Amanda Lester and the Pink Sugar Conspiracy

  Chapter 17

  The Secret Room

  Amanda and Nick stood at the top of the steps that led who knew where and looked down. Amanda panned her camera all around the tight space, which was lined with stone. The place really did look like something out of a horror movie. Once you entered you might never return. She felt a shiver ripple through her. What a great opening this would make if she were the type to make horror movies.

  “It’s a very live room, isn’t it?” she said. Her voice echoed round and round.

  Nick’s did too. It sounded spooky. “Yes. Not the best place to be recording audio, but we can improve that in the editing.”

  They crept down the stairs, illuminating more and more of the area as they went. The steps turned and became a coil, so there wasn’t much to see ahead of or behind them. The construction was obviously ancient. Amanda wasn’t sure what kind of stone it was. In L.A. nothing was made out of stone because there were too many earthquake faults in the area. Stone was a dangerous material when the ground wasn’t stable. Nick said it was probably flint.

  The air was surprisingly dry for an underground tunnel in a damp country. She expected to see moss on the walls and water dripping from the ceiling. It wasn’t anything like that. She thought maybe there was a source of dry air somewhere but couldn’t tell for sure.

  Suddenly she stopped, almost tripping Nick, who was close behind her. “Eeeeek!”

  “What do you mean—oh. Look at that.” Ahead of them on the stairs was another gluppy thing, this one much smaller than the first.

  “I don’t like this,” said Amanda. It may have been smaller but it was just as ugly.

  “You’re afraid it’s the planet of the gluppians?” teased Nick.

  She turned around and shone the light and the camera right in his face. “Very funny.”

  “Sorry, but this is extraordinary, isn’t it? Do you suppose they live down here?” He stooped down to examine the blob closely.

  “It’s starting to look like it,” she said. “Wait a minute. There’s more pink stuff here.” A little rosy patch lay next to the small gluppian.

  “So there is. Do you suppose there’s a connection?”

  “Yes, I do. Okay, now I’m really curious.” She stooped down to get a good look too, shining her light right on the thing. It didn’t like the glare and contracted its muscles.

  “Like you weren’t before. Oh, look at that. It doesn’t like your light.”

  “I’m more curious, and that gluppy thing tensing might be significant. Into the evidence locker it goes.”

  “Yes,” he said. “We’ll have the Greek chorus recite an entire verse about the gluppy thing’s light sensitivity. Let’s keep going.”

  But there wasn’t much more staircase to go. Within a few steps they were at the bottom, staring at a heavy wooden door that looked like something out of a gothic romance, or Professor Stegelmeyer’s twisted imagination.

  “Doo doo doo doo,” she said. “What do you suppose is on the other side?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe a gluppy thing colony.”

  “Or a witch’s hideout.” She was really getting into this now. “Let’s see if the door is unlocked.”

  Oddly enough, it was. They pushed it open, but it would only move about a foot.

  “Something’s in the way,” said Amanda, exerting as much force on it as she could. It wouldn’t give.

  “Let me have a look,” said Nick. He took the light from her, held it up, and wedged his head into the opening. “You’re not going to believe this,” he said breathlessly.

  “What, what? Let me see,” she said, trying to stick her head in too.

  “Prepare yourself.” He backed out to make way for her.

  “Is it icky? Are there dead bodies in there?” she said, stopping short. Maybe she shouldn’t look after all.

  “No. No dead bodies.”

  “Here, give it to me,” she said taking the light from him and putting her face to the opening. There before her was indeed a scene out of a horror movie, but not the kind she expected. Behind the door was a large stone room containing bag after bag of the pink substance. And everywhere as far as she could see were icky gluppy things draped over them.

  “They’re eating the pink stuff,” she said. “What’s going on?”

  “For one thing, I think they’re blocking the door,” said Nick, testing it again.

  “Yes,” she said. “That’s why we can’t open it.”

  “If I had to guess I’d say those are some kind of slugs. Whoever left that stuff there wasn’t very careful. They must have gotten in under the door.” Sure enough, there was about an inch and a half of space under the door, more than enough room for a small gluppy thing to get through. “Those things are coming from the garden. I suspect their normal food source has dried up.”

  “Yes,” she said. “Perhaps they live near the garage and the explosion disrupted them. So now the question is, what are they?”

  “Yes. Gluppy things probably isn’t the right term to google them with. We should get a sample.”

  “Ha ha! Not me. And you’re not going to touch those things, are you?”

  “Of course I am.” He reached into his coat pocket.

  “No, they might be poisonous.”

  “I don’t think so,” he said, rummaging around. “England doesn’t have a lot of poisonous animals. No snakes, for example, and no spiders.”

  “Are you kidding me?” she said. No spiders? She couldn’t imagine that. Back home they had tons of them. She was always trying to save them, which her parents didn’t appreciate. If they saw any they’d just step on them. She wondered what Nick would do.

  “Nope. We’re pretty clean here.”

  “All right, but please be careful.”

  “I’ve got my evidence bags,” he said, pulling one out of his pocket. “I’ll just scoop up a little one.” He opened the bag.

  “I don’t think there are any little ones.” There were, actually. They looked like oysters or something, but even uglier.

  Nick produced a handkerchief and reached inside the door. “I’ll just get this . . . there!”

  “Oh yuck.”

  He held it up. “Not at all. It’s really quite beautiful. Into the bag with you.” He popped the thing into the clear plastic bag. “Uh, do you have a pen?”

  “No camera, no pen. And you tease me about my detective skills.”

  “Sorry. I should be more prepared.”

  She found a bright green felt-tip pen and handed it to him. After he had labeled the bag and she had taken a number of stills, they headed back up the stairs, through the door, and back into the garden. The light hurt her eyes and it felt weird for their voices not to echo.

  “You do realize something,” she said, jiggling her ear.

  “What’s that?”

  “This is where those noises we heard came from. It’s on the other side of the wall and down a level from the ladies’ in the chapel. And I suspect this has something to do with that spot on the wall I saw.”

  “Ah,” said Nick. “A piece of the puzzle filled in.”

  “It couldn’t have been the gluppy things making that noise, though. It must have been the cook putting the bags in there. Which reminds me, we still don’t know what the pink stuff is.”

  “No, but I think it’s time we found out. This thing in the bag has got some on it. We should go to the lab.”