The Boy at the Top of the Mountain (8 page)

‘Do you think you have a choice in this?’ asked Herta, putting her hands on her hips and staring at him as if he was a member of an alien species. ‘Orders are orders, Pierre—’

‘Pierrot.’

‘You’ll learn that soon enough. Orders are given and we obey them. Every time and without question.’

‘I won’t do it,’ said Pierrot, growing red with embarrassment. ‘Even my mother stopped bathing me when I was five.’

‘Well, your mother’s dead – that’s what I heard. And your father jumped under a train.’

Pierrot stared at her, unable to say anything for a moment. He couldn’t quite believe that anyone would say something so cruel.

‘I’ll wash myself,’ he said finally, his voice cracking a little. ‘I know how to do it and I’ll do it right. I promise.’

Herta threw her hands in the air in defeat. ‘Fine,’ she said, picking up a square of soap and slamming it sharply into the palm of his hand. ‘But I’ll be back in fifteen minutes and I want all that soap to be used up by then, do you understand me? Otherwise I’ll take the scrubbing brush to you myself, and there’s nothing you can say that will stop me.’

Pierrot nodded and breathed a sigh of relief, waiting until she had left the bathroom before taking off the nightshirt and climbing carefully into the bath. Once he was in, he lay back and closed his eyes, enjoying the unexpected luxury. It had been a long time since he’d taken a warm bath. In the orphanage they were always cold, as there were so many children who needed to use the same water. He softened the soap, and when it produced a good lather, he began to wash himself.

The bath water quickly turned murky from all the dirt that had collected on his body, and he buried his head under the surface, enjoying the way the sounds of the outside world disappeared, before massaging his scalp with the soap to wash his hair. When he’d rinsed out all the lather he sat up and scrubbed his feet and his fingernails. To his relief, the soap got smaller and smaller, but he kept washing until it disappeared entirely, relieved that when Herta returned she would have no cause to go through with her appalling threat.

When she came back in – without even knocking! – she was carrying a large towel, and held it out before him. ‘Come on then,’ she said. ‘Out you get.’

‘Turn round,’ said Pierrot.

‘Oh, for pity’s sake,’ said Herta with a sigh, turning her head away and closing her eyes. Pierrot climbed out of the bath and allowed himself to be enveloped in the fabric, which was softer and more sumptuous than any he had ever known. It felt so comfortable wrapped tightly around his small body that he would have been happy to stay in it for ever.

‘Right,’ said Herta. ‘I’ve left fresh clothes on your bed. They’re too big for you but they’ll have to do for now. Beatrix is going to take you down the mountain to get you kitted out, or so I’m told.’

The mountain again.

‘Why am I on a mountain?’ asked Pierrot. ‘What sort of place is this?’

‘No more questions,’ said Herta, turning away. ‘I have things to do even if you don’t. Get dressed, and when you come downstairs, you can find something to eat if you’re hungry.’

Pierrot ran back upstairs to his room still wrapped in the towel, his feet leaving small outlines on the wooden floor, and sure enough a set of clothes had been laid out neatly on his bed. He put them on, rolling up the sleeves of the shirt, turning up the cuffs on the trousers and fastening the braces as tightly as he could. There was a heavy jumper too, but it was so over-sized that when he put it on it hung down below his knees, and so he took it off again and decided to brave the weather.

Walking back downstairs, he looked around, uncertain where he was supposed to go now, but there was no one about to help him.

‘Hello?’ he said quietly, nervous of drawing too much attention to himself but hoping that someone would hear. ‘Hello?’ he repeated, walking towards the front door. He could hear voices out there – two men laughing – and turned the handle, opening it to reveal a burst of sunlight despite the cold. As he stepped outside, the men threw their half-smoked cigarettes on the ground, crushing them underfoot, standing tall and staring directly ahead. A pair of living statues wearing grey uniforms, grey peaked caps, heavy black belts around their waists and dark black boots that reached almost to their knees.

They both carried rifles slung over their shoulders.

‘Good morning,’ said Pierrot cautiously.

Neither soldier spoke, so he walked out a little further before turning round and looking from one to the other; but still neither of them said a word. A sense of their ridiculousness overtook him and he put two fingers to the corners of his mouth, stretched his lips as wide as he could and rolled his eyes, trying not to giggle too much. They didn’t react. He hopped up and down on one foot while slapping a hand back and forth against his mouth, letting out a war cry. Still nothing.

‘I am Pierrot!’ he declared. ‘King of the mountain!’

Now the head of one of the soldiers turned a little and the expression on his face, the manner in which his lip curled and his shoulder lifted slightly, causing his rifle to rise too, made Pierrot think that maybe he shouldn’t talk to them any more.

A part of him wanted to go back inside and find something to eat, like Herta had suggested, as he hadn’t eaten anything in the twenty-four hours since leaving Orleans. But for now he was too intent on looking around, trying to discover exactly where he was. He walked across the grass, which had a white frosting that crackled in a pleasing manner beneath his boots, and looked out at the view. The sight that he beheld was astonishing. He wasn’t just at the top of a mountain; he was on a mountain within a collection of other mountains, each one with huge peaks that rose into the clouds. Their snowy summits mingled with the white of the sky, and the clouds gathered between them, disguising where one ended and the next began. Pierrot had never seen anything quite like this in his life. He made his way round to the other side of the house and looked at the landscape from there.

It was beautiful. An enormous, silent world captured in tranquillity.

He heard a sound in the distance and wandered around the perimeter, staring down at the winding road that led from the front of the house through the heart of the Alps, twisting left and right in unpredictable ways before blurring into the invisible area below. How far up was he? he wondered. He breathed in and the air felt so fresh and light, filling his lungs and his spirit with an enormous sense of well-being. Looking back down at the road, he watched as a car worked its way towards him, and wondered whether he ought to go back inside before whoever was in it arrived. He wished Anshel was here; he would know what to do. They had written regularly to each other when Pierrot was in the orphanage, but the move had happened so quickly that he didn’t even have time to let his friend know. He would have to write soon, but what address would he offer?

Pierrot Fischer,

The Top of the Mountain,

Somewhere near Salzburg

That would hardly do.

The car drew closer and stopped at a checkpoint about twenty feet below. Pierrot watched as a soldier emerged from a little wooden hut before lifting the barrier and waving it forward. It was the same car that had collected him from the train station the night before, the black Volkswagen with the retractable roof, a pair of black, white and red flags blowing in the breeze at the front. When it pulled up, Ernst got out and walked round to open the back door, and Pierrot’s aunt stepped out, the two of them chatting for a moment before she glanced in the direction of the soldiers at the door, then seemed to rearrange her face into a stern expression. Ernst went back and climbed into the driver’s seat, then drove forward to park a little distance away.

Beatrix asked something of one of the soldiers, who pointed in Pierrot’s direction, and she turned and caught his eye. As her face relaxed into a smile, he thought how much like his father she was. Her expression reminded him deeply of Wilhelm, and he wished that he was back in Paris, in the good old days when his parents were both alive and had cared for him and loved him and kept him safe while D’Artagnan scratched at the door longing for a walk and Anshel was downstairs ready to teach Pierrot silent words through fingers and thumbs.

Beatrix raised a hand in the air, and he waited a moment before raising his own in reply and walking over, growing curious now as to what his new life would entail.

The following morning Beatrix came into Pierrot’s bedroom to tell him that they were going to take a trip down the mountain in order to buy him some new clothes.

‘The things you brought with you from Paris were not suitable for here,’ she said, glancing round and walking over to close the door. ‘The master has very strict ideas about such things. And it will be safer for you to wear traditional German clothing anyway. Your own clothes were a little too bohemian for his tastes.’

‘Safer?’ asked Pierrot, surprised by her choice of words.

‘It wasn’t easy to persuade him to let you come here,’ she explained. ‘He’s not accustomed to children. I had to promise that you would be no trouble.’

‘Doesn’t he have any of his own?’ Pierrot had hoped that there might be another child his age who would come when the master did.

‘No. And it would be best if you didn’t do anything to upset him, in case he decides to send you back to Orleans.’

‘The orphanage wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be,’ said Pierrot. ‘Simone and Adèle were very kind to me.’

‘I’m sure they were. But it’s family that matters. And you and I are family. The only family that either one of us has left. We must never let each other down.’

Pierrot nodded, but there was one thing that he had been thinking about ever since his aunt’s letter arrived. ‘Why did we never meet until now?’ he asked. ‘How come you never visited Papa, Maman and me in Paris?’

Beatrix shook her head and stood up. ‘That’s not a story for today,’ she said. ‘But we’ll talk about it another time if you like. Now come along, you must be hungry.’

After breakfast they made their way outside to where Ernst was leaning casually against the car, reading a newspaper. When he looked up and saw them, he smiled and folded it in half, placing it under his arm and opening the back door. Pierrot glanced at his uniform – how smart it looked! – and wondered whether his aunt might be persuaded to buy him something like that. He’d always liked uniforms. His father had kept one in a wardrobe in their Paris apartment – an apple-green cloth tunic with a rounded collar, six buttons running down the centre, and trousers to match – but never wore it. Once, when Papa caught Pierrot trying on the jacket, he had frozen in the doorway, unable to move, and Maman had scolded her son for rooting around in things that were not his.

‘Good morning, Pierrot!’ said the chauffeur cheerfully, tousling the boy’s hair. ‘Did you sleep well?’

‘Very well, thank you.’

‘I had a dream last night that I was playing football for Germany,’ said Ernst. ‘I scored the winning goal against the English and everyone cheered as I was carried off the field on the shoulders of the other players.’

Pierrot nodded. He didn’t like it when people recounted their dreams. Like some of Anshel’s more complicated stories, they never really made any sense.

‘Where to, Fräulein Fischer?’ Ernst asked, bowing low before Beatrix and tipping his cap dramatically.

She laughed as she climbed into the back seat. ‘I must have received a promotion, Pierrot,’ she said. ‘Ernst never refers to me in such respectful terms. Into town, please. Pierrot needs new clothes.’

‘Don’t listen to her,’ said Ernst, taking his place in the driver’s seat and turning the ignition on. ‘Your aunt knows how highly I think of her.’

Pierrot turned to look at Beatrix, whose eyes were meeting the chauffeur’s in the rear-view mirror, and noticed the half-smile that lit up her face and the slight flush of red that appeared on her cheeks. As they drove off, he glanced round through the back window, and got a view of the house as it disappeared from sight. It was very beautiful, its blond wooden frame standing out amid the rugged snowy landscape like an unexpected charm.

‘I remember the first time I saw it,’ Beatrix said, following the direction of his eyes. ‘I couldn’t believe how tranquil it was. I felt certain that this would be a place of great serenity.’

‘It is,’ muttered Ernst under his breath, but loud enough for Pierrot to hear. ‘When
he
’s not around.’

‘How long have you lived here?’ asked Pierrot, turning back to his aunt.

‘Well, I was thirty-four when I first arrived, so it must be . . . oh, a little over two years now.’

Pierrot examined her carefully. She was very beautiful, that much was obvious, with long red hair that curled up a little around her shoulders, and pale unblemished skin. ‘So you’re thirty-six?’ he asked after a moment. ‘That’s so old!’

‘Ha!’ cried Beatrix, bursting out laughing.

‘Pierrot, you and I need to have a little talk,’ said Ernst. ‘If you’re ever going to find a girlfriend you need to know how to speak to one. You must never tell a woman that she looks old. Always guess five years younger than you really think.’

‘I don’t want a girlfriend,’ said Pierrot quickly, appalled by the idea.

‘You say that now. Let’s see how you feel in a few years’ time.’

Pierrot shook his head. He remembered Anshel going all silly over a new girl in their class, writing stories for her and leaving flowers on her desk. He’d had to have a serious talk with his friend about it, but there was nothing he could do to change his mind; Anshel was smitten. The whole thing had seemed utterly ridiculous to Pierrot.

‘How old are you, Ernst?’ asked Pierrot, leaning forward and moving his body into the gap between the two front seats to get a better look at the chauffeur.

‘I’m twenty-seven,’ said Ernst, glancing back at him. ‘I know, it’s impossible to believe. I look like a boy in the first flush of youth.’