Shiverton Hall (21 page)

Chapter Eighteen

When Arthur got up to his bedroom he called his mother on a phone borrowed from George.

‘Hello, petal!’ she said, clearly thrilled to hear his voice. ‘How are you getting on?’

Arthur hesitated. ‘Great, thanks, Mum,’ he said.

They chatted about Arthur’s schoolwork and their plans for the Christmas holidays, then Arthur cut to the chase.

‘Mum,’ he asked, ‘did I ever have an imaginary friend?’

May laughed. ‘What makes you ask that?’

‘It’s for an English project.’

‘Oh, right.’ May hummed as she racked her brains. ‘No, I don’t remember you ever having one. Rob had one, of course. Don’t you remember –’

‘Pom Pom,’ Arthur finished for her. ‘How could I forget?’

‘I’m glad we don’t have to put up with that little rascal any more. But I don’t think you ever had an imaginary friend.’

‘All right, never mind.’ Arthur sighed; he didn’t feel as relieved by this information as he thought he would.

For the next few days, Arthur, Penny and George remained as cheerful as they could, and it seemed to work. There were no strange nightmares, and no imaginary friends.

One morning break, they walked into the common room, which had been decorated with a large Christmas tree and hundreds of fairy lights, and found a hubbub in the corner. At the centre of a circle of students was Xanthe, with both legs in full casts, in a wheelchair. They approached her.

‘Hi, Xanthe,’ Arthur said a little nervously.

Xanthe pretended not to hear him and carried on chatting to her well-wishers. After her brush with death, even the most popular students wanted to talk to her. Penny and George drifted away to find some tea, but Arthur stuck stubbornly to Xanthe’s side until she acknowledged him.

‘What do you want, Arthur?’ she said coldly.

‘I want to apologise,’ he said quietly, aware that some people were eavesdropping.

‘For what?’ she asked breezily.

‘For snapping at you.’

‘And . . . ?’

‘And . . . What else did I do?’

Xanthe tossed her crimped hair. ‘You could have sent me a card in hospital.’ She sniffed.

‘I’m really sorry,’ Arthur said.

‘It’s OK, Arthur.’ Xanthe beamed, incapable of being cross with him for more than a few seconds. ‘You can carry my books to my next class.’

‘Right. Yeah. Of course.’

Arthur walked slowly alongside Xanthe, who hadn’t quite mastered the wheelchair and kept veering off in the wrong direction.

‘So what happened?’ he asked as they made their way down the hall.

‘When?’ she asked.

Arthur rolled his eyes. ‘Your legs, Xanthe! You broke them, remember?’

‘Of course I remember, silly.’ She giggled. ‘I don’t know, I don’t remember anything. I must have been sleepwalking.’

‘You don’t remember anything?’ Arthur pressed.

‘Nope!’

‘Nothing? You weren’t having any weird dreams?’

Xanthe frowned and slowed down a little, concentrating.

‘Nope! Nothing!’ she said finally.

‘OK.’ Arthur sighed as they reached Xanthe’s classroom.

‘Arthur?’ Xanthe asked as he handed over her books.

‘Yup.’

‘Will you sign one of my casts?’

Arthur took the purple sparkly pen that Xanthe was dangling in front of him. His hand hesitated over the cast as he wondered what to write. Eventually he plumped for:
Hi, Xanthe. Get well soon! Arthur Bannister
. He drew a few stars around the message for good measure and returned the pen.

Xanthe craned forward to read it and said quietly, ‘You should have signed your real name.’

Arthur frowned. Had he heard her correctly?

‘What?’ he asked, licking his lips anxiously. ‘What did you say?’

‘I know who you are,’ Xanthe said. ‘I know no one else can be bothered to read the papers at this school, but I always do. I knew it was you the moment I saw you.’

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ Arthur said, stumbling away in panic.

‘I don’t mind though,’ Xanthe called after him. ‘Arthur!’

But he was gone, racing through the corridors. As he skidded round a corner, he saw Amber hurrying towards a classroom.

‘Amber!’ he called.

She pretended not to have seen him, but he stepped into her path.

‘I need to talk to you,’ Arthur said urgently.

‘I have to go to class.’

‘Look, I realise you think I’m nuts, but if you don’t believe me ask Penny and George. They know that everything I’ve said about the imaginary friends is true.’

Amber looked uncomfortable.

‘I know it sounds mad – imaginary friends suddenly appearing and –’

‘Arthur!’ Amber snapped. ‘I really need to get to class. I’d appreciate it if you stopped talking to me about this, OK? It’s crazy.’

She strode past him, leaving Arthur standing alone in the hall, his face burning, and a full ten minutes late for Long-Pitt’s class.

Back at Garnons that evening, Arthur wrote a letter to Amber, and this time he was determined to send it. It explained in detail what had been going on at Shiverton Hall, what Toynbee had said, and the danger that they were all in. Arthur also told her how he felt about her and how brilliant he thought she was.

He gave the letter to Penny to drop off to Amber in Starling.

Penny pinched the envelope between her fingers distastefully. ‘It’s not a love letter, is it?’ she asked, sniffing it for aftershave.

‘Not completely,’ Arthur said, embarrassed.

‘Arthur!’ Penny said. ‘Honestly, Amber’s awful!’

‘You don’t know her like I do,’ Arthur said, a little dramatically.

‘Yeah.’ Penny snorted. ‘I know her better.’

In spite of her reservations, Penny gave the letter to Amber, who read it with a sneer of contempt. She casually tossed it in the bin once she had finished it and flicked her hair.

‘Your friend Arthur,’ she said to Penny, ‘is clinically insane.’

During football that afternoon, the Forge triplets were more than usually violent towards Arthur, fouling him more than once, until the referee was forced to send Dan off. After the game, Arthur hobbled towards house, rubbing his leg where one of the triplets had kicked him.

‘Painful, is it, Scholarship?’ he heard from behind him.

Suddenly Arthur’s head was in the crook of Dan’s elbow and all he could see were three pairs of enormous trainers on the ground below.

‘It’ll be a lot more painful in a minute,’ Dan hissed through gritted teeth.

Arthur received a blow to his stomach and fell to his knees, winded. The Forge triplets circled him slowly.

‘I’ve never liked you, Scholarship,’ Dan said, grinding his fist into his palm. ‘You don’t really
belong
here, do you?’

Arthur tried to stand, only to find himself brutally pushed back on to the ground.

‘I’m very angry with you,’ continued Dan. ‘Do you know why I’m angry?’

Arthur struggled to get the word out. ‘No.’

‘No?’ Dan said.

One of the brothers kicked Arthur’s back.

‘Any idea now?’ Dan asked, pressing his crooked nose against Arthur’s.

Arthur stared him out, and got another kick for it.

‘I’ll tell you then,’ Dan growled. ‘I’m angry because you’ve been hassling my girlfriend.’

‘Amber’s not your girlfriend,’ Arthur gasped, as a hand smacked his ear.

‘What? She’s yours, is she?’ Dan sneered and his brothers laughed.

Dan pushed the spikes of his football boot into Arthur’s neck. ‘I’m asking you nicely, Scholarship, and I’m only asking once. Leave Amber alone. She thinks you’re a creep.’

With a final kick, the Forge triplets ambled off, sniggering and slapping each other on the back, leaving Arthur to slowly hoist himself up and resentfully beat the pieces of mud and twigs from his football kit.

‘Woah!’ George gasped, as Arthur limped into his bedroom with a bloody nose. ‘What happened to you?’

Arthur slumped on to George’s bed. ‘The Forges,’ he replied grimly.

‘No way! Are you all right, mate?’

‘Did you tell anyone about me and Amber?’ Arthur asked.

‘No – no one, I swear,’ George replied.

‘Well then how on earth did Dan find out?’

George shrugged. ‘He must have seen you together.’

‘No, we’re always really careful. I think she knew he would react like this.’

‘Maybe she told him herself,’ George suggested.

‘No way. She wouldn’t.’

George looked down at the floor.

‘What?’ Arthur said.

George sighed. ‘I didn’t want to be the one to tell you this, mate, but Penny told me what Amber said when she gave her the letter.’

‘What did she say?’

‘She said she thought you were insane.’

Arthur digested this blow, his eyes prickling. It hurt a lot more than the Forges’ beating.

‘I’m really sorry.’

‘I shouldn’t have told her,’ Arthur muttered, ‘but I wanted to warn her.’

‘About the imaginary friends?’

Arthur nodded.

‘Maybe that wasn’t the wisest move,’ George agreed. ‘If Professor Long-Pitt finds out, we’ll all be for it.’

‘I need to talk to her,’ Arthur said decisively, standing up.

George rushed to the door and blocked Arthur’s path. ‘Why don’t you leave it, mate?’ he said.

‘Thanks, George, but I’ll take my chances.’

‘Amber isn’t interested,’ George blurted out. ‘She says she never was. She thinks you’re imagining it all.’

‘Imagining it!’ Arthur sat dumbly back on the bed.

‘Maybe you’ve blown it out of proportion,’ George said kindly, ‘and just thought she was interested when she wasn’t. We all do that sometimes – it’s an easy mistake to make.’

Arthur didn’t know how to respond. He knew that Amber had liked him; she’d even said as much! But he could see that George wouldn’t believe him. Arthur realised he shouldn’t have told her about what was going on at Shiverton, but for her to deny their whole friendship and set Dan on him seemed unnecessarily cruel. He traipsed out of George’s room, ignoring his pleas to stay, and unhappily threw himself face down on his own bed.

Chapter Nineteen

December was always a hard month at Shiverton Hall. The old buildings were poorly insulated, with ancient, clanking central heating, and it wasn’t uncommon for students to go to bed wearing jumpers, socks and scarves. Arthur was miserable, sick of the cold and, for the first time all term, properly homesick. Penny and George tried to perk him up, conscious of Toynbee’s advice to ‘remain cheerful’, but nothing helped.

In the last week of term, Penny and Arthur were sitting in Long-Pitt’s classroom for their evening English class. The lesson started late, so it was already dark and so wincingly dim that it was almost impossible to read the blackboard. They had been studying a poem by Robert Browning,
My Last Duchess
, and Long-Pitt handed back their essays covered in her jittery, red hand.

She paused at Arthur’s desk, dangling the papers above him. He braced himself for another lecture and a poor grade.

‘This is better, Mr Bannister. Much better,’ Long-Pitt said.

Arthur stared at the A in shock, as Penny nudged him excitedly.

‘Well, it’s no wonder he got an A,’ Dan Forge sneered, tipping himself back on his chair. ‘It’s his specialist subject, isn’t it? Murder.’

Arthur’s essay fluttered out of his hand.

‘Would you care to elaborate on that remark, Mr Forge?’ Long-Pitt said as she continued to return the essays.

Arthur felt his pulse quicken in his neck.