“Yeah? Why mustn’t I?”
“The Bird don’t like us talking about Victor,” he said. “It’s why she wears black all the time, you know. Anyway, she can’t find out we been in here. She’ll hang us by our pinky toes!”
As if on cue, we heard the unmistakable sound of Miss Peregrine limping up the stairs. Bronwyn turned white and dashed past me out the door, but before Enoch could escape I blocked his path. “Out of the way!” he hissed.
“Tell me what happened to Victor!”
“I can’t!”
“Then tell me about Raid the Village.”
“I can’t tell you that, neither!” He tried to shove past me again, but when he realized he couldn’t, he gave up. “All right, just shut the door and I’ll whisper it to you!”
I closed it just as Miss Peregrine was reaching the landing. We stood with our ears pressed to the door for a moment, listening for a sign that we’d been spotted. The headmistress’s footsteps came halfway down the hall toward us, then stopped. Another door creaked open, then shut.
“She’s gone into her room,” Enoch whispered.
“So,” I said. “Raid the Village.”
Looking like he was sorry he’d brought it up, he motioned me away from the door. I followed, leaning down so he could whisper into my ear. “Like I said, it’s a game we play. It works just like the name says.”
“You mean you actually raid the village?”
“Smash it up, chase people round, take what we like, burn things down. It’s all a good laugh.”
“But that’s terrible!”
“We got to practice our skills somehow, don’t we? Case we ever need to defend ourselves. Otherwise we’d get rusty. Plus there’s rules. We ain’t allowed to kill anybody. Just scare ’em up a bit, like. And if someone does get hurt, well, they’re back right as rain the next day and don’t remember nothing about it.”
“Does Emma play, too?”
“Nah. She’s like you. Says it’s evil.”
“Well, it is.”
He rolled his eyes. “You two deserve each other.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
He rose up to his full five-foot-four-inch height and poked a finger into my chest. “It means you better not get all high an’ mighty with me, mate. Because if we didn’t raid the damned village once in a while, most of this lot woulda gone off their heads ages ago.” He went to the door and put his hand on the knob and then turned back to face me. “And if you think we’re wicked, wait’ll you see them.”
“Them who? What the hell is everyone talking about?”
He held up one finger to shush me, then went out.
I was alone again. My eyes were drawn to the body on the bed. What happened to you, Victor?
Maybe he’d gone crazy and killed himself, I thought—gotten so sick of this cheerful but futureless eternity that he’d guzzled rat poison or taken a dive off a cliff. Or maybe it was them, those “other dangers” Miss Peregrine had alluded to.
I stepped into the hall and had just started toward the stairs when I heard Miss Peregrine’s voice behind a half-closed door. I dove into the nearest room, and stayed hidden until she’d limped past me and down the stairs. Then I noticed a pair of boots at the front of a crisply made bed—Emma’s boots. I was in her bedroom.
Along one wall was a chest of drawers and a mirror, on the other a writing desk with a chair tucked underneath. It was the room of a neat girl with nothing to hide, or so it seemed until I found a hatbox just inside the closet. It was tied up with string, and in grease pencil across the front was written
It was like waving red underwear at a bull. I sat down with the box in my lap and untied the string. It was packed with a hundred or more letters, all from my grandfather.
My heart picked up speed. This was exactly the kind of gold mine I’d hoped to find in the old ruined house. Sure, I felt bad about snooping, but if people here insisted on keeping things secret, well, I’d just have to find stuff out for myself.