Keats Alice - The Bell Tower Of St. Barnabas, mm

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The Bell Tower of St. Barnabas |
Alice Keats
2
Chapter 1
Caleb and the Prince
C
ALEB
peered out through the window next to his desk, his
gaze alighting on the impressive stone bell tower that stood
halfway
across
the
campus.
Come
on
,
he
thought,
concentrating on the bronze mass,
ring already
.
He’d spent the entirety of World History class willing the
bell to move, and as of yet his mental exertions had yielded
no results. He let his gaze wander back into the room. Two
seats in front of him he saw Jinx, a rather small-built boy
with big, doe-like eyes and orange-tinted brown hair held out
of his eyes with a little girl’s hair clip, also staring vacantly
out the window. The whole room full of uniformed sixteen-
year-olds, actually, seemed to be falling asleep; Caleb
attributed this to Mr. Abbeforth’s droning voice, which he
had more than once considered recording for the sole
purpose of staving off insomnia. Only one head among the
bobbing and drooping masses seemed to be paying any kind
of attention, a curly, golden-blond one sitting in the very
front. Caleb smirked. Of course
he
would be the only one
able to keep his eyes from glazing over, listening to the
teacher most students swore was deliberately trying to
sound like Ben Stein. He was the D.A.R.damn average
raiserin every single class he took. He’d been making Caleb
look bad since kindergarten.
The Bell Tower of St. Barnabas |
Alice Keats
3
Before he realized it, the lulling sound of Mr. Abbeforth’s
lecture was weighing Caleb’s eyelids down again, and he
hastily returned his attention to the window. The campus
stretched beneath him, a sprawling labyrinth of stone,
whitewash, brown winter lawns, and evergreens. Despite the
impressiveness of the scenery, owing to the courtyard’s
presence just outside that particular building, Caleb felt his
gaze migrating back toward the bell.
Can’t be much longer
now,
he repeated in his head.
Ring, damn you!
As if on commandthough that was impossible, since
his last several thousand commands hadn’t had any effect
the bell started to swing, filling the school campus with its
solemn echo and signaling the end of the class period. An
audible wave of relief swept the classroom as Mr. Abbeforth
stopped abruptly and issued a final “We’ll continue this next
week.”
Caleb crammed his books into his overstuffed
messenger bag as Jinx stretched noisily and turned around
to him, shooing the boy at the desk between them out of the
way. “Finally!” Jinx yawned. “Lunch!”
“I didn’t hear a word of that lecture,” Caleb said by way
of reply. “Whose bright idea was it to put the most boring
teacher in the school teaching in the hour that always seems
to go the longest, regardless?”
“That’s nothing to be proud ofyou can’t rely on my
notes forever, Caleb,” said another voice as its owner
approached them. Caleb turned his head, but he knew who
it was without looking. Tall, handsome, and brilliant, with
gorgeous blue eyes and stunning shoulder-length curls of
golden blond
The Bell Tower of St. Barnabas |
Alice Keats
4
“Hey, Gabe.” Caleb nodded at Gabriel, who was
probably the single most popular guy in the school and,
oddly enough, Caleb’s childhood friend. They’d grown up as
next-door neighbors, and, while Gabriel wasn’t the timid,
girl-faced crybaby he once was, Caleb never could get used
to the fact that the kid he’d always had to fight off bullies for
had grown bigger than he had.
Gabriel frowned, though the boy before him was
immune to his displeasure. “Did you hear me, Caleb?”
“Yeah, yeah.” He swung his bag over his shoulder.
“You’re pontificating again.”
Jinx turned to him with a blank look in his eyes. He
clearly didn’t understand the larger word in Caleb’s
sentence.
“We off to the cafeteria, or what?” Caleb prodded.
The thought of lunch brought the light back into Jinx’s
eyes, like it always did. “I’ll go get Elliottsave us seats!”
And he dashed off.
“Come on,” said Caleb.
Gabriel followed him out the door and they strode down
the sunlit hall together. There was no denying the two of
them attracted a lot of staresprimarily femalewhenever
they were together, which was most of the time. Gabriel was
the model student, walking with perfect posture and wearing
the school uniform immaculately, from the white collared
shirt and navy-blue blazer with the St. Barnabas Academy
coat of arms emblazoned on the jacket pocket to the black
slacks and carefully shined shoes. His curls caught the
sunlight and his fair skin shone flawlessly as he carried
himself wherever he was headed like a young prince, exactly
The Bell Tower of St. Barnabas |
Alice Keats
5
as he was raised to be. Next to him, Caleb, who hadn’t quite
managed to match Gabriel’s height but wasn’t about to let
anyone figure out this bothered him, strutted along
confidently, letting his jacket hang half off his shoulders,
keeping his shirt untucked at the bottom and sloppily
unbuttoned at the top, and not even bothering to tighten or
straighten his tie. He seemed almost the opposite of Gabriel,
his wild black hair spiking out every which way and his dark
eyes promising mischief, but even though Gabriel had the
bearing of a gentleman while Caleb grinned and clomped
along like a born rebel, not every feminine eye that stopped
to watch the unlikely duo was fixed solely on the school
prince.
The cafeteria was in another building, but their usual
table was still open when they got there. They had a bit of a
reputation that kept people from snatching it; no girl could
tell Gabriel no, and few boys particularly cared to argue with
Caleb, who, according to rumor, had been sent to St.
Barnabas to shape him up because his parents couldn’t deal
with his delinquent tendencies and excessive violence
anymore. Caleb, blissfully unaware of the extent of his bad
reputation, just thought they were lucky they didn’t have to
fight anyone for a spot and chose to leave it at that.
Jinx arrived a little while later, breathless and dragging
Elliott along behind him. Elliott was the tallest of the lot by
far, which made him cut an even stranger picture next to
Jinx, who was tiny. He had light-brown hair so colorless it
looked almost gray, ice-blue eyes that faded into the whites,
and perpetually wore an expression that could best be
described as disinterest, boredom, tolerance, or some
combination of the three. He was bright, at least, no matter
what his constant heavy-lidded stare made it seem, and
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