The Beginning

The boy could see daylight beyond the wheels of the cart, but something had caught his foot. He pulled against it and felt a sharp sting across his ankle. When he looked down, there was a loop of wire disappearing beneath the black water. He tried lifting his foot instead, carefully this time, and the wire slipped over his heel.

For a while he stood holding the cart. Water dripped somewhere behind him, each drop making the same small sound. His ankle hurt, and he was cold enough that his teeth knocked together when he breathed through his mouth. There was nothing on him to pull tighter. He rubbed his hands over his arms, then bent to look beneath the cart again.

Outside, a man was shouting at a horse.

The boy waited for the shouting to stop before he went towards it. Stones pressed into the soles of his feet, and he kept one hand against the wall where the ground sloped. He knew what a horse was. He knew that the thing beside him was a cart and that he should not touch the little flame burning inside the lamp hooked to its side. But when he tried to remember how he had come into the dark, he could find nothing at all.

Near the entrance, the roof grew higher. There were wooden posts on either side, some split and held together with bands of iron. Between them, the daylight was so bright that he had to stop and put an arm across his eyes. The man outside swore again. Something heavy struck wood, followed by the creak of wheels.

The boy stepped out beside a pile of broken stone.

Rain had fallen recently. He could smell it in the mud, beneath another smell that came from the horse. The animal stood between the shafts of a wagon, broad and brown, with a sack fastened over its mouth. A man beside it was trying to work a pin loose with a hammer. Each time he struck, the horse moved one foot and settled again.

The boy watched him for a moment before trying to speak. His throat hurt. The sound that came out was too small, and the man brought the hammer down once more before he looked up.

He stared at the boy, then past him into the mine.

“Where in God’s name have you come from?” He lowered the hammer, but did not put it down. “Here. Stay where you are. Is somebody in there with you?”

The boy turned because the man was looking over his shoulder. There was only the entrance, the cart inside it and the little lamp. He shook his head, though he did not know whether that was true.

Another man came around the wagon carrying a length of rope. He stopped so suddenly that the loose end swung against his boots. For a moment neither of them moved. Then the second man laid the rope across the wagon and took off his coat.

“Get that round him,” he said. “Look at the state of his feet. Somebody’s had him down there.”

The first man caught his sleeve before he could come closer. He said something too quietly for the boy to hear. The other man looked towards the entrance, and the coat stayed hanging from his hand.

The boy wished they would give it to him. He could see the lining, pale at the cuffs where it had worn thin. Water ran from his hair down the middle of his back, and he folded his arms harder against his chest.

They began asking questions. Whether he belonged to someone in the village. Whether his father worked the mine. Whether he had gone in with the morning men. The boy tried to answer, but each question made him look for something that ought to have been there, and the harder he looked, the more frightened he became.

When they asked his name, he said, “Elias.”

The man with the hammer bent closer. “Elias what? What’s your father’s name?”

He could not answer that. He knew his own name in the same way he knew he was cold, without needing to think about it. Nothing came after it.

More men emerged from a low shed beyond the wagon. One had bread in his hand. Another was wiping his mouth with a rag. They gathered a few paces away and spoke over one another, looking at Elias as though he had done something they were trying to understand.

Someone asked how far inside he had been. Someone else wanted to know which shift had last come up. The man with the coat said again that they ought to cover him, but a grey-haired man near the shed told him to wait.

“No children went below this morning. I counted them through myself.”

“Then he went in last night.”

“And slept where? You’d hear a child down there.”

The man holding the coat glanced at Elias, then back at the others. “You’ll hear him die of cold out here if we stand discussing it much longer.”

He came forward and put the coat around Elias’s shoulders. It was heavy and smelled of smoke. Elias caught the edges with both hands, grateful enough that he almost began to cry. The sleeves hung below his knees.

The grey-haired man made a movement against his chest with his fingers.

Elias watched him do it. Two of the others did the same.

“Fetch the priest,” the grey-haired man said. “Before anyone takes him anywhere.”

The man who had given Elias the coat put a hand on his shoulder and steered him towards the shed. There was a bench against the wall, beneath an overhang that kept off most of the rain. He lifted Elias onto it, then crouched to pull the coat clear of a puddle.

“Sit there a little while. Someone’s coming who’ll know what to do with you.”

Elias held the coat shut and watched him go back to the wagon. He wanted to ask whether he could have a drink, but the men were talking again. One of them used the word devil. Elias knew that word too, and he began looking towards the mine, afraid there was something inside that he had not seen.

---

The priest arrived with mud halfway up his boots and a boy carrying a basket behind him. By then Elias had stopped shivering quite so hard. He had drawn his feet onto the bench, and the man who had given him the coat had brought a cup of water. It tasted of something bitter, but he drank it all.

Father Martin listened to the grey-haired man while he unfastened his cloak. He was broad through the middle, with eyebrows that nearly met and a red mark on one side of his nose. When the man pointed at the mine, the priest looked towards it. When he pointed at Elias, the priest came to the bench.

“I understand you’ve had a bad morning.” He lowered himself with one hand against the wall and took the empty cup from beside Elias. “My name is Martin. You can tell me yours while we find you something to eat.”

“Elias.” His voice sounded clearer now. He watched the basket being set on the ground. “I didn’t take anything.”

The priest glanced up at the men standing behind him. Then he looked back at Elias. “Nobody’s told me you did. Are you hungry?”

Elias nodded, and the priest asked the older boy to open the basket. There was a cloth inside, wrapped around bread and a piece of cheese. Father Martin broke off a small portion of bread and put it into Elias’s hand. He did not ask another question until it was gone.

The man beside the wagon began explaining that none of the workers recognised him. Father Martin listened while he divided the cheese. When the explanation reached the part about the lower workings being closed, he held up his hand.

“I’ll hear the rest in a moment. First I’d like a shirt, if anyone here has a spare. A clean one would be welcome, but I’ll settle for dry.”

No one moved immediately. Then the man with the hammer went into the shed.

The priest returned his attention to Elias. He asked whether anything hurt, and Elias showed him his ankle. There was a red line above the heel, with dirt caught in it. Father Martin leaned close without touching it, then examined the cuts on his feet.

“We’ll wash those. Can you move your toes for me?”

Elias did. The priest nodded as though he had done something useful, and gave him another piece of bread.

The questions that followed were easier than the others had been. Had anyone hurt him? Had he seen somebody in the mine? Did he remember a house, or a road, or being carried? Father Martin waited after each one, but waiting did not help. Elias stared at a button on the priest’s coat and tried until his eyes began to hurt.

“I don’t know,” he said at last. “Am I in trouble?”

“No. You can stop trying for a little while.” The priest reached for the cup and passed it to the boy with the basket. “More water, please. From the house this time.”

The shirt came out of the shed folded beneath a man’s arm. Father Martin shook it open, inspected it and helped Elias into it under the cover of the coat. The hem came almost to his ankles. He had to push his hands through a long way before his fingers appeared.

Behind the priest, the grey-haired man cleared his throat.

“Father, there’s something you ought to consider before you bring him into the village. My brother was on the night shift. He says they heard things below the old passage. Three nights now.”

Father Martin stood, slowly enough that Elias heard his knees click. He took the man a few steps away, but Elias could still hear them.

“What sort of things?”

“Voices. A child, one of the men thought. But they looked. They took lamps down as far as the supports and found nothing. Now this one’s come out without a stitch on him, and he can’t say where he’s from.”

“Then I’ll speak to your brother. If they heard a child, I’d like to know where they searched.”

The grey-haired man lowered his voice, though not far enough. “You know what I’m asking. There’s been talk.”

“There generally is.” The priest glanced towards the bench, then drew the man farther aside. The rest was too quiet for Elias to make out.

He watched their mouths instead. The grey-haired man looked angry now, and that frightened him more than the questions had. Elias pushed the remaining bread into his mouth so that no one could take it back.

When Father Martin returned, he folded his cloak around Elias over the borrowed coat and tucked it beneath his legs. His hands were warm. Elias had not noticed how cold his own had become until one of them disappeared inside the priest’s grip.

“We’re going somewhere with a fire,” he said. “I’ll carry you until we’ve seen to those feet. You may find I’m slower than you’d like, but you’re welcome to complain once we’re up the hill.”

Elias put his arms around his neck. He had meant only to hold on while the priest lifted him, but when he was off the bench he could not loosen them. Father Martin adjusted the bundle against his chest and said nothing about it. As they left the yard, Elias looked over his shoulder at the men, the wagon and the black space between the timber posts. No one came out after them.

---

There was a pot warming beside the kitchen fire when they reached the priest’s house. A woman with flour on her forearms took one look at Elias and pulled a chair away from the table.

“Not there,” she told Father Martin when he started towards it. “The cushion will be soaked through. Put him by the hearth. I’ll bring something.”

Her name was Mistress Bell. She fetched a folded blanket, a basin and a pair of shears, then sent the older boy out for more water. Father Martin sat on a stool with Elias still on his lap until she was ready.

The kitchen was small enough that everything seemed within reach. Strings of onions hung beside the door. There was a split in the table with flour worked white into it, and a black cat slept beneath the bench with its nose tucked under a paw. Elias watched the cat while Mistress Bell washed his feet.

It hurt when the cloth reached his ankle. He jerked away and spilled water onto her skirt.

“I know,” she said, catching his heel before he could put it on the floor. “This part’s unpleasant. You can hold the priest’s hand if you like. He’s got another one.”

Father Martin offered it. Elias gripped two fingers and stared at the cat until Mistress Bell finished. She wrapped a strip of linen around his ankle, then cut another for the sole of his foot. Afterwards she dried his hair so firmly that his head moved with the towel.

By the time she set a bowl of broth in front of him, his eyelids had become heavy. He was afraid to shut them. Each time they dipped, he opened them and checked the door.

Father Martin sat at the table eating bread and an onion. He had hung his wet cloak on a peg and looked smaller without it. Mistress Bell stood beside the hearth, stirring the pot though nothing seemed to need stirring.

“How old would you put him?” she asked quietly.

“Five, perhaps. Somewhere about that.”

She looked at Elias’s hands around the spoon. “About five,” she agreed, and returned to the pot.

Elias knew they were talking about him. He wanted to tell them whether they were right, but he could not find that either. He concentrated on getting the broth into his mouth without spilling it.

After a while, Father Martin asked whether he knew any prayers. Elias shook his head. The priest did not seem angry.

“That’s something we can manage later. Do you remember someone praying with you? Before bed, perhaps?”

Elias looked down into the bowl. A pale piece of onion floated against the side. He tried to imagine a bed, but all he could picture was the bench by the mine, and he knew that was wrong.

“Will they come here?” he asked.

Father Martin put down his bread. “Who do you mean?”

He did not know how to explain. Whoever had taken his clothes. Whoever had gone away while he was in the dark. There ought to have been someone, because children belonged to people; he was certain of that, even if he could not remember belonging to anyone himself.

“The people who left me.”

Mistress Bell stopped stirring. Father Martin leaned forward, his forearms resting on the table.

“Do you remember somebody leaving you there, Elias?”

He shook his head. His mouth had begun to tremble, and he pressed his lips together because he was afraid he might lose the broth if he cried.

“Then we don’t know that they did. Someone may be looking for you. I’ll ask, and I’ll send word farther out than the village. Until we know, you need somewhere to sleep and somebody to take care of you.”

Elias turned towards the hearth. He wanted to stay near the cat and the warm stones, where no one was waiting for him to answer another question. “Can I sleep here?”

“You can sleep here this afternoon.” The priest waited until Elias looked at him again. “Later, there’s a house I’d like to take you to. Good people live there. I’ll come with you, and we’ll see how you get on.”

Mistress Bell watched Father Martin for a moment before she lifted the bowl away. She did not say anything until Elias had been settled on the bench with a blanket beneath his cheek.

He heard the kitchen door open. Their voices moved beyond it.

“Have you asked them?”

“Not yet.”

“Martin.”

“I’ll ask.”

Elias kept his eyes closed. The cat had climbed onto the far end of the bench, and he could feel its weight through the blanket. He listened to Mistress Bell say something else, too softly to understand, then fell asleep before the priest answered.

---

When he woke, the light had moved across the floor. Mistress Bell was sitting at the table with the borrowed shirt spread over her knees. Elias looked down and found himself wearing another one, softer than the first, with the sleeves turned back.

Father Martin came through the kitchen door carrying a pair of small shoes. He set them by the hearth before asking how Elias felt.

The shoes were brown, with one lace darker than the other. Mistress Bell helped him put them on, easing the leather around the bandage. His heels slipped when he walked, so she pushed folded cloth into the toes.

“Only until we find something better,” she said. She watched him take another step, then crouched to retie the darker lace. “Tell someone if they rub. Don’t wait until you’ve made yourself sore.”

They left while she was putting bread into a cloth for them. She caught Father Martin at the door and pushed it into his hands, along with a small pot wrapped separately. Elias could smell something sharp when she lifted the lid to show the priest.

“For his feet,” she said. “And don’t forget what I told you.”

The priest assured her he would not. Outside, he offered Elias a place on his back, but Elias wanted to try the shoes. They walked slowly between the houses, Father Martin keeping hold of his hand.

People looked at them. A woman carrying a bucket stopped at her gate and asked the priest whether it was true. He answered without stopping, and Elias hurried to keep beside him.

At the end of the lane, the houses gave way to a low wall and fields. There were sheep on the slope beyond it, their wool marked with red. Farther off, a man was bending over something in the earth. Elias watched him straighten, press both hands into his back and bend again.

Father Martin pointed out the farm before they reached it. There was a house with pale plaster between dark beams, a barn set a little crooked beside it and a yard divided by hurdles. A brown dog began barking when it saw them, but stopped after a man at the barn called its name.

The man came across the yard wiping his hands on a piece of sacking. He was taller than Father Martin and had a beard cut close along his jaw. One of his sleeves was rolled higher than the other. He looked at Elias, then at the priest.

“She knows you’re coming,” he said. “She’s inside.”

Father Martin nodded. “This is Elias. Elias, this is Thomas.”

Elias tightened his grip on the priest’s hand. Thomas noticed, and instead of coming closer he bent to catch the dog by its collar.

“She’s loud when she doesn’t know someone. Once she’s had a smell of you, she generally loses interest. Best let her come to you when you’re ready.”

The dog sat against his leg, panting. Elias watched its mouth. Thomas waited another moment before leading it towards the barn.

A woman stood in the doorway of the house. She had pushed her sleeves above her elbows, and there was a wet patch down the front of her apron. Father Martin called her Anne. She stepped aside to let them enter, but when Elias passed, her eyes stayed on his shoes.

Inside, the room smelled of woodsmoke and something cooking with onions. A table stood near the window, with a basket beneath it and a knife laid across a board. There were three stools around it. Elias counted them while Father Martin took off his coat.

Anne moved one nearer the hearth.

“Would you like to sit down?” she asked.

He glanced at the priest before he obeyed. The stool was low enough for his feet to reach the floor. He kept his hands between his knees while Anne poured water into a cup.

Father Martin did most of the talking. He explained about the cuts, the broth and the sleep. He set Mistress Bell’s little pot on the table and repeated her instructions. Anne listened closely, asking once how often the bandages needed changing.

Thomas came in and washed his hands in a basin by the door. When the priest mentioned asking after Elias in the neighbouring villages, Thomas looked towards the hearth.

“And until then?” he asked.

“We take a little time,” Father Martin said. “Let him eat. Let him sleep. He may remember more when people have stopped asking him to.”

Anne set the cup beside Elias. Her hands were rough across the knuckles, and one nail was broken very short. When she crouched to look at him properly, he saw that she had been crying. He did not know when.

“Is there anything you won’t eat?” she asked. “I’ve a pot on, but I can make you something else.”

Elias shook his head. He had not understood there could be a choice.

“Stew, then.” She stood and reached for a bowl on the shelf. Her hand stopped in front of a smaller one before she took it down. She held it for a moment, thumb resting along the edge, then carried it to the hearth.

They ate while the light faded outside. Father Martin stayed, though he said twice that he ought to be going. Thomas cut the bread. Anne broke Elias’s piece smaller after watching him try to bite through the crust.

For a while they talked about a gate that needed replacing and whether the rain would hold off the next day. Elias listened without understanding why Father Martin seemed so interested in the gate. No one mentioned the mine.

He was nearly finished when he noticed Anne watching him again. She looked away as soon as he raised his head.

“Did I do something?” he asked.

Thomas put his bread down. Anne looked at him across the table, then moved her bowl aside so that she could lean closer.

“No, Elias. You haven’t done anything.” She rubbed a hand across her cheek, leaving a pale streak where flour still clung to her wrist. “We had a little boy who lived here. Sometimes I miss him, and it makes me cry. That isn’t your fault.”

Elias looked at the bowl in front of him. There was a chip in the rim, worn smooth around the edges. He wondered whether it had belonged to the other boy and whether he should stop using it.

“Will he want his shoes?”

Anne drew a breath but did not answer immediately. Beneath the table, Thomas’s chair shifted.

“No,” she said at last. “You can wear them.”

After supper, Father Martin went into the yard with Thomas. Elias watched the door until Anne asked him to hold a folded cloth while she fetched warm water. She knelt in front of his stool and untied the shoes, setting them side by side beneath the table.

The bandage came away more easily than it had in the priest’s kitchen. Anne worked slowly around the cut, asking him to tell her if she pressed too hard. He kept looking towards the door.

“Father Martin will come back tomorrow,” she said. “He told me before you arrived. You can show him how those feet are getting on.”

“Is he going now?”

“In a little while.”

Elias tried to pull his foot from her hand. She let him, setting the cloth in the basin instead of catching him.

“I can take you outside to say goodbye,” she said. “But let me finish this first, or you’ll have dirt in it again. Would you hold the clean bandage for me?”

He took it because she was waiting, and because the door had not shut behind the priest yet. When she finished, she carried him into the yard in her arms.

Father Martin was beside the gate. He came back when he saw them and rested his hand against Elias’s back.

“I’ll be here tomorrow, after the morning service. You needn’t be dressed on my account.”

Elias reached for his sleeve. He could not help it. “I can come with you.”

“I know you can.” Father Martin let him hold on. “Tonight you’re staying here with Anne and Thomas. They know where to find me if you need me.”

Elias searched his face, trying to decide whether this was what people said before they went away. Behind the priest, the lane was turning grey. He could no longer see the village roofs.

Anne adjusted him against her hip. She did not tell him to let go, and neither did Father Martin. They waited until his hand loosened by itself.

---

His bed was in a small room beyond the kitchen. Anne had turned back the blanket, and Thomas brought a lamp through while she helped Elias out of his clothes. There was a chest beneath the window and a peg on the wall, polished at the end by things that had hung from it.

Thomas set the lamp on the chest. “I’ll leave this while you’re getting settled. The privy’s across the yard, but there’s a pot under the bed. No need to go out in the dark.”

Elias looked under the bed to make sure it was there. When he straightened, Anne had folded his shirt over the end of it. She pulled the blanket up after he lay down, leaving his bandaged foot free until he asked her to cover that too.

From the kitchen came the sound of Thomas moving dishes. The dog scratched at the outer door and was let in. Elias could hear its feet on the floor, then the scrape of something heavy being pushed into place.

“Is he shutting it?” he asked.

“The house door.” Anne followed his gaze to the doorway beside her. “This one can stay open.”

She sat on the edge of the bed while he lay listening. After a while he asked whether she would still be there in the morning. She said she would, and began telling him what happened in the mornings: Thomas went out to the animals, she stirred up the fire, the dog got under everyone’s feet until someone fed it. He would probably hear the hens before any of them.

Elias tried to keep listening, but the words had begun to drift apart. Anne remained beside him until he stopped opening his eyes to check. When she finally rose, she left the door wide enough for the light from the hearth to reach his bed. Through it he could hear Thomas asking where she had put the bread, and Anne telling him it was beneath the cloth by his elbow. Elias turned his cheek against the pillow and listened to them moving around the kitchen until he fell asleep.