Milrose Munce and the Den of Professional Help by Douglas Anthony Cooper Page A

night they sat on the top bunk and embellished their plans for revenge and escape, and nothing the least bit practical emerged.
    “I wonder if we shall grow old here,” wondered Arabella. “Perhaps that is how we shall escape. We’ll be here for so many years that Massimo Natica will grow ancient and die, and then we can take our chairs and wheel out into the sunshine.”
    “Now that’s a joyful thought,” said Milrose.
    “Well, it’s the only plan I can come up with this evening.”
    “We’re getting pathetic. Come on—where’s our famed ingenuity?”
    Both of them knew that they were not yet widely famous for their ingenuity. But surely they would be, were they to figure out a way to extricate themselves from this Helpful situation.
    “Milrose, one thing I’ve been pondering: Massimo Natica seems keen on preventing us from hearing voices, but he doesn’t seem to have any idea where those voices come from. Don’t you think it’s odd that he is, apparently, completely unaware of ghosts? I mean, if that’s his
job
—to make students stop seeing them—surely you’d think he would
know
about them.”
    “Not knowing about anything hasn’t stood in his way thus far.”
    “True.”
    “He’s probably like a professional hit man. You know, you just hire him to go off and whack a bunch of guys, but you don’t tell him
why
he’s doing it.”
    “I’m not thrilled with that analogy, Milrose.”
    Nor was Milrose himself. This terrible possibility had in fact occurred to both of them. How else would you prevent students from seeing ghosts? Or, more to the point, from
talking
about what they could see? Perhaps Massimo Natica was truly a Professional, but not the kind of Professional that he advertised. In fact, Milrose noted to himself, hit men in movies were often immaculately dressed.
    “Well, let’s hope we manage to escape before we get whacked.”
    “I must confess, I’m not fond of that expression, Milrose.”
    “Okay, then. ‘Cured.’ I hope we get out of here before we get good and cured for good.”
    “That’s a sensible hope,” said Arabella.
    “Anyway, remember: what we’ve been told is that we’re being Helped because we hear non-existent voices. There’s still no reason to assume that anyone knows we’re hearing actual voices, much less ghosts. So, no reason, really, to do us in. And even that would be no reason to do us in. Would it?”
    He considered putting his arm around Arabella to comfort her, but he had an attack of cowardice, which caused his arm to freeze and cleave to his ribs. So instead he changed the topic. “You know, I’ve been thinking. What’s everybody on the outsidedoing while we’re locked in here? I mean, your parents are probably pretty happy …”
    This was also clearly not the right thing to say. As she stared up at the ceiling, Arabella had produced a single tear, which emerged from the corner of her eye, wended its way down the side of her face and lodged uncomfortably in her ear.
    “I’m sorry, Arabella. That was insensitive. It’s an old family trait, insensitivity …” But this did not seem the right time for an “old family trait” joke, so Milrose did not complete the remark. “Anyway, you’d think that my parents would be, I don’t know, at least complaining to the Parent-Teacher Association. I mean, yeah, Dad signed the documents and whatever, but there has to be
something
they can do.”
    “It is a terrible thought,” sniffed Arabella, “that nobody is thinking of us at all.”
    And at that moment, a very faint and pretentious voice filtered through the ceiling above.
    “Arabella? Is that Arabella?”
    “Milrose, actually.”
    “Oh, Munce,” said the voice, with palpable disappointment. “Are you wearing Arabella’s flower? I am inhaling the distinct scent of almonds.”
    “Percival!” said Arabella, with what approached excitement, but remained of course a few feet away.
    “Ah. Arabella. I so hoped it was you. Although the