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what he meant. 'A lot of what?'
Don looked around to check he wasn't being overheard, then spoke in a softer voice. 'Nutters. Cranks. Spadeadam, you see. It attracts them. All the conspiracy theories - you wouldn't believe the stuff people make up about that place.' He rolled his eyes as if to indicate his disdain for such people.
'Right,' Ben replied, not wishing to let on that he was having his own doubts about the place.
'Anyway.' Don jumped up brightly. 'Part of my job is to look after any unaccompanied kids who stay here. Don't want you getting into any kind of trouble, do we? Let me know if he gives you any gyp.' With that he walked off.
Ben sat there in silence for a few minutes, deep in reflection and chewing on his fingernails. Conspiracy theories, he thought to himself. Don had laughed it off so easily, and under different circumstances no doubt Ben would have done too. But he couldn't get the image out of his head of the soldier shooting the two hen harriers earlier in the day. Whatever anybody said, that was a strange thing to happen, and the old man seemed quite sure he knew what was going on. He decided to try and find him, now, and ask him what he had been about to say when they had been interrupted. No doubt it would be nonsense, the ravings of a crazy mind; but at least Ben would be able to satisfy himself of that.
All the dormitories were on the first floor of the building, up a central flight of stone steps that clattered as he hurried up them. Turning right at the top of the steps led you to the dormitories that were in use - boys on the right, girls on the left - but Don had told Ben that the old man had been put somewhere else. Following little more than his instinct, Ben turned left.
In this direction, the corridor was less well lit - a single low-wattage bulb hanging from the ceiling was all the illumination it had. There were several doors on either side: tentatively, Ben tried them, but they were locked. Eventually, though, at the end of the corridor on the left, he found one that wasn't. He gently opened it. 'Hello,' he breathed into the darkness.
There was no reply, so he opened the door a little wider and stepped inside.
His hand fumbled for a moment for a light switch, but he couldn't find one. Instead he stood still and waited for his night vision to become accustomed to the darkness. It took a minute or two until he could see that he was indeed in a dormitory, but the beds were all empty. There was a general aroma of disuse about the place, and the large windows had no blinds or curtains: clearly this was not somewhere that was frequently used. Certainly there was no sign of the old man.
All of a sudden, Ben heard Don's overly cheery voice. For some reason he didn't want to be caught snooping around, so he closed the door behind him and stepped further into the room, crossing the wooden floorboards to the window. He looked out into the blackness.
Clouds were scudding past the almost-full moon, which was bright when it was in view. Mesmerized by their swift movement, Ben thought of the moonlit African nights he had seen in the Congo, and of the silent airborne majesty of the hen harriers earlier today. And then he thought of something Annie had said back in Macclesfield. 'We humans can do some pretty dumb things sometimes.'
Too right, Ben thought to himself. Like standing around in dark rooms looking for weird old men.
He was just about to turn and leave, however, when he heard a noise from outside. Looking through the window, he saw, in the half-light of the moon, a figure. He was unmistakable really, in his grey overcoat. Ben watched as the old man walked as hurriedly as his frail legs could manage away from the house and faded into the impenetrable gloom.
And as he disappeared into the night, Ben felt as if the room in which he stood had suddenly grown colder.
He shook his head and turned round. The old man had spooked him at the train station - that much was obvious. It all seemed too much of