A Map of Days (Miss Peregrine's Peculiar Children #4) - Ransom Riggs Page 0,124
with her finger. “Boop. More for you later.”
She turned to Bronwyn. “You.”
“My name is Bronwyn Bruntley and I’m quite strong and my brother, Victor, was also—”
“BORING!” the girl screamed. “POOP!”
Feet scurried toward us. The bow-tied teacher appeared in the doorway.
“Yes?”
“I don’t want any more dolls like these, Poop. Just look at them. Do they seem like they would be fun to play Monopoly with? DO THEY?”
“Er . . . no?”
“THAT’S RIGHT. THEY DO NOT.”
She kicked a pile of dolls and they flew everywhere.
“Well, him I like.” She pointed at Enoch. “But the rest are HORRIBLE and BORING.”
“I’m very sorry, Frankie.”
“What should we do with them, Poop?” She turned to offer us a quick aside. “His name isn’t really Poop. I just call him that because I can call anyone anything I like.”
“Perhaps we should eat them,” Poop suggested.
Frankie sneered. “You always want to eat them. It’s weird, Poop. And anyway, that gave me a stomachache last time.”
“Or we could sell them.”
“Sell them? To who?”
“To whom,” the teacher said, and then he put a hand over his mouth and turned pale.
The girl flew into a rage. She pointed at him, then drew a quick, invisible line downward. The teacher fell to his knees as if pulled by strings. “YOU. DO NOT. TELL ME THINGS.”
“Yes, Frankie. Yes, ma’am.” His voice was quivering. “Mater semper certa est.”
“That’s right. That is extremely correct.” A small line of dolls was marching toward him across the room. “Because you’re so obedient, Poop, I’m only going to have them chew off one of your legs.”
The teacher repeated the phrase over and over, faster and faster—“Mater semper certa est, mater semper certa est!”—until the words were slurring together. The dolls swarmed him, grasping and champing their porcelain teeth. The man was crying, sobbing, but he didn’t struggle. When he seemed about to pass out, the girl spread her arms and then brought her hands together, and the clap made all the dolls go limp and fall over.
“Oh, Poop. You’re so funny.”
The man gathered himself, wiped his face, and wobbled to his feet. “Where was I?” He cleared his throat. “You could sell them to the Animists, the Mentats, the Weathermen . . .” He pressed a trembling hand to his neck, quickly checking his pulse, then tucked it behind his back. “But, as always, the Untouchables are paying the highest rate.”
“Blecch. I hate them. But as long as none set foot here . . .”
“I’ll call them and arrange a sales meeting.”
“I’m not selling him, though.” She pointed at Enoch, then traced a U in the air with two fingers. Enoch’s lips curled into an exaggerated, grotesque smile.
“That’s fine, Frankie. That’s very good.”
“I know it’s good. The rest of them, I don’t care. I just have one condition. If whoever buys them does something nasty to them? I get to watch.”
* * *
• • •
After a long and dreamless blank, I woke up tied to a chair. We were spaced out all in a row, our feet bound to the chair legs and our hands strapped behind us: Emma, Bronwyn, Noor, and even Millard, the ropes hovering around what looked like an empty seat. All but Enoch. He was nowhere to be seen.
We were on the stage of an old theater, arranged behind a tattered yellow curtain. If I craned my neck, I could see ropes and pulleys behind us and lights along a catwalk above. We weren’t gagged, and yet I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t even persuade my mouth to open. Then I heard voices on the other side of the curtain. They seemed to be talking about us.
“They were trespassing on my property! Trying to steal from me!” It was the psychotic little girl, Frankie. “I had every right to hang them, but I’m showing mercy instead. And doing you all a favor.”
“That’s funny, usually it’s you who’s tryin’ to steal from us,” said a gravelly male voice. “The last specimen I bought from you turned to corpse-dust after only two days.”
“S’not my fault if you don’t take care of ’em right,” said Frankie.
“The seller isn’t responsible for user error.” An oily-sounding voice I recognized—Poop, the tutor.
“You sold me junk! I’m owed a free one!”
It sounded like a scuffle was about to break out, but then a lady shouted, “Stop it! No brawling allowed on neutral ground!”
Things settled down. The gravelly voice said, “You’ve wasted too much of my day already, Frankie. Let’s get your dog and pony show started.”