The professor remained silent and thoughtful for a while, with his eyes closed. Blake knew he oughtn't to interrupt, but a question was rattling around inside his brain and gradually he built up the confidence to ask it.

'Um, was my mother a good student?' he asked, with a shy smile that broadened into a mischievous grin.

The professor opened one eye and said quizzically, 'It depends on how you define good.'

Blake shifted uncomfortably where he sat, and groaned. Like his parents, the professor was getting him to define his words more accurately. It was a game he didn't like much, since he wasn't very good at it.

The old man, noticing his distress, relented. 'I beg your pardon. It's a trick I play when I feel my students haven't formulated their questions properly. Sometimes it's more difficult to know the question than to find an answer.'

Blake gave him a puzzled look.

'Your mother was Juliet Somers then,' explained the man, unmindful of the man's confusion. 'She was a capable, clever and highly motivated student, who finished her dissertation in good time, I believe, despite your father's efforts.'

Jolyon glanced at Blake to see if he understood the last remark and was confronted by two amazingly light blue eyes, as watchful as mirrors.

Taken aback, he continued in a softer voice, speaking more honestly than Blake had expected, 'She was, I dare say, even then, more conscious of her career than her vocation. I am not sure that she loved books, but she analyzed what was in them very well. Still, without that passion, she was never, I fear, my best student.'

It felt odd to hear someone criticizing his mother and Blake looked around the room uneasily until he spotted her. There she was, still talking to Prosper Marchand, who was now offering her a glass of ruby-colored port. They appeared to be on familiar terms. Too familiar, perhaps. Blake scowled.

'No, that distinction,' resumed Jolyon, 'goes to your father. He was my most promising student.'

Blake's eyes zipped back to the old man's face. 'My Dad?' he asked, thinking he had misheard.

The professor eyed him astutely. 'Oh, yes, your father had a most remarkable imagination. Not always accurate, mind, but blessed with an insight I have rarely seen.'

Insight. The resonated in Blake's mind, reminding him of the blank book he had found in the library. It had appeared in the final line of the poem.

Suddenly a grandfather clock started to chime the hour. It sounded so old and frail Blake thought it would expire before it reached the last toll. Seven, eight, nine o'clock…The numbers wheezed by, accompanied by a prolonged bronze echo.

Jolyon, following his gaze, seemed alarmed to notice the time. 'Good heavens,' he said. 'I had no idea.'

Blake was momentarily distracted.

'Huh?' he said. He had just caught sight of Duck tugging on Sir Giles Bentley's sleeve. The old man looked down at her with barely concealed contempt. His stare would have crushed a lesser opponent. Diana stood nearby, observing them both with mild detachment.

Jolyon staggered to his feet. 'You'll forgive me, I hope, if I make a hasty departure.'  Once again, he extended a hand, which this time Blake noticed was spattered with ink. 'It's been a pleasure, my boy.'

'Um, yeah,' said Blake, sorry to see him go. There were still so many things he wanted to know about his parents.

The man clearly sensed his disappointment, for he said, 'You appear to have more questions in you yet. Why not come round to my office once you know precisely what you want to know.'  He seemed to appreciate the riddle in the last part of this sentence and winked. Chortling softly to himself, he began to walk away.

For some reason, the question slipped out before Blake could prevent it. Immediately he wished the words unsaid, but there they were, out in the open, hovering in the space between them.

'What is Endymion Spring?'

What is Endymion Spring?  The professor wheeled round sharply and stared at the boy, astonished. Evidently, this was not the question he had been expecting.

Blake backed away. For a moment he thought he could detect a glimmer of desire on the man's face — a lean, hungry look that reminded him of the homeless man outside the bookshop. Luckily, this was wiped clean almost instantly and was replaced by a more affectionate expression.

'Who is Endymion Spring?' the man repeated, the name quivering on his lips. A hint of worry still troubled his brow.

Blake nodded.

Jolyon looked around the room apprehensively. 'Now is neither the time nor the place,' he whispered finally, scrunching his hands together and then plunging them deep into the folds of his gown. 'We must talk about him… later.'

With that, he rushed away, although Blake could tell that he was still agitated, since he almost forgot which way to go.

So Endymion Spring was a person and not a season, he thought to himself. He was probably the author of the book, then and not the title. But how could anyone be the author of a blank book?

There was only one way to find out. Blake would have to go to the library, find the volume and figure out its riddle. It was now or never.

Checking to make sure that no one was watching, he moved towards the door. Just before he slipped out, he glanced at the plate of Turkish delight.

No one, it seemed, had touched it.

6

It was colder outside than Blake had expected. After the warm glow of the Master's Lodgings the air felt chilly, almost like winter, and he hugged himself to keep warm.

Moonlight dusted the college paths and he stumbled clumsily, trying to negotiate his way in the silver-dark. Shadows clustered all around him. He didn't want to switch on his torch until he was safely concealed inside the library, just in case he got in trouble for sneaking out on his own.

The cloisters loomed ahead and he hurried towards them.

As he passed down the first dark-beamed passageway, he stopped. It was like a doubt tapping him on the back, making him turn round. Someone was following him.

He stood perfectly still, listening carefully.

Nothing. Not a whisper.

Then, peering stealthily around a column, he checked the doorway of the Old Library on the opposite side of the garden. Only the faint toothlike striations in the stone were visible, taking a bite out of the night. Otherwise, there was nothing. No one was there. It must have been his imagination.

He carried on. Stairwells climbed into the darkness around him, while footsteps — his own — scratched the paving stones and rebounded off the walls, pursuing him as echoes. He started walking faster.

Reaching the next courtyard, he took a moment to steady himself. Buildings that were familiar in the daytime were now unrecognizable shadows. Trees shivered:  black, batlike rustlings. His heart was beating fast.

Spotting the library, a wall of darkness in the distance, he ran towards it.

As his feet tripped up the steps, he saw the illuminated keypad by the door, its numbers lit up like eyes. The college no longer used keys for the main buildings, but had installed a high-tech entry-code system instead. Rather foolishly, he thought, the code was the same for each building, since the students and absentminded professors couldn't remember more than one number. In any case, he was lucky, since his mother had made him memorize the sequence so that he and Duck could get in and out of the library on their own.

He entered the number — 6305XZ — and heard the door click open. With a sigh of relief, he slipped inside.

The library, as he had imagined, was totally dark.

The first thing he heard was the sound of the clock ticking softly. It reminded him of a slow, rhythmic heartbeat. He relaxed.

Dimming his torch so that it would not shine through any of the windows, he swept the beam across the hall.

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