Diamond Jack by Anna Rainbow

Author:Anna Rainbow
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Chicken House

Lena avoided Bram all through lunch, then she disappeared inside the hideaway without a word. Bram was just beginning to worry, when her sister came down the ladder, with a wicker basket hanging from her arm.

‘Bramble, Ernest, I need to show you something,’ she said.

‘What is it?’ Bram said as she laid out more strips of ivy for Ernest. The wicker basket was overflowing with velvet pouches and her interest grew.

‘You’ll see. Follow me,’ Lena said, stepping into the dappled shadows of the forest.

She still wore her pink dress, though soil crept up the hemline and dead leaves clung to the bodice. Bram fancied that she looked like a girl from a fairy tale, about to take a basket of freshly picked strawberries to her grandmother. An image of a wolf – long ears and even longer teeth – swam into her mind. His face was skull-like and she shuddered.

Agnes was right, Lena wasn’t so bad really.

They left Charlie and Agnes in charge of the camouflage, and trudged through the trees in silence, except for Bertie, who happily yapped the whole while; birds scattered from nearby branches and butterflies danced from blooms. Sunshine broke through the leaves, mottling their skin and the mulch beneath their boots with bright yellow light.

‘Stand and deliver,’ Ernest yelled, as he jumped out from behind trees, his multicoloured jacket vivid amongst the green.

‘Does he ever stop?’ Lena muttered.

‘Never,’ Bram replied.

‘And what’s with the coat?’ Lena said.

‘Hey,’ Ernest said. ‘I like this coat. I made it myself.’ He glanced at her dress and grinned a wicked grin. ‘You know that’s imitation silk, right? You can tell because it doesn’t shimmer in the sun quite as much as real silk.’

Lena glared in response.

Bram’s feet began to ache just as they reached a large clearing, filled with a huddle of stone cottages and the sound of children laughing.

Lena gestured to them to stop at the treeline. ‘Bramble, put on your mask.’

‘I am not going to rob a village,’ she said, horrified.

Her sister simply laughed. ‘Oh, please, we’re going to give to the village.’ She lifted the wicker basket. ‘These pouches are filled with coins, money from hold-ups. I know I always told you that stealing is wrong, and it is, of course it is, but starvation is worse.’

Relieved, Bram pulled the mask from her apron pocket and tied it to her face.

Whoosh. Fizz.

‘That will never stop being cool,’ Ernest said, scooping up a wriggling Bertie.

On entering the village, Bram realized just how poor it was; the cottages looked like they were falling in slow motion, roofs slipping into walls and walls crumbling into mud. The people milling about looked tired and slow. Bram lived in the well-to-do part of town surrounded by busy merchants and people ready to buy. Her family weren’t rich, but they always had enough to eat, fresh clothes, and a roof that kept out the rain. Bram went to school and had gone riding every weekend before her parents died. She’d never seen anything like this, and she took a moment to just take it all in.

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