The Good House (Part 3 of 3)

PART 3

 

James saw her slipping from the foot of the tree and he bought his gun up quickly. Easy as shooting a small creature for food he thought. The sights rested on her blonde hair and his finger felt for the trigger. She was as good as dead. But he faltered. His mission: but then the doubts. The hair mesmerised him. All conspired to make him falter: then she was gone.

 

He followed again. She was cunning, this creature, clever to slip back down into the gulley, he thought. Though not that clever, the gun had been on her long enough, one split second and he could have finished her. Down they went into the gulley. Here the trees were thick. The snow had stopped. He could hear the running water of the small stream. Stealthily he tracked the lithe human again. A heavy man: but light on his feet. Many years hunting had made him so, both for food and war. Tracking small scared creatures or larger aggressive ones: he was an all round professional.

 

Then as the trees thinned near the stream he saw a square regular feature. Coming closer he could make it out as concrete. There were never buildings in the gullies, this was new to him. From a distance he had seen buildings in the lands above but they were always ruins and broken. This one looked complete. He reached it and placed a hand on the hard wall. It was hard to see above and living rock took up the route that the concrete had started.

 

The wall continued to his right, hidden in places by undergrowth and trees. Tracking along it he soon found a small entrance. It was let into the concrete and contained a ramshackle and mouldy wooden door. The door was swinging slightly. He checked and knew the tank human had come that way.

 

--

 

Claire could not believe her luck to find the door. She carefully went through and found a large empty room beyond. The walls were the same concrete as the outside, the same grey colour. The room was entirely empty. On the far left wall to her left was a large empty door frame. Around the room were various other, smaller, doors. Then she heard the soldier outside, very close. Quickly, her heart thumping, she headed fleetingly for the larger, and closer, door. She rounded it and flattened herself on the other side of the right hand frame, away from the soldier.

 

Her heart was beating hard, making it difficult to concentrate with fear. Her eyes took in this new room. Again it was big and grey but at the far end was a large dilapidated thrown sitting on an equally dilapidated wooden platform. That was it. In despair she looked for a way out, not daring to look back through the door, as she knew the soldier must be coming.

 

Then she saw a faint dark hole to her right. She felt towards it. The dark hole turned out to be the beginning of a steep narrow grey spiral staircase. Without so much as a pause she climbed quickly upwards. She realised swiftly that the soldier, with his bulk, would be slowed down by it.

 

--

 

James was hard on her heels across the room. He was so light of foot that she was unaware how close he was. Her hearing was not as alert as his after years with the tank engine in her ears. He could have had her at any point as they traversed the big room. But he held back, unsure why, doubts in his mind. Then she was through the big door and he stopped short, suspecting she could have him covered with her gun. He heard her breath coming fast and then her movement away. He took a silent sideways roll into the room, instantly the gun covered the area. She was just vanishing though a small hole in the wall.

 

He stood and followed again. At the foot of the steps he realised he would not fit in the narrow way with all his equipment. He removed his big bulky backpack, equipment belt and ammunition belt. Now he was in only his uniform with hat and holding the big machine gun. He took the stairs, finding it a very narrow squeeze, but passable. He had to duck down and walk sideways with the gun before him, but he was able to climb.

 

He could hear the lithe human speedily disappearing above.

 

--

 

Claire climbed as fast as she could. The spiral went up and up. Very gradually the walls became less rough. Then abruptly they stopped and opened out into another room. This room was vast and she wondered how it could have increased in size over the ones below. The grey concrete walls had changed, now they were smoother, less brutal. There were odd forms of furniture, mostly of a rough design. Even the doors were lined with wood.

            She snatched a glance back down the steps feeling sure the man was coming. Looking around she saw what looked like a door to more steps across the room. She ran across the open space. Shortly she reached the door and looked back. The brute was just emerging. He levelled his gun but she darted away up the steps.

            Now the way was narrower but much plusher; designs on the walls and smooth stone steps. The way round upwards, and tight. She knew the soldier would be slowed by this and she gladly appreciated it.

            Then again the steps ended and opened into another room. This one was quite small but much more plush with carpet underfoot and finer furniture. The walls were paper with nice designs. There were real wooden doors. She ran to the first and went through. Beyond was another room. As she ran she thought she started to notice people, but all was becoming a haze. Each room opened to another and she hoped her way was loosing the man.

            Presently there came another staircase. This one was wide and straight with soft carpet and wooden walls. Pictures of grand people and scenes. The steps led to a landing which switched back and led up again. The decoration became more and more grand, as she ran up the steps to each switchback.

Then the last switchback came and she could hear voices and see up above the way opened out. She reached it and before her was a sight that astounded her. A sight like nothing she had ever seen before.

 

--

 

She had arrived at the very top of the stairs into a room; unlike the others, it was vast in size. This room was not just plush but golden: golden of sunshine and light. The far wall was a huge window to the land beyond, but this was not the dead land of the gullies, this was a bright beautiful landscape of trees and fields and sunshine. Beyond was a blue sky of the deepest, most tranquil blue she had ever seen.

 

But this was not was took her attention. The room was fantastic: with two large long tables covered in food like she had never seen before. Large cooked turkeys on platters of vegetables. Plates of roast potatoes, fruit of many types, all beautiful and sumptuous. Around the tables were children, happy and talking. Beyond this a large tree stood with pretty baubles and glitter. Candles were placed on the ends of the boughs. At the top was an attractive doll in a fairy outfit. Underneath stood boxes in pretty paper. The sound was of a running stream and of laughter and happy talking.

 

Sitting at the far end of the table was a woman. She wore good but unassuming clothes. She behaved in a relaxed manner, not the focus of the room, or the centre of attention, but clearly the middle of the universe. Claire was drawn to her. The soldier forgotten. Her fear had gone. She came to the woman.

 

There was no extravagant and embarrassing greeting, the woman simply turned and smiled and gestured to a chair near her. The same style of chair that all used, the same that her herself rested on.

 

Claire smiled back. It was so long since anyone had smiled at her and so long since she had herself smiled.

 

“I don’t know who I am,” she surprised herself by saying to the woman.

 

“You were the last of the Ultimate War. A long time ago the whole world was like this place. The King used to live in the rooms you saw on the way up to us. He created it when the world went crazy.”

 

“What is this place?”

 

“This is The Good House. Here there is no war, all the bad things stop in this place. It doesn’t exist really, in that world. You and the soldier were the last of the war. We tried to free you before but it never worked. Now it happened. We finally guided you here.”

 

“But the others are dead.”

 

“Yes, we tried so hard to stop that. We only managed to save you.”

 

“And the soldier?

 

“Ask him yourself,” she said nodding across the room.

 

She turned in fear to see him standing at the top of the steps. Claire still held her gun in her hand. The soldier held his at ease in his left hand.

 

They looked at each other across the room.

 

The old woman, the Queen, looked back at the time when the King had first arrived in those grey war ravaged rooms and together they had made a new life. Her young self pictured in her mind’s eye. She remembered those long good years before he had died an old man.

 

THE END