The Secret Key

by Lena Jones

  ‘Thirsty? Me too …’

  I pick up his empty water dish and take it to the sink. Again, Oliver is doing laps round my legs. I turn on the tap, and for a second nothing comes out. Then there’s a dribble of water, a splutter, a choke, and suddenly something that definitely isn’t water is oozing from the tap. I take a step back in shock and watch as thick red slime fills the sink.

  The gloop isn’t smooth, but rough like porridge, and the colour of blood. It’s as though the sink is filling with fresh gore. It’s so thick it can barely go down the plughole, spluttering and coughing bubbles of gas. And what an awful gas it is – suddenly the kitchen is full of a sickly stench. It’s like the rotten smell of the bin I used to escape school – but worse. Whatever the stuff is, it smells dreadful.

  Coming to my senses, I rush back to the sink and turn the tap off. The stuff just sits there, refusing to drain. I take a fork from the drawer and prod it. Oliver, who at first continued crying for water, catches the foul smell and retreats to the doorway, from where he glares at me.

  I bend over the sink to take a closer look, stirring through the red sludge with my fork. Bubbles blossom on its skin, so thick that when I prod them, they don’t pop, only deflate. Suddenly my eyes are burning, and I start to choke. The air in the kitchen is full of fumes.

  Quickly, I open the windows, then scoop the protesting Oliver and take him out to the back garden. As soon as I put him down, he runs across the lawn and leaps over the back fence. Outside again, the eerie silence covers London like a blanket. Far off there are sirens and a helicopter circling. In spite of myself I’m scared. I need to think.

  After a little while has passed, I go back into the kitchen. The air has thinned out and doesn’t burn my eyes any more, but the smell lingers. Most of the slime has oozed its way down the drain by now, and I wash the remainder away with a pan of rainwater fetched from the barrel in the garden. Then I go and turn the TV on, flicking through the channels.

  ‘… Reports are coming in from as far west as Twickenham …’

  ‘… People are advised not to run any taps or flush any toilets …’

  ‘… Downing Street has yet to comment, but sources close to the Prime Minister say an emergency meeting of COBRA has been called …’

  The newsreel shows people in protective suits going down into the sewers; people carrying buckets of red slime from their homes and tipping them down the drains; the head of the army holding a press conference near a water-pumping station. Then a man who looks vaguely familiar comes up on the screen. Just as he’s about to start talking there’s an explosive sound as Dad kicks the front door open. He’s wearing an enormous pair of fishing waders, covered in slime. His eyes are pink.

  ‘Dad! Are you OK?’

  ‘It’s in the Serpentine … full of it … bubbling up from nowhere …’

  ‘Oh no!’ I rush to help him.

  ‘Don’t! This stuff burns, whatever it is. Just put some newspaper down.’

  ‘Dad, are you crying?’

  ‘It’s just this stuff. Stings the eyes. Come on – newspaper!’

  I hurry off and find an old copy of The Times, spreading enough of it for Dad to get through the house to the back garden. Dad stomps through the house, already taking off the waders. As he swears and kicks the ground outside, my attention wanders back to the TV screen – the same pictures going around: people being interviewed, people going down into the labyrinth of tunnels beneath the city. It has spread from one side of the capital to the other, affecting every house, every factory, every hospital. Nobody is safe from the choking red gunk, and nobody seems to know where it has come from.

  Something is rotten under London.

  I go to my school bag, where I dumped it not ten minutes before. In those ten minutes, everything has changed. To think I had considered – even for a moment – giving up being a detective! I take out my notebook and flip it open. I turn to a new page and write …

  LONDON IS POISONED.

  Night has fallen and I’m in my room, sitting on the bed with the skylight open. I’m mending the rip in my school skirt by torchlight while listening to the radio. I’m supposed to be asleep, so the volume is turned right down, the speaker close to my ear. Every couple of minutes I change station, but they’re all saying the same thing.

  ‘Red algae have spread through …’

  ‘The water supply of London has been infected by …’

  ‘The slime, described by Richard in Islington as “like something out of a horror movie” …’

  I listen to it all. When the skirt is mended, I set it to one side and look up through the skylight to the hazy stars. On the breeze I can hear sirens, ringing around London like a headache. Every so often a helicopter passes, but whether they’re police or television crews, filming the city from above, I can’t tell. All around me, London is in crisis.

  And me?

  I’m grounded.

  As I lie perfectly still, there is a battle raging in my head. On one hand, I’m terrified by the threat – the threat that someone will come for Dad. On the other hand (I’m not too proud to admit it) I’m excited! The incident with Professor D’Oliveira is a real case, a big case – why else would someone threaten me? I remember the sheet of newspaper that I had found on the professor. I take it out and unfold it. There is a small story – barely two paragraphs – about London water pollution.

  … Scientists confirmed today that the quality of London’s water had declined in the last week, but refused to speculate about the origin of the pollution. While current levels of pollution are not dangerous for human consumption …

  Well, it’s definitely dangerous for human consumption now. And this story was written yesterday – before the crisis hit. Had Professor D’Oliveira known something about this beforehand? Now there was talk of quarantining London to stop the algae from spreading to the rest of the country, even the rest of the world.

  I have my notebook in my hand, and I flip back between the two pages I’d written on that day – HIT-AND-RUN and LONDON POISONED. The more I think about it, the more I feel the two have to be connected. I can’t see how yet; it’s just an intuition, a hunch. I put the notebook down, but the words are still there, flashing in the stars above my skylight, back and forth until they get jumbled up –

  HIT-AND-RUN

  LONDON POISONED

  HIT-AND-RUN

  LONDON POISONED

  HIT AND POISONED

  LONDON RUN

  So could the hit-and-run have something to do with the crisis? I take out the professor’s card and read it again. Then I take down my dictionary and look up ‘hydrology’ – The branch of science concerned with the properties of the earth’s water.

  Finally, I take out my pen and write –

  The polluted water seems to be coming from underground, not from the reservoirs north of London. Who would know more about the workings of underground London than a professor from the Royal Geographical Society, who specialises in hydrology, the study of water?

  It’s a flimsy connection, I have to admit – but doesn’t Poirot often act on a suspicion, a hunch, an unproven fancy? I need to know more.

  And there is my dilemma. If I want to know more, I’ll have to talk to Professor D’Oliveira, and in order to do that I’ll have to leave the house. I’d be disobeying not just Dad, but the man who had attacked me as well. I can’t be sure that he will go through with his threat, but I also can’t assume that he won’t. I lie here while all this is going through my mind, until a voice on the radio catches my attention. It’s a reporter, just out of a conference held by the Metropolitan Police.

  ‘At the moment, there seems little hope that the situation can be easily resolved. Fresh water – the lifeblood of the city – has stopped pumping around London. The heart of the capital has stopped, and this crisis will continue until someone finds a way to restart it.’ He takes a breath, and even with the volume down I can hear how shaky he sounds. ‘Right now, London needs a mir
acle.’

  Poirot is sitting in a chair on the other side of the room in near darkness. His green eyes are shining like a cat’s.

  ‘London needs a miracle,’ he repeats, tutting softly. ‘Mon dieu.’

  ‘I could get into trouble,’ I say to him.

  ‘Ah, Mademoiselle Oddlow – trouble is all around. But heroes are rare.’

  I turn off the radio and get out of bed. It’s no good waiting for a miracle – somebody needs to act.

  ‘Thanks, Hercule.’

  He rises from his chair and bows goodbye. ‘It is my pleasure.’

  Someone might be watching me leaving the house, so I need a disguise. Thankfully, I’ve spent plenty of time preparing for this. I look through my wardrobe for a minute before settling on my outfit of choice – a white T-shirt, lace-up shoes and baby-blue medical scrubs. If I’m going to the hospital, I might as well look like a nurse.

  The scrubs are loose fitting – nice in the hot weather, but I know I can’t go out like this – I put on a knee-length navy trench coat and a matching floppy hat. I look in the mirror, checking everything over, then decide that my hair is too recognisable. I replace the hat with a wig of honey-blonde hair and look again. Now I doubt even Dad would recognise me in the street. I’m roasting, though.

  Disguise complete, I step up on the bed and hoist myself out of the skylight. I sit on the roof for a moment. There’s a breeze, but it’s still warm. When I’m ready, I shuffle forward, down the slope of the roof, until I come to the edge. There’s a rustle as my feet brush the leaves of the oak tree below. Putting one leg over, I feel around for the right branch.

  I find my foothold and – with a deep breath – push into space.

  The craggy tree is there to meet me, and I grip on to the trunk until I find my bearings. I start to climb down, finding old footholds, trying to be quiet. By the bottom, I’ve turned a half spiral round the tree, so its trunk is between me and the house. I peer round and can see the kitchen light on. Dad is hunched over the table, talking on the telephone. Before he can turn and see me, I steal across the garden lawn and out through the back gate.

  Hyde Park is dark. I move quickly, jumping at every rustle, every shadow. Before I reach the gates, a fox leaps out in front of me and I almost cry out. It scampers off, and I take a moment to compose myself. In another minute I come to the north edge of the park. The traffic ahead reassures me – when there are other people around I’m less scared that someone will drag me into the shadows.

  I come out opposite Lancaster Gate underground station. My mobile is back in my room, so I cross the road and go into a telephone box outside the station. It smells dreadful inside, but it’s worth it to remain anonymous. Someone might be tapping my phone.

  Because Professor D’Oliveira was knocked down in Hyde Park, I know which hospital they will have taken her to – St Mary’s, just a five-minute walk north of the park. I had my appendix taken out in the very same hospital, so I know it well. I wipe down the plastic receiver with my handkerchief and put a handful of change into the slot. Quickly, I Change Channel. A filing cabinet with handwritten cards appears in front of me, and I flip through to ‘H’ for hospital …

  Ah! There we go – I dial the hospital reception’s number from memory.

  ‘St Mary’s Hospital, how can I help?’ a chirpy voice says.

  ‘Ah yes, ’ello,’ I say, adopting a French accent and lowering my voice an octave, ‘I am telephoning you to enquire about – ’ow you say? – my aunt. I sink she was taken to your ‘ospital earlier today.’

  ‘Name?’

  ‘My name? It iz …’

  ‘No, not your name – hers.’

  ‘Ah, mais oui! Dorothée D’Oliveira.’

  ‘Hang on a second.’

  I listen to her typing on a keyboard, while I worry that my handful of change will run out.

  ‘Hello? Yes, she’s staying the night for observation, but visiting hours are over – you’ll have to come tomorrow.’

  The phone starts to beep – I’m about to be cut off.

  ‘Ah, but of course! Could I have ze details of ze ward?’

  She tells me the wing and ward in which the professor is staying, and the hours I can visit her the next day.

  ‘Ah, sank you, merci!’

  The phone goes dead, and my change clunks into the belly of the machine.

  ‘Good work, Agatha,’ I say to myself. ‘Now you just need to break into a hospital without getting arrested.’

  St Mary’s is as busy as ever – ambulances coming and going, people smoking and talking outside the main gates. I notice a number of tankers, parked in a line down Praed Street, in front of the main building. I guess they’re delivering fresh water – nowhere in the city will be worse affected by the crisis than hospitals.

  I know if I go in through the main entrance I’ll be spotted. I walk to the end of the street and turn down South Wharf Road – the back of the hospital buildings. Keeping my head down, I walk until halfway down the road I come to an open bay door, next to which is parked one of the huge trucks. A thick plastic pipe runs from the tanker into the dimly lit bay. There is a whooshing, gurgling noise as the water is drained.

  I stop and pretend to search for a phone in my pocket. Carrying a mobile gives you an excuse to stop dead in the street and look gormless. The only person I can see who’s watching over things is the lorry driver, leaning against the wall by the bay, smoking a cigarette. He isn’t watching the lorry, but something inside the bay – a pressure gauge, perhaps. He isn’t wearing his security pass, which is resting on a piece of machinery next to him.

  I stand for a second, weighing up my options. I look at the lorry and at the street. Then, before I draw attention to myself by standing there too long, I cross the road and walk until the lorry is between me and the driver. Stepping up on the metal plate, I reach for the handle, hoping he has left his door locked. He has – the handle doesn’t give. I yank it a couple more times, but nothing happens. Exasperated, I draw my foot back and give the truck a hard kick.

  ‘Ow ow ow!’ I mutter under my breath, toes smarting.

  Nothing happens for a second.

  The truck’s alarm goes off, scaring me half to death. Quickly, I jump down from the plate and walk round to the other side of the lorry where the driver is still smoking his cigarette. He’s frowning, looking at his truck with its alarm blaring and lights flashing, when I go up to him.

  ‘‘Scuse me, mister, some kid’s trying to break into your truck!’ I say.

  ‘What …’ he begins, then swears loudly and runs round the side. Quickly, I duck inside the bay, past an array of pipes and gauges to a door at the back. I grab his security pass as I go and press it to the door release. It beeps once and the door opens. I breathe a sigh of relief and step through.

  I inspect my outfit – immaculate – before hurrying down the corridor, away from the angry shouts of the truck driver, who must have returned to his station to find the pass missing. I take off my coat and stash it in an alcove. I fix my blonde wig back with a scrunchie and a couple of hair slides.

  Showtime.

  I spend the next quarter of an hour navigating my way through the service corridors of the hospital, many of them quiet and unlit, listening for sounds of activity. The hallways go from bare brick with pipes and cables to old, chipped plaster, full of cleaning supplies and mop buckets. Finally, fresh-painted walls – corridors through which doctors, nurses and porters can move quickly around the hospital.

  After a close call with a woman collecting laundry, and another with a porter wheeling a patient on a trolley, I make my way to the professor’s ward. Several people see me, but none of them close up. From a distance, I can pass for one of the nursing staff. Entering through the caretaker’s door, I avoid going past the ward reception. At the other end of the ward I can see a nurse sitting at her station, reading. Everything else is dark – closed doors on either side. Some have dim lights behind their misted glass – reading la
mps or televisions. I wonder if patients are staying up to watch the news of London’s crisis.

  Starting to move down the ward, I peer in the half light at each door, on which is a whiteboard giving the names of the patients. The rooms have up to four people in them, but when I find the professor’s room, halfway down the ward, her name is alone on the board. Through the misted glass, I can see that the lights are off. I’d hoped she’d be awake to see me, but I haven’t come this far to give up.

  I try the handle. It’s locked, but I know that hospital doors never have proper locks – they can always be opened easily from the outside, in case there’s a medical emergency. Examining the handle, I see a turning piece with a groove down the centre. I used all my spare change back at the telephone box, but I take one of the clips from my hair, fit it into the groove, and turn the mechanism. The door clicks.

  Not wanting to alert the night nurse to my presence, I step inside the room before saying anything, and close the door behind me.

  ‘Hello—’ is all I manage, before something hard whistles through the darkness and cracks on the back of my head.

  I tumble forward on to the floor, clutching my head.

  Suddenly the lights are on.

  ‘Who the hell are you?’ A voice speaks above me. Not a male voice, nor a young one – it is an older woman’s voice, with a hint of the Caribbean – Jamaica, at a guess, or possibly Trinidad. Slowly, half blinded by the light, I open my eyes and look up. Standing above me, with one arm in a sling and the other holding a metal crutch over her head, is Professor D’Oliveira. She looks more formidable than when she was unconscious.

  ‘My name is Agatha.’ I wince, keeping my arms over my head until she lowers the crutch.

  ‘Who sent you?’ Her gaze is piercing and I have trouble meeting it.