‘I know,’ said Victor, grimly.
‘-the seats, they’re still-‘
‘I know.’
‘-occupied.’
‘I know.’
All these people – these things who had been people – sitting in rows. It’s as though they were watching a click.
He’d almost reached it now. It shimmied above him, a rectangle with length and height but no thickness.
Just in front of it, almost underneath the silver screen, a smaller flight of steps led him down into a circular pit half filled with debris. By climbing on to it he could see behind the screen, to where the light was.
It was Ginger. She was standing with one hand held above her head. The torch in it burned like phosphorus.
She was staring up at a body on a slab. It was a giant. Or, at least, something like a giant. It might just have been a suit of armour with a sword laid on top of it, half buried in dust and sand.
‘It’s the thing from the book!’ he hissed. ‘Ye gods, what does she think she’s doing?’
‘I don’t think she’s thinkin’ anythin’,’ said Gaspode.
Ginger half turned and Victor saw her face. She was smiling.
Behind the slab Victor could make out some kind of big, corroded disc. At least it was hanging from the ceiling by proper chains, and not defying gravity in such a disconcerting way.
‘Right,’ he said, ‘I’m going to put a stop to this right now. Ginger!’
His voice boomed back at him from the distant walls. He could hear it bouncing away along caverns and corridors er, er, er. There was a thud of falling rock somewhere far behind him.
‘Keep it quiet!’ said Gaspode. ‘You’ll have the whole place down on us!’
‘Ginger!’ Victor hissed. ‘It’s me!’
She turned and looked at him, or through him, or into him.
‘Victor,’ she said sweetly. ‘Go away. Far away. Go away now or great harm will befall.’
‘Great harm will befall,’ muttered Gaspode. ‘That’s boding talk, that is.’
‘You don’t know what you’re doing,’ said Victor. ‘You asked me to stop you! Come back. Come back with me now.’
He tried to climb up . . .
. . . and something sank under his foot. There was a faraway gurgling noise, a metallic clonk, and then one watery musical note billowed up around him and echoed around the cavern. He moved his foot hurriedly, but only on to another part of the ledge which sank like the first, producing a different note.
Now there was a scraping sound as well. Victor had been standing in a small sunken pit. Now to his horror he realized that it was rising slowly, to the accompaniment of blaring notes and the whirr and wheeze of ancient machinery. He thrust out his hands and hit a corroded lever, which produced a different chord and then snapped off. Laddie was howling. Victor saw Ginger drop her torch and clap her hands over her ears.
A block of masonry leaned slowly out of the wall and smashed on the seats. Fragments of rock pattered down, and a rumbling counterpoint to the blare suggested that the noise was rearranging the shape of the whole cavern.
And then it died, with a long strangulated gurgle and a final gasp. A series of jerks and creaks indicated that whatever prehistoric machinery had been activated by Victor had given of its all before collapsing.
Silence returned.
Victor eased himself carefully out of the music pit, which was now several feet in the air, and ran over to Ginger. She was on her knees, and sobbing.
‘Come on,’ he said. ‘Let’s get out of here.’
‘Where am I? What’s happening?’
‘I couldn’t even begin to explain.’
The torch was spluttering on the floor. It wasn’t an actinic fire now, it was just a piece of charred and nearly extinguished driftwood. Victor grabbed it and waved it around until a dull yellow flame appeared.
‘Gaspode?’ he snapped.
‘Yeah?’
‘You two dogs lead the way.’
‘Oh, thank you very much.’
Ginger clung to him as they lurched back up the aisle. Despite the incipient terror, Victor had to admit that it was a very pleasant sensation. He looked around at the occasional occupants of the seats and shuddered.
‘It looks as though they died watching a click,’ he said. ‘Yeah. A comedy,’ said Gaspode, trotting ahead of him.
‘Why do you say that?’
‘They’re all grinnin’.’
‘Gaspode!’
‘Well, you’ve got to look on the bright side, haven’t you?’ sneered the dog. ‘Can’t go around bein’ miserable jus’ because you’re in some lost underground tomb with a mad cat lover an’ a torch that’s goin’ to go out any minute-‘
‘Keep going! Keep going!’
They half-fell, half ran down the steps, skidded unpleasantly on the seaweed at the bottom, and headed for the little archway that led to the wonderful prospect of living air and bright daylight. The torch was beginning to scorch Victor’s hand. He let it go. At least there had been no problems in the passage; if they kept to one wall and didn’t do anything stupid they couldn’t help but reach the door. And it must be dawn by now, which meant that it shouldn’t be long before they could see the light.
Victor straightened up. This was pretty heroic, really. There hadn’t been any monsters to fight, but probably even monsters would have rotted away centuries ago. Of course it had been creepy, but really it was only, well, archaeology. Now it was all behind him it didn’t seem so bad at all . . .
Laddie, who had been running ahead of them, barked sharply.
‘What’s he saying?’ said Victor.
‘He’s saying’, said Gaspode, ‘that the tunnel’s blocked.’
‘Oh, no!’
‘It was prob’ly your organ recital that did it.’
‘Really blocked?’
Really blocked. Victor crawled over the heap. Several large roof slabs had come down, bringing tons of broken rock with them. He pulled and pushed at one or two pieces, but this produced only further falls.
‘Perhaps there’s another way out?’ he said. ‘Perhaps you dogs could go and-‘
‘Forget it, pal,’ said Gaspode. ‘Anyway, the only other way must be down those steps. They connect with the sea, right? All you have to do is swim down there and hope your lungs hold out.’
Laddie barked.
‘Not you,’ said Gaspode. ‘I wasn’t talking to you. Never volunteer for anything.’
Victor continued his burrowing among the rocks.
‘I don’t know,’ he said, after a while, ‘but it seems to me I can see a bit of light here. What do you think?’
He heard Gaspode scramble over the stones.
‘Could be, could be,’ said the dog grudgingly. ‘Looks like a couple of blocks have wedged up and left a space.’
‘Big enough for someone small to crawl through?’ said Victor encouragingly.
‘I knew you were going to say that,’ said Gaspode.
Victor heard the scrabble of paws on loose rock. Eventually a muffled voice said, ‘It opens up a bit . . . tight squeeze here . . . blimey . . . ‘
There was silence.
‘Gaspode?’ said Victor apprehensively.
‘It’s OK. I’m through. An’ I can see the door.’
‘Great!’
Victor felt the air move and there was a scratching noise. He reached out carefully and his hand met a ferociously hairy body.
‘Laddie’s trying to follow you!’
‘He’s too big. He’ll get stuck!’
There was a canine grunt, a frantic kicking which showered Victor with gravel, and a small bark of triumph.
‘O’corse, he’s a bit skinnier’n me,’ said Gaspode, after a while.
‘Now you two run and fetch help,’ said Victor. ‘Er. We’ll wait here.’
He heard them disappear into the distance. Laddie’s faraway barking indicated that they had reached the outside air.
Victor sat back.
‘Now all we have to do is wait,’ he said.
‘We’re in the hill, aren’t we?’ said Ginger’s voice in the darkness.
‘Yes.’
‘How did we get here?’
‘I followed you.’
‘I told you to stop me.’
‘Yes, but then you tied me up.’
‘I did no such thing!’
‘You tied me up,’ repeated Victor. ‘And then you came here and opened the door and made a torch of some sort and went all the way into that – that place. I dread to think of what you’d have done if I hadn’t woken you up.’
There was a pause.
‘I really did all that?’ said Ginger uncertainly.
‘You really did.’
‘But I don’t remember any of it!’
‘I believe you. But you still did it.’
‘What – what was that place, anyway?’
Victor shifted in the darkness, trying to make himself comfortable.
‘I don’t know,’ he confessed. ‘At first I thought it was a temple. And it looked as though people used it for watching moving pictures.’
‘But it looked hundreds of years old!’
‘Thousands, I expect.’
‘But look, that can’t be right,’ said Ginger, in the small voice of one trying to be reasonable while madness is breaking down the door with a cleaver. ‘The alchemists only got the idea a few months ago.’