For now, though, her priority was the next chapter of In the Fifth at Mallory Towers and the resolution of the poison pen mystery!
Kicking her way through the remains of her fabulous party – mostly disarticulated bones and dresses stained with bodily fluids now, but still the occasional scrap of discarded wrapping paper and tinsel – Barbara went to the drawing room, humming to herself.
She stopped and stared, her mouth hanging open, when she saw the man silhouetted in the French doors.
“Barbara Wolfing-Gusset?” said the man in a bland Croydon accent.
She nodded.
“Baroness?”
She nodded again.
The man raised his arms and Barbara saw he was holding a shotgun.
As the pellets thudded into her she realised two things. First, that no dry cleaners in the world was going to be able to salvage her best party frock; and second, that she’d never find out who’d written Moira those beastly letters.
The man walked across the room and stood over her as she gasped for air.
“Sorry,” he said. Then he turned and walked away.
Barbara pulled herself out of the drawing room, leaving a thick, slick trail behind her. It was agony, but she fought her way back through the hall and into the scullery. After tremendous effort, she reached Tommy’s rotting skeleton and rested her head on his ribcage. She closed her eyes and prepared for death.
Then she opened them again and shoved the dog away.
For now.
THE SMOKE CURLED upwards from the embers of the Old Schools. No-one left alive in there, then.
Arthur panned the binoculars left and surveyed the wider ruins. The cultists – at least that’s what he assumed they were - had done their job thoroughly, but had made his infinitely more difficult.
The message painted on the wall of the (latest, only recently ascended, blissfully unaware) King’s house had directed anyone who was looking for him to his school. He’d obviously felt that it would provide a refuge. Arthur supposed it was a sensible idea; if the boy were safely ensconced in a stable community environment, it would make him far harder for Arthur to pick off. For that reason alone it showed common sense. And anyway, where else was there for the boy to go?
On his way to the school, Arthur had decided he would masquerade as a teacher from a similar institution. Computer Science; useless now, so unlikely to have to prove his credentials. If he could convince whatever passed for staff that he was legitimate – and damn, wouldn’t you know it, he’d not got a copy of his Criminal Record Bureau check on him right now and it was going to be hard to get a replacement wasn’t it, ha ha – then he could infiltrate the school, identify the boy and wait for an opportune moment to make his move.
Upon arrival, however, he’d discovered the school under siege by a ferocious band of naked, blood-daubed nutters led by some weirdo in a pinstripe suit and bowler hat. He’d stayed out of sight and let the siege play out to its inevitable conclusion – the complete destruction of the school and everyone in it. He was pretty sure there’d been cannibalism involved, but he’d avoided looking too closely once the gates were breached and the real savagery began.
Now, as he looked at the smouldering ruins of Harrow School, Arthur had difficulty deciding what to do.
If the boy king had made it to the school, he had almost certainly died in the massacre. But what if he’d been waylaid en route? What if he’d never made it here? There were too many variables, and Arthur had to be sure. He couldn’t have a pretender turning up and causing trouble once he’d taken the throne.
Then a dreadful thought occurred to him: perhaps the boy had converted – he was pretty sure one or two of the boys had joined the cultists. Blimey, he hoped he wouldn’t have to wade into that particular hornet’s nest.
No, there was nothing else for it; he’d simply have to rummage around in the debris and entrails in search of identification. He might get lucky.
With a weary sigh, Arthur collapsed the binoculars, put them in the pocket of his coat, and stood up. He felt a slight nervous tingle as he broke cover and walked towards the wreckage. He might already be king, and he might find proof of that fact within the next hour. He could embrace his destiny by lunchtime. He felt lightheaded at the thought of it, and lengthened his stride.
TWO HOURS LATER Arthur sat on a blood-soaked bench feeling deflated and nauseous.
Rifling through the pockets of half burnt – and in some cases half eaten - child corpses was not the best way to spend a morning. But, he told himself, if he was going to be king he had to earn the right, and facing up to difficult realities and making hard decisions was part of the job. Kings needed to be made of stern stuff. He was proud that he hadn’t flinched in the face of such horror; he’d only thrown up twice.
But he’d found no proof of identity. A couple of bodies had been identifiable by library cards – held on to for what reason, he wondered? Habit? Some kind of totemic article of faith that one day there would once again be fines for overdue books? – but the majority of the bodies were anonymous.
This was not acceptable. He’d managed to find and eliminate ten obstacles with no doubt at all, but now, at the final hurdle, he was going to have to make a leap of faith. The boy was almost certainly dead but Arthur knew that scintilla of possibility, that maggot of doubt, would gnaw away at him for the duration of his reign. He’d never feel entirely secure upon his throne, he’d always be waiting for the day when the miraculously resurrected boy king, now grown up and riding at the head of an army, would rise up to challenge his rule and topple him from the throne.
Unconsciously, his hand rose to his throat as he contemplated Charles I’s fate. Then he clenched as he recalled Edward II’s.
No, he had to be sure. There was nothing else for it – he had to find the cultists. If he could talk to the boys who had converted they’d be able to tell him the boy king’s fate. It was his final test, the last thing he must do to prove that he was worthy of his own destiny. He understood that.
But it really was going to be a pain in the neck.
THE KING OF England, Jack Bedford, picked his way through the wreckage of his school.
Coming back to school had seemed like such a good idea when the world died. After all, if any school was going to survive The Cull, it would be Harrow, wouldn’t it? As it turned out, only a few children thought of returning to school, so the community never had time to reach critical mass before their first big challenge.
When the Blood Hunters had turned up to kill and eat anyone who wouldn’t convert to their mad creed, Jack and one of his classmates had escaped the slaughter by sheltering in a huge brick ice house deep in the woods that made up a large part of the school grounds. They’d heard nothing in two days now, so Jack had emerged to scout the area.
He was shocked to see the school reduced to a pile of smouldering embers and a half collapsed stone shell. This was Harrow, for God’s sake. Was nothing sacred?
The Old Schools, chosen for a last stand in the event of attack, was still smoking, but he approached anyway. There had been twenty-three other children and one teacher – the Head of English, who had proclaimed himself Headmaster – here when the cultists had arrived. Jack didn’t hold out much hope of finding any of them alive, but he could at least bury any remains. There were no bodies here, though; everyone had been taken elsewhere during the bloodletting. Jack scrambled away from the still hot embers, ashamed at the relief he felt.
As he approached the dormitories he caught a whiff of cooking meat and a thick smoky stench of chemicals. He paused, thinking again. The sick feeling in his stomach hardened into a knot of fury and fear. He wanted to run as far as he could from this awful place, but at the same time he wanted to find a gun or a knife or a club, pursue the Blood Hunters and massacre the whole bloody lot of them.
He shook his head and sank to the grass, sitting down and wrapping his arms around his legs, resting his chin on his knees and staring blankly at the smouldering wreckage. Who was he
kidding? He was fifteen, his arms were too long for his body and he kept bumping into things. Always the last to be chosen for rugby, Jack was not sporty or physically confident; he was gangly, awkward and beanpole thin. Give him a gun and he’d probably just blow his own foot off. He wasn’t going to be massacring anybody, let alone a gang of heavily armed psychotic cannibals.
He sniffed and stuck his lower lip out.
Where could he go now? His family were dead, his school destroyed, the only friend he had left was that interloper Ben, who had remained in the ice house, asleep and unconcerned.
Jack sat there, disconsolate. He had no real friends, no family, no home, and nowhere to go. He was unwashed, hungry, tired and simultaneously terrified and furious.
He realise the simple truth of his life - he was prey, and that was all. A tasty morsel to be eaten up by whichever cult, gang or death squad ran him to ground. The best he could hope for was a squalid few months scratching a life in the wreckage and then a brutal and pointless death.
He felt tears welling up in his eyes.
Then he froze as he heard a noise. He held his breath and willed his heart to slow. There it was again. Sounded like someone behind him and to his left. He heard the faint sound of shifting bricks; someone was walking through the rubble of the Old Schools.
Instinctively realising that he had not been seen, Jack slowly raised his head and turned to look over his shoulder. A freestanding wall blocked the other person from view. He rose to his feet and moved away as quietly as he could, taking cover in the ruins of a classroom, peering out through the hole where a window used to be. He glanced down and noticed that his hands were shaking.
There was a sound of shifting stone and Jack saw the freestanding wall wobble dangerously. The unseen man must have destabilised it by accident. Jack heard him scrabbling to escape, but he misjudged it, because the wall toppled away from Jack with a slow, clumsy grace, and there was a loud cry of alarm and pain mixed in with the sound of crashing brickwork.
Unsure what to do, Jack stood there, stunned, watching the wreckage settled. After the sudden noise, silence fell again, for a moment.
“Oh... bother!” came a voice from inside the rising dust cloud. “Damn and blast and buggeration!”
This did not sound, Jack thought, like the cries of a dangerous killer or a mad cultist. But still he did not move, waiting patiently for the dust to settle so he could see who he was dealing with. It took a minute or so, but eventually a silhouette hardened into the prone form of a chubby little man dressed in a v-neck sweater and a puffy green jacket. He was lying with his feet towards Jack’s hiding place, but his legs were buried beneath piles of fallen bricks.
The man was trapped.
THE MAN WATCHING from the tree-line cursed under his breath.
“Don’t let me down now, Arthur,” he whispered. “Not when we’re so close...”
Then he reached into his backpack and pulled out a machine gun.
Just in case.
JACK STUDIED THE prone man, trying to work out what to do.
The man didn’t have a gun in either of his hands, and his bag had fallen beyond his reach. That left his coat as the only likely place for a weapon to be concealed. As he leaned forward and began trying to dig himself out, the coat fell open and Jack was pretty sure there was nothing heavy in any of the pockets.
Maybe this guy was friendly. He didn’t look threatening. But what had he been doing here? Was he a looter, come to pick over the wreckage of his school, or something else?
He considered for a moment and then broke cover. He stood in plain sight but didn’t move, waiting for the man to notice him. It took a few moments.
“Oh, hello, I didn’t see you there,” said the man, momentarily forgetting his predicament. He stopped trying to free himself and leaned backwards.
Jack licked his lips; he had a dreadful case of dry mouth.
“What are you doing here?” asked Jack, warily.
The man paused before replying, and Jack fancied that he could see cogs turning in the guy’s head as he worked out his response. Subterfuge was definitely not this guy’s strong suit. Jack did not think it would be wise to trust him.
“I’m on a sort of quest,” he said.
“For what?”
“Not what, young man. Who.”
“All right, for whom are you questing?”
“Oh very good. You must be an Harrovian, such good grammar.” The man was eyeing Jack almost hungrily. Jack bit his lip nervously. What was this guy’s game?
“I’m Arthur. Is there any chance..?” He waved at his trapped legs and smiled.
Still Jack didn’t move.
“I asked you who you were looking for,” he said.
“A boy. His name’s Jack Bedford.” The man’s eyes were narrow, gauging Jack’s reaction to this news.
And Jack was so astonished that he let a momentary flicker of that surprise show on his face before he said: “Never heard of him.”
GOT HIM! THOUGHT Arthur. He either knows the boy or – he looked him up and down; right age, at least – is the boy.
Arthur was good at subterfuge, though, and had played his cards close to his chest. There was no reason for this boy not to trust him. Plus, his legs hurt like hell, and might be broken, so he didn’t think he presented an obvious threat. If this was the king, he could lure him forward by playing the helpless victim. His reached his right hand down, as subtly as he could manage, and wrapped his fingers around a brick.
“Oh, that’s shame,” he said. “I’ve got good news for him. Anyway, first things first, can you please help me free my legs? They really are rather sore.”
“What news?”
Oh for god’s sake, this boy was skittish.
“I’m sorry, I can only tell that to him. I promised.” He was pleased with that last flourish.
The boy considered for a moment and then said “I can take you to Jack. I know where he is.”
“You mean he’s alive? Oh that’s wonderful!” Now help me move these bricks you snot-nosed whelp.
He let go of the brick, and the boy moved forward at last, reaching forward to help release him. The poor idiot child had no idea he’d played right into Arthur’s hands.
IT DIDN’T TAKE long for Jack to uncover Arthur’s legs. He worked in silence, unsure whether he should be doing this. He’d been shocked to hear his own name, and he couldn’t pass up the chance that this man might be able to help him in some way. But he didn’t trust him.
The best plan he’d been able to come up with was to take Arthur back to the ice house where Ben was waiting. He’d introduce Ben as himself and pull faces at Ben behind the guy’s back to get him to play along.
Ben was more confident than he was, good at handling confrontations and problems. If anyone could turn this situation to his advantage, it was Ben. He just had to hope that he was feeling sharp today.
Jack heaved the last brick away and Arthur’s legs lay exposed at last. There were spatters of blood on his trousers, but he cautiously flexed his legs and then shakily got to his feet.
“Well fancy that!” he cried. “No bones broken.”
Jack also stood up, and kept his distance as Arthur hobbled over to his bag, picked it up, and slung it over his shoulder.
“Right then,” he said. “Lead on... sorry, you didn’t tell me your name.”
“I’m Ben,” said Jack.
Arthur reached out a hand, smiling insincerely. “Please to meet you Ben, and thank you for helping me.”
Jack reluctantly shook Arthur’s clammy, limp hand.
“S’this way,” he murmured, and slouched off towards the woods. Arthur followed close behind.
“So, do you know Jack well?” asked the man, feigning small talk.
“He was in my house, but he was in the year below. So not really.”
“Then how...?”
“We were just lucky. We’d been sent off to collect some firewood when the cannibals attacked. So we ju
st hid in the ice house until they’d gone.”
“Nice lad, is he?”
“Don’t you know?”
“Oh no, never met him. I’m just running an errand.”
“He’s all right, I suppose. Bit annoying when you’re cooped up in the dark with him for three days.”
“I think maybe everyone is.” Arthur gave a short, nasal laugh, which irritated Jack intensely. His fear had largely faded, now he was only curious.
THE ICE HOUSE was a small brick dome with a door that you had to crouch to get through; it looked like a brick igloo, sitting incongruously among the school’s woodlands, swathed in ivy, better camouflaged than any pill box.
As soon as it came in sight, Jack stopped.
“Better stay here, let me warn him you’re coming,” he told Arthur. “He’s kind of nervous and he’s got a knife. We don’t want you to get stabbed do we?”
Arthur gave another of his nervous, snorty laughs. “Heavens, no!”
Jack walked towards the ice house, only just resisting the urge to run. As he stooped to enter, he glanced back over his shoulder and saw Arthur standing where he’d left him. The man smiled and waved.
The ice house smelled of damp leaves and dirt. It was dark inside, only a tiny chink of light penetrated the canopy of ivy that covered the small hole at the apogee of the dome. Designed to keep ice frozen throughout the year in the days before freezers, the majority of the ice house lay under ground; almost immediately you were inside, the ground opened up into a cavernous, brick lined hole. In the half-light, Jack could just about make out the sleeping figure of Ben. He was exactly where Jack had left him, curled up on the carpet of detritus that had accumulated at the bottom of the ice house in the hundred or so years since it had last been used.
Jack scrambled down into the hole and shook the sleeping boy awake.
Spotty, unkempt and decidedly common, Ben Wyman didn’t deserve his place at Harrow. The Headmaster had insisted that the school should open its door to any refugee children they dredged up, and Ben had been the first. He claimed to be the middle class son of a school teacher from the local comp, but Jack had his suspicions about that. Ben had been wary of the Harrow boys and the haughty ease with which they carried themselves. He’d not been bullied, exactly, but he was ostracised by the other boys, including Jack. But he’d been appointed Ben’s ‘shepherd’, which meant it was his job to show him the ropes and help him find his feet, so they’d ended up spending a lot of time in each other’s company.
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