Children of the Red King Book 01 Midnight for Charlie Bone

by Jenny Nimmo

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  Mom fanc( Pfa((.

  f .6. A nice-Ifacfa from social services is comina to look. After uou until We aetlrfacX.

  "I don't like the part about the nice lady" said Charlie, when he had finished the letter. "People have different ideas about nice."

  ?As long as she's nice to Runner, I don't mind," said Benjamin. The two boys decided to go to Ingledew's immediately Benjamin had taken the precaution of copying the tape twice, in case Manfred turned up to search them, or something equally horrible. He had also pushed a large suitcase into the cellar and dropped a rug over it, so that anyone searching for Dr. Tolly's case would be temporarily fooled.

  "You have been busy" said Charlie admiringly

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  With Runner Bean leading the way they set off for the bookshop. Being Sunday they found it closed, of course, but after several knocks and a few shouts, Miss Ingledew opened the door. She was wearing a long green bathrobe and looked a bit down in the dumps.

  "What do you want?" she asked. "It's Sunday morning, for goodness sake."

  "I'm sorry Miss Ingledew,? said Charlie. He told her about the tape they'd found in the metal dog. "It's meant for you," he said, "so we brought it for you. It'll tell you everything about your niece. She's in the academy and we think we can wake her up."

  "Wake her up? What are you talking about? You'd better come in, both of you." She glanced at Runner Bean. "He doesn't eat books, does he?"

  "Never," said Benjamin.

  They followed Miss Ingledew through the curtains and into her cozy book-lined living room, Runner Bean taking great care not to knock over the little towers of books scattered on the floor.

  Miss Ingledew put the tape into a dusty-looking

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  tape recorder and motioned the boys to sit. They squeezed themselves into the only empty armchair - the others being full of books and papers

  - while Miss Ingledew perched on the edge of her desk. She pressed play and Dr. Tolly's voice rumbled out into the room.

  The boys watched Miss Ingledew's face as she listened. Several times she shook her head, and often she wiped her eyes. Now and again she exclaimed, "Oh no," and when the tape finally ended, she murmured, "I remember that day so well. A very strange thing happened-I should have guessed."

  "What sort of strange thing?" asked Charlie.

  "Cats," said Miss Ingledew

  "Cats?" Charlie sat up.

  "I don't know where they came from, but the day little Emma was due to leave they suddenly appeared in my kitchen. They caused a fire by knocking a dishcloth onto the gas burner. It took a while to put it out. Their coats were very bright -red, orange, and yellow-and they kept circling the baby as if they were

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  trying to protect her. They gave Dr. Tolly a nasty scratch on his face when he finally lifted the baby away"

  "One of them is in the photo," Charlie said.

  "I daresay it is," said Miss Ingledew. "They were everywhere. But when Emma left, they vanished." She rubbed her forehead. "So poor little Emma is asleep. This is all so extraordinary!"

  "She's hypnotized," said Charlie. "Manfred did it to me. Only he's done it much worse to her. But it's wearing off Miss Ingledew I heard them talking about your niece, and Manfred said he was getting fed up because he had to keep 'putting her under' So it won't take much to wake her up, and we think we've got the thing that'll do it."

  "But who is she, Charlie?"

  "We think she's a girl called Emilia Moon," said Charlie. "She has fair hair and her eyes are very blue and sort of dreamy. She doesn't say much, but she's very good at drawing."

  "Nancy" murmured Miss Ingledew. "She sounds just like my sister, Nancy. Oh, I wish I could see her."

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  "Leave it to us, Miss Ingledew,? said Charlie, jumping up. "We'll find a way to wake her up, and then she can come and live with you." Miss Ingledew gasped. "Is that possible? Perhaps she's happy where she is, living with the Moon people."

  "She doesn't look very happy" said Charlie. "She probably doesn't even know she can fly"

  "That's something, isn't it?" Benjamin remarked. "I wish I could fly"

  "I think it's very unlikely that Emma can fly Dr. Tolly certainly never mentioned it before." Miss Ingledew pushed herself off the desk. "I can't thank you enough, Charlie, and you, Benjamin," she said. "You've given me hope. Let me know as soon as you need me, won't you?"

  "You bet," said Charlie. He had just glimpsed a tiny bit of glass shining in her hair and wondered how he could bring up the subject of the unfortunate glass popping. He had to do it, for his uncle's sake. But Runner Bean was barking excitedly and they were already through the curtains and heading for the door.

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  Charlie stopped suddenly cleared his throat and said, ?About my uncle, Miss Ingledew"

  She went very red. "I'd rather not talk about that," she said.

  "But it was an accident."

  ?Accident? It was most embarrassing."

  "I mean the lightbulbs, Miss Ingledew My uncle couldn't help himself."

  "Lightbulbs?" She didn't understand. "Your uncle walked out on me. Well, ran out, to be precise. Anyone would have thought I was an ogress."

  "Not at all. Quite the opposite. It was because he thought you were beautiful that it happened."

  Seeing Miss Ingledew's puzzled expression, Charlie plunged straight in and told her the truth about his uncle's peculiar gift. She stared at Charlie, first in disbelief, and then horror. Finally a sort of alarm crossed her face. "I see," she muttered. "How unusual."

  "He'd really like to see you again," Charlie went on hopefully 281

  "Hm," said Miss Ingledew "I'm feeling sort of tired now, boys." She opened the door and they dutifully stepped out. The door was closed very firmly behind them.

  "I didn't know your uncle did that kind of thing," said Benjamin.

  "Don't tell anyone," said Charlie. "Perhaps I shouldn't have told Miss Ingledew, but Uncle Paton is desperate to see her again, so I thought it would be best to tell the truth."

  "If you ask me, it's scared her off," said Benjamin cheerfully "Next stop Fidelio's. Come on. I've got a map of where he lives." Benjamin and Runner Bean raced ahead while Charlie jogged along behind, feeling bad about Miss Ingledew and his uncle. It seemed that he had made the situation even worse.

  Fidelio's house was quite a sight or, to be more precise, a sound. It was a large and, luckily detached old house sitting in the middle of a cobbled square. The only garden to speak of was some wispy grass 282

  that surrounded the house inside a low brick wall. As Benjamin and Charlie approached, the noise coming from inside the house was so great that they saw the oak beams, supporting the porch, tremble, and two slates slid down the roof and smashed on the brick path. The noise was made up of many instruments: violins, cellos, a flute, a harp, and a piano could be heard. A brass plaque on the door told them that the place was called Gunn House. Many guns, they thought, as a drumroll echoed out of a lower window

  Charlie wondered how the people inside were going to hear the doorbell. He soon found out. When he pressed the bell, a loud recorded voice boomed, "door! door! door!"

  The two boys jumped backward and Runner Bean gave a long howl of fright. Seconds later Fidelio opened the door and Charlie and Benjamin found themselves stepping into a sort of hive of music. Children rushed up and down the stairs, in and out of rooms, carrying sheets of music and a variety of instruments.

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  "Is this... I mean, are they all your family?" Charlie asked in amazement.

  "Most of them," said Fidelio. "There are ten of us including Mom and Dad. But some of our musical friends have come by My oldest brother, Felix, is starting a rock band."

  A large bearded man crossed the landing at the top of the stairs and Fidelio called out, "This is Benjamin, and this is Charlie, Dad!" Mr. Gunn beamed down at them and sang out, "Benjamin and-Charlie, eating barley welcome both of you, however earl
y." He gave a booming laugh and disappeared into a room that was full of violin sounds.

  "Sorry about that," said Fidelio. "Dad likes to turn everything into a song. I've put the case in a room at the top of the house. Come on." He led his friends and a quaking Runner Bean up the stairs and past doors that shook with sound. The rock-band room caused Runner Bean to whine so pitifully Benjamin had to cover the dog's ears with his hands. Whenever they passed a child with the same bright

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  hair and freckles as Fidelio, he would say "This is Benjamin and this is Charlie," and the two boys would be welcomed with beaming smiles and a

  "Hi!" or "Hello!" or sometimes a "How ya doin?" At last they reached a door at the very top of the house and Fidelio showed them into a room full to bursting with music cases of various sizes. "Our instrument cemetery" said Fidelio. "It's where we keep everything that's broken and might one day be fixed." He pulled the long xylophone case into the light, snapped it open, and lifted out Dr. Tolly's metal case.

  "Shall we open it?" he asked, setting the case on the floor. Suddenly Charlie wasn't sure. He couldn't wait to find out what was in the case and yet he was a little afraid. Uncle Paton had suggested he should be there, to help if something went wrong. But what could go wrong in such a friendly noisy house? No one would hear the sounds that Dr. Tolly had arranged, and if they did, they would think nothing of it. 285

  "OK," said Charlie.

  "You do it, Charlie," said Benjamin.

  Charlie stepped forward and knelt beside the case. He could see the letters quite clearly now: Tolly Twelve BELLS. He touched the first "T," gently but firmly Next came the "O," and now Charlie found that he could hardly stop himself. It was easy really One by one he pressed the letters and, as he came to the last one, an "S," a light tap came from inside the lid.

  Charlie quickly stood up and took a few steps back.

  With a loud crack, the lid swung back and a figure began to rise out of the case.

  It was certainly not what Charlie had expected. He had imagined Dr. Tolly's ancestor to be an old man, dressed in velvet. The) figure that rose out of the case was a knight. Its arms and legs were encased in shining chain mail, and on its head it wore a flat-topped hood, also of chain mail. There was a small opening for the face, but only the eyes and nose could be seen. It was an eerie, awesome sight, this tall shining figure,

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  rising up like a fast-growing flower. Most awesome of all was the gleaming sword held in the knight's right hand.

  When the figure had achieved its full height it suddenly raised the sword, and three boys and a dog jumped back with yelps, screams, and furious barks. And then they were silent, for somewhere inside the knight, a bell began to ring. One, two, three... on it went, and while the bell rang out, a chorus of deep male voices chanted an ancient-sounding hymn.

  "It's Latin," whispered Fidelio. "I've heard them practicing in the cathedral."

  All at once, Charlie understood what Dr. Tolly had done. He had used the sounds that swam around little Emma Tolly just at the moment when she was hypnotized-or spellbound. Dr. Tolly believed these sounds would wake his daughter, and even if she couldn't remember who she was, she would at least be aware that something had happened to her.

  The bell inside the shining knight tolled for the twelfth time. The knight lowered his sword and began

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  to sink back into the case. It was strange to watch how he dropped and dwindled, bending his head and subsiding until he lay in his silk-lined bed, no bigger now than the length of his gleaming sword.

  "Wow!" gasped Benjamin.

  ?Amazing!" said Fidelio.

  "I wonder if it really will wake Emilia up," murmured Charlie. Fidelio was still shaking his head in disbelief. "How did he do it?" he muttered. "What's it made of?"

  "The face looks real," said Benjamin. "The eyes are so shiny"

  "Glass," said Charlie. ?And the rest is just a sort of poly-something." He thought of all the strange metal shapes in Dr. Bloor's workshop. "I bet Dr. Tolly had been fooling the Bloors for years, sending them robots and metal figures and dressed-up skeletons, pretending they held the secret to waking Emilia up. Just to keep them off his back. But they got him in the end."

  "They got him, but not Tolly Twelve Bells," said Benjamin. 288

  Charlie closed the case. "Do you think it'll be safe here until next weekend?" he asked Fidelio.

  "?Course it will. But we'll need a girl to help us if we're going to get Emilia here."

  "No problem," said Charlie. "Olivia Vertigo loves this kind of thing." The three boys made their way back through the musical house, and this time they met Mrs. Gunn, who had the same bright hair and freckles as everyone else in the family She was carrying a double bass across the hall, but took the time to pat each boy fondly on the head as he passed. When they left Gunn House, Benjamin and Charlie headed for number nine, where Maisie had promised a big lunch would be waiting for them. Soon Charlie and Benjamin were sitting down to roast chicken, potatoes, parsnips, and several other more unusual vegetables from Mrs. Bone's greengrocer. There were three dessert choices and the boys had all three: ice cream, pudding, and mango crumble.

  Uncle Paton called down that he wasn't at all hungry,

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  so Runner Bean had his portion. Maisie wondered about keeping some food for Grandma Bone. It was most unlike her to stay in bed so long, she remarked. Charlie smiled to himself. "Why don't you give what's left to Runner Bean?" he asked. "I'm sure he's hungrier than Grandma Bone."

  "Good idea," said Maisie, and Runner Bean happily polished off his second lunch.

  Benjamin stayed for tea as well. That's when Grandma Bone woke up. She came staggering downstairs in a gray bathrobe. "What's going on?" she barked. "It's four o'clock. Why didn't someone wake me up?"

  "You were tired, Grizelda," said Maisie. "We didn't want to wake you."

  "Tired? Tired? I'm never tired," said Grandma Bone. Benjamin and Charlie escaped into the garden where they played all Runner Bean's favorite games. For a while it seemed just like every other weekend, as if nothing had changed since they met, when they were both five years old. Runner Bean had seemed a lot bigger then. 290

  But, of course, things had changed. Tomorrow Charlie had to go back to Bloor's Academy and tonight a complete stranger was coming to look after Benjamin.

  "Do you want me to come with you?" Charlie asked, when his friend decided he'd better go home.

  Benjamin shook his head, "It'll be OK," he said. "I've got Runner."

  "Look, if anything happens while I'm away I mean, if you need help, go to my Uncle Paton. He's not like the otherYewbeams. He's on my side."

  "OK," said Benjamin.

  As Charlie watched Benjamin and Runner Bean cross the street, he had a nasty feeling in the pit of his stomach. Something was wrong, but he couldn't say what it was.

  Benjamin climbed the steps, put his key in the lock, and went into number twelve. Charlie stared at the closed door and wished he had gone with his friend. And then he put Benjamin out of his mind, because there was something he had to tell his mother.

  He found her in the tiny bedroom at the back of

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  the house. She had obviously gone there to escape Grandma Bone's ranting. She patted the bed and Charlie bounced up and sat among the piles of clothes that she'd been mending. He waited until his mother was sitting in her favorite chair -one of the few things she'd managed to save from their old house -and then he told her about Dr. Tolly's strange message.

  Mrs. Bone's expression of amazement turned to sadness as Charlie recounted the story of Emma Tolly He wished he could make her smile by telling her that his father was still alive, but he had no proof, yet. Sometimes he thought a little of the spell that had captured his father had reached out and caught his mother as well. She was so quiet and remote. One day he would find Lyell and rescue him. But first there was Emma Tolly to rescue. And that was something Charlie could do. Next week
he would make sure Manfred found no excuses to give him detention. He would keep his head down, like Uncle Paton, and on Saturday they would find a way to get Emilia Moon to Gunn House.

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  As he slipped out of his mother's room, she looked up and said, "Take care, Charlie. Don't do anything ... dangerous."

  Charlie grinned and shook his head. But he made no promises. 293

  WAR

  If Charlie had gone with Benjamin to number twelve, what happened that night might have been stopped. But who can say for sure? After all, theYewbeams were a powerful family

  As Benjamin and his dog walked up the steps to their front door, Runner Bean gave an anxious whine and Benjamin wondered who the "nice" person might be that his parents had arranged to look after him. They stepped into the hall together. There was a smart black bag at the bottom of the staircase, but no sign of a sitter.

  "Hello!" Benjamin called out, tentatively

  Someone walked out of the kitchen, someone tall, all in black, with gray hair piled on her head and big round pearls dangling from her ears. She didn't have red boots, but Benjamin knew who she was. Or rather he knew she was related to the woman with the red boots.

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  ?Are you - ?" he didn't know how to finish the question.

  "I'm your sitter, dear," she said.

  "But aren't you ... ?"

  "Yes, I'm one of Charlie's great-aunts. So that makes it all very cozy doesn't it? You can call me Aunt Eustacia."

  "Thank you," Benjamin said nervously "Did my mom and dad really ask you to come?"

  "Of course."She spoke a little impatiently "Why else would I be here?"

  "It's just a bit peculiar," said Benjamin.

  Aunt Eustacia ignored this. "You'd better come and have your dinner," she said. "I've made some nice hot broth."

  Benjamin followed her into the kitchen and drew a chair up to the table. Runner Bean gave a small grunt and sat beside him.

  "Dogs shouldn't be in kitchens," said Aunt Eustacia. She poured some steamy brown liquid into a bowl and set it in front of Benjamin. "Shoo!" she said to Runner Bean. "Out!"

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  Runner Bean growled, showing his teeth.