Ribblestrop (31 page)

Millie counted the needles. There were five in all, deep in the brain, and the surgeon's voice had taken on a strange confidence and passion.

“It's a
shorthand
, of course it is—we're penetrating the interdependent cortexes, because it's in this part of the brain that we find
desire.
The need—if you will—the
instinct
, to challenge and question.”

“It's late, Jarman—keep it simple.”

“I'm talking about the very thing you asked me to investigate:
ego
, if you will. The desire to rebel. The chemistry used to unpick and eradicate that sense of self—well, it's going to vary from child to child, of course it is. Heavy doses of stimulants are required alongside every injection.”

“Let's go,” whispered Sanchez. He was inching backward. “I've got to get out, Millie!”

The bowler hat spoke. “We're actually no further forward. We've all seen the paperwork but what we need is the demonstration, and I think Christmas is unreasonable. The money's run out and there's still nothing to show—my chairman's going to laugh at me.”

“Can I ask a question, old boy?”

The voice was new and it was followed by total silence. Millie and Sanchez went rigid again. They hadn't noticed him at first. He had remained at the end of the laboratory. His raincoat was buttoned up and belted tightly. He carried an umbrella and a briefcase, and he had the worst mustache Millie had ever seen. It was thick and dark and made her think of caterpillars. His voice was refined and friendly—even apologetic. “My committee feels—unreasonable as it may seem—that it pulled a few strings on this. Considerable risks were taken, some would say. Against the advice of several officers!”

“I understand that, Sir Peter.”

“Some of us feel it's now or never, and the delays we've had—”

“The delay was caused simply by a small injury I sustained . . .”

“Well, we seem to have had one delay after another, don't we? Not pointing a finger, old boy, not a bit of it. But we have to move to phase two, or the whole project founders and leaves egg on our faces. There's similar stuff being trialed in Thailand at half the price—you know that. You've got access. You've had the green light. Let's do it.”

Everyone started talking at once. A cell phone was ringing and there was a squeal of hydraulics. Over it all, the man in the white coat was calling. “Listen!” he cried. He plucked the needles from the brain, one by one. The chair was tilting under his hands and now it was rising; the model was leaning backward in the chair, its empty eyes fixed on Millie and Sanchez. Its head was opening. The brain was rising and unfolding like a flower, revealing honeycombs of purple, orange, and red. “Everything is ready!” said the man in the white coat. “We're ready to try! We drill the skull in five places. There, and there—those are the first points, that's the nerve center. The marks will be invisible, it will take eight hours and we'll have him back in his bed before dawn. He's ready, and you're right—we can't keep putting it off.”

“Please . . .” whispered Sanchez. “I'm going to be sick, really.”

Sanchez had seen a gap a few meters to his left and was pulling at Millie, pointing. The air conditioning opened up to a funnel, and from the top of the funnel ran a shaft, at least the width of his shoulders. There was a narrow ladder bolted to the side and he moved toward it. Millie squirmed after him, as the voices below got louder, arguments flaring. It took the children a few minutes only. The disk of light shrank below them; the sound finally faded. They climbed steadily, hoping for daylight. Hand over hand in darkness.

After some time, they found themselves on a narrow maintenance platform. In front of them was a deep shaft, and in the shaft a cluster of cables. Millie recognized it at once: it was a lift, and the lift car sat just a few meters below them. She went first and helped Sanchez onto its roof.

Millie spoke softly, with absolute conviction. “They were talking about Tomaz. ‘
Back in bed before dawn . . . invisible marks
.' They're talking about Tomaz!—they've got him, haven't they?”

“No,” said Sanchez. “He got home.”

“He's their prisoner! They're going to do something—”

“No, Millie! Don't say it.”

Back at school, the headmaster hadn't gone to bed.

He and the captain had meant to have an early night, because of the big day ahead. However, as had happened so often, the two men had got sidetracked into redesigning tiny details of the roof interior. Not a week went by without some idea occurring, and right now the two men were sitting in the office, staring at Ruskin's model, trying to devise new supports to the hip rafters. Routon had realized that if the vertical struts of the current design were replaced with diagonals, the hips would still be supported but a lot of extra attic space would be made available. Both men were repositioning the doll furniture, excited by the versatility of the new area.

“You could put a sofa there,” said Captain Routon.

“Yes, you could. Move the table back a bit—is there room?”

“Bit of a squeeze, but it could be done.”

“What about a stove?” said the headmaster.

“Why not? A nice woodburner—we had one of them in Al-Houti, kept us warm during the coup. Imagine that in the evenings, eh? All the boys, curled up with a bit of Kipling. Just a case of ordering a flue.”

“When I was a boy, Routon, we used to have two hours' reading every night. It was one of the few good rules. A reading club.”

“Call it the reading room, sir.”

“Excellent. Make it part of the library—you could link it with a staircase, just there. Imagine that! You could have discussions,
Routon. Lectures, seminars . . . We could have visiting speakers and the boys could question them over a glass of port. It was like that at my old school, you know. We'd retire upstairs, serve a few snacks . . .
What the hell was that?
”

Routon had leaped to his feet. His hand had sprung to his hip for the revolver he no longer carried. An explosion had come from the very roots of the building and, as both men stood horrified, it came again and then a third time. It was the most furious knocking, as if Death had come to claim a victim.

“My goodness, Routon—it sounds like cannon fire.”

“It's the door, sir! Someone's at the door!”

“Whatever's the time? It can't be!”

“Oh my word, it's nearly five o'clock. It must be the deliveries, that's all it can be. They said dawn, but—”

“Lady Vyner's not going to be happy about this. Quickly, we—”

But his voice was silenced again by another volley of thunderous knocks and the two men made for the stairs. They had to go carefully, because the moon threw long, strange shadows through the narrow windows and it was so easy to miss your step. As they descended the stairs, they ran straight into Professor Worthington, whose eyes were wide with panic.

“Headmaster, someone's outside,” she cried. “I can't get the door open, someone's bolted it.”

“Oh Lord, we don't need this!”

“Why is everything locked and bolted? Who's doing this?”

“Miss Hazlitt.”

“Why?”

“It's part of this wretched drive for security. She's convinced that some of the children are getting into the grounds at night, so—”

The knocking came again and—now they were in the lower corridor—the vibrations seemed to set them stumbling. Routon knelt down and attacked one of the bolts, while Professor Worthington turned away helplessly. “I don't like it!” she cried.

“What's going on?” said a voice. Miss Hazlitt stood at the end
of the corridor. She was leaning against the wall and she looked unsteady. They watched as she limped toward them. She was only half dressed—a disturbing combination of long skirts and a man's dressing gown. She hadn't had time to fix her wig properly and without makeup there was something hungry and cadaverous in her face. “Who's been out?” she said. She was having trouble getting her breath. “Someone's stolen my briefcase—there are children in the grounds, it's intolerable—”

As she spoke, there were three more stone-breaking knocks. “All right!” she roared, and her voice echoed in the hallway. The volume seemed to use up the little strength she had left. She turned to the headmaster; her eyes were mad and staring, as if she hadn't slept—as if she'd been searching the school all night. “Somebody has stolen my briefcase,” she whispered. “Some of the most confidential papers I own. There are thieves in the school, Headmaster, and they're out of control. We've known that since day one, when my credit card . . .” Her cell phone bleeped, but she ignored it. She bent down awkwardly, fell to one knee, and shot the lower bolt. Routon wrestled with the top one, and at last the door was unlocked. “I've had just about enough,” she said, gasping for air. “My report . . . I can tell you, my report! It will be that girl, I'm positive . . .”

They heaved the door open together and, in the thin light of the approaching dawn, everyone saw—not a crane driver with a clipboard of papers to sign, nor a deliveryman of any sort. The figure staggering back from the doorway appeared—at first glance, with the moon over its shoulder—to be a small silver bear, wearing glasses. As everyone stared, the bear clutched wildly at the doorframe, and then took a big step backward.

“Ruskin,” said the headmaster.

“I got so cold,” said the bear. Then it pirouetted twice and sprawled backward, paws in the air.

*

Ruskin's world had gone violently out of control.

He had been getting colder and more frightened. There are
only so many times you can sing the school song and only so many shots of rum you can swallow. By the time Millie and Sanchez were staring at the brain of the plastic child, Ruskin had got through half the bottle and the world was beginning to swirl.

He'd taken off his glasses again and jogged on the spot to coax some feeling back into his feet. Then, when he staggered round to look for his spectacles, he couldn't find them. This struck him as funny rather than frightening, and he laughed.

He drank more rum and felt better, so—forgetting his glasses—he decided to go for a short, brisk stroll. His vision was now doubly blurred and he noticed that he was far from steady on his feet. He set off bravely and found the night air bracing. When he tried to retrace his steps, however, everything had moved around and changed. Still, he didn't panic. He giggled and squinted into the night. Sure enough, there was the Vyner Monument, but if he was correct, the man now had his back to him. More worryingly, there seemed to be two columns, which meant two Lord Vyners—so Ruskin made for the ground between them. He wove his way round the front, stumbling in undergrowth that was thick and wet. There was the sports bag and the line of tools, exactly as he'd left them. Ruskin found he was talking aloud, telling the tools how pleased he was to see them.

There was something else though.

Impossibly and ridiculously, there was a tray of food laid out just where he'd been sitting. He racked his brains. Had he brought a complete dinner-for-one with him and simply forgotten? Had his friends returned, having stopped at a restaurant? It was a silver tray and the white cloth over it was immaculate. Just beside it—as if it might serve for a seat—there was a large, furry object. It had been folded neatly and laid on a Selfridges shopping bag.

Ruskin knelt down, unsteadily, and unfolded it. It was a rich, silver-colored fur coat, and as he shook it out he was reminded how cold he was. He put it on and buttoned it up. Then he attended to the tea tray, drawing the cloth to one side. There was a slice of meat pie with roast vegetables in thick gravy. There was a half bottle of
red wine, complete with a crystal glass. The food was piping hot and the smell sent saliva squirting round his mouth. It was all on fine-quality china too, and there, best of all, on a serviette, were the glasses he'd forgotten he'd lost. Some thoughtful soul had even put a coffeepot and an after-dinner chocolate next to them.

Ruskin had no answers to the questions that buzzed in his head, so he ignored them. He sat down and ate. He drank the wine and had another nip of rum. Needless to say, by the time he'd finished this, he had only the vaguest memories of his duties. They had become so muddled that places and names were merging into one. A telephone and a policeman . . . but what the message was and when it was to be delivered was all simply gone from his mind. He couldn't even recall why he was out, alone, at night, sitting under some monument.

It was at this point that Ruskin decided to go home and see his good friend Sam. So, he set off for the bridges, amazed to see four of them swirling round in front and behind. Laughing again, he aimed for one and hauled himself along the rails. It swung madly under him and suddenly tipped him forward onto the path. He kept his balance and started for one of the schools in front of him. Now and then he fell, but he was so padded and furry that he didn't notice. The mansions seemed to be avoiding him, so he had to keep changing direction: in the end, he reached the front door. Of course, he had no key, but luckily, there was a heavy knocker. He was giggling more and more. He was singing the first verse of the school song again, loud as he could. He grabbed the knocker and held himself upright. Oh, it was so cold to the touch, the frost was freezing . . . He hammered it down three times. The noise reverberated in his head and all at once he felt rather ill. Nobody came, so, despite the fact that the knocker now felt heavy in his hands, despite the need to sleep, he crashed it down three more times, then four. That was when the whole world tipped backward and he found himself on his back in the gravel.