Hector & Gerta
‘Hector and Gerta lost their mother over a year ago.’
‘Careless,’ Eddie muttered.
‘It was cancer or something bad like that. She got all sick and withered and their dad had to carry her to the toilet and wipe her bum and all of that sick type of crap.’
‘So they didn’t like lose her in the shopping mall or at the beach.’
‘No, man, nothing stupid like that. Why you taking the piss?’
‘I’m sorry. Let’s hear about Hector and Gerta. But just the facts, eh? See if you can tell me a story based on facts.’
‘It’s real. This happened. Serious. Hector told me himself. It’s epic. His Aunt Matilda …
***
On the stroke of midnight a loud rapping on the front door signified Aunt Matilda’s arrival. Hector woke and crept to the stairs. His aunt barged through the door barking orders to his father to pay the taxi and fetch her luggage. She breezed about the foyer wiping at ledges and table tops with her gloved hand.
‘No cleaner,’ she tutted. ‘No problem, we’ll soon get the children on the job.’
‘Well go easy on them, all right. They’ve just lost their mother.’ Hector’s old man was dressed in pajamas and this tatty dressing gown. It didn’t have a cord and had nasty looking stains on the front.
‘We’re all grieving, but chores will get their minds off their troubles.’
Hector was woken early the next morning, his aunt pulling the covers from his bed, the curtains thrown aside and the windows opened wide. Frost chilled the room and the slumbering birds nestling in the eaves squawked in protest.
‘Work to do young man,’ she said. She wore yellow rubber gloves and clapped her hands together. ‘I need firewood collected and chopped. The ashes need to be swept from the hearth, the chickens fed and the vegetable garden weeded. I won’t have you lying about in bed all day.’
Every day started the same with her in her gloves and white dust coat clapping her hands and pulling off their bed covers. There was no breakfast until chores were completed and all they got was a piss poor pot of porridge type gruel. No sugar.
Hector looked like death and Gerta was napping in class. One night Hector heard his father telling their Aunt that she worked the children too hard. Not only did he miss their evening stories, but they looked worn out in the mornings. And he’d had reports of Hector fighting at school and Gerta was failing numbers and letters. ‘She loves her numbers,’ he said.
Aunt Matilda was sat at the table with a pile of invoices before her. She looked at Hector’s dad over half-moon glasses and clasped her hands on top of the pile. Hector reckons she gets this right cold look and if you stare too long your fingers and toes turn to stone. So you don’t look. ‘Huh,’ she said. ‘Those children are bone lazy and good for nothing. I don’t blame you, but my sister spoilt them senseless. Have you seen how much they eat? And that boy needs new shoes every week. Do his feet have to grow so fast? The bills are constant and your piddling wage packet I’m afraid doesn’t come close to covering the expenses.’
The next day was the weekend, but their father had to work. Aunt Matilda’s best friend, an ugly looking witch of a woman came to visit and while Hector chopped wood they took tea in the conservatory.
‘We can’t afford them,’ Matilda said. ‘It’s hopeless. I don’t know what we’re going to do. I mean the man means well, but his menial clerk wages don’t fill the growing hole of debt.’
The hag nodded in sympathy to her friends lament. ‘Children these days don’t appreciate life.’
‘No they don’t. They take without so much as a thank you.’
‘You have to blame her.’
‘Oh I do blame her. Spoilt rotten and soft inside, they are. I don’t know what my sister was thinking having children on such a meagre income.’
The ladies sipped at their tea, the hag helping herself to another chocolate biscuit. ‘And the father?’ she said.
‘Oh, he never so much looks at me or thanks me for my servitude. He mourns my sister still. What conversation we do share centers on those damned children.’
‘They will always remind him of her. The little girl has her eyes.’
‘Oh, don’t I know it.’
‘You should take them into the Lanes. It’s a jungle in there, and children go missing all the time.’
‘Just leave them there.’
The hag nodded. ‘With the children gone, the man will notice you. In time you can make him forget your sister.’
Gerta had stopped cleaning long ago, listening with her cleaning rag held against the window. She ran to the woodshed and found Hector. ‘She’s planning on losing us in the Lanes.’
Hector set the axe against the shed and sat with his sister. ‘What are the Lanes?’
***
The next weekend Aunt Matilda took the children shopping in the Ostere town square. She’d promised them ice cream, and after three hours of bartering for supplies, she stopped at a narrow, cobbled lane. She handed Hector two large copper coins and pointed.
‘Follow the lane to the end, and then take the first right until you hit the spice shop. Take the second right, then a left at the chicken shop. You’ll see a large shop with phones and the next shop will be selling you your precious ice cream. I’m meeting someone for coffee, so I’ll wait for you here.’
The sun had started to set and the gloom offered a chill to the day. Hector and Gerta hadn’t worn a coat, scarf or mittens and shivered as they trod the uneven cobbles. A man with a patch watched them dawdling up the lane. A woman threw slops from an upstairs window and splashed their shoes. Two lads stood behind a table daring them to find the painted lady for their penny.
‘We only have two pennies,’ Hector said.
‘So, if you find the painted lady you’ll have four pennies.’
Hector watched the young lad move the cards, his hands quickening, his eyes watching Hector. ‘Just for practice,’ he said. More lads gathered about the table, hemming Hector closer to the cards. ‘Where’s the painted lady.’
Hector reckoned she was in the middle of the three cards and pointed. The boy flipped the card, caught it and showed Hector the painted lady.
‘It’s easy.’
Hector rubbed his two pennies together in his pocked, but Gerta pulled at his coat. ‘I want ice-cream,’ she said. A crowd had formed as the boy dropped the painted lady back on the table. Gerta pulled, but the crowd pushed. As the boy moved the cards, Hector turned to Gerta. ‘I’ve just got to pick the painted lady,’ he said. ‘It’s easy.’
He looked back to the table, but he’d lost count of the moves and the boys hands were fast and the cards a blur. Hector had no idea where the painted lady sat. As he pointed his finger the lad grabbed his digit and shook his head.
‘I need to see your penny for this game.’
Gerta pulled harder at Hector’s coat. He leant toward her. ‘You don’t know.’
He shook his head. ‘No idea.’
‘Ready to run,’ he whispered. Hector grabbed Gerta’s hand and pushed free of the crowd and ran for the end of the lane. One of the boys gave chase, but the children had entered a crowded lane lined with shops. Men and women called out their wares to eager patrons. Rugs and baskets, spades and buckets and all manner of livestock cluttered the narrow path. Hector and Gerta ducked deep into the crowd hoping the bodies would hide them.
An old hag chopped the head from a chook and allowed the decapitated bird to run blind in the lane spurting blood until it collapsed and bled into the cobbles Men called to the children with leers and crooked pointing fingers. An old boy grabbed Hectors ear as a young girl took Gerta’s hand. He pulled Hector into a shop where an old hag petted his hair and pinched his arse. The old man shone a torch into his mouth and depressed his tongue. The girl with Gerta held cloths of yellow and red to her body, and wrapped scarves about her head. A tall dark man with serious facial hair sat in the corner drinking mint tea from a gla
ss, speaking gibberish as the girl made Gerta swirl.
Hector appeared at the doorway and called to Gerta. ‘Run Gertie,’ he shouted.
The two children met in the street and dodged free, side stepping a large man with a pig’s carcass on his shoulders Gerta screamed as the pigs trotters kicked at her face. She ducked and pushed off the man’s bloodied apron and joined hands with Hector as they turned into a narrow alley.
With no sign of pursuit they slowed their steps. Balconies hung low. Washing crisscrossed the narrow alley. A child ran by with a squawking chook under his arm. They turned into a cobbled square and sat on a seat looking overlooking a pond with a school of large colorful fish. ‘Are we not going to get ice cream?’
‘No Gerta, we’re not going to get ice cream.’
‘I’m cold. But I like the fish. We should’ve brought some bread.’
Hector pulled his phone from his front pocket and smiled as he flicked through the menu. ‘Tyson,’ he said when the phone was answered. ‘Do you know the Lanes?’ Hector looked at Gerta and nodded. ‘We’re sitting by a pond with a load of carp in it.’
***
It was late when they returned home, and their father was furious. He pointed to the stairs, his anger brightening his pale face. Auntie Matilda stood at his back, her lips pursed and arms crossed. She tapped her foot and urged their father to beat them for running off and causing her hours of worry.
It was weeks of hard labor, and lashings of homework before their father began talking to them again. But one morning, while the children completed their morning chores, their father called them to the dinner table.
‘No more chores children. Your father has been promoted and with that comes a pay rise. And that means we might be able to employ some help around here. I worry about your school work and all these chores are showing in your grades.
Hector and Gerta cheered, both of them giving their father a severe hug. Both children assumed the help their father talked of meant Auntie Matilda would become redundant.
But behind their backs a thunderstorm brewed. Auntie Matilda stood tapping her foot, her lips pursed and her dark eyes boring into the heads of her charges.
‘Come on children, the help isn’t here yet,’ she scolded. ‘Back to your chores. The fire wood isn’t going to chop itself.
The next day was Hector’s birthday and Aunt Matilda met the children at the school gate. She talked of birthdays and phones and cake. Neither child understood her happy disposition. Hector was on edge, but excited to hear about the new phone Auntie Matilda wanted to buy him.
The phone shop was located deep in the lanes. After the umpteenth turn Gerta reached for Hector’s hand, struggling to keep pace with her brother, who was struggling to keep up with his Auntie. But their journey stopped in the middle of the maze, outside a small shop with a narrow black door.
‘Right,’ Auntie said. ‘Straighten up and try not to talk. I don’t want you embarrassing me.’
‘This doesn’t look like a phone shop,’ Gertie said.
‘Of course it is. Appointment only and right exclusive it is. In you go, and I’ll collect you when you’ve selected a phone.’
The hag welcomed them into the shop with a scowl. She held out her hand for Hector’s phone and dropped it on the floor
‘Oh dear,’ she said. ‘Good thing you’re getting a new phone.’ She then stamped it into little pieces and locked the front door.
‘Where are the phones?’ Hector said. He pulled a curtain aside and revealed a large kitchen with a massive pot boiling on the stove.
‘Be quiet boy.’ She leered and leaned into Hector’s face. A gnarled finger, the nail blackened and hooked tapped him on the cheek. ‘The phones are coming.’
She ushered them into the kitchen and sat them at a long wooden table. Pots hung from hooks in the ceiling. Knives and axes lay cluttered on the far metal bench. A big white sink with a water pump looked out a dirty window layered with cobwebs. The black cauldron atop the cooker bubbled and burped, with a foul smelling steam rising to a hole in the ceiling.
The hag tipped a bag of dirty vegetables and two small knives on the table. ‘Peel,’ she said.
‘Are we staying here,’ Hector asked. ‘Only our dad will be worried.’
‘No talking, just peeling.’
‘But …’
The boggle eyes stared and the head shook.
‘But I’m hungry,’ Gerta said. ‘Auntie Matilda said there would be cake.’
The hag emptied a bag of broken ginger bread onto the table, and returned to her pot. She moved from cupboard to cupboard, collecting ingredients and muttering an incantation. Gerta nibbled and fretted. She didn’t like the hag and shuddered at the ingredients.
‘Rat tail,’ she repeated. Hector, no one eats rat tails.’
‘Or bat’s gizzards.’
‘And the whisker of a cat.’
‘Ewww,’ Gerta said and screwed up her face.
‘Silence child.’
Hector looked at Gerta and nodded. ‘We have to get out of here,’ he whispered.
‘How?’
He shook his head. ‘I’ll think of something.’
The hag shuffled to the table with a box of matches. ‘Who’s going to light my cooker? I’m too old to be bending.’
Georgia took the matches and looked at the big black oven. She looked at Hector and he followed her to the oven.
‘Maybe you can help your little sister. She probably shouldn’t be playing with matches, should she?’
Hector and Gerta, looked into the deep oven. He pulled back. ‘Where do you light it?’ He pulled Gerta away from the cooker.
‘Stupid boy, where do you think? At the back of course.’
‘Yeah, but where? Can you show me?’
The old nag dropped to her knees, her bones cracking and crawled onto the oven door. She leaned into the oven with her crooked finger, the one with the big wart on its knuckle, pointing at the jets at the bottom of the back wall.
‘Can you see now?’
‘No, is it at the top?’
‘No you stupid children. It’s there, at the back.’ She shuffled further into the oven and pointed, thrusting a trembling finger at the jets.’
Hector and Gerta grabbed the edge of the oven door and lifted. The old nag squealed and tried to scrabble backward. The children heaved and grunted and the door snapped shut. Hector put his back to the door and turned on the gas. Gerta struck the match and together they counted before Hector opened the door and Gerta threw the match into the oven. The door slammed shut and the gas inside the oven exploded. The heavy door muffled the hag’s wailing cries. She kicked at the door and scratched at the metal floor with her black talons. The smell of gas was replaced by the burning of her rags and roasting body and a rancid green plume of smoke spewed from the back of the cooker. When the kicking stopped, the scratching silence, the children stepped away from the oven and sat at the table. Georgia nibbled at a biscuit.
‘What do we do now? We still don’t know how to get out. And Auntie Matilda still hates us. And you don’t have your phone.’
‘We’ll call dad. There must be a landline.’
When their father heard their story he called the police and they tracked the children to the old hag’s home. When they got home their father hugged them tight.
‘Where’s Auntie?’ Gerta asked.
‘She had an accident,’ he said. ‘You know that stupid cooker. Your mother was always complaining wasn’t she about lighting it. It exploded and your Auntie was burnt.’
Hector and Gertie looked at each other with wide eyes. Their father nodded. ‘Don’t worry. With my promotion we can get a new cooker.’
// // //
Tyson came to see me around the time the Man promised the world leaders Albion Minor would be tough on child trafficking. He found some shekels to pay one of his cronies to set up a task force and dusted his hands of the problem.
Tyson bummed a paper and a pinch of tobacco
and sat back, imitating my pose and blew a thin stream of smoke into the night. Fortunately he hadn’t cultured a taste for whisky, but these street kids grew up fast. I took a quick slug and secreted the flask deep in my inside pocket.
His gang walked the street, watching Tyson, looking for the nod when they passed a target. They had a young lass distracting all and sundry and their little hands hoisted phones, wallets and car fobs with ease.
‘How you doing Eddie?’ he said. ‘You like chilling here don’t you. You always waiting out for the next big scoop, like. Is that what you doing?’
‘Just chilling Tyson. You shorthanded tonight?’
‘The Wolf Girl’s got them doing some undercover work. She wants the low down on a few dudes so we’re they’re in houses fitting devices to computers, cameras and recorders and all sorts of stuff.
‘And a little bit of stealing, like.’
He smiled and nodded to little Spike as he ran his pushbike into a tall man, with cane and posh hat, and kid leather gloves. As the man reached to his injured limbs a dark lithe figure had the bottom of his satchel slashed and his lap top secured inside his coat. Seconds and both imps had merged into the crowd standing in awe of the fire juggling, bare chested Jason the Juggler.
‘Ah the Wolf Girl,’ Eddie said. ‘Now there’s a person of interest?’
‘You’d like a chat with the Wolf Girl? I can arrange that for sure. Me and the Wolf Girl are close, like.
‘But about that scoop you’s looking for.’
‘Am I?’ Eddie said as Tyson sidled close. ‘Stay where you are Eddie. The army is trigger happy and the Man’s cronies are looking for any sign of child mistreatment. I don’t need to be getting in charge for your scoop.’
Tyson nodded in response and sidled back to his edge of the seat. ‘You know that Tommy the Car.’
‘Street Boy’s mate. He had a brother, little fellow called little Billy Two Guns.’
‘Yeah that’s him. Tall skinny and a bit thick, and likes to nick a good quality motor. Can’t drive, but. He give me a lift once and needed help with the gears. I told him you need to be nicking other stuff, like. It’s no good nicking a motor if you can’t drive it from the scene, you know what I mean. He didn’t like me telling him that. No way
‘And his brother got barbequed didn’t he, by those Black Hat twats.’