Graveyard Shift Read online

  “Did you catch the news?” Becky said.

  I nodded. We weren’t supposed to discuss it in school, but she was finding it hard to keep quiet.

  “I saw him,” she said.

  “Who?”

  She checked around — no one watching — and mouthed the words Mr. October.

  “On the news report,” she said. “After the building came down, he went inside, into the ruins. No one commented or tried to stop him. And when he came out again, a whole train of people were following. Couldn’t anyone else see him?”

  Mr. Glover’s glare cut short our conversation.

  “Sorry, sir,” Becky said.

  “Sorry,” I echoed.

  “Later,” she whispered as Mel returned to reading. “I can’t wait for tonight. I’m all jittery. It’s like being part of a secret society.”

  “That’s exactly what it is. Let’s try to keep it secret.”

  From that day on, we walked to the Ministry together after school. At HQ I took her through the duties she’d soon be performing, showing her the telegraph and the typewriter and explaining the importance of transcribing each list accurately.

  I introduced her to the dispatch workers, who by now were calling me by my name. Becky was impressed by that, but not as impressed as she was by the ever-expanding records office with its miles-apart walls and infinite ceiling.

  “How can that be? You mean every single day it grows larger?”

  “Every hour, every minute. It never stops.”

  “So who are the armed guards I keep seeing? And who’s the grumpy old woman in the booth? Is she always so disagreeable? And has anyone ever told her she has spiders in her hair?”

  “I did once. It wasn’t a great idea.”

  She soon grew into the part, sometimes joining Lu and Mr. October in the field while I stayed behind to file paperwork. On Saturdays she even offered to cover for me while I took Mum to her weekly hospital appointment.

  At the hospital I kept to the waiting area outside Mum’s treatment room. It seemed wiser not to go wandering. Now and then I saw agents from the Ministry come and go from the ward. I didn’t know them all by sight, but with a look and a nod they quickly told me who they were. It was reassuring to know they were around and on my side.

  After the hospital, once Mum was home and resting, I’d return to the Ministry and Becky would tell me excitedly about the dramas I’d missed during the day.

  The month sped past. Halloween was approaching. The shops filled with broomsticks, pointy black hats, and green, glowing goblin masks. We all brought pumpkins to school, where we scooped out the soggy pulp and seeds to make jack-o’-lanterns. Becky brought an extra, using it to bake pumpkin bread in home ec. It tasted more like cake than bread, with a sweet cinnamon flavor.

  In art, the rest of the class volunteered me to take charge of decorations. I painted a scarecrow creature and a Michael Myers mask from the film Dad used to play every Halloween night when I was too young to stay up and watch.

  By the time we were done, the art room looked like a haunted house, and the school’s corridors resembled the walls of a ghost train ride. Grinning skulls and phosphorescent masks, werewolves and vampires and Frankenstein monsters looked down with eyes that followed you wherever you went.

  After Mr. Redfern’s class, the last of the day, I was clearing my desk when I heard voices outside the room — Becky and Kelly talking out in the hall.

  “But you always have before,” Kelly was saying. “What’s the problem? It’s only for a few hours.”

  “I know,” Becky said. “But I forgot, and now I’ve got other plans.”

  “Well, the rest of us are going. It won’t be the same without you.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “You’re no fun anymore. You’re becoming dead boring, actually. You’ve been boring ever since you made friends with him.”

  I wondered if Kelly knew I was in hearing range. Something in her tone told me she knew very well.

  “Don’t be like that,” Becky said patiently. “Look, if you like, we’ll do something this weekend instead.”

  “Nah, forget it. You do what you like.”

  “But, Kelly . . .”

  Kelly’s voice faded as she flounced down the hallway. “And don’t bother seeing us off at the bus stop, either. Wouldn’t want to keep you from your new best friend.”

  She stomped angrily down the stairs.

  Becky was leaning against the wall looking flushed when I came out of the classroom. She answered without my needing to ask.

  “It’s nothing. They’re trick-or-treating, and they expect me to go because I always have. How can I tell them we have matters of life and death — well, death — to deal with?”

  “You can’t.”

  “No, I can’t. I’m all right, though. I’m not upset. Kelly’s never spoken to me like that before, but I know she’s only jealous.”

  “You could still go if you wanted. They’re your friends. You don’t have to come every night.”

  “But I do,” Becky said. “I’ve waited years for this, ever since my Blue Grandma’s funeral. Mr. October calls it my true calling.”

  “I know.”

  “And if you’re lucky enough to find it, or for it to find you, you have to grab the chance with both hands, don’t you?”

  “Even if it’s dangerous?”

  “Even then.”

  At first I’d wanted to warn her about the enemy and the risk of taking sides against them, but after she rescued the fire children I’d never brought it up. She’d seen what was at stake, and she’d never backed down. If anything, the risk was what attracted her. It made her tick.

  The clocks had gone back an hour over the weekend, and when we arrived in Islington the sky was showing the first signs of dark. A biting wind swept along the streets, hurrying us on toward the Ministry. Gangs of witches ran up to complete strangers carrying lanterns and shaking buckets of change, stamping their feet against the cold, unaware of the dead man watching from an antique shop doorway.

  A field agent I’d seen once or twice before, Joe Mort, had joined the dead man to lead him away. Joe had the wiry frame of a bantamweight boxer, crew-cut black hair, and a thousand-yard stare. He winked at us as we passed and said, “Almost got away, this one. A 1742, dropped stone dead during a horror double bill at the cinema round the corner and ran out screaming.”

  “Good thing you found him,” I said. “Is there much else going on tonight?”

  Joe made a face. “It’s Halloween. What do you think?”

  We were early for work, and when we walked in, Sukie was finishing her stint in receipts, tapping out the last of a tall stack of cards.

  “Oh, hi,” she said, not looking up.

  “This is Becky,” I said.

  “I know.”

  Of course she did.

  “He’s busy,” she said before I could ask where Mr. October was. “Sorry, must stop doing that. Last I saw of him, he was running round the building in a fit. One of our operatives spotted a lost soul by the canal just east of here. We’ve been looking for this one for ages.”

  “Busy night,” Becky said.

  “Aren’t they all?” Sukie’s kinked eyes took us both in with one look. “But yeah, especially when the short days come and seasonal affective disorder kicks in. We’ve had two 3624s on the Northern Line already today.”

  “What’re they?” Becky asked.

  “A bit like the first case you saw,” I reminded her. “But intentional.”

  “Jumpers,” said Sukie. “Fatalities on the underground. There must be something about the Northern Line. It’s the most popular departure point for suicidals.”

  “What about the lost soul?” I said.

  “Yeah,” Sukie said. “A matter of some urgency. Mr. October’s all worked up about it. Obviously we need to track it before the enemy do, because as you know Samhain is their special night of the year — they’ll be out in force until dawn.”

&n
bsp; “A matter of some urgency,” Mr. October said, sneaking his head around the door. He hadn’t yet changed for the evening’s duties. His dark pirate persona alternated with the frail old man’s, morphing back and forth between them. “There’s a lost soul out there we need to track before the enemy do, because as you know Samhain —”

  “We do know,” I said. “Sukie just told us.”

  “Ah. Of course. In that case, may I just say ‘happy All Hallows’? Here, have a candy apple.”

  He plucked one from behind his back and tossed it to me, then found another for Becky in the empty space above the door.

  “Not for me, thanks; they hurt my teeth,” Sukie said, adding her last card to the stack.

  “Leave the cards for Ben,” Mr. October told her. “I’ll need your talents in the field if we’re going to find this lost soul. Yours too, Becky. Ben, would you mind holding the fort while we’re gone? Shouldn’t take more than an hour if we’re lucky.”

  “OK,” I said, feeling excluded. Whatever was in the air tonight sounded like something I wouldn’t want to miss.

  “You won’t miss a thing,” Sukie reassured me. “We’ll call you as soon as you’re needed.”

  “Took the words right out of my mouth,” Mr. October said. “Sukie, where’s —”

  “Already on it,” Sukie said. “She’s outside bringing the rickshaw.”

  “Be careful,” I said to Becky as they filed from the room. “You don’t know what’s out there yet.”

  She smiled back from the doorway, her face patterned orange-black in the candlelight. “I’ve a fairly good idea, Ben. It’s Halloween.”

  The time dragged after they’d gone. Why would Mr. October require their services but not mine? If this was such a big night for the enemy, shouldn’t I be out there doing whatever I could?

  I took the cards to sullen Miss Webster in records, then sat at the desk studying the ancientspeak phrase book. The words still wouldn’t settle on the page, and my head swam after a few minutes, so I rolled paper into the typewriter and went to work on my journal instead.

  As I typed, the wind groaned through the building, and the shivering candle flame sent strange light across the page. Something was coming — I felt it in my bones. As I pulled the first sheet from the typewriter, the telegraph machine sputtered and choked out smoke.

  It stopped almost as soon as it started. With a gasp the machine fell silent. I stared at it, expecting more. This happened all the time, though — nothing for hours, then one solitary name, then a whole slew of names sending the machine into rumbling overload. But nothing more came. That was all for now.

  With a sigh, not fancying the trek to Miss Webster’s booth for just this, I brought the new list to the desk. The reference number 4837 didn’t mean much to me, but the name and address were familiar — very familiar. My insides turned over; the room darkened around me as I fell into the chair to read it again, then again to be sure.

  Perhaps deep down I’d known it was coming. I’d known but kept the thought hidden away where it wouldn’t hurt. It wasn’t a surprise so much as a shock to find out like this, to see that single name recorded there in stark black and white.

  Mum.

  A screaming in my head blotted everything out, growing louder and deadlier by the second, like a train fast approaching through a tunnel — a train heading directly at me.

  My eyes were hot and streaming, turning the words and numbers on the paper watery. I heard myself speak, or try to, but I hardly knew what was coming out of my mouth.

  “Not fair. Not fair. Notfairnotfairnotfair . . .”

  And then I did something I’ve been trying to live down ever since. Something that broke every rule in the Ministry’s book. Something I never would’ve done if the telegraph hadn’t said what it said.

  I got up, shaky-legged, crushing the sheet into a tight ball between my fists, stuffing it into my hip pocket. This was one name I wouldn’t, couldn’t transcribe. No way could I make myself type it. The telegraph never lied, but so what? That didn’t mean I had to go along with it. Not this time.

  I turned and fled from the room.

  A siren went up around the building the second I stepped into the corridor. It drilled through my ears as I legged it past the other offices, downstairs and out to the moonlit alley.

  Mr. October had warned me what might happen if lists were badly transcribed, mistyped, misfiled. The consequences could be dire. The natural order of things could change. But what if the cards were never typed at all, if the names were never filed, but stolen?

  If the siren ringing in my ears was any indication, I’d done the worst thing, the most unforgivable thing an operative could do. Until now, no one but the Lords of Sundown had stolen from the Ministry. I’d landed myself in a world of trouble.

  My sneakers screeched across the cobblestones as I ran for the invisible gap. A searchlight snapped on somewhere above the dark building, its icy beam falling on the wall ahead of me.

  The crevice between the walls felt narrower than ever as I slid sideways into it. For a moment I feared the walls might seal up completely, trapping me there, crushing me to dust where I’d never be found. But the alarm continued to rise and fall, and I heard the slap and thunder of boots in the alley behind me.

  Pandemonium security. The Vigilants.

  I froze, but only for a second. It sounded like a multitude, uniformed and fully armed and dangerous. The Vigilants had been set on my tail.

  Edging between the cold, dank bricks, I came out onto Camden Passage, where covens of witches were still trick-or-treating, and a child-size ghost flapped its arms and yelled “Boo!” as I passed. When I rounded the corner onto Upper Street, the glare of shop windows and car headlights nearly blinded me. Above the rush-hour clamor I could still hear the siren and, closer, the clatter of Vigilant boots.

  I tore across the intersection, turning left onto a quieter, darker street. A posse of guards stormed past the top of the street a few meters away, swinging powerful flashlights in my direction. I jumped inside the nearest doorway and shrank back as far as I could, listening to the crackle of their walkie-talkies.

  Whatever happened, I couldn’t get caught. I had to keep Mum safe, do whatever I could to protect her. But how much time did she have? Minutes or hours? The telegraph was never clear about things like that.

  The walkie-talkies faded into traffic noise. I waited a minute in case the Vigilants came back. When I was sure they had moved on, I set off downhill, cutting from one street to the next in search of the canal.

  It had to be somewhere nearby. If I could find it, the darkness by the water would give me cover. But suppose the enemy were down there too? Suppose they were already waiting at home? It was a chance I had to take. Breathless, I ran deeper into the night.

  I kept to the shadows the whole way, trying not to think about what might be inside them. But if the enemy were out in force tonight — Samhain, their special night, Sukie had called it — then so were the Ministry. Their security forces were everywhere.

  The Vigilants patrolled every other street, flashlights scanning doorways and dipping over garden walls. At one point I had to dive behind a mountain of black trash bags and wait there, not moving, until they turned the corner. On another street I hid inside a Dumpster filled with bricks and soggy, splintery lengths of timber, huddling under a muddy tarp that smelled of cat pee.

  By the time I scrambled out and got moving again, all the streets were beginning to look alike. I had a sinking feeling I’d lost my way. I’d traveled to and from the Ministry too many times to count, I knew the route by heart, but nowhere I turned looked familiar now.

  Mum needed me. I couldn’t waste time. But I couldn’t afford to panic, either. All I had to do was find a way back to Upper Street, avoiding the Vigilants, and start over again from there.

  The breeze whipped up piles of dead leaves from the roadside as I ran. They swirled around me, scraping my face. Jack-o’-lanterns grinned from every other
window I passed. The streets were all the same, silent and empty and foreign. I couldn’t be far from where I needed to be, but the canal may as well have been miles away.

  The next intersection rushed at me up a steep slope. I couldn’t decide whether to turn right or left at the end. All I could see stretching in front of me was darkness, more darkness, and the faintest ripple of light.

  I screeched to a halt, almost cartoon-style, at the junction. At the far side of the road was a low-walled bridge, and a short distance along the bridge the top of the steep path leading down to the canal. I’d found my route home.

  The road was clear. I started across it, readying myself to start running again. Everything ached and my head was throbbing. The shivering light on the dark water’s surface made me dizzy. But I had to keep going, I had to believe Mum would be OK when I got there. Don’t give up. Don’t let the fear take over.

  I hadn’t reached the curb on the other side when the light hit me — a huge light, the blaze of fifty or sixty flashlights snapping on at once, burning out of the darkness from both sides.

  I could almost feel heat in those lights. I froze in my tracks, closing my eyes against the brightness as the Vigilants tramped nearer. The clatter of their boots on the cold ground sounded like volleys of gunshots.

  “There he is,” a voice barked somewhere in the light.

  “The thief,” said another.

  “Hands in the air,” a third voice ordered. “Don’t do anything stupid, kid. Don’t even twitch.”

  “You don’t understand,” I said shakily. “Someone needs my help. . . .”

  “Don’t speak. Don’t make a sound.”

  The command was accompanied by the ratcheting lock and load of rifles.

  They didn’t kill, I remembered. They were defenders, only licensed to stun. All the same, the cold edge in their voices told a different story — if they could, they would. Whatever it took to preserve the natural order.

  Peering through the dazzling haze, I could just pick out the bridge fifteen, maybe twenty paces away. I might make it before they had time to react. And if I could reach the towpath, leg it as far as the first bend . . . I knew the way after that very well.