Alan Bradley - The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie

"By now we were boiling over like a room full of teakettles. Dr. Kissing went to his wall safe and twirled his fingertips in an elaborate dance on the dial of the combination lock.

"With a couple of clicks the thing swung open. He reached in and brought out a cigarette tin—an ordinary Gold Flake cigarette tin! That fetched a bit of a laugh, I can tell you. I couldn't help wondering if he'd had the cheek to pull out the same old container in front of the King.

"There was a bit of a hubbub, and then a hush fell over the room as he opened the lid. There inside, nestled on a bed of absorbent blotting paper, was a tiny envelope: too small, too insignificant, one would say, to hold a treasure of such great magnitude.

"With a flourish Dr. Kissing produced a pair of stamp tweezers from his waistcoat pocket and, removing the stamp as carefully as a sapper extracting a fuse from an un-exploded bomb, laid it on the paper.

"We crowded round, pushing and shoving for a better view.

"'Careful, boys,' said Dr. Kissing. 'Remember your manners; gentlemen always.'

"And there it was, that storied stamp, looking just as one always knew it would look, and yet so much more . so much more spellbinding. We could hardly believe we were in the same room as the Ulster Avenger.

"Bony was directly behind me, leaning over my shoulder. I could feel his hot breath on my cheek, and thought I caught a whiff of pork pie and claret. Had he been drinking? I wondered.

"And then something happened which I will not forget until my dying day—and perhaps not even then. Bony darted in, snatched up the stamp, and held it high in the air between his thumb and forefinger like a priest elevating the host.

"'Watch this, sir!' he shouted. 'It's a trick!'

"We were all of us too numb to move. Before anyone could bat an eye, Bony had pulled a wooden match from his pocket, flicked it alight with his thumbnail, and held it to the corner of the Ulster Avenger.

"The stamp began blackening, then curled; a little wave of flame passed across its surface, and a moment later, there was nothing left of it but a smudge of black ash in Bony's palm. Bony lifted up his hands and in an awful voice, chanted:

'Ashes to ashes, dust to dust,

If the King can't have you, the Devil must!’

"It was appalling. There was a shocked silence. Dr. Kissing stood there with his mouth open, and Mr. Twining, who had brought us there, looked as if he had been shot in the heart.

"'It's a trick, sir,' Bony shouted, with that charnel-house grin of his. 'Now help me get it back, all of you. If we all join hands and pray together—'

"He grabbed my hand with his right, and with his left, he seized Bob Stanley's.

"'Form a circle,' he ordered. 'Join hands and form a prayer circle!'

"'Stop it!' Dr. Kissing commanded. 'Stop this insolence at once. Return the stamp to its box, Bonepenny.'

"'But, sir,' Bony said—and I swear I saw his teeth glint in the light of the flames from the fireplace—'if we don't pull together, the magic can't work. That's how magic is, you see.'

"'Put. the. stamp. back. in. the. box,' Dr. Kissing said, slowly and deliberately, his face like one of those ghastly things one finds in a trench after a battle.

"'All right then, I'll have to go it alone,' Bony said. 'But it's only fair to warn you it's much more difficult this way.'

"Never had I seen him so confident; never had I seen him so full of himself.

"He rolled up his sleeve and held those long white pointed fingers upright in the air as high as he could reach.

'Come back, come back, O Orange Queen,

Come back and tell us where you've been!’

"At this, he snapped his fingers, and suddenly there was a stamp where no stamp had been a moment earlier. An orange stamp.

"Dr. Kissing's grim face relaxed a little. He almost smiled. Mr. Twining's fingers dug deeply into my shoulder blade, and I realized for the first time that he had been hanging on to me for dear life.

"Bony reeled the stamp in for a closer look until it was almost touching the tip of his nose. At the same time he whipped an indecently large magnifying glass from his hip pocket and examined the newly materialized stamp with pursed lips.

"Then suddenly his voice was the voice of Tchang Fu, the ancient Mandarin, and I swear that even though he wore no makeup, I could clearly see the yellow skin, the long fingernails, the red dragon kimono.

"'Uh-oh! Honabuh ancestahs send long stamp!' he said, holding it out to us for our inspection. It was an ordinary Internal Revenue issue from America: a common Civil War vintage stamp which most of us had aplenty in our albums.

"He let it flutter to the floor, then gave a shrug and rolled his eyes heavenward.

'Come back, come back, O Orange Queen—'

he began again, but Dr. Kissing had seized him by the shoulders and was shaking him like a tin of paint.

"'The stamp,' he demanded, holding out his hand. 'At once.'

"Bony turned out his trouser pockets, one after another.

"'I can't seem to find it, sir,' he said. 'Something seems to have gone wrong.'

"He looked up each of his sleeves, ran a long finger round the inside of his collar, and a sudden transformation came over his face. In an instant he was a frightened schoolboy who looked as if he'd like nothing better than to make a bolt for it.

"'It's worked before, sir,' he stammered. 'Lots and lots of times.'

"His face was growing red, and I thought he was about to cry.

"'Search him,' Dr. Kissing snapped, and several of the boys, under the direction of Mr. Twining, took Bony into the lavatory where they turned him upside down and searched him from his red hair to his brown shoes.

"'It's as the boy says,' Mr. Twining said when they returned at last. 'The stamp seems to have vanished.'

"'Vanished?' Dr. Kissing said. 'Vanished? How can the bloody thing have vanished ? Are you quite sure?’

" 'Quite sure,’ Mr. Twining said.

"A search was made of the entire room: The carpet was lifted, tables were moved, ornaments turned upside down, but all to no avail. At last Dr. Kissing crossed the room to the corner where Bony was sitting with his head sunk deeply in his hands.

"'Explain yourself, Bonepenny,' he demanded.

"'I—I can't, sir. It must have burned up. It was supposed to be switched, you see, but I must have. I don't. I can't.'

"And he burst into tears.

"'Go to bed, boy!' Dr. Kissing shouted. 'Leave this house and go to bed!'

"It was the first time any of us had ever heard him raise his voice above the level of pleasant conversation, and it shook us to the core.

"I glanced over at Bob Stanley and noticed that he was rocking back and forth on his toes, staring at the floor as unconcernedly as if he were waiting for a tram.

"Bony stood up and walked slowly across the room towards me. His eyes were rimmed with red as he reached out and took my hand. He gave it a flaccid shake, but it was a gesture I found myself unable to return.

"'I'm sorry, Jacko,' he said, as if I, and not Bob Stanley, were his confederate.

"I could not look him in the eye. I turned my head away until I knew that he was no longer near me.

"When Bony had slunk from the room, looking back over his shoulder, his face bloodless, Mr. Twining tried to apologize to the headmaster, but that seemed only to make matters worse.

"'Perhaps I should ring up his parents, sir,' he said.

"'Parents? No, Mr. Twining. I think it is not the parents who should be brought in.'

"Mr. Twining stood in the middle of the room wringing his hands. God knows what thoughts were racing through the poor man's mind. I can't even remember my own.

"The next morning was Monday. I was crossing the quad, tacking into the stiff breeze with Simpkins, who was prattling on about the Ulster Avenger. The word had spread like wildfire and everywhere one looked knots of boys stood with their heads together, hands waving excitedly as they swapped the latest—and almost entirely false—rumors.