Mr. Curtain had finished his juice and was watching Reynard watch the Whisperer. “You’ve missed it, I see,” purred Mr. Curtain. “Well, miss it no longer. Take your seat, Reynard. Take your rightful place.”
Reynie’s mind was so foggy. Had Mr. Curtain said “your rightful place”? Or was that his own mind? And who had been talking to him before that? Wasn’t it the Whisperer? No, he realized. Unfortunately not. It wasn’t the Whisperer at all. It was Reynie himself.
“Reynard!” Mr. Curtain prompted.
Reynie made his way toward the Whisperer. The session would go quickly — a few minutes, Mr. Curtain had said — and then it would be over. And then . . . he swallowed hard. What would happen to Constance? Would something dreadful happen to her when Mr. Curtain boosted the power? And what would become of the others?
He looked back at Sticky, slumped on a cushion in a posture of weary defeat. Despite his terror, in the face of the Whisperer’s irresistible power, Sticky had resisted with all his might. He would never have done that if not for Reynie’s urging, and now it had put him into disfavor with Mr. Curtain. Was Reynie really going to help Mr. Curtain? It would be a betrayal of their friendship! And Kate — to think of what they’d been through together, and the risks she’d taken. . . .
“Ledroptha Curtain!”
The cuffs clasped Reynie’s wrists. The helmet lowered. Reynie closed his eyes, only to see the faces of his friends. He remembered the final question of Mr. Benedict’s first test: Are you brave? Now, at least, Reynie knew the answer. He wasn’t brave. He had only hoped he was.
Good, said the Whisperer. What is your name?
“Just get it over with quickly,” Reynie told himself.
Welcome, Reynard Muldoon.
“Welcome,” Reynie repeated. Yes. Welcome was such a — such a welcoming word. It made you feel a part of something. It made you feel . . . not alone. No, he was not alone at all. And yet . . .
Reynard Muldoon, what do you fear most?
In his mind’s eye Reynie still saw the faces of his friends. Sticky, Kate, Constance — all watching him with concern. They’d been through so much together! Was he really going to betray them?
“You could never be more alone than if you betrayed your friends,” Reynie said to himself.
Instantly the Whisperer’s voice said, Don’t worry. You will never betray your friends. You are brave enough.
Reynie was so startled he almost laughed aloud. The Whisperer was too perceptive for its own good! At the most important moment of all, it had given him just the encouragement he needed — the encouragement to help him fight it!
Let us begin, said the Whisperer.
Reynie was flooded with a terrific sense of well-being. Real well-being — not an illusion at all. He would not betray his friends. He knew that now. He had confronted his worst fear, and now it was gone. No need for the Whisperer to deny it — there was nothing left to deny!
Let us begin, the Whisperer repeated.
Reynie braced himself. Let the worst come. He would be brave enough to resist, and he would not be alone.
Let us begin, the Whisperer repeated, more insistently.
Not just yet, Reynie thought.
Let us begin.
First let me polish my spectacles, Reynie thought.
Let us begin.
Not without my bucket, Reynie insisted.
He heard Mr. Curtain muttering behind him.
Let us begin, let us begin, let us begin.
Rules and schools are tools for fools, Reynie thought.
And then, as if he had conjured her, Reynie heard Constance’s shrill voice. It was perhaps the first time he had ever been glad to hear it.
“Help! Open up! Let me in!”
“Pah!” sputtered Mr. Curtain. “What is wrong with this infernal machine? And now another interruption! Where is that voice coming from?”
“From the window,” said Sticky, who looked every bit as surprised as Mr. Curtain.
“The window?” Mr. Curtain said, thrusting the red helmet from his head and looking toward the window. Nothing was visible beyond it except blue sky. He grunted and lowered the helmet again. “Never mind. We’ll just ignore it. I am going to finish this session if it’s the last thing —”
“Open up! Open up! Open up!” shrieked Constance.
“That’s going to be difficult to ignore, sir,” Reynie said as Constance continued to shriek.
“This is outrageous! How am I to concentrate if . . . ?” Mr. Curtain’s face twisted with frustration. “Very well, I’ll have to address this. The window latch is too high for me to reach from my chair, however. George —” He glanced suspiciously at Sticky, then shook his head. “No, George, you stay where you are. Reynard, go and see what the trouble is.”
The cuffs unclasped his wrists, the helmet went up.
Reynie needed no prodding. In an instant he was across the room and scrabbling at the window catch. He flung open the panes and looked down. Just beneath the window, the miniature figure of Constance Contraire clung desperately to the flagpole — Reynie’s first impression was of a koala bear hugging the trunk of a fallen eucalyptus tree — her entire body trembling with effort, her eyes rolling with fright. She had good reason: The least slip would send her plummeting to rocky ground.
Nor, apparently, was the ground a safer place to have remained, for there Kate was engaged in a furious struggle. Reynie’s heart swelled with pride and hope. It might be bad, but it wasn’t over. The girls weren’t captured yet.
“Well?” Mr. Curtain demanded from across the room. “What is it?”
Sticky was watching with a hint of new hopefulness.
Reynie kept his face turned away; he must not reveal his smile to Mr. Curtain. “It’s those children S.Q. mentioned, sir. One appears to have been apprehended. The other is stuck on the flagpole outside the window.”
Mr. Curtain seemed unsure whether to laugh or snarl. “Go ahead and haul him inside, then. This will be our last interruption.”
“It’s a girl, sir,” Reynie corrected. “Sticky, can you help me?”
Sticky, having recovered a bit of strength, came over to hold Reynie’s legs as he reached out and lifted the frightened girl through the window.
“Well, well, well, Constance Contraire,” said Mr. Curtain with apparent satisfaction. “Just as I suspected. I knew all along you weren’t to be trusted. In fact, I would have taken care of you long ago had it not been for —”
He gave a sudden start, whipping off his glasses to reveal bright green, horribly bloodshot eyes — eyes quite flaming with angry realization.
“Had it not been,” he repeated, turning those eyes now on Reynie, “for you.”
Mr. Curtain threw his silver glasses to the floor, as if without them he would have seen the truth much sooner. And then, to the children’s great confusion and horror, the fearsome man unstrapped himself, rose from the wheelchair to stand at his full alarming height, and strode across the room to seize them.
Kate Wetherall, meanwhile, was fighting for her life. Martina Crowe had been hoping for just this sort of occasion, an opportunity to exact revenge for past humiliations. And now Jackson and Jillson, never the most delicate creatures to begin with, were equally determined to knock Kate about, having been embarrassed — not to mention bruised — by her bucket. Kate might be clever and quick as a fox, but she was a weary fox now, and one among hounds.
Still, she had managed to inflict some unpleasantness: In addition to the knot on Jackson’s head, his pointy nose was swollen and red where she’d pinched it to encourage her release. Jillson’s ear was ringing painfully — the result of a well-placed elbow. And Martina had been rebuffed by an excruciating shin-scrape. The Executives circled her more warily now, looking for the right moment to renew their attack.