Free Ancient Echoes by Robert Holdstock Page A

I’m not sure …’
    ‘The Spire isn’t ready to be built. The human mind that wants to build it is too far ahead. Dreaming. But the building won’t accept it. The earth won’t accept it. Am I right?’
    Jack didn’t know. He’d prepared several set-answers to do with the book, and with William Golding in general. But mediaeval priests and the construction of churches in the Middle Ages held as much interest for him as … well, mediaeval priests and the construction of churches in the Middle Ages! If the
Antichrist
had featured, Beelzebub, Satanism, maybe some exorcism, even a minor demon or two, the story might have taken on a different dimension.
    ‘It’s a bit dry. It’s about more than the story itself. Subtext, metaphor, all that stuff.’
    ‘I know. I know,’ Garth said wearily. ‘All that stuff.’
    ‘Lots of vertigo, though. That’s cool.’
    ‘But a dry book. Like stone? Like earth?’
    ‘Yeah. I suppose so.’
    Garth smiled. ‘Or maybe you just don’t get it. Yet.’
    ‘I suppose so.’
    ‘And the earth itself may have some surprises for you. Get up, Jack. Get dressed.’
    ‘Why are you here?’
    ‘I told you. I’m expecting to leave today.’
    ‘Leave for where?’
    ‘Good question.’
    ‘What’s happening to you?’ Jack asked gently, suddenly sad.
    ‘The White Whale,’ Garth said, winking at the boy. ‘Come
on.
Get dressed. And make a substantial packed lunch. We have some walking to do.
Vertical
walking,’ he added with a leathery grin. ‘As opposed to horizontal.’
    Jack left a note on the breakfast table, pretending that he had left early for a swim before school, a less frequent occurrence now than a few years ago, but a suitable enough explanation for his absence.
    Garth had hired a car, a sleek, peacock-green Renault whose back seats were now pushed down to make sufficient space for two heavy coils of rope, each with a gleaming grappling hook at its end.
    ‘You
can
drive, can’t you?’
    ‘No. Not officially.’
    Garth spun the wheel too hard for its power-assisted steering and the car skidded and screamed on the road as it sped away towards the hills. ‘Well, that’s too bad. You’ll just have to take a chance. It’s easy enough to handle.’
    As he spoke, he crashed the gears, which complained with ear-splitting stridency. He frowned as he stared down at the gear lever. ‘I’m used to automatics; this was all I could get at short notice. Where’s the overdrive?’
    ‘You’re about to hit the kerb!’
    ‘Shit!’
    By the time they parked, in the thin woodland that ran along the bottom of the Mallon Hills, the day had developed into strong sunshine and warm breezes and Jack felt he had aged ten years, the result of the dowser’s appalling driving. From the car park they could see the traffic heading to Exburgh for the start of the working day. But away from all that, the hills rose in silent, solitary splendour, cloud-shadowed and brilliant with dew. Everything here was fresh, unspoiled, the new season bringing a scintillating green to the land.
    They struck off through the beechwood, found the path, the kissing gate and then the rough track that wound up the firstof the hills, towards the Mallon valley. Garth led the way, his long oilskin coat and heavy leather pack slung over one shoulder, a coil of rope over the other. Jack carried the second grappling hook, and his own knapsack with roast beef sandwiches, two apples and a chunk of game pie.
    At the first summit they gazed over farmland, the river valley itself, and the wooded slopes of Windover Hill, a good hour’s stride away. Garth crouched down and listened to the wind. His face almost shone in the bright sun.
    ‘I know this place so well, now,’ he said. ‘I know the springs, the windbreaks, the snow-shelters, the pipes and caves that riddle the rock.’
    Jack watched the man carefully. Aware of the attention, Garth turned on him, still crouching, then pointed to a clump of trees and a dry-stone