The Adventures of Jill Berrisford

It started to snow; her back-trail would soon be obliterated.

Jill pulled up the hood of her anorak and turned back. She followed her footprints as far as she could; until it was impossible to tell where they had been. The snow became steadily heavier and a stiff wind picked up, from the north. At least, Jill thought it was from the north, she was no longer certain of the direction in which she was going. There was a diffuse glow visible on the horizon, she thought that that had to be coming from the west. The sun would be getting low in the sky by now and there was only one thing to do anyway . . . Roxdale lay to the west. Huddled against the rising wind, she pressed on, keeping the glow in the sky in front and the wind to her right. The glow, however, soon faded and Jill began to think that the wind had changed. She was on the edge of despair. "Lost on the moors, Jill!" she muttered. "How could you be so silly?"

Jill had been warned many a time about this. The weather in these parts could change drastically, from one minute to the next. Intellectually, she had understood, but had not really known it . . . until now. As a result, she had been caught unprepared. Although dressed warmly enough in her jeans and overpants, a thick sweater, boots, thick socks and an anorak, she had no food. No food, that is, except for an apple and a bar of chocolate.

She kept walking, hoping she was not going around in circles. "They have rescue teams, Jill," she told herself. "They’ll come looking."

But she hadn’t told anyone where she was going, apart from the cat, and Malcolm would respect her wish to be left alone . . . for that day at least.

It seemed like hours since the storm had set in. The wind was stronger than ever; but at least the snow had stopped falling. Now Jill was so tired, she was ready to give up. She came to a standstill, turned her back to the wind, sat down in the snow and let her head droop.

"No, don’t go to sleep out ‘ere, love. You’ll freeze to death in this wind."

Jill looked up. Although she could not see her clearly, there appeared to be an old woman standing by her side. "But . . . ? Where did you come from?" she asked, struggling to her feet.

"Oh, I’m always ‘ereabouts. Foller me, I know a place."

Jill wasted no time on questions, she tucked in behind the old woman and followed along. As she walked, the sky began to clear. Now there were faint shadows in the snow and... was that a sliver of moon showing in the cloud wracked sky? The landscape was taking form before her eyes where, a short while ago, all had been a white blur.

There! A deeper shadow, a blacker black amongst the dark. It had to be a building; their destination. There were no lights showing, but that meant nothing. Perhaps the occupants were all in bed? It was late enough. Still, she did wonder fleetingly about the yard light; all the farms hereabouts had one of those. And she did expect to hear a dog barking at their approach. Well, the old woman had said that she knew the place. It must be alright.

"Not even a dog would be out on a night like this!" Jill muttered. "WHUMMPH!" She stumbled into something hard.

"This way, love. Foller the wall."

She felt her way along the drystone wall, until she came to the entrance to the farmyard. The old woman was nowhere in sight. Maybe she had gone in already. "HELLOOO!" she called out, her voice whipping away on the wind. "HELLOOO IN THE HOUSE!" Not a light: Not a sound! Except . . . a ‘Creak-BANG! Creak-BANG!’ carried on the wind. "Oh, where did she go?"

Jill made her way towards the sound, to find a door swinging on broken hinges. "Oh no!" She eased her way past the door and into the house. The place smelled musty, damp; long abandoned. She stood there, out of the wind at last, trying to see what was around her. And, now that she was out of the wind, she could hear something else. Something scurrying. She held a hand to her mouth and stood rigid. Light spilled in through a time streaked window; an eerie glow filled the room. The moon had broken through the clouds at last. A brief glimpse of piercing red eyes . . . and the rats were gone.

Jill turned, startled by the slamming of the door. She took a calming breath, found a piece of scrap wood and wedged the door shut. Rats or no rats, she was not going back out into that wind. Not until daybreak at least. She had almost frozen to death as it was. Probably would have, if the old woman hadn’t come along. Where had she got to? "Probably already bedded down in another part of the house," Jill thought.