The Walls Have Eyes Read Free

deterred him from wandering the halls. Wandering school hallways got you yelled at. The bare room and white laminate tables depressed him. Did schools ever look nice?
    â€œI thought I’d find you here.”
    William stood in the doorway. She was as gorgeous as ever, and now Martin knew she was terrifically smart as well. “Sim says you’re leaving in the morning,” she said. “Off with Theo to find a new site for the school.”
    Hey, maybe she came to wish me luck, Martin thought. I should say something. After all, she’s a teenager like me. But he didn’t, because she wasn’t. She might be his age, but she was a genius like the rest of the prototypes. He remembered how she had performed an experiment on him to see what he’d do if she swiped his shoes. She seemed to like making fun of him.
    â€œI was hoping you’d do me a favor if you have the time,” William said. “Can you help me with a tool that’s out of reach?”
    â€œOh, sure,” Martin said. “Come on, Chip.”
    William led the way through the empty, impersonal corridors to her office. Following William was rapidly becoming the best part of Martin’s day. Her shiny brown hair looks just like when syrup meets butter, Martin thought, and there isn’t a more beautiful sight than that.
    The office was an even greater disaster now than it had been earlier. Martin stepped gingerly around a cardboard boxfull of old circuit boards. Chip sniffed at them and gave an unhappy whine.
    â€œIt’s okay, boy,” Martin told him. “They aren’t anybody you know.”
    William waded through the piles and stacks to a shelving unit in the far corner. “Up there,” she said as she stood on her tiptoes in her high-tops and pointed to an object on the highest shelf.
    The object she wanted was about a foot square, wrapped in a hard case of dusty green. From its front protruded many short metal bits that gave it a snaggletoothed bulldog’s grin.
    â€œWhat is it?”
    â€œAn antique,” she said. “A typewriter.”
    â€œIs it heavy?”
    â€œThat depends on your idea of heavy.”
    Martin stretched as far as he could, but he could barely brush the typewriter’s bottom edge with his fingertips. He decided against dislodging it and walking it off the shelf inch by inch; his idea of heavy was an object capable of bashing his head in, and this one looked as if it could. He glanced around. The office chair rolled, so that was no good. He picked his way back through the mess and began moving boxes off the chair by the door.
    â€œWhat are you doing?”
    Martin gestured at the chair. “What does it look like I’m doing?”
    â€œYou’ll get those out of order,” William said. “I have a system.” And she frowned when Martin laughed. “Anyway, you don’t need that chair. Think! You have another way.”
    Now it was Martin’s turn to frown. “I don’t need to think, and I don’t need another way. The chair’s my way, so if you don’t want me to move it, it looks like you and that typer thingy are out of luck.”
    William nodded as if he’d just confirmed her suspicions about something. Then she went to the door.
    â€œSim,” she called, “would you come here for a minute and fetch me down the typewriter?”
    The bent old bot hobbled to the doorway. His mild blue eyes brightened when he saw Martin. “Oh, hello, new student. Taking a little instruction, I see.”
    William’s laugh annoyed Martin much more than it should have.
    With some difficulty and adjustment of his gray robes to avoid toppling papers, Sim made his way across the room. Then he reached up one skinny arm. It stretched to an absurd length in a sudden movement that made Martin’s stomach flop over. Foot-long fingers fanned wide and plucked the cumbersome object from the shelf.
    â€œHere you are,”