But if Joseph heard, he wasn't listening.
'He's going to get us all killed,' Annie shouted.
Ben knew she could be right. He looked sharply towards the woods — they were close enough for him and Annie to get there safely and quickly. Maybe they should just make a run for it: if Joseph wanted to stand in the middle of a live ammo exercise, that was his lookout. But then he looked back towards the old man. He was staring at the hut, oblivious to the chaos around him. He wasn't in any kind of position to help himself. Ben took a deep breath. 'You go,' he told his cousin. 'Get to the woods. I'm going after Joseph.'
Annie stood for a moment, her gaze alternating between the woods, Ben and the old man. 'You can't manage him by yourself,' she said. 'I'm coming with you.'
Ben saw the determination on her face and didn't even bother to argue.
'But, Ben…' Annie added breathlessly.
'What?'
'As soon as we've got him to safety, we're getting out of Spadeadam, OK?'
'Too right,' Ben agreed fervently.
Together they sprinted towards the old man.
They started running just as another plane screamed overhead, unloading its ammunition onto a rough patch of ground nearby. As the bomb fell, so did Annie. She screamed as she hit the ground. 'You all right?' Ben bellowed.
'Yeah,' she replied through gritted teeth, allowing Ben to pull her back up to her feet; but he noticed that as they continued to run towards Joseph she was limping a little.
By the time they got to the hut, Joseph was standing in front of the door. Even amid the panic, Ben could see an enigmatic smile on the old man's face as he stepped forward and opened the rickety metal door.
'We can't go inside the hut, Joseph.' Ben was so out of breath that it almost hurt to speak. 'The planes are aiming for them — it's too dangerous. You've got to come with us — it'll be safer in the trees, they're not a target.'
He stepped forward to seize the old man's arm, but Joseph brushed him off with unexpected vigour, opened the door and stepped inside.
Ben looked at Annie, who glanced over her shoulder longingly at the safety of the trees. 'We can't…' she started to say, but her voice trailed off. They both realized that if they wanted to help Joseph, they would have to get him out of that hut, at least while the training exercise was going on.
'Ready?' he asked.
Annie closed her eyes. 'This was meant to be a quiet weekend bird-watching,' she muttered to herself before looking directly at her cousin. 'Ready,' she responded.
They stepped inside.
It was dark in the hut, but the open door gave them enough light to be able to see inside. It gave the impression of being a disused office, with a rickety old tin table against one wall, and a rusting filing cabinet against the other. As another plane flew overhead, Ben found himself wondering how long it had been since anyone had used this place. Many years, he decided. 'Come on, Joseph,' he heard Annie saying urgently. 'We've got to get out of here.'
Joseph was standing in the middle of the room, looking around him with a sense of wonder, as though he were taking in the glories of some royal palace. 'This is it,' he whispered to himself. 'This is it.'
Quickly, he stepped towards the filing cabinet, and before Ben or Annie could say or do anything, he pushed it sharply. The empty cabinet clattered noisily onto one side.
The ringing metal seemed to echo against the concrete walls of the hut. And as the sound settled down, Ben found himself aware of something else.
It was silent outside.
He heard Annie breathe out heavily with relief. 'Thank heavens for that,' she said. 'It sounds like they've finished.'
But Ben didn't reply, because now there was something else to attract his attention — the same thing that Joseph was staring at, his face serious and any glimmer of madness in his eyes now gone. He took his cousin gently by the arm and pointed at the area of floor where the filing cabinet had been. 'Look,' he said.
Annie looked and saw what had grabbed their attention. A square piece of wood with a small hole for a handle and hinges along the opposite side.
'A trap door,' Ben whispered, and Joseph nodded his agreement.
Chapter Nine
'What is it, Joseph?'
Ben asked the question carefully, quietly. He was afraid to shatter the sudden calm that seemed to have descended upon the old man.
Joseph turned to look at him. His face was dirty, and Ben noticed a small cut on his left cheek, which bled slightly into his wiry grey stubble. 'What did you say your name was?' he demanded hoarsely.
Ben moistened his dry, dusty lips with his tongue. 'Ben,' he replied. 'Ben Tracey. And this is my cousin, Annie. You gave us a bit of a fright out there, you know.' The bombs might have stopped, but Ben still felt as though he needed to tiptoe around him.
Joseph inclined his head. 'Frights aren't always a bad thing, young man,' he whispered.
Ben's eyes narrowed. He seemed almost like a different person now, calmer, more focused, somehow less, well, crazy.
'But you're right,' he continued. 'It was dangerous and I apologize for my behaviour. Sometimes I am not the master of my actions.' His eyes flickered back towards the trap door, and he stepped tentatively towards it. 'You are the bird-watcher, yes?'
'Sort of. It's more Annie, really…' His voice trailed off.
'There used to be a great many birds here when I was a young man. And other wildlife too. I used to walk out and watch them. When I first came here there would be huge fields of roe deer. And there were butterflies too, like you never saw. Fragile and colourful.'
Ben and Annie listened to him in edgy silence. There was something fragile about him too.
'The world of nature can be cruel, but not as cruel as the world of men,' the old man said. 'And I meant what I said, about Spadeadam. This is not a place for you to be wandering around. You should leave now.'
'He's right, Ben,' Annie piped up. 'Come on, we had an agreement. Let's get out of here.'
Ben nodded. He felt suddenly exhausted after everything that had just happened, and not in the mood to argue. 'Are you going to come with us, Joseph?' he asked.
Joseph shook his head. 'They'll come for me soon enough,' he said obscurely.
'Come for you? Who'll come for you?'
Joseph's head seemed to shake of its own accord, and for a moment Ben thought he saw a hint of the old craziness in his eyes. 'It's not important. But there are things I have to do before then. Things I have to see.'
'And this is one of them, right?'
The old man stared directly at Ben. His piercing green eyes seemed an alarming contrast to the crimson of the blood on his cheek. 'Right,' he said.
And then, as if they were no longer in the room, Joseph bent down and tried to lift up the trap door. It was heavy — too heavy for the old man — and the wooden square slipped from his hands, sending an echoing bang around the concrete walls.
Ben and Annie exchanged a long look as Joseph tried again, without success.
Ben sighed. He wanted to get out of there, but he couldn't bear to see the old man struggling. 'Here,' he said. 'I'll help you.'
Joseph turned round. 'You should leave,' he repeated, but he didn't decline the offer of help as Ben stepped forward. Together they heaved the trap door up onto its edge, then stepped back.
A musty, damp smell wafted up from the cellar below. It was the smell of darkness, disuse and age. A flight of steps, chipped and dusty, descended into the gloom — Ben could not see the bottom, nor indeed more than a couple of metres down, and he had the impression that nobody had opened up this cellar for a very, very long time.