How to Live Forever (8 page)

Maybe his grandfather wasn't even ill. Maybe he'd been pretending to set Peter on the journey that had brought him here.

No, it was impossible. There was no way he could be cruel enough to pretend to Peter he was ill, just to make him do something. Surely he and Peter were close enough that the old man could have told him the truth.

Peter felt as if the inside of his head was spinning faster and faster until it would burst open.

It was just all the painkillers Festival's mother had given him, making him think crazy thoughts. His grandfather was the very foundation of his world. If Peter couldn't believe in him one hundred per cent, what could he believe in? He began to feel very alone.

At last sleep too deep for dreams overtook him.

Except there was a dream, though when he thought about it later, Peter wasn't sure if it had been a dream or real. No, real wasn't the right word, because there are dreams that can be as real as being wide awake.

In the quiet hour when only owls are awake, Peter woke up. There was someone in the room.

It was too dark to see anyone, nor did the intruder make any noise, but Peter could sense something else in the room. He held his breath and listened.

Nothing.

And then the voice.

I will see you in the encyclopaedia
, it said, and then it was gone.

Peter called out but there was no one there.

Very early the next morning, while everyone else was still asleep, Festival crept into Peter's room and shook him. She put a finger to her mouth to tell Peter to stay quiet and nodded towards the door. As the two children left the room, Archimedes opened one eye and then went back to sleep. They tiptoed downstairs, opened the door in silence and left.

‘I don't want to tell Mum where we're going,' she explained as they went down to the first level to look for Earshader, ‘otherwise she would try and stop us.'

‘Where's the encyclopaedia?' Peter asked.

‘What encyclopaedia?' said Festival.

‘They didn't say,' said Peter. ‘They just said they would see me in the encyclopaedia.'

‘Who did?'

Peter told Festival about the voice.

‘It was probably just a weird dream,' she said. ‘Probably didn't mean anything.'

‘I suppose,' said Peter.

‘One of our dreams is about an encyclopaedia,' said Festival. ‘Maybe now you're here, you're going to start having our dreams.'

‘What's the dream about?'

‘Well, it's like you're in a long deep canyon, but instead of rocks the walls are made of massive books, thousands and thousands of them that are the biggest encyclopaedia ever created, fifty million times bigger than the Encyclopaedia Britannica. And you walk down the bottom of the canyon, along the river, trying to find the book that's got a special word in it, and you can never find it, and the canyon goes on and on forever, and you never reach the letter you're looking for, and –'

‘No, it wasn't like that,' said Peter. ‘It was just a voice. That's all.'

As they went down to the next level, Festival pointed towards the middle of the circular lake, where a forest of clouds hung over the water, and
said, ‘The Ancient Child is supposed to live out there. That's the island.'

‘Well, hasn't anyone been to see?' said Peter.

‘No. No one will go near the island. It's haunted. I mean, look, you can't even see it.'

‘The clouds must go away sometimes.'

‘No. They just go round and round in a circle,' said Festival. ‘Boats that go in are supposed to never come out again. Some people say there isn't even an island there, just the clouds.'

‘Yes, there is,' said Peter. ‘When I got here, I saw it.'

‘Really? Wow,' said Festival. ‘You're the only person I know who's ever seen it. Maybe you were meant to see it.'

‘What?' said Peter.

‘You know, maybe you were meant to see it, because you have to go there,' said Festival.

Festival had grown up with the fear of the forest of clouds in the middle of the lake. As Peter's Caretaker, she couldn't refuse to go there with him, but she hoped they wouldn't be able to find Earshader, or if they did, that he would refuse to take them. But she knew that if that happened, Peter would simply wait until dark and steal a boat.

Peter went down the iron steps to the next gallery and Festival followed him. The top of the morning mist hung round their feet as they
walked to the next staircase and down to water level.

Round the bottom gallery, the books were frayed and peeling, the result of years of exposure to the damp air that rose from the lake. The gold ink had disappeared from the embossed spines, the leather grown faded and green with mould. The windows were dull, hidden beneath layers of dust and cobwebs. The people who lived inside the books knew there was no point in cleaning the glass because it would just be dirty again a few days later. It was a clammy place where rumours grew until they became real. The whole level smelt of neglect and decay, yet there was an exciting atmosphere that is always present by the sea. Among the narrow jetties and wharves there was the possibility of the unexpected, the chance of a boat carrying you off to the sort of place you only ever read about in books.

Along the edge of the water were rows of wooden boathouses, looking as if they were on the verge of collapse. The planks were green with mould. Between each building, a narrow walkway led down to the water, where boats of every shape and size were tied up. Most of the walkways tilted at dangerous angles as the posts that supported them gradually sank deeper into the mud at the bottom of the lake. There was a constant buzz of activity as
boats arrived and left. Boxes of fish were being unloaded. People and parcels loaded. Strange cargoes hidden in canvas were carried into dark warehouses where the doors shut quickly behind them.

People from Festival's level thought the water level was a smelly, damp place, somewhere you only went when you wanted to buy fish, but Peter was enchanted. It looked like the old painting his grandfather had hanging above the fire back in their apartment. Peter had often sat in front of the burning logs on a cold winter's night and looked at it. The flickering flames and the heat always sent him into a beautiful half-asleep place where he could imagine himself inside the painting. The water would appear to move and the smell of the sea would drift into his head. Now he really was inside the picture and it was so similar to the old painting that they had to be the same place. The warm relaxed feeling began to creep over him and he would have happily just wandered about for hours, if Festival hadn't nudged him.

‘What is it?' she said.

‘Nothing,' he said, returning to reality.

Festival could sense a great sadness coming over Peter. It was coming over her too. It was a comforting sadness, a feeling that was dangerous yet bound the two of them together. Maybe sharing their birthdays had something to do with it, some sort of
invisible force that had touched them both at exactly the same second of their birth.

Festival wanted to put her arms round Peter and hold him tight, but she felt too shy.

Everywhere he looked Peter saw people hurrying about their business, their eyes fixed firmly on the ground to avoid the children's faces. They all knew why the two of them were there and didn't want to get involved. Festival stopped some of them but each one shook their head and pointed along the dock.

‘I told you,' she said. ‘No one will go.'

‘Come on, it's just old wives' tales,' said Peter, ‘stupid stories. Grown-ups will believe anything like that. It makes them feel safe.'

‘They're scared. They think it's haunted,' said Festival. ‘They think if they go near the island their boats will sink.'

‘What about Earshader?' said Peter.

‘He's supposed to be along at the end on the last jetty,' said Festival, hoping the old man wouldn't be there.

But he was.

At the end of the last jetty, he was sitting on a wooden chair smoking a pipe with Archimedes curled up on his lap. He seemed to be staring out across the water, but if he really was deaf, dumb and
blind, he would be seeing nothing except old memories inside his head. Beside him, his boat sat silent and empty, looking frail enough to fall apart and sink below the slightest wave.

During his explorations of the museum's hidden places, Peter had grown used to Archimedes popping up in unexpected places. It had always been like that, right from when he had been little, so seeing the cat now came as no surprise to Peter, though Festival looked very surprised to see him.

‘Will you take us to the island?' she said.

The old man said nothing. He seemed quite unaware that the two children were there. Festival waved her hand in front of his face, but he was unaware of that too.

‘It's true then,' she said. ‘He is deaf, dumb and blind.'

‘So how do we speak to him?'

‘Like this,' said Festival.

She lifted the old man's hand, opened his fingers and began writing in his palm. Earshader turned his sightless eyes towards them and nodded. From the expression on his face, Peter felt Earshader had been expecting them. The old man stood up, carrying Archimedes in his arms, and without missing a step led them onto his boat. He untied the ropes, and as they drifted away from the dock, he raised the sail.
He wet his finger, held it up in the air and steered the boat towards the clouds.

‘How does he know where to go?' said Peter.

‘I suppose he can sense where it is,' said Festival. ‘They say he was born there, the only person anyone knows who was, so I suppose it's imprinted on his soul.'

‘Like salmon swimming thousands of miles across the ocean back to the same creek where they were born,' said Peter.

‘Yes, exactly,' said Festival.

A lazy breeze lifted the sail and they began to drift towards the island.

At first the children sat silently side by side in the front of the boat, neither of them knowing what to say and each deep in their own thoughts. Peter kept seeing his grandfather sitting white-faced on the kitchen floor holding his chest and looking scared. Staying inside the library forever was just not an option. He had to find his way back and he had to help his grandfather.

‘How's your hand?' said Festival.

‘It's like a dull throbbing,' said Peter.

‘It's not bleeding anymore though, is it?'

‘No,' said Peter. ‘I suppose it could have been worse.'

‘I suppose.'

‘I mean, if it had been my thumb, I wouldn't be able to pick things up properly.'

‘Yes,' said Festival. ‘It could have been worse.'

She moved closer to Peter and took his bandaged hand in hers.

‘Sorry,' she said quietly.

‘Why?'

‘Well, you know. I shouldn't have taken you up there. I'm probably the worst Caretaker there's ever been.'

‘No you're not,' said Peter.

‘I bet no one else has had their finger bitten off before,' said Festival.

‘That wasn't your fault,' said Peter. ‘We had to go and see Foreclaw.'

‘I suppose.'

‘Anyway, you stopped it bleeding. You know,' Peter said, blushing and looking down at his feet, ‘you saved my life.'

‘Thank you,' said Festival and kissed him on the cheek, which made him blush even more.

They fell silent. Peter felt a long way from the comforts of home. He'd spent all his remembered life in a world of gentle security and none of it was with him here in this old boat drifting slowly across this unreal lake. He felt himself choking up inside. He was glad Festival was there.

‘Tell me about Outside,' she said, seeing Peter's sadness and trying to think of something to take his mind off it.

‘How do you mean?' said Peter, thankful for the distraction.

‘Well in here, you can see the whole world,' said Festival. ‘If you go up to the ninth gallery when the clouds aren't too tall, you can see right across to the other side. I can see the roof and the high windows where the sunshine comes in. It's the whole world. I can see all of it.'

‘But it isn't, though, is it?' said Peter. ‘What about outside the windows? That's outside.'

‘Yes, but that's just the sky, nothing else,' said Festival. ‘It's just like a big blanket over the roof.'

‘No it's not,' said Peter. ‘It goes on forever. The only way you could see all of it would be to go up in a spaceship, and even then you'd only be able to see a bit of it. There would be billions of miles of space all around you.'

‘I'd hate that,' said Festival, ‘not knowing what's there.'

‘But if we didn't have the sky,' said Peter, ‘we would all be dead. The sun's up there and it's where the rain comes from. I mean, how do you get rain in here?'

‘We don't.'

‘You have to,' said Peter. ‘How does the grass grow?'

‘I don't know,' said Festival. ‘Every morning when we wake up, the grass is wet.'

‘So it must rain.'

‘I thought the grass sort of sweated in the night.'

Peter gave her a sideways look. The idea was so ridiculous, he thought she was teasing him to try and cheer him up, but if she was it didn't show on her face.

‘And what about the museum?' she said. ‘Tell me about that.'

He told her how the museum made him feel secure the same way the library did for her. They both had boundaries you could see.

‘It makes you feel safe,' he said. ‘Even when I go into the corridors and all the storerooms, and the boundaries seem to go on and on, even then I know I'm still inside my own world.'

‘I wouldn't want to live on the Outside,' said Festival.

‘But it's got a kind of magic too,' said Peter. ‘Because there's always the chance something wonderful might happen.'

‘Yes, but something terrible could happen too,' said Festival. ‘I'd rather be here, where you can see everything.'

‘Yes,' said Peter, holding up his bandaged hand, ‘but there's bad stuff here too.'

‘But here, we know where it is,' said Festival. ‘You just don't go to the top galleries.'

Peter knew what she meant. His safe world was inside the museum and his upper galleries were the world outside it. Although most of him never wanted to leave his beloved museum, even for an hour, he also knew that out there in the larger world, anything could happen. The museum was safe and secure but sometimes that could take away the chance of magic.

Except that now, more magic than he could ever have imagined was happening right inside the museum.

Then Festival asked him about school, because she had never been. Where she lived, your parents and older brothers and sisters and maybe cousins or people next door taught you everything you needed to know. She found the idea of going to another place with strangers and people you might not even like, to be taught things, very odd. For Peter, of course, it was perfectly normal, though he had to admit, he wasn't as happy at school as he was back in the museum. He liked the idea of staying at home learning everything from your family, except his mother was busy all day, so that only left his grandfather.

‘I haven't got any brothers or sisters,' he said. ‘There's only my mum and grandfather.'