Ribblestrop (41 page)

Sanchez found the words at last. He said simply, “Hello, Tomaz.”

Words deserted him again, and he strode forward to embrace his friend, and it would have been a deeply emotional and a great lingering, joyous reunion had Millie not dived between them and grabbed Sanchez by his shirt.

“You haven't found him!” she cried. “Have you?”

Sanchez went to embrace her, but she twisted out of his arms and said again, “Anjoli's been taken. We don't have any
time
, Sanchez, he's gone. Do you have your gun?”

“No.”

“Get it now. We need it.”

“Why? What—”

“You won't believe me. They're experimenting on the orphans and they've chosen Anjoli.”

Asilah was next to her and the other orphans were muttering, clustering, holding each other. “He was in the kitchen,” said Asilah. “He was on duty.”

“I know where he
was
and he didn't come back—I asked you!” said Millie. “I said, ‘Where is he?' ”

“Where is he?” said Israel.

Millie said, “Don't you remember? Oh, you're so dumb, I asked you, I
told
you!”

It was Asilah's turn to grab somebody. He put his hands on Millie's shoulders and shook her once: “Where is my brother?” he said. There was a frightening calm in his voice and Millie felt his hands crushing her collarbones.

“Underground,” said Millie. “I think the policeman took him; I think he's in the lab.”

Asilah made a terrible noise, half groan, half sob. A child started to cry.

Sanchez said, “There's a lift in the headmaster's study—we were going to explain all this, but . . . we started playing that game.”

Asilah simply ran and every orphan followed him.

Sanchez and the others watched them sprinting away. “They don't know what's down there,” he said. “Millie, this is so dangerous—what can they do?”

“Follow them,” said Millie. “Give me your radio, I'll go down the ventilation shaft. Follow Asilah and get your gun.”

“Not on your own, no—”

Millie screamed at him and shoved him so hard he nearly fell. “For once, Sanchez, do what I tell you! You know the way, he doesn't. Take Tomaz—Tomaz knows the tunnels.”

Millie turned and ran. In half a minute she was over the first humpback bridge, racing to the Vyner monument.

*

Six minutes it took. Asilah's gang piled up the stairs and along the corridor, and Sam was dragged to the door. The toothbrush
sprang the lock and they dived for the wall. Eager hands fluttered over the joins and in seconds the paneling was swinging open, to reveal both metal grille and control panel. They stared into a dark lift shaft. They could hear a motor grinding below them and Asilah smashed at the switch panel with his hand.

Nothing happened.

“Someone might be using it,” said Ruskin. “Press the button again . . .”

Asilah clawed at the grille and other fingers pressed the button. Deep below in the dark vault, the vibrations stopped. The humming was replaced by silence. Then there was a click and the lights in the panel closed down.

“They've turned it off,” said Sam. “Does that mean we're too late?”

“We're not,” whispered Asilah. He yanked at the metal grille, but it wouldn't budge. He started talking in a soft clear voice and Ruskin thought he must be cursing, but he couldn't understand a word. It was the orphans' own language, of course, and the boy was giving instructions. He spoke in rapid bursts, and after every line a pair of boys leaped into action.

In seconds everyone was running again, pouring back out of the room and down the stairs. Henry, Ruskin, and Sam ran with them; Tomaz and Sanchez met them in the courtyard.

*

In the tunnels below, Millie paused for breath. She clicked her radio on and tried to speak clearly and calmly.

“Sanchez, where are you?”

“They can't get down,” he said. “The lift's dead. Over.”

She was trembling. She'd slid down the rope so fast her hands were burning. Then she'd sprinted all the way. “What's your plan?” she said.

“I don't know. Asilah's in charge.”

“You have the gun, don't you, Sanchez? Over.”

Sanchez paused. “No,” he said.

“Get it! For the love of God, get your gun. I'm going to the lab,
I'll be there in five minutes. You don't know how dangerous this is, now—”

“All right! I'll get it!”

Millie clicked off the radio and set off again. She knew she was close, as long as she hadn't taken a wrong turn.

*

Down on the building site, Henry forced a crowbar behind the bolt mechanism of the storage unit. He took a deep breath, heaved, and the metal clasp sprang from its rivets.

Sanjay and Israel moved inside, pulling out the grinders and welders. There were gauntlets, masks, tool belts, and—heaviest of all—the chainsaw. They fed them into a queue of willing hands.

Asilah grabbed hold of Ruskin and Sam. “Go with Vijay, take the van. He'll get the chain. I want you to chain up the park gates, then come back here. If you see any cars—anything—stop them, he might be inside.”

“Right,” said Ruskin.

Israel moved off, dragging an acetylene cylinder behind him. Sam and Ruskin shouldered a burden of pipes, rods, and asbestos matting and followed Vijay. The main doors were unlocked still after Millie's flight, so in seconds they were out onto the courtyard. A motor was kicked into life: two small orphans cut down the ornamental chains round the front lawn. They were using the huge slate-cutting tool and it sprayed an arc of sparks over the gravel. As the chains fell, they heaved the machine to shoulder height and ran back to Asilah, who was waving them into the main school.

Round the back, Vijay had climbed into Captain Routon's van. He was twisting wires from the steering column and in seconds the engine was revving. His legs were short, so he pulled at Ruskin. “Drive!” he said.

“Me?” said Ruskin. “I'm not sure I can. Have you ever driven a vehicle, Sam?”

“I've done the gears for my father.”

“Come on, go!” shouted Vijay. “Go! Go!”

“I'll give it a try, I'm sure it's not rocket science. That's the brake, presumably . . .”

The welding gear was loaded. Ruskin revved hard and Sam yanked the gearstick into reverse. The van cannoned backward into the wall, jarring everyone onto the van floor. Sam plunged into first gear and Ruskin accelerated hard over the grass. He snaked wildly, avoiding a tree by centimeters. Then he saw the long ribbon of tarmac that led to the gates and he managed to guide the screaming vehicle onto it.

“I told you, didn't I?” said Ruskin to Sam. He had his mouth to his friend's ear, but he still had to shout.

“Told me what?”

“These boys! They're good in a crisis!”

*

Lady Vyner was peering through her window in disbelief. She had heard engine sounds and was now staring down into the quadrangle. A crowd of children had gathered, their flashlights lighting up the school's main fuse box.

“We'll cut the electricity,” said Asilah.

Sanchez nodded. The fuse box was sealed in a metal case and three armor-plated cables, the thickness of Henry's arm, snaked up out of it, clamped to the wall. Henry had worked each one free from its clips with his crowbar, so they stuck out like twisted drainpipes.

“Is it safe?” said Sanchez. “That's a lot of power, that does the whole school . . .”

The orphans wore thick rubber gauntlets and Wellington boots; they pulled visors down, and one of them wrenched the cord on the chainsaw. It caught first time and howled. Lady Vyner saw Henry stand back and cover his eyes, then the child with the chainsaw leaned into a savage cut clean through the cables. The explosion cracked windows and a bolt of lightning went from the fuse box to the floor. The saw screamed louder and another great arc of jagged electricity reared up, swung over everybody's heads like a snake, and whipped into the ground. When the smoke
cleared and Asilah shone his flashlight, Sanchez saw that the fuse box had melted and a black, bent chainsaw was welded to it.

“Not safe at all,” said Asilah. “Very dangerous.”

Now the school was in total darkness. The boys' flashlights bobbed madly as they buckled on their tool belts. They jammed in screwdrivers, hammers, chisels, pliers, and as they set off, they clanked. The grinder was heaved up onto shoulders and in a moment everyone was up in the study again.

Asilah said, “Let's go.”

Sanchez said: “Come in, Millie—where are you? We're coming down the lift shaft. Where are you? Over.”

“I'm nearly there.”

“We've killed the power. Over.”

“I know, the lights went out down here. Clever.”

“Be careful, though. I think they might know we're coming. Try to . . .”

Whatever Sanchez thought Millie ought to try was drowned out by the frenzy of the grinder, as its motor screamed. He saw Tomaz in the doorway. “Did you find it?”

“Yes.”

The boy had a box of bullets in one hand and the heavy black pistol in the other. Sanchez took both and loaded in the light from the flashlight. Israel set the grinder to the metal grille and there was another plume of sparks.

In the hospital, the headmaster was going through a similar experience to Professor Worthington. He would also wonder afterward what psychic force was pulling him out of his waiting-room chair and infusing him with such impatience. As soon as he was alone, he'd felt restless and started to pace up and down.

He'd phoned Miss Hazlitt, but the line to his study seemed to be out of service. That decided him. He walked briskly to reception and asked if he could see the patient he was waiting for. Phone calls were made and he was assured that treatment was continuing and he should wait to be called. The headmaster spoke firmly and was assured again that everything was under control. He grew more assertive. He grew positively demanding. In a short while he was standing in a booth looking at the boiled, anesthetized form of Captain Routon. Two nurses were halfway through the long process of preparing his burns for dressing. Routon was stable, but would be unconscious for a few more hours.

This freed Dr. Norcross-Webb, and that was important. He knew then that there was no reason for staying any longer, so he took the stairs two at a time and ran to the car park. His car was covered in ice and he lost precious minutes hacking away at his windshield. When he had a hole big enough to see through, he roared out onto the Ribblestrop road, a voice whispering, insistently:
Get back to your school, get back to your school.
The ice meant nothing. He put his foot down and skidded over the lanes.

*

In the basement, far below, Millie was mystified.

She'd come round the final bend so gingerly, on tiptoe in her army boots. She was in the right place; she could see the door and the air vent and was ready to go. What stopped her was the fact that the metal door was open.

It had been firmly closed on her last visit, but now it was ajar. She approached it cautiously, not sure what this meant. If she was too late, then maybe they'd done the job and left. Though why they would leave the door open made no sense. Had someone gone to get something? Was it for ventilation, perhaps?

Millie approached, keeping close to the wall. She shone her flashlight inside. Without electricity, the place had an abandoned look: the power cut had been a clever idea, it would have turned off every machine and stopped them dead. Perhaps they'd fled? She stepped into the little hallway, and there were the familiar double doors, the portholes reflecting her beam. Millie crawled toward them and crouched low, waiting for the courage to enter.

Of course, someone might have seen her flashlight by now. She clicked it off and the darkness closed in all around. If they were in there, they were waiting for her. If they weren't, then it was all over. Anjoli, her friend, would be gone. She could not crouch here forever wondering. It was Anjoli's life, Anjoli's smile . . .

She clipped the radio into her back pocket so she had both hands free and rose slowly to the glass.

They'd lit candles. She could make out the chair, and cabinets, and glimmering silver tools laid out on long counters. She blinked and tried to see detail. There were candles round the chair and on it—they'd put a cluster on the little tray that swung in close to the chair's headrest. By the light, dim as it was, she could make out a figure, but whether it was Anjoli or the model she could not tell. Around him stood three figures, absolutely motionless. They were in dark silhouette—bending forward, like waiters in a restaurant.

Millie licked her lips, desperate for a bit of moisture. She eased the door open an inch, and as she did she heard someone
sob. She waited, her heart in her mouth, and it came again: a lonely, abandoned sob followed by a sniff. She could hear the child breathing, and he seemed to be having difficulty. Then, unmistakable, she heard his voice. “Please?” he said, very softly.

She pushed her head into the room and listened harder. Nobody moved: the figures were still. They had their hands up by their chests and were holding what looked like trays—yes, now she could see. There were candles on each one, and they were the models she'd seen, the dummies or robots, so similar to what Sam described after his visit to Lady Vyner's home. Now, in the flickering light they looked like statues in a church.

Anjoli sobbed again. “Please?” he said, louder this time. There was just a quiver of hope in the voice, as if he knew someone was close. It was so forlorn, but it was alive—he could think and speak! It came again. “Help me . . .” Then the boy started to cry and Millie's heart cracked in half. She drew her head back, let the doors close, and clicked the radio on.

“Sanchez?” she whispered. Her voice was shaking and so were her hands.