The One Safe Place (25 page)

Twenty-Two

THEY HEARD THE ENTRANCE
door below bang open and then heavy steps on the stairs. Luke grabbed Devin’s arm. “Don’t say anything, not a word. I’ll tell them it was all my doing, that I influenced you, forced you into it . . .”

The steps came down the corridor toward Luke’s room and passed by. Devin ran to the door and listened. “They’re going down to the end of the hall. They’re going to Kit’s room.”

There was a rattle of keys, the sound of the footsteps coming back and down the stairs again. Devin flung open the door and ran to Kit’s room.

“Let me in!”

“They’ve locked the door,” came her voice. “Hang on a sec.”

He heard a scratching at the keyhole and the door opened.

“That lock is pathetic,” Kit said. “A cross-eyed sloth could pick it.

“With one arm tied behind its back,” she added. She looked at Devin and Luke.

“What are you staring at? Are you going to come in or not?”

“Where’ve you been?” Devin asked. She closed the door behind him and dragged a chair over, wedging the top of it under the door handle. “Just to be on the safe side,” she said.

“Where did you go?” Devin asked again.

“For a long time, nowhere. I was too nervous to eat breakfast and I sat here for a couple of hours kind of psyching myself up.”

“For what?” Luke demanded.

“I’ll tell you if you let me just talk, okay?”

She had sat on her bed for a long time, Kit told them. She was thinking through everything she had to do. At last she was ready. She got what she needed from the drawer in her dresser and slipped on a dress with deep pockets. Then she took a deep breath and went out looking for Mrs. Babbage.

After a long search, Kit found her in the laundry room, counting towels.

“I need to see the Administrator,” Kit said. “It’s very important.”

A look of annoyance flickered over Mrs. Babbage’s face, quickly replaced by a smile.

“What’s it about, Kit, dear?”

“I can’t tell you.”

“The Administrator is ever so busy,” Mrs. Babbage said. “She can’t be disturbed. You don’t want to get into trouble do you?”

“You’re the one who’ll get in trouble if you don’t let me see her,” Kit said. “Believe me.”

Mrs. Babbage hesitated, her eyes narrowing.

“All right,” she said at last. “I’ll let her know you’re coming. But I do hope, Kit, dear, that it is important. I’d hate to see you punished, you know.”

Kit didn’t bother replying. She went at once to the tower.

The Administrator was sitting behind her desk, her hair shining as if it had been polished strand by strand. Kit made a note of what she was wearing: an icy pink shirt with the top three buttons undone. She stepped forward.

“You said it was important,” the Administrator stated.

“Yes.” Kit glanced over to the small birdcage. The cover was off, and she could see Darwin on his perch. He was wiping his beak against the bars of the cage, over and over, making a rasping, clacking noise. The Administrator didn’t seem to notice the sound. Perhaps it had been going on for so long that she had simply gotten used to it. Kit felt a stab of pity for the bird, and then shook it off. Pity made you weak, she thought. She had to be strong.

“I’m waiting,” the Administrator said. Kit walked forward until she was almost at the desk.

“It is important. Important to me,” she said in a rush. “It’s about getting adopted.” She put her hands on the desk and leaned forward. “I really want to get adopted, I mean I really want to and . . . and I want to tell you that I’ll do whatever it takes to get to the top of the list.”

The Administrator stared at her. Kit leaned even further forward. Her hands moved fast, but not as fast as they could, she made sure of that.

“This is not what I would call—” the Administrator began. Then her eyes widened. “Open your hand!” she snapped. “I saw you. Open it now!”

Kit appeared to tremble slightly. She took a step back and hung her head. Slowly she uncurled her fist. In her palm were four blue marbles from the bowl on the Administrator’s desk. The Administrator pushed back her chair and strode around to the front of the desk.

“You dared to come in here and disturb me so you could steal from me?” she said in a low voice.

Kit made a wailing noise and pitched forward. “I’m sorry!” she cried, clutching at the Administrator, “I’m sorry! They’re so pretty and I . . . I can’t help myself . . .”

The Administrator stiffened in disgust as Kit’s arms went around her in a hug. The Administrator’s arms shot up, jerky as a robot, and Kit heard her gasp. For a split second they stayed like that and then Kit let go and fell back. “I’m sorry,” she said again and began to cry.

The Administrator brushed herself off with both hands. “You will go to your room,” she said. “You will not come out. You will not eat. You will stay there until further notice.”

“Yes, yes, I deserve that,” Kit mumbled, wiping her eyes.

The Administrator was still frantically brushing at herself as if she could wipe away even the memory of having been touched.

“Oh,” Kit cried. “You dropped something, your necklace. Under the desk there. I’ll get it!” And without waiting for a reply she dropped to her hands and knees and groped under the desk. “Here it is,” she said, handing it back. The Administrator took it without a word, her eyes fixed furiously on Kit’s face. Two security guards had appeared.

“Take her to her room,” the Administrator ordered the guards. “And make sure you lock the door.”

Devin and Luke stared at Kit. Her eyes were shining with triumph. She rummaged in the pocket of her dress and pulled something out. It was a little silver key.

“Remember my rule, Devin? Steal small and steal big? The Administrator was so busy thinking about me taking the stupid marbles that she didn’t notice that I got this!”

“But what about when she sees it’s gone?” Devin exclaimed. “She’s bound to . . .”

Kit smiled. “I noticed that key and that chain around her neck the first time I met her. I saw that the chain was thin but the clasp was quite big. I notice things like that. I also noticed that the key looks a lot like one of the keys I brought with me from the city—from my special collection. When I grabbed her I undid the chain and threw it under the desk. Then I pretended to find it, and while I was under the desk, I swapped her key with mine. She won’t notice the difference. People don’t really look at their keys, do they? Not till they have to use them.”

There was a stunned silence and then Luke stepped forward.

“I doubted you,” he said simply. “I shouldn’t have and I’m sorry.”

“ ’S okay,” Kit said, sounding very embarrassed but also very pleased.

Luke took the key and examined it carefully.

“You’re right that people don’t look at keys, but she might. So we don’t have much time. If we’re going to do this, we have to do it soon.”

“What do you mean, ‘if’?” Kit demanded. “We’ve got everything we need except the code.” She looked at Devin. “You had an idea about that, didn’t you?”

“Kind of,” Devin said hesitantly. “You see, they don’t know that I’ve figured out what they’re doing and they don’t know I can move around the place. Maybe the code is somewhere in there and maybe I can find it.”

“It’s a big maybe,” Luke said skeptically, “but I guess it’s the best plan we’ve got.”

“Only problem is,” Kit said, “Devin’s got to go to the Place again before we get out.”

They were all silent. “It’s okay,” Devin said at last. “Don’t worry. I’ll be okay.”

Devin spent most of the next day wandering around aimlessly. He’d spoken bravely the day before, but he didn’t feel brave. There was an ache in his throat, and his hands were sweaty, no matter how many times he wiped them on the front of his shirt.

The sky was just as blue as always, but the color had hardened as though covered by a thin film of burning ice. When Devin stared up, it seemed to glitter slightly, sending out a thin whine, as faint and insistent as a mosquito. He had heard this sound before. It was the noise of the sky being stretched tighter and tighter, like skin over clenched knuckles. They should have had a storm days ago, he thought. Instead it had just grown hotter.

Devin felt stretched too, pulled tight between desperate hope and terrible fear. He wanted more than anything to be sent to the Place again, but he also dreaded it with all his heart. He walked slowly up to the top of the hill where he had found the four-leaf clovers with Roman. The tower was on his right, just below him. To his left lay the maze and carousel. As usual, there was nobody riding the golden horses. Their manes flew back, and their eyes were wild, but they were trapped, speared through the heart by rigid poles, forced to turn in the same tight circle forever.

The mirrors at the top of the carousel flashed as they caught the sun and made the same noise as the sky, only louder. On the farthest edge of the horizon, where it met the line of trees at the perimeter of the Home, there was a blurring in the air as if someone had smudged it with the tip of a finger. Devin felt the muffled drumbeat of a headache against his skull.

Above the tower, the birds wheeled and scattered. There was something different about their flight and a new urgency to their shrieking. Birds had knowledge, he thought. They could feel the disturbance in the atmosphere. The strange heat, the tight, unbreakable sky.

Devin sat down in the long grass, watching them. He could sense disturbance in the weather too, just like the birds. He’d always assumed everyone had this ability, but he’d also thought everyone could see colors and sounds in the same way that he did. Kit had told him otherwise. A “power” she’d called it. A secret power.

Was it possible to have a power without realizing it?

Devin turned and lay on his stomach and rested his throbbing head in his hands. For most of his life there had been only his grandfather to explain things to him. What other powers might he have that he didn’t even know about?

A breeze ruffled the grasses in the meadow. It was a feeble thing, almost spent already. From the other side of the grounds, the notes of the ice-cream truck tinkled faintly, half lost in the heat.

In a little while they would be laying out supper in the dining room. And then it would be night and another day gone. Devin didn’t know how much more waiting he could take. What if Gabriel Penn never switched with him again? Maybe he was tired of it. Maybe he was dead. Old people did die suddenly sometimes. Devin rested his cheek against the ground and thought of his grandfather lying on the porch of the farmhouse, his big empty hands, his open eyes . . .

He felt a vibration in the earth, distant at first but growing stronger. Devin raised his head. Someone was toiling slowly up the hill toward him, head down.

It was Karen.

He waited until she was right in front of him, panting in the heat.

“It’s okay,” he said. “You don’t have to say it.” He got to his feet and brushed himself off.

Karen hung her head. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, “I’m sorry, so sorry . . .”

“Don’t be,” Devin said. And he meant it. The hammering in his head was stronger than ever. He took a deep breath and set off walking toward the Place.