The Invisible Hand
Page 14
Now what?
As he leaned back against the door, sweating, realising he needed to find a spare key – perhaps it would be in the secretary’s office? – the door clicked open behind him and he had to spin quickly to catch it and stop it banging off the inside wall.
Sam ducked inside, closing the door, and walked past the fire to Water’s desk and looked out through the bay windows. He could see the back lawns, the playing fields and, through the snow, sometimes, the hills. Closer, down below, he saw the Assembly Hall, packed but silent.
I’m here. I’m in here. Search!
Sam started with the desk. Two of the drawers were locked but the longest, which ran the entire length of the writing surface, slid open to reveal a mobile phone, some keys, a black purse and a pair of scissors. Sam slammed it shut and looked up. There were some books on a shelf behind the sofa at the furthest end of the room, near the door, and some objects dotted about on the mantelpiece above the fire. He decided to try the mantelpiece first.
Sam didn’t know what to make of the objects he saw. There was a two-headed foetus, an animal of some kind, floating in aspic or liquid. The eyes stared out at Sam and gave him the creeps. Next were a collection of small off-white objects arranged on a brass plate: again Sam got a shiver when he realised he was looking at teeth. The teeth of what, exactly, he wasn’t sure.
Check the bookcase. Stay awake. Stay alert.
To read the titles on the spines of the books Sam had to put one hand on the corner of the frame but all the titles began to swim before his eyes and he suddenly heard the books talking to him: the words of each book were being spoken in his own voice – but the timbre and tone of each of his voices was different.
He could make out his normal voice, the voice he heard inside his own head, the same voice he’d always heard inside his own head, but he could also hear other tones and accents. He heard himself talking as a baby. Heard his voice as he read in class – that horrible self-conscious monotone. He heard his recorded voice. His happy voice. Acting the fool. Taking the mickey. Somewhere else he was crying, upset.
Sam fell to the floor and held his ears.
Give up Sam! he heard.
Don’t give up, Sam!
He made himself stand up and ran to the window, wanting air, but his eyes immediately focussed on Mrs Waters who was walking across the snow in the centre of the back lawn. Her fresh footsteps, strangely sooty, trailed back to the Assembly Hall. Behind her the students were oozing out of the Hall exits like green blood. Water’s eyes were glowing red and her face, which Sam knew only he could see, had taken on a terrible aspect, as though she were hundreds of years old. Finally she reveals herself!
Turning back to the room Sam saw the walls were bare, very white and that he was standing on brown, unpolished floorboards. The hearth was black and empty and there was a man walking towards Sam with a book in his hand and a dog by his side. The man smiled and Sam recognised him as Mr Chipping.
Sam took the book as it was offered but as he touched it everything vanished. There was a crash of thunder and he was back in the stuffy room, back with the fire and curtains and dizziness and a ceiling alive with flapping bats wings.
Sam was knocked down and a terrible, powerful force began to drag him by the feet towards the fireplace, towards the flames in the grate which had taken on the appearance of a fiery-orange, gaping jaw.
So this is how it ends.
The grip on his shoes was so fierce that Sam lay back on the carpet and put his hands behind his head and surrendered. He knew he couldn’t die again – he had done that once, to save Leana – but now he must find out why he was here and why he had been pitted against Hecate. He must find out how this ended.
Sam was calm. He wanted the magic over. He wanted to know reality.
As the leather on his toecaps hissed, popped and melted in the jaws of the fire, Sam looked up, half-hoping to see angels or perhaps some kindly old relative telling him everything was going to be all right, but instead noticed the portrait of the Mr Chipping and his dog hanging over the fire. The painting was wavy, affected by the heat from the flames below and he thought at that moment he could hear the old master’s voice saying, You have the power, Sam. Use The Book. End Hecate’s reign. She has been waiting for one who has the power. Use what is within you before she uses you. Use the power within.
“Within. Within.”
In a moment Sam had kicked off his shoes, jumped up and punched through the canvas. His arm came back with a wide old book clenched inside his bleeding knuckles and Sam knew it was the prize: so that was where the book had been kept!
And as the bats came down and the fire leapt from the grate, the Queen of Witches appeared transfigured by brilliant light in the doorway. Sam flipped open the great book on the desk and the teeth chattered on their bronze trays, the jewels which made up the sand in the windows melted, the hairs and nails in the dirt of the carpet twitched and chattered and the insects in the sofa coughed blood.
Ignoring the inferno all around him, Sam began to write.
25
The Beginning And The End Of A Circle Are One
Dear Saraswati,
Thank you so much for your letter! Of course I’d be happy to be your pen-pal and write to you from time to time. I love knowing about other cultures and would like to know all about your country and where you live.
At the moment I go to a school in the middle of the countryside here in England. It’s called St Francis’s and it is a boarding school for girls and boys. I miss my parents a lot but luckily I have my sister, Gemma, here. Maybe I’ll tell you about her in another letter.
I have many friends even though I’ve only been here a month or so. My best friends are Gillian, Kizzie and Charlotte. Our housemistress is a nice lady called Mrs Bainbridge who tells us incredible stories at night. We live in the Main Building, which is very old and full of secret passages and legends. Maybe in the next letter I’ll tell you one of them?
The headmaster here is a nice man called Mr Firmin. He likes sailing a lot and is trying to change the tennis courts into a big boating lake but nobody else seems too keen. The Head Boy and Head Girl this year are Sam and Leana They are really nice and both of them take good care of all the new pupils to make sure they settle in. We see them a lot because Sam’s mother is a famous writer and she is a friend of Miss Bainbridge.
In school I take all the usual subjects. In biology we are studying plants and cells, in English Romeo and Juliet and in geography, coastal erosion. I like all the subjects but my favourite activity is drama. This year, for the first time, I’ve got a part in the end of year play. More details to follow!
I wish I could write more but I have to go to bed now. Please write and tell me how you are. Tell me about your family and your school and what you do. Do you have any good legends in your town? Any mysteries? I like mysteries. Tell me about the weather there and what you eat. I would love to know everything.
I hope you like writing. I do!
Speak soon. Lots of love,
Athena.
About the Author
James was born on a rainy Thursday in the north of England in May, 1973. Six years later he moved with his family to the heat and humidity of Singapore before experiencing a wet couple of years on the rugged east coast of Scotland, near Aberdeen. He went to a boarding school not dissimilar to St Francis de Sales before going on to university in London.
For most of his twenties James wandered about Ireland, France, Germany and Thailand, washing dishes, making sandwiches, watching various world cups and teaching English.
He now lives in Madrid, Spain, with his wife and two children.
James would like to thank Han, Matso, Seets, Ben, Paul, Dan, Kim, Car, Pepe, Jon, Luce and Max for their help, hospitality and advice in writing this book. Thanks also to everyone at Lodestone and JHP. Thank you, too, for reading it.
About Shakespeare’s Moon
The Invisible Hand is the first in the Shakespea
re’s Moon series of books about St Francis de Sales school and the adventures of the people who go there.
If you would like to find out more about the other books in the series, have a chance of appearing in the next book as a character or take part in other exciting competitions, go to jameshartleybooks.com for more information, or follow us on Facebook or Twitter.
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