Point Blanc (12 page)

Mrs. Stellenbosch
flicked off the controls. "I will take you down to meet the
director," she shouted over the noise of the blades. "Your luggage
will be brought down later."

It was cold
on the roof. Although it was almost the end of April, the snow covering the
mountain still hadn't melted and everything was white for as far as the
eye could see. The academy was built into the side of a steep slope. A little
farther down, Alex saw a big iron tongue that started at ground level but then
curved outward as the mountainside dropped away. It was a ski jump--the
sort of thing he had seen at the winter Olympics. The end of the curve was at
least fifty feet above the ground, and far below, Alex could make out a flat
area, shaped like a horseshoe, where the jumpers were meant to land.

He was
staring at it, imagining what it would be like to propel yourself into space
with only two skis to break your fall, when the woman grabbed his arm.
"We don't use it," she said. "It is forbidden. Come
now! Let's get out of the cold."

They went
through a door in the side of one of the towers and down a narrow spiral
staircase (each step a different distance apart) that took them all the way to
the ground floor. Now they were in a long, narrow corridor with plenty of doors
but no windows.

"Classrooms,"
Mrs. Stellenbosch explained. "You will see them later."

Alex followed
her through the strangely silent building. The central heating had been turned
up high inside the academy, and the atmosphere was warm and heavy. They stopped
at a pair of modern glass doors that opened into the courtyard Alex had seen
from above. From the heat back into the cold again, Mrs. Stellenbosch led
him through the doors and past the frozen fountain. A movement caught his eye,
and Alex glanced up. This was something he hadn't noticed before. A
sentry stood on one of the towers. He had a pair of binoculars around his neck
and a submachine gun slung across one arm.

Armed guards?
In a school? Alex had been here only a few minutes and already he was unnerved.

"Through
here!" Mrs. Stellenbosch opened another door for him, and he found
himself in the main reception hall of the academy. A log fire burned in a
massive fireplace with two stone dragons guarding the flames. A grand staircase
led upward. The hall was lit by a chandelier with at least a hundred bulbs. The
walls were paneled with wood. The carpet was thick, dark red. A dozen pairs of
eyes followed Alex as he followed Mrs. Stellenbosch down the next
corridor. The hall was decorated with animal heads: a rhino, an antelope, a
water buffalo, and, saddest of all, a lion. Alex wondered who had shot them.

They came to
a single door that suggested they had come to the end of their journey. So far,
Alex hadn't encountered any boys, but glancing out of the window, he saw
two more guards marching slowly past, both of them cradling automatic machine
guns.

Mrs. Stellenbosch
knocked on the door.

"Come
in!" Even with just two words, Alex caught the South African accent.

The door
opened, and they went into a huge room that made no sense. Like the rest of the
building, its shape was irregular, none of the walls running parallel. The
ceiling was about fifty feet high with windows running the whole, way and
giving an impressive view of the slopes. The room was modern with soft lighting
coming from units concealed in the walls. The furniture was ugly, but not as
ugly as the animal heads on the walls and the zebra skin on the wood floor.
There were three chairs next to a small fireplace. One of them was gold and
antique. A man was sitting in it. His head turned as Alex came in.

"Good
afternoon, Alex," he said. "Please come and sit down."

Alex
sauntered into the room and took one of the chairs. Mrs. Stellenbosch sat
in the other.

"My
name is Grief," the man continued. "Dr. Grief. I am very pleased to
meet you and to have you here."

Alex stared
at the man who was the director of Point Blanc, at the white-paper skin and the
eyes burning behind the red eyeglasses. It was like meeting a skeleton, and for
a moment he was lost for words. Then he recovered. "Nice place," he
said.

"Do you
think so?" There was no emotion whatsoever in Grief's voice. So far
he had moved only his neck. "This building was designed in 1857 by a
Frenchman who was certainly the world's worst architect. This was his
only commission. When the first owners moved in, they had him shot."

"There
are still quite a few people here with guns." Alex glanced out of the
window as another pair of guards walked past.

"Point
Blanc is unique," Dr. Grief explained. "As you will soon discover,
all the boys who have been sent here come from families of great wealth and
importance. We have had the sons of emperors and industrialists. Boys like
yourself. It follows that we could very easily become a target for terrorists.
The guards are therefore here for your protection."

"That's
very kind of you." Alex felt he was being too polite. It was time to show
this man what sort of person he was meant to be. "But to be honest, I
don't really want to be here myself. So if you'll just tell me how
I get down into town, maybe I can get the next train home."

"There
is no way down into town." Dr. Grief lifted a hand to stop Alex from
interrupting. Alex glanced at his long skeletal fingers and at the eyes
glinting red behind the glasses. The man moved as if every bone in his body had
been broken and then put back together again. "The skiing season is over.
It's too dangerous now. There is only the helicopter, and that will take
you from here only when I say so." The hand lowered itself again.
"You are here, Alex, because you have disappointed your parents. You were
expelled from school. You have had difficulties with the police."

"That
wasn't my bloody fault!" Alex protested.

"Don't
interrupt the doctor!" Mrs. Stellenbosch said.

Alex glanced
at her balefully.

"Your
appearance is displeasing," Dr. Grief went on. "Your language also.
It is our job to turn you into a boy of whom your parents can be proud."

"I'm
happy as I am," Alex said.

"That
is of no relevance." Dr. Grief fell silent.

Alex
shivered. There was something about this room, so big, so empty, so twisted out
of shape. And this man who was both old and young at the same time but who
somehow wasn't completely human. "So what are you going to do with
me?" Alex asked.

"There
will be no lessons to begin with," Mrs. Stellenbosch said.
"For the first couple of weeks we want you to assimilate."

"What
does that mean?"

"To
assimilate. To conform ... to adapt ... to become like." It was
as if she were reading out of a dictionary. "There are six boys at the
academy at the moment. You will meet them and you will spend time with them.
There will be opportunities for sports and for being social. There is a good
library here, and you will read. Soon you will learn our methods."

"I want
to call my mom and dad," Alex said.

"The
use of telephones is forbidden," Mrs. Stellenbosch explained. She
tried to smile sympathetically, but with her face it wasn't quite
possible. "We find it makes our students homesick," she went on.
"Of course, you may write letters if you wish."

"I
prefer e-mail," Alex said.

"For
the same reason, e-mail is not permitted."

Alex shrugged
and swore under his breath.

Dr. Grief had
seen him. "You will be polite to the assistant director," he
snapped. He hadn't raised his voice, but the words had an acid tone.
"You should be aware, Alex, that Mrs. Stellenbosch has worked with
me now for twenty-six years and that when I met her she had been voted Miss
South Africa five years in a row."

Alex glanced
at the hostile face. "A beauty contest?" he asked.

"The
weight-lifting championships." Dr. Grief glanced at the fireplace.
"Show him," he said.

Mrs. Stellenbosch
got up and went over to the fireplace. There was a poker lying in the grate.
She took it with both hands. For a moment she seemed to concentrate. Alex
gasped. The solid metal poker, almost two inches thick, was slowly bending. Now
it was U-shaped. Mrs. Stellenbosch wasn't even sweating. She brought
the two ends together and dropped it back into the grate. It clanged against
the stone.

"We
enforce strict discipline here at the academy," Dr. Grief said.
"Bedtime is at ten o'clock--not a minute past. We do not
tolerate bad language. You will have no contact with the outside world without
our permission. You will not attempt to leave. And you will do as you are told
instantly, without hesitation. And finally..." He leaned toward Alex.
"You are permitted only in certain parts of this building." He
gestured with a hand, and for the first time Alex noticed a second door at the
far end of the room. "My private quarters are through there. You will remain
on the first and second floors only. That is where the bedrooms and classrooms
are located. The third and fourth floors are out of bounds. The basement also.
This again is for your safety."

"You're
afraid I'll trip on the stairs?" Alex asked.

Dr. Grief
ignored him. "You may leave," he said.

"Wait
outside the office, Alex," Mrs. Stellenbosch said. "Someone
will be along to get you."

Alex stood
up.

"We
will make you into what your parents want," Dr. Grief said.

"Maybe
they don't want me at all."

"We can
arrange that too."

Alex left.

"An
unpleasant boy ... a few days ... faster than usual ... the Gemini
Project ... closing down..."

If the door
hadn't been so thick, Alex would have been able to hear more. The moment
he had left the room he had cupped his ear against the keyhole, hoping to pick
up something that might be useful to MI6. Sure enough, Dr. Grief and
Mrs. Stellenbosch were busily talking on the other side, but Alex heard
little and understood less.

A hand
clamped down on his shoulder and he twisted around, annoyed with himself. A
so-called spy caught listening at keyholes! But it wasn't one of the
guards. Alex found himself looking up at a round-faced boy with long, dark
hair, dark blue eyes, and pale skin. He was wearing a very old Star Wars
T-shirt, torn jeans, and a baseball cap. Recently he had been in a fight, and
it looked like he'd gotten the worst of it. There was a bruise around one
of his eyes and a gash on his lip.

"They'll
shoot you if they catch you listening at doors," the boy said. He looked
at Alex with hostile eyes. Alex guessed that he was the sort of boy who
wouldn't trust anyone easily. "I'm James Sprintz," he
said. "They told me to show you around."

"Alex
Friend."

"So
what did you do to get sent to this dump?" James asked as they walked
down the corridor.

"I got
expelled from Eton."

"I got
thrown out of a school in Dusseldorf." James sighed. "I thought it
was the best thing that ever happened to me. Until my dad sent me here."

"What
does your dad do?" Alex asked.

"He's
a banker. He plays the money markets. He loves money and he has lots of
it." James's voice was flat and unemotional.

"Dieter
Sprintz?" Alex remembered the name. He'd made the front page of
every newspaper in England a few years before. The hundred-million-dollar man.
That was how much he had made in just twenty-four hours. At the same time, the
pound had crashed and the British government had almost collapsed.

"Yeah.
Don't ask me to show you a photograph, because I don't have one.
This way..."

They had
reached the main hall with the dragon fireplace. From here, James showed him
into the dining room, a long, high-ceilinged room with six tables and a window
leading into the kitchen. After that, they visited two living rooms, a games
room, and a library. The academy reminded Alex of a ski resort-and not just
because of its setting. There was a sort of heaviness about the place, a sense
of being cut off from the real world. The air was warm and silent, and despite
the size of the rooms, Alex couldn't help feeling claustrophobic. Grief
had said that there were only six boys currently at the school. The building
could have housed sixty. Empty space was everywhere.

There was
nobody in either of the living rooms--just a collection of armchairs,
desks, and tables--but they found a couple of boys in the library. This
was a long, narrow room with old-fashioned oak shelves lined with books in a
variety of languages. A suit of medieval Swiss armor stood in an alcove at the
far end.

"This
is Tom. And Hugo," James said. "They're probably doing extra
math or something, so we'd better not disturb them."

The two boys
looked up and nodded briefly. One of them was reading a textbook. The other had
been writing. They were both much better dressed than James and didn't
look very friendly.

"Creeps,"
James said as soon as they had left the room.

"In
what way?"