The Apothecary Page 0,34

say so?” Pip said.

I took the pin out of my skirt and handed it around the wall, hoping my skirt would stay up.

“Wish it was a bit longer,” he complained.

“It’s all I’ve got, okay?”

By pressing my forehead against the bars, I could just see Pip’s dirty hands fiddling experimentally with the safety pin in the lock. It seemed hopeless.

Then the door outside the cells to our right opened, and Pip’s hands quickly withdrew. A pink-faced matron in a grey wool dress came in and said, “There’s someone here to see you.”

“Me?” Pip said.

“No,” she said.

There were footsteps in the hall behind her, and then Mr Danby came into the room. I’d never been so relieved to see anyone in my life.

“Are these the children you mean?” she asked. “Not the little one, the other two.”

“These are they!” Mr Danby said. “Have they treated you all right, Miss Scott?”

I wanted to throw my arms around him, through the bars, but I sensed that would embarrass him. “No!” I said. “They keep saying we’re not really arrested, so we can’t have a lawyer. And they threatened to deport my parents, and it’s freezing, and there’s a rat in here. And we haven’t even done anything!” I added that last part as an afterthought.

“Let’s get you out of there, then,” he said. “And really, madam, can you do something about the rats? It’s unsanitary for the children.”

“Certainly, sir,” the matron said, though I could tell she intended to do nothing. She unlocked the bars and let me out.

Benjamin said, “What about the police? How do you have the authority to let us out?”

“He’s from the Foreign Office,” the matron said.

“The Foreign Office?” Benjamin said. “As in the government Foreign Office?”

“Yes,” Mr Danby said, looking slightly abashed. I didn’t know why our Latin teacher was handling matters for the government, but I thought Mr Danby could handle anything, so I didn’t care.

Pip tried to slip out after Benjamin, but the matron closed the door on him with a clank and relocked it. He pressed his face between the bars. “Take me, too!”

I had thought Pip was younger than we were, when I’d only seen him quickly, because he was so much smaller than Benjamin, but now I guessed he was thirteen or fourteen, like us. His hair was cropped close to his head in the way of the other Turnbull children, to combat lice, and his eyes were enormous, an unsettling bright hazel. He reminded me of a lemur I’d once seen in a zoo. “Don’t leave me!” he cried.

“I apologise,” Mr Danby said. “I’m only authorised to take Mr Burrows and Miss Scott.”

“But they’re my mates!” Pip said.

Mr Danby turned to Benjamin. “Is that true?”

Benjamin shook his head. “I think he’s a snitch.”

“I ain’t a snitch!”

Mr Danby and the matron led us away down the hall.

“Please!” Pip howled after us. “Take me with you!”

Mr Danby ignored him.

We passed the empty classroom where I’d been questioned, and the one full of ragged-looking students. There was a fight going on, and the matron stopped to break it up. I felt sorry for the kids, stuck in here.

“What a miserable place,” Mr Danby said when we were further down the hall and out of earshot. “Dickens would recognise it in an instant. We’ll go someplace warm for a hot cocoa.”

“Where’s Detective Montclair?” I asked.

“I sent him away.”

“What do you do for the Foreign Office?” Benjamin asked.

“It’s difficult to explain, but I’ll try.”

“Are you a spy?”

Mr Danby smiled. “Would I tell you if I were?”

“You are!” Benjamin said, delighted. “But then why do you teach Latin?”

Mr Danby sighed. “Our country lost many good men in the war,” he said. “And now we’re in another war, of a different kind. You’re clever, so I’m sure you know that we have always stationed people in our best schools to keep an eye out for emerging—talent.”

Benjamin went silent. I could feel his excitement at the idea that Mr Danby was a spy, charged with recruiting new spies. Myself, I’d had plenty of excitement already, and was ready for a hot cocoa.

“And the truth is,” Mr Danby said, “that I was assigned to St Beden’s to keep an eye on you, in particular.”

“On me?” Benjamin asked.

“We’ll go to E. Pellicci’s, just up the road,” Mr Danby said. “I have a driver waiting, and it’s rather a good little café.”

The matron joined us again and unlocked the heavy front door with a ring of keys, and Benjamin beamed at her as if