Uprising

Chapter Seventy-Five

Joel’s saviour’s name was Gheorghe. He seemed a man of easy ways, smiling and laughing constantly, and it was obviously of no concern to him at all that neither of them could understand anything the other was saying. The truck bounced and rattled its way up the winding mountain passes. Every so often the walls of the pine forest would drop away and Joel caught a glimpse of the dusky mountain landscape behind.

The warmth of the heater blasted away the chill from his hands and feet, and he felt his resolve beginning to return like a spreading whisky glow inside him. After a while he even relaxed enough to tell a joke, some daft thing Sam Carter had had the office in an uproar with a while back. Gheorghe plainly didn’t understand a word but nonetheless found it so amusing he had to wipe tears from his ruddy cheeks. Then, in the chuckling pause that followed, Joel threw away his caution and tentatively asked about Vâlcanul.

And he knew right away he was on to something, because that was when Gheorghe suddenly clammed up tighter than if he’d been slapped. There was no more laughter, no more joking, and a deep silence fell over them. Any other time, Joel might have regretted killing the atmosphere of camaraderie they’d struck up — but his heart was racing and his hands trembling with excitement. He had no idea what road he was on, but he knew now that it was the right one.

It wasn’t long afterwards that the truck’s headlights picked out the mossy roof of a log house through the trees, then another, then the steeple of an old wooden church.

Gheorghe seemed keen to continue alone, and the small village looked to Joel like a place where he could carry on his investigation. They parted amicably, almost apologetically, and Gheorghe took off up the road looking relieved.

Joel sighed and made his way into the heart of the tiny hamlet. The temperature had dropped a couple of degrees while he’d been with Gheorghe, and he dug his hands deep in his pockets as he walked. Light from the rambling rows of log houses spilled out onto the unpaved road; he could smell the woodsmoke drifting from their chimneys.

As he walked on, he heard the sound of hooves from out of the gloom, and moments later a horse-drawn carriage passed by in the opposite direction, carrying a load of firewood. Just a few miles from the tourist trade of Sighişoara, and a few hours from the modern city bustle of Bucharest, he was in a whole other world. The place was a time capsule.

Light and music drew him towards what seemed to be the village’s only bar. A few drinkers turned to stare at him and eyed his rucksack and case as he walked in, ducking to avoid the low beams. He didn’t feel up to beer, and paid a few lei for a coffee. While he sipped it, sitting on a stool at the bar, he caught the eye of the barman and dared to mention the name Vâlcanul again. All he got were a lot of strange looks, but that didn’t deter him. Feeling braver now, he left the bar and stopped the first people he met in the street outside, a pair of tiny elderly women who looked like sisters. In the faltering mixture of sign language and pidgin English he was developing, he asked them the same question. ‘Can you tell me where I can find a place called Vâlcanul?’

The women shot glances at one another and scurried on past him. Joel wasn’t sure whether they’d understood his attempt at communication and was heading further down the street to find someone else to ask when he was halted by a shout from behind him. He turned to see an old man hobbling with a stick towards him. The two ladies watched from a distance.

The old man had a shaggy mane of pure white hair, skin like tanned leather and no teeth. He spoke even less English than Gheorghe, but the wary glint in his eye gave a clear message. Why are you looking for Vâlcanul?

Then it really did exist. Joel was trying to formulate his next question when the old man grasped his arm with a bony hand of surprising power, waving his cane at one of the houses. He seemed to want him to come back there with him. Joel followed, wondering where this was leading.

A woman emerged from the finely crafted wooden door of the house, framed in the light from the hallway. She was in her fifties and bore a strong resemblance to the old man, but with black hair and a full set of strong white teeth — she was clearly his daughter. Her father spent a couple of moments jabbering at her in quick-fire Romanian, and she looked at Joel with concern.

‘You are American?’ she asked in English. Noticing his surprise, she added, ‘I am a teacher.’

‘I’m from Britain,’ Joel said. ‘I’m looking for—’

‘I know what you are looking for,’ the woman interrupted him. ‘Why do you wish to find this place?’

‘Can you tell me where it is?’

‘This is not a place you should go.’ She seemed unwilling to mention its name.

‘Nobody goes there. Nobody lives there any more.’

‘You’re sure?’

‘Stay away from that place.’ She pointed at the case. ‘You are photographer, yes? Many beautiful pictures you can take here. No need to go to…to there.’

‘I’m not a photographer,’ Joel said. In the background, the old man was jabbing a gnarled finger up at the sky and muttering the same words over and over. ‘What’s he saying?’ Joel asked the woman.

‘The snows are coming early this year, and it will soon be night. My father is saying that it is not safe to travel up the mountain.’

Joel felt his eyes light up. ‘Then this Vâlcanul is further up the mountain?’ He turned to scan the dark horizon beyond the trees. ‘Which way?’

‘You must stay down here,’ the woman insisted. ‘Tomorrow the autobuz comes and will take you back to where you came from. You stay with us the night. We have a room and a bed.’ She smiled. ‘I make polenta with sheep’s cheese and sausage.’

‘It sounds delicious,’ he said, meaning it. ‘And I’m very grateful to you for your offer. But I really need to get to Vâlcanul.’

‘Then you will not come back,’ she said with a pained expression.

Joel thanked her as best he could, and she very reluctantly told him which road to follow out of the village and through the forest. Then, hardly able to keep from breaking into a run, he hefted his rucksack and started walking back down the street.

There had to be someone around who could rent him a small truck or a cheap four-wheel drive.

A few minutes’ walk from the middle of the village, he came across a small garage. Light was shining from the main building, which was little more than a corrugated iron shack surrounded by a stained concrete forecourt. There were two solitary fuel pumps that looked like relics from the forties. As he walked nearer, he saw a scraggy Alsatian dog that might just as well have been a wolf lying on the ground between heaps of scrap car parts and old tyres. The animal appeared relaxed but its amber eyes were watching his every move. Joel was fifteen yards from the shack when its ears pricked up and it gave a low growl. It was only when he saw the chain that tethered the dog to a railing that he beat down the urge to turn round and walk quickly back the way he’d come.

He walked up to the shack and peered in through the gap in the doors. A rusty collection of cars and a couple of trucks were lined up against the back wall. Tools were littered all over the place. An engine stood partly dismantled on a workbench.

‘Hello? Anyone there?’ At the sound of Joel’s voice, the dog jumped to its feet and rushed at him, barking and snapping and baring its fangs, but was jerked short on the end of the chain. Joel repeated ‘Hello?’ There didn’t seem to be anyone around. Joel wondered where the mechanic was. Probably in the bar he’d just come from.

He slipped inside and looked at the vehicles. It was a desperate collection. The only one that still had all its wheels was a corroded old Matra-Simca. Joel lifted the bonnet and found himself looking at an empty hole where the engine used to be.

Outside, the dog was still going crazy on the end of its chain, but the noise didn’t seem to be attracting anyone. This wasn’t helping him. Time was passing too quickly.

That was when he spotted the tarpaulin-draped shape in the corner and walked over to investigate. Under the dusty cover he found a motorcycle. It was a Russian Dnepr mounted to a sidecar, an old Communist-era replica of a wartime Wehrmacht BMW. It was rugged and battered, with tyres that wouldn’t have looked out of place on a tractor. The machine was a far cry from the slick 200mph superbike he’d left behind him, but something like this would be a lot better suited to the kind of harsh terrain he expected to find where he was going. He gave the handlebar a waggle, heard the hollow slosh of fuel in the tank. The key was in the ignition. On the sidecar’s single seat was a scuffed open-face helmet, with a pair of antiquated leather gauntlets stuffed inside, and glass goggles on an elasticated strap.

Joel glanced furtively around him. The dog had finally stopped its noise. No footsteps on the forecourt outside. He twisted the key, clambered on board the machine and tried the kickstart. The old flat-twin 650cc engine rumbled into life.

Everything seemed to work. It was crude, but it was perfect.

After five more frustrating minutes, still nobody had turned up. Opening up his wallet, Joel plucked out a thick wad of the banknotes he’d drawn out back in Britain. He counted out four hundred euros, left them in a curling pile on the bonnet of the old Simca, then chucked his rucksack and the case into the sidecar.