The Hush Read Online Free Page A

dripping with sweat and stinking of cattle dung. Boys with cuts and grazes across their knuckles. Women massaging aching arms.
    Some would be locals, but others likely hailed from smaller towns nearby and were here for Execution Day. They slopped like water through the bar, peeling off in different directions: stools, tables, the bathroom out the back. Men knocked each other aside, jostling for prime position at the bar.
    â€˜Get us some supper, Bel!’ one bellowed.
    â€˜All right, all right – keep your hair on,’ said Annabel. ‘You ain’t about to starve if your stew’s a minute late.Besides, I got a treat for you folks tonight.’ She stood on tiptoes behind the bar, and gestured at Chester to begin. ‘Go on, boy.’
    Chester pressed his bow to the strings. Few people had noticed him yet, hidden away in the corner, but now the farmers swivelled to face him. A few elbowed each other and pointed.
    â€˜Fiddler! Look at that, Jim.’
    â€˜By the Song, how long’s it been? Months and months, I reckon, since –’
    â€˜Well, good for Bel, I say –’
    Chester tuned out the voices. He tuned out the stink of the room, and the heat of the air. He gave the bow an experimental slide across the E string and let the note reverberate. The closest tables were silent now in a sceptical sort of hush, as they waited to judge how well he could play.
    And Chester let the music take him.
    He began with a folk ditty, common enough in this region. He’d learnt it a few weeks back, in a saloon called the Gabbling Goose, and clearly the locals in Hamelin knew it. Soon they were clapping, cheering along, and a couple of women linked arms in a dance. They threw back glasses of cactus wine, as the smell and sizzle of frying sausages wafted from the kitchen.
    When Chester pushed the song up a notch, into an even faster tune, foot stamping reverberated through the floor and sent Annabel’s liquor bottles into a quiver. People scrabbled at cards, shoving piles of coins back and forth across the tables. Barmaids bustled around, sliding trays ofdrinks across the bar, and men called, ‘Another whiskey, darlin’!’ or ‘How’s about some fried potatoes?’
    Chester couldn’t help noticing, however, that the good cheer was not universal. One boy – perhaps two or three years older than himself – sat alone at a table to his left. He was a large boy, thick with muscles, and as tall as any of the full-grown men in the room. He picked at his plate of stew, and didn’t order any drinks. A cowboy hat perched atop his head, angled slightly downwards. He peered out beneath the rim, his eyes fixed on Chester.
    Of course, that was fair enough. Chester was a performer; the whole point was for people to watch him. But for some reason, this felt different. Worrying. The boy didn’t smile, or tap his toes, or nod along to the music. His eyes were an eerie pale blue, focused like bullets. He just stared. Silent. No blinking. No movement.
    That was the difference between this boy and the others. Everyone else was watching Chester’s performance, his music. But this boy was watching Chester .
    Still, at least the rest of the bar seemed in high spirits. Annabel brought out plates of stew, and barmaids passed around mugs of warm beer. People chewed cornbread, slurped their drinks and sloshed their supper onto the tables. Chester sped up into another verse, faster and faster, and copper coins skittered into the fiddle case by his feet.
    He slowed on the final verse, letting one note linger well past its right. People around him held their breath, hands poised in mid-air ready to clap. Chester grinned, dragging his bow to extend the note, teasing them. He stretched it and stretched it, letting the moment drip.
    A man tossed a coin into the fiddle case.
    â€˜Ha!’ Chester shouted, and he launched into the final chorus with a frenzy. People laughed and