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Part I
Elijah
Day 6
I
When they file back into the room, I’m no longer in the chair. Instead, I’m sitting on the table, bare legs swinging. A pink square of sticking plaster gleams on my knee. Weird, really, that I don’t remember injuring it.
They raise their eyebrows when they see I’ve moved, but nobody comments. The table is bolted to the floor so it can’t tip over and hurt me. When I was ten, I broke my leg running in the Memory Wood and nearly died, but that was two years ago. I’m much more careful now.
‘Seems like we’re all done, Elijah,’ one of them says. ‘Are you looking forward to going home?’
I glance around the room. For the first time I notice it has no windows. Maybe that’s because of the sort of people it usually contains – bad people, not like these in here with me now. They’re police, even if they don’t wear the uniforms. Earlier, the one who brought me a Coca-Cola told me they wearplayclothes. He could have been joking. For a twelve-year-old I have a pretty high IQ, but I’ve never really understood teasing.
For a moment I forget they’re still watching me, stillwaiting for an answer. I glance up and nod, swinging my legs harder. Whywouldn’tI be looking forward to going home?
My face changes. I think I’m smiling.
II
We’re in the car. Papa is driving. Magic Annie, who lives on the far side of the Memory Wood, says that these days most kids call their parents Mum and Dad. I’m pretty sure I used to do that too. I don’t really know why I switched to Mama and Papa. I read a lot of old books, mainly because we don’t have money to waste on the newer stuff. Maybe that’s it.
‘Did they question you?’ Papa asks.
‘About what?’
‘Oh, about anything, really.’
He slows the car at a crossroads, even though he has right of way. Always careful like that, is Papa. Always worried that he’ll hit a cyclist or a dog-walker, or a slow-crossing hedgehog.
‘They asked me about you,’ I say.
In the front seat, Mama turns to look at him. Papa’s attention remains on the road. He holds the steering wheel delicately, wrists angled higher than his knuckles. It makes him look like a begging dog, and suddenly I think of the Arthur Sarnoff print that hangs on our living-room wall, of a beagle playing pool against a couple of rascally, cigar-chomping hounds. The picture’s calledHey! One Leg on the Floor!because the beagle is perched on a stepladder, which is cheating. Mama hates it, but I kind of like it. It’s the only picture we have.
‘What did they ask you?’
‘Oh, you know, Papa, just stuff. What kind of job you do, what kind of hobbies you have, that sort of thing.’ I decide not to mention their other questions just yet, nor my answers. Not until I’ve had a bit more time to think. In the last few days a lot’s happened, and I need to get it all straight. Sometimes life can be pretty confusing, even for a kid with a high IQ.
‘What did you tell them?’
‘I said you’re a gardener. And that you fix things.’ I make a dimple in the pink plaster on my knee and wince. ‘I told them about the crow you saved.’
We found the crow outside the back door one morning, flapping a broken wing. Papa nursed it for three days straight, feeding it bread soaked in milk. On the fourth day we came downstairs to find it gone. Crow bones, Papa said, mend much faster than human ones.
III
We’re coming to the edge of town. Fewer buildings, fewer people. On the pavement I see two boys wearing uniform: grey trousers, maroon blazers, scuffed black shoes. They look about my age. I wonder what it must be like to have lessons at school instead of at home. There isn’t a book in my house I haven’t read ten times over, so I’m pretty sure I’d do well. Magic Annie says I have the vocabulary of someone with far bigger shoes. There was a playwright, once, who knew sixty thousand words. I’d like to beat him if I can.
As we speed past, I press my palm against the window. I imagine the boys turning and waving. But they don’t, and then they’re gone.
‘Did you talk about me?’ Mama asks.
Her head is still sideways. I’m struck by how pretty she looks today. When the low sun breaks through the clouds her hair gleams like pirate gold. She looks like an angel, or one of those warrior queens I’ve read about: Boudicca, perhaps, or Artemisia. I want to climb into the front seat and curl up in her lap. Instead, I roll my eyes in mock-exasperation. ‘I’m not acompletewitling. Just because I got lost this one time.’
Witlingis my new favourite word. Last week it wasflibbertigibbet, which is Middle English for an excessively chatty person. Everyone’s life should contain a couple of flibbertigibbets, preferably with a few witlings to keep them company.
Again, I glance out of the window. This time all I see is fields. ‘I hope Gretel’s OK.’