Counting Stars Read Online Free PDF Page A

the grass.
    “Think about it! Think!”
    He thought and cried.
    “I think I remember,” he said at last. “I think it starts with The.”
    “Hell’s teeth,” said Colin. “The bloody what?”
    “The Hayning?” said Catherine. “The Crescent? The Green? The Drive?”
    His eyes brightened.
    “The Drive? Yes? The Drive?”
    “I think so. I don’t know.”
    We looked at each other. We looked over the playing fields and rooftops to the distant curved roadway named The Drive.
    “But what time is it?” said Margaret.
    Colin looked at his watch: just time enough, if we hurried and Valentine was right.
    We gathered our things together. We lifted Margaret’s hot figures from the dying embers and laid them in the tin where the eggs and bread had been. She carried the angel that wouldn’t fit, rolling it from hand to hand because of its heat. We hurried out of the Heather Hills and away from the hospital. We kept urging Valentine to move, to hurry, we were doing this for his sake and he should at least try to keep up. He kept stopping, saying he was tired, he was too hot, he wanted to go home, we were being horrible to him. His face was wet and wild and red with weeping. I lost patience with him and half dragged him across the playing fields.
    “Is it near here?” said Catherine as we entered Chilside Road and headed down toward The Drive.
    “He doesn’t blinking know,” said Mary.
    “I think so,” said Valentine. He said yes as we entered The Drive. He wiped his eyes with his fists.
    “Yes,” he said. “That one there.”
    We hesitated as he began to lead us toward it.
    “Don’t leave me yet,” he said, starting to cry again.
    We went to the gate. The garden inside was worn smooth as stone. Someone had been digging a deep hole. A sheet of corrugated steel was thrown across it with Danger Keep Out painted in red. At the side of the house a sleeping mongrel was chained to a clothes post and a fire was smoldering. A man stared from the window, disappeared, appeared at the door. He wore a maroon dressing gown, black boots.
    “Who’s this?” he said.
    “They brung me home,” said Valentine. “My friends.”
    “His brother just left him,” said Mary. She pulled up Valentine’s shirt. “And look what he did to him.”
    “Get in here,” said the man.
    Valentine walked to the door and the man pulled him over the threshold. The door slammed. We heard the yelling from inside.
    “Adrian! Get in here! Many times have I told you not to leave him? Many times have I told you not to hit the little sod?”
    Then there was Adrian’s voice, yelling in pain and cursing, too, and Valentine looking out at us through his tears.
    “Poor little Valentine,” we murmured as he was dragged from our sight.
    “We’ll see him again,” said Catherine.
    “We’ll take him to see Mam,” said Mary.
    “Yes. Someday. Poor little soul.”
    We turned away and Margaret sighed: she was so tired and hot, the way back was so steep. Mam would be so worried if we weren’t there on time.
    The distant rooftops and chimneys of the hospital shimmered in the heat.
    We heard a voice:
    “Here they are! Oh, here they are!”
    It was Mrs. Minto in her garden. She knelt at the border of her lawn with a trowel in her hand. She still had her battered hat on and when she rose and came to the fence we saw the little squares of carpet tied around her knees with string.
    “Fancy that!” she called. “How lovely! How nice to see you all!”
    She stood there beaming, with dirt on her face and a ladybird crawling over the front of her green blouse.
    “Don’t move, now!”
    She trotted off to her open back door and came back with a bottle of sarsaparilla in her hand. She passed it across the fence and we drank and handed it on to each other.
    “Fancy you lot coming past my fence on such a lovely day. Suppose you’re off to see your mam. Give her my love. Make sure, now.”
    She took a packet of biscuits from her pocket and passed them over,