“But we disagree. Not only do they threaten massive loss of life to unfortunate humans and innocent animals swept up in any disaster, the sirens also risk exposure: the very thing our Society was set up to prevent. Exposure of mythical creatures leads to investigation: investigation inevitably to eradication. We needed your help to persuade them. They won’t listen to us anymore. We’ve no idea why they’ve suddenly taken against our ways and opted for the path of violence.”
In the silence that followed, Col noticed the frantic ticking of a small clock on the mantelpiece. It was intensely annoying, unnaturally loud at this tense moment. He was tempted to get up and remove it from the room but dared not be the first to break the hush. Then Signor Antonelli spoke, his voice gruff after his recent fruitless efforts.
“They no come when I called. They are too angry and only a vero—a true—companion can speak to them in dis—’ow you say?—dis state. ’Ow do I know this? Each colonia of sirene is distinct. Le sirene from Capri: when they are afraid, they speak only to me—they want no one else. From what you say, dis ones are linked to your seagulls. I am no companion to that familia. But your sirene—I feel their fear: they are filled with a...with a furia profondissima...a terrible fury. They be a danger to anyone—idiota—who meet them at this time.”
The image of the most recent victim bobbed to the surface of everyone’s thoughts—a grim piece of flotsam. Dr. Brock rubbed his forehead as if trying to relieve the tension that had come to roost there. “We seem to be at something of a dead end. It’s suicide for someone who isn’t a siren companion to go out to the Stacks now. We have no one in our local chapter of the Society, as you must realize. The nearest we have is Evelyn: she’s companion to the banshees—but if you can’t talk to them, what hope is there for her? Col is as yet unassigned, but we think his calling is to the pegasi. Sirens are very rare in England and I do not think I have met a companion able to speak to them since the last universal companion died ten years ago.”
Mrs. Clamworthy clucked her tongue. “And we can’t pin our hopes on another of them coming along: we only see one in a century or so here in Britain,” she muttered to Col.
“What should we look for in a siren companion?” asked Mr. Masterson.
“A rapport with the bird-species, the usual signs of a second order companion,” answered Signor Antonelli briskly.
Mr. Masterson shook his head. “That’s no one I know,” he said.
Dr. Brock dropped his hand from his forehead, a memory suddenly returning. “There was this bird-girl, though,” he muttered, half in thought. “I saw her a few days ago. A day-tripper probably, but she was definitely at least a second order companion from the way she played with the seagulls. I was going to mention it but other events intervened.”
The others, who had been slumped in dejection, all sat up.
“What was she like?” asked Evelyn eagerly.
Dr. Brock wrinkled his brow in an effort to remember. “I’m hopeless at this sort of thing. Young—yes, definitely very young. Younger than Col, I’d guess. Dressed like all young people—jeans, you know the sort of thing.” He faltered.
“Great,” said Evelyn, unable to keep the hint of irritation out of her voice. “A young girl in jeans, shouldn’t be hard to find.”
Dr. Brock looked apologetic. “I warned you I’m not very good at remembering these details, but I do remember the birds.”
“Are you sure she wasn’t local?” Evelyn asked.
Did she have to be quite so touchy, Col wondered. She had been in a bad mood ever since her niece had been dumped on her, cramping her freedom to see the banshees. And everyone knew that banshee companions were not the most sociable of people even at the best of times.
“We’re a small community, and I know nearly all the children. I’d not seen her before: that I am sure of,” Dr. Brock reiterated patiently. “Besides, I think she got back on a bus.”
A disappointed groan went up from all those gathered. Col thought for a moment of Connie: could it be her? But then, she was the same age as him, not younger, and her gift seemed to be with small mammals, like the gerbils at school. Should he say something? He cleared his throat to interrupt the adults, but his grandmother spoke first.
“There is only one thing for it. We must ask the seagulls themselves for a better description. My water sprites can speak to them for us.”
“Good idea, Lavinia,” said Dr. Brock. He checked his watch. “If you would be so kind as to do that tonight, I suggest we gather here tomorrow evening to find out if there is any news. Will that be enough time?” Mrs. Clamworthy nodded. “Right. Thank you all for your good work tonight under very trying circumstances. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
The meeting broke up, and the guests began putting on their coats. Col felt the moment to say something had passed. It had probably been a stupid idea anyway—Connie could not have a gift both for four-legged and winged creatures at the same time, if she had any gift at all. Nobody could.
4
Water Sprites
As it was already very late, Col went with his grandmother to keep her company on the dark paths out to the home of the water sprites. The sprites lived on the wooded slopes of the moors, where the springs broke out from the escarpment above Hescombe. In these little valleys, the streams were particularly clear, containing nothing but rainwater and as yet unpolluted by farming or factories. Not that Col would see any of this tonight: it was pitch black under the trees, and he could only tell the streams were there by the gentle bubbling of water running over stones. This expedition was a rare treat for him as his grandmother normally spoke to the water sprites on her own: the presence of another human—even her grandson—made the creatures wary and suspicious.
Mrs. Clamworthy shone a flashlight onto a large stone that jutted out over the water.
“This is the place,” she said. “Stand back a little, Col, and try not to move too much, there’s a dear.”
Col did as he was told and stood apart to watch his grandmother. She switched off the torch and allowed herself time for her eyes to get used to the night. Once Col had also adjusted to the darkness, he realized that everything was bathed in a wash of pearly light provided by a nearly full moon. He could make out the water quite clearly now as it flowed from jet-black pools over sparkling miniature waterfalls. He watched with bated breath as his grandmother stepped out onto the stone and began to hum softly, her frothy white hair gleaming in the moonlight. The strange tune ran on with seemingly no beginning or end, gathering tempo then slowing to a gentle croon. It came to Col’s mind that the tune was like the stream, ever-changing but somehow always the same. Mrs. Clamworthy fell quiet, and they both waited in the silence that followed.
After a few moments, Col’s heart leapt—shapes were rising out of the stream. Though their substance changed continually, like water bubbling out of a fountain, the water sprites held the form of slender people, about two feet tall. Their bodies mirrored the dark sky but the moonlight reflecting from rippling skin revealed trailing hair, long fingers, and solemn eyes. Their faces were oddly distorted, as if their features were being viewed through a glass of water.
Mrs. Clamworthy stretched out her hand, palm downward, and the nearest sprite touched it lightly with its fingertip. The touch wrought a complete change: its flowing body suddenly turned to spiky solidity as if it had become ice. Its features became sharply defined: a long pointed nose and dark eyes like wet pebbles. It stepped out of the water to stand by the woman it acknowledged as a water sprite companion.
Mrs. Clamworthy and the sprite began to sing together the same rising and ebbing tune she had used to call them to her. Col did not understand the words, but he thought he could follow the drift of the singers. His grandmother’s eyes were closed in concentration, her tone pleading and anxious. Col guessed she was explaining the need to identify the bird-girl. The sprite, whose song rippled underneath, supporting and supplementing the companion’s tune, was soothing her, giving her a m
usical caress like a stream gently smoothing the tangled tresses of water-weed. Col deduced that the sprite was willing to help, if only to take away the disquiet felt by its friend. The song faded away; the water sprite broke its touch with the companion and flowed back to mingle with the stream, taking the other sprites with it.
“So, that’s all right,” Mrs. Clamworthy said to Col with relief when the sprites had gone. “Issoon has promised to run down to speak to the gulls for me when they come to drink. We should have an answer by tomorrow.”
“That’s great, Gran,” Col replied softly, still feeling awed by the meeting he had just witnessed. “That’s great.”
Taking her by the arm, he helped her carefully back down the shadowy paths to where they had left the car.
Connie, Anneena, Jane, and Col met in Anneena’s kitchen after school on Wednesday to devise their questions for the oil company. Col had been difficult to pin down, pleading a prior commitment, but finally had admitted he could spare the girls a few hours.
“I have to be somewhere at six,” he said moodily as he flung his sports bag into a corner. “I only came to tell you that I don’t think we should do this.”
“Come on, Col,” urged Anneena, “this is really important. Mr. Johnson has said he’d try and get us in to see the company if we come up with some good questions.”
“That’s what I’m afraid of.”
Connie felt a flash of annoyance toward him. Like everyone else in that Society, he seemed to forget that there were other people interested in doing something to save their local wildlife.
“I’ll come only if you lay off questions about the missing men,” he said, throwing himself into a chair.
“Col!” protested Anneena. “That’s the most interesting stuff. Didn’t you see Rupa’s article about them finding the body of O’Neill?”
“’Course I did,” muttered Col. “I was there, wasn’t I?”
“You were there?” asked Jane, turning her eyes toward him with an appalled expression.
“Yeah. It was Gran and her friends that pulled him out of the water. It was sick.”
Connie was stunned at this news. Evelyn hadn’t said anything but she must have been there, too—yet another secret her aunt was keeping from her. The revelation momentarily silenced Anneena, but it would take more than a drowned man to deter her when she had her mind set on something.
“Well, then. Now you know how important it is to get Axoil to own up to the problem. They’re pretending it’s nothing to do with them—they claim that the men never even made it to work—but Rupa’s sure they’re lying.”
“But why lie about something like this?” asked Connie.
Anneena looked at her in disbelief.
“Because it’s terrible publicity for them, of course—hardly the best background to the opening of a new oil refinery. And if it turns out the men are falling into the sea at work, the employer is responsible. Health and safety. Surely even you’ve heard of that?”
Connie nodded vaguely.
“They could be prosecuted or be sued by the families,” Jane explained quietly.
“And it’s nothing to do with us,” Col interrupted wasp-ishly. “Let’s make up some questions if we must, but we stick to an agreed list, okay? No detours into stuff that is none of our business.”
Anneena said nothing, but her lips were pressed tightly together. Jane, ever the peacemaker, looked from one to the other. “Okay, Col, we won’t ask if you’re not happy about it.”
“Oh, won’t we?” muttered Anneena.
“No, we won’t,” said Jane firmly. “We work as a team, remember, Anneena? We can still ask them about the Stacks and the local protest—there’s lots of interesting things for us to cover.”
With bad grace, Anneena gave in. “All right. Here’s what we’ve come up with so far.” She put a list of questions down on the table. Col pointed to the first one.
“Let’s start with an easy one—something to get them to think of us as silly little kids—it might help us get better answers to the real stuff on the Stacks.”
Connie wrinkled her nose at his suggestion. “Silly little kids? Are you sure we want them to think we’re stupid?”
Col nodded. “Quite sure.” The others agreed, so Connie fell silent.
“How about,” Jane suggested, “some dumb question as to what a refinery does?”
“Good idea,” fired back Col.
“What does a refinery do?” Connie asked.
Anneena and Col groaned.
“Turns crude oil into stuff you can put in your car,” explained Jane patiently. “You can’t use it straight from the ground—it has to be processed to be any good.”
“And Jane should know,” Anneena butted in, “because her dad works in it, doesn’t he?”
Jane nodded. “Yes. I told him about our project. He was really interested. He suggested we write directly to Mr. Quick, the managing director.”
Connie hadn’t known this before. She looked sideways at Jane, wondering if, with all these missing men, she was worried for her father. If it were Connie’s father who worked there, she would be worried sick that one day he wouldn’t come home.
“Won’t it be a bit awkward for your dad if we turn up asking difficult questions?” ventured Connie.
Jane shrugged. “I don’t think so—not unless we’re rude or something—and we won’t be, will we?” She looked confidently around at Anneena and Connie and then with less certainty at Col.
“’Course not,” Col said. “You can count on me to be the soul of discretion—as usual. After I’ve taken the managing director in a headlock and told him how rotten his company is, I’ll be sure to apologize very politely,” he joked.
The girls laughed nervously. His presence in their project team added a maverick element they could not control.
It did not take long to finish the questions. Col bolted for the door at the first opportunity, leaving Jane volunteering to type them up that evening at home.
“I’ll look up the company on the Web,” she said, gathering the notes together, “see what they say in public about the environment, wildlife, and all that stuff. We might find something to quote back at them.”
“And don’t worry about Col,” Connie said reassuringly to Jane now that he had gone. “I’m sure it’ll be just fine. He may be a bit...a bit...”
“Full of himself?” suggested Anneena. Col’s blocking of her plan to investigate the missing men still rankled.
“Yes,” said Connie, “that’s it—but his heart is in the right place. He won’t get your dad into trouble.”
“It has to be her!” Evelyn exclaimed. “Who else in Hescombe has hair like that?”
Col was standing outside the back door of his house, eavesdropping on the conversation within. He had heard excited voices and had paused to listen to what was going on.
“Yes, indeed, the sprites were quite clear about that.” That was his grandmother’s voice, bubbling over with joy. “I knew there was something special about the girl the moment I set eyes on her.”
A murmur of voices followed as the meeting broke up into the buzz of separate conversations. After a minute or two, Mrs. Clamworthy called them to order.
“However, there is something I want to add. The sprites also said that the seagulls are angry with us. It seems they do not want us near the Stacks. I don’t know why, but once they found out from the sprites that it was us who were asking after a companion to sirens, they quite dried up and would not tell the water sprites any more. That’s why we’ve only got this sketchy description to go on.”
“But it’s enough from what you say, Evelyn,” interjected Dr. Brock. “We’ll have to ponder the mystery of the seagulls’ anger another time. We have lives to save. Now we must send for your niece.”
Col chose this moment to clatter into the kitchen.
“Col, you’ve arrived at a most exciting time,” his grandmother said eagerly. “My water sprites have given me a description o
f a girl just like Evelyn’s Connie. It has to be her—the family connection, everything, seems to point that way.”
Col was silent for a moment. Connie Lionheart—that shy protégée of Anneena’s—a companion to sirens? He’d thought of it first, he remembered, but had dismissed it as ridiculous. And what about the gerbils?
“I wouldn’t be so sure,” he said with forced casualness. “It seems to me from what I’ve seen at school that Connie’s gift lies with the four-legged creatures.” He had their attention—the jubilant faces were beginning to dim.
“What do you think, Evelyn?” Dr. Brock asked, turning to his neighbor.
Evelyn Lionheart nodded. “It’s true—I was getting carried away. Connie clearly has a special relationship with my cat. Perhaps Col’s right: she might have a gift, but not the one we need right now. She may well fall into the Company of the Two-Fours. Perhaps, Dr. Brock, you did only see a day-tripper: we may have been leaping to conclusions on the slimmest of evidence.”
Dr. Brock turned next to the Italian. “What do you think, signor? Have you sensed anything about the girl?”
Signor Antonelli scratched his beard thoughtfully. “I ’ave no ’eard ’er sing. Does she sing?”
Evelyn shrugged. “Not that I’ve noticed. She keeps to herself at home.”
Horace Little leant over to Evelyn and patted her wrist.
“We must assess her—put the matter to rest once and for all,” he said in his velvet-toned voice.
Col remembered his own assessment only the year before—the mystery, the confusion: only trust in his grandmother had made him go through with it. “But how are you going to explain all this to Connie?” he asked. “She’s said once or twice she’s interested in the Society, but she doesn’t have a clue what that really means. Won’t it be a bit much to spring it on her?”
“Can’t we tell her something about all this?” asked Evelyn, looking to Dr. Brock.
He sighed. “The rules of the Society, forbid us to explain our business to others—even a prospective member—before they have been assessed. We all know the reasons for this, of course: for the protection of those creatures we have sworn to defend.”