Read Online The Dead Path by Stephen M. Irwin - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Stephen M. Irwin
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with the other; then, hearing Nicholas, he looked down and smiled—half of his face bright with yellow light through the dusty window, half as dark as the cobwebbed shadows in the garage’s far corners—and slid the bottle away into the bench drawer. No, the garage was not a place for games.
This Sunday morning, Nicholas had come over straight from church (the Boyes didn’t go to church—further evidence of their grand good fortune). Suzette had changed into shorts and T-shirt to tend her little garden patch. She’d found an old book somewhere that had belonged to their dad, and had become excited about planting tiny seeds and urging them up into curling green things. After a spat over TV channels, Nicholas had once threatened to dig up Suze’s garden and she’d gone totally spack, hitting him and screaming that he’d better not dare! The one male in a house with two females, he’d been wise enough not to. As Suzette screwed on her sunhat, Nicholas had pulled on his gym boots, kissed his mother’s cheek, and jumped the back fence.
He and Tristram had eased into the day’s play with a hunt through the Boyes’ games cupboard. While Nicholas and Suzette had an incomplete chess set and a deck of cards, the Boyes had an Aladdin’s cave of entertainment: Bermuda Triangle, Payday, Microdot (complete with cool plastic Lugers, stiletto knives, and wirecutters), Mastermind, Grand Mastermind, Squatter, The Game of Life, Mouse Trap, Clue, Chinese Checkers, Monopoly (British and American versions), several decks of cards, and a roulette wheel that Tristram said came from a P&O steamer. But this was too bright a day for the lethargy of board games. The sunlight had a tart sting, the jacarandas were dropping sweet blizzards of lavender flowers, nasturtiums blazed between roses … no, today called for violence. So they set up the killer jumps for their Hot Wheels cars.
“We’re going to Fraser at Christmas,” said Tristram, slotting an orange plastic tongue into the end of a section of track. The boys had appropriated the whole front veranda and had nearly finished the two ramps, each facing the other. At the farthest ends were kitchen chairs for height. The tracks swooped down to the floorboards, ran two meters, then swept up ramp stays of phone books and atlases. If they timed their releases right, two cars should collide spectacularly in midair.
“Oh?”
“You don’t know where Fraser Island is, do you?”
Nicholas shrugged. “Up your fat arse?”
Tristram chuckled. The boys had just discovered the joy of insults, and Nicholas was the acknowledged master. Not knowing what or where Fraser was didn’t upset him, but news of the Boyes’ trip did: if Tristram went away, the Christmas break would be really boring.
Tristram pulled out his ace. “Dad’s going to hire a Land Rover.”
“A Land Rover? Really?” Nicholas couldn’t disguise his excitement. Land Rovers were what the SAS sped to battle in. They had aluminium bodies and wouldn’t rust. “Wow. Will your dad let you drive it?”
Tristram shook his head and grinned. That was one thing Nicholas liked about him: he might be rich, but he was honest. “I reckon he’ll let Gavin drive it, though. He’s thirteen now. Dad learned to drive on Pop’s tractor when he was thirteen, so …” His ramp finished, Tristram squatted back on his heels and looked at Nicholas. “What were you going to tell me?”
“About what?”
Tristram came to Nicholas’s ramp to help him finish.
“You said you found something on the way home from school on Wednesday, then you went all funny and shut up.”
Nicholas felt some warmth go out of the morning. The dead bird outside the woods. The bird with no head … well, with a strange head made of woven sticks and its own scrawny legs. He had wanted to tell Tristram about it on the way home from school Thursday and Friday, but Suzette had been with them and he didn’t want to freak her out with gory talk about
This Sunday morning, Nicholas had come over straight from church (the Boyes didn’t go to church—further evidence of their grand good fortune). Suzette had changed into shorts and T-shirt to tend her little garden patch. She’d found an old book somewhere that had belonged to their dad, and had become excited about planting tiny seeds and urging them up into curling green things. After a spat over TV channels, Nicholas had once threatened to dig up Suze’s garden and she’d gone totally spack, hitting him and screaming that he’d better not dare! The one male in a house with two females, he’d been wise enough not to. As Suzette screwed on her sunhat, Nicholas had pulled on his gym boots, kissed his mother’s cheek, and jumped the back fence.
He and Tristram had eased into the day’s play with a hunt through the Boyes’ games cupboard. While Nicholas and Suzette had an incomplete chess set and a deck of cards, the Boyes had an Aladdin’s cave of entertainment: Bermuda Triangle, Payday, Microdot (complete with cool plastic Lugers, stiletto knives, and wirecutters), Mastermind, Grand Mastermind, Squatter, The Game of Life, Mouse Trap, Clue, Chinese Checkers, Monopoly (British and American versions), several decks of cards, and a roulette wheel that Tristram said came from a P&O steamer. But this was too bright a day for the lethargy of board games. The sunlight had a tart sting, the jacarandas were dropping sweet blizzards of lavender flowers, nasturtiums blazed between roses … no, today called for violence. So they set up the killer jumps for their Hot Wheels cars.
“We’re going to Fraser at Christmas,” said Tristram, slotting an orange plastic tongue into the end of a section of track. The boys had appropriated the whole front veranda and had nearly finished the two ramps, each facing the other. At the farthest ends were kitchen chairs for height. The tracks swooped down to the floorboards, ran two meters, then swept up ramp stays of phone books and atlases. If they timed their releases right, two cars should collide spectacularly in midair.
“Oh?”
“You don’t know where Fraser Island is, do you?”
Nicholas shrugged. “Up your fat arse?”
Tristram chuckled. The boys had just discovered the joy of insults, and Nicholas was the acknowledged master. Not knowing what or where Fraser was didn’t upset him, but news of the Boyes’ trip did: if Tristram went away, the Christmas break would be really boring.
Tristram pulled out his ace. “Dad’s going to hire a Land Rover.”
“A Land Rover? Really?” Nicholas couldn’t disguise his excitement. Land Rovers were what the SAS sped to battle in. They had aluminium bodies and wouldn’t rust. “Wow. Will your dad let you drive it?”
Tristram shook his head and grinned. That was one thing Nicholas liked about him: he might be rich, but he was honest. “I reckon he’ll let Gavin drive it, though. He’s thirteen now. Dad learned to drive on Pop’s tractor when he was thirteen, so …” His ramp finished, Tristram squatted back on his heels and looked at Nicholas. “What were you going to tell me?”
“About what?”
Tristram came to Nicholas’s ramp to help him finish.
“You said you found something on the way home from school on Wednesday, then you went all funny and shut up.”
Nicholas felt some warmth go out of the morning. The dead bird outside the woods. The bird with no head … well, with a strange head made of woven sticks and its own scrawny legs. He had wanted to tell Tristram about it on the way home from school Thursday and Friday, but Suzette had been with them and he didn’t want to freak her out with gory talk about
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