“I’ve read a lot of books about people wandering into strange or frightening situations, and what kind of things they can do. If the situation was different I wouldn’t mind hanging around to find out what was going on and then, you know, freeing everyone. But a few days ago a man and a woman tried to kill me, with a car and with a gun. Another man and woman saved my life, and they told me I was an immortal lycanthrope, although I don’t turn into a wolf. Well, really they don’t know what I turn into. And I fell out of a speeding car and I didn’t die, so maybe they’re right. But I’ve got to get out of here and find out if I’m really a werewolf or what, so I’m not going to stay, I’m sorry. But before I go, I need to know what town this is. Do you know what town this is? Where we live?” He tried it several times, at slower speeds, but Kwame couldn’t understand him. Kwame spoke a language Myron had never heard before, from somewhere in western Africa. He also spoke French.
It was in French that Kwame spoke to Jack (not his real name; Mr. Rodriguez had given it to him), an Algerian, and also Binky (not his real name; Mr. Rodriguez had given it to him), Vietnamese. Binky had become friends with Lord Thundercheese (not his real name; Mr. Rodriguez had given it to him), Nigerian, and had worked out a kind of private pidgin between the two. Bancroft (not his real name; Mr. Rodriguez had given it to him), Sudanese, could speak Arabic with Jack, as well as English with our friend John (not his real name; Mr. Rodriguez had given it to him). There were several other kids running around—at least one from Russia and one from a temporary autonomous zone that no nation but Cuba had ever recognized as sovereign—but Myron hadn’t figured out how they all fit in.
For that matter, Kwame was not his real name. Mr. Rodriguez had given it to him. He was from Senegal.
The English speakers at odd hours explained in whispers what Myron had already concluded: that Mr. Rodriguez did not, in fact, run a school for international students. He collected an assortment of fees, some from a guardian or government official, and some from nonprofit groups that sponsored the students. The children spent the day eating very little and on occasion laboriously copying sample letters Rodriguez had penned and that most of them couldn’t read. These letters extolled their ongoing education, and asked for spending money.
“If I could figure out where we are, I could sneak to a phone and call my parents.”
“No phone here,” John pointed out.
Mr. Rodriguez spent a lot of time elsewhere, sometimes coming home very late, and usually soused and angry. Sometimes, while he was gone, the kids were locked in the house; sometimes they were locked out, but Myron was always locked in.
“Just go to the police while you’re out,” Myron begged, but Bancroft shook his head in fear.
“American police make AIDS.”
The international students would, as a rule, rather spend their time foraging for food. They hated but respected Mr. Rodriguez, and they trusted absolutely no one else, including Myron.
“Just ask them what town we’re in, Bancroft. I need to know how far from Westfield we are.”
Bancroft demurred. The inhabitants of this strange land were not to be trusted.
Mr. Rodriguez ignored most of his charges, but he looked at Myron suspiciously. The doors, of course, were deadbolted. There were bars on the first-story windows.
During the days, and nights, that Mr. Rodriguez was gone, Myron wandered the house, at first looking for a way out, then seeking a clue to his current location, and finally just poking his nose around. In a drawer were several bundles of pamphlets for Featherstone Academy, “an elite multicultural educational setting in beautiful Pennsylvania, USA,” with crudely retouched photographs of Tudor houses and acres of rolling grasslands; but the place where the return address sticker would go was blank. He found quite a stash of pornographic magazines, too, but they were, on the one hand, too tailored to bizarre niche tastes and, on the other hand, too overt a reminder that Myron had still not hit puberty for him to enjoy.
“I sure feel older, though,” he said to himself, and waited for his growth spurt. He hummed happily. He was, after all, having an adventure.
Mr. Rodriguez’s house had two floors