Lonie45

Audrey sat in the car waiting for Lonie. The Botanic Gardens had heated greenhouses. She preferred her own little box, with the engine running, hot air blowing out and making her drowsy. She flipped between the company of Radio Clyde, with its annoying adverts and Radio 1 with the more annoying Tony Blackburn and tried not to think about public toilets, because there really should be a public toilet in The Botanic Gardens. She shifted in her seat. Maybe there was, but if she did think about toilets she’d really need to wee. The windscreen wipers splish-splashed their own beat. All she could see were trees and bushes which, if she was a man, would be one big communal toilet waiting to be used at any time.

Lonie tapped on her windscreen. Audrey was almost glad to see him. His collar was up and he looked warm enough. She turned the engine off and wound down the window. ‘Where should we search first?’

Lonie scratched at his chin. She’d parked in almost the same place as yesterday. He figured Father Campbell was the kinda guy that wouldn’t want to hang himself in plain view of passers-by. He scanned the foliage looking for treetops and some out of the way place, at the back of the green houses and off the beaten path. He pushed his fists into his coat pockets and felt the contours of the Diane camera and, in his other pocket, the leather belt. He heard the driver’s side door opening and took in another view. Audrey’s long legs got out of the car first. She was dressed as if on safari and was packaged in her long green dress, with matching bag, and smelt as fresh as a lime Opal fruit.

‘If you want to wait here, out of the rain, Ah’ll go and have a look over there’ Lonie vaguely pointed in the general direction of some trees that were visible.

‘No. I’ll come with you.’ Audrey smiled, flashing her canines, enjoying her day away from the office.

Lonie yawned and pointed down at her shoes. ‘You’ll get your feet wet!’

‘No, I’ve got a pair of wellington boots and a mackintosh in the backseat.’ She looked at Lonie’s feet, but said nothing.

‘Well, you stick them on. And I’ll scout ahead and make a start.’ Lonie walked quickly away. He didn’t look behind him, trying to put as much space between Audrey and him as he could without actually running.

Audrey sat in the back seat with her legs dangling out. She put on her wellies and pulled on her coat. It seemed only sensible to also put on the see-through plastic hood. She stood up to test out her winter ensemble and hurried to catch up with Lonie, who was now walking past the first set of greenhouses.

Lonie waited until he was on the curve of a bend before he stepped onto the grass and cut a diagonal towards the distant set of trees. He’d on his working boots, but the long grass soon soaked through his thin trousers.

‘Wait. Wait.’ Audrey shouted. Her face was red with running and her legs tingling. She caught up with Lonie. He was standing beside a rhododendron bush. She put her hand on his shoulder and had a childish impulse to say –tig and your het. Instead she said :‘What kind of tree are we looking for?’

‘Silver birch, like that one over there.’ Lonie pointed to a tree largely denuded of its leaves. ‘But we can’t take it for granted that it is a silver birch. He also mentioned an oak.’ He took a step into the carpet and crunch of autumn yellow and winter brown. ‘The best thing to do is split up.’ Audrey came and stood beside them. Another step and they were behind the rhododendron and nobody could see them from the path. ‘You work your way back towards the car.’ Lonie nodded in that general direction. ‘Ah’ll work my way up and round this way.’

He sounded grumpy, which made Audrey smile. ‘And what am I looking for again?’ She walked away. Her head was already turning and eyes tracing an arc along the tops of the trees.

‘Watch your head!’ Lonie turned and a tree branch snapped back against his head. ‘A leather belt.’

The distance between them grew. The scrunch of feet on crumbled leaves marked the passage of muffled time. A robin redbreast followed Lonie’s passage with interest. A grey squirrel shot up a Birch tree, clinging to one branch and following into another and scuttling to safety on the far side of the unseen. Lonie fingered the belt in his pocket. His mouth opened as he leaned back to look upwards to the top of a silver birch. He took his jacket off and pegged it to one of the lower wooden fingers of an elm. Remembering Father Campbell’s description he buckled the belt around him and pulled himself up, using his knees to hug the tree. Branches scratched at his face, but he ignored them and the quaking in his legs as he began to climb. He was about eighteen feet up before he looked down. The tree began to bend with his weight and his feet scrambled for footholds. He slipped down and bruised his face. Birds from the trees all around him beat out a noise like a jackhammer and he knew he was going to fall. He worked the belt out of his pocket. The distraction of looping it around a branch distracted him, made him sure footed as a native arboreal dweller. He had no time to be surprised when the plunge came.

‘Are you alright?’ Audrey cradled Lonie’s head.

‘Are you an angel?’ Lonie wiggled his toes. His back was sore and his neck too. He could taste blood in his mouth where he’d bitten through his lip. He struggled away from her grasp so he could spit out salvia and blood. Even his tongue felt bruised and he felt the gap where his knee had hit his mouth and knocked a tooth out, luckily it was one of the back ones. He grimaced up at her, trying out his new smile, but it hurt too much. He groaned.

Audrey dropped his head and stood up and brushing herself down. She checked her clothes for blood marks. ‘I thought you were concussed.’

‘A’h’m ur. Gi’e me another cuddle, help me up and Ah might live.’ Lonie felt his head and groaned.

‘You want an ambulance?’ Audrey watched him sit up. She bent down and put her arms around him to help him up, but as he got up his hand brushed against her breast. She let go of him. He stumbled and swayed, but remained upright.

‘Whit’s the matter with you? You’d think it was you that fell out of a tree and no’ me.’

‘You put your hand against my breast?’

‘Ah never.’ Lonie’s head hung down and he spat out blood, phlegm and salivia. His eyes looked equally bloodshot when he looked up at her. ‘If Ah did Ah’m sorry. Ah didnae mean it.’

Audrey’s face was marked by indecision. ‘What where you climbing a tree for anyway?’

‘Ah seen the belt we were looking for and Ah climbed up to get a closer look.’ Lonie twisted his neck in a slow arc, and looked up the tree he’d fallen out of, a stab of pain imprinted on his face. Neither the branch nor the belt was there. He guessed he must have tore at it as he fell. Audrey followed his gaze as he looked for it.

‘Is that it there?’ Audrey ambled behind Lonie and picked up a branch. The Scout belt was still attached. She looked puzzled and dropped the branch and belt.

‘Shit.’ Lonie face screwed up. ‘Go over to my jacket and get the camera out of the pocket and take a picture.’ He groaned. ‘You’ll need to be my witness that there was a leather belt up that tree and I accidentally knocked it down.’ She stayed in the same spot. ‘Hurry up. Get my coat. I’m freezing.’

Audrey leaned across and picked up his coat. The luminous green of the camera casing snaked out of his pocket as she pulled on the strap. He took his coat and quickly buttoned it up around him. The camera hung like a pendulum in her hand. ‘I don’t think anybody would try and hang themselves with a belt like that.’ She looked at Lonie. ‘It’s just ridiculous. It’s a Scout belt!’

Lonie limped over. One of his legs felt longer than the other and it felt like someone had jumped up and down on his spine. ‘Give me the camera.’ She handed it to him. He strode around her and took a few snaps. ‘Satisfied?’ He’d an aggravated look on his face.

‘Not really.’ The rain was letting up. Audrey took off her rain hood. ‘What about the other belt?’

‘What other belt?’ Lonie spat blood out behind him and wiped at his mouth.

‘The one hanging in a tree back there.’ Audrey looked back the way she’d come and shivered. ‘That’s what I’d come to tell you about.’

‘Show me.’ A strange noise came from Lonie’s throat and he bent over double. He got down on one knee and spat up more blood.

‘Maybe I should phone an ambulance?’ Audrey looked at Lonie, unsure if she could carry him, or if she should leave him and go and phone.

Lonie stood up slowly, groaned and bent over again. ‘Show me?’

Audrey put her arms around him to help him along. She was no longer concerned about his hand brushing her breasts. She was more concerned he wouldn’t be able to walk. Out of the corner of her eyes strange shadows appeared. Trees blowing in the wind, branches creaking and groaning seemed to be an almost human sound. They soon reached the spot which she’d seen earlier. She hadn’t told Lonie she’d rushed to get him because she’d been spooked.

‘Jesus.’ That’s not a birch. Lonie looked up at the leather belt swinging about twenty feet up. ‘That’s an oak. A very old oak.’ It’s blackened fingers seemed to point at the sky. He looked at Audrey. She clung onto him. Her soft warmth reassured him, but he wasn’t sure. ‘Where did those standing stones come from?’ Thirteen ancient looking crouching stones encircled the tree.

‘I don’t know, but it gave me the heeby-jeebies.’ Audrey wanted to get away.

Lonie looked at the smooth trunk and the swinging noose. ‘How the hell did he get up there?’

‘I don’t know.’ The hairs on the back of Audrey’s neck began to stand up. ‘But let’s just leave it the now. Now we know it’s here we can come back later.’

She was scared. Lonie heard it in her voice and could feel it in her touch, but he’d a job to do. ‘Just give me a minute until Ah'll take a few photos.’ He used her as a leaning post as he took snap after snap until he heard the click and whine of the film running out. He knew it was time for them to do the same.