Carlos Zafon - The Midnight Palace

‘I need to consider this matter carefully,’ said Carter.

‘Don’t take too long. This man has waited sixteen years; perhaps he won’t mind waiting another day. Or perhaps he will.’

Carter collapsed into his armchair, defeated.

‘I had a visit from a man named Jawahal the day we found Ben,’ Carter explained. ‘He asked about the boy and I told him we didn’t know anything. Soon after, the man disappeared and was never seen again.’

‘This man uses a lot of different names and identities, but he has only one objective, Mr Carter,’ said Aryami, her steely eyes shining. ‘I haven’t crossed the whole of India to sit and watch my daughter’s children die because of the indecision of a couple of old fools, if you’ll forgive the expression.’

‘Old fool or not, I need time to think. Perhaps we’d better talk to the police.’

Aryami sighed.

‘There is no time, and it wouldn’t do any good,’ she replied harshly. ‘Tomorrow afternoon I’m leaving Calcutta with my granddaughter. Tomorrow afternoon Ben must leave this place and get as far away as possible. You have a few hours to talk to the boy and prepare everything.’

‘It’s not that simple,’ Carter objected.

‘It’s as simple as this: if you don’t talk to him, I will,’ Aryami stated, making her way to the door. ‘And pray that this man doesn’t find him before he sees the light of day.’

‘I’ll speak to Ben tomorrow,’ said Carter. ‘I can do no more.’

Aryami threw him a last glance from the doorway.

‘Tomorrow, Mr Carter, is today.’

‘A secret society?’ Sheere asked, her eyes sparkling with curiosity. ‘I thought secret societies only existed in penny dreadfuls.’

‘Siraj here could spend hours contradicting you,’ said Ian. ‘He’s our expert on the subject.’

Siraj nodded gravely, agreeing with the reference to his boundless wisdom.

‘Have you heard about the Freemasons?’ he asked.

‘Please,’ Ben butted in. ‘Sheere is going to think we’re a bunch of sorcerer apprentices.’

‘And aren’t you?’ laughed the girl.

‘No,’ said Seth solemnly. ‘The Chowbar Society is founded on two entirely worthy principles: to help one another, and to share our knowledge so we can build a better future.’

‘Isn’t that what all great enemies of humanity claim to do?’ asked Sheere.

‘Only for the last two or three thousand years,’ said Ben, interrupting again. ‘Anyway, this is a very special night for the Chowbar Society.’

‘We’re disbanding,’ said Michael.

‘Hark, the dead do speak,’ remarked Roshan, surprised to hear him talk.

Sheere looked around the group, trying to hide her amusement at the crossfire between them.

‘What Michael means is that today we’re holding the last meeting of the Chowbar Society,’ Ben explained. ‘After seven years, the final curtain.’

‘What a shame,’ said Sheere. ‘For the first time in my life I come across a real secret society, and it’s about to disband. I won’t have time to become a member.’

‘Nobody said that new members were accepted,’ said Isobel, quick as a flash. She’d been listening in to the conversation, her eyes never leaving the intruder. ‘In fact, if it hadn’t been for the resident bigmouths here who’ve already broken one of the oaths, you wouldn’t even know it existed. All they need is a glimpse of skirt and they’d sell their souls.’

Sheere offered Isobel a conciliatory smile, struck by the slight hostility in her tone. It was not easy to accept not being the only girl.

‘According to Voltaire, the worst misogynists are always women,’ said Ben casually.

‘And who the hell is Voltaire?’ snapped Isobel. ‘Only your twisted mind could come out with such rubbish.’

‘Ignorance has spoken!’ replied Ben. ‘Although perhaps Voltaire didn’t say exactly that …’

‘Stop fighting,’ Roshan intervened. ‘Isobel is right. We shouldn’t have said anything.’

Sheere watched nervously as the mood appeared to darken in a matter of seconds.

‘I don’t want to cause an argument. I’d better return to my grandmother. I’ll forget everything you’ve said,’ she stated, returning the lemonade glass to Ben.

‘Not so fast, princess,’ Isobel exclaimed behind her.

Sheere turned to face the girl.

‘Now that you know something, you might as well know everything and then keep it secret,’ she said, offering an embarrassed half-smile. ‘I’m sorry about what I said earlier.’

‘Good idea,’ said Ben. ‘Go on.’

Sheere raised her eyebrows.

‘She’ll have to pay the admission fee,’ Siraj reminded Isobel.

‘I haven’t got any money …’

‘We’re not a church – we don’t want your money,’ replied Seth. ‘The price is something else.’

Sheere scanned each face in search of an answer. Ian smiled back at her.

‘Don’t worry, it’s nothing bad,’ the boy explained. ‘The Chowbar Society holds its meetings in the dead of night at a secret location. We each pay the price of entry when we join.’

‘Where’s the secret location?’

‘It’s a palace,’ replied Isobel. ‘The Midnight Palace.’

‘Never heard of it.’

‘Nobody has except us,’ Siraj said.

‘And what is the price?’

‘A story,’ replied Ben. ‘A personal, secret story you have never told anyone else. You share it with us and then your secret will never leave the Chowbar Society.’

‘Do you have anything like that?’ asked Isobel defiantly, biting her lower lip.

Once again Sheere looked at the six boys and the girl, who were watching her cautiously. In all her years of moving around with her grandmother she had never stayed in one place long enough to make a single true friend, much less seven of them willing to listen and to invite her to be a part of something.

‘I have a story that I’m quite certain you’ve never heard,’ she said at last.

‘Right then,’ said Ben rubbing his hands. ‘Let’s get going.’

While Aryami Bose was explaining the reasons that had brought her and her granddaughter back to Calcutta after so many years of exile, the seven members of the Chowbar Society were leading Sheere through the bushes that surrounded the Midnight Palace. To the newcomer’s eyes, the palace was just a large abandoned house with a dilapidated roof through which you could see the star-studded sky. Gargoyles, columns and reliefs loomed through the sinuous shadows, the vestiges of what must once have been a stately mansion straight out of the pages of a fairy tale.

They crossed the garden via a narrow tunnel that had been hacked through the undergrowth and led straight to the main entrance of the house. A light breeze stirred the leaves and whistled through the stone arches of the Palace. Ben turned and looked at Sheere, grinning from ear to ear.

‘What do you think of it?’

‘It’s … different,’ Sheere replied, not wishing to dampen his enthusiasm.

‘Sublime,’ Ben corrected her, marching on, oblivious to any other opinion regarding the charms of the Chowbar Society’s headquarters.

Sheere smiled to herself and let him lead the way, thinking how much she would have liked to have known this group and this mansion during the years it had served as their refuge and sanctuary. The place exuded that aura of magic and dreams that rarely exists beyond the blurred memories of our early years. It didn’t matter that it was only for one night; she was looking forward to paying the admission fee to the almost extinct Chowbar Society.

‘My secret,’ she began, ‘is in fact the story of my father. The two are inseparable. I never met him, and I have no memory of him except what I learned from the lips of my grandmother and what I read in his books and notebooks. Yet, however strange this may seem to you, I’ve never felt closer to anyone in the world. Even though he died before I was born, I’m sure he will wait for me until I join him, and on that day I’ll finally be able to see for myself that he is just as I imagined him: the best man who ever existed.