The Children’s Home (15 page)

On their side of the road, set back about fifty yards from the metal railings, was a low sprawling building that seemed to go on forever. It must have been extended many times, its style changed every fifty yards or so, as did the materials that had been used to construct it, stone, brick, concrete; the windows were large or small or simply absent, the roof changed color, dipped and then rose. The walls of the building had been painted white, each section at different times, there was a sort of pulse of gray as the color faded away and was renewed, although some sections were better maintained than others. Behind the building chimneys rose in groups of two and three, working chimneys with smoke pouring from them; it must be a factory of some sort, thought Morgan. The railings were interrupted by tall iron gates every twenty or thirty yards. These had been opened and people were streaming towards them in groups, or twos and threes; they didn’t look towards the car, not even when David told Morgan to drive more slowly now because they would soon be turning off the road, they were almost there. It had started to rain and Morgan turned on the windscreen wipers, which made two perfect arcs in front of his eyes. He could smell the fear coming off the new boy, what was his name? He glanced towards the mirror and saw the child’s wild eyes, framed by his hair, as long and fine as a girl’s. Goddie. His own heart was pumping as he drove, with the factory stretched out beside him like a sleeping beast. So this was where he would find Moira, the first child of them all, he told himself.

He wasn’t surprised when David told him to turn in through the largest of the gates; he wasn’t surprised when his eye was caught by the high arch over the gate, which bore, entwined in flowers and leaves of gilded iron, the name of the factory; he wasn’t surprised when he saw that the name at the center of the arch was his, his family name. Fletcher. Maker of arrows. The coat of arms above the name was the one his grandfather had designed from his summerhouse in Ecbatana, the coat of arms his mother had despised so much. He had finally been brought home, if home was the source of it all, of his wealth at least. I’ve never been here, he thought, and was about to say this to the Doctor, who might not even have noticed the significance of where they were, but a small hand on his shoulder warned him.

“You’re someone else now,” David said. “Not really, of course,
we
know that. We know you’re Morgan. But you mustn’t think of yourself, do you see? You must think only of Moira, because you don’t matter. None of us do right now, all right? Drive through and when they try to stop you, tell them you’re bringing them some new children. They’ll understand. If they say we can’t go in, it doesn’t matter. Don’t argue, all right? Just turn round and drive out again. We’ve got other ways.”

The Doctor produced an odd noise in his throat, half laugh, half cough. “It’s all in David’s hands, apparently,” he said to no one in particular, so that everyone would hear, and when Morgan thought of how control had been usurped by David, it was with a sense of relief, as something inevitable. “All right,” he said. Goddie whimpered in the back, crouched down between the girls, his hands held up to his face. Daisy put her arm across his head, as if to both protect and conceal him. “Don’t worry,” Melissa said in a sharper voice than usual. “Nothing’s going to happen to us. I mean, this whole place belongs to Morgan. We’re perfectly safe here.”

“Shut up,” snapped David.

“Well, it does,” said Melissa. “You can’t tell us everything all the time. You can’t tell us all what to do every time. We aren’t fools, David. You aren’t God.”

Morgan halted the car outside what appeared to be the central section of the building. In front of his eyes, a flight of gray marble steps led to a series of glass and metal doors, through which nothing could be seen. Two armed men in black capes stood at each door. Morgan touched his face with hesitant fingers. It was raining hard by now and it struck him that water might affect the wax. But surely not; wax repelled water. He moved his features tentatively, a smile, a frown, until David nudged his shoulder from behind. “It’s all right,” he said. “Let’s go.”

in which Morgan and the children enter the factory

T
he Doctor got out of the car first and opened a large umbrella for the children. Goddie refused to leave his seat, but the other three jumped down with excitement, David with Mite in his arms. Melissa turned to Goddie, but Daisy hurriedly pulled her away, whispering something in her ear, and Melissa shrugged and left the car. David hurried towards her, holding Mite out for her to take. “You can look after him,” he said. Morgan watched them as they walked towards the steps, which were dark and gleaming with the rain, then joined them, playing with the car keys in a nervous way, but refusing to stand beneath the umbrella, enjoying the touch of the water on his face, which felt both protected and exposed. He raised his eyes and saw the sopping flags along the top of the building. How powerful we must be, he thought, we operate all over the world. Perhaps the airport is ours as well. Turning his head each way, behind him and farther on, he could see no end to the factory as it stretched into the distance; it seemed to curve with the earth. It occurred to him then that he had no concrete notion what might be produced in this building, which fed and clothed him now as it had when he was a child, as it had his mother. His father had said they sold their goods overseas, that was why he traveled so much, so far, the hundreds of beautiful objects in the house that his grandfather had gathered from all over the world were often gifts from grateful customers. But what had his grandfather’s actual business been? At the end of his life he had been obsessed by knowledge, finally by medicine, that was clear from his library, from the presence of the anatomical figures, he had devoted all his time to it. But before that? Arms, he had supposed, but this supposition had had no consequence until now. Perhaps he had been obsessed by power all the time, it occurred to Morgan; power over what people knew, and what they were, the way their bodies worked. The way their bodies could be destroyed.

They had reached the top of the steps when one of the uniformed men stepped forward, holding his rifle across his chest. Morgan saw that the badge on his cap bore the family’s coat of arms. These men belong to me, he thought, and it occurred to him that they would know nothing of his accident. They might have heard rumors, for surely people would have talked about his absence, there must have been stories of the recluse in the country house, of the madwoman and her dogs; but whatever they had heard, no guard would dare deny him access to his own factory. This made him smile. When the man held his rifle out to bar the door, Morgan rested his hand on it and the man was startled. Then he remembered what David had said he must do. Very well, he would try that first.

“We have some children for you,” he said. The man shrugged, his face impassive once again. This didn’t surprise Morgan. He wondered what effect his words were supposed to have. What sense would children have in a place like this? What purpose would they serve? He glanced down at David beside him, who was staring at the man and frowning, his face in the shade of the Doctor’s umbrella. Mite had begun to whimper and struggle in Melissa’s arms; she was clutching him as though scared he might run off, although he could barely walk. Despite the Doctor’s umbrella, they were all getting wet. Morgan was about to turn away when the oldest among the armed men walked across.

“Where did you find that car?” he said, pointing his rifle at the forecourt behind them. Morgan’s eyes followed the gesture, noticing once again the coat of arms on the driver’s-side door, then turned his gaze towards the man, who stared at him, with initial hesitation and then a sort of startled shame, before lowering his eyes and stepping back.

“Master Morgan?” he said, his voice breaking. “I’m sorry, sir, I didn’t see who you were at first. It’s been so long.”

“Too long,” said Morgan, thrilled. He had been recognized. David strained up to whisper. “Say you want to see your sister.” Morgan nodded.

“I’ll have the car parked for you, sir,” the man said.

“There’s no need for that,” said Morgan. “We shall be needing it again soon enough.” He looked at the Doctor. “Perhaps we should be getting on with our business.”

“Quite,” said the Doctor, nodding his head, although it was evident, to Morgan at least, that Crane had not the slightest idea of how to proceed. But the guard had brushed aside the younger man and opened the door.

“Come in, sir, out of the rain. All of you. The children will be drenched.”

The Doctor shook and closed the umbrella as the children followed Morgan into the building. They found themselves in a large, bare atrium, as vast as a church, at the far side of which was a series of gleaming metal desks and, behind each desk, a woman. Each woman also wore a uniform, Morgan noticed as he walked across the gleaming floor with the children and the Doctor behind him; light gray jacket and white blouse with a small black bow at the neck. They looked like schoolmistresses. This would have been his sister’s doing, he thought. He strode towards the central desk, followed by the children and Crane. His voice, when he spoke, was loud and clear. There would be no hissing with the mask.

“Good morning. I am Morgan Fletcher.”

The woman at the desk looked startled, as the guard had done, then scared. Her eyes opened wide, as though stretched from within. “I’m sorry?” she said. She stared behind him towards the door, perhaps to make sure that he had been allowed in by someone and was not a mere intruder.

“I am Morgan Fletcher and I should like to see my sister,” Morgan said.

“Your sister?” the woman said.

Morgan stepped back and glanced along the row of desks, behind each of which a woman gaped, appalled, in his direction. He felt the presence of the guards behind him, gathered by the glass doors at the entrance to the foyer. “Is anyone among you capable of announcing my arrival to my sister? Rebecca Fletcher?” he said in a voice that echoed in the empty space. He thrilled to the sound of it, the clear pure sibilance of
sister
. One of the women to his left gave a shrill, nervous laugh. He walked towards her and paused in front of her desk. She was young; her hair was pulled back from her face into a metal clasp, reflected in the mirror behind her head, as Morgan was, and the Doctor, and the heads of the children, with Mite still in Melissa’s arms. Nothing will happen to you, he thought. I will make sure of that. The metal clasp was in the form of the letter
F
, Morgan noticed. He smiled at his face in the polished glass. I can frighten you, he thought, because I am powerful and a word from me could have you fired, and you know that. Just imagine if you saw my face. Then you would know what fear was and you would think it was pity.

“Perhaps you can help me?” he said. He heard himself speak, a model of courtesy. How proud his mother would have been of him. Or maybe not; courtesy wasn’t her style. The blood drained from the woman’s lips. She shook her head, then nodded. “Of course. I’ll tell the director general you’re here,” she whispered, dry-mouthed with shock. She stood up and walked around her desk, before breaking into a knock-kneed run towards a broad flight of stairs to Morgan’s left. He smiled and leant across the desk to pick up the receiver of a square black telephone with his good hand. “Wouldn’t it be simpler to use this?” he said. “I imagine my sister also has a telephone.” The woman halted and scuttled back. After a moment’s hesitation, she took the receiver from him, pressing a number on the telephone, her knuckles white. But why this fear, wondered Morgan, because there was no sense to it that he could see. Yet he reveled in it too. He would have liked to whistle or make some low gruff animal noise or lash out like a cat with his wounded hand, simply to observe the effect. He was both ashamed of this desire and exhilarated. The woman had turned her back to them and was muttering into the receiver. Her conversation ended, she turned and said in a stronger voice that he should take the directors’ lift, pointing towards a double door to their right, of burnished bronze framed in marble and gilt, flanked by pairs of smaller, more modest doors. Morgan looked around his group. The Doctor was leaning on his closed umbrella, which had made a pool on the marble floor. The children were staring around them, openmouthed.

“David,” Morgan said. “Fetch Goddie from the car. He won’t want to come, I know, but you will persuade him. I don’t want anyone left behind. We have work to do and it’s best if we do it together.”

David nodded and ran across the foyer, his steps echoing. At the door, he paused. The armed men fell apart to let him through.

“The director general is waiting for you,” the receptionist said in an unexpectedly loud voice, from which she appeared to take courage. “You really ought to go at once.” Her tone was both anxious and officious. “She mustn’t be kept waiting.”

“She has been waiting for years,” Morgan said. “A few more minutes won’t hurt.”

David came in with a trembling Goddie, who glanced around himself with awe, his hand in the older boy’s. Together now, they walked towards the lift. Someone must have pressed a button somewhere, because the bronze doors opened and they stepped into a wood-lined box the size of a small room. There was choral music playing from some hidden source and the air was heavy with a scent that was flowers and not flowers, a stultifying chemical essence. The doors closed behind them soundlessly, the lift began to rise. After no more than five or six seconds, marked only by the stifled whimpering of Goddie, the lift eased to a halt and the doors slid back to reveal a corridor wider than most rooms, with honey-colored light falling onto carpets that reminded Morgan of his home. Low tables along the walls bore intricate Oriental vases and porcelain animals: lions, dragons; objects his grandfather might have collected, although he had never seen them before. It was natural, he thought, that she should do this; deprived of her own home as a child, she would do whatever she could to repossess it. They walked down the corridor towards an open door at its far end. Daisy had her arm round Goddie’s shoulders. Then David said, “They recognized you downstairs with the mask on and that was good. It helped us get in. But you don’t need it here. Not with your sister. She knows who you are.”