Читать книгу Feather Boy онлайн | страница 7

Their hush seems to fall on us as we enter the room. A disconsolate, decrepit hush. And all of a sudden the ten of us are trying to huddle behind Catherine as though we’re embarrassed for being so full of life. Some of the residents peer at us, others ignore us, or maybe they just don’t see us. Niker shifts from foot to foot. I concentrate on the floor. The carpet is gold and swirly. If Miss Raynham were here she’d take charge, but Miss Raynham is not here. As we wait – and wait – for Catherine to do something, a wheelchair suddenly shrieks: “I think I’m in the wrong place!”

“Join the club,” says Niker.

“Now, now,” says Matron. “Mavis.”

Mavis is a chicken in a dress. At once bony and fleshy, her plucked yellow skin springs with coarse hair. At some stage her neck must have been chopped out and her head stuck straight back on to her shoulders.

“What’s going on?” she asks.

“It’s The Project,” says Matron, enunciating loudly and clearly as though talking to a foreigner or an imbecile, “with the children.”

“Oh,” says Mavis. “When’s tea?”

“Hello,” says Catherine, finally arriving at the television set, the room’s focal point. Then she adds, in her rather faltering way, “I’m Catherine.”

“Two of my family died in this place,” says Mavis.

“No, they didn’t,” says Matron briskly. “Now children, why don’t you all sit down?”

Gratefully we sit. The residents shuffle and cough and peer.

“Hello,” says a relatively normal and fit-looking man, leaning down towards me. “Who’s this then?”

“Robert,” I whisper.

“Oh aye,” he says. “What yer doing here, Robert?”

Catherine begins to explain. Because she’s standing and we’re all sitting, she’s just about big enough to command attention. She talks briefly about the project and then suggests we work in pairs.

“Just space yourselves out a bit,” she tells the class, “that’s right, into a ring. Now, introduce yourself to whoever you’re closest to. That person will be your main partner. Though, of course, we’ll all be sharing ideas later on.”

As chance would have it, I’m still closest to Mr Relatively Normal. Niker, however, is sitting at Mavis’s feet.