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?'
‚When I was told about this place, they said all the kids had problems. I thought it was going to be wild. Do you have a cigarette?'
‚I don’t smoke.'
‚Great, another one… I get here and it’s like a museum or a monastery or … I don’t know what. It looks like Dr. Grief’s been busy. Everyone’s quiet, hardworking, boring. God knows how he did it. Sucked their brains out with a straw or something. A couple of weeks ago I got into a fight with a couple of them, just for the hell of it.' He pointed to his face. ‚They beat the crap out of me and then went back to their studies. Really creepy!'
They went into the games room, which contained table tennis, darts, a wide-screen TV, and a snooker table. ‚Don’t try playing snooker,' James said. ‚The room’s on a slant and all the balls roll the wrong way.'
Then they went upstairs, where the boys had their study-bedrooms. Each one contained a bed, an armchair, a television (‚It shows only the programs Dr. Grief wants you to see,' James said), a bureau, and a desk. A second door led into a small bathroom with a toilet and shower.
None of the rooms was locked.
‚We’re not allowed to lock them,' James explained. ‚We’re all stuck here with nowhere to go, so nobody bothers to steal anything. I heard that Hugo Vries—the boy in the library—used to steal anything he could get his hands on. He was arrested for shoplifting in Amsterdam.'
‚But not anymore?'
‚He’s another success story. He’s flying home next week. His father owns diamond mines.
Why bother shoplifting when you can afford to buy the whole shop?'
Alex’s study was at the end of the corridor, with views over the ski jump. His suitcases had already been carried up and were waiting for him on the bed. Everything felt very bare, but according to James, the study-bedrooms were the only part of the school the boys were allowed to decorate themselves. They could choose their own bedspreads and cover the walls with their own posters.
‚They say it’s important that you express yourself,' James said. ‚If you haven’t brought anything with you, Miss Stomach-bag will take you into Grenoble.'
‚Stomach-bag?'
‚Mrs. Stellenbosch. That’s my name for her.'
‚What do the other boys call her?'
‚They call her Mrs. Stellenbosch.' James sighed. ‚I’m telling you—this is a deeply weird place, Alex. I’ve been to a lot of schools because I’ve been thrown out of a lot of schools. But this one is the pits. I’ve been here for six weeks now and I’ve hardly had any lessons. They have music evenings and discussion evenings and they try to get me to read. But otherwise, I’ve been left on my own.'
‚They want you to assimilate,' Alex said, remembering what Dr. Grief had said.