Ladders and Snakes

 

It was a sunny day in August. Twins Jack and Hazel, aged 10, were tired of hanging around at home, playing boring games like snakes and ladders, and decided to take a walk on the heath that was a short bus ride away.

“We might see some lizards”, said Jack. “And maybe snakes”.

“Snakes?” said Hazel. “I don’t like snakes, and I don’t just mean the ones that aren’t ladders”.

“Real snakes are fine”, said Jack. “Have you ever seen one?”

“Only on TV”, said Hazel. “Snakes can bite you, and you might die”.

“Only adders can bite you”, said Jack. “And even if one does it won’t kill you”.

“I’m still not all that happy about it”, said Hazel.

The two of them wandered off down a sandy track with heather and gorse all round them. Hazel watched where she put her feet with great care, just in case she trod on an adder.

“So where do you expect to find lizards and snakes?” she asked her brother.

“They like warm, sunny places on days like this”, he said. ”Let’s see if we can find some rocks that have got nice and warm”.

They searched around for a few minutes without success, with Jack being much keener on turning over the few rocks that they found than Hazel was. All of a sudden she stood upright with a worried look on her face.

“I can smell something”, she said. “I think it’s smoke”.

“Smoke?”

“Yes. Something’s burning”.

“Where?”

“Behind us. Over there. Look - I can see a fire”.

“That’s miles away”, said Jack. “Nothing to worry about”.

“If you say so”, said Hazel, but she didn’t sound all that convinced.

They carried on searching for another ten minutes or so, after which Jack gave a shout of triumph as he turned over a rock and saw what was unmistakably an adder with a zig-zag pattern down its back.

“Look”. he shouted, “I’ve found one. Quick, look here before it slides away”.

But Hazel was far more concerned with what she could see behind them, which was the heath fire a lot closer to them than it had been before, now that a breeze was blowing the fire in their direction.

“Jack”, she called out. “Forget the snake, we need to get out of here, fast”.

Jack took one look and had to agree with his sister. The two of them started running, but had a nasty shock when they realised that the smoke from the fire was closing in around them and making it difficult to breathe.

“Jack”, Hazel shouted. “This is awful. We need to get above this smoke. There’s a tree there - let’s climb up it”.

The tree, a solitary pine, looked to be their best hope of escaping the smoke, but it soon became clear that this plan was not going to work. There were no low branches to give them a handhold or foothold, and therefore no way of climbing up it.

“If only we had a ladder”, Jack said, but Hazel was conscious of the fact that a tree was probably not the best bet for safety when a raging fire reached it, whether not a ladder was handy. They had no choice but to keep running, coughing with the smoke as they did so.

Then Jack saw something that made him stop in his tracks.

“What are you doing, Jack?”, said Hazel. “We need to keep going”.

“It’s the snakes”, said Jack. “Look at them.”

“We’ve got no time for that now”, said Hazel. “Forget them, keep running”.

“No”, said Jack. “Those snakes know something. We should follow them”.

Jack had a point. The two adders he could see certainly seemed to have a purpose in mind as they slithered through the heather in the direction of a large rock that was just about visible through the swirling smoke. Jack and Hazel watched as the snakes made for what appeared to be quite a large hollow in the sand underneath the rock. Jack could see that this must be where the snakes knew they would be safe, and that this could be their own best hope for escaping the fire.

“Come on”, he yelled to Hazel, “there’s room for us as well in that hole”.

With the smoke in her throat, Hazel had no breath with which to argue, so she joined her brother in crawling underneath the rock. They found that the smoke was very much less dense down below ground level.

“Where did the snakes go?” she asked.

“I think they found a crevice right at the back”, Jack said. “Besides, would you rather be nipped by an adder and have to go to the doctor or be burned to death?”

Hazel could see Jack’s point, and that following the snakes was clearly the most sensible thing to have done. At least they would both live to tell the tale, knowing that there are times when snakes are more useful than ladders.

© John Welford