The Second Forever (9 page)

‘
I
suppose the first thing we should do is try to find your parents,' said Peter when they were back in Foreclaw's apartment, drying off by the fire.

‘Well, our gallery is underwater now,' said Festival. ‘So I'm not sure where they might be.'

‘Don't you have any friends or relations on any of the higher galleries?'

‘I don't think so,' said Festival. ‘No, wait, there is someone. An old uncle. No one ever talked about him.'

‘How do you know about him, then?' said Peter.

‘I found a photo in an old album. It's really weird, because when I was looking through it there were blank spaces. There was only one photo of him in
there, so I always assumed that those bits were where his other pictures had been.'

‘Did it say who he was?'

‘It just said “Palsy”,' said Festival. ‘When I looked it up, I found out it was a disease, a sort of paralysis. I thought that maybe he had died of it, and they'd torn out all his photos to stop from getting so upset.'

‘Did he look ill in the photo?'

‘No, not ill, just creepy,' said Festival. ‘His eyes were sunk really deep in his head and it appeared as though he had fangs. But it was quite blurry, so it was hard to tell.'

‘What did your parents say?' said Peter.

‘They didn't want to talk about him, but they did mention Palsy was his name and he wasn't dead and I wasn't to ask about him ever again. They said he lived up on the dangerous levels and that was the best place for him.'

‘Well, I don't suppose they'll have gone to sleep in his spare room, then,' said Peter.

The first thing they had to do was get down from the top gallery, which the Gold Lady had sealed off from the others. Five years earlier they had let themselves down in a bucket, counterbalancing their descent with fish, so they thought to try that again.

Peter and Festival walked around the gallery to where the big pulley wheel had hung from the roof.
It was still there, but there was no rope.

‘Rotted away in the damp, it did,' said the Gold Lady, who had come up behind them.

‘Is there any other way down?' said Peter.

‘Well, there might be, or there might not be. It all depends.'

‘On what?' asked Festival.

‘On all sorts of things,' said the Gold Lady.

‘Like, what?' asked Peter.

‘How do I know you're not trying to smuggle gold out of here?'

‘Listen,' said Peter, ‘don't start all that stuff again. If we can't get down from here, I won't be able to go home and fetch your other gold, will I?'

‘Ah.'

‘And I'll tell you what,' Peter continued, ‘in the museum, there is a more gold than you could ever imagine. If you help us, I will get you a goblet of solid gold.'

‘No!' said the old woman. She seemed as though she was about to faint. Her legs quivered and she sat down on an old book and put her head between her knees.

‘It's true,' said Peter. ‘And that's barely the tip of it. If we manage to fix the floods with your help, I'm sure we could get you lots more gold as a reward.'

‘Sovereigns?' said the Gold Lady.

‘Yes,' said Peter, ‘and some doubloons too, no doubt.'

‘And some ducats,' Festival added.

‘Oh my goodness,' the old woman cried. ‘In that case I will show you how to get down to the next level. I sealed all the trapdoors, but I knew the day would come when I would want to leave, so I made provisions. After all, there would be no point in buying a big house on Lake Geneva if I could never go and live there. Not only that, but there isn't a single real-estate agent anywhere on this level.'

The Gold Lady led them back to Foreclaw's front door and knocked.

‘He's not there,' said Peter.

‘Oh, we'll just have to wait, then.'

‘He's never going to be there,' said Festival.

‘Don't be silly.'

‘Not only is he never going to be there,' Festival continued, ‘but we can't tell you where he has gone.'

‘It's all right, though,' said Peter. ‘He gave me the key.'

They entered the apartment and the old woman took them through to a small bathroom at the very back. She pointed at the toilet and said, ‘There.'

‘Don't be ridiculous,' said Festival. ‘People can't fit down a toilet.'

The old woman reached out and flushed the toilet,
but instead of water gushing down, the whole lavatory slid aside to reveal a very narrow hole with steel rungs that led into darkness.

‘When you get to the bottom,' the old woman said, ‘pull the lever, and this toilet will slide back into place while another one further down will move away.'

‘Does Foreclaw know about this?' said Peter.

‘Of course he does. Now off you go.'

The two children squeezed into the hole and climbed towards the bottom. Peter pressed the lever and the circle of light above them vanished, while a door beside them opened. They climbed out into a toilet cubicle of a public restroom. Peter opened the door and peered out.

Fortunately the place was deserted, so Peter and Festival left the restroom and walked out into what appeared to be a small hotel. It was in fact several large books that had been made into a luxury hotel many years ago, when the top galleries had been the most stylish place to stay in Festival's world. Now everything was crumbling away, but since the floods had driven people higher and higher, people were living there again. They were doing what they could to tidy up the place, but they were fighting a losing battle.

The hotel lobby was full of people, not guests in a hotel, but homeless people on camp beds. There were
cats and dogs and small children running everywhere – the noise was deafening. No one took any notice of Peter and Festival as they walked across the lobby and out on the gallery. But it was the same thing outside: people packed in everywhere; campfires on the pavements, a world of refugees.

The two children stood on the gallery, trying to decide whether to turn left or right. It was chaotic in both directions.

‘How long have
you
been here?' said a voice from behind them. ‘You're not supposed to be here until next week.'

There were boats out on the lake below, and they too were crammed with people, not going from A to B, but just sitting in the water, drifting backwards and forwards as the currents came and rose slowly over the drowning balconies. Peter leant over the balcony to watch the boats.

The water, almost as flat as glass, reflecting the giant dome far above them, was like a dream. Even with everything that was going on, Peter was entranced by the boats slipping silently across the lake like an old Victorian painting. There was a voice somewhere, but it seemed to come from miles away.

The voice came closer and said, ‘Hey, I said, how long have you been here?'

Peter snapped out of his dream and turned. ‘What?'
he said.

Standing in front of them was a girl of about ten. She had Syracuse in her arms and was tickling her behind the ear. It was Victoria, Peter's second cousin. The last time he had seen her she had been five years old, a skinny little child with the same dark hair and nervous brown eyes that danced around without settling on anything long enough for it to look back at her – like Peter's. Victoria was wearing a white frock, which made her look as if she was going to a party.

‘I'm going to a party,' she said. ‘You're not supposed to be here till next week.'

‘What?' said Peter.

‘You're not supposed to be here till next week, neither of you,' Victoria repeated, ‘not until the full moon.

‘The bat and the Journey Bell have been destroyed,' said Festival. ‘We came through the wall.'

‘Oh, I knew that,' said Victoria in a tone of voice that suggested she hadn't the faintest idea what Festival was talking about.

‘Do you know where my parents are?' said Festival.

Victoria nodded and led them through the crowd until they reached the stairs to the level below. There were fewer people on the far side of the gallery and it wasn't hard to see why. This side was much darker and
more rundown. It still had the same atmosphere from five years earlier when only misfits and criminals had lived there.

Victoria stopped outside a black book and pointed at the door. ‘In there,' she said. ‘I might wait here, or I think I might go home, actually.

‘Yes, I'm going to go home,' she added. ‘And then I'll come back again.'

‘Er, why?' said Festival.

‘I'm supposed to show you where to go,' said the little girl.

‘We already know,' said Festival. ‘I live here.'

‘But he doesn't,' Victoria said, gesturing to Peter. ‘I can show him where to go.'

‘So can I,' said Festival.

‘But, but,' Victoria began, looking as if she was about to burst into tears.

‘It's all right,' said Peter. ‘If anyone says anything, just tell them we said it was okay.'

‘Yes, you just go home to your mummy and tell her we told you to.'

Victoria looked unsure, but after more reassurance she turned and left.

Neither Peter nor Festival wanted to knock on the door. The air here was so damp that drops of condensation were running down the dull black paintwork. There was a small brass plate in the middle of the
panel, half-eaten away with verdigris. It said:

Palsy Fivesaken

‘Palsy,' said Festival. ‘I don't want to go in there.'

Beneath the name, in letters that were so small it was almost impossible to read, were the words:

Nil by door

‘Nil? Who's Nil?' said Festival.

‘It's not a name. It means nothing,' said Peter.

‘Nothing by door?'

‘I suppose it means he doesn't want any visitors,' said Peter.

‘Yes it does,' said a voice behind them.

It was Festival's mother and young brother, Orleans.

‘We kept knocking on the door,' Orleans said, ‘but he just came out, growled at us and told us to go away.'

‘Some family I married into,' said Festival's mother. ‘We're made homeless by the flood and our own relatives won't take us in.'

‘So you're not staying here, then?' said Festival.

‘No, he wouldn't let us in. We knocked and rang and banged and pleaded, but he wouldn't change his
mind.'

‘Don't you have any relatives on your side of the family?' said Peter.

‘No,' said Festival's mother. ‘Well, I say no, but I might have. I was brought up in an orphanage and they didn't know anything about me.'

‘You never told me that, Mother,' said Festival.

‘I was ashamed to.'

‘Being an orphan is nothing to be ashamed about,' said Festival, taking her mother's hand.

‘Of course it isn't,' said Peter. ‘It's not like you did anything wrong.'

‘Did they have any records?' said Festival.

‘No, I was left on the steps in the middle of the night,' said her mother. ‘If it weren't real, it would sound like a corny made-up story.'

‘And there was no note or anything?' said Peter.

‘No, just this.' Festival's mother reached into the top of her dress and pulled out a thin chain with a key on the end. Peter recognised it immediately. He took his chain from underneath his shirt and held one of the keys up to the one Festival's mother was holding. It was a perfect match.

‘The Journey Bell cupboard,' said Festival.

‘No,' said Peter. ‘The one into the . . .' He stopped himself. It was the key that opened the other side of Foreclaw's door, which led up to the hourglass cavern.
As far as he knew, there were only three people alive who were aware of the Hourglasses.

‘The other one,' he said.

‘What does it open?' said Festival's mother.

‘Oh, just a door into an old man's apartment,' Peter said. ‘No, I mean a cupboard in the apartment.'

‘Would he let us stay there?' said Festival's mother.

‘Actually, that's a great idea,' said Peter. ‘I've got the key and he's not there anymore.'

‘But . . .' Festival began.

‘It'll be all right,' said Peter. ‘You know he's not coming back. I think it would be good if we looked after the place.'

‘Where is Father?' Festival asked.

‘Trying to find work,' her mother explained. ‘It's pointless, though. Our home and the bakery are under fifty feet of water, but people still have to eat, so he went to see what he could find.'

‘I think we should look for him and together we should go up to the top floor,' said Peter.

‘You can't get there,' said Festival's mother. ‘And besides, it's not safe.'

‘We know how to,' said Festival, ‘and it's perfectly safe. There's just some crazy lady who's obsessed with gold.'