“Yup,” said Molly. “I’m preparing myself.” She got up to go. There was no point in staying just to be insulted.
Hazel looked at Molly in disgust. “Prize weirdo,” she said. Then, as Molly was leaving the room, Hazel said slyly, “By the way, have you heard?”
“Heard what?”
“Rocky’s found a family.”
The words walloped Molly. It was as if a cascade of icy water had drenched her from head to foot. She found it hard to speak. “Wh … when?”
Hazel smiled spitefully. “That American couple that came yesterday. Amazingly, they liked him…. Weird couple. Anyway, he left last night. Didn’t say good-bye to you, did he? That’s because, well, he told me he’s gone right off you. Said it was like eating too much of something. He said he’s kind of overdosed on you…. Said he’d drop you a line.”
“You’re joking,” said Molly.
“No, no, not joking, although I s’pose it is funny,” Hazel said.
Molly stared at Hazel’s mean face. “Liar,” she said, leaving the room. But inside, fierce emotions scorched her.
Rocky leaving? The idea was horrific. Molly couldn’t believe it. The thought of losing Rocky was devastating, like losing your arm or your leg or your whole family all at once, because he was all the family Molly had. Hazel must be lying. Rocky would never have left without saying good-bye to Molly. In fact, he wouldn’t leave unless she was adopted with him. That had always been their pact. If they went, they’d go together. Hazel’s bullying had simply reached a new level.
Yet a dreadful suspicion filled Molly—that Hazel wasn’t lying. On the landing, the light coming from the boys’ bedroom doorway lit the passage, familiar and friendly. Seeing this, Molly knew Rocky’s possessions would wink at her as soon as she entered his room. She would feel a fool for falling for Hazel’s story. But with every step she took, she became more numb. The ghastly truth hit her as undeniably as a thump in the face.
Rocky’s bed was stripped of its sheets, its threadbare blanket was folded into a neat rectangle, and its pillow was without a cover. His bedside table stood bare of comics. The wardrobe was open and his clothes were gone.
Molly could hardly breathe. An invisible terror seemed to have gripped her chest so that she couldn’t use her lungs. She fell against the doorjamb, staring at the anonymous corner and the ownerless bed.
“How could you?” she whispered. Molly slopped across the room and sat on Rocky’s old mattress. It was a little while before she could breathe normally and think logically again. In her heart she felt sure that Rocky wouldn’t leave without saying good-bye unless he had a very good reason. They’d had an argument, but it wasn’t that serious, and although Rocky had been extra secretive lately, Molly didn’t believe that he was sick of her. That part was Hazel’s vicious imagination. But why hadn’t he said good-bye? He had always been unreliable and a bit of a wanderer, but Molly didn’t think that his faults could actually make him forget to say good-bye to her. They were like brother and sister. He couldn’t have been that vague. It was all too strange.
With Rocky gone, Molly had no one. No one except Petula. The younger kids were okay, but they were too young to be her friends. Living here without Rocky was inconceivable. She must find out where he was.
In a daze, Molly dragged herself upstairs to her attic room. She turned the basin tap on to wash her face. She felt very muddled. She glanced at herself in the mirror. There were her closely set eyes, burning with tears. She stared intently at her reflection, remembering what had happened when she’d practiced the looking glass exercise before. Perhaps if she imagined herself feeling good now, she could hypnotize herself into happiness.
As she stared, her features disappeared. The meowing music for Hazel’s tap dance floated upstairs, and Molly imagined that she didn’t feel so bad. In a moment her face changed. Her cheeks became rounder and rosier, her hair softer and blonder. Ribbons grew in it. She looked pretty! Like a child star. It was incredible! Molly started to feel a tingling sensation, like the fusion feeling, creeping up her body again. Her depression peeled away from her like a crusty old cocoon and optimism took its place. And just then the idea hit her. A huge, stunning, colossal idea.
She had this eye trick under her belt. And the eye trick was the hypnotism trick used on crowds. There would be an audience—a crowd of watching people—at the children’s talent competition tomorrow. Somebody had to win that competition, with its huge cash prize. Why shouldn’t that somebody be Molly?
Molly blinked—and was herself again. But now she was feeling hopeful. She refused to believe that Rocky hated her, even if he had gone.
She made up her mind on the spot. She’d discover where he was, and she’d work out a way to leave Hardwick House and join him. It might be difficult, but Molly promised herself she’d use every ounce of her energy and talent to find Rocky, and she wouldn’t give up until they were together again.
Nine
By Saturday evening Molly was up and about. Although she felt better than before, she missed Rocky. All through evening assembly, as other children whispered excitedly about his adoption, Molly felt sad. She missed him—his black, shiny hair with its tight curls, his smooth, black skin, his soft, dark eyes. She missed his patchy jeans, which every week had new holes in them, and his hands that were more often than not covered with doodles. But most of all she missed his reassuring smile.
Miss Adderstone’s announcement shook Molly out of her misery. “Tomorrow is the Briersville Children’s Talent Competition. I believe some of you will be entering. You will walk from school to the town Guildhall to arrive for the competition by one o’clock. The prize money is, as you know, a ridiculous three thousand pounds, and if any of you win, you are expected to donate your winnings to the orphanage funds. Is that clear?”
“Yes, Miss Adderstone.”
“After supper we will be having a dress rehearsal.” Miss Adderstone looked at Hazel and smiled her false-teeth smile. Then the smile left her face. “Molly Moon, I see you are well again. You will sit at a solitary table at supper as I cannot have other children catching what you had.”
“Yes, Miss Adderstone.”
Molly followed the others through to the dining room. Nobody talked to her, but she didn’t care. Inside, the different-sized tables were laid with napkins and candles, and Edna was standing triumphantly beside a large pot of steaming spaghetti with peas and green vegetables in it. It smelled wonderful.
“Spaghetti primavera,” Edna declared dramatically. “Justa lika my mamma maka.” And holding up a loaf of oily bread with olives in it, she added proudly, “And my very own home-made ciabatta bread.” The bread had a red, white, and green Italian flag stuck into it. Behind Edna on the wall was a map of Italy.
“Have you gone mad, Edna?” asked Miss Adderstone coldly.
“No,” retorted Edna. “I happen to have a love of Italy, deep down in my soul, and sometimes it comes out.”
“It’s never come out before.”
“There’s always a first time for everything,” said Edna.
“Well, I hope you’ve made me my usual food … I don’t want any of this Italian muck.”
“Certainly, Miss Adderstone.”
Unimpressed, Miss Adderstone made her way to her table with a plate of liver and kidney pie while the children lined up for their meal. Molly noticed that Edna gave Hazel, Gordon, and Roger special plates of spaghetti. Extra-spicy spaghetti, she hoped. It seemed Edna had remembered all Molly’s instructions.
Edna’s vegetable spaghetti was fantastic. Molly looked at the small children’s faces as they tasted it. Gemma, Gerry, Ruby, and Jinx were gobbling it up as if it might be snatched away from them before they’d finished it. It was, without doubt, the best thing that Edna had ever cooked. But not for Hazel, Roger, and Gordon. They all gasped and spluttered after a mouthful of their food.
“Pass me the water,” Hazel croaked. Gordon forgot about Hazel being the boss. He filled his glass first
and glugged it back.
“Gordon!” Hazel snapped. He poured some water for Hazel, and then Roger snatched the jug.
“That … is … horrible,” said Hazel, gagging and pointing at her spaghetti.
From four tables away, Edna’s voice boomed, “What did you say?” Edna’s food had improved, but Edna had not, and her temper was as fierce as ever. She came marching over, and the bullies shrank in their seats. “What did you bleedin’ say about my food, ‘Azel bleedin’ ‘Ackersly?”
“Well, it’s too spicy,” said Hazel in a wormy voice. She wasn’t used to being told off.
“Spicy? Are you blasted barmy? You’re eatin’ spaghetti bleedin’ primavera. It’s Italian, ‘Azel ‘Ackersly … from the land of olive groves and opera. If you can’t taste the finesse and the warmth of the ‘ills in my pasta, if you think the summer sun in my food is too ‘ot, then you, I’m afraid, are a complete and utter blinkin’ moron, an’ bogs’ swill to you.”
Hazel looked at her plate and her eyebrows went up and down. Edna seemed to have gone mad.
“It’s delicious, Edna,” said Molly loudly. Hazel shot her a dagger look.
Edna smiled appreciatively. “Thank you, Molly.” She beamed.
“Molly Moon!” Miss Adderstone shouted. “However much you like Edna’s food, you know it is against the orphanage rules to shout. You will come to my office later for a punishment.” Then she drank down her glass of sherry in one gulp and let out a burp.
Perfect, thought Molly, looking at Edna and wondering whether she had remembered Molly’s other instructions. Edna was staring at Miss Adderstone with a look of outrage. A blush of red was beginning to flush her cheeks, and her face was twisting into angry contortions.
“Is there something wrong, Edna?” Miss Adderstone asked crisply.
Edna’s face grew redder and redder and redder like the center of a molten volcano. Then she exploded.
“Wrong…. Wrong? Molly Moon just complimented my food, Agnes Adderstone …”
Miss Adderstone’s mouth opened in astonishment, and a small piece of kidney fell out of it. Never had Edna answered her back or called her by her first name.
“… She complimented my spaghetti primavera … maybe loudly, but I like her compliments loud, and what’s more, I like ‘er. I like ‘er an awful lot. I like ‘er more than I like Italian cooking, which I like more than anything else in the world, and you, YOU TOLD HER OFF!” Edna pointed one of the Italian flags at Miss Adderstone and roared, “You are not bleedin’ well punishing Molly Moon later…. Over my stinkin’ dead body!”
Miss Adderstone put her knife and fork down and stood up. “Edna, I think maybe you need a little holiday.”
“A little ‘oliday? You must be joking. My work’s just startins’. I’ve got a blasted mountain to climb. I’ve got the whole of Italian cookin’ to learn.” Edna now put the Italian flag to her chest as if swearing an oath, and to everyone’s amazement she stepped onto a chair and then onto a table. “Because I am going to become the best Italian chef in the world.”
Everyone stared. Gordon Boils couldn’t resist looking up her skirt to try and see the legendary tattoo on her thigh. Miss Adderstone walked unsteadily toward the dining room door.
“Edna,” she said sternly, “I would like to talk to you later.”
“Aren’t you going to finish your supper?” said Edna from her lofty heights.
“No. I too found my dinner too spicy.”
As Miss Adderstone went, Edna said under her breath, “Old cow. She should ‘ave tried my spaghetti.”
Ten
After supper Molly went obediently to the door of Miss Adderstone’s apartment and knocked. Miss Adderstone opened the door and promptly put a handkerchief over her mouth when she saw it was Molly.
Miss Adderstone’s parlor was a dark room, paneled with chocolate-brown painted wood and furnished with prune-colored chairs. A patterned gray carpet covered the floor, and the whole place smelled of mothballs, sherry, and a hint of antiseptic mouthwash. There were two small tables with lacy cloths on them, but no photographs in frames, as Miss Adderstone had no family or friends. Three lamps with fringes lit the room, illuminating the pictures on the walls. All the pictures were of dark woods, dark rivers, and dark caves. As Molly was thinking how spooky it was, Petula bounded up to her, dropped a stone at her feet, and licked her knee. Molly gave her a pat.
“Control yourself, Petula,” Miss Adderstone said. Then, “Sit.” Both Molly and Petula sat down. For a moment, the room was silent except for the sound of Miss Adderstone sucking on her false teeth and, Molly was sure, the sound of her own heart beating. Miss Adderstone was her biggest challenge so far, and there was a horrible chance that this might all go wrong, especially since she didn’t have a wooden spoon or any sort of pendulum object to focus Miss Adderstone’s mind.
The cuckoo clock on the wall broke the silence with its rusty, hollow chime, “Cuckoo!” Molly jumped. Miss Adderstone sneered. For another six chimes the clock cuckooed. Molly watched the dusty wooden bird with its broken beak shoot in and out of the cuckoo house on its spring, until it finally disappeared into its hole. Miss Adderstone turned to look out of the window, and spoke.
“As you know, Rocky has left. He was responsible for many house duties that will now need doing by someone else. I have decided to give them all to you, as you are the sort of child who will learn a lot from hard labor. That display of yours in the dining room that provoked Edna was very vulgar. I hold you entirely to blame.”
When Miss Adderstone turned around, Molly was looking down.
“Have the courtesy to pay attention when I’m speaking to you.”
Molly gritted her teeth and looked up. She had summoned up the special eye sensation, and now, as she stared into Miss Adderstone’s joyless, dreary eyes, her new power, like a trained laser beam, shot out. Miss Adderstone felt oddly unstable. “Thank you—that’s more like it,” she managed to say as normally as she could. She twitched, wondering whether this odd feeling was her heart palpitating again. After a sip of sherry, she felt better.
“As I was saying …” Miss Adderstone’s cold eyes found Molly’s again, drawn to them like a moth is drawn toward light. She was powerless to stop herself looking, so she looked. And as she did, a peculiar thing happened.
All Miss Adderstone’s anger drained away from her, and all her thoughts, too. She couldn’t remember what she was going to say. All she knew was that Molly’s green eyes were very, very relaxing and she was experiencing a warm, yawny feeling inside. And then, Miss Adderstone was, all of a sudden … gone. Molly’s eyes throbbed, and the fusion feeling shot through her body. As Miss Adderstone’s head tilted sideways and her tongue lolled out of her mouth, pushing her false teeth forward, Molly calmed down. It was obvious that she was now in complete control.
“Agnes—Adderstone—listen—to—me. You are now—under my—command.” Molly’s voice sounded like waves lapping a shore. Miss Adderstone nodded. “From now on, I can do nothing wrong, do you understand? You will like me now as much as Edna does … which is a ten-ton amount…. Anything I ask for, you will give me.” Miss Adderstone nodded again. “And the first thing I want is Rocky’s telephone number.”
Miss Adderstone shook her head. In a monotonous, robotic voice she said, “I—have—no—record—I—destroyed—the—number.” Molly was shocked. Miss Adderstone was obviously not as hypnotized as she looked. She must be only half hypnotized. Molly pumped up her eye power.
“Miss Adderstone, you must give me the number,” she said forcefully.
“I’m telling—the truth,” said the robot Adderstone. “I—never—keep records…. I always—destroy—records of—children once they’ve left. It’s always good—to see the—back of them … I wish they’d all—leave here and leave me—alone, except for you, Molly….” Miss Adderstone whined, “Don’t you go, Molly.”
Molly ignored her. So, Adderstone always threw records of children away! How completely horrible! br />
“You must remember the town he’s gone to,” Molly ordered, “or the family’s name. I want you to remember.”
Miss Adderstone obediently looked into the depths of her cobwebby mind. “The family name—was … Alabaster. The town was … was … was … I can’t remember … It was a long—address in America—near New York City.”
“You must remember!” Molly nearly jolted Miss Adderstone awake. She pumped up her eye power again. “You must remember the town.” Miss Adderstone stood dumbly, her eyes rolling in her head. “Come on,” Molly demanded. “Think!”
“Polchester, Pilchester, Porchester,” said Miss Adderstone. “Something like—that.”
“Where are the records kept?” demanded Molly. “Show me. You can’t have thrown everything about Rocky away. I don’t believe you.”
Miss Adderstone meekly opened a gray filing cabinet in the corner of the room. “Here.” She gestured. “Here—are all—the files.”
Molly hungrily flicked through the drawer. Rocky’s file was not there. Instead, Molly saw her own name on a folder. She pulled it out.
As Miss Adderstone stood like a sentry by the desk, Molly opened her folder. Inside was a passport and one sheet of paper. “Is this all you have on me? No reports … nothing else?”
“That’s it,” said Miss Adderstone.
Molly read the sheet in front of her and froze.
And underneath, in Miss Adderstone’s crabby hand, was written: A plain child. unremarkable. An outsider. not And that was it.
Molly stared at the piece of paper. She felt like more of a nobody than she had ever felt in her life before. She opened her passport, which she’d never seen although she remembered having her picture taken for it. Miss Adderstone always kept the children’s passports up-to-date, so that if any foreigners came to adopt, they could fly home immediately with the child they’d chosen. A six-year-old Molly Moon smiled excitedly out of the little book. Molly remembered how keen she’d been to have her picture taken, and how Miss Adderstone had scolded her for smiling when the camera flashed. Molly felt enormously protective of the little girl in the picture. Looking at the stiff spinster in front of her, she wondered how a person could be so utterly without kindness. Had Miss Adderstone been mean ever since she was born? Molly took the paper with her own sad record from her folder along with her passport and stuffed them ínto her pocket. Then she wiped her sweaty hands on her skirt and concentrated again.