The Orphans of St Halibut’s

The Guvnor rattled the iron gate in his fists. There was no reply. No sign of any of his useless guards.

He was fast moving through shock and entering full-blown panic. The carriage journey with his incensed boss had been one of the most unpleasant experiences of his life. It had proved almost impossible to figure out how he was going to wriggle out of this mess while she was so relentlessly tearing strips off him. What made it worse was that he could hear the driver chuckling to himself up front while she was shouting at him.

Lady Crock turned her cold scrutiny on him. He could tell she still hadn’t forgiven him for calling her an old trout. ‘I must say, if this is an example of how you run the Mending House, I have grave concerns about your suitability for the post.’

‘What? No! You’ll see, you’ll see.’ He fumbled in a pocket, dropped something and banged his head on the gate as he picked it up. ‘I have my key, here we are.’

On entering his quarters, he immediately set about lighting candles and a lantern on the desk, partly to still his shaking hands, and partly to give him time to think things through. Why had his burglar been at Lady Crock’s house, of all places, when she was supposed to be at St Halibut’s, stealing back the evidence against him? Was Miss Happyday behind it somehow? Had she turned his own burglar against him? And what on earth had she done with Snepp? He would never have thought her so cunning.

‘Would you like a drink, to warm you after such a cold journey? I can get a guard to make some tea.’ He fussed about, plumping up the cushion on his chair for her, brushing a speck of dust from it while she cast her eye disapprovingly over the mess of papers on his desk. ‘Then we can clear up this entire misunderstanding.’

There was a loud knock and Buttly’s voice came from the other side. ‘Guv, Guv!’

‘I do not need tea, Myers,’ Lady Crock said abruptly. ‘But explain this.’ She plucked a paper from his desk and held it up.

I, Ainderby Myers, do hereby certify that I have received advance payment of one thousand pounds, in exchange for the diamond necklace currently in the possession of Lady Crock, which I shall acquire by secret means.

Myers’ eyes were goggling. His finger was pointing at the paper, his cheeks aflame. ‘What the . . . that is not . . . Lady Crock, you must see that I would never have written that! It’s not my handwriting.’

He craned over it. There was no denying it. He had spent years perfecting his ornate scribble, believing that a man’s stature and worth could be ascertained by how many scrolls and curlicues he could fit into his first name; it had the extra benefit of being unforgettable.

‘That’s my signature, but I didn’t sign it.’ He was blinking rapidly, as though his eyeballs had malfunctioned.

‘Oh, well, that’s perfectly clear,’ she drawled, letting it drop to the desk.

‘Not now, man! Lady Crock, can’t you see? It’s a trick! Someone has played a . . .’ He whirled around as though the person who had done it might be laughing at him from the corner of the room. ‘It makes no sense! Why would I sign such a paper? It would incriminate me!’

His hands bent into claws and he clutched at his head. ‘Who could have done this?’ At once, a light dawned. ‘Maisie . . .’ he whispered. ‘I signed for a parcel . . .’

‘What are you blathering about, man?’ Lady Crock was fast losing her patience. ‘I am beginning to think you have entirely lost control, not only of this establishment but your mind.’

‘The postwoman, of course! She must be a criminal mastermind! She’s behind all of this!’ He gasped. ‘And she’s in league with the matron!’

‘Guv!’ Buttly was now hammering on the door with the desperation of a man who has had six cups of tea and now finds the toilet engaged by someone who has settled in with the newspaper.

‘I am close to discovering what is going on,’ Myers was saying, almost to himself. There was a strange, fevered light in his eyes. ‘The Mended . . . they may have seen something. They will not deny me the truth. I shall have it out of them.’ He grabbed the lantern, pushed past Buttly and entered the factory floor just as the dormitory door on the other side of the room burst open, and Donk appeared momentarily in it, eyes bulging like a couple of eggs being squeezed out of a chicken.

‘Help—’ he managed, before he was overwhelmed by a flow of the Mended pouring over him, flattening him under their feet. They were not the Mended as Myers had left them. They were chanting, but not the brainwashed chants he had taught them. These were . . . ruder. The tide of shouting, running, laughing merged into a riotous noise through which nothing else could be heard.

Lady Crock’s mouth was moving, her chin juddering in outrage as her lips formed questions he could not hear, let alone answer. The Mended were flowing around him now, and he felt himself shoved this way and that, pinched and tickled and jostled.

He began to flail about, trying to catch his assailants but missing them by millimetres.

A tremendous explosion made his ears ring, and for a second he thought it was his own temper erupting from his brain. But then a shockwave swept through the room, and the glass in every window of the Mending House shattered outwards.

Everyone froze in position, ducked low. Silence fell. Then the world began again. The Mended continued their exodus, throwing blankets over jagged window sills, climbing out.

Myers sprinted upstairs, leaping three steps at a time, barely aware of Lady Crock following as she screeched instructions at confused guards behind him, ordering them to arrest him.

There was only one thing that mattered now: his vault, and in it, the last remaining hope for his future.