It was a cold day in early January. The sky had threatened snow since the first grey light of morning, but so far only a few, dismal flakes had drifted down, powdering the crazy-paving in the garden and then hardening into crusty ice. The birds sat silently on the bare branches of the apple tree, looking chilly and miserable. Occasionally, one of them would fly down and peck vainly at the frozen soil, then, giving it up as a bad job, flutter up into the apple tree again. The iron sky frowned, and the day was long and heavy.
"I wish it would snow," muttered Graham, half to himself.
Mrs. Bedford, his mother, stood at the sink, peeling potatoes and looking out into the garden.
"Heaven preserve us if it does. Your father will get his twinges again and then where'll we be? We're supposed to be going to your Auntie Stella's on Sunday."
"Oh no."
"Oh yes. What are you pulling faces for now? I thought you liked going to Auntie Stella's. You hardly ever see them."
"It's Mandy."
"What's wrong with Mandy? She's growing into a proper young lady."
"Yeah. She's a snob. All she ever talks about is riding school and the boys she met at the tennis club."
"Oh really, Graham -"
"Anyway, I'm fed up. I wish I was back at school. Oh –no I don't. We'd be doing physics now – Hey! It's beginning to snow."
"Oh my goodness. Your father'll go mad. Here, take the peelings up to the top of the garden will you dear? Hurry up, before it comes on heavy."
"Yes Mum."
"– put your shoes on. You'll get your slippers wet."
"Yes Mum."
"And put your anorak on too."
"I'm only going -"
"– you heard me."
"Yes Mum."
Graham slipped on his old anorak and took the dripping colander from his mother.
"Don't dawdle up there - there's half a blizzard coming up." Graham slammed the kitchen door behind him.
"– and don't slam the door! Really – that boy –"
She dried her hands and went into the front room.
The path was slippery and Graham half ran, half slid his way up the garden. His breath hung in misty clouds at his lips. He ducked under the low branches of the apple tree, and as he did, his anorak became caught in the brambles.
For some reason, nobody had bothered to touch the bramble patch this year, and it had already begun to take over the strawberry bed and the lettuce frames. Not that Graham minded. He had always disliked gardens in which the plants were all in neat rows and the grass was cut just to the right height to see the plastic dwarves. The tangled mass of brambles at the top of the garden made the place look a little more exciting. Indeed, there was something about the twisted thicket against the dark sky that was a little frightening. But today it was just annoying.
Graham yelled as he scratched the back of his hand on the thorns trying to free his anorak. The colander tipped and the peelings were scattered all over the path.
"Damn!"
He pulled at his anorak in a sudden fit of anger and it tore. "Oh blimey, now I've done it."
Freed, he examined the damage to his hand and his anorak, neither of which was irreparable, and bent down to pick up the spilt peelings.
Suddenly, something moved behind him. At first he thought it was a cat, or even a bird, in the brambles, but from the way the entire mesh of brambles was shaking, it seemed to a bigger animal than that. He stopped gathering up the peelings, and stood up, watching.
The sky had darkened. The snow was falling more heavily than ever.
Curious, and not a little unnerved, by the horrid stillness that had fallen, Graham scanned the bramble-patch, not moving a muscle in case he frightened whatever it was away. Nothing. The patch was absolutely still.
Wait! There, in the thickest, darkest part of the patch his eyes met the gaze of another two eyes, large and shining. Graham drew a quick breath with surprise. He knew the eyes were human. They looked back at him with intelligence and not a little enmity.
His first thought was to turn and run for it - but suppose he got caught in the brambles again and whoever it was jumped from their hiding place and caught him? On the other hand, he could hardly stand there and gaze like an idiot at the mysterious eyes until one of them froze to death, so he said, in a very low and hoarse voice:
"Who – are – you?"
No answer. Maybe he can't speak, Graham thought. The figure moved a little in the shadows, and Graham discerned the hunched shape of a thin little man.
"What are you doing in our bramble patch?" The eyes stared back, unblinking.
"Are you hurt?"
Graham made to approach the man, but suddenly the expression in the large eyes changed and a wiry brown arm shot out from the brambles, seemingly unharmed by the thorns, and dragged a fistful aside. A head emerged, with a long and wizened face, brown and seamed like bark, with a small, scrawny beard. He had rings in his slightly over-large ears.
Graham stepped back, and the man darted from the bramble patch and started to scramble over the fence at the bottom of the garden. As he ran, he dropped something which fell amongst the strawberry plants. Graham picked it up. It was a candle, a white candle.
"Hey wait! You've dropped –"
The little man turned, poised with expert, almost cat-like balance on the top of the fence. His eyes were wide with fear and confusion. Graham proffered the candle.
"Here – take it."
The man looked at him, and then, slowly and warily, climbed down the fence and started towards Graham. Suddenly, muted by the ever-thickening snow, there came a strange and unearthly sound. It might have been a man blowing on a horn; it might have been an animal bellowing. The sound made Graham shudder, but the little man, having been momentarily transfixed by terror, gave one last look at Graham and the candle and then turned and disappeared over the fence. Graham ran after him and put his foot through one of the lettuce frames. The glass shattered and cut his ankle. Yelling with pain and anger, he managed to hop to the fence, and, sticking his head over it, looked to see where the man had gone.
By now the snow was thick and he couldn't see farther than a few yards. There was a school playing field at the bottom of the garden, but it was almost completely obliterated by the swirling snow. The man had gone.
Then Graham heard the bellowing again and for just the briefest of moments the snow made the shapes of two horsemen, galloping off across the field, to be lost into the wall of white. His bleeding ankle stung him back to this world, and gritting his teeth, he hopped and limped his way back to the kitchen door. As he turned the door-knob he remembered the candle, which he still clutched in his hand. For some reason he did not want his mother to see it, so hastily stuffing it into his anorak pocket he opened the door, and fell inside with a yell that brought his mother running.
"You'll survive," his mother said unsympathetically, when the ritual of washing and bandaging the cut was completed. "But I shouldn't be surprised if your father doesn't make you pay for the glass."
"It wasn't my fault, it's those brambles. You can't get to the compost heap without tip-toeing through the vegetable patch. They're everywhere."
"Well nobody else manages to put their foot through the lettuce frames. You are clumsy, you know."
"Yes, Mum."