The Night Rainbow A Novel - By Claire King Page 0,68

I say.

I told them to come quickly.

I hope they do, I say. I am worried that if they don’t hurry the wing turbines will set on fire.

Listen, says Margot, and far away I hear the pin-pon-pin noise of fire engines. I am really surprised.

How did you do that? I say.

Margot smiles and wiggles her shoulders. I’m magic, she says.

Just then there is a buzzing in the sky. We look up but the plane is flying past the sun and it is too bright-white to look at even if we squint. Eventually it comes into the blue. It is heading right for the smoke.

I don’t think that is very sensible, says Margot.

Nor me, I say, and we stare at the little plane flying right into the fire. It disappears behind a hilltop, but I can still hear the buzzing.

We have to get over there, says Margot, pointing down past some rocks and bushes, so we can see.

The fire doesn’t seem to be coming that fast towards us; I think we could run away if we had to, so I agree. There is a sort of a path through the prickly yellow coconut bushes and the lavender, where the ground isn’t as rocky, so we follow that. It leads us through big thick bushes covered in flowers like fried eggs. Things skitter away, rustling as we pass.

I wonder where that plane will go when it gets burned up, I say as we walk. Dead oak leaves the colour of bread crusts scrunch under our feet.

It would disappear, says Margot.

But where would the disappeared parts be?

Oh, says Margot. I don’t know. I will have a look on the internet.

It can’t just be there and then not be.

Why not? says Margot. Lots of things do that.

But it must go somewhere.

No, the internet says they just disappear, says Margot. Think about it. If all the dead and broken things had to be put somewhere then our planet would just be a big pile of dead and broken things and we’d have to be climbing over it all the time.

Well, then what about the dead trees that are our floor?

You ask a lot of questions, says Margot.

The path has taken us up a little hill and in between some pine trees. And here we find a very strange thing indeed. There is a house for a very small person, built out of stones. Not stones like our house, though. This one has only got four stones but they are enormous, like squashed boulders. Bigger than people. They have round edges like pebbles but they are not smooth, they are rough. One of the stones is the back of the house, two are the sides. But the strangest thing is the roof, which is just one very big flat rock, balanced on the not-flat tops of the other three.

This, says Margot, is where people used to hide from tigers in the olden days.

Weren’t they worried that the roof might fall off?

They were more frightened of tigers than roofs.

I give the top stone a push. It doesn’t budge.

Inside it is shady and cool and feels like a cave. It is just the right height for me to stand up without banging my head. There is a pile of pine cones and pine needles but nothing else.

It is a shame there are no tables and chairs, says Margot.

Maybe no one lives here now, I say. Maybe I could bring the biscuit tin here and then we wouldn’t have to cross the stream any more. This could be our girl-cave on Windy Hill and we can come here even when it is hot and shelter from storms and bring Claude and Merlin for picnics. And no one would ever find us. Ooh, look at this!

There is a big red stain on one of the walls. We run our fingers along it to see if it comes off but it doesn’t. I wonder what could have made it.

Also we would need to have a proper door, to keep the tigers and the crocodiles out, I say. And a window so that it wasn’t too dark with the door shut.

And a casserole, says Margot. And a sink we could reach to wash our hands.

And some electricity for at night. And some books to read.

Yes, Margot agrees.

I sit down at the entrance and look out at the view. You can see everything from here, all of the hills and the wing turbines and right out over the étangs. The wing turbines are still