Among the Barons (8 page)

“I’m not hungry anyway,” Smits said.

Luke’s stomach growled. He tried to ignore it. “Want to go outside and play, then? Shoot some hoops or something?”

“Nah,” Smits said. “Outside the trees have ears.”

There were gardeners, Luke guessed. He supposed that Smits was trying to warn him. He supposed that he ought to be grateful.

But what Luke really wanted to do was punch Smits right smack in the nose. It was almost as bad as if Smits really were his brother.

CHAPTER 19

The rest of the day felt interminable. Luke wandered aimlessly around the house and grounds for several hours. He didn’t encounter either of Smits’s parents again, but there seemed to be a servant around every corner. And they all seemed to know everything about him—or, at least, about the person he was supposed to be.

“Have you brought up those grades in mathematics, Master Lee?” a man Luke guessed was a butler asked him in the front hallway.

“I tuned up the engine on your motor scooter, sir,” a mechanic in a grease-covered uniform told him out beside the garage, which looked large enough to hold a boat—and probably did, come to think of it.

As the grandfather clock by the front door chimed seven, a housekeeper scolded him, “There you are! Why aren’t you washed up and dressed for dinner?”

“I
...
,“
Luke protested. He scrambled toward what he thought was the dining room. He remembered seeing a

vast wooden table in one of these rooms—now, where was it?

Mostly by luck Luke arrived in the proper room. Mr. and Mrs. Grant were seated at opposite ends of the huge table. Two chairs were arranged between them. Smits sat in one of those chairs. Luke dashed toward the other one.

‘And where is your tuxedo, young man?” Mrs. Grant asked.

“Um...,” Luke said. He noticed that both Smits and Mr. Grant were in formal black suits, with pure white shirts underneath and black bows tied crisply around their necks.

“We didn’t dress for dinner at school,” Smits volunteered. “Lee probably forgot all about it.”

“Indeed,” Mrs. Grant sniffed. “Well, we shan’t have you forgetting here. Go and change this instant”

Luke considered himself quite fortunate to be able to find his way back to his room, find a suit—a tuxedo?—in his closet, and scramble into it. He was flimbling with the tie, wondering how angry the Grants would be if he just forgot about it—versus how angry they’d be if he kept them waiting any longer—when Oscar silently stepped into the room and adeptly twisted the tie into shape. He straightened the sleeves of Luke’s coat, shoved a stray lock of hair off Luke’s forehead, and pushed him out the door without saying a single word.

Back in the dining room Mrs. Grant purred, “Now, that’s better. That’s the son I like to see.” Then she, Mr.

Grant, and Smits began spooning up soup that had gone cold. The dinner passed in a blur. Luke ate heartily of the

soup, thinking it was a shame that that was all there was. So he was pleasantly surprised when a plateful of greens arrived next. But the courses that came after that were foods he had no hope of identifying. Once, he suspected he was eating white lumps of rice under some type of gravy But Luke was pretty certain that the gravy wasn’t made from pork fat, which was the only kind he’d ever eaten before.

He supposed the food was good—delicious, even—but it was hard to enjoy it sitting with a sullen Smits and Smits’s icy parents. And an army of servants constantly came in and out, whisking dishes away as soon as any of them were finished. By the ninth course Luke was aware of a strange sensation in his stomach: He was too full.

“Psst, Lee,” Smits finally whispered from across the table. “You don’t have to eat it
all.”

Luke noticed that the others were barely touching their food, letting the servants take away plates missing only a bite or two.

“Oh,” Luke said. He wondered what happened to the extra food. Did the servants eat it? Was it thrown away?

No one would be able to tell from the Grants’ dining habits that there’d been famines and starvation barely fifteen years earlier, that food was still rationed across the land. Luke had a feeling that the Grants hadn’t paid any attention to the famines at all.

Except for Smits’s quick whisper, there was no chatter at the table, no questions from the parents, like, “How’s school going?” or “When do you suppose they’ll have the wiring fixed at Hendricks?” For all the notice Mr. and Mrs. Grant gave Smits and Luke, you’d almost have thought the boys were still away at school.

The Grants didn’t even speak to the servants who brought and removed the food. For all the notice they gave to the servants, Luke wondered if they thought that the food appeared and disappeared by magic.

Finally, finally, the servants brought ice cream, which Luke was sure had to be the last course. In spite of his now aching stomach, he ate all of his ice cream, down to the last drop. Ice cream had been such a treat back home. He’d had it only once or twice in his life.

“Lee,” Mrs. Grant hissed. “Gentlemen do not
gobble.”

Red faced, Luke dropped his spoon. It clattered on the floor, spinning off threads of melted ice cream across the polished marble.

“May I be excused?” Smits asked in the silence that followed.

Mrs. Grant nodded.

Luke watched a servant swoop out of nowhere, grab up the spoon, and wipe away the ice cream in a flash. He gathered his nerve to speak.

“May I be excused, too?” he asked.

“I suppose,” Mrs. Grant said.

Heavyhearted, Luke found his way back to Lee’s room.

He threw himself across the bed, fighting waves of nausea. He’d hated Hendricks School at first, too, but the Grants’ house seemed much, much worse. And yet Smits had seemed to be trying to help him. And Oscar had appeared at just the right moment to help him with that tie.

Why? Why did either of them care what happened to Luke?

CHAPTER 20

Luke was sound asleep, and had been for hours, when someone began shaking his shoulder.

“Lee. Get up,” a voice whispered.

Luke opened his eyes to complete darkness. It was the middle of the night, he thought. He’d fallen asleep without changing his clothes, so the knot of the bow tie dug uncomfortably into his neck. He’d been dreaming, he realized, about nooses.

uWha who are you?” he said, fighting a sense of total disorientation.

“Shh!” A hand clapped instantly over Luke’s mouth. He’d accidentally spoken out loud. “Don’t make another noise. So help me, I’ll...” A tiny penlight switched on in the darkness. “I’m your.., father. See?”

Mr. Grant held the tiny light below his chin, illuminating his face. But the effect was ghoulish, creating eerie shadows around his eyes. Luke felt like he was looking into a Halloween mask.

“Now, come with me,” Mr. Grant whispered.

Timidly Luke slipped first one foot, then the other, out of bed. He had a flash of memory—this was like all those nights he’d been awakened by Oscar, summoned by Smits. And he’d always gone. What if he’d disobeyed? What if, just once, he’d stamped his foot and announced, “You know what? I’m not Lee, and I’m not going to pretend anymore. Leave me alone. Let me go back to sleep.”

But he couldn’t have done that any of the other times, and he couldn’t do it now.

Silently, fighting a rising sense of dread, Luke walked alongside Mr. Grant. They went out of his room, down the hall, down the stairs. Luke might have suspected Mr. Grant of purposely leading him in circles, trying to confuse him. But the house was so much like a maze, even in bright daylight, that Luke figured Mr. Grant was truly taking the most direct route to wherever he was going.

Finally Mr. Grant stood before a closed door on the first level. Luke wasn’t entirely
sure,
but he thought that he’d attempted to open this door earlier in the day, when he’d been exploring. The door had been locked then. But now Mr. Grant looked around cautiously, opened the door effortlessly, and motioned Luke inside. A few seconds later Mr. Grant stepped in behind him and shut the door.

“Have you activated the system?” a woman~s voice asked in the darkness.

“Three, two, one.., all set,” Mr. Grant said.

Lights came on then. They were standing in an office. A massive mahogany desk stood in the center of the room, and bookshelves lined the walls. Mrs. Grant was sitting in a stiff chair in front of the desk, but she quickly stood up and walked toward Luke and Mr. Grant.

“Finally,” she said.

Luke tensed, afraid that she was going to hug him again. But she only took him by the shoulders, held him at arm’s length, and squinted thoughtfully at him.

“Braces, of course,” she said. ‘And perhaps some hair dye...”

“Maybe contacts,” Mr. Grant said.

“Do you think anyone would really notice his eyes? They’re not that different,” Mrs. Grant said. “Having him fitted for contacts, that’d be another person we’d have to pay off—”

“Of course. You’re right,” Mr. Grant said.

Luke felt like he was an object they were considering buying. Neither of them had looked him square in the eye yet or addressed him directly. Didn’t they think he would have any say in the matters of braces, hair dye, or contacts?

No. Of course not.

Finally Mrs. Grant stepped back and said, ‘Well,
I
think it will work. I think we ought to try it.”