Читать книгу Feather Boy онлайн | страница 26
But what if they’re inside?
I look at my watch. Six minutes to nine. I really have to get to school. Absolutely can’t be late. Have to go right now. The skirting board in the corridor has been ripped off. There’s a gap between the base of the wall and the floorboards through which I can see down to some sort of basement. In the dark cavity there are flowerpots, lamp bases, lamp shades, a desk, a filing cabinet and a sink, the old ceramic sort. There’s also the sound of water. Not a small drip drip, but a gushing, the noise of a tap on full bringing water pouring from a tank. Or maybe a cistern filling, or a bath emptying or…
Crash!
It’s the brick. The brick has fallen. I wheel around, catch my foot in the hole in the floor, fall, twist my ankle, drag myself up, never once taking my eyes from the swinging door. But nobody comes through. Nobody comes through! Why don’t they come through! I’m not an impetuous person, but I burst through that door, hopping across the kitchen faster than normal people run. And then I’m in the garden, and actually my ankle’s all right, so I do run. Run, run, run – flowers, washing line, burnt ground, smashed glass, corner of house, swollen door, front wall. Front wall of Chance House. Safety of St Aubyns. I collapse on to the pavement.
“Run rabbit run rabbit, run, run, run.” A familiar voice croons softly above me. “Don’t be afraid of the farmer’s gun.”
I look up. About a hand’s breadth from my head is a pair of feet.
“Hello, Norbert,” says Niker.
He swings himself down from the wall.
“You want to watch yourself.” He brushes imaginary specks of dust from his trousers. “Bad place, Chance House.” He smiles.
“What?”
“Bad place, Norbert. Bad house. Bad karma.”
He looks at my blank face. “You don’t know, do you? Everyone in town knows. But you don’t.” He turns towards school.
“Niker…”
He pauses. “Yes, Norbert?”
“Tell me.”
“Please. Pretty please, Norbert.”
“Pretty please.”
He looks at me pityingly. “A boy died in there, Norbert.”
“What?”
“You heard.”