Surviving the Evacuation, Book 4 by Frank Tayell

Surviving the Evacuation, Book 4 by Frank Tayell

Author:Frank Tayell [Tayell, Frank]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: General Fiction
Publisher: Frank Tayell
Published: 2016-08-14T16:00:00+00:00


22nd March

And again, she woke up. It was around four a.m., going by the sharp glow on the horizon. Certainly, it was bright enough to see the train tracks and the hedgerows to either side. She pulled herself to her feet, walked stiffly down to the bike, and began to push it north. After a few hundred yards, her muscles warmed, she got on and began to cycle. She managed a few more miles, and was beginning to wonder why dawn hadn’t arrived, when the rain began.

It started light, just a few drops that she found refreshing, but quickly turned into a steady torrent. Within a few minutes she was soaked to the skin. She needed to find shelter. About twenty minutes later, she spotted a spire jutting up above the trees. She guessed she must have passed farms and perhaps other buildings, but they’d been too far from the tracks to see in the rain-filled pre-dawn gloom. Leaving the bike by the tracks, she trudged through a morass of mud as she crossed a field, and approached the church.

It was a small affair, not really more than a chapel, and it was old, judging by the worn stone. But while the church might offer shelter, she needed more than that. She skirted the church to the vicarage, a twee, rambledown cottage with a fussily maintained garden. It looked unoccupied, but she knew appearances weren’t to be trusted. Delineating the church-grounds from the vicar’s small patch of garden was a low picket fence. She crossed to the gate and banged it open and closed a few times. Muffled by the rain she doubted the sound had carried far, but the weather was getting worse. She needed shelter.

The vicarage door was closed and locked. That, she thought, was a good sign. She walked around the cottage until she found a window large enough climb through. Picking up a fist-sized stone from the rockery, she smashed the glass. She listened. Nothing. She climbed inside.

She found herself in a small kitchen. Even in the pre-dawn gloom she could see it was clean. The floor was scrubbed, though now covered in glass. No crockery stood next to the sink. She opened the fridge. It was empty. So were the bins. It took only a few minutes to check the rest of the cottage. The appliances had all been unplugged with the depressing diligence of someone who thought that one day they would be coming back.

Overly conscious of the muddy trail she was leaving on the floor, she climbed the stairs. She rooted around the drawers in the main bedroom - it was far too poky to be called a ‘master’. The clothes were absurdly large. So were the shoes. The vicar must have been at least seven feet tall. With the beams of the cottage at five feet six, she wondered whether the man had been sent there for punishment or chosen it as penance.

She went back down to the kitchen. The cupboards were empty.



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