The White Fox Read Online Free Page A

him, and he still took no notice. He seemed to be fixed on another plane, something which they could not see. Only when one of the boys hit him on the shoulder did he pay attention. He turned his head slowly to look at the offender.
    The boy felt himself shake slightly. The blackness of the hood was hypnotic. It seemed to numb everything—the noise of the wind, the light from the swiftly escaping day, and the ground beneath his trainers.
    Another of the boys whipped out a short knife and grabbed the man’s arm. He instantly regretted it. His shadow seemed to congeal around his feet, anchoring him to the ground. With a start, all the boys realized they could not move. They struggled, but the air was becoming heavier, sapping their strength, their lungs protesting against the slowly encroaching pressure. Time seemed to thicken, clotting from water to rancid syrup.
    The man removed his arm from the boy’s grip and snapped his fingers. The shadows leapt.
    A minute later the man walked up the street, his spectral cloak rippling around him. In an alley, near to where he had been standing, the last of the bodies slumped to the ground. The shadow turned and slunk back into the gloom.

Chapter III
a phone call
    “… but then George is really funny, so I’m not sure,” Lucy finished breathlessly.
    “Have you thought about which one’s actually the nicest person?” Jack replied teasingly.
    “You girl.” She laughed, pushing him playfully on the shoulder.
    He grinned.
    “How’s your love life, then?”
    “Nothing at the moment, no,” he said resignedly.
    “I was pretty sure you thought Karris was fit.”
    “She’s
fit
definitely, but she’s in with all the rugby players. I’ve barely spoken to her.”
    “That’s no excuse. You just need to talk to her. Attract her attention. Come on. Once she knows you, she can’t say no.”
    Jack shrugged and looked away in embarrassment.
    It was Saturday morning, and the two of them were sitting in comfortable armchairs in Costa’s, overlooking the shopping center. A large section of the first floor was cut out, so that the overcast sky pressed on the glass ceiling and down onto the tiled pattern and escalators on the ground floor. An ornate, Victorian-style clock hung from the glass ceiling a few feet away from them, its many spikes making it look like an overgrown spider. Beyond the clock, on the other side of the first floor, was the train station, and galleries of shops ran down the north and south malls to the left and right. This time on a Saturday, the whole place was bursting with shoppers.
    They sat in silence for a while, watching the world drift by. The train times flicked across the electronic board above the ticket offices. People milled around, talking and carrying shopping bags. A group of teenagers they recognized from school hung around the JD on BMXs, a couple on guard for security officers. An exhausted-looking mother passed with a pushchair, her two children shrieking about the lack of chocolate currently present in their lives. A man in an Abercrombie & Fitch jumper marched past, his Doberman imprinting the tiles with perfectly formed muddy paw prints, which themselves seemed to ooze of high society. He was swiftly followed by a woman stooped with a threadbare mop, scouring the floor for something else to have the privilege of dirtying it.
    Jack found it incredible sometimes that people could pass in the street and walk on by, never to see each other again. Every single person had their own life, their own problems and aspirations, and yet you looked at someone in passing as just another obstacle on your way to the bank. He kept this feeling to himself. The last time he’d tried to explain it to Lucy they had ended up in an argument about stalkers.
    He gazed absently at the other side of the upper level. A moment later he registered something on the edge of his vision. “You see that?” He pointed, determined not to be misunderstood again.
    Lucy followed