One Crow Alone Read Online Free Page B

telephone to phone my mother. Grandmother has sent these.”
    â€œPretty Magda, come and sit on my knee!” Stopko had slurred.
    At least thirty and no wife. Still drunk from his success at the market. Slumped by the dirty stove. With his boots on!
    â€œNearly sixteen now, aren’t you,” he said, waving his hand clumsily.
    But he let her edge around him like a frightened dog. And she called the number written on the faded piece of paper—
    Magda loosened her boots, thought about that last call. Standing in Bogdan Stopko’s house, turned to the wall, speaking to her mother. When she had finished, Stopko wanted to know everything.
    â€œWhat news, young Magda? Come on. I won’t bite. I let you make the call. The expensive call to England. And you can keep the strawberries. Eat them and think of me when you do, ha!”
    But the news—
    â€œShe says things are bad.”
    â€œShe lost her job? She should be looking after her own child. Here. Where she belongs.”
    â€œNo. Not that. She says it is very cold. And food has become too expensive. Even the English are hungry.”
    â€œKeep digging, boys!” Stopko burped.
    â€œShe wants to come back. But there are no buses home. Nothing is working. She says it is turning ugly.”
    *   *   *
    How long ago had she made that call? Months? Magda’s head sank to her knees. It had been the last time she had spoken to her mother. Before, everything had had its place, Babula and Magda quiet together like peas in a pod. Mama sending money from London. Writing letters—telling the story about how they would all be together one day: Magda, Mama, and Babula, an apartment in town—she wrote about her job and the people she worked for, the children she looked after, the shops where you could buy the clothes and shoes and sweets that spilled out of her bag as soon as she walked up the steps of the porch, tired from the long bus journey from England.
    I am saving, saving for your future, my little Magda.
    But then there is the scene before Mama leaves for the bus back to London, the scene where the bedroom door is closed. Babula sending you outside even though you are too old to play.
    Even outside you can hear Mama crying through the shutters.
    And you think to yourself, I will never leave Morochov, or Babula. However many things she brings in her bag.
    And now you must find Mama and tell her that Babula—your own Babula—is dead.
    Magda put another stick on the fire. She thought of the pony out in the cold.
    There is no time to crowd your head with tomorrow’s problems.
    She took a blanket and went out to lay it over the pony’s back. But out in the forest the darkness overwhelmed her, and she fled back to the safety of the fire, shouldering the door, with her heart beating fast.
    Azor lay calm beside the stove.
    You foolish girl! The fears are inside your head.
    And Karlikov—it was so close. As soon as dawn had even thought of breaking, she would be away and safe.
    Worse things could happen.
    â€œWorse things can happen, Azor.” She crouched down by him. “We must wait for dawn.”
    But the dog paid her no attention.
    Out in the darkness something had stirred.
    He pricked his ears. The hackles on his back like bristles.
    He growled.
    Low down in his chest.
    Magda heard the pony stamping and snorting out under the trees.
    She got up. Azor pushed his nose into the gap at the door, scrabbling at the earthen floor.
    Heart thumping, Magda picked up a stick.
    â€œWhat, Azor?”
    She tried to listen. The dog squeezed out—leaping into the dark with teeth bared and hackles up. His long pale back disappeared under the trees.
    â€œAzor!”
    She stood trembling by the hut. A toothlike sliver of light fell out of the doorway and onto the snow.
    She gripped the branch tight and crept out. Fear stabbed under her ribs. The pony whinnied and strained. The rope slipped from the