The Grandest Bookshop in the World

by Mellor, Amelia

  As they helped Eddie limp into the Tea Salon, Pearl was pleased to see that the cafe was as busy as usual. But her relief was quick to fade. The Symphonion was slow, sounding less like a beautiful modern music machine and more like the plinking threat of ‘Pop Goes the Weasel’ played on a jack-in-the-box. The magnificent paintings on the walls – ancient Chinese emperors, maharajahs hunting on elephant-back – seemed flat and amateurish, and the paint was cracking. The customers gave off an air of dissatisfaction. They looked as if they’d expected the Tea Salon to be brighter, the food sweeter, the tea stronger and the staff quicker.

  Mr Pyke pulled a chair out for Eddie, and picked up two water jugs – one full, one empty – from a nearby sideboard. ‘Hold out your hand.’

  Eddie eased himself down, taking care not to brush his cane injuries on anything. He propped his elbow on the table and Mr Pyke began to pour water from one jug to the other, over his burned hand. Eddie winced and turned his face away.

  ‘That’s the way. You’ll be all right, mate.’ Mr Pyke cast about for a staff member, but all the waitresses had disappeared. ‘Pearl, go and ask Mr Yang for that first-aid kit.’

  Unable to recall where the kitchen was, Pearl looked around. She spotted a doorframe hidden behind a painted silk screen and headed towards it.

  Vally slung the satchel down on one of the chairs and jogged up behind her. ‘That’s the way to the toilets,’ he murmured, nudging her to turn towards the saloon doors on the neighbouring wall.

  ‘Thanks.’ They weaved between empty tables. ‘Vally, I’ve just realised we didn’t get a bouquet.’

  He shrugged. ‘Maybe we won’t this time. Some simple instructions would make a nice change. There’s a Whipping Machine – destroy it. Go to Wonder Land.’

  ‘Display a dozen in three rows of five.’

  ‘When did we do that?’

  ‘Lolly Land.’

  Vally pushed open the saloon doors to the kitchen. The cook, Yang Tao, was cutting strawberries with his back to them, bent over his chopping board. ‘Point is, I wish we had some proper rules to go on. Something concrete. And why do they all have to rhyme?’

  Pearl gave him a mischievous look. ‘You don’t want things to rhyme all the time?’

  ‘It’s a crime to rhyme,’ said Vally, picking up on the joke. ‘Maybe next time, we could … see a mime.’

  It was comforting to hear something as normal as her brother being silly. It made a little bubble around the two of them, in which they were not fighting to save their father, but simply enjoying Cole’s Book Arcade on a Saturday. ‘Eating a lime?’

  ‘Covered in slime.’

  ‘What a shame, Valentine.’

  Pearl froze. That was not Mr Yang’s voice.

  The cook straightened – and kept straightening. He was too tall, too thin, too graceful …

  ‘Maximillian!’ shouted Vally.

  He laughed, spun, struck his heels on the floor in a little jig. The cook’s uniform vanished in a puff of blue smoke, and the Obscurosmith stood before them in his top hat and tails.

  ‘You two!’ he beamed. ‘What bright little buttons you are!’ He tossed his cane to his other hand. ‘I love your strategy. The way you play off each other! Hilarious! Splendid! And as for bringing in the whole family – it’s so nice that young people today are keeping up the fine art of exploiting loopholes. You’ve no idea how entertaining you are to watch.’

  ‘Entertaining?’ said Vally. ‘You made Linda get eaten alive!’

  The Obscurosmith laughed, long and loud.

  ‘You nearly killed us in Wonder Land,’ said Pearl sternly.

  ‘I know! Wasn’t it exciting?’

  ‘Why are you here?’ Vally demanded.

  The Obscurosmith stroked his chin. ‘Why, indeed? Why are any of us born into this crazy world?’

  ‘I’m not talking about the crazy world,’ said Vally. ‘I mean this kitchen, right now.’

  ‘Just wanted to drop in. It’s half-time, you know – or thereabouts.’

  ‘Tell us what you’ve done with Linda,’ said Pearl.

  ‘Shan’t.’

  ‘We agreed you could have three things,’ Pearl said. ‘Pa, and our memories, and …’ What was the other one?

  ‘The Book Arcade,’ Vally said. ‘Linda was never part of the deal. If you cheat, you forfeit, remember?’

  ‘Don’t fret – I won’t keep her,’ said the Obscurosmith. ‘Consider her disqualified, for the time being. And lest you start thinking you can make demands of me, I ought to remind you of something else we agreed. You said we could play any game I like. You gave me the freedom to make the rules, and I can always make things more difficult if you don’t play nicely. Like this.’

  He gave the barrels on his cane two practised flicks. At a gesture, the benches, walls, and Obscurosmith rocketed up to a gigantic size. Pearl looked at Vally and realised with a jolt that they were both shrinking.

  The Obscurosmith loomed over them. ‘Or this,’ he thundered, and tapped a rhythm on the floor.

  At once, Pearl and Vally shot back up to their normal size – but now twelve Obscurosmiths were lounging about the kitchen.

  ‘But why?’ Vally persisted, focusing on what seemed to be the original. ‘Why go to all this effort to get your hands on our Arcade? You could have any shop in the city for your Emporium.’

  ‘I told you,’ said the dozen men in chorus. ‘I like this one. And I have so many ideas for it.’ They began speaking the same sentence one at a time, in little fragments that made Pearl’s head spin. ‘This is a –’

  ‘– nice enough teahouse –’

  ‘– but just imagine –’

  ‘– a place where people could –’

  ‘– quite literally –’

  ‘– drink their troubles away.’

  ‘You’re doing all this just to start your own pub?’ Vally cried.

  ‘No, that’s only part of it,’ said an Obscurosmith who was balancing a kitchen knife on its point.

  ‘To entice the masses,’ said one sitting on the bench.

  His neighbour nodded agreement. ‘And I’d like a smoking room, too.’

  ‘But Pa hates alcohol,’ Vally said, sounding a little plaintive.

  ‘Who said anything about alcohol? Besides.’ A snicker ran around the room, making Pearl feel as if insects were scurrying across her skin. ‘He’ll be dead.’

  ‘Why did you choose our family?’ she asked.

  ‘Because your father loved your sister,’ said an Obscurosmith leaning on the sink.

  ‘That gave me a way in,’ said one of his doubles, who was inspecting a cucumber sandwich.

  ‘An exploitable weakness,’ said a third.

  ‘Right there in his book.’

  ‘Handed to me on a platter.’

  ‘Couldn’t resist.’

  He’d struck a nerve: Vally’s face became pinched with hatred. ‘Pa isn’t weak!’

  ‘Everyone has weaknesses,’ said the dozen Obscurosmiths, and folded up into one being again. They made a soft flapping sound as they came together, like cloth falling in a pile.

  Pearl crossed her arms. ‘Then you must have one, too.’

  ‘Of course,’ said the single Obscurosmith, adjusting his hat. ‘Want to know what it is?’

  Vally regarded him through narrowed eyes. ‘In exchange for …?’

  ‘Your hearing.’

  ‘And be deaf for the rest of our lives?’ said Pearl. ‘That’s a terrible deal.’

  ‘How about one ear each, for a small foible?’

  ‘Forget it.’

  ‘Forget what?’

  Pearl didn’t know. She’d known a moment ago, but now it was gone. She’d forgotten what she was telling him to forget. Hot blood rose to her cheeks. ‘That’s not fair.’

  The Obscurosmith grinned. It was unbridled and gleeful, showing too many teeth. In moments like this, Pearl was the most afraid of him. The nonchalant charm slipped, revealing a glimpse of something manic and
destructive and hungry inside him. When he grinned instead of smirked, when he laughed instead of chuckled, she could see that wild inner thing breaking through. ‘If you wanted fair,’ he said, ‘you should have gone to somebody else.’

  ‘You promised,’ said Vally. ‘At the start of the game. And she’s right. Taking our memories of things that have just happened doesn’t give us a sporting chance at all.’

  ‘You keep using that word,’ said the Obscurosmith, wagging his finger. ‘Take. As if I could pick every little morsel of recollection out of your head like fruit off a tree. Just so you understand the magnitude of what you’ve signed away, the process is more like … a cascade of marbles. I have no more control over which marbles drop into my barrel first than you do. They’re all mixed together. If you lose a memory you just formed, that’s your bad luck. I’m within my rights to comment on my new collection, aren’t I?’

  Pearl studied his face. He was controlling it again, the inner beast hidden behind the dignified mask. ‘You’re lying.’

  ‘I don’t lie.’ For once, the Obscurosmith looked serious. ‘I’ve not lied to you. That’s the beauty of it. That’s the fun of it.’ He leapt effortlessly onto the kitchen bench and strolled across it. ‘Don’t you like to have fun?’

  Vally left a careful pause before answering. ‘I don’t need to hurt people to have fun.’

  ‘Oh, lighten up! I haven’t done anything permanent. Yet.’ The Obscurosmith waved his cane at the two of them. ‘You know, you’ve both been quite rude to me just now. Not good sports at all. I say that deserves a penalty.’

  And he pointed the cane right at Vally’s chest.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  NONSENSE WORDS

  A manic ticking sound came from Vally’s waistcoat pocket. Pearl realised the Obscurosmith hadn’t been aiming for her brother’s heart, but his treasured watch. As Vally drew it out, Pearl leaned over to see. The second hand was no longer flicking meticulously from one mark to the next, but speeding past them.

  ‘You said we would have twenty-eight hours!’ she protested.

  ‘You do,’ said the Obscurosmith, fiddling with the wheels on his cane. ‘The next few will simply pass a little faster.’

  ‘You can’t do that,’ Vally said. ‘An hour is an hour.’

  ‘Is it? Haven’t you ever lost an afternoon in the blink of an eye, or had a school day last eternity?’

  ‘Yes, but –’

  ‘Well, there you have it. But you didn’t come in here to argue with me.’

  Pearl felt, not for the first time, as if he had whisked a chair from under her a moment before she sat on it. She couldn’t recall why they had come into the kitchen.

  ‘I’d hurry if I were you. That was a nasty burn.’

  Vally gasped. ‘Eddie!’

  The Obscurosmith gestured at a low cabinet. ‘You’ll find what you need in that cupboard.’

  It had a bold medical cross carved into the door. Pearl threw the cupboard open. Inside was a yellow and purple posy. ‘Tell us where the thing is!’

  ‘Dear girl,’ said the Obscurosmith, ‘the world is full of things.’

  ‘The thing with the burn cream!’ Pearl said, furious with both him and herself that she couldn’t remember the word. ‘The doctor box!’

  ‘The first-aid kit? Try that one.’ He waved his cane towards a crate of green apples. Then he stepped both feet into an enormous soup pot and dropped into it.

  Vally lifted the pot. The base was solid, as was the table underneath. ‘There’s nothing wrong with the door!’ he called into it, but there was no reply.

  When Pearl and Vally finished digging the first-aid kit out of the apple crate and returned to the Tea Salon, the waitresses were serving as if they’d never left. Tentatively, Pearl pushed one of the swinging doors to the kitchen. Mr Yang was assembling sandwiches, humming along with the discordant Symphonion.

  Eddie was alone when they reached their table. He was using his good hand to pour water over his burn, while he pored over the books from Vally’s bag. He seemed more impressed by the flowers than the medical supplies. ‘You found them!’

  ‘And something else,’ said Vally. ‘He was in there. The Obstin–… Obser–…’

  ‘Obscurosmith,’ said Pearl. ‘You’d better not forget.’

  ‘I haven’t!’ Vally said, overreacting. ‘It’s hard to say, is all. That’s why we took so long – he made us forget what we were doing.’

  ‘Good thing you’ve got me to remember for you.’ Eddie lifted the full jug again.

  ‘You don’t have to do that.’ Vally set the first-aid kit on the spare chair. ‘Let’s see that hand.’

  Pearl, curious to see the wound up close, opened the clips on the box. ‘I’ll do it!’

  Eddie held out the palm of his good hand to stop her. ‘I’d rather not, if it’s all the same to you. Vally’s a bit more … thorough.’

  That was fair. Pearl wasn’t known for doing tasks with care. She started rifling for the required supplies. ‘Where’s Mr Pyke?’

  Eddie pushed Cole’s Funny Picture Book across the table. ‘I convinced him to go back to help with the machine so I could work on figuring this out.’

  ‘Have you?’ asked Pearl eagerly.

  ‘Almost. The first two lines are obvious: the famous rainbows of Cole’s Book Arcade now count its final hours as they fade. That’s been happening the whole time. Same with the next couple of lines. Wondrous rooms, find a test, pass them in a certain order and a given time limit. That time limit is four hours per rainbow stripe – right, Val?’

  ‘It was.’ Vally took out his watch and glanced at the Arcade proper. Pearl followed his line of sight. Already it was past twelve o’clock, and the sky-blue fifth bands of the rainbow signs were fading. He counted under his breath. ‘It took the second hand twenty seconds to go all the way around. That’s three times faster. The rounds were two hundred and forty minutes before, so that’s – oh, no, that’s only eighty minutes.’

  ‘What?!’ said Eddie. ‘Why?’

  ‘We got a penalty,’ said Vally, opening the lid of the burn cream. ‘We weren’t being good sports, apparently.’

  Eighty minutes per round. It was a daunting prospect. Eighty minutes to identify the flowers, figure out their meaning and complete the next challenge.

  ‘Well, that’s still a set limit,’ said Eddie. ‘Avoid the snares that lurk within is a little more vague, but now that we’ve played four rounds, we know that in every challenge, something will try to stop you. But this last line. This is where I get stuck.’ He tapped the violet words. ‘As it began, it ends. It almost sounds like … the game ends where it started. And you begin again.’

  The terrible suggestion hung in the air between them. Pearl looked up, trying to think of some other possible explanation – but the cracks in the ceiling stole her attention. She was sure that a building merely ten years old shouldn’t crack like that.

  ‘We made him promise to put the Arcade back to normal,’ said Vally, with forced optimism. ‘Maybe it’s that.’ He began to wind the bandage around Eddie’s hand.

  ‘Well, I can work on it while you two play the next round.’ Eddie looked over his shoulder and began to clear the books from the table with his good arm. ‘Let’s do the flowers first.’

  It turned out he was making room for the tea he’d ordered while Pearl and Vally were in the kitchen. And what a tea it was: dainty cups edged in gold, fragrant steam unfurling from the teapot, tarts and scones and buns and sandwiches arrayed on a three-tiered cake stand. Pearl sank her teeth into a pillowy bun. It was the perfect mouthful of decadence – butter and sugar, warm spices, plump sultanas. As she washed it down with a sip of jasmine tea, a little shiver of contentment ran through her. She’d been awake since … since dark o’clock in the morning, and hadn’t eaten all day.

  ‘Now hang on,’ said Eddie, picking up the latest bouquet. ‘I’ve seen these before.’ He plucked off one of the rich purple flowers. In the centre of its six
petals were six … six … Pearl would have to call them pollen thingies until she got her memories back. Three of the pollen thingies were short and yellow, but the other three were long and red. Eddie picked out one of the red ones. ‘You can eat them.’

  ‘I wouldn’t if I were you,’ said Vally.

  Eddie stared him dead in the eye and put the red thread in his mouth. Then he pulled a face and reached for his teacup.

  Vally rolled his eyes. ‘What did you expect?’

  ‘Well, it’s not really food,’ Eddie said. ‘It’s a spice. We’ve got some at home. What’s it called?’

  ‘Oh, I know the one,’ Vally said. ‘Really expensive. Dyes things yellow.’ He tapped his finger on the table. ‘Sapphire!’

  Eddie laughed. ‘That’s a jewel.’

  ‘It is?’

  ‘Saffron,’ Eddie said. ‘Got there in the end.’

  Pearl reached for the flower dictionary. Al-mond … car-natt-i-on … hah-zel. She had read plenty of signs and labels outside the Book Arcade, even books on long travels, but it wasn’t enough. ‘Does it have an F or a P-H?’

  ‘The flower isn’t saffron, the flower’s something else,’ Eddie said. ‘Croaker. Something like that.’

  The purple flower was a crocus, which meant happiness or mirth. It felt like an Obscurosmith insult, though Pearl wasn’t sure whether it referred to him laughing at them, or another command to loosen up and enjoy themselves. Her progress through the books was annoyingly slow. She was using Ivy’s picture method again, but it was difficult to identify plants from a drawing, especially since so few were in colour. The names were sounding increasingly foreign and ridiculous. Tansy. Quince. Ranunculus. They reminded her of the nonsense poetry that someone used to recite at family concerts. She closed her eyes and tried to picture the recital, but could only hear a small girl’s voice, steady and proud. On top of the Crumpetty Tree, the Quangle Wangle sat. Who had learned that poem? Was she missing a piece of herself, or one of her sisters?

  It wasn’t long before the Tea Salon was empty. The customers trickled out and the staff, under orders from Mr Pyke, went to help tidy the Arcade proper. Cole’s Book Arcade was closing on what should have been an ordinary weekend – and it might never open again. The thought made Pearl’s teacake turn as dry as plaster in her mouth.