The Keeper. Part 1. An Invitation

Strange Goings-On

It was the summer holidays. School was out. Arthur and his family had packed up their things at the end of July and had moved from their home in the outskirts of London to their grandmother’s little cottage in the Lake District. Built by his great-great-great-grandfather over a hundred years ago, it was situated on the side of a steep, sloping hill and surrounded by a garden so chock-full of apple trees and fruit bushes that there was always something ripe and ready to be picked. It was, without doubt, the holiday that the family most looked forward to each year. And ever since he could remember, Arthur had spent the majority of his summers there.

The time, as usual, had flown by. Those four weeks which had seemed to stretch out before him, full of the promise of exciting adventures, had suddenly turned into one, and the number of adventures: precisely zero. But then, what had he really been expecting? Nothing ever happened at the cottage, and that was OK—it was still way better than being back in the city.

Then, one day towards the end of August, quite unexpectedly, something did happen. Arthur, oblivious to the fact that it was about to, had stayed in bed that morning playing games on his phone as usual, until the rumblings in his stomach had made it impossible to ignore them any longer. Utterly famished, he’d gotten up and ventured into the kitchen to find a large pot of porridge perched on the stove by the window. Still warm, a search for the whereabouts of the strawberry jam had revealed that his aunt had once again attempted to hide it all in the back of a cupboard. And realising that the situation called for him to be extra crafty about it, he poked his head around the door to check that she wasn’t about to walk in and catch him red handed—quite literally in this case—and sneakily helped himself to a large dollop or three. With the jam safely hidden under a layer of mush, he stole outside into the garden to eat it.

One interesting but highly regrettable fact about the summer holidays was that the older he got, the less relaxing they seemed to become. This, he reasoned, could be entirely explained by the lists of chores, tasks, to-do lists (whatever you want to call them), which now appeared every morning like clockwork. And, if that wasn’t bad enough in itself, they were becoming longer and more tedious every year. Clean this… do that… change something else. Most of them, completely unreasonable. After all, what was the point in making your bed or tidying up your things when you were only going to need to sleep in it or use them again? Resistance, however, was useless, and that morning had been no exception.

Rushing to finish his list quickly, he had arrived at the conclusion that it was going to have to be a lake day. That’s not to say that most days weren’t, in fact, lake days, but for some reason, he was especially sure that this one needed to be. And no sooner was everything done than he grabbed his fishing rod and pack, and whatever could be found in the kitchen that looked good, and headed off to the nearby lake. The cat, spying him opening the garden gate, trotted after him.

One of the biggest in the area, the large expanse of water was surrounded by thick pine forests and long stretches of sandy beach. Ever popular with bathers during the hot weather, Arthur would always head to the side that was the least crowded. This was not just because it was obviously far better for fishing, but also because several summers ago he’d made the chance discovery of an old, abandoned jetty there. Hidden from sight by thick reed beds and missing half of its boards, it jutted out just enough for him to be able to see what was happening on the other side without anyone being able to notice that he was there.

Ever careful to avoid giving its location away, he stopped beside the stone that marked the entrance to it, checked that the coast was clear, and climbed into the reeds, working his way along to the end. On the other side of the lake, the usual crowds were having fun splashing around in the warmth of the summer afternoon.

‘Argghh!’ cried Arthur, throwing up his arms to protect his face from the reeds which had suddenly begun thrashing about wildly. Out of the corner of his eye, he could just make out a number of large, dark shadows, thundering overhead. And scrambling to his feet once they’d passed by, he stood watching in amazement as helicopters started setting down amongst billowing clouds of green smoke in the woods on the other side.

‘What the!?’ He mumbled to himself, as men dressed in black uniforms and carrying what looked like guns jumped out and vanished into the foliage.

Unsure what was happening and noticing too that all the bathers were no longer where they should’ve been, Arthur hurriedly gathered his things together and made his way back down the path towards the railway line and the track back to the cottage.

At the end of the lake, the men from the helicopters were busy setting up a barricade across the main road. Curious to see what they were doing, he was just about to duck behind a tree, when he caught sight of them also preparing to block off his way home.

‘You’re too late—it’s closed!’ said one of the men as Arthur sprinted over to them.

‘But I need to go that way to get home.’

‘Where’ve you come from, then?’

‘From the lake.’

‘Impossible—the lake was cleared hours ago.’

‘OK, but that’s where I’ve come from, honestly.’

The soldier eyed him suspiciously.

‘Wait,’ he ordered, pulling a radio from his belt.

‘Colonel, there’s a kid here who says he needs to take the track path to get home… Says he’s been at the lake all this time… I don’t know, he just appeared holding a fishing rod… maybe ten, twelve.’

‘I’m twelve.’

‘Yes, Colonel, I thought it’d been cleared too… Yes, Sir, yes, Sir, I understand.’

‘Alright, you can go through, but you need to keep moving, do you hear me?’ he said, signalling to let Arthur pass. ‘This whole area’s been closed off. You shouldn’t be here.’

Thanking him, Arthur hurried up the steep railway embankment, stopping for a second at the top to catch his breath. About to set off again, a sound, a short way up the tracks, caused him to turn around and look. There, parked in a shaded siding, was a completely black, windowless train. Not very long, but coupled to a massive engine, it seemed to consist entirely of a number of very strange-looking, oblong-shaped carriages. Having never seen any trains use the siding before, and wondering for a second if he might not be able to sneak a closer look at them, a group of soldiers emerging from the surrounding woods made him change his mind and hurry on his way.

Back at the cottage, Arthur found his stepfather, Sasha, busy painting the front fence.

‘You’ll never guess what I’ve just seen,’ he said, bursting through the gate. ‘A whole load of helicopters landing at the lake. Seven of them to be exact.’

‘Seven?’

‘Yep. And they were carrying a load of men dressed in black.’

‘Dressed in black? Well, that’ll be the army, I expect,’ said Sasha, without looking up from what he was doing. ‘Probably on exercise or something. There’s a big base near here.’

‘I know. But they didn’t look like normal soldiers.’

‘Well, I wouldn’t worry about it if I were you. Right now, I’d be worrying more about the fact that you’re late again.’

‘I’m not worried. I was just wondering what they were doing. I’ve never seen them at the lake before.’

‘And I just said that you’re late again.’

‘Oh, yes, I know, I’m sorry, I fell asleep.’

‘Then perhaps you should remember to take an alarm clock with you next time.’

‘Sure,’ grinned Arthur. ‘Definitely.’

‘Go on, get your self inside and cleaned up. Dinner’s ready.’

Spotting his mother sitting outside under the kitchen window, pushing his baby sister’s pram backwards and forwards, Arthur trudged off down the garden path towards them.

‘Mu-um, you’ll never guess..’

‘Shh!’ She replied, raising a finger to her lips for him to be quiet.

‘But Mum…’

‘Shh!’

‘Agh, fine!’ he said, reaching for the porch door and leaping out of the way as the family labrador, who’d evidently heard him coming, bounded past, sending a stack of empty paint tins clattering to the ground. Not about to hang around and find out who was going to get the blame for waking his sister, he vanished into the kitchen.

‘Well, well, if it isn’t our intrepid adventurer returning from a hard day’s doing nothing,’ said Aunty M, with her customary cheeky grin. ‘Is that your handiwork I can hear?’

‘All I did was open the door,’ said Arthur, trying to keep a straight face.

‘And how many times do you need to be told not to let the dog out?’

‘But I can’t see through it, can I?’

‘It’s called “being careful”,’ she replied, handing him a bowl of soup and leaving to go and help his mother.

Soup again.

It had been soup yesterday and the day before that and very likely even the day before that, too. Cutting himself some bread, he sat down at the kitchen table and gazed at it all miserably.

‘You know you’re supposed to eat it, not watch it,’ said Sasha, entering the kitchen.

‘I know, but why do we have to have it every day?’

‘Because your mum’s decided that it’s good for you,’ he said, washing his hands and splashing water over his shaven head.

‘But there must be other stuff that’s good for me.’

‘Well, then I suggest that you get yourself down to the shops and find something. And, when you’ve worked it all out, you can take over doing the cooking. I’m sure she’ll be delighted.’

Arthur pulled a face and dipped his spoon into the soup.

‘Yum,’ he said, grinning.

While they ate, they talked more about the helicopters landing in the woods and how the men in black uniforms had blocked off the road. The part about the black train, however, Arthur left out – even just thinking about it gave him with a weird feeling and he had no idea why.

When they were done, Sasha turned on the local news and, curious to see if there’d be any mention about what had happened, Arthur stayed for a while to watch the reports. But there wasn’t anything, and not wanting to watch it anymore, he moved to sit by the kitchen window. A storm was already starting to blow in, and soon the rain which was already tapping on the glass was coming down in force. Presently, his mother called out for them to go and bring the cushions in from the chairs in the garden.

‘You grab those from the bench, I’ll get the rest,’ said his stepfather, entering the porch, which already smelled strongly of damp earth. Opening the door, a sharp gust of wind knocked them both backwards.

‘Right, go!’ he shouted, leaping into the downpour.

No sooner though had Arthur jumped out after him, than a terrible flash had lit up the sky, flooding everything around him with a pulsating white light. Barely able to move, and no longer feeling the torrents of rain beating down on him, his hands suddenly began to shimmer like two black holes. Holding them out in front of him, unable to look away, Arthur started to become aware of a kind of deep and distant darkness. An endless abyss, flecked by tiny lights, it felt vast – ancient. And in those moments which followed, as he stared through his hands, feeling a rush of sensations which he could not understand; he could have sworn that he heard his name being called from within.

Then, just as suddenly as it had all begun, it was over. The light vanished leaving Arthur staring at his hands in disbelief. Only now, all he saw was the rain splashing against his fingers.

‘Hey, did you see that?’ shouted Sasha, reappearing clutching several large seat cushions.

Arthur stared at him, shaking.

‘Come on, grab those over there, and get inside, quickly.’

Hurrying back into the porch, they both stood in silence, watching the storm through the open door, waiting to see if it would happen again.

‘Go on in, I’ll lock up,’ said Sasha finally.

Peculiarly, no one indoors appeared to have noticed a thing. His mum had been preoccupied with his sister’s bath time, whilst Aunty M had been enthusiastically scouring for shoes online and had just shaken her head in surprise. Not sure what to make of it all, Arthur spent the rest of the evening lying on his bed unable to get the images of his hands and what they’d transformed into out of his mind. When he did finally manage to close his eyes, he began to imagine a star-filled night.

‘Hello, Cat,’ he mumbled sleepily, feeling the cat come and lie down on the bed next to him. ‘Where’ve you been all evening, then?’

‘Where do you think? Trying to stay out of that dreadful storm.’

Arthur’s eyes flickered slightly. If he hadn’t known better, he’d have sworn that the cat had just said something to him.

‘You didn’t just talk, did you?’ he grinned, reaching out to stroke his warm fur.

‘Sure, I did. Is there something wrong with your ears, all of a sudden?’

Gasping, Arthur sat bolt upright, almost tumbling out of bed in the process. ‘Oh my god! Cat! You’re talking!’

‘What do you mean I’m talking? Of course I’m talking. What’s wrong with you?’

‘No, you don’t understand—you can really talk!’

‘And there you have it folks, the kid’s a born genius.’

‘What? No, look—I mean, listen. You’re talking, and I can understand everything that you’re saying. Go on, say something, I’ll prove it.’

‘Liquorice sticks,’ said the cat.

‘Liquorice sticks!?’

‘Yeah, I don’t know, it was the first thing that came to mind.’

‘Weird, but OK. Now do you see!?’ he exclaimed excitedly, struggling to keep his voice down. ‘But, Cat, how’s it even possible?’

‘Search me. Maybe you hit your head on something? Did you hit your head on something?’

‘No. I don’t think so. Did you?’

‘Not that I can remember. But then I reckon that if I had, it might explain why I can’t remember doing it.’ The cat made a slight choking sound, which Arthur could have sworn was him laughing.

‘Woah! You don’t think it’s got something to do with that light, do you? You did see it, right?’

‘Of course I saw it. It made all my fur stand on end.’

‘And everything was normal before that?’

‘Well, if by normal, you mean that you couldn’t understand me, then yes.’

‘But what about everyone else? Do you know if they can understand you too?’

‘No, I don’t think so. That aunt of yours completely ignored me when I suggested that she might want to share some of her chicken with me. And that was even after I complimented her on her hair, so… And your stepfather, well let’s just say I had a few choice words for him when he stood on my tail—which still hurts, by the way.’

‘OK, so only me, then?’

‘I guess.’

‘What do you mean you guess? You don’t seem particularly excited about it. Can’t you see that this is major? You’ve suddenly started talking like a person.’

‘Perhaps,’ replied the cat, yawning. ‘Only, without wishing to put a hole in your boat or anything, as you’re the only one who appears to be able to understand me, maybe it’s actually you who can suddenly talk like a cat?’

Arthur stared at him, gobsmacked. ‘Oh! Do you really think so?’

‘I really do,’ he purred. ‘And now, not wanting to be a killjoy about the whole discovery thing and all, but having just spent the last two hours deep cleaning my fur after that rain, I’m totally knackered. Soooooooo, super excited and everything, but as the saying goes, “Too much doing and not enough sleeping turns cats in to rats.”’

And without another word, the cat curled up into a ball and fell asleep.

More Surprises

Arthur wasn’t the first to wake that morning. His stepfather, who worked shifts for the emergency services, had already left to go to work. In the summer, when they were all at the cottage, that always meant a very early start in order to stay ahead of the traffic.

Not wanting to get up, but finding that he’d forgotten to charge his phone, he lay watching his baby sister taking little side steps along the edge of her cot. She hadn’t started to walk yet but seeing that she was barely having to hold on to the edges at all, he understood that it wouldn’t be long now.

All of a sudden, the words ‘liquorice sticks’ filtered through his mind, and with them, the weirdest feeling that he and the cat might really have been talking to each other the previous night. Deciding that he was going to have to go and find out once and for all, he got up quietly and crept out into the garden. The cat was stretched out on his favourite patch of sunny grass near the rose climbers.

‘Alright, Cat,’ said Arthur, perching himself on the swing.

The cat didn’t react.

‘Hey?’ he called out. ‘Earth to Cat!’

‘Whaat!?’ meowed the cat unhappily, making him jump. ‘Can’t you see I was sleeping? I was having the greatest dream ever. I was able to fly! And, if you really must know, I’d be a lot more all right if breakfast wasn’t always those same dreadful, dry biscuits. And now that you bring it up, I need you to have a little word with your mum for me. You know, ask her to come up with something a bit more exciting for a change. What d’ya say?’

‘So, it’s really true, then. We can talk!’ Arthur said, mouth agape.

‘Oh Lord, didn’t we go through all of this last night?’

‘Well, yeah we did, but…’

‘But you woke up thinking that maybe you’d dreamt it?’

‘Well, actually yeah, but…’

‘But, as you can see, you didn’t, and yes, we can.’

‘Well, yeah, but…’

But before he could finish, a screeching sound made them both look towards the porch door. His sister’s head had just appeared in the doorway, and she was looking very pleased with herself.

‘Anna!’ puffed his mother, seconds later, looking decidedly flustered. ‘You can’t run away before breakfast—how far do you think you’ll get on an empty stomach? Arthur, come and eat, and don’t leave the door open to the porch. How many times have I told you?’

‘But, Mama! It wasn’t me!’

‘Of course it wasn’t. It never is,’ she said, making a point of stepping outside and looking around.

‘Ugh!’ he groaned. But it was pointless to argue. And in any case, what did it matter? He was always in trouble for just about everything that went wrong, especially where it concerned his baby sister. His mother went back inside, closing the door with a bang.

‘Well, Cat, that settles it, then. We definitely need to go fishing again today.’

It took him much longer to finish all his tasks that day. The list had included helping his aunt vacuum the entire cottage, which, whilst not big, was still a pain, especially when you were in a rush not to be there. On top of that, he’d also been told to mop the floors in the kitchen, which he’d ended up having to do twice because no sooner had he finished the first time, than the dog had traipsed through, leaving muddy paw marks everywhere.

‘What took you? I’ve been waiting ages,’ meowed the cat, spotting him coming up the path.

‘Aunty M decided I needed to help her vacuum everything. Come on, let’s get out of here before she and mum come up with something else for me to do.’

‘Good idea. But don’t think for a moment that your life is harder than mine. I just woke up with ants in my fur!’

In all the excitement of discovering that he could talk with the cat, Arthur had quite forgotten about the events of the previous afternoon, and it was only once they climbed up onto the railway path that everything flooding back. Drawing nearer to the spot where the train had stood, two hefty crane engines were now lifting large pieces of tangled metal out of a very large hole.

‘Cat, look there. That’s where a weird-looking black train was parked last night…You’re not thinking what I’m thinking, are you?’

‘Well, not unless you were also thinking that we’ve just missed the turning for the lake path.’

‘Halt! That’s as far as you!’ growled a man, suddenly appearing from down the side of the embankment, dressed like a security guard. ‘This section of the line is closed.’

‘Closed? But why? What happened?’ Arthur asked, seeing that a whole load of trees on either side of the hole had been blown over, and that most of them were blackened and charred.

‘Nothing happened,’ the man replied tersely.

‘Nothing!?’

‘That’s right. And that means that there’s nothing here that you need to be concerned about. Now, be on your way before I phone your parents and tell them that you’re trespassing and poking your nose into things that don’t concern you!’

Pretending for a second not to have heard him, Arthur craned his neck to see what else he could see.

‘Go on! Be off with you,’ said the guard, noticing the cat by Arthur’s feet and becoming more agitated. ‘And take that fleabag with you!’

‘Fleabag, indeed. I bet he has more fleas that I do,’ grumbled the cat, as they headed back towards the main crossing to the lake.

‘You know, Cat, I have this really strange feeling that whatever happened here was somehow connected with that white light last night. Only, I still don’t get why it made my hands go all weird?’

‘And my tail!’

‘Really? What happened to your tail?’

‘It went all black hole-like. It totally freaked me out. I thought I was about to get sucked into myself or something.’

‘Army, train, white light, a huge hole in the railway line. What do you reckon it could mean?’

‘That it’s probably time to get the heck out of dodge, while we still can.’

Arthur stopped and looked at him.

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

‘Beats me. I think I heard it on a cowboy film once.’

‘Really!?’

Reaching the road, Arthur found that the barricades from the previous evening had all been removed. The men, too, were gone. The only signs that anything had happened were dozens of scorched patches of ground, all triangular in shape and about the same size.

‘What do you think could cause burn marks like that?’ he asked, crouching down to examine one of them.

‘Giant pizza slices,’ mused the cat, and jumped out of the way as a twig came hurtling towards him.

‘Well, whatever they were, they’ve all been cleared away, by the looks of it.’

Disappointed not to have found anything more and guessing that he probably wasn’t going to now, Arthur left the cat stalking something in the hedgerow and headed to the jetty. On the other side of the lake, yesterday’s crowd had returned; groups of kids were jumping and shouting near the water’s edge, while their parents lay on towels nearby, looking like pink seals.

‘Damn birds!’ meowed the cat, catching up to him.

‘No luck?’ Arthur asked, casting out his fishing line.

‘Luck? Depends on what you mean by luck. I wasn’t trying to eat them, if that’s what you were thinking. Not much into feathers—they’re always getting stuck in my teeth. No, if you must know, I was just trying to teach them a lesson.’

‘Really? What kind of lesson?’

‘I don’t know, just a lesson… What?’ he meowed, seeing Arthur’s puzzled look. ‘Why should there have to be a reason for wanting to teach pesky birds a lesson?’

‘Yeah, but Cat…’

But before he could finish what he was going to say, the tip of his rod dipped sharply.

‘Oh my God. It’s a monster!’ he cried, striking hard and feeling a heavy weight suddenly twisting and pulling on the other end.

‘Speaking of fish, it might come as a surprise to you to know that I’m not into fish much, either.’

‘What kind of cat are you?’

‘The roast chicken kind.’

Arthur laughed.

‘You know that they’re birds too though, right?’

‘Not the way I get served them, they’re not.’

It must have taken a full ten minutes before Arthur was been able to land it. The fish had weaved left and right, breaking the surface, and thrashing about wildly before diving again, attempting to tangle his line in the reeds. Finally managing to haul it onto the jetty, Arthur watched triumphantly as it flopped around on the weathered wooden boards. By far the biggest ever, in his mind he could already picture the expressions on everyone’s faces when he brought it home.