Read Online Garden of Evil by Graham Masterton - Free Book Online

wide, in the same way that he had been standing under the eucalyptus trees. His eyes were bright and unfocused, as if he were staring into the distance, and he was smiling a beatific smile. In his white shirt and white pants and sandals, he looked almost like Jesus.
    Jim was about to tell him to find a place to sit down when the African-American girl clasped her hands together as if she were praying and lowered her head until it almost touched the workbench in front of her. Then, one after another, the remaining students did the same, even Rebecca Teitelbaum, as if they were all paying homage.
    Jim stared at all of his students in disbelief. Then he turned back to Simon Silence to ask him if he knew what the hell this meant.
    For a fraction of a second – and it was so quick that he couldn’t be sure that it wasn’t an optical illusion – he thought that Simon Silence’s sandaled feet were actually
floating
about a half inch above the floor. But then Simon Silence looked at him, and took a step forward, and said, ‘Mr Rook – I’m so sorry I’m late. I had to have a word with my father.’
    Jim turned back to the rest of the class. They were all sitting up now, or slouching, or leaning back in their chairs and chewing gum, as if nothing had happened.
    â€˜Not the
last
word,’ Simon Silence added, still smiling. ‘It’s not quite time for the last word yet. But it will be soon. Sooner than you think.’
    With that, he lifted his white sack off his shoulder, reached inside it and produced another pink-and-green apple.
    â€˜This is for you, sir. Paradise.’

SIX
    F or a moment, Jim didn’t know if he ought to accept the apple or not. But Simon Silence continued to hold it out to him, with that strange radiant look on his face, and Jim thought:
it’s only an apple, for Christ’s sake.
And besides, he was really interested to find out if it had that same sweet-and-sour taste as the apple that he had eaten yesterday, and what it was that taste brought to mind.
    A woman talking, a warm wind blowing. A calliope playing someplace far, far away. And for some reason, a feeling of infinite regret – regret for something that he should have done, but never had.
    â€˜OK, Simon, thanks,’ he said, taking the apple and placing it on his desk. ‘Now, why don’t you find yourself a seat so that we can get on with what we all came here to learn – English for people who are not too good at it?’
    Simon Silence made his way to the third bench back. The Hispanic boy who was sitting on the end immediately stood up so that he could make his way to the middle of the bench.
Almost the geopolitical center of the classroom
, thought Jim. All the other students turned around as Simon Silence sat down and opened up his sack, and he gave a benign smile to each of them in turn.
    Jim said, loudly, ‘Any of you people want to tell me what all that kowtowing was all about, when Mr Silence here came into the room?’
    Simon Silence was setting out a neat row of different-colored felt-tip pens. ‘It was not “kowtowing”, sir. They were simply showing their friendship and respect.’
    â€˜This isn’t downtown Kyoto, Simon. This is West Hollywood. In West Hollywood, we show friendship and respect by shaking hands, or punching fists, or high fiving. We don’t
bow
to each other, OK?’
    Simon Silence gave an almost imperceptible shrug, ‘My father said that if a person is a living representative of a higher power, sir, then there is nothing demeaning in bowing one’s head. You are bowing to the higher power, not to the person himself.’
    â€˜Oh, I see. So you think that you’re the living representative of a higher power? And which higher power would
that
be, exactly?’
    Simon Silence looked around at his fellow students. They were all smiling back at him. ‘Yesterday I talked to almost all of my new