A moment later he had scrambled underneath and into the room, which was, as he'd guessed, a scullery, with sinks for washing and racks for drying crockery. After the darkness of the drain, his eyes welcomed the dim light that let him see everything there. The stream ran across the floor, just like the one at Godstow, in a channel lined with bricks. And, mercy of all mercies, there was a range, slumbering but alight, and above it a rack of warming towels, hanging there to dry after having been washed. He tugged off his sweater and his shirt and wrapped a large towel around his shoulders, huddling near the range, rocking back and forth as the cold gradually left his body.
"I'll never be warm again," said Malcolm. "And if I'm shivering like this, I'll never keep quiet in that nursery looking for Lyra. Are you sure we'll recognize her? Babies are all pretty much the same, en't they?"
"I'll recognize Pan, and he'll recognize me."
"If you say so...We can't stay here for long."
He was thinking of Alice. It must be nerve-racking for her outside on the water, with nowhere to hide. He dragged his shirt and sweater back on, wet as they were, and shivered again violently.
"Come on, then," said Asta. "Oh, look! That box..."
She was a cat now. The box she meant was a wooden thing of the sort that might have contained apples.
"What about...Oh, yeah! Right!"
It was big enough for Lyra. If he lined it with towels, she might stay dry as he pulled her down the drain. He dragged some towels off the rack and laid them inside it, ready for her.
"Let's go, then," he said.
He opened the scullery door and listened. Silence. Then, from high above and some way off, a deep bell rang three times. He tiptoed along the stone corridor, making, he hoped, for the back staircase. There were dim anbaric lamps along the wall, which was otherwise bare and whitewashed, with doors to the left and right.
Then the bell rang again, much louder than before, and he heard a choir singing, as if the door to a chapel or an oratory had opened. He looked around--there was nowhere to hide. The singing got louder still, and then to his horror a line of nuns, hands pressed together and eyes lowered, came around a corner and straight towards him. Evidently, like the Godstow nuns, they got up at all times of the night to sing and pray. He was caught. There was nothing he could do but stand and shiver and lower his head.
Someone stopped in front of him. He kept his head low, so all he could see were her sandaled feet and the hem of her habit.
"Who are you, boy? What are you doing?"
"I wet me bed, miss. Sister. Then I got lost."
He tried to sound sorry for himself, and in truth it wasn't hard. He sniffed and wiped his nose on his sleeve, and the next moment there came a resounding slap on the side of his head that sent him staggering to the wall.
"Filthy brat. Go upstairs to the bathroom and wash yourself. Then take an oilcloth and a fresh blanket from the airing cupboard and go back to bed. We'll discuss your punishment in the morning."
"Sorry, Sister..."
"Stop whining. Do as I tell you, and don't make a noise."
"I dunno where the bathroom--"
"Of course you do. Up the back stairs and along the corridor. Just keep quiet."
"Yes, Sister."
He dragged his feet in the direction she pointed and tried to look contrite.
"Good! Good!" whispered Asta on his shoulder. She had subdued her natural wish to change into something that could bite and threaten, and remained a robin.
" 'S all right for you. It wasn't your head she smacked. The oilcloth'll be useful, though. For the box."
"And the blankets..."
He found the staircase easily enough. It was lit, like everything else he'd seen so far, with a dim anbaric bulb, which made him wonder how they still had power.
"Surely in a flood that would be the first thing to go," he said.
"They must have a generator."
They were barely whispering. At the top of the staircase, a drab corridor stretched out ahead, with rough coconut matting on the floor. The light here was even dimmer. Remembering what the woman in the cave had told them, Malcolm counted the doors: the ones on the left were cells for the nuns, and those on the right were first the two bathrooms and then the nursery.
"Where's the airing cupboard?" he whispered.
"There, between the bathrooms."
He opened the little door and was met with a wave of musty heat. Shelves of thin folded blankets rose above a hot-water tank.
"There's the oilcloths," said Asta.
They lay in rolls on the top shelf. Malcolm took one down, together with a couple of blankets.
"Can't carry any more, not with her as well. This'll be hard as it is."
He closed the cupboard silently, and then, with Asta as a mouse, listened as hard as he could outside the nursery. A light snore, which might have been the nun on duty, a little snuffling and whimpering--no more than that.
"No point in waiting," Malcolm whispered.
He turned the handle, trying to do it silently, but the little noise he made sounded to him like a stick banging a bucket. Nothing to be done about it: he slipped inside and shut the door, and then stood absolutely still, assessing the place.
A long room, with a dim anbaric light at each end. A line of cribs along one wall, and small beds along the other, with an adult's bed at the nearer end, where a nun was sleeping and, as he'd heard from outside, gently snoring.
The floor was drab linoleum, and the walls were bare. He thought of the pretty little nursery the nuns had made for Lyra at Godstow and clenched his fists.
"Concentrate," whispered Asta. "She's in one of these cribs."
There were so many things that could go wrong that Malcolm could scarcely manage to push them all aside in his mind. He tiptoed to the first crib and peered in. Asta was a night bird of some kind, perching on the side and looking down. A large heavy child with black hair. No. They shook their heads.
The next: too small.
The next: the head was too round.
The next: too fair.
The next: too big.
The next-- The nun in the bed behind them groaned and murmured in her sleep. Malcolm stood stock-still and held his breath. After a moment the woman sighed heavily and fell silent again.
"Come on," said Asta.
The next child was the right size and coloring, but she wasn't Lyra. He was surprised: it was easy to tell, after all.
They moved on to the next, and then the door handle turned.
Without thinking, Malcolm darted to the nearest bed against the opposite wall and pulled himself underneath, clutching the blankets and the oilcloth.
Two voices were speaking quietly at the other end of the room, and one was a man's.
Malcolm was already freezing cold, but a shiver took hold of him. Help me stop shivering! he thought desperately, and Asta instantly became a ferret and lay close around his neck.
Footsteps came slowly towards them. The voices continued in a murmur.
"Are you sure about this?" the woman said.
"As sure as I can be. That child is the daughter of Lord Asriel."
"But how did she come to be in a cave in the woods with a lot of poachers and common thieves? It doesn't make sense."
"I don't know how, Sister. We'll never know. By the time we send someone back to interrogate them, they'll have gone. I must say this has been a complete--"
"Keep your voice down, Father."
They both sounded testy.
"Which one is she?" said the priest.
Malcolm lifted his head and watched as the nun led him to the seventh crib from the end.
The priest stood gazing down at the child in the crib. "I'll take her with me in the morning," he said.
"I beg your pardon, Father, but you won't. She is in our care now, and there she will remain. That is the rule of our order."
"My authority outweighs the rule of your order. In any case, I should have thought that the o
ne thing a Sister of Holy Obedience ought to do was obey. I will take this child in the morning, and that is the end of it."
He turned and walked to the end of the room and out the door. One or two of the sleeping children muttered or whimpered in their sleep as he passed, and the nun in the bed at the end gave a soft shuddering snore and turned over.
The nun who had come in remained by the crib for a few moments, and then made her way more slowly to the door. Malcolm could see along the length of the room under the beds, and in the dim light from the corridor he saw her sandaled feet under her long habit as she stopped and turned to look back. She stood there for some time, and he thought, Has she seen me? What's she going to do?
But finally she turned and left and shut the door.
Malcolm thought of Alice, faithfully waiting outside in the cold, cut off from any knowledge of what was happening. How lucky he and Lyra were to have her to rely on! But how long could he stay lying here? Not much longer. He was aching with cold.
Slowly, carefully, he pulled himself out from under the bed. Asta was watching all around, cat-formed, ears pricked. When he stood up, she flew to his shoulder as a wren.
"She's gone down the corridor," she whispered. "Come on!"
Malcolm, shivering hard, tiptoed to the seventh crib. He was about to reach down when Asta said, "Stop--"
He stood back and looked around, but she said, "No--look at her!"
The sleeping child had thick black curls.
"That's not Lyra," he said stupidly. "But she said--"
"Look in the other cribs!"
The next one was empty, but the one after that--
"Is this her?"
He was so bewildered now that he couldn't even guess. It looked like Lyra, but the nun had been so sure....
Asta, silent-winged, flew down to the pillow. She bent her head to the little daemon fast asleep around the child's neck and nudged him gently. The child stirred and sighed.
"Is it?" said Malcolm, more urgently.
"Yes. This is Pan. But there's something--I don't know--something not right...."
She lifted the little ferret daemon's head, and it flopped back as soon as she let go.
"They should have woken," said Malcolm.
"They're drugged. I can smell something sweet on her lips."
That would make it easier, at least, he thought.
"Are you absolutely sure it's her?"
"Well, look. Aren't you?"
The light was very dim, but when he peered down close and looked at the child's face, he knew beyond any doubt that this was the Lyra he loved.
"Yes, it's her. Course it is. Well, let's go."
He spread the blankets he was carrying on the floor, and while Asta carefully lifted the sleeping Pan away, he bent and picked up the child, feeling a little surprised at her solidity. She neither stirred nor murmured, but hung in his arms profoundly asleep.
He laid her on the blankets and rolled them around her. Asta, badger-formed now, carried Pan in her mouth, and they made their way silently between the row of cribs and the row of beds, past the sleeping nun at the end of the room, still gently snoring, and opened the door.
Silence. Without waiting a second, Malcolm stepped through and Asta followed, and then they shut the door and tiptoed back towards the stairs.
As they were about to take the first step down, the great bell rang and startled him so, he nearly dropped the clumsy bundle; but it was only telling the time. Nothing happened. They went on down through the kitchen and into the scullery, and found the wooden box where they'd left it.
Malcolm laid Lyra on the table, lined the box with the oilskin, and put the child and blankets inside. Then Asta settled the limp daemon in his place around Lyra's neck, and Malcolm said, "Ready?"
"I'll go first," said Asta.
Malcolm was shivering so hard he thought he'd never be able to hold the box, but he managed to step into the drain, his back to the way out, and pull the box after him. Once they were under the grating, he reached up and set it free from the catch. He couldn't prevent it from falling with a loud clang and wished he'd left it, but there was nothing to be done.
He clambered backwards down the drain, moaning with cold, bashing his head, scraping his knees, slipping, falling on his face, pushing himself up again, into the darkness, until Asta said, "There it is! We're nearly there!"
He could see a faint light gleaming on the wet walls; he could smell fresh air; he could hear the lapping of water.
"Careful--don't go too fast--"
"Is she there?"
"Course she's there. Alice--Alice--come closer...."
"Took your bloody time, didn't you?" came her voice from below. "Here--gimme your foot--thassit--now the other--"
He felt the rock and swing of the canoe underfoot and let his whole weight down into it. Then he didn't know what to do with the box. He was nearly stupid with exhaustion and fear and cold.
"I got it steady--don't hurry," she said. "Just bring it out slow and careful. No hurry. Got the weight? Take your time. Turn round this way. I got it--I got it--and she slept through all this? Lazy little cow. Come here, sweetheart, come to Alice. Here, Mal, sit down and put them blankets round you. For God's sake, get warm. And eat this--here. I kept it from the cave. If you got summing in your belly, it'll warm you up quicker."
She shoved a lump of bread and a piece of cheese into his hands, and he gobbled down a bit at once.
"Gimme the paddle," he mumbled, and with another bit of bread and cheese in his mouth, the blankets around his shoulders, and the paddle in his hand, he pushed away from the walls of the great white priory and brought the faithful canoe out once more onto the flood.
Between bites of the bread and cheese and strokes of the paddle, Malcolm told Alice everything that had happened.
"So the priest wanted to take her away," she said, "and the nun showed him the wrong child? D'you think she just didn't know herself which was the right one?"
"No, I think she knew, all right. She was trying to trick him, and it would have worked. Well, it might still work--for a while, anyway. Till he finds out it wasn't Lyra. And the nuns find out that the real Lyra's missing."
"But how could he know it was Lord Asriel's kid who was there in the first place?"
"It must have been Andrew. I had to use our real names 'cause Mr. Boatwright knows who we are, but I should have called Lyra something else. There can't be many Lyras in the world."
"You can't help that. I trusted 'em too. Little toe rag."
"But I can't understand what the nuns were going to do with Lyra if the priest had taken the wrong kid. I mean, they wouldn't have been able to keep her hidden forever. Maybe what she was going to do would have been even worse'n what he was going to do."
"I'd like to see what happens in the morning, though. Pity we can't get 'em all out. Poor little buggers."
He finished the bread and cheese. All he wanted to do was lie down and sleep. He felt on the edge of death with the desire for it, and presently, without his being able to prevent it, his eyes closed.
"Want me to paddle for a bit?" said Alice, waking him up with a start. He nearly dropped the paddle. "You been asleep for a long time."
"No," he said. "I'm all right. But as soon as we find somewhere..."
"Yeah. What about that hill over there?"
She pointed, turning around. A wooded hilltop rose out of the water, a little island all on its own, brightly lit by the lowlying moon. The air was warm, and there was a softness about it, almost a fragrance.
Malcolm steered for it, still more than half asleep, and brought La Belle Sauvage gently alongside the hill, out of the main current, where little swirls and whirlpools made the canoe dance and lurch and bob, until Alice found a branch to hold on to.
"Just a bit further along--look--there's a sort of little beach," she said, and he pushed the paddle into the water and brought the bow of the canoe firmly up onto a patch of grass. The moon shone directly in at it a
nd helped him see a firm branch to tie the painter to, and then he slumped down in the canoe where he was and closed his eyes and fell asleep.
--
He must have slept for hours. When he woke up, it felt like a whole season later because he was warm, and the light through the leaves above was bright and sparkling. Leaves! There couldn't be leaves out, not yet! He blinked and rubbed his eyes, but there they were: leaves, and blossoms too. He had to put his hand up against the brilliance. But the brilliance defeated him: there it was inside his eyes, twisting and scintillating like a...
It was like an old friend now. Certainly it was a sign of something. He lay stiff and aching where he'd dropped, and slowly let his wits come back to him as the spangled ring expanded and drifted closer and closer, until it vanished past the corner of his eye.
Someone was talking nearby. It was Alice, and a woman was responding. The woman's voice was low and sweet. They were discussing babies. Could he hear Lyra's voice as well, burbling her nonsense? It might have been that, or it might have been the lapping of the water, which sounded like a little stream now, not like a great flood. And birdsong! He could hear a blackbird, and sparrows, and a lark, for all the world as though it was already spring.
There was a warm smell--was that coffee? Or toast? Or both? Either was impossible. Both were inconceivable. But there it was, that fragrance, stronger by the minute.
"I think he's woken up," said the woman's voice.
"Richard?" called Alice quickly.
And he was on his guard at once.
He heard her light footsteps, and then felt her hand on his, and he had to open his eyes properly.
"Richard, come and have some coffee," she said. "Coffee! Think of that!"
"Where are we?" he mumbled.
"I dunno, but this lady, she...Come on. Wake up!"
He yawned and stretched and made himself sit up.
"How long have I been asleep?"
"Hours and hours."
"And how's--"
"Ellie?" she cut in. "She's fine. Everything's all right."
"And who--" he whispered.
"This lady, it's her place, that's all," she whispered back. "She's really nice. But..."
He rubbed his eyes and reluctantly pushed himself up out of the canoe. He'd been so deeply asleep that he could remember no dreams, unless the episode at the white priory had been a dream itself, which seemed not unlikely, now that scraps of it came back to him.