“It doesn’t matter,” said Gordon with moxie Amanda had never seen before. Maybe there was hope for the kid yet. “I’m going.”
“Suit yourself,” said David. “Just remember, I told you so.” And with a tsk tsk, he turned and strutted back down the hall with his back so rigid he looked like a robot.
Gordon just stood there and watched him go with no expression whatsoever. Then he turned to Amanda’s group and said, “I’ll catch up with you.” Amanda was stunned. She’d never expected this kind of behavior from Gordon. He had always been such a toady. Maybe the earthquake had released some weird spores that had gone to his head.
“Don’t do us any favors,” said Amphora, opening the door to the basements.
When they’d reached the bottom of the stairs the first order of business was to pick a starting place. Since they had no access to blueprints or maps, they were going to have to feel their way. This was one situation in which Ivy’s sister, Fern, might have been helpful, but to everyone’s astonishment the fifth-year student had explored only a small part of the basements and couldn’t describe anything beyond the first few rooms. Amphora wondered if they should make like Hansel and Gretel and leave breadcrumbs so they’d know where they’d been, but Simon pointed out that that wouldn’t guarantee that they’d seen everything. Ivy did not penalize him for this statement because it wasn’t really arguing. It was a good thing because if she had, he would have argued, and then she would have had to fine him.
Ivy suggested an empirical approach by which she, and they with their artificially enhanced hearing, would listen at walls to see if they could tell whether corridors or spaces lay beyond, then find their entrances by calculating exactly where such means of access would have to be. This approach seemed, if a bit tedious, sensible. Amanda expanded on the suggestion by proposing that they map the basements as they go, an idea Simon heartily endorsed and volunteered for. He’d found a special open source mapping program that would be perfect for the job. However, despite these useful strategies, there was nothing in their plan that identified a logical starting point.
Now they were divided. Reasoning that the farthest reaches of the basements would be the most obscure and therefore the most likely places to hide something, Amanda and Amphora wanted to start with them. Ivy and Simon said that just finding those places would waste time and they’d do better to begin with the closest section and work outward. With no one to break the tie, Editta being off who knew where and Gordon not eligible to vote and by himself anyway, they decided to flip a coin. This solution, however, proved to be more difficult than they realized when no one seemed to have one—until Simon came up with a virtual coin.
With heads signifying the closer rooms and tails the farther, he shook his mobile. The coin flew up in the virtual air, flipped a couple of times, clattered to the virtual ground, and wobbled. Everyone clambered to get a good look. Tails it was, and with their lights in place the kids embarked upon the lengthy process of locating the far portions of the basements.
They soon learned that each section had its own personality in the same way as the rooms the décor gremlins arranged. The area at the bottom of the stairs acted as a foyer, a place to introduce the reaches beyond to the “traveler.” It comprised a capacious space that looked nothing like a basement. Rather, it resembled one of those lovely rotundas you see on college campuses, with a checkered marble floor, stone archways, massive urns, busts of famous detectives, and a ribbed ceiling. The only way in which it didn’t resemble a rotunda was that the ceiling didn’t soar, as there was no place for it to go. If it had risen much higher, it would have invaded the first floor of the building, and that would have impinged on valuable classroom space.
Beyond the foyer lay specialized rooms that contained furniture and props grouped in a manner similar to the way movie studios organize their set decorations. Furniture was laid out as an entire room, such as a living room, office, or restaurant. Hand props took their place on shelves with like items, so that you might find an array of light fixtures, vases, or dog food dishes all in one place. Each room was labeled with a general location, and each shelf, cubby, closet, or other division carried its own designation. Presumably the gremlins maintained an index that let them go straight to the desired item rather than having to browse.
Amanda and Amphora were transfixed. When Amanda came across a set of original Lego blocks, she thought it so rare and important that she had to stop and take a picture. Amphora was finding the draperies and upholstery fabrics tantalizing, and the rest of the kids had to pull her away from one particularly charismatic set of emerald green velvet drapes and a gold-and-green brocade fainting couch. Simon was completely impervious to these attractions until he came across a set of action figures that included a G.I. Joe and a variety of Batmans, or as he kept calling them, Batmen, and then they had to pull him away. Ivy and Nigel were patient with all this messing around, as usual, even though neither of them could enjoy exploring in the same way the others did.
But for all the fun of the stash, as soon as they’d set out Amanda realized she’d made a mistake and should have voted with Simon and Ivy. There were so many twists and turns, and so many false starts and dead ends, that they made little progress for the amount of time they were spending. It seemed that Amphora was realizing the same thing, for she started to grumble that they weren’t getting anywhere. But shortly after the two misguided girls had repented, the group reached a fork in the road, and what a fork it was, for there before them were about a dozen tunnel entrances in a semicircle, ready to receive them. Beyond the entrances they could see rough rock walls.
“Oh great,” said Amphora. “Now what?”
“What is it?” said Ivy.
“There are all these tunnels we could go into and they all look alike,” said Amphora.
“That’s an illusion,” said Simon. “There have to be differences. We just need to pick the most interesting one.” It occurred to Amanda that Editta would have decided the question by counting and then picking the luckiest number. That would have been her definition of “most interesting.”
“Oh, right,” said Amphora. “How silly of me not to know that.”
“Fifty p!” yelled Ivy. “Stop scrabbling. There are things we can do. Give me your money, Amphora. Right now.”
Amphora dug in her pocket and slapped a fifty p coin into Ivy’s palm. She and Simon had both started to carry them, even though they continuously protested that Ivy’s methods, and occasionally her judgments, were unfair.
Nigel looked up at Ivy and whined, as if he wanted to be allowed to choose the opening. “No, Nigel,” she said. “I really don’t think you’ll be able to tell this time.” The dog stopped whining and stared at her. Despite the fact that she couldn’t see his begging, she knew he was doing it and said, “Don’t give me that face. We’re going to have to figure this one out for ourselves.”
Poor Nigel looked so crushed that Amanda knelt down and gave him a big hug. He responded by licking her nose. As she pulled away she caught Simon smiling. She wasn’t sure whether he was laughing at Nigel’s impudence, Amphora’s frustration, or something else. Since he rarely smiled, this was a big deal. Amanda suspected it had something to do with skateboards.
“I have an idea,” said smiling Simon. “Regardless of which tunnels we choose, we’ll do better on skateboards than on our feet. It’s more efficient.”
“Oh right,” said Amanda, giving him a look that was harsher than called for. Maybe Amphora’s rancor had rubbed off on her, although Simon could be oblivious to people’s feelings. “How is Ivy going to skateboard?”
“You’d be surprised,” said Ivy, a remark that itself caught Amanda off guard.
“What do you mean?” said Amanda.
“I’ve skateboarded.” Could Ivy actually be looking smug? No, it wasn’t possible. But she did seem pleased with herself.
“You’ve skateboarded?” Amanda peered at Ivy to see if she was joking. She didn’t se
em to be.
“Sure. Why not?”
“How have you skateboarded?” said Amanda.
“Nigel pulls me,” Ivy said. She rubbed the dog’s ears. Amanda noticed that he seemed to have assumed Ivy’s expression. If she hadn’t been feeling so skeptical she would have found the similarity funny.
“And you didn’t fall over?”
“Nope. He’s a genius. You know that.” Ivy leaned over and planted a big kiss on Nigel’s head. He gazed up at her lovingly and let his long pink tongue dangle out of his mouth. He was a smart dog, and extremely well trained. Perhaps he really could pull Ivy along without killing her.
“If you say so,” said Amanda. “But we don’t know what kinds of surfaces these tunnel floors have. They could be bumpy. Because of the earthquake they might be completely uneven.”
“Let me just try it,” said Simon. “How about a diagnostic ride?”
“I’ll go along with that,” said Amphora, astonishing Amanda until it occurred to her that perhaps her roommate’s motive was to see Simon fall on his face. It was a good thing Ivy wasn’t fining the two of them for what they were thinking.
“Okay,” said Simon. “Let me just run back to the skateboard graveyard and grab something.”
Amanda had her doubts about whether Simon’s idea would work, but she wasn’t about to argue. Ivy might fine her as well, and anyway, Simon was pretty good at assessing risk. He probably knew what he was doing.
Because they really had left breadcrumbs, or rather gingersnap crumbs, behind them, Simon was able to get to the skateboard closet on the third floor and back to the clearing inside of ten minutes. When he rejoined the girls and Nigel, he was carrying the monkey board, which looked a bit worse for wear but seemed to be intact.
“Here I go,” he said, stepping on the board and shoving off into the tunnel entrance closest to him.
Clomp, clomp, whoops went his skateboard. Then came a loud thump thud and the noise stopped. “Oops,” he said, his voice echoing.
Amanda ran to see what had happened. There he was a little way down the rocky tunnel standing on the board, nose to the wall. He looked unhurt, but obviously something hadn’t worked as expected. “Let me try that again,” he said.
Turning the skateboard parallel with the tunnel, he shoved off again. This time Amanda could hear swoosh swoosh swoosh, and then bluck bluck crash. She ran down the tunnel, noting how uneven the floor was, until she came upon Simon, who again had run into the wall. Fortunately he was still unhurt.
“It seems that the surface is kind of bumpy,” he said.
“Ya think?” said Amanda, noting a collection of ruts, potholes, and stumpy bits.
“I think that might qualify as a fifty p fine,” he said.
“I’m not part of that deal,” she said. “But you’re okay and that’s the main thing.”
He brushed himself off and said, “Of course I’m okay. I’ve never fallen off one of these things in my life, and you are part of the deal.”
“No, it’s just you and Amphora, and how many times have you ridden them?” Amanda said. It was the kind of thing Editta would have come out with.
“Billions. Seriously, I know what I’m doing. And no, it’s supposed to be all of us.”
“Well, as far as I can see, this isn’t any more efficient than walking. In fact, it’s less so. And forget it. I’m not playing.”
“Agreed,” he said pleasantly. “I’ll have to make some adjustments. Okay, I’ll let you off this time.”
“Not right now, I hope,” she said. “And thank you, oh great and powerful wizard.”
“‘Course not. I’ll do it tonight. It will be awesome. You’ll see. You can try one too if you want. You’re welcome.”
Just then Amanda heard Amphora yell, “Go away.” Then she heard, “I won’t bother you. I just want to see the tunnels.” It was Gordon. “Go that way,” she heard Amphora say. “Fine,” said Gordon. She could hear the sound of Gordon’s feet stomping away.
Amanda and Simon trudged back to the clearing, the roof of which had been carefully painted to look like blue sky graced by a few fluffy white clouds. Amanda thought it looked very L.A. “What was that about?” said Simon.
“Gordon,” said Amphora. “He wanted to come with us.”
“No he didn’t,” said Ivy. “He was perfectly content to be on his own.”
“How can you believe a guy like that?” said Amphora. “You’re too nice.”
“It’s not a question of believing what he says. I can tell what he’s thinking by the tone of his voice. He meant it.”
“Oh, right,” said Amphora. “When are you going to give that talk on audio observation? I really need that.”
“I think we could all use some tips,” said Amanda.
“It’s almost ready,” said Ivy. “But I can tell you right now how I knew Gordon was telling the truth.”
“Oh?” said Amanda. “How’s that?”
“His voice wasn’t shaking and it didn’t go up high. If he’d been lying his voice wouldn’t have sounded normal.”
“Why didn’t I think of that?” said Amphora.
“You will,” said Ivy.
The regular basements, if you could call them that, benefitted from the gremlins’ influence and felt welcoming, but the tunnels were downright creepy, or at least the one the group had chosen was. It was dark, close, knobby, and twisty, with a plethora of tempting tributaries leading off the sides. Amanda couldn’t stop thinking about what a great movie setting it would make, and Simon was loving it, but Amphora was freaking out and suggesting that they turn back at two-minute intervals. She kept thinking she was hearing weird noises. Ivy told her there was nothing there but them and that she should take her listening device out, to which Amphora replied that she had removed it ages ago and she was still hearing bumps, shuffling, and banshees wailing. Fortunately Simon kept his mouth shut or Ivy would have collected enough money for them to go out to dinner.
Soon they began to see drawers in some of the walls. These looked kind of like those safe deposit boxes you see in bank vaults. They were about the same size and of similar arrangement. Each one had two locks, just like in the bank. The kids wondered if any of them might contain the whatsit. (What a hunt for a needle in a haystack that would be!) When they had passed hundreds of the things in the tunnel, they came upon various clearings and grottoes that were studded with them. A few of these had collapsed, and despite the danger of falling rock the kids were excited about the prospect of exploring them. It looked like they had pieces of paper inside.
“I wouldn’t go in there,” said Amphora at one ruined clearing. “It’s too dangerous.”
“It’ll be okay,” said Amanda. “If we could make it through the exploded garage we can do this.”
“Not the same,” said Amphora. “There could be another aftershock.”
“Yes, but we’ll be in and out in a flash,” said Simon. Amanda thought he sounded like he believed he was some kind of superhero, but she had to agree with his logic. The odds of something falling on them in the two minutes they’d be there were minuscule.
“Whatever you guys think is fine with me,” said Ivy.
“Let’s go,” said Simon.
He and Amanda stepped carefully into the collapsed grotto in front of them, took out their phones, and started snapping away. Taking pictures rather than reading the pieces of paper on the spot seemed like a productive use of their time and would allow the others to see the findings too. Amphora kept protesting that there had to be creepy crawly things in there, but neither Amanda nor Simon paid any attention to her. They were so absorbed in what they were doing that they wouldn’t have noticed a skeleton tapping them on the shoulder.
“Time,” said Amphora suddenly.
Amanda slued around to face her. “Not yet.” She turned back to the compartments and kept clicking.
“Yep. Two minutes.”
“Thirty seconds,” said Simon. “Hang on.” He snapped madly,
each click coming closer and closer to the previous one. “Ouch! My finger slipped. Hang on.”
Amphora tapped her foot, which made a weird uneven rhythm with the clicking of the two cameras. Tap, click, click, click, tap, tap, click, tap, click click. After ten seconds she said, “Time.” Click, click.
“It is not,” said Ivy. “Let them work.” Click, click, click.
“Is too,” said Amphora. Click.
“You’re distracting them,” said Ivy. Click, click, click.
“Time,” said Amphora. Tap, click, click.
“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” said Amanda. “Be quiet. We’ll be there in a second.” Click, click.
“Three seconds,” said Amphora. Tap, tap, click, click, tap.
“Please,” said Ivy. Click, click.
“It’s dangerous,” hissed Amphora. “How would you feel if they were killed?” Click, click, click.
“They’re not going to be killed,” said Ivy. Click, click.
“You don’t know that.” Click.
Suddenly Simon and Amanda were standing next to the two girls with broad smiles on their faces. “We got ‘em,” said Amanda. “Let’s go.”
Amphora gave them a pout, faced toward the tunnel, and continued to walk. When they didn’t follow, she turned around and said, “Are you coming?”
After what seemed like a long time, the kids reached the farthest end of the tunnel, which opened onto the lake. This was not the famous Lake Windermere, but the smaller Lake Enchanto, which was every bit as beautiful but more intimate. Wild peacocks lived around the edges and their calls could be heard at all hours. Amanda had even seen some peachicks on campus. They had the silliest expressions on their faces and they made her laugh.
Between the tunnel and the lake lay three gates one after the other. The middle one was damaged, probably in the earthquake from what they gathered. When the kids looked through, they could see a hidden cove that housed a small dock with a couple of small boats bearing the names Bacon and Eggs tied to it.
Now they faced a dilemma. They had to let Professor Thrillkill know that the gates were no longer secure, but they didn’t want him to know they’d been there. If he found out that they’d wandered around in the basements, he’d want to know why, and then they’d have to tell him that they knew about the whatsit, and who knew where that might land them? However the lack of security was a serious problem. If any of the entrances to the school were to be penetrable, criminals could walk right in.