The Whispers in the Walls. Sophie Cleverly
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Название: The Whispers in the Walls
Автор: Sophie Cleverly
Издательство: HarperCollins
Жанр: Детская проза
isbn: 9780007589210
isbn:
“I’m just not sure, dear.” That was Father. “Do we really think they’ll be safe there?”
“They’ll be fine,” snapped our stepmother. “It’s just a school! I can’t COPE with them here, you know that. They need to go.” And then, the killing blow. “It’s them or me!” she screeched.
“Her,” I whispered. “Say her!”
There was an unbearable pause.
When Father replied, his voice was quieter, and I strained to hear it. “I’ll take them back in the morning,” he said.
We were allowed to stay for supper and had a bed for the night, but that was all. Father was shipping us back to Rookwood first thing the next day, a fact that had left me spitting with anger while Ivy tried to comfort me. Father left me to “get used to it”. He was lucky I didn’t snap his stupid glasses in two.
Our stepmother dished up burnt roast lamb and soggy vegetables for dinner, whilst simpering about what brave girls we’d been. Harry and the other boys, Joseph and John, didn’t seem to care that we’d ever gone away, and were their usual horrible selves, pulling faces and flicking peas at us. I scolded one of them and the troll flicked her eyes up at me, nostrils flaring, as if I’d attacked him. But she didn’t dare say a word in front of Father.
Exhausted, Ivy and I made our excuses and climbed the steep stairs to our bedroom. I flicked on the little brass light switch, illuminating the two matching beds side by side, and the tall mirror between them. There was a cupboard and some curtains, but besides that the room was bare.
I carried my suitcase inside, a small leather one that contained a few of my possessions. Much as Miss Fox had been a repulsive witch, she had at least allowed me that much when she threw me into Rosemoor Asylum. She must have told the doctors so many lies about me to convince them I was hysterical, a fantasist, and needed to be locked away for my own sake and for the safety of others. I shook my head fiercely. I was never going back there.
“Oh, Scarlet,” said Ivy, sinking down on to her bed. A little cloud of dust flew up from the white sheets. “What are we going to do?”
I flopped onto my own bed. “Poison Edith? Run away?”
“No poisoning, Scarlet. And we can’t run away from everything. We don’t have any money, or a motor car. They’ll just catch us and send us straight back to Rookwood.”
“We’ll dig an escape tunnel,” I said. But I was being stupid, and I knew it. We were stuck.
My twin gazed up at the plaster on the ceiling. “It could be worse.”
I hated Rookwood. Every inch of the place was filled with terrible memories. “How could it possibly be worse?”
“I could be alone.”
She smiled at me then, a smile that flowed from the depths of sadness, and I felt a piece of my anger float away.
“You’re right,” I said. “We’re together. That’s all that matters.”
I jumped up on the bed, shoes on, not caring.
“If we have no choice but to go back, then we’re going back. Rookwood School isn’t going to know what hit it!”
For months I had believed my sister was gone forever. And now she sat beside me, as we rode in a motor car back to a place neither of us wanted to set foot in, and I had to remind myself that she was real. I kept reaching out and taking hold of her arm for reassurance.
Father’s car was comfortable but smelled strongly of pipe tobacco – he insisted on smoking all the way there. He attempted conversation, awkwardly. “How did you get on with your lessons, Ivy? How’s your ballet coming along?” As if that was all there was to talk about.
I felt myself getting more and more nervous the nearer we got to Rookwood. I’d only been gone a few days, but knowing what had really happened made the place even more intimidating and foreboding than it had been before. I had to tell myself it was all right – I had Scarlet, I had Ariadne, and Miss Finch was on our side. Miss Fox was gone and she wasn’t coming back.
The car chugged through the school gates, the stone rooks on the pillars poised to grasp us with their talons. Scarlet squeezed my hand tightly, but when I looked up at her, her expression was as determined as ever. The tall trees bent over us, their crisp leaves peeling away in the late-autumn wind.
When we came to a stop in front of the building, Scarlet pulled away from me and got out of the car without a word. I leant out and watched as she climbed the steps with her suitcase. I didn’t know if she would ever forgive Father for this.
I stayed in the car. If this was my one chance to speak to Father, I had to take it. “Do we have to do this? Do you have to just drive away and leave us here?”
He craned his neck to look at me as I perched on the rear leather seat. “We’ve been through this, Ivy.”
“I know, but there has to be another way. What if we went to stay with Aunt Phoebe? She must be lonely.”
Father got out and pulled open my door with a thunk. Then he crouched down at my feet, looking up at me, a gesture that made me feel like I was a little girl again. “I know you’re worried about things being as bad as they were before.” He looked up at Scarlet, who was staring pointedly at the stonework above the entrance. “But it’s all in the past now. We have to move forward. The headmaster, Mr …”
“Bartholomew.”
“Bartholomew, that’s it. He reassured me and your stepmother that everything will be in order; that it’s all been dealt with. You need an education and this is the best place for it. Your sister can pout all she wants, but one day she’ll realise that we did the right thing.”
I looked down at him, kneeling there on the gravel, greying streaks in his dark hair and wrinkles in his suit. The little girl in me wanted to give him a hug, tell him how much I’d missed him. But I wasn’t that girl any more.
So instead I just said: “You’re wrong.”
I picked up my suitcase and pushed past him. I heard his gasp of shock, but I wasn’t going to back down. Not this time.
“I love you, girls,” he called out from behind me.
I didn’t look back. I climbed the stone steps and took Scarlet’s hand. She pulled me through the entrance, and we left Father far behind.
“HOW DARE HE?” Scarlet yelled, as the door shut behind us. “How dare he act like this is all for the best?”
Rookwood’s worried secretary looked up and shushed her, though it was one of the most timid shushes СКАЧАТЬ