Now, Ladies and Gentlemen, this story does feature a character who is very much real in my own life. However, she has four legs instead of two, with paws on the end of those instead of feet.
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FORGIVE US OUR TRESPASSES!
The modern mobile 'phone, known as a smartphone. Rumoured to contain computing power roughly equivalent to the complete 1969 N.A.S.A. Moon Landing operation, a claim that's entirely believable. What a fantastic device, a piece of real electronic wizardry, so versatile, so useful, so important in this digital age. You can alter the settings of your central heating at home while you're not even there, you can undertake all sorts of financial transactions, shop on-line, blimey, the list of things one can do with one of these devices is almost endless. It's even been said one can actually talk to somebody else, yes it is possible to use them as a telecommunications device! Fancy that, I mean who uses them in that way anymore?
However, as in the case with most things in life, there can be a downside to all of this. For these devices can only work IF the battery has some charge within it. And if not, if the owner has allowed said battery to drain, and that can occur very quickly if the 'phone is used extensively, then the device becomes utterly useless. As was the case here. For the battery in Henry Wilson's 'phone was so dead that it positively made the Dodo appear to be a thriving species in comparison. The screen was totally blank, and no matter how often and with whatever strength he pushed any of the buttons that state of affairs was not going to change.
And the 'app' that he desperately wanted to use gave a clue as to his current predicament. He was trying to log-on to Google Maps. Why? Simple answer, he was well and truly lost. Boy, was he now regretting not making sure he'd fully charged the battery before he'd set out. Because he wasn't just lost, but really lost, not next to something like a road or railway line, that he could perceivably follow to eventually come to something from which he could obtain some sort of bearing, a small village perhaps. No, he was deep in an unknown forest, surrounded for as far as he could see by trees, trees and nothing else except yet more trees.
He kept blundering on, more in hope than any expectation, on a thinking line of 'I must go in some sort of direction. This is a direction. Right then I'll go this way then.' I mean, he thought, sooner or later I must come across something.
He did. A fence, not a tall one at all, in fact he didn't have to climb over it really, he merely had to step across, hardly breaking his stride as he did so. But, totally unknown to him at the time, there would be consequences for that action.
For if said fence was very small in physical size, it was huge in significance. You see, it was a boundary fence, it marked the outer edges of private property. By crossing it Henry had stepped out of the public area and entered into the very private lands of Lady Lavinia Bythesea. Obviously without her express permission at all, which meant that he had trespassed. He didn't know it yet, but before very long he'd be fully aware of that fact.
Utterly oblivious to that error he continued onwards. And he began to feel as if he was being shepherded in a certain direction, no longer was the vegetation random, hedges and more fences appeared, and in such positions that it almost appeared that they had been placed there rather than grown naturally in their location. For they had, gently he was being guided down a particular route. Soon he found himself walking between two rows of tall trees, and hedges between them to ensure he was channelled down this, carefully planned path. Until he came to a small clearing.
For as he walked into the said clearing in the middle of several groups of trees he failed to notice that the ground beneath his feet was different, as if he was walking on top of something laying there. Indeed he was.
Because all of a sudden said ground moved! He heard the sound of ropes being pulled fast, and suddenly all he could see was a net rising from the earth and closing in around him. The rope pulling that he heard was the draw-rope around the outer edge of the net being pulled in by some sort of machinery suspended in the trees. And pulled in tight, closing the net around his body, trapping him utterly within. Looking up he could see the opening of the net completely close, then saw two more mechanical arms moving in. He couldn't quite make out the details of what they did, but what happened is that as the net was completely closed, there were two metal rings embedded within the draw-rope that were positioned just outside the openings of the ropes passage in the outside path of the net itself. What these arms did was to secure a padlock through said rings, meaning that the net was locked shut, with Henry the totally helpless prisoner inside of it. Just for good measure the net was then lifted so he was just off of the ground, unable to stand on terra firma and balance himself. He had been NETTED!
At first it was almost a pleasant distraction to study the mechanism that had captured him. It was extremely well engineered and had done its job superbly, the whole capture had happened so quickly that even if he'd been more alert he almost certainly would still have been taken. But by whom and why? Well equipment like this would not have been cheap, somebody had spent an awful amount of money and taken a great deal of trouble to construct this whole apparatus. But who was that, and what did they want with anybody, Henry Wilson in this case, who had fallen into their trap? For it was a totally secure and inescapable trap, there was nothing he could do but wait until his captor showed their hand. The net was constructed of very solid rope, he couldn't really climb up the sides at all. And even if he could have what would have been the point? As alluded to before the opening had been tied utterly shut, and that padlock was holding the draw-rope in that position. He then noticed a zipped up opening in the side of the net, but that zip too had been padlocked shut. No, there was no way out.
And then another rather unpleasant thought entered his mind. Despite all of the above, despite the obvious careful planning, not to mention expense, that had occurred in order for him to be trapped as he now undoubtedly was, his mind asked itself the question as to was his captor even aware of their success in taking him as their captive? Of course, they surely would be, wouldn't they? Surely nobody would go to this trouble, and not monitor the situation. But, of course, by now panic had well and truly got full hold of him, as it did so now his thinking wasn't necessarily straight or logical, all he knew that he was now a helpless prisoner of something that somebody had created and had worked so well as to trap him. They could be away on business, or holiday, it wasn't completely inconceivable that they could even be dead! He was miles from anyway, totally alone and unable to escape. Would he spend the rest of his days in this net, and after all, with no sustenance or hydration available to him, the number of those days probably wouldn't amount to very many!
And that wasn't the only factor that worried him, a far more immediate, if not quite so serious, threat was the colour of the sky. For the clear light blue shade of not so long ago was rapidly becoming replaced by very dark grey clouds that were being blown in, and rain, heavy rain, had been forecast for later on in the day. Was he going to get a thorough soaking? And then somehow have to try to sleep, cold and wet, in a very un-natural position.
