The Crow Folk Read online

  The scarecrow wobbled to its feet, arms outstretched to her. ‘It’s that man again. It’s that man again!’

  ‘Get out!’ she cried, grabbing a poker and bashing it across the back of the scarecrow’s head. It howled and scurried from the room into the hallway and slammed into the door, falling back onto the stairs. Mrs Teach darted around it, yanked the door open, grabbed it by the scruff of the neck and tossed it out into the street.

  The thing dashed along the pavement as lights began to flick on in neighbouring houses. The door to the Green Man swung open and young Faye was first out, followed by Terrence.

  ‘It’s one of them,’ Mrs Teach cried. ‘One of them scarecrows was in my house!’

  * * *

  There began a shambling pursuit as a few of the Local Defence Volunteers headed off after the fugitive scarecrow. The war had left the village short of athletic males and Faye held out little hope for the success of Terrence, Bertie and a handful of pensioners from the village bowls team who gave chase.

  In the meantime, Faye comforted Mrs Teach in the Green Man with words of sympathy and a gin.

  ‘Tinkety tonk old fruit and down with the Nazis,’ was Mrs Teach’s toast as she knocked it back in one.

  ‘How did it get in?’ Faye asked.

  ‘The back door was unlocked,’ Mrs Teach replied. ‘I’m such a fool. My Ernie used to check it every night and I still haven’t got into the habit myself.’

  ‘But why you?’ Faye asked, squinting one eye and adjusting her spectacles.

  ‘I’m a woman alone,’ Mrs Teach said, fanning herself with a beer mat. ‘Vulnerable and in mourning.’

  More squinting from the girl. ‘So’s Mrs Nesbitt. And Mrs Brew. And if you’re a no-good scarecrow wanting to put the willies up vulnerable ladies, why not try Miss Moon and Miss Leach on the corner? They’re easier targets, surely? The scarecrow would have passed all their houses before reaching yours,’ Faye said, sensing she was starting to get on Mrs Teach’s nerves. ‘It’s almost like the scarecrow knew who you were.’

  ‘All I know,’ Mrs Teach said, her voice trembling, tears glistening, ‘is that creature came to my home in the dead of night and tried to ravage me.’ Her body shuddered with melodramatic sobs, causing Faye to back off and stop asking annoying questions. ‘They must be driven away, the lot of them,’ the widow blubbed. ‘They’re a danger to us all.’

  ‘Just last night you was telling us all to let them be.’

  ‘That was before I had one of them break into my house and try and get up me nightie.’

  Faye had the decency to blush with shame and she shut up. That’s when they both heard the cries from outside. ‘We got it!’

  * * *

  Faye had tried to convince Mrs Teach to stay safe inside, but the widow was having none of it. The pair of them marched out into the street where they found Terrence, Bertie and the other Local Defence Volunteers dragging a thrashing figure to the war memorial. As Faye got closer, she could see its sackcloth head. It was a scarecrow. A living scarecrow. She would never get used to the idea, and a part of her wanted to take the sack off its head and see what was underneath. But first she had to deal with the creature’s captors, who were so excited they had actually caught it that they didn’t quite know what they should do next.

  ‘Interrogate the cur,’ declared Mr Marshall, the captain of the bowls team, trembling with anger.

  ‘We should give it a bunch of fives,’ Mr Baxter the ironmonger said, clenching his fists but not going so far as to raise them.

  ‘Tie it up first,’ Terrence said. ‘We’ll need some rope, though.’

  ‘Or a whistle, maybe?’ Bertie asked. ‘We should call a constable.’

  ‘First sensible idea I’ve heard,’ Faye said. ‘Constable Muldoon just left. If we hurry—’

  ‘No police,’ Mrs Teach said in a voice that cut through the confusion and would brook no dissent.

  Except from Faye. ‘Mrs Teach, we have to—’

  ‘No police,’ Mrs Teach repeated, not taking her eyes off the scarecrow. ‘Stand aside.’

  Bertie and the bowls team all looked to Terrence, who in turn looked to Faye, and she got the peculiar feeling they thought she was in charge, which was nonsense as it was perfectly clear it was Mrs Teach who had taken control. Nevertheless, Faye nodded and the menfolk released the scarecrow and backed away.

  The creature reached up to her. ‘Philomena,’ it said.

  Surreptitious glances were shared all around. The only person who ever dared to call Mrs Teach by her Christian name was her late Ernie. How could this thing know her so?

  Faye looked on as Mrs Teach crouched down, took one of the creature’s gloved hands in hers and gently squeezed it, looking into its button eyes all the while. Mrs Teach leaned closer and whispered to the scarecrow. She spoke for some while and it nodded three times in response to questions Faye could not hear. Mrs Teach gave the thing a long embrace and it lay back on the stone steps of the memorial as if readying for sleep.

  Once the scarecrow was still, Mrs Teach tugged its shirt open, popping the buttons which clattered on the steps. She thrust a hand into its body, right where its heart would be, and began to pull it apart with her fists, tossing great clumps of straw into the air behind her again and again and again. The scarecrow did not protest as she whipped off its sackcloth head, revealing only straw stuffing, and it was the work of moments for her to take that apart, too, followed by the arms and legs. Terrence, Bertie and the bowls team backed off, shielding their eyes from the floating particles of dust in the night air, but Faye stood her ground, unable to look away. Mrs Teach quickly reduced the scarecrow to naught but baggy clothes and dried strands of corn stalks on the cobbles.

  And then it was gone. A gust of wind swept down the street and all that was left were the clothes.

  Mrs Teach remained on her knees for some time, facing the ground in silence, though Faye thought she detected a little sob.

  ‘Job done,’ Mr Marshall said with all the certainty of a man who had just opened the larder door but had quite forgotten what he was looking for.

  ‘Quite,’ said Mr Baxter, similarly befuddled. ‘Well, I must be off.’

  ‘Me, too,’ Bertie said, scratching his head as he limped away down the Wode Road.

  Faye watched, incredulous, as the men wandered in uncertain zigzags back to their homes. She was left standing by the war memorial looking over the clothes of the late Ernie Teach laid out on the cobbles.

  Terrence stayed by Faye’s side. She took his hand. ‘Don’t you go nowhere,’ she told him.

  ‘I’m not sure I could anyway,’ Terrence said, his face wrinkled in confusion.

  Mrs Teach stood, turned to face them, raised her chin and said, ‘I am rather tired and I should like to go home now. Goodnight to you, Faye, Terrence.’

  ‘What just happened, Mrs Teach?’ Faye asked.

  ‘What do you think happened?’

  Faye glanced at her father as if to apologise before replying, ‘Magic? Witchery?’

  ‘You’re tired, girl,’ Mrs Teach replied. ‘As am I. We should retire to bed and forget what happened here.’

  ‘I’m not sure I can,’ Faye said.

  ‘Me neither,’ said Terrence, still open-mouthed in astonishment.

  Mrs Teach smiled at him. ‘I understand.’ She took a small perfume bottle from her dressing-gown pocket and sprayed a tiny puff in Terrence’s eyes. He shook his head, blinking tears. Mrs Teach took his chin, looked into his eyes and commanded, ‘Forget.’

  Terrence became still and nodded.

  ‘What have you done to my dad?’ Faye rushed forwards and took his arm. ‘Dad? Dad?’

  ‘He’ll be fine.’ Mrs Teach remained calm as she put the perfume bottle away. ‘The others cannot understand what they saw, so their minds tell them it never happened. Your father is more open to the arcane through his association with your dear departed mother. Come and see me, Faye. Not tomorrow, not on a Sunday. Come for elev
enses on Monday. We’ll have tea and I’ll tell you what you saw.’

  ‘I know what I saw.’

  ‘But you cannot explain it,’ Mrs Teach said. ‘I can. Monday. Elevenses.’ Mrs Teach wiped a tear from her eye as she walked to her front door and stepped inside.

  ‘Dad?’ Faye shook her father and he took a deep breath through his nostrils as if waking from a nap.

  ‘Faye?’ He looked around at the war memorial and the empty village. ‘Have I been sleepwalking again?’

  20 NORMAL GIRLS

  Church wasn’t the same without bells. The bells called the villagers to the service. The bells were Faye’s purpose and focus on a Sunday morning. And because the bells finished ringing once everyone was inside the church, they gave Faye an opportunity to sneak off before the service started so she didn’t have to sit through the boring rigmarole of hymns, prayers and sermon.

  No such luck today. No ringing before the service, no ringing a quarter peal for her mother later that day and no escape from the service.

  ‘Oh, come on, Dad. Let me skip just this once.’

  ‘If I have to suffer, then so do you.’

  He hadn’t mentioned anything about the events of last night and Faye didn’t dare bring it up. Over breakfast he said he’d had his best night’s sleep in years. He was happy and full of energy and Faye didn’t want to set that off balance.

  ‘You’re coming to church,’ he told Faye. ‘Wear a nice frock for once. Be normal.’

  ‘Normal?’ Faye snorted. As if anything in this village could be normal ever again. ‘This is not normal.’ Faye stood before the hall mirror in her Sunday-best floral-print frock, which she outgrew last summer and had a hem that was now way above her scuffed knees. ‘I can’t wear this,’ she told him. ‘I look like an overgrown seven year old.’

  Dad stood next to her, adjusting his tie. He made several attempts to tell her that she looked fine, but in the end, he could only pat her on the shoulder. ‘There’s one of them clothing exchanges in the church hall after the service,’ he told her. ‘Maybe you can get something nice there?’

  ‘Can’t I just wear my dungarees?’

  ‘In church? Certainly not.’

  ‘How about my ARP uniform?’

  ‘Oh, and I suppose you want to sit there with a tin hat on your head, too?’

  Faye beamed and nodded.

  Terrence shook his head and scruffed her hair. ‘You’re a funny old fish, aren’t you?’ he said with a smile. ‘When you arrived, your mother and I were over the moon. A lovely little girl, we said, who’d wear dresses, play with dollies, have her hair in bunches or pigtails. Look at you now. You’re more likely to end up in pig muck.’

  Faye shrugged. ‘Least I’m handy around the pub.’

  ‘Tell you what,’ Terrence said, raising a finger. ‘I’ll let you wear your ARP uniform – minus the tin hat – if you wash the pub windows this morning.’ He extended his hand and Faye shook it.

  ‘You, dear Father, have got a deal.’

  * * *

  And that’s how Faye found herself in church in her ARP bluette boiler suit. It was far too baggy for her, and it got her some funny looks as she took her seat, but at least no one could see her knees. She sat next to her dad in the pews by the porch of the north transept. The door had been left open and a draught crawled around her ankles. Only a church could be so cold on such a lovely summer Sunday. Faye folded her arms and crossed her legs to keep warm as the Reverend Jacobs gave a patriotic sermon on ‘being vigilant’. On cue, Faye’s bottom started to go numb and she fidgeted to get comfy.

  Miss Moon hammered the keys of the church organ and everyone stood to sing ‘Jerusalem’. Miss Moon’s playing slowed to a crawl after the first verse, as did everyone singing along with her. She had to cough to wake Miss Leach, who had nodded off on sheet-music duty. Miss Leach jolted awake, turned the page of the organ music and the hymn resumed its regular pace.

  As Faye sang, she looked around the church in idle curiosity. The old flags from the Great War, the tatty carpets around the altar, the stained-glass windows, the strange shadowy figure skulking by the porch door.

  She gave a little yelp, dropping her hymn book in fright.

  The singing faltered as some of the congregation turned and stared at her. Her father shook his head in disapproval and the singing returned to its usual volume as Miss Moon hit a few bum notes before getting back on track. Faye grimaced in apology, crouching to pick up the hymn book. As she did so, she caught sight of a long shadow creeping around outside. It wore a dress and a summer hat.

  One of the scarecrows? The one who wanted Craddock? Suky?

  Without daring to look at her father, Faye slipped from the pew, through the transept porch and out into the sunshine just in time to see the shadow hurrying around the back of the church.

  Faye, wobbly legs telling her to turn back and heart thumping, took off after it. Like the LDV men last night, she wondered if she would know what to do with a scarecrow if she caught one. Drag it before the village congregation as proof that she wasn’t losing her mind? Confront it about Craddock and demand to be taken to him? Faye told herself she would know when she caught it. And that would be any second now as she could hear the thing whispering by the entrance to the vestry.

  Faye leapt around the corner, hands like claws, ready to grab. ‘Gotcha. Oh.’ She stumbled to a halt.

  ‘Faye Bright, what the bloody hell are you doing?’

  It was Milly Baxter in her Sunday-best summer frock and straw hat. She was with Betty Marshall, also resplendent in a pretty dress. Both were leaning towards one another, cigarettes on lips, a lit match between them.

  ‘Oh, sorry,’ Faye said, taking a step back. ‘I thought you were… Well, not you.’

  ‘Don’t you dare snitch, Faye Bright, or I’ll get my brother to duff you up,’ Milly declared, shaking the match out.

  ‘In’t he fighting in Malta?’ Faye asked.

  ‘Yes, but he’ll do it when he comes home. I have a list.’

  ‘Don’t tell my mum and dad,’ Betty Marshall begged, hiding the unlit cigarette behind her back. ‘They’ll half kill me.’

  Milly gave Faye the side-eye. ‘What are you doing out here anyway?’ she asked. ‘You look as guilty as we do.’

  ‘Nothing. I thought I saw… Don’t matter.’

  ‘Thought you saw what? A scarecrow?’ Milly grinned.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Word is you’re telling everyone that scarecrows are coming to life and stealing babies at night.’

  ‘What? I never said that.’

  Betty added, ‘I heard you took Bertie Butterworth out to the woods to turn him into a scarecrow.’

  ‘Like anyone would know the difference,’ Milly cackled, and Faye resisted the urge to thump her for being rude about Bertie.

  ‘Maybe you pair need to get your ears cleaned out,’ Faye told her, ‘cos everything you’re hearing is wrong.’

  ‘That so?’ Milly looked up and down at Faye’s ARP uniform and snorted. ‘Like your outfit.’

  Betty giggled. ‘Proper Sunday best.’

  ‘Oh, shut your cakeholes,’ Faye said, stuffing her hands in her pockets and turning back for the church porch. That’s when she spotted someone cross the road to Perry Lane. Miss Charlotte. And she was pushing a wheelbarrow. She was out of sight in moments, but they all saw her.

  ‘That one’s off her rocker an’ all,’ Milly Baxter said, scratching a new match to life and lighting her cigarette. ‘You two would get on like a house on fire.’ Faye ignored their silly giggling and walked away.

  * * *

  Faye didn’t dare go back into the church. From the sound of it, the service was as good as over. She could hear them singing ‘Abide with Me’, and Reverend Jacobs always ended with ‘Abide with Me’. She leaned against the lychgate as the congregation slowly filed out into the summer sun. Bertie was one of the first to emerge and came limping over to her.

  ‘Not the
same without bells, is it?’ he said with a tut.

  ‘Definitely not.’

  ‘Nice service, though,’ he said.

  ‘It was the same as last week’s, and the week before.’

  ‘Even so, shame you missed half of it. What happened?’

  Faye briefly wondered if she should tell him the truth. That she was jumping at shadows and how she had discovered that Milly Baxter was a two-faced cow. ‘I don’t like that song “Jerusalem”,’ Faye said in the end. ‘I walked out in protest.’

  ‘Why?’

  Faye thought for a second. ‘Builded ain’t a proper word. And was Jerusalem builded here? I mean, what sort of half-arsed question is that?’

  ‘It’s just an old word, ain’t it? Hymns have all sorts of old words we don’t use any more. Words we forget.’

  ‘That ain’t all we forget. Look at ’em. Mr Marshall there. Mr Baxter, too.’ Faye nodded at the happy congregation chatting away on the church steps. She wasn’t a vindictive person, but the temptation to snitch on Milly Baxter and Betty Marshall as they mingled with their parents was almost irresistible. ‘You’d never think they saw a straw man torn to pieces last night.’

  ‘Saw a what?’ Bertie flared his nostrils when he was puzzled.

  ‘One of them crow folk. Last night,’ Faye said, but Bertie’s nostrils only got bigger. The bigger the nostrils, the greater the confusion. You could stick corks up them, Faye thought to herself. ‘He nearly gave Mrs Teach a heart attack, and you and the rest of the Old Contemptibles chased after it and… and you haven’t got a clue what I’m going on about, do you, Bertie?’

  ‘Yeah, yeah, no, er… I remember… there was an intruder… or a burglar… or something, and then we chased him off and…’ Bertie’s eyes rolled skywards as he tried to recall. ‘I’m a bit knackered, to be honest. Long day yesterday. And I haven’t had me breakfast.’

  ‘Where’s Mrs Teach? She’ll remember.’ Faye scanned the dispersing congregation.