Dr. Franklin's Island by Ann Halam Page A

began. A free castaway, a prisoner in paradise. But I had no way of knowing.
    Operated on in the morning.
    She kept holding my hand, and I kept holding hers, but each of us was alone, a million miles apart. I saw my information pack lying on the floor. I let go of Miranda’s hand, grabbed it, and threw it away from me so it whammed against the bars. As if I cared what kind of a monster I was doomed to become. Yes, that was it. Better face up to the truth. There was no escape. Either we were going to be tortured to death, or we were going to be turned into monsters. Depending on whether Dr. Franklin was a crazy genius, or plain crazy. I got up and flung myself on the bed. Miranda lay down too.
    We didn’t cry, we didn’t talk anymore. We just lay there.

chapter six
    Someone was shining a bright light into my eyes. My brain dissolved into a puddle of terror. I thought this was it, Dr. Franklin had come to take me. Then Dr. Skinner turned the penlight beam the other way, shining it on his own face. “Come on,” he snapped, in an angry undertone. “Get up, let’s go.”
    When he’d hustled me out of bed, he grabbed my pillow and shoved it down under the sheet. It was dark in the ward, but I could see that Miranda was out of bed too. When she saw what he was doing she did the same thing with her pillow. He let me out and then her, and shut the cage doors behind us. The three of us slipped out into the corridor, and he locked the door of the ward too. We walked along to a recessed panel in the wall, which he opened. He pressed a couple of buttons. I thought,
He’s turning the security system back on . . .
and it was only then that my brain caught up, and my heart leaped.
    He was helping us to escape! We were going to escape!
    “Come on,” he whispered. “Don’t mess around. Keep up.”
    Miranda and I were barefoot; Dr. Skinner seemed to be used to walking silently. We followed him swiftly along dark corridors, then through some automatic double doors into a big dark hall. There were long tables, chairs. Light gleamed faintly on glass-fronted counters. It seemed to be a canteen, or a cafeteria. He pointed to us to sit down at one of the tables, whispered, “Not a word from either of you,” and went off. We stared at each other, two shadowy faces, the dark making my eyesight as good as Miranda’s. Our hearts were beating hard in hope and fear.
    Dr. Skinner came back, with his arms full. “Not a word,” he repeated. “Listen.” He still sounded as if he hated us. “I’m going to let you out of the compound, you’re going to make your way to the east shore. There’s a motor launch. There’ll be no one in it, it will be moored against a jetty. You get into that launch and hide yourselves below, in the cabin. You will be taken to the coast, the mainland. Then you’ll be on your own. You’ll have to walk. Head north. You’ll find a place called Menozes, where you can find someone who will understand English. Say you were shipwrecked on an empty atoll, there are a few around here. Say you built a raft, say you floated for days. Say you lost everything and you have no idea where you were stranded. Say what you like, but
I’m saving you,
so don’t you tell any secrets about what happened to you here, don’t say anything about what he planned to do. Is that agreed?”
    We nodded, frantically, and tried to whisper our thanks.
    “Don’t thank me. I don’t even think you’ll get away. The people at Menozes will send for Dr. Franklin when two castaways turn up, he’s a big man around here, the local
jefe,
you know what that means? They’ll send for him, and you’ll be back.” He set his teeth and grimaced, as if he was in pain. “He wants to study the psychological effects. Do you understand me? I’m warning you, he doesn’t only want to change you, he wants to play games with you as well.
Do you understandme?
I don’t know why but I think . . . in a way . . . that’s what I really can’t