Read Online The Bone Tiki by David Hair - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: David Hair
Tags: Fiction
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line, where the beach was darkest.
For half an hour he felt bursting with energy, striding along the shore, almost feverish with his need to get away from the lights behind him. But around eleven the energy left him, and he felt the weight of tiredness, like a massive blanket on his shoulders. He began to stagger, and his eyelids began to drag him down. He left the dark houses behind, and walked the empty beach between Westshore and Bay View. Occasional cars roared unseen on his left, beyond the embankments, on the highway. He wondered if any contained Puarata and his accomplices. Or Dad. To hisright, the sea churned sullenly. Once a gull swooped above, as though it couldn’t sleep either, then disappeared out over the waves. The tiredness got worse, until he began to feel dizzy. Each step seemed to take more effort than the last. It was as though all that he’d seen and done was bleeding him of energy.
He remembered dimly that somewhere above him, on the embankment that protected the low-lying inland from the sea, and bore the railway north, there was an old gun emplacement—a rough and dirty concrete thing half-buried in the gravel. It had been made for the Second World War, when the threat of Japanese invasion had seemed real, and there’d been rumours of Japanese submarines in the waters of Hawke Bay. He’d looked at it once—its walls were covered in graffiti, and it stank of urine and rot. Maybe he could sleep inside? Just for a while…
He turned away from the shore, and began to clamber up toward the embankment. The gravel scrunched, loud in the darkness and silence. He looked up and froze. Nearly yelped in terror. There was a massive man-shape there, still as stone, with one red eye glowing from the middle of his head. He gasped and tried to back away, when the shape spoke.
‘Ullo? Someone there?’ A match flared, and Mat found himself staring at a stubbly, rough face, with a kindly smile. The red eye shrank to nothing more than a cigarette. He was a soldier, but not a modern soldier. He wore a khaki greatcoat and lemon-squeezer hat, and an old rifle over his shoulder. Mat stumbled backward, his brain refusing to take all this in, tripped, and fell backward.
‘Hey, Mike,’ he heard the soldier call. ‘There’s a lad out here.’
The soldier’s boot crunched closer, and he bent over Mat, who had no energy left to run. He held the lit match over Mat’s face. It lent the soldier’s face a ruddy glow.
‘Hey, lad, you OK?’ Another soldier appeared beside him, thinner, with a small moustache. He was also wearing an out-of-date uniform. Maybe they belonged to some military re-enactment society, Mat thought dazedly.
‘He looks dead-beat, Wally,’ the new man commented.
Mat felt a sense of panic as they both bent over, but as they touched him, he felt a strange welling of sound rise from the waves behind him. Entwined in the sound of the waves was a girl’s voice, singing, something like a lullaby. A wash of dizzying lassitude made his head spin. He barely felt the two soldiers as they carried him into the warm, and wrapped him in blankets that smelt of camphor and grease. He hardly tasted the steaming cocoa they poured down his throat, or heard the rough but soothing words. Instead he felt as if he was in a tumble-dryer, slowly spinning into a soothing cradle of comforting, all-embracing sleep.
A calloused hand tucked a tin water-bottle into the crook of his arm.
‘That’s for tomorrow, laddie. You have a nice wee kip, now,’ he heard Wally say, and then everything floated away.
6
Kelly
T he first thing that came back was taste. His mouth felt dry and sour, as if he hadn’t brushed his teeth for days. Maybe he hadn’t. Then came smell. Sea air, and wet concrete. He opened his eyes to a bright glare. His body ached everywhere. He was wrapped in his coat, propped against the side of one of the gun emplacements, in the approach path to the airport. A gull landed beside him and shrieked in
For half an hour he felt bursting with energy, striding along the shore, almost feverish with his need to get away from the lights behind him. But around eleven the energy left him, and he felt the weight of tiredness, like a massive blanket on his shoulders. He began to stagger, and his eyelids began to drag him down. He left the dark houses behind, and walked the empty beach between Westshore and Bay View. Occasional cars roared unseen on his left, beyond the embankments, on the highway. He wondered if any contained Puarata and his accomplices. Or Dad. To hisright, the sea churned sullenly. Once a gull swooped above, as though it couldn’t sleep either, then disappeared out over the waves. The tiredness got worse, until he began to feel dizzy. Each step seemed to take more effort than the last. It was as though all that he’d seen and done was bleeding him of energy.
He remembered dimly that somewhere above him, on the embankment that protected the low-lying inland from the sea, and bore the railway north, there was an old gun emplacement—a rough and dirty concrete thing half-buried in the gravel. It had been made for the Second World War, when the threat of Japanese invasion had seemed real, and there’d been rumours of Japanese submarines in the waters of Hawke Bay. He’d looked at it once—its walls were covered in graffiti, and it stank of urine and rot. Maybe he could sleep inside? Just for a while…
He turned away from the shore, and began to clamber up toward the embankment. The gravel scrunched, loud in the darkness and silence. He looked up and froze. Nearly yelped in terror. There was a massive man-shape there, still as stone, with one red eye glowing from the middle of his head. He gasped and tried to back away, when the shape spoke.
‘Ullo? Someone there?’ A match flared, and Mat found himself staring at a stubbly, rough face, with a kindly smile. The red eye shrank to nothing more than a cigarette. He was a soldier, but not a modern soldier. He wore a khaki greatcoat and lemon-squeezer hat, and an old rifle over his shoulder. Mat stumbled backward, his brain refusing to take all this in, tripped, and fell backward.
‘Hey, Mike,’ he heard the soldier call. ‘There’s a lad out here.’
The soldier’s boot crunched closer, and he bent over Mat, who had no energy left to run. He held the lit match over Mat’s face. It lent the soldier’s face a ruddy glow.
‘Hey, lad, you OK?’ Another soldier appeared beside him, thinner, with a small moustache. He was also wearing an out-of-date uniform. Maybe they belonged to some military re-enactment society, Mat thought dazedly.
‘He looks dead-beat, Wally,’ the new man commented.
Mat felt a sense of panic as they both bent over, but as they touched him, he felt a strange welling of sound rise from the waves behind him. Entwined in the sound of the waves was a girl’s voice, singing, something like a lullaby. A wash of dizzying lassitude made his head spin. He barely felt the two soldiers as they carried him into the warm, and wrapped him in blankets that smelt of camphor and grease. He hardly tasted the steaming cocoa they poured down his throat, or heard the rough but soothing words. Instead he felt as if he was in a tumble-dryer, slowly spinning into a soothing cradle of comforting, all-embracing sleep.
A calloused hand tucked a tin water-bottle into the crook of his arm.
‘That’s for tomorrow, laddie. You have a nice wee kip, now,’ he heard Wally say, and then everything floated away.
6
Kelly
T he first thing that came back was taste. His mouth felt dry and sour, as if he hadn’t brushed his teeth for days. Maybe he hadn’t. Then came smell. Sea air, and wet concrete. He opened his eyes to a bright glare. His body ached everywhere. He was wrapped in his coat, propped against the side of one of the gun emplacements, in the approach path to the airport. A gull landed beside him and shrieked in
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