You might call IT the Boss.Then Charles Wallace giggled, a giggle that was the most sinister sound Meg had ever heard. IT sometimes calls ITself the Happiest Sadist.
Meg spoke coldly, to cover her fear. I dont know what youre talking about.
Thats s-a-d-i-s-t, not s-a-d-d-e-s-t, you know, Charles Wallace said, and giggled again. Lots of people dont pronounce it correctly.
Well, I dont care, Meg said defiantly. I dont ever want to see IT, and thats that.
Charles Wallaces strange, monotonous voice ground against her ears. Meg, youre supposed to have some mind. Why do you think we have wars at home? Why do you think people get confused and unhappy? Because they all live their own, separate, individual lives. Ive been trying to explain to you in the simplest possible way that on Camazotz individuals have been done away with. Camazotz is ONE mind. Its IT. And thats why everybodys so happy and efficient. Thats what old witches like Mrs Whatsit dont want to have happen at home.
Shes not a witch, Meg interrupted.
No?
No, Calvin said. You know shes not. You know thats just their game. Their way, maybe, of laughing in the dark.
In the dark is correct, Charles continued. They want us to go on being confused instead of properly organized.
Meg shook her head violently, No! she shouted. I know our world isnt perfect, Charles, but its better than this. This isnt the only alternative! It cant be!
Nobody suffers here, Charles intoned. Nobody is ever unhappy.
But nobodys ever happy, either, Meg said earnestly. Maybe if you arent unhappy sometimes you dont know how to be happy. Calvin, I want to go home.
We cant leave Charles, Calvin told her, and we cant go before weve found your father.You know that. But youre right, Meg, and Mrs Which is right. This is Evil.
Charles Wallace shook his head, and scorn and disapproval seemed to emanate from him. Come. Were wasting time. He moved rapidly down the corridor, but continued to speak. How dreadful it is to be low, individual organisms. Tch-tch-tch. His pace quickened from step to step, his short legs flashing, so that Meg and Calvin almost had to run to keep up with him. Now see this, he said. He raised his hand and suddenly they could see through one of the walls into a small room. In the room a little boy was bouncing a ball. He was bouncing it in rhythm, and the walls of his little cell seemed to pulse with the rhythm of the ball. And each time the ball bounced he screamed as though he were in pain.
Thats the little boy we saw this afternoon, Calvin said sharply, the little boy who wasnt bouncing the ball like the others.
Charles Wallace giggled again. Yes. Every once in a while theres a little trouble with cooperation, but its easily taken care of. After today hell never desire to deviate again. Ah, here we are.
He moved rapidly down the corridor and again held up his hand to make the wall transparent. They looked into another small room or cell. In the centre of it was a large, round, transparent column, and inside this column was a man.
FATHER! Meg screamed.
9
Meg rushed at the man imprisoned in the column, but as she reached what seemed to be the open door she was hurled back as though she had crashed into a brick wall.
Calvin caught her. Its just transparent like glass this time, he told her. We cant go through it.
Meg was so sick and dizzy from the impact that she could not answer. For a moment she was afraid that she would be sick or faint. Charles Wallace laughed again, the laugh that was not his own, and it was this that saved her, for once more anger overcame her pain and fear. Charles Wallace, her own real, dear Charles Wallace, never laughed at her when she hurt herself. Instead, his arms would go quickly around her neck and he would press his cheek against hers. But the demon Charles Wallace sniggered. She turned away from him and looked again at the man in the column.
Oh, Father she whispered longingly, but the man in the column did not move to look at her.The horn-rimmed glasses, which always seemed so much a part of him, were gone, and the expression of his eyes was turned inwards, as though he were deep in thought. He had grown a beard, and the silky brown was shot with grey. His hair, too, had not been cut. It wasnt just the overlong hair of the man in the snapshot at Cape Canaveral; it was pushed back from his high forehead and fell softly almost to his shoulders, so that he looked like someone in another century, or a shipwrecked sailor. But there was no question, despite the change in him, that he was her father, her own beloved father.
My, he looks a mess, doesnt he? Charles Wallace said, and sniggered.
Meg swung on him with sick rage, Charles, thats father! Father!
So what?
Meg turned away from him and held out her arms to the man in the column.
He doesnt see us, Meg, Calvin said gently.
Why? Why?
I think its sort of like those little peepholes they have in apartments, in the front doors, Calvin explained. You know. From inside you can look through and see everything. And from outside you cant see anything at all. We can see him, but he cant see us.
Charles! Meg pleaded. Let me in to father!
Why? Charles asked placidly.
Meg remembered that when they were in the room with the man with red eyes she had knocked Charles Wallace back into himself when she tackled him and his head cracked on the floor; so she hurled herself at him. But before she could reach him his fist shot out and punched her hard in the stomach. She gasped for breath. Sickly, she turned away from her brother, back to the transparent wall. There was the cell, there was the column with her father inside. Although she could see him, although she was almost close enough to touch him, he seemed farther away than he had been when she had pointed him out to Calvin in the picture on the piano. He stood there quietly as though frozen in a column of ice, an expression of suffering and endurance on his face that pierced into her heart like an arrow.
You say you want to help father? Charles Wallaces voice came from behind her, with no emotion whatsoever.
Yes. Dont you? Meg demanded, swinging round and glaring at him.
But of course. That is why we are here.
Then what do we do? Meg tried to keep the desperation out of her voice, trying to sound as drained of feeling as Charles, but nevertheless ending on a squeak.
You must do as I have done, and go in to IT, Charles said.
No.
I can see you dont really want to save father.
How will my being a zombie save father?
You will just have to take my word for it, Margaret, came the cold, flat voice from Charles Wallace, IT wants you and IT will get you. Dont forget that I, too, am part of IT, now. You know I wouldnt have done IT if IT werent the right thing to do.
Calvin, Meg asked in agony, will it really save father?
But Calvin was paying no attention to her. He seemed to be concentrating with all his power on Charles Wallace. He stared into the pale blue that was all that was left of Charles Wallaces eyes. And, for thou wast a spirit too delicate / To act her earthy and abhorrd commands/ she did confine thee into a cloven pine he whispered, and Meg recognized Mrs Whos words to him.
For a moment Charles Wallace seemed to listen. Then he shrugged and turned away. Calvin followed him, trying to keep his eyes focused on Charless. If you want a witch, Charles, he said, IT is the witch. Not our ladies. Good thing I had The Tempest at school this year, isnt it, Charles? It was the witch who put Ariel in the cloven pine, wasnt it?