“It’s alright, Mary. I understand; really, I do. I bet your mum felt like she was just trying to tell people actual things; trying to tell them what she was truly seeing and hearing, but they always insisted on telling her different and explaining it away for her; you know what I mean. Just like they do at school with us kids, especially certain subjects like the Arts and Religions. She probably didn’t have anyone she could talk to about it,” he finished morosely.
“Yes, exactly,” Mary said, seeming a bit better now at being understood. “Me Mum always said that what she was seein’ was the future – or a future anyway; one that really upset her.” Mary became silent then.
But before Roger could say anything else, she quietly added, “She said she could see the end of the world, Roger. Everything was on fire, and everything was dead or dying. It was really terrible, and it really upset her a lot.”
“What about your Gran, though? Wasn’t your mum able to talk to her about it at all? Surely, she’d be the sort of person to at least listen and try and understand,” Roger asked.
“Yes, she would have, ‘cept me Gran wasn’t around then, she was up North living in the Forest of the Mad Jester, an’ when she did visit us it was too late; the Psychonomy already had their claws in ‘er by then.”
“Oh, I see,” was all the Roger could say to that. It was becoming obvious that Mary’s Family background was a strange and rather sad one.
Roger was intrigued though as to further details on what Mary’s mum had actually seen, but he felt right now wasn’t a good time to ask, so he said nothing further.
Roger had turned out to be a good listener. And he realized he was genuinely interested in hearing about someone else’s life and experiences and what things were like for them, well, for someone like Mary Maddam, anyway. Even though a lot of the details were different; there was a lot he could empathize with. He too knew how it felt to feel lost and all alone, confused and not understood by anyone. So, when Mary had finished, he felt more able to tell her a bit about his own home life too.
He didn’t want to say much about how he really felt about some things though, such as his feelings about his own Mother and Father especially; (he never called them Mum and Dad), as sharing anything about his private life was such a new and unnerving experience for him. But he told her enough that she understood the sort of life he’d had to put up with, despite all the apparent rich trappings, privileges and big house and everything.
Mary realized Roger was a lot shyer and more introverted than she was, but he was also a very kind-hearted and intelligent person, as well as being a naturally curious one. Though his curiosity took a more scientific bent than her own nature-loving and artistic one.
Where they lay was very warm and very peaceful; and, as yet, nothing at all had given them any reason to believe that here, in the so-called ‘Bad Wood,’ they had entered upon some wicked realm of dastardly evil and wicked ill-fortune, like the Psychonomists went on and on about in their weekly School lesson on Basic Psychonomy for the well-child.
The two new friends lay together, side by side in silence for a while, but then Mary awoke and began nervously chewing on a stalk of grass and growing increasingly restless. Then she sat upright, suddenly fully alert and grabbed Roger’s arm. In a hushed voice she whispered urgently in his ear.
“Can you hear that noise, Roger? I think there’s something moving about over there, along the riverbank, down by those reed beds?”
Roger listened intently but at first could hear nothing and started to say so, but then froze; he’d heard a definite rustling noise from the reeds Mary had indicated, down by the edge of the river, and not that far away from them.
Meanwhile Mary had regained her calm and composure and was once again alive and alert to all the background sounds of the surrounding wood and the nearby riverbank.
“Quickly, Roj, roll over under these bushes here; whoever it is won’t see us in these.”
Roger quickly did so, following Mary’s urgent lead.
The rustling noises seemed to be getting closer and closer and moving alongside the reed-lined riverbank right in front of them.
Roger was now quite certain that there was indeed something, in fact some things, coming along the riverbank, he couldn’t quite make out. Whatever they were or were doing there, they were being noisy about it and were getting steadily nearer.
Roger and Mary kept as low as they could, hugging themselves to the ground, furtively peering through the bush concealing them from the noisy intruders.
“Oh, my Doddering Diogenes!” whispered Roger to himself, “What on Erf can they be? Look what happens. We’ve been in this Bad Wood for less than an hour or so, and already we’re under attack from some invisible monsters!”
“I think there’s definitely more than one of ’em fer sure, whatever ‘it’ or ‘they’ is,” Mary answered, peering along the riverbank, and into the reeds, as penetratingly as she could.
But she still couldn’t see a thing; but could definitely hear them. And so could Roger.
“Yes, you’re right!” whispered Roger. “I can hear them clearly now; it sounds like there’s a lot of them too; sounds like they’re eating up the reeds on the bankside or something!”
Roger could see that the reed banks were indeed being shaken and broken in the wake of whatever these creatures were.
“O.K. Let’s keep our nerve, Roj. Whoever or whatever, let’s pray they just pass us by, eh,” Mary told him, trembling slightly, as she lay hidden beside him, fingers crossed.
“Look, look, that bush over there, it seems to be shaking,” Roger cried out softly in alarm. “Oh, my P-p-potty Pythagoras, it couldn’t be carnivorous crocodiles, c-c-could it, Mary? Or even w-w-wild wolves? They may have come down to the river for a drink?”
“Now, don’t be silly, Roger, you don’t get any ol’ crocodiles here in Inglande, you knows that!” But then very quietly and half to herself, added, “Well, at least, I thinks you don’t; but this is the Bad Wood after all, ain’t it? Who on Erf knows what sorts of bloodthirsty creatures are lurking around here, just waiting to pounce on a person, unexpected an’ out of the blue?”
“Yes, indeed, who knows?” whispered Roger, gulping again, in barely contained panic.
CHAPTER 4:
THE BAD WOOD BEGINS
“Could it be Josh the Cosh and his gang again, do you think?” Roger whispered, staring intently at the area where the sounds were coming from. “Could they have crossed up-stream and then crept up on us, on this side of the river, while we’ve been lying here recovering?”
But then, before Mary could answer, there was a huge splash from the nearby riverbank.
The noisy intruder now showed itself at last. But it was not at all what Roger or Mary had expected. It was a large, brown, furry animal with big, dark eyes and long, white whiskers. And it definitely wasn’t Josh the Cosh, it was in fact … a Giant Otter!
And it wasn’t alone, there was a whole family of giant Otters; the large mother and father and then three smaller baby Otters, or ‘pups’, as they’re properly called. They were noisily making their way along the side of the bank, within the reeds; keeping to the Bad Wood side and threading their sinewy bodies in and out of the tangles of tree roots and through the forest of reeds and mats of wet undergrowth. The two adults were busy, desperately trying to keep their three playful pups in some order.