Mad Dog Moonlight (20 page)

‘We're lost,' she said. ‘You think I don't know what I'm doing?' Uncle said.

‘I think the entire family, following after us,
knows
you don't know what you're doing!' Aunty said.

Uncle laughed and said, ‘Relax.' He drove them over open moorland, down in deep dark valleys and out again, through forestry commission land densely planted with rows of conifers, beside rivers, up and
down tiny switchback roads, and along lanes so unused that grass grew up the middle of them.

Finally, when Aunty declared that she'd given up all hope of their ever stopping before it got dark, Uncle pulled off the road into an official designated campsite, complete with Welsh and European flags, public lavatories, tourist information boards, taps of running water and way-marked nature trails.

The place was as unexpected as it was unlikely. What all these amenities were doing in a remote corner of Plynlimon, Mad Dog couldn't imagine. Tentatively he got out of the car. There was an area for tents and camper vans on one side of him, set back between trees, and a picturesque view down to a riverbank on the other, with picnic tables, a place for making barbecues and a covered shelter in case of rain.

This was an entirely different Plynlimon to the one that Mad Dog had seen before – and he felt relieved. Telling himself that nothing strange could ever happen in a place like this, he trailed down to the river, which turned out, according to a way-marked sign, to be the Hafren, also known as the Severn.

Uncle called him to come back and help, but he pretended he hadn't heard, and so did all the other Lewis and Williams children, including Luke, Rhys and Hippie. The river was shallow enough to play in, and they charged in without stopping to take off their shoes and proceeded to kick water in each other's faces, laughing and shrieking and running about. In just a few days' time their new big school would claim them. But, just for now, they could lark about and still be little kids.

Finally they trailed back to the picnic site, wet and shivering, hoping that their mothers had thought to bring changes of clothes. Here they found a campfire built and Aunty's sisters cooking over it while she sat with her feet up, doing nothing, as befit the birthday girl. The sun was lowering and the day was golden and mellow. They crouched around the fire to eat food on plastic plates, drink Aunty's health and watch her blow out the candles on her cake. Then one of the sisters' boyfriends got out a guitar and they all started singing.

Aunty sat back, full and contented, her family around her just like in the old days before the Aged Relative's inheritance had become their poisoned chalice. It was beginning to get dark by now, and someone said what a shame it was that they'd have to go. But then, a beer or two later, someone else said, ‘Who
says we should go?
' and suddenly the talk was all of how many blankets they'd got between them and whether, with the help of coats and cushions, they could make themselves comfortable for a night under the stars.

It wasn't what they'd planned, but everyone agreed that it was the sort of opportunity that, when it came along, had to be seized. Someone poked the fire and set it sparking. Someone else went off for a fresh supply of wood to see them through the night. The beers went round again, by which time nobody was fit to drive anyway.

Soon half the family was asleep, lulled by fire and song. Mad Dog watched them dropping off one after another. The last to go was Aunty.

‘This has been the best birthday ever,' she said.
‘Shame I had to get to forty before it happened. But, now it has, I don't want the day to end.'

‘I don't either,' Mad Dog said. ‘I wasn't sure to begin with, but I'm glad I came.'

‘You do know, don't you, that if ever you wanted to talk …' Aunty began.

‘… that you'd be there for me,' Mad Dog said.

They both laughed. Aunty said she knew what a pain it must be having someone like her always trying to get inside his head. Mad Dog said he wished that she could. If he could make it happen, he would. In fact, if he could get inside his own head he'd make that happen too.

But Aunty never heard him. Her eyes had proved too heavy and she'd fallen asleep. Mad Dog smiled and pulled a blanket over her. Then he reached for another one, rolled up in front of the fire and tried to sleep as well.

But it wasn't as easy as it looked. Everybody else had dropped off, even Luke, who'd sworn he was going to stay awake all night. Mad Dog itched with restlessness, tossing and turning until he couldn't bear it any more. The harder he tried to sleep, the more awake he felt. What was the matter with him?

In the end, he got up, built up the fire and walked around the campsite. Even in the darkness, it was surprising how much he could see. With nothing but firelight to help him, he could even read the information boards.

They told him nothing he didn't know already from his project at school, but he read them anyway, mugging up on kingfishers and otters, mountain ponies and foxes. He read up on snakes, and how to
recognise their different skins. Read up on skylarks and their nesting habits. Memorised wild orchids and which toadstools not to touch.

This was the real Plynlimon, wasn't it? The mountain on these information boards was a world away from washrooms, tarmac car parks and shelters from the rain. And suddenly Mad Dog wanted it again. He wanted cotton-grass and gadflies, ponds full of lilies and mountain springs bursting out of secret places. They were out there, and he felt them calling him.

Mad Dog drew in his breath. He stood there trembling, not quite understanding what was happening to him. Then, behind him, Aunty stirred and the spell was broken. Twice the mountain had lured him away, but not this time.

This time he had more sense.

Long after the fire had burned out, Mad Dog heard dogs barking. No one else heard them, only him. No one else sat up, took a quick look around to check that everything was all right, then drifted off to sleep only to awaken later as if an alarm clock had gone off inside their head, shrilling the words
it's time
.

Mad Dog sat up like a shot, wanting to believe that he'd dreamt those words but knowing he'd really heard them. He tried to go back to sleep, but something inside his head shouted that it wasn't for sleep that he'd been brought back here to Plynlimon. It wasn't for pretending he hadn't heard things when he had.

Mad Dog got up, knowing he had no choice. This wasn't a matter of staying close to Aunty and keeping safe. It was a matter of doing what he had to. He crept away, telling himself that if there was any reason for his being here, it wasn't for staying wrapped up in blankets, but for following whatever had called him and seeing where it led.

Stepping over Aunty, Mad Dog disappeared into the night. ‘You won't even know I did this,' he whispered. ‘I'll be back before you wake up.'

Then he was gone, taking the way-marked path down to the river, before following the river up through the forest, heading for its source. Somewhere up there, he told himself, high on Plynlimon in the
wild places where the snakes and the red kites lived, was the one thing he was looking for. The mystery. The treasure. The answer to his questions. Whatever.

Mad Dog walked through the darkness and never felt lost. Every other time on Plynlimon, its vastness had overwhelmed him. But, this time, every tree he passed and every twist and turn along the riverbank felt like an old friend. Climbing Plynlimon felt as easy as walking round his own garden.

Eventually the forest fell behind Mad Dog. He scrambled over a stile and found himself on the open mountaintop. The night was cloudy, not a star in sight. But he didn't need starlight to know where he was. He could smell the mountain all around him, peaty and alive.

Mad Dog walked for miles across the silent grasslands. At one point, he found himself at the
ffynnon
of the Severn, surrounded by a sea of duckboards. He stopped to look at the little bit of black bog, clogged with lichen, that marked its source, marvelling that this could be the start of anything big enough to become so mighty a river. Then he carried on, passing close to the Wye's source too, though not stopping to look for it because the words
it's time
drew him on.

But time for what? Mad Dog didn't know. All he knew was that the night seemed to go on for ever, day never breaking and the sky never getting any lighter. On the far side of Plynlimon, he picked his way down a tricky little rocky gully, not knowing where it was leading but feeling perfectly at home – and that even before he saw the van.

It was in the bottom of the valley – a broken-down,
rusty thing, crouching like a dead beast on the side of the track. At first Mad Dog assumed that it was empty and abandoned, but then the smell of wood smoke came his way and he looked again and noticed a thin strand of smoke winding out of a tin-can chimney.

Immediately Mad Dog's heart started turning like a piston. He knew that smell of wood smoke, didn't he? And he knew that chimney too. In fact, he even knew that van – and a long, low breath came whistling out of him like a train out of a tunnel. Of course he knew that van! There were curtains at the windows, and he knew those curtains. And he knew the lights behind those curtains.

They were the lights of home!

Mad Dog cried out loud. No wonder Plynlimon had felt like his back garden! It
was
his back garden. At least, it had been all those years ago!

He started running. Someone inside the van must have heard him because a door opened. A woman appeared in a handful of yellow light. She had long hair, a flowing skirt, a tea towel in one hand and a baby in the other.

She was Mad Dog's mother.

His mother!

Mad Dog stumbled towards her. Strange sounds came out of his throat, meant to be words but completely indecipherable. Mad Dog's mother waved to him, but she didn't come to greet him. Instead, in measured tones – as if he'd only just stepped out to play and this was just another ordinary day – she called, ‘There you are. I was just wondering how long you'd be. Supper's on the table. Come and eat.'

Mad Dog wanted to hug her, but she'd already
turned back inside. In a state of confusion, he followed her, only to find his dad, of all people – his dad,
his dad!
– sat perched on an all-too-familiar bench at a tiny, all-too-familiar, fold-up table. When he saw Mad Dog, he showed not a flicker of surprise. He didn't hug him or get up. He didn't even scold him or ask where he'd been. And as for how much he'd grown – neither he nor Mad Dog's mother made a single comment.

‘You'd better wash before you eat. Your hands are filthy,' was all that either of them said.

Mad Dog couldn't work it out. None of it made sense. What was going on here? Where were his mother's tears? Why didn't his dad want to know where he'd been? What was wrong with his parents – and
who was that baby?

When Mad Dog had washed his hands, his dad made room for him on the bench. There they were, all together again for the first time in years, and Mad Dog mightn't have been away at all. Never once, in all his dreams of finding his parents, had he imagined it would be like this. His parents looked unchanged by the years, as did the van. But he had changed, and he wanted everybody to comment on how big he was, how tall and grown up, what a different boy from the one who went away.

Instead, Mad Dog's parents carried on as if nothing much had happened since he'd gone. His dad went on about some problem to do with the van's engine, which would cost a fortune to repair. His mum went on about the baby. She didn't ask about Elvis. Maybe one baby was much like any other as far as she was concerned. Maybe Elvis was forgotten and she didn't
miss him, just as she obviously hadn't missed Mad Dog.

After supper, Mad Dog's mother folded up the table and his dad pulled down their beds. The little fold-down cot, which had once been Elvis's, now belonged to this new baby, but Mad Dog's bed was still his own. He expected it to be too small for him but, when he climbed in, he found that it fitted perfectly.

His mother tucked him in as if he was still a five-year-old, then, taking a coat off the back of the door, she went and sat on the step to give the baby its final feed. Mad Dog's dad went and sat with her, and Mad Dog was left alone.

He lay looking around the van, marvelling that everything – every last, single thing – was exactly the same. You'd have thought there'd been some changes, but even the same bucket stood in for a sink. The kitchen cupboards were just the same, showing off his dad's carpentry skills. And the exact same bits of silver jewellery were scattered about everywhere, made by Mad Dog's mother.

Mad Dog fell asleep at last, comforted by the sameness of it all. But when he awoke later he found that his parents still hadn't come to bed, but that the step was empty.

Mad Dog called, but no one replied. He went and stood on the step, but couldn't see a soul outside and a sense of panic washed over him. Surely he couldn't have found his parents again, only to lose them! What sort of carelessness was that?

Mad Dog called again. Still no one replied, but this time, somewhere off in the darkness, he caught a sound of singing. A sense of relief washed over him.
Singing
, he told himself. Only singing – and how many times had his dad gone off in the night to sing to himself beneath the stars? There was nothing to worry about here. All that had happened was that his mother had gone with him, taking the baby.

But the sense of having nearly lost something was hard to shake off. Mad Dog started following the singing, anxious to rejoin his family. The stony track outside the van led him up a small hillock from which he could see a campfire down the other side. He couldn't see his parents, but he could hear his father singing and his mother laughing.