The Graveyard Book

Paul thought. “Why don’t I just tell the police anyway?” he asked.

“Can if you like.”

“I’ll try it your way first,” Paul said. He smiled. It wasn’t a big smile, but it was a smile, right enough, his first in three weeks.

So Paul Singh explained to Nick Farthing just how and why he wouldn’t be paying him any longer, and walked away while Nick Farthing just stood and didn’t say anything, clenching and unclenching his fists. And the next day another five eleven-year-olds found Nick Farthing in the playground, and told him they wanted their money back, all the pocket money they’d handed over in the previous month, or they’d be going to the police, and now Nick Farthing was an extremely unhappy young man.

Mo said, “It was him. He started it. If it wasn’t for him…they’d never have thought of it on their own. He’s the one we have to teach a lesson. Then they’ll all behave.”

“Who?” said Nick.

“The one who’s always reading. The one from the library. Bob Owens. Him.”

Nick nodded slowly. Then he said, “Which one is he?”

“I’ll point him out to you,” said Mo.

Bod was used to being ignored, to existing in the shadows. When glances naturally slip from you, you become very aware of eyes upon you, of glances in your direction, of attention. And if you barely exist in people’s minds as another living person then being pointed to, being followed around…these things draw attention to themselves.

They followed him out of the school and up the road, past the corner newsagent, and across the railway bridge. He took his time, making certain that the two who were following him, a burly boy and a fair, sharp-faced girl, did not lose him, then he walked into the tiny churchyard at the end of the road, a miniature graveyard behind the local church and he waited beside the tomb of Roderick Persson and his wife Amabella, and also his second wife, Portunia, (They Sleep to Wake Again).

“You’re that kid,” said a girl’s voice. “Bob Owens. Well, you’re in really big trouble, Bob Owens.”

“It’s Bod, actually,” said Bod, and he looked at them. “With a D. And you’re Jekyll and Hyde.”

“It was you,” said the girl. “You got to the seventh formers.”

“So we’re going to teach you a lesson,” said Nick Farthing, and he smiled without humor.

“I quite like lessons,” said Bod. “If you paid more attention to yours, you wouldn’t have to blackmail younger kids for pocket money.”

Nick’s brow crinkled. Then he said, “You’re dead, Owens.”

Bod shook his head, and he gestured around him. “I’m not actually,” he said. “They are.”

“Who are?” said Mo.

“The people in this place,” said Bod. “Look. I brought you here to give you a choice—”

“You didn’t bring us here,” said Nick.

“You’re here,” said Bod. “I wanted you here. I came here. You followed me. Same thing.”

Mo looked around nervously. “You’ve got friends here?” she asked.

Bod said, “You’re missing the point, I’m afraid. You two need to stop this. Stop behaving like other people don’t matter. Stop hurting people.”

Mo gri

“I gave you a chance,” said Bod. Nick swung a vicious fist at Bod, who was no longer there, and Nick’s fist slammed into the side of the gravestone.

“Where did he go?” said Mo. Nick was swearing and shaking his hand. She looked around the shadowy cemetery, puzzled. “He was here. You know he was.”

Nick had little imagination, and he was not about to start thinking now. “Maybe he ran away,” he said.

“He didn’t run,” said Mo. “He just wasn’t there anymore.” Mo had an imagination. The ideas were hers. It was twilight in a spooky churchyard, and the hairs on the back of her neck were prickling. “Something is really, really wrong,” said Mo. Then she said, in a higher-pitched panicky voice, “We have to get out of here.”

“I’m going to find that kid,” said Nick Farthing. “I’m going to beat the stuffing out of him.” Mo felt something unsettled in the pit of her stomach. The shadows seemed to move around them.

“Nick,” said Mo, “I’m scared.”

Fear is contagious. You can catch it. Sometimes all it takes is for someone to say that they’re scared for the fear to become real. Mo was terrified, and now Nick was too.

Nick didn’t say anything. He just ran, and Mo ran close on his heels. The streetlights were coming on as they ran back towards the world, turning the twilight into night, making the shadows into dark places in which anything could be happening.

They ran until they reached Nick’s house, and they went inside and turned on all the lights, and Mo called her mother and demanded, half crying, to be picked up and driven the short distance to her own house, because she wasn’t walking home that night.

Bod had watched them run with satisfaction.

“That was good, dear,” said someone behind him, a tall woman in white. “A nice Fade, first. Then the Fear.”

“Thank you,” said Bod. “I hadn’t even tried the Fear out on living people. I mean, I knew the theory, but. Well.”

“It worked a treat,” she said, cheerfully. “I’m Amabella Persson.”

“Bod. Nobody Owens.”

“The live boy? From the big graveyard on the hill? Really?”

“Um.” Bod hadn’t realized that anyone knew who he was beyond his own graveyard. Amabella was knocking on the side of the tomb. “Roddy? Portunia? Come and see who’s here!”

There were three of them there, then, and Amabella was introducing Bod and he was shaking hands and saying, “Charmed, I am sure,” because he could greet people politely over nine hundred years of changing ma

“Master Owens here was frightening some children who doubtless deserved it,” Amabella was explaining.

“Good show,” said Roderick Persson. “Bounders guilty of reprehensible behavior, eh?”

“They were bullies,” said Bod. “Making kids hand over their pocket money. Stuff like that.”

“A Frightening is certainly a good begi

“I hadn’t really thought—” Bod began, but Amabella interrupted.

“I should suggest that Dreamwalking might be the most efficient remedy. You can Dreamwalk, can you not?”

“I’m not sure,” said Bod. “Mister Pe

Portunia Persson said, “Dreamwalking is all very well, but might I suggest a good Visitation? That’s the only language that these people understand.”

“Oh,” said Amabella. “A Visitation? Portunia my dear, I don’t really think so—”

“No, you don’t. Luckily, one of us thinks.”

“I have to be getting home,” said Bod, hastily. “They’ll be worrying about me.”

“Of course,” said the Persson family, and “Lovely to meet you,” and “A very good evening to you, young man.” Amabella Persson and Portunia Persson glared at each other. Roderick Persson said, “If you’ll forgive me asking, but your guardian. He is well?”

“Silas? Yes, he’s fine.”

“Give him our regards. I’m afraid a small churchyard like this, well, we’re never going to meet an actual member of the Honour Guard. Still. It’s good to know that they’re there.”

“Good night,” said Bod, who had no idea what the man was talking about, but filed it away for later. “I’ll tell him.”

He picked up his bag of schoolbooks, and he walked home, taking comfort in the shadows.

Going to school with the living did not excuse Bod from his lessons with the dead. The nights were long, and sometimes Bod would apologize and crawl to bed exhausted before midnight. Mostly, he just kept going.

Mr. Pe