himself prone beside a small section of knee-high stones. Without hesitation the others followed suit. Voices. The lights of two torches emerged round the end of the church and scanned the churchyard in erratic sweeps as the men explored the shadows and fissures likely to hide their absconders. Barely daring to breathe, the three lay flattened beneath the broken wall. Oblivious now to the cold and wet clothing, they strained to listen for approaching footsteps, fearing the sudden glare of a torch beam exposing their fragile shield. They had almost stumbled straight into the clutches of their captors.

Minutes passed. Mel, unable to contain her curiosity, tentatively raised her head. Slowly she peered above the wall, prepared to recoil in an instant. A tall athletic figure was following the outer walls of the church, examining each of the buttresses of the flint church. His companion, a thick-set figure whom she suspected was Hood, remained by the far corner of the rectangular nave, waving his torch randomly into the darkness, but its beam fell far short of the escapees.

“Come on, they didn’t come this way. They’ll have made for the road across the fields. Let’s get back,” Hood called impatiently to the younger man. “If they’re not inside the church, they’re hardly likely to be out here,” he rationalised.

“Alright.”

There was something in the way the second man had answered that alarmed Mel. He had only said the one word, but inexplicably she felt uneasy. In the darkness, it was not possible to get a good look at him and she did not wish to expose their whereabouts by risking being caught in the flashlight of their torches, but there was definitely something familiar about him. It sounded very much like the German accent of Kurt. But surely he is dead!