The Hotel Under the Sand

by Kage Baker

  Suddenly the wind came blustering straight at them. It plucked the boat off their shoulders as though it weighed no more than a straw hat, and tumbled it away behind them, end over end, far away across the trackless waste of sand to the edge of the horizon.

  But neither Emma nor Winston noticed.

  They were staring in astonishment at what had appeared before them, rising from where the high dune had been. It was a palace of turrets and spires, verandahs and cupolas, scrollwork and gilded weathervanes. In some places it was five stories tall. It was the most beautiful building Emma had ever seen, and brightly burning lights above the fourth-floor balcony spelled out its name:

  THE GRAND WENLOCKE

  5

  THE GRAND WENLOCKE

  "OH, MY GOSH!” cried Winston. He slid down the bluff to 111 the hotel, so excited he didn’t remember he was a ghost and could fly. “Oh, look at her!”

  Emma slid after him, yelling, “But how can the lights still be on, after all this time?”

  “Who knows? It’s as though no time has passed at all!” cried Winston gleefully. He landed on the great front steps and turned, throwing Emma a snappy salute. “Welcome to the Grand Wenlocke.”

  Emma reached the bottom of the staircase and looked up at him. His eyes sparkled, and he seemed almost solid as a living person. Cautiously, she put her foot on the first step. It was real and solid too. She climbed the steps, staring up in wonder. The rising sun lit the gilded weathervanes, cut glass, and carved eaves.

  “Why hasn’t the wind ever uncovered it before?”

  “I don’t know why,” said Winston. “Unless it had something to do with that fence you put up—perhaps it deflected the wind just right! It must have turned the gusts back on themselves, and dug out the hotel. Thank you, Miss Emma!” Winston bowed and tried to open the big front doors for her, but they would not budge. “What the heck?” he muttered.

  Emma walked along the verandah and peered through a window. She saw a big Victorian lobby, with a marble floor and Turkish carpets, and chairs and sofas covered in fancy brocade. Right on the other side of the window was a vase, lying on its side on a tabletop. Its flowers had spilled out, and she could see some scattered on the carpet below. They were big, white, frilly tulips, white cabbage roses, and white delphiniums. They looked as fresh as though they had been picked that morning.

  Emma rubbed her eyes and looked harder. Was there a faint blue glow, flickering over everything? She leaned closer to see. Her nose touched the windowpane, and she felt a sparking shock.

  “Oh!” She jumped back.

  Winston was still struggling with the doors. “I can’t think why they won’t open,” he said. Very carefully, Emma put out one finger and touched the door handle. There was another spark.

  “There’s electricity all around the walls,” she said.

  Winston slapped his forehead. “Of course! It must be Mr. Wenlocke’s Temporal Delay Field,” he said. “Perhaps it’s gotten stuck and stopped time in there.”

  “Maybe you could walk through the wall and unlock it from the inside,” Emma suggested.

  Winston nodded gamely and tried, but bumped into the solid wall and staggered back. “Well, that won’t work,” he said. “And I’ll bet I know why. That out there—” and he waved a hand at the sea, the sand, and the sky—“is all mist and clouds and confusion. Nothing’s solid. But this place is real! So you and I—oh, dear. I hope you haven’t passed—er…”

  He stopped before he said it, but Emma knew what he had been going to say. For a moment she was scared. Then she remembered that the electric sparks had hurt, and she was pretty sure nothing can hurt you when you’re dead.

  “No, I’m fine,” she said. “Can we fix whatever’s broken so we can get inside?”

  Winston looked around and pointed to the far end of the verandah where there was a big sloping hatch like a cellar door. “The Temporal Difference Engine was under the cellars,” he said, “and I don’t think the Temporal Field went down past the fruit cellar. Mr. Wenlocke wanted the port wines to be able to age properly. So we ought to be able to get that door open.”

  Emma ran down the verandah to the door. There was still some sand on it, which fell inside as she tugged on the handle. She saw that it wasn’t very tightly closed, with only a loose catch that had come unfastened. Stepping back, she opened it wide. Emma peered down steep steps just barely visible under all the sand that had drifted in. “I see some old wooden boxes with bottles in them,” she said.

  “Ah, that would be the port wine,” said Winston, coming to her side.

  “And a lot of machinery,” said Emma.

  There was certainly a lot of machinery. As they slid down the steps into the cellar, they saw enormous gears and springs and brass flywheels, as though the whole hotel were built on top of the insides of a giant clock. But nothing moved, because sand had blown into the works and jammed the tremendous mechanism.

  “Oh, dear,” said Winston, wringing his hands. “I wish I’d been a watchmaker’s assistant, instead of a shoeshine boy.”

  There was a brass plate with writing on it mounted on one of the wheels. Emma brushed sand from it and read aloud:

  “M. M. de L. Wenlocke’s Patented New Advanced Practical Temporal Difference Engine. Self-Winding. Self-Stoking. In The Event of Gears Jamming, Remove Obstruction and Pull Lever to Resume Operation.”

  Emma looked up at a big red lever on the wall, beneath which was another plate that read: LEVER.

  “I think we have to clean out all the sand,” said Emma. She looked around. In one corner were a broom and a dustpan, beside the cases of wine. There was what looked like a very large fireplace bellows in another, and no fewer than seven oilcans scattered on the floor, lying where they had fallen when the hotel sank.

  So Emma and Winston got to work. First they swept up all the sand and carried it up the steps and dumped it off the verandah. Then they took turns blowing sand from the gears with the bellows. That done, Emma swept up all the sand they had blown loose, while Winston crawled around among the gears and oiled everything.

  It took hours, but when all the sand was gone and the brass was gleaming with oil once more, Emma stepped to the lever and took hold of it. She looked at Winston, who took off his cap and crossed his fingers.

  “One-two-three-GO!” Emma cried, and pulled the lever.

  With a snap and a hum, the Patented New Advanced Practical Temporal Difference Engine came back to life. The gears turned, the wheels meshed, the springs went up and down. Winston threw his cap in the air and shouted, “Hurrah! We’re back in business!”

  He took Emma by the hand and ran with her back up onto the verandah, pausing only to close and latch the cellar door. “No more sand in there!” he said. They came together to the big front doors. Winston put his shoulder to them and pushed hard—

  And they swung open. Emma stepped across the threshold of the Grand Wenlocke.

  It was even more beautiful from the inside. Emma could see the high painted ceiling, with its sparkling chandelier. The stairs were inlaid wood in different colors and patterns. Graceful old-fashioned settees and comfortable-looking armchairs had drifted down the room to one side, like ice skaters, but they must once have been arranged before the big marble fireplace. Sunlight streamed through high windows of diamond-paned glass and into the little shop across the Lobby, lighting up cases of cigars and sepia-tint postcards.

  A Grand Staircase led up to the Mezzanine, and on either side its newel posts were crowned with a pair of golden statues, almost life-size: mer-people, holding up twin seashells that were really electric lamps. There were no clocks anywhere. Above the registration desk a panel was carved with words painted in gold, which read: TIME IS FORGOTTEN HERE.

  Emma sniffed the air. It smelled like new wood and fresh paint, and lemon oil, and baking bread, and flowers.

  “Oh, dear, these have begun to wilt,” said Winston, gathering up the bouquet that had fallen. He took the vase and hurried away
through an archway where there was a sign that said BAR, and a moment later Emma heard water splashing as he refilled the vase.

  “There’s quite a lot to do,” he called in to her. “I hope you’ll excuse me, Miss Emma, but I’ve got to put things to rights.”

  “That’s all right,” said Emma. Winston came out carrying the vase and put it back on the table beside the great front doors. He looked at her, blinking as though he’d just woken up.

  “Good lord,” he said. “It’s only now sinking in. Here I am, back in the Grand Wenlocke, and—and where did you come from? I’ve never even asked you, have I?”

  “You were a little confused,” said Emma. “I don’t mind. I washed up on the beach.”

  “Oh! Were you in a shipwreck?”

  “No,” said Emma, scowling down at the inlaid pattern on the marble floor. She didn’t like thinking about what had happened to her. “I was in a bad storm. Can I help you tidy things up?”

  “Certainly,” said Winston tactfully. “I’ll start in the Bar—some bottles have spilled in here, and I can see some books that have fallen off the shelves out in the Smoking Lounge, and, oh, my, I can’t imagine what it must be like in the Library—”

  “I’ll tidy the Library, then,” said Emma, because she loved books.

  “It’s just up the Grand Staircase, to the left,” said Winston, pushing one of the sofas back into place. Emma ran up the Grand Staircase to the Mezzanine, her bare feet pattering on the parquet floor, and saw rooms stretching away to both right and left. The first door had a sign above it that said LIBRARY.

  She opened the door and went in. The Library was a long room, with a big window at its far end that stretched from the floor to the ceiling. It was a stained-glass window depicting a lady in a Greek helmet. There was sky behind the lady, and blue sea, with little stained-glass ships with striped sails on the sea. The lady was holding out a book as though offering it to Emma.

  Along either wall were high shelves of books. These were indeed a mess, with big leatherbound volumes spilled off the shelves, flooding around the armchairs and reading tables. So Emma set to work putting them all back, going up and down a ladder on wheels.

  She only slowed down once, when she came to the children’s section. Many of her favorite books weren’t there, of course, because they hadn’t been written yet when the Grand Wenlocke sank. Still, she was happy to find Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. There were strange old books with beautiful gold lettering on their spines, and titles like The Princess and the Goblins, The Water-Babies, and The Chatterbox Annual.

  It was tempting to think of stopping and taking a book to one of the big chairs. The chairs were upholstered in leather just the color of caramel, and looked very deep and comfortable. But Emma made herself finish tidying up first. After all, she thought, who knows how long I’ll be here? I might have time to read everything!

  The thought made her happier than she had been in days and days. Emma hummed to herself as she ran down the Grand Staircase again. She noticed the hotel’s big front desk and wandered behind it.

  There were rows of pigeonholes full of old-fashioned long keys, which she expected to see. But there was also a glass-fronted box covering a big brass lever, which she didn’t expect to see. Underneath it, in curly script, were the words In Case of Pirates, Break Glass. Emma wondered whether the box used to connect with a police station and whether there had ever really been any pirates in the Dunes.

  She stood on tiptoe to see the guestbook. It was open to the first page, snowy white and unmarked, still waiting for a guest to check in. Emma found the old-fashioned wooden pen with its steel point, and had just dipped it in the inkwell to write her name in the book when she heard an unexpected noise.

  It was a creaking, and a little pattering clicking, and a heavy footstep. It wasn’t coming from the Bar, where she could hear Winston sweeping up broken glass. It was coming from the opposite direction.

  Emma turned her head. In the hall leading off to the right of the Lobby, she could see a flight of stairs leading downward. A sign over the stairway said TO THE KITCHENS.

  Someone, breathing heavily, was coming up the stairs.

  6

  THE COOK

  EMMA GRIPPED THE pen until her knuckles were white, but she did not scream. She watched the stairway, as the noises grew louder, and in a moment she saw who had been making them.

  It was a middle-aged lady, rather stout, with a round red face. She wore long skirts and a shawl over her shoulders, which wasn’t surprising to Emma. Her hair was fastened up with long pins in an old-fashioned way, which wasn’t surprising either. But the black eye-patch she wore was a bit startling. A little dachshund scrambled up the stairs after her.

  “I think something must have happened, Shorty,” she was saying to the little dog. “Where has everyone gone?”

  The dachshund spotted Emma and ran forward, barking ferociously. The lady peered at Emma with her one eye.

  “Behave yourself, Shorty, it’s only a child,” she said. “Hello? What are you doing there, child?”

  Winston, who had heard the barking, came running in with the broom and dustpan. “Mrs. Beet!” he exclaimed. “I thought you got out with everyone else! Did you die too?”

  “I beg your pardon?” Mrs. Beet’s face paled to a salmon pink. “I never! I was working late in the Kitchens, to get ready for today. Just settled down to put my feet up for a moment, after I put the last loaves of bread in the oven. And I suppose I, er, must have dozed off. Had the most horrid dreams that the bread was burning. Couldn’t seem to wake up for ages.”

  “It was ages, I’m afraid,” said Emma. “You must have been frozen in time with the hotel!”

  “Frozen in time? Whatever do you mean, child?” said Mrs. Beet.

  “Well…” Emma wondered what was the best way to break the news. “Your bread’s been in the oven for about a hundred years. But at least it didn’t burn.”

  “What!”

  “Perhaps you’d better sit down, Mrs. Beet,” said Winston tactfully. “We need to explain a few things.”

  Poor Mrs. Beet! When everything had been explained to her, she was so shocked that she became quite faint, and in a feeble voice begged Winston to fetch her a drink of rum from the Bar. He kindly brought it for her, and in no time it restored her natural color, which was a delicate shade somewhere between brick red and boiled lobster.

  “Dear, dear, what a dreadful thing!” she said, looking sadly at her empty glass. “I’ve been marooned in time! This is just the sort of thing that keeps happening to me!”

  “It does?” said Emma.

  “Yes,” said Mrs. Beet, waving her empty glass until Winston got the hint and refilled it for her. “I’ve had a most unusual life, you know.”

  “I guess you must have,” said Emma, trying not to stare at her eye patch.

  “It didn’t start out that way,” said Mrs. Beet.

  “Were you an orphan, like Winston?” Emma asked.

  “What? Why, no. There were the most appalling crowds of babies in my family, and not enough food to go around. So when I was a little girl, I was put into service. I became an under-backstairs chambermaid for a rich family with a lot of spoiled children. I scrubbed the little spaces between the stair railings, and crawled under furniture to dust the back legs, and other things small hands were needed for. I used to sneak into the nursery at night, when the children of the family were asleep, and play with their toys.”

  “Did they mind?” said Emma.

  “I suppose they would have, if they’d ever noticed. But they were given new toys so often they never even looked at most of them. I thought it was very unfair, and I detested those children. I detested being an under-back-stairs chambermaid, too,” said Mrs. Beet.

  “Now, the Cook in that household was a very important person. She was a good Cook, and knew lots of secret recipes. The master and mistress of the house gave her all sorts of things to keep her from leav
ing and going to cook for somebody else: holidays, her own room, oodles of money. It seemed to me that it would be much better to be a Cook than a Maid, for a Maid simply spends her life cleaning other people’s houses, and what does that get her?”

  “A nice, clean house,” said Winston.

  “But it didn’t get me a nice clean house,” said Mrs. Beet. “It was my master’s house, after all, not mine. I resolved to become a Cook too, to change my lot in life. I made myself useful in the kitchen by crawling under the stove to find dropped jar-lids that rolled back there. I did tedious tasks for the Cook, like pitting cherries and shelling peas. By the time I was eight I could make a white sauce without any lumps in it; by the time I was nine, I could steam a pudding. The Cook was so grateful for my help, she taught me some of her secret recipes.

  “And then the master and mistress of the house and all their unpleasant children went for a holiday to the seaside. One night, most unexpectedly, pirates came ashore and broke into their lodging-house and carried them all off as prisoners,” said Mrs. Beet, smiling fondly at the memory. “So we servants were all given our notice. I pretended to be older than I was and answered an advertisement for a merchant ship that needed a cook on board. They didn’t want to hire a lady, but I made them a Spotted Dog Pudding, which all sailors love. They liked it so well I became Cook on the Flaming Disaster.”

  “Did you enjoy it?” asked Emma.

  “Oh, pretty well,” said Mrs. Beet. “I got to visit foreign countries and see the sights, you know. Had lots of unusual adventures. Mostly good ones, though there were storms, to be sure, and giant squid, and the Flying Dutchman, which was a great nuisance. I had to kill a mad elephant with a skillet once.

  “And once I fell in love with a boy ashore, and he was in love with me, but he couldn’t bring himself to run away to sea. So he stayed there, and I sailed on, until one day there was a dreadful accident when a Spotted Dog exploded in the galley. A volley of currants put my eye out. It was very painful. The rum sauce got everywhere, causing the Flaming Disaster to catch fire and sink. Luckily we all escaped in the lifeboats, but that spoiled my taste for a nautical life.”