The One Safe Place (24 page)

Caspar heard a yell of triumph. They had the boy on the ground now and had tugged the bag free. The biggest gang member opened it and looked inside. Then he flung it down again with a howl. Whatever he’d been expecting, food or money, clearly wasn’t there.

It seemed to drive the gang into a fury. Caspar shrank back against the wall, his heart pounding and his hands sweaty. They were laying into the boy now, powered by disappointment and rage. The boy was still on the ground, his hands over his head, his body curled up.

“What did you do?” Devin asked. Caspar hung his head.

“Nothing,” he whispered.

He’d squeezed his eyes shut and put his hands over his ears, trembling in the shadow of the wall. After a long time, he looked again. The gang was gone. The boy lay on the ground without moving, his backpack by his side. Caspar crept toward him. There was blood on the boy’s head, and his eyes were closed. Caspar put his hands under the boy’s shoulders and dragged him inch by inch into one of the nearby buildings. It was cooler in there, the light filtered through windows thick with dust.

He hesitated, then took off his jacket, bunched it into a pillow and slid it under the boy’s head.

“He bled on it. But luckily only on the inside.” He opened his jacket and Devin saw the huge stain, dark against the gray silk lining.

Caspar gave the boy water, although he didn’t drink much. Then he carefully washed the boy’s face and sat down beside him. He sat with him all afternoon. In the early evening, just as the light was starting to soften, the boy died.

“I don’t think he was in pain,” Caspar said. “He didn’t look like he was in pain. I went out and got his backpack. You’ll never guess what was inside.”

Devin was silent.

“A soccer ball,” Caspar said. “All that for just a plain old soccer ball.”

Twenty-One

“I’M NOT LISTENING TO
you!” Kit half-shouted. She shoved her hands over her ears. “Go away, I’m not listening!”

“You have to listen,” Devin said. They were in Kit’s room. He had gone to find her as soon as he could. Frisker was curled up in a ball on the bed. When Kit started shouting, he leaped up and began to bark, his yelps tiny and squeaking.

“You have to listen,” Devin said again. “Ansel is dead. He never was adopted. There is no adoption. We stay here until we’re all useless, Spoiled, whatever you want to call it, and then they dump us back into the city and they don’t care whether we live or die.”

“It’s a lie. That new kid is just causing trouble. Or maybe he did see someone who looked like Ansel. Or maybe Ansel has a brother. The real Ansel’s been adopted.” She stared at Devin almost pleadingly. “You saw his photo. That’s the proof.”

Devin didn’t reply. He reached into his pocket and took out the picture, smoothing the creases. “I took it from the wall,” he said quietly. “Something always bugged me about this picture and now I know what it is. Do you remember the campout? How Ansel caught Frisker? He fell on his face and had a big scrape on his cheek. You wiped it yourself.”

Devin held the picture out for her to see. “Look at his face. There’s not a mark on him. They faked the photo. They faked all the photos on that wall. They did it to keep us quiet and well behaved.”

Kit’s face went as red as if Devin had slapped her. Then all the blood drained from her cheeks and the whole upper part of her body seemed to cave in on itself. She sank to the floor.

“I knew it,” she wailed. “I knew, I knew. All along, right from the start. The minute I got here I thought, this place stinks worse than the leather of my dad’s old belt.”

She was crying now, her face blurred and twisted.

“I didn’t know what was wrong,” she sobbed, “but I could feel it. I just didn’t want to think about it. I wanted Frisker and good food and nice clothes and . . . and I wanted to be adopted. The more you tried to talk to me, the angrier I got because you were spoiling it, Devin. But I knew you were right. Deep down I knew it.”

“It’s okay,” Devin said helplessly. She had stopped crying, but there was still despair on her face. He sat down on the floor beside her. “It’s okay,” he repeated.

“No,” she said, “no it’s not. I lied to myself. I thought I was tough, but that’s only on the outside. Inside, I’m nothing. The Administrator was right, Devin. There’s something wrong with me. I’m damaged.”

Devin thought about her, the whole of her. Her fierce, freckled face, the way she ran and climbed and looked toward the sky, her skilled thievery and love of beauty, her sparkling rooftop and the scars upon her back. All her daring and her passion and her weakness and her sorrow.

“You’re not damaged,” he said. “You’re perfect.”

Kit buried her head in her hands and burst into tears again.

“Don’t cry,” Devin begged. “It’s going to be okay.” He knew he had promised to stay silent, but he couldn’t help himself. “We’re planning to get out, to get everyone out. It’s not just talk anymore. We haven’t gotten very far with the plan yet, but we will.” And he told her all about the diversion, and their idea of possibly attacking the Administrator to get the key, and the difficulty with the code.

“I’ve got an idea about how to do it. It might work . . .”

Kit’s head was still buried in her hands, but she had stopped crying. And Devin could tell she was listening, because she had gone completely still.

Of the three boys, Luke seemed the most devastated by Devin’s news. Malloy cried when he heard about Ansel and crept off silently to mourn on his own. But he had never wanted to be adopted and wasn’t too surprised to find out it had all been a hoax. Luke, on the other hand, seemed to turn in on himself; his face grew tighter and his twitching worsened. He became morose and then downright mean.

They were still talking about Caspar’s story next day in the dining room, although they were careful to avoid being overheard.

“You haven’t told anyone else, have you?” Devin asked. “I don’t know what would happen if everyone knew.”

Malloy shook his head.

“No one. Although I think Roman might have a clue. Luke and I were crossing the courtyard yesterday and talking about it and I turned around and there he was. He might have overheard.

“Rotten sneak,” he added.

“He doesn’t matter,” Luke muttered. “Nobody talks to him except for Megs, and she probably wouldn’t pay any attention. Too busy trying to set fires.”

“Sooner or later, someone’s gonna hear, though. Like Vanessa,” Malloy said. “Once she knows, there’s no stopping it. The good news is that I’ve got a great idea for a diversion.”

Malloy’s idea unsurprisingly involved his friend Fulsome. According to Malloy, the pig was virtually psychic and the two of them could communicate without words. Besides, he said, the diversion would be a chance for Fulsome to redeem himself after the fiasco in the courtyard.

Luke listened to him chatter on without saying anything.

“He nearly saved us last time,” Malloy said, “only I didn’t give him complete instructions.”

Luke suddenly banged his fist hard on the table. “Are you a moron? Are you a complete idiot?”

Malloy looked astonished. Luke had always been sarcastic with him, but never unkind.

“I can’t believe you’re even thinking of using that stupid pig again,” Luke cried. “This isn’t a game, Malloy. This isn’t another one of your jokes. Ansel died. Don’t you get it? He died.”

Luke pushed away from the table and strode out of the room, his whole body jerking as he went. Malloy’s mouth was open.

“It will work,” he said sadly, “I mean it will probably . . . I thought he trusted me . . .”

“I’ll go and talk to him,” Devin said.

Luke didn’t answer when he knocked on the door of his room. When Devin pushed it open, papers swirled and rustled around his feet. The floor was covered with Luke’s notes and calculations. He had obviously shoved them all off his desk, along with the photograph of his parents. Devin spotted it lying half under the bed. There was a crack in the glass over the picture.

Luke was sitting at the empty desk, his head sunken into his shoulders.

“What do you want?” he muttered without looking up.

“Are you okay?”

“Oh, great. Never been better.”

“Why’d you throw everything onto the floor?”

“Because it’s trash.”

“It’s all your work,” Devin protested. He knelt and started to gather up the papers.

Luke was biting his bottom lip so hard that Devin thought he might draw blood.

“It’s trash,” he repeated. “Like our escape plan. Malloy says himself that he’s a chicken. That’s who’s going to get us out of here? A chicken and a pig? I’m never getting out.”

“You have to,” Devin said. He picked up the photograph with the cracked glass and placed it carefully on the desk. “You have to so you can bust your parents out of jail, remember?”

Luke made a sound that was meant to be a laugh but sounded more like a rattle.

“My dad! I’ve been thinking a lot about him. He stole more money than he could possibly spend in ten fabulous lifetimes. But he wouldn’t stop. He just kept going and going. He told me that greed makes idiots out of people. Well, that makes him the biggest idiot in the world, doesn’t it? Except that he’s not. I’m the biggest idiot in the world.”

“Why would you say that? How can you think that?”

“I should have seen it!” Luke cried. “I should have figured out what was going on here. If I had, I might have saved Ansel. He was a good kid. He didn’t deserve what happened to him . . . But they tricked me, they made an idiot out of me, and I’m supposed to be some kind of genius?”

“You are a genius,” Devin said simply. “You’re the smartest person I’ve ever met.”

“Yeah? And how many people have you met, Farm Boy? It must be all of ninety-three.”

Luke slumped, his head and shoulders on the desk, his long hair covering his face.

“We’ll work it out,” Devin said, his words tumbling out with anxiety. “You really are a genius, and Malloy’s a kind of genius too with animals, and now that Kit understands we have to get out, she’ll help. She’s amazing, you know, she’s—”

“You told Kit?” Luke had raised his head and was staring at him. “You told Kit about the escape?”

Devin fell silent.

“That’s great. Just great. You promised not to tell her, but you did.”

“I know,” Devin said. “I broke my promise. I’m sorry.”

“A lot of good that does. The damage is done. Where is Kit, by the way? I haven’t seen her all day.”

Now that Devin thought about it, neither had he. The last time he’d seen her was the night before, in the dining room. She had sat by herself in a corner, picking at her food. Since then there had been no sign of her at breakfast or at lunch.

“I haven’t seen her either,” he admitted.

“So let me get this straight,” Luke said. “You run off and tell Kit all about how we’re going to create a diversion, possibly attack the Administrator, try to disarm the posts, and get everyone out, and then Kit mysteriously disappears for hours and hours. I’m not liking the sound of this, Devin. I’m not liking it at all.”

But Devin had stopped listening. He was looking out the window to the courtyard below. The door to the tower had opened and Kit had come out. She was walking right toward their rooms and there were two security guards, one on either side, walking along with her.

“Oh, no,” whispered Luke. “They’re coming this way.”