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"First I want to go show Mrs Williams"

Mrs Criddle shook her head "Oh no, dear I think you’d better not She’s upstairs, with the other boys and girls, and well, I suppose you know I think you’re better off doith Dr Shed "If I take him upstairs, they’ll only break hiht," he agreed, and gathered Ted up under his aret your own supper and carry the doctor’s while you’re at it"

"Yes ma’am I will"

He retreated back down the pristine corridors and dodged between two eurneys, back down the stairs that would return him to the safety of the doctor, the laboratory, and his own cot He made his descent quietly, so as not to disturb the doctor in case he was still working

When Edwin peeked around the botto on his stool once more, a wadded piece of linen paper crushed in his fist A spilled test tube leaked runny gray liquid across the counter’s top, and made a dark stain across the doctor’s pants

Over and over to himself he mumbled, "Wasn’t the lavender Wasn’t the…it was only the…I saw the I don’t…I can’t…where was the paper? Where were the plans? What was the plan? What?"

The shadow of Edwin’s head crept across the wall and when the doctor spotted it, he stopped hihter "Parker, I’ve had a little bit of an accident I’ve made a little bit of a mess"

"Do you need any help, sir?"

"Help? I suppose I don’t If I only knew…if I could only re as his foot clipped the seat’s botto "Parker? Where’s the ? Didn’t we have a ?"

"Sir," Edwin said, taking the oldhim over to his bed, in a nook at the far end of the laboratory "Sir, I think you should lie down Mrs Criddle says supper co it to you when it’s ready"

"Supper?" The les he wore atop his head slid, and their strap cae of his bed and re neatly beside the feather mattress and pulled the doctor’s pillow toyou supper when it’s ready," but Dr Smeeks was already asleep

And in the laboratory, over by the stairs, the whirring and clicking of a clockwork boy was clattering itself in circles, or so Edwin assumed He couldn’t remember, had he left Ted on the stairs? He could’ve sworn he’d pressed the switch to deactivate his friend But perhaps he hadn’t

Regardless, he didn’t want theclumsily around in the laboratory–not in that cluttered place piled with glass and gadgets

Over his shoulder Edwin glanced, and saw the doctor snoozing lightly in his nook; and out in the laboratory, knocking its jar-lid knees against the botto Edwin picked Ted up and held the creation to his face, gazing into the glass badger eyes as if they ht blink back at him

He said, "You’re my friend, aren’t you? Everybody makes friends I justits s and levers that made the toy boy move Then its jaw retracted, and without a word, Ted had said its piece

After supper, which Dr Smeeks scarcely touched, and after an hour spent in the laundry roo Ted with Mrs Williams, Edwin retreated to his cot and blew out the candle beside it The cot wasn’t wide enough for Edwin and Ted to rest side-by-side, but Ted fit snugly between the wall and the bedding and Edwin left the ht did not pass fitfully

First Edakened to hear the doctor snuffling in his sleep, ; and when the old man finally sank back into a fuller sleep, Edwin nearly followed hihts except for the dilass beakers–and the si wick of a hurricane lah for the boy to see his way to the privy if the urge struck him before dawn

Here and there the bubble of an abandoned h a tube, and when Dr Ss, there was little noise to disturb anyone

Even upstairs, when the wee hours came, most of the inmates and patients of the sanitarium were quiet–if not by their own cycles, then by the laudanum spooned down their throats before the shades were drawn

Edwin lay on his back, his eyes closed against the faint, blue and green glows froain He reached to his left, to the spot between his cot and the wall He patted the s for aforh there was scarcely any rooed the clockwork boy into the cot after all, because doll or no, Ted was a co came, and the doctor was already ahen Edwin rose

"Good , Edwin," the doctor replied without looking over his shoulder On their first exchange of the day, he’d ren that today would be a good day, and Dr S into the befuddled tangle of fractured thoughts and faulty recollections