Alcatraz Read Free

least favorite part of the process. I stared up at my ceiling.
    ‘You are fatherless and motherless,’ Ms. Fletcher said, ‘a parasite upon the system. You are a child who has been given a second, third, and now twenty-seventh chance. And how have you received this generosity? With indifference, disrespect, and destructiveness !’
    ‘I don’t destroy,’ I said quietly. ‘I break. There’s a difference.’
    Ms. Fletcher sniffed in disgust. She left me then, walking out and pulling the door closed with a snap. I heard her say good-bye to the Sheldons, promising them that her assistant would arrive in the morning to deal with me.
    It’s too bad , I thought with a sigh. Roy and Joan really are good people. They would have made great parents .

2
    N ow, you’re probably wondering about the beginning of the previous chapter, with its reference to evil Librarians, altars made from encyclopedias, and its general feeling of ‘Oh, no! Alcatraz is going to be sacrificed!’
    Before we get to this, let me explain something about myself. I’ve been many things in my life. Student. Spy. Sacrifice. Potted plant. However, at this point, I’m something completely different from all of those – something more frightening than any of them.
    I’m a writer.
    You may have noticed that I began my story with a quick, snappy scene of danger and tension – but then quickly moved on to a more boring discussion of my childhood. Well, that’s because I wanted to prove something to you: that I am not a nice person .
    Would a nice person begin with such an exciting scene, then make you wait almost the entire book to read about it? Would a nice person write a book that exposes the true nature of the world to all of you ignorant Hushlanders, thereby forcing your lives into chaos? Would a nice person write a book that proves that Alcatraz Smedry, the Free Kingdoms’ greatest hero, was just a mean-spirited adolescent?
    Of course not.
    I awoke grumpily that next morning, annoyed by the sound of some banging on my downstairs door. I climbed out of bed, then threw on a bathrobe. Though the clock read 10:00 A.M ., I was still tired. I had stayed up late, lost in thought. Then Joan and Roy had tried to say goodbye. I hadn’t opened my door to them. Better to get things over without all that gushing.
    No, I was not happy to be reawoken at 10:00 A.M . – or, actually, any A.M . I yawned, walking downstairs and pulling open the door, prepared to meet whichever assistant Ms. Fletcher had sent to retrieve me. ‘Hell—’ I said. (I hadn’t intended to swear, but a boisterous voice cut me off before I could get to the ‘o.’)
    ‘Alcatraz, my boy!’ then man at the doorway exclaimed. ‘Happy Birthday!’
    ‘—o,’ I said.
    ‘You shouldn’t swear, my boy!’ the man said, pushing his way into the house. He was an older man who was dressed in a sharp black tuxedo and wore a strange pair of red-tinted glasses. He was quite bald save for a small bit of white hair running around the back of his head, and this puffed out in an unkempt fashion. He wore a similarly bushy white mustache, and he smiled quite broadly as he turned to me, his face wrinkled but his eyes alight with excitement.
    ‘Well, my boy,’ he said, ‘how does it feel to be thirteen?’
    ‘The same as it did yesterday,’ I said, yawning. ‘When it was actually my birthday. Ms. Fletcher must have told you the wrong date. I’m not packed yet – you’re going to have to wait.’
    I tiredly began to walk toward the stairs.
    ‘Wait,’ the old man said. ‘Your birthday was . . . yesterday?’
    I nodded. I’d never met the man before, but Ms. Fletcher has several assistants. I didn’t know them all.
    ‘Rumbling Rawns!’ then man exclaimed. ‘I’m late!’
    ‘No,’ I said, climbing the stairs. ‘Actually, you’re early. As I said, you’ll need to wait.’
    The old man rushed up the stairs behind me.
    I turned, frowning. ‘You can wait downstairs.’
    ‘Quickly,