Bubbling away
STELLA RODWAY
The Battlefield William Mayne (Hamish Hamilton 18s)
This is a book where children and adults rival each other, as in life, in the quirkiness and inconsequence of their talk, which is strikingly original and often very funny. William Mayne knows how to entertain while keeping the lid down on the elements of mystery and suspense, so that they bubble only under the surface until he is ready for them.
Bubbling at the upper level are his two ebullient heroines, Lesley and Debby, helping in their parents' pub, listening to the village talk, and exploring the old battlefield adjoin- ing the pub. Here they search for treasure with a divining rod made of bent wire, and investi- gate the old lookout tower, standing high up on the rock. They are helped by the kindly Thomas with his tractor, and by the more grudging Billy Calvert, who is trying to rebuild the old stone cross which once stood on the battlefield, and who finds some of their dis- coveries more inconvenient than helpful.
In the pub old legends are resurrected, of bloodstained water in the beck, of the devil being crushed there by a rock, and of strange lights playing over the ground. An old shepherd, whose clothes smell of 'concentrated essence of sheep' and who scarcely ever speaks, is moved by some of the girls' discoveries to interpret these, and he warns them against 'putting to scorn the forces of nature.' The climax comes when the girls go to sleep in the tower and wake up to find it moving with them inside it.
This is a stylish tale in which the everyday and the strange are blended so skilfully that it remains just this side of fantasy.
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