The Apothecary Page 0,37

had climbed up from the broken window. I looked back at Pip in a panic, and he was holding up the little brown bottle, between his thumb and forefinger.

“This it?” he asked.

“How did you get that?”

“From your pocket,” he said. “When you left with your mate there.” He nodded towards the pale fingers gripping the roof ’s edge.

I put my hand on my blazer pocket and tried to think when Pip could have reached into it. It seemed impossible. There was another grunt, and a second hand appeared on the roof next to the first. Then Mr Danby’s face appeared, strained with effort. He hadn’t yet figured out how to lever himself up onto the roof.

“Benjamin,” he called. “Janie. Please. That man you saw in the car is a friend. He’s been working for England. I can give you proof.”

“You’re lying!” I said. I turned back to Pip. “You have to give me the bottle.”

Pip backed away, along the peak of the roof. “So you can leave me again?” he said. “What if I just drink it, and leave you?”

“We couldn’t take you with us before,” I said, crawling forward. “But now we can. We’ll all leave together.”

“How long does it last?”

“We don’t know.”

“Is there enough for all three of us?”

“Probably.”

“You don’t know!”

Danby got one leg up over the edge of the roof with a thump. Pip stood, right on the peak, and ran effortlessly away. Benjamin and I tried to follow, but my feet kept slipping down the sides.

The gothic roof of Turnbull had two peaks, like a child’s drawing of two triangular mountains side by side, and then a round turret beyond. Pip slid easily down into the valley between the two peaks and clambered up the second one. I hesitated behind him.

“Go!” Benjamin said.

So I slid with effort after Pip and started climbing. Benjamin followed.

Danby was still slipping along on the first peak, in slick leather-soled shoes. “Don’t be ridiculous, Miss Scott,” he called. “We’re on the same side!”

Pip slid down the second peak, which dropped off into empty space, except where it attached to the cylindrical turret. The crowd on the ground had moved so they were still just below him. He edged over to the base of the turret and started to climb up it. Benjamin and I followed. The brickwork on the turret wall was uneven, and the bricks created footholds and handholds, so it was possible to scale. I’d even started to get used to the height. The children were cheering, and looked happy and excited, as if they were watching a film.

Once we had climbed into the top of the turret, it was as if we were in a kind of lookout post. There didn’t seem to be any way to get back inside the house. Maybe there had once been access, but now there was only a drain to let out the rain. The lookout had walls about three feet high, so the people below couldn’t see us unless we stood and looked over the wall, which we did.

The children immediately cheered, and the matron looked stern. “Come down,” she said. “You have nowhere to go.”

“Call the detectives!” Benjamin said. “Tell them to come back!” He pointed at Danby, who had sat down on the nearest peak to rest. “That man is a Russian spy!”

Danby, his striped socks revealed below his trouser cuffs by his bent knees, wiped his handsome forehead with a handkerchief. “Benjamin,” he said wearily. “I am no more a Russian spy than you are.”

“Jump!” one of the ragged children shouted to us. “We’ll catch you!”

“Yes, jump!” some of the others joined in, shouting and laughing and leaping, to demonstrate how we should do it.

Danby started climbing down the roof towards the base of our turret.

I sank down behind the wall and turned to Pip. “Open the bottle,” I said. “We’ll all take some.”

But Pip hesitated, and Benjamin lost patience. He snatched it away, unscrewed the top, and drank.

Right away, a startled look came over his face, and he set the bottle down. For a second, nothing more happened. I looked over the wall and saw Danby trying to scale our turret. His feet slipped, and he swore.

When I looked back at Benjamin, he had started to shrink. His head grew longer in front and sank into his shoulders, and his body tilted forward at the hips. A feathered tail grew out behind him, and he kept rapidly getting smaller. His hands disappeared, and his arms became wings.