Doctor Who_ Warchild - Andrew Cartmel [92]
Waiting for him to slip. She leant further out. ‘Get back before you break your neck.’
‘You have so little faith in me it hurts.’ Redmond’s voice sounded distracted. He was preoccupied with finding handholds and footholds in the darkness. Roz looked up at the dark lip of the roof. He was inching along it, hands busy in the shadows. The aluminium guttering made a squealing, wrenching sound as it took his weight and Roz’s stomach turned over.
‘Don’t do it. It won’t hold you.’
‘You’re speaking to a man who climbed into more than one room in Fort William Catholic Girls’ School when he was young,’ said Redmond. ‘This is nothing.’
‘Come back. I’ll give you a hand.’
‘Nonsense. I’m going up on to the roof. To look around a little.’
‘Creed will be here any minute with the armoured car.’
‘I suppose I just can’t wait,’ said Redmond apologetically.
And before Roz could stop him he was gone, climbing effortlessly up out of sight. She swore and pulled her head back into the bedroom.
Norman Peverell was staring at her.
‘I don’t know if I can wait, either,’ he said miserably.
But Roz wasn’t listening to him. A thought had suddenly occurred to her. ‘Norman, you’re familiar with the floorplans of the houses on this estate aren’t you?’
Norman Peverell nodded sadly.
‘And this house shares a common roof with its neighbours on either side, doesn’t it?’
‘You’re just trying to distract me. That’s terribly kind of you, but-’
‘Doesn’t it?’ snapped Roz. Norman Peverell blinked in surprise, his bladder forgotten for a moment.
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘But why do you ask?’
Roz had crossed back to the window now and she was peering out. ‘And those houses have both been evacuated.’
‘Yes.’
‘So there’s nothing to stop the dogs getting into them and up on to the roof somehow?’
‘Oh, my God,’ said Norman Peverell.
But Roz was already climbing out of the window and up on to the drain-pipe, following Redmond.
Chapter 30
Comparative Anthropology, thought Wally Saddler, wasn’t really a very good description for what this class was all about. As a matter of fact, it was kind of interesting. Some of it even chimed in with a few observations Wally had made through hanging around with Wolf.
Not that Wolf would have noticed. All his attention was fixed on the kid who sat in the first row, Ricky McIlveen.
All of Ricky’s attention was on the teacher. Their teacher was the Buddhist monk, the shaven-headed freak who called himself the Young Master. He wandered down the aisle between the desks, his saffron robes flapping loosely around him, his flip-flops softly slapping the floor. He seemed lost in concentration, absent-mindedly rubbing one hand across the smooth contours of his shaved scalp. Several of the girls watched him with fascination, obviously taken with his exotic appearance.
‘One of the first topics we’ll address in these classes is religion and its importance to different human communities.
But religion is a very abstract concept, a cold ideology divorced from the warm flesh and blood of human beings. So we’ll focus on the subject of religious leaders such as Christ, Mohammed, and Buddha. When we discuss these remarkable individuals we tend to focus on their doctrines rather than the men themselves. The message rather than the messenger, if you like.’
The Young Master had wandered back to the front of the classroom. Now he gathered his orange robes around himself and perched on the corner of his desk, tucking his long legs under him in the lotus position.
‘Now what I propose to do is reverse that emphasis. To set aside the message and talk about the messenger. What kind of men could create whole new belief systems, literally changing the minds of millions of people?’
At the back of the class Wolf Leemark shifted uneasily in his chair. He was beginning to feel distinctly uncomfortable about the direction this lesson was taking. All this talk of religion made him think about his old man. Wolf Leemark didn’t like to think about his father. Wolf was virtually a man