All three of them spotted the footprints at the same time: They were difficult to miss in the otherwise perfect carpet of dust. Cal placed his boot inside one, measuring it for size. There were a couple of inches between his toes and the front of the imprint. He and Will caught each other's eye, and Will nodded at him, then began to peer nervously into the shadowy corners of the room.
"The tracks go over there," Chester whispered. "To the table."
The footprints led from the door where the boys now stood, over to the shelves, and then circled around the table several times, disappearing into a jumbled confusion behind it.
"Whoever it was," Cal observed, they went back out again." He was stooping to examine another, less obvious set of tracks that went past a wall of shelves, then meandered back toward the door.
Will had stepped farther into the room and was holding up his light to inspect the corners. "Yeah, it's empty," he confirmed as the others joined him by the long table.
They fell silent, listening to the occasional fluttering and high-pitched call from the bats on the other side of the shutters.
"I'm not going back out there, not until those bloodsucking beasties have gone away again," Chester said as he leaned against the table. His shoulders sagged as he blew wearily through his lips.
"Yes, I think we should stop here for a while," Will agreed, heaving off his rucksack and placing it on the table next to Chester.
"So are we going to check out the rest of the house or not?" Cal pressed Will.
"Don't know about you two, but I need something to eat first," Chester cut in.
Will noticed how, quite suddenly, Chester's speech had become slurred. All the walking they'd done, and the attack of the bats, had obviously taken it out of him. Will reminded himself that his friend was probably still suffering from the aftereffects of the rough treatment he'd received in the Hold.
Making his way toward the door, Will turned to Chester. "Why don't you keep an eye on things here while Cal and I…" he said, trailing off as the books on the shelves caught his eye. "These bindings are awesome," he said, scanning his light over them. "They're pretty old."
"Really," Chester said disinterestedly. He undid the flap on Will's pack and fished out an apple.
"Yeah. This one's interesting. It's called The Rise and Progress of Religion in the Soul by…" He wiped away the dust and then leaned in to peer at the rest of the gilt lettering on the dark leather spine. "By Reverend Philip Doddridge."
"Sounds gripping," Chester commented through a mouthful of apple.
Will gently slid the book out from between the other grand-looking tomes and flipped it open. Fragments of the pages spewed up into his face, the rest of the paper reduced to a powdery residue that seeped onto the floor by his feet.
"Blast!" he said, holding up the empty book cover with an expression of pure disappointment on his face. "What a shame. Must be the heat."
"Looking forward to a good read, were you," Chester chuckled as he lobbed the apple core over his shoulder and then began to root around in the rucksack for more food.
"Ha-ha. Very funny," Will retorted.
"Let just get on with it, shall we?" Cal said impatiently.
Will ventured upstairs with his brother to check that the rest of the house was indeed unoccupied. Among all the empty rooms, Cal came across a small washroom. This consisted of a limescale-encrusted tap protruding from the tiled wall over an old copper bowl set into a wooden shelf. He pushed back the lever at the top of the tap. There was a knocking sound that seemed to come from the walls themselves.
As the racket continued, transforming into a low, whining vibration, will bounded out of the room he'd been investigating and down the long corridor that led back to the landing. He paused to look over the splintered balustrade to the hall below, then dashed into the corridor where Cal had gone. Calling his brother's name, he stuck his head through each doorway until he found him.
"What's going on? What have you done?" Will demanded.
Cal didn't answer. He was staring fixedly at the tap. As Will watched, a dark molasseslike fluid oozed from it, and then clear water flowed from the spout with a huge gush, much to the boys' delight.
"Do you think it's safe to drink?" Will asked.
"Ahhh, beautiful. Nothing wrong with that! Must be from a spring."
"Well, at least we've solved our water problem," Will congratulated him.
Having gorged himself on food, Chester slept for several hours atop the library table. When he finally awoke and learned of the washroom discovery from Will, he slipped out to have a look for himself and didn't reappear for some time.
When he finally did come back, the skin on his face and neck was red and blotchy where he'd evidently aggravated his eczema in an attempt to scrub off the ingrained dirt, and his hair was wet and slicked back. The way he looked now, in his cleaned-up state, reminded will of how they'd once been. It brought back memories of less troubled times before they stumbled upon the Colony, of their life back in Highfield.
"That's better," Chester mumbled self-consciously, avoiding the others' gazes. Cal, who had been taking a nap on the floor, propped himself up and, still not fully awake, regarded Chester with a kind of bleary amusement.
"Why'd you do that?" he asked wryly.
"Smelled yourself lately?" Chester fired back at him.
"No."
"I have," Chester said, wrinkling his nose. "And it's not very pleasant!"
"Well, I think washing up's a great idea," Will instantly spoke out to spare Chester any further embarrassment, but Cal's comments seemed not to bother him in the slightest. Chester was totally preoccupied by something on the end of his pinkie finger, which he'd just been using to pick away energetically at his ear.
"And I'm going to do just the same," Will proclaimed as Chester started on his other ear, ramming a finger repeatedly into it.
Will rummaged around in his rucksack for some clean clothes, then took a second to examine his shoulder, wondering whether it was time to change the dressing on the wound. Through the rends in his shirt, he gingerly probed the area around the bandage, then decided he needed to remove the shirt altogether in order to see what state it was in.
"Will, what happened to you?" Chester said, forgetting his ear for the moment and turning quite pale. He'd caught sight of the large patch of dark crimson showing through the bandage on Will's shoulder.
"From the stalker attack," Will told him. He bit his lip, then groaned as he lifted the dressing to look underneath. "Yuck!" he exclaimed. "I definitely could do with a new poultice." He turned to his pack and hunted through the side pockets for the spare bandage and the small parcels of powder that Imago had given him.
"I didn't realize it had been that bad," Chester said. "Want any help?"
"No, really… feels better now, anyway," Will replied, lying through his teeth.
"OK," Chester said, his face still displaying his squeamishness as he tried to smile but only managed a grimace.
And, despite his initial reaction at Chester's efforts to clean himself up, Cal, too, took the opportunity to slip out of the room and wash himself in the tepid water once Will had returned.
The hours seemed to pass more slowly within the house, as if it was somehow isolated from everything outside. And the absolute hush that pervaded the interior gave the impression that it was itself asleep. This stillness affected the three boys; they made not the least effort to talk and instead took catnaps on the long library table, using the backpacks as pillows.