Free Taken by Edward Bloor Page B

Mangrove boys backed away as soon as the men intervened. Albert shouted at me, “Miss Charity! All of you! Get in the security van. Right now!”
    Patience and I made a quick about-face and hurried toward the van. I watched one Highlands guard jump into the driver’s seat while the other pulled the machine gun out of its rack. I turned and saw that James had pulled Hopewell to his feet and was fast-walking him toward us.
    Suddenly all of the butlers were involved. Albert, William, and Edward formed a line behind Hopewell. Each had a can of biorepellent out and was brandishing it at the Mangrove kids. This just seemed to make the kids angrier.
    Patience and I hurried up the van steps, followed by Sierra, the Dugans, the four maids, and Sterling Johnston. Hopewell and the four butlers climbed on right after. The guards closed the steel doors and glared at the mob through the tinted windows.
    The Mangrove kids retreated behind a tree. They started talking among themselves in an animated way and making violent gestures.
    About one minute later, Mickie Meyers wrapped up her shoot and returned to the van with Mrs. Veck, Mr. Patterson, Lena, and Kurt, walking right past the roiling mob.
    They had no idea what had just happened. They had no idea, that is, until the van pulled away and we all heard the thuds. Objects started crashing against the windows. I pressed my face against a tinted window and saw what the objects were—Ramiro Fortunato novels, dozens and dozens of them—all hurled at us angrily by the children of Mangrove.
    Mickie finally looked up and inquired, of no one in particular, “Why are they doing that?” No one volunteered an answer, so she let the matter drop.
    The van roared away as fast as the driver could go, not stopping until we reached a turnpike rest area. The driver swerved into it and pulled to a halt in front of the food court. Both guards then stepped outside. One held the machine gun at a downward angle while the other circumnavigated the van, looking for damage.
    Albert took a seat next to Hopewell and examined his bleeding elbow. He pulled out a small first-aid kit and started to clean the wound.
    As she watched Albert in action, Patience said, “Remember the girl with the cleft palate?”
    “Yeah.”
    “She looked really good. Better than Hopewell, you know?”
    “Yeah.”
    “I wonder who did the surgery.”
    “A clinic doctor?”
    “No way. She’d look mangled.”
    “Then a real doctor, I guess.”
    Albert finished bandaging Hopewell’s elbow and was coming back up the aisle. Patience told him, “You’re really good at medical stuff, Albert. You should be a clinic doctor.”
    Albert smiled. “Thank you, Miss Patience.”
    “Would you like to do that?”
    “No. I’m happy doing what I do.” He kept walking up to his seat.
    Patience asked Daphne, “What do you have to do to be a clinic doctor?”
    “I don’t think you have to do anything,” Daphne answered. “You rent a house or a storefront, put up a sign, and start calling yourself a doctor.”
    Patience wrinkled her nose. “That’s it? Anyone who wants to call himself, or herself, a doctor can set up a clinic?”
    “Pretty much.”
    “You don’t need to go to medical school?”
    “No. I suppose you could, but there’s nobody to check if you did or did not. You can print yourself a phony diploma, buy a pack of tongue depressors, and start telling people to say
Ahh.
”
    Just then, Mickie and Kurt came down the aisle and set up in front of Mrs. Veck. Mickie explained, “We were looking at the tapes from before. I want to hear a little more about something that you said.”
    The red light on Kurt’s camera came on. Mickie smiled into it. “Mrs. Veck, you used a phrase before that I had never heard, so I wrote it down: ‘rituals of social inversion.’ Can you tell me a little more about those?”
    Mrs. Veck smiled. “Certainly. What would you like to know?”
    “Well, you gave a very interesting example about the