Bartimaeus: The Golem’s Eye by Jonathan Stroud Read Free Book Online Page B

later, her friend Mrs. Hyrnek, who had also been dismissed, got her a job as a cleaner in a printing works, and life resumed its structured course.
    But Kitty didn’t forget.
    Kitty’s parents were avid readers of The Times, which brought daily news of the army’s latest victories. For years, it seemed, the wars had been going well; the Empire’s territories expanded by the season, and the world’s wealth was flowing back into the capital. But this success came at a price, and the paper continually advised all readers to be on the lookout for spies and saboteurs from enemy states, who might be living in ordinary neighborhoods, while all the time quietly working on wicked plots to destabilize the nation.
    “You keep your eyes open, Kitty,” her mother advised. “No one takes heed of a girl like you. You never know, you might see something.”
    “Especially around here,” her father added, sourly. “In Balham.”
    The area where Kitty lived was famous for its Czech community, which was long established. The high street had several little borscht cafes, marked by their thick net curtains and colorful flowerpots on the sills. Tanned old gentlemen with drooping white mustaches played chess and skittles in the streets outside the bars, and many of the local firms were owned by the grandchildren of the émigrés who had come to England back in Gladstone’s time.
    Flourishing though the area was (it contained several important printing firms, including the noted Hyrnek and Sons), its strong European identity drew the constant attention of the Night Police. As she grew older, Kitty became used to witnessing daytime raids, with patrols of gray-uniformed officers breaking down doors and throwing belongings into the street. Sometimes young men were taken away in vans; on other occasions the families were left intact, to piece together the wreckage of their homes. Kitty always found these scenes upsetting, despite her father’s reassurances.
    “The police must maintain a presence,” he insisted. “Keep troublemakers on their toes. Believe me, Kitty, they wouldn’t act without good intelligence on the matter.”
    “But, Dad, those were friends of Mr. Hyrnek.”
    A grunt. “He should pick his pals more carefully then, shouldn’t he?”
    Kitty’s father was in fact always civil to Mr. Hyrnek, whose wife had, after all, gotten Kitty’s mother a new job. The Hyrneks were a prominent local family, whose business was patronized by many magicians. Their printing works occupied a large site close to Kitty’s house, and provided employment for many people of the area. Despite this, the Hyrneks never seemed especially well-off; they lived in a big, sprawling, rundown house set a little back from the road, behind an overgrown garden of long grass and laurel bushes. In time, Kitty came to know it well, thanks to her friendship with Jakob, the youngest of the Hyrnek sons.
    Kitty was tall for her age and growing taller, slender beneath her baggy school jersey and wide-legged trousers, stronger than she looked, too. More than one boy had regretted a facetious comment to her face; Kitty did not waste words when a punch would do. Her hair was dark brown, veering to black, and straight, except at the ends, where it had a tendency to curl in an unruly fashion. She wore it shorter than the other girls, midway down her neck.
    Kitty had dark eyes and heavy black brows. Her face openly reflected her opinions, and since opinions came thick and fast to Kitty, her eyebrows and mouth were in constant motion.
    “Your face is never the same twice,” Jakob had said. “Er—that’s a compliment!” he added hastily, when Kitty glowered at him.
    They sat together in the same classrooms for several years, learning what they could from the mixed bag of disciplines on offer to the common children. Crafts were encouraged, since their futures lay in the factories and workshops of the city; they learned pottery, woodcutting, metalwork, and simple