STAGS 2, page 26
Of course. ‘It’s his birthday today, right? Is he having a party?’
‘Yes. It’s going on right now.’
‘God, you shouldn’t have come all this way in the middle of his do, just for me.’ Then a thought struck. ‘Cass,’ I said gently, ‘isn’t it your birthday too? You know, you being a twin and all?’ I tried to make light of it.
She clasped her hands together. ‘Yes. Yes, it is.’ She didn’t quite meet my eyes. It struck me then, with a pang of sympathy, just how coconuts this whole entail thing was. Just like that, she had ceased to matter, to the extent that she could leave her own party and no one would care. I wondered if she’d even got a cake.
As if she’d read my mind she said, ‘It’s only an hour in the car. And I needed a break. I think –’ she forced a smile – ‘it will go on all night. Louis is pretty happy.’
My stomach shrivelled with hope and foreboding. ‘I bet he is. Master of all he surveys now, I guess.’
‘I guess,’ she repeated. She bit her lip a little.
‘Any …’ I didn’t know how to ask if her spectral cousin had done a Sixth Sense and turned up at the party, ‘special guests?’
‘Oh,’ she said, looking a bit awkward. ‘That is, of course you would all have been invited – Louis especially wanted me to say that – but you were … here, and Shafeen and Nel wanted to stay with you.’
‘I wasn’t fishing for an invite. I just meant, who was there?’
‘Just family really.’
That’s what I was afraid of. ‘Surprise appearances?’
‘Well, the London lot are there. And Mummy and Daddy made it down from Scotland, despite the snow.’
I breathed again. So Henry had been a dream after all. ‘Nice,’ I said.
‘Yes. Usually when there’s even a flake of snow they can’t get –’ She stopped and her face drained of colour. She was staring fixedly at something on my bedside table. It was quite unsettling.
‘The flowers,’ she croaked, sounding a bit like me.
‘I know,’ I said. ‘They’re from the school. Pretty flash, hey?’
‘Not those. The dog roses.’ She put her hands to her heart in a curiously theatrical way. ‘They’re from Longcross.’
My own heart started to beat faster.
She turned her gaze on me. ‘You’ve seen him, haven’t you?’ Her eyes seemed huge and were shining unnaturally brightly. ‘Haven’t you?’
I didn’t toy with her by asking who she meant. But I didn’t want to fuel whatever fire was burning in those eyes. ‘I thought I did,’ I said gently and evenly. ‘But I’ve been on some pretty hardcore drugs.’
‘Then how do you explain the flowers?’
‘I don’t. I can’t.’
‘Did he say he’d brought them?’
‘Yes.’
‘Then he’s there.’ She laughed with pure joy and clapped her hands together. ‘He went home. That’s right, isn’t it?’
I shifted uncomfortably. ‘He said something about 221b Baker Street.’
‘He’s in London?’
‘No. It’s a … thing we have, about Sherlock Holmes. Holmes fell off a waterfall, and then he went home.’
She stood. ‘I’ve got to go.’
‘Where?’
‘Back to Longcross, of course.’
I had a horrible feeling that she wasn’t rushing back to Louis, but to Henry.
She leaned in and kissed my cheek, not poshly this time but properly, firmly, affectionately, as if she was thanking me for something.
‘Oh, and Ty’s waiting to see you,’ she said as she straightened up. ‘Can you tell her to be quick?’
‘Ty’s here?’
‘She was at the party too, and when I said I was coming to see you, she wanted to come with me. But they have this one-at-a-time rule …’
‘I know, I know …’
‘So she said she’d wait.’
‘OK. Thanks, Cass. And thanks for the cake. Thank Louis too.’
She ducked her head and left me alone with the little iced slice on my lap. I put it on the bedside table, next to the Longcross roses. It was very nice of her, and Louis, and I’m sure it was delicious, but there was absolutely no way in the world I was going to eat it.
Scene xiv
I wasn’t really sure why Ty had come to visit, unless it was just to keep Cass company in the car.
I mean, it was nice of her and all, but we’d never been super-close, apart from that night of the deciphering, and that was evidenced by the fact that she didn’t even sit down, but just sort of hovered, fiddling with her hair.
Like everyone else she noticed my neck first and the flowers second. ‘I can’t stay very long,’ she said. ‘That creepy gamekeeper brought us in the estate car, and I don’t think he’s a patient man.’
I smiled. ‘Ty,’ I said, ‘you look amazing.’
She was in a red dress with a sequinned bodice and a sticky-out skirt of red net. She had very dramatic, glittery red eye make-up on her eyelids. At the edge of her eyes she’d stuck little ruby crystals. They looked like tears of blood.
‘Thanks.’
‘How’s the party?’
‘Banging,’ she said. ‘I never seen anything like it. They got an orchestra, Greer. And these waiters walking around like penguins with trays of food and drink. And later, they reckon, fireworks.’
‘Cool,’ I said. ‘Enjoy.’
‘Thanks,’ she said again. There was a long, awkward pause.
‘OK,’ she said. ‘Glad you’re still alive. Gotta go.’
Gotta go. Where had I heard that phrase before? It was a common enough phrase, but I hadn’t just heard it, I’d seen it written down. As she was disappearing through the door I remembered just in time. I sat up straight and called: ‘mrs_de_warlencourt!’
She turned around.
Her eyes were wide and guilty, and in that moment I knew.
There was a long silence. ‘Talk to me,’ I commanded, channelling a bit of Cass. She gave a small sigh and closed the door behind her. This time she did take the chair and pulled it close by my bedside.
‘His name was Leon Morgan. He came over on the Empire Windrush from Jamaica in 1948. It was the first time he’d been on a ship that big. He was so excited, Greer. Excited to be coming to England with his mum and dad and his little sister. When they landed, someone in the Foreign Office was kind to the family. They told them about this school in the north of England that would give a scholarship to a clever little boy. An old school, a church school, a good place. They were godly people, and Leon’s parents knew they couldn’t give him a chance like that in a million years, however hard they worked. So, although they missed him every day, they let him go. And he never came back.’
I didn’t breathe.
‘They knew he’d gone with some friends to a country house for the weekend and there’d been an accident. They knew what had happened, however unbelievable, because Leon had sent them a letter, which arrived after he died, but they couldn’t prove a thing. They had no power, no friends in this country. So they could do nothing. His mum and dad never got over it. Neither did his little sister. My grandma.’
I was horrified. Horrified for Leon. Horrified for his poor parents reading a letter from a dead boy. And horrified at myself. How could I have been so stupid? How could I have fantasised over Henry’s return? How could I have flirted with death like that? I knew what he was, what his heritage was, but he’d charmed me even from beyond the grave. He’d even been a rival for Shafeen, beautiful lovely Shafeen. Suddenly I wanted Shafeen very much – I wanted to see him right now, that instant, and reassure him that Henry was my past but he was my future. I was ready, at last, to take us to the next level – to finish what we’d started at Longcross in the Queen’s Chamber. I couldn’t believe I’d ever thought more of Henry than of him. And worse than that, worst of all, I’d thought far more of Henry than of this kid, this footnote who wasn’t a footnote. Leon Morgan was a real person. I remembered we’d talked about him, Henry and I, in that last fateful conversation at the top of Conrad’s Force. That anonymous ‘African son’ listed casually as one of the Order’s kills. Then I’d been more focused on saving my own skin. I’d never considered that other poor child – the one who never went home.
When I could speak I said, ‘I thought he was from Africa.’
‘Who said that?’
Henry. ‘I dunno – rumours.’
‘Rumours put about by people who don’t know the difference between Africa and the West Indies? Black is black, right?’
I was very much afraid she might be right.
‘I tried to tell you I wasn’t just a token character, didn’t I?’ said Ty. ‘I’m much deeper into this thing than any of you. You’ve only had a year of it. For me … it’s been my whole life.’ She breathed in a long, deep breath. ‘And now I’m coming for them, Greer. I’m gonna let slip the dogs of war. That’s why I worked so damn hard to get the best grades in my school on the Isle of Dogs. That’s why I applied to STAGS. That’s why I read every webpage on the Internet about Henry de Warlencourt. And that’s why I got in touch with you.’
‘How did you know so much? About me? About everything?’
‘I made it my business to know. This is my mission, Greer, you get me? I’m going to get them bastards who did my Great- Uncle Leon, if it’s the last thing I do.’
I believed her. She looked supremely confident and a little dangerous – Queen Cynthia all over again.
‘So you’re not in love with Louis then.’
She flashed a brilliant smile. ‘Told you I could act, didn’t I? No, I’m not in love with him. Besides, I think, despite her “poor little me” act, Cass and Louis are still pretty tight.’
‘Still?’
‘Oh yes,’ she said. ‘There’s no room for anyone else in that twisted little relationship. But there’s no way in this world I would get together with any of that family. The only place I’ll ever be mrs_de_warlencourt is on Instagram.’
Visitors, alive and dead, had been taking my hand for the past two days. Now, I took hers. ‘Ty,’ I said, ‘you’ve been a greater friend to me than I’ve been to you. I should have done much better. But I’d like to try.’
She didn’t reply but looked at our hands on the coverlet – one black, one white. ‘I should go,’ she said, withdrawing hers.
I grabbed at it, just as I’d tried to hold onto Henry. That seemed unbelievable now. ‘Stay,’ I said urgently. ‘Don’t go back. Just tell Cass – tell her you’re unwell, or tired. Tell her anything. Just don’t go back.’
‘I’m not finished yet.’
‘At least let us help you.’
She shook her head. ‘You’ve got to get well. This is my thing.’
‘It’s our thing,’ I said.
And then I did what I should have done in the first place. I told her. I clued her in. And I held nothing back. She should be, would be, part of our gang. I told her everything about last year, the huntin’ shootin’ fishin’. I told her about Shafeen’s dad, and what had happened to him at Longcross in 1969. I told her about Henry’s death, and even Henry’s comeback. Some of it I felt like she already knew. Some of it I felt was new to her. But she listened to it all and then put her hand back in mine. ‘Everything you’ve told me just demonstrates how much they need to be stopped. They’re planning something, Greer, something big. And I have to be in the right place at the right time.’
That reminded me. ‘Where is another Place?’
‘Cumberland Place,’ she said quietly. ‘The London home of the de Warlecourt family. The twins were brought up there. I’m pretty sure it’s the HQ of the Dark Order of the Grand Stag. That’s where the power lies.’
‘What sort of power?’
‘I don’t know yet. And that’s why I have to go back.’
Gently, she took her hand away. She got up, and the red skirts fell around her. She hesitated. ‘The friend thing – I’d really like that. There’s always next term.’
‘Yes,’ I said, heart sinking. ‘Next term.’
‘And now,’ she said, this time with a smile, ‘I really gotta go.’
As she went for the door once more, I got an overpowering, terrible feeling that I wasn’t going to see her again.
‘Ty!’ I called.
She turned back.
‘Be careful.’
Scene xv
And then, at last, I got the visitors I’d expected all along.
I was pretty exhausted, but I was dying to tell Shafeen and Nel what I’d learned from Ty. But, in a massively frustrating piece of timing, we’d had no time to say more than hello when Nurse Annie bustled in.
She wagged her finger at us. ‘You two are terrible at this one-at-a-time thing. One of you’ll have to hop it.’
Now, I liked Nurse Annie just fine, but at that point I could cheerfully have killed her.
Shafeen took a more considered approach. ‘Oh come on, Annie,’ he said. ‘We’ll be good, I promise. And then we’ll all get a proper night’s sleep. Just like the nurse ordered.’
It worked. ‘All right, hinny,’ she said. She was obviously Shafeen’s slave already. ‘So long as you don’t mind me changing this dressing. You two jump on the bed, cos I’ll be needing this chair. And I haven’t seen this wound yet so if there’s a bit o’ blood, don’t go fainting on me – I don’t have the beds.’
I was actually pleased they were there, because the snipping of the scissors and the pulling of the bandage was just painful enough to make me glad of the distraction. Obviously I couldn’t tell them about Leon Morgan yet, but we chit-chatted in a totally bogus way about Louis’s eighteenth and other irrelevant stuff, until the nurse stopped us with an exclamation.
‘Well, God save us,’ she said, sitting back in her chair. ‘I’ve never seen the like of that before.’
I looked at my thumb and my blood turned to ice.
Only you have the answer, said Henry’s voice in my head.
There was no blood on the pad of my thumb, but there was a burn.
More specifically, a brand.
And it said, simply:
M
S.T.A.G.S. was founded in the seventh century by St Aidan the Great. The name Aidan means ‘fire’ in Gaelic, and he is considered to be a protector against fire. He was dubbed ‘the Great’ in order to distinguish him from the lesser saint St Aidan of Ferns. Our St Aidan was born in Ireland, and became a monk on the Scottish island of Iona. He travelled to Northumbria, where he was made Bishop of Lindisfarne. Realising the value of education, he founded a school in the hope that he would train the next generation of Christian leaders. The school began with just twelve boys as pupils, but it grew into a centre of education and a jewelhouse of scholarly knowledge.
Aidan was canonised upon the performance of a miracle; he saved a stag from the hunt by turning him invisible. That stag gave the school an emblem, and a name. Today, after a thousand years of exceptional scholarship, S.T.A.G.S. has educated a dozen British prime ministers and countless members of both houses of parliament. St Aidan’s dream that he would train the future leaders of men has become a reality.
DE WARLENCOURT PLAYHOUSE – built in 1969, the theatre is an exact replica of the sixteenth-century Swan Theatre which used to stand on London’s bankside.
BEDE LIBRARY (incorporating the Scriptorium) – named after the Venerable Bede, the library has several notable architectural features, including the medieval Scriptorium, a remnant of the original monastery school, and the Tudor Reading Room.
GATEHOUSE – the gatehouse forms the entrance to the school, reached by crossing the medieval moat. In the days of the monastery school, the drawbridge was raised at night to keep marauding Scots away from the treasures of the chapel.
BEDE’S PIECE – STAGS boasts extensive playing fields, named for a piece of common land enclosed by the school during the eighteenth century.
CHAPEL – Founded in 683, the chapel is the oldest surviving building of the first monastery school. The stained-glass window of Aidan and the stag is original.
REFECTORY – This long building with vaulted ceilings was rebuilt at the time of the Civil War after a fire. The wooden benches and tables on which the students dine are the original ones from the monastery, on which the monks ate their breakfast of bread and beer.
ENGLISH SCHOOLS – In the reign of Edward VI, New Quad –a quadrangle of exquisite Tudor buildings – was built at STAGS to represent the four pillars of learning. The first of the schools (always referred to in the plural) is the English Schools, and the original sign still remains carved above the door.
HISTORY SCHOOLS – The second side of the quad, the History Schools houses the original copy of Bede’s work.
CLASSICS SCHOOLS – The third side of the quad, the Classics Schools still fulfills its function of teaching Latin, the language of law and learning.
SCIENCE LABS – Originally the Theology Schools, the fourth side of the quad, despite its Tudor appearance and theological sign carved in stone, now houses STAGS’ extensive science laboratories.
THE HUNDRED STEPS – this ancient stone stairway connects the upper and lower schools. Legend has it that in 1348 Edmund de Warlencourt rode up the hundred steps on his horse for a wager.
POOL – The STAGS swimming pool is Olympic-sized and fully compliant with the regulations of the Fédération Internationale de Natation. It is 164 feet long, 82 feet wide and 6 feet deep, with eight swimming lanes marked with rope and buoys.
FIVES AND REAL TENNIS COURTS – Both courts are fully enclosed, and constructed of their original timbers. The Real Tennis court is fashioned after Charles II’s court at Hampton Court Palace. The Fives court is designed to replicate one of the exterior bays of the chapel, where the game was first played after Mass.
HONORIUS
Honorius was Archbishop of Canterbury in the seventh century. His is the oldest and grandest house at STAGS. The White Quad, dating from the tweltfh century, features at its centre the Jerusalem Tree, a cedar tree grown from a seed brought home from the Crusades by Conrad de Warlencourt.
