Chapter 26
It seems this is, in fact, Danger Night after all.
‘What’s happening?’ says Hannah, leaning over the side of the carriage as the square below us erupts into chaos. ‘Is it fireworks? Is that what that bang was, Daddy?’
‘Er, no. No, I don’t think so,’ replies Hunter, grabbing her coat to pull her back to safety. ‘Here, sit still. Let me try to figure out what’s going on.’
The Ferris wheel stopped moving at the same time as the lights went out, and our carriage hangs there, rocking gently from side to side in the wind, as Hunter peers over the side, while Hannah and I shuffle carefully towards each other for safety.
‘What is going on, Hunter?’ I ask, my voice shaking as Hannah crawls onto my lap. I hug her tightly to me, not quite sure who’s comforting who.
‘It looks like a power cut,’ says Hunter, pulling his head back inside the carriage. ‘As far as I can see, all the power in the village is out. There’s not a light to be seen.’
My fingers tighten around Hannah’s body. The lights being out isn’t too much of a problem for now, given how late the sun sets here at this time of year. The power, on the other hand . . .
‘What does that mean?’ I ask, trying not to sound as scared as I feel, for the benefit of the seven-year-old on my lap. ‘How will we get down from here without electricity?’
In spite of my best efforts at self-control, my voice wobbles dangerously at the end of that sentence, and Hunter reaches out and wraps a comforting arm around both me and Hannah, pulling us into the reassuring warmth of his chest.
‘It’s OK,’ he tells us. ‘We’ll be fine, I promise. They’re bound to have a back-up generator to get us moving again. We’ll be on the ground in no time. We’re just taking a little break up here, that’s all.’
Hannah shifts uneasily on my lap.
‘What’s a generator?’ she asks, her small voice breaking the uneasy silence. ‘And what if they don’t have one? How will we get down then?’
‘Are you kidding me?’ says Hunter, in a cheerful tone that hopefully only I can tell is completely fake. ‘A funfair as cool as this one, without a generator? No chance. This is just an extra adventure for us, Hannah. And look, we’ve got the best view of the village now – haven’t we, Rosie?’
He nudges me hard in the side, and I reluctantly look down at the square, which is a scene of pure chaos: people shouting and yelling as they try to exit stalled rides and figure out what’s going on.
Somewhere in the general commotion, I can hear Sabrina’s voice rising above everyone else’s while, off in the distance, dogs are barking as if they know something the rest of us don’t.
It’s not much of a view to be honest, but I coo dutifully over it anyway, seeing the way Hunter keeps glancing worriedly at Hannah, and wanting to help reassure her.
Fake it till you make it; isn’t that what I’ve been doing here all along?
I hug the little girl tighter, whispering into her ear about what a great story she’ll have to tell her friends.
Hannah looks up at me doubtfully, just as a strange, mechanical noise comes from somewhere below us, and the Ferris wheel jolts back into action, creaking horribly as it goes.
‘See?’ says Hunter smugly. ‘Back-up generator. I told you they’d have one.’
Sure enough, the carriage is on the move again, and although the lights are still out, and this whole episode feels a lot like the opening scene of a disaster movie, it’s not long before we’re safely back at ground level, and Hannah’s doing her best to insist that she wasn’t scared at all, she was just pretending.
‘Me too, Hannah,’ I tell her, taking her hand as we exit the ride at last, my legs still wobbly from the tension of the last few minutes. ‘Me too.’
Hunter disappears to find out what’s going on, and I take a moment to stand there, enjoying the reassuring feel of the ground beneath my feet again, as I take in the mayhem of the funfair.
The crowd has started to thin out now – I guess most people have decided to head for home now that nothing’s working – but there’s still plenty of confused fair-goers milling around, trying to figure out what to do next.
‘Rosie! There you are!’ says Bex, coming bouncing up to me with Daniel trailing behind her, still meticulously documenting everything with his two cameras.
‘We were wondering where you were,’ Bex says, beaming down at Hannah, whose eyes get even wider at the sight of the ‘princess’ she saw in the castle grounds.
‘Are you ready to go? Sabrina wants to get everyone back to the bus. We can’t get any decent photos here now that nothing’s working, so we may as well head back to the hotel. ’
‘I can’t go now,’ I tell her, my heart sinking with disappointment at the thought of going back to my lonely hotel room without Hunter there to protect me. ‘I have to look after Hannah. I’m not sure where her dad’s gone.’
‘I’m here,’ he says, appearing at my elbow.
‘And you should go with the minibus, Rosie. I’ve just been talking to some folk from the village, and it doesn’t look like the power’s going to be back on here anytime soon; probably not tonight.
They haven’t been able to figure out what the problem is yet, and the generator was only for the Ferris wheel, so everything else is still out. ’
‘Will the hotel be OK, though?’ I ask, reluctant to leave him and Hannah. ‘Will it have power, I mean?’
‘Aye. Aye, the hotel should still have power,’ he replies distractedly. ‘It’s on a different grid from the village. We’ll be fine.’
‘Oh, ye will, will ye? And what about the rest of us?’ demands a voice from the crowd. ‘What are we supposed to do while you lot are up there at the castle, feasting and carousing like Henry the Eighth?’
A moment later, Izzie appears, clutching a large crystal ball, which she brandishes before her like a weapon.
‘Maybe your crystal ball could give you the answer to that?’ says Hunter bluntly. ‘I’m surprised it didn’t warn you about this in advance.’
‘That’s not how it works,’ replies Izzie sharply. ‘The force moves in mysterious ways.’
‘The force? Are we in Star Wars now?’ Hunter says, amused. ‘You couldn’t get this “force” of yours to get the power working again, could you? That would be a lot more helpful than whatever it is you’re trying to do with it right now.’
‘OK, smart arse,’ replies Izzie, glaring at him. ‘Are ye seriously all just going to head back to your swanky castle and leave us here to starve?’
‘Och, we won’t starve, Izzie,’ says Ian, joining us. ‘I still have a full pot of stovies back there. And there’s quite a few tattie scones left over, as well. I’ve nothing to warm them up with now, mind you, so we’ll have to have them cold.’
‘I suppose we could build a fire,’ Izzie muses. ‘Although if the storm’s as bad as they’re saying it’s going to be, it’ll probably just blow it out again.’
She looks up at the sky accusingly. I somehow don’t think even a storm would dare defy Izzie, but I’m moved to help her, all the same.
‘Why don’t you come back to the hotel for a bit?’ I say impulsively. ‘All of you? Hunter says they’ll still have power there.’
Hunter’s disgust at this suggestion is so strong I can almost feel his eyes burning into me; and the Fosters don’t look particularly thrilled at the idea either. Hannah, however, starts jumping up and down with excitement, and Ian looks like he’s about to join her.
‘That’s certainly what the ball told me would happen tonight,’ Izzie says, nodding. ‘Thank you, Rosie, lass; we’d be pleased to accept your kind invitation.’
‘Hold on,’ says Hunter. ‘It’s not really up to Rosie to invite anyone to the—’
‘I’ll go and find Callum and tell him where we’re going,’ Ian interrupts. ‘We’ll meet you at the minibus, Izzie. Unless you want to take your car?’
‘Aye, probably a good idea,’ she replies thoughtfully. ‘I can get at least four people in it; and if you bring the van, Ian, that’ll be even more.’
‘No, wait, you can’t—’ Hunter begins, but it’s too late; Izzie and Ian have already darted off in different directions, leaving the rest of us standing there, open-mouthed; me in particular, given that I’m the one who started all of this, and I can already tell from the grim look on Hunter’s face that it’s not going to go down as one of my better ideas.
‘Um, sorry?’ I venture cautiously, risking a glance at him. ‘It’s just, you said it could be a while before the power’s back on, and it’s starting to get cold now. It didn’t seem fair to just leave them to get on with it when there’s an entire hotel they could shelter in.’
‘It’s a power cut, Rosie,’ Hunter points out. ‘Not a natural disaster. I hardly think we need to start thinking about setting up shelters. They do all have homes to go to, you know.’
‘Homes that won’t have any heat or light,’ I reply. ‘Plus, don’t you think it would be a good opportunity to build some ties between the hotel and the community? It’s just a few extra people; and maybe it’ll make them less likely to want to complain to the Laird?’
‘You’re always saying we should try to help people when we can, Daddy,’ adds Hannah, coming unexpectedly to my rescue. ‘And this’ll be so fun!’
‘Aye. Well. I suppose it’s done now,’ Hunter replies, his jaw tightening with thinly suppressed annoyance. ‘We’ll just have to hope they don’t bring too many people with them. And that the power comes back on sooner rather than later.’
‘Oh, I’m sure it will,’ I say, with the confidence of someone who has absolutely no idea what she’s talking about. ‘And, like Hannah said, it’ll be fun. Kind of.’
‘Just promise me one thing,’ replies Hunter, as he takes Hannah’s hand, ready to leave. ‘Promise me you’re going to be the one who tells Dante about this?’
Oh yeah. So much fun.