The Secret Key

by Lena Jones

  ‘I want you to come with me to the tunnels,’ I say.

  We need supplies to take with us – drinks, food, gas masks, waterproofs – so we head to Groundskeeper’s Cottage first.

  Dad is still working in the park so we are able to discreetly grab some apple juice from the fridge. Liam pokes around the dead experiments in the kitchen while I go and change into black jeans and a long-sleeved T-shirt. I give Liam the gas mask and find swimming goggles, plus a handkerchief to tie round my mouth. I get us each some waterproof trousers to cover my jeans and his school trousers, and a couple of jackets. I have my own waders, but Liam has to wear Dad’s spare pair, which come up past his knees. Protected as well as we can manage, we take torches and trudge from the house, through the heat haze, across the lawns of Hyde Park to the entrance to the tunnel. We look around carefully before we go in. Seeing nobody, I open the gate, and we step into darkness.

  It’s hard to tell what Liam is thinking, with his face covered by the mask in the near-darkness of the tunnel, but he makes no sign that he wants to turn back, even as the darkness stretches on. My own legs and back are aching. Although the algae in the Serpentine have been dying off, the fumes are still thick underground. We press on. At one point a particularly large gobbet of slime falls from the ceiling in front of us, and Liam grips my arm in panic. He recovers quickly, loosening his grip and forging on. He knows that I only have a handkerchief to protect me from the fumes. We need to hurry.

  We come at last to the cavern under the lake. I was almost expecting the iron door to have been bricked up since my meeting with Professor D’Oliveira. What had she said? I had ‘stumbled a little too close for comfort’. But it’s still there. My breath is ragged. I take the key from my pocket and fit it into the lock with trembling fingers, wondering if the Guild might have changed the lock. But the door still opens smoothly, and together we step into the brightly lit corridor. Liam removes the gas mask, and I can see the wonder in his eyes. He looks at the plush carpet and panelled walls, mouth hanging open.

  ‘I know you said there was a carpet – but I was just imagining a concrete tunnel. This is something else …’ He lets out a low whistle.

  ‘I know,’ I say. ‘Come on – let’s get moving.’

  We take off our waders and waterproofs, and stash them in the doorway, together with our torches and protective masks. Liam had the foresight to bring our regular shoes in a carrier bag, and we put them on now. All the time I’m listening for the sound of footsteps, but none come. My heart is in my mouth. Although the professor seems to be an ally, what if this is all a trap? What if she warned me off the tunnels, knowing I wouldn’t obey her instruction – that I didn’t like to be forbidden to do anything?

  ‘Ready?’ asks Liam.

  I pull a face. ‘As I’ll ever be.’

  We turn down the corridor to the left, though the choice is random – both directions continue further than we can see. We walk for a couple of minutes in silence. Every fifty steps or so there’s a door recessed into the wall. We stop at the first few, but they are all locked and unmarked. We try my Guild key, but it doesn’t work. My key might let us into the network through the main door, but there are just as many secrets once you’re inside. Just when I’m getting frantic that we have nowhere to hide if someone appears, there’s a right-hand turn in the tunnel. My good sense of direction – I never need a map to find my way around London – is uncertain underground without landmarks to guide me. Still, I think we are near my house. Perhaps right under it.

  It’s dark in the new section of tunnel. Liam runs his hand over the wall, and flicks a switch. More lights come on, spreading down the tunnel in a slow wave of light. Down five tunnels. Like fingers unfurling on a hand, they stretch out in front of us in five directions, each one signposted – South Bank, St James, Piccadilly, Westminster and Waterloo. Liam laughs nervously. The sound echoes down the tunnels. In front of us is a rack of bicycles, clearly meant for riding through the tunnels.

  For a long moment, I don’t breathe. ‘But … this is right under the park. I’m sure of it …’

  ‘You can’t cycle under London …’ Liam whispers, holding his head, as if he’s entered an alternate universe.

  I’m about to respond, but my attention fixes on one of the bikes in the rack and my heart starts to beat faster. It’s an old sit-up-and-beg, light blue, with a battered basket. Unlike the others, it’s covered in a fine layer of dust, as though it hasn’t been touched in a long time. I know this bike. I have looked at a picture of it every night for the last four years.

  ‘Are you OK?’ Liam prods me in the arm.

  I swallow hard. ‘This bike …’ I say, ‘it was my mum’s.’

  ‘You’re sure?’

  ‘I’m sure.’ I touch the handlebars and a shiver runs down my spine. This is the bike she was riding when she was knocked down and killed. Or so I had been told. But there is no sign of damage to the frame. The paintwork isn’t even scratched. And how did it get down here?

  ‘Agatha?’

  Tears are running down my cheeks and my hands are shaking. Suddenly, before I can stop him, Liam puts his arms round me and hugs me. I’ve never been so close to him before. A sob escapes me.

  ‘What does it mean, Liam?’

  ‘I don’t know … I’m just so sorry.’

  He waits until I’ve stopped crying, then lets go. I’m a little sad – it felt nice, being held by him. I give myself a mental slap. What am I thinking? Danger is making me crazy. I clear my throat. ‘Sorry. I’ve left a wet patch on your top.’ ‘Don’t worry about it.’ He smiles kindly.

  I wipe my eyes on my sleeve. ‘Let’s push on, shall we?’

  I take the bike from the rack, blow off the dust, test the brakes, and sling one leg over. It’s a little on the high side, but I can manage.

  ‘Come on – pick one,’ I say to Liam.

  ‘Are you sure? That bike belongs to you, but for me it just feels like stealing.’

  ‘We’ll bring it back. You’re just borrowing it.’

  He picks the smallest of the other bikes, which is still a bit too big for him.

  ‘So, where do you want to go?’ I ask.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  I point to the tunnels.

  ‘See those signs? South Bank, St James, Piccadilly … Take your pick.’

  ‘Um … that one,’ he says, pointing.

  I put my foot to the pedal, and start to cycle down the one marked Westminster. Liam follows, sitting half out of the miniature saddle. This tunnel is concrete, with lights at regular intervals. Unlike the stinking tunnel under the Serpentine, this one is clean and dry, wide enough for us to cycle side by side. We seem to be moving steadily deeper. It’s a relief to be out of the dry heat above ground. Down here, it’s cool and breezy. Liam cycles ahead and I chase him. When I catch up, we come to a bend in the tunnel.

  ‘Better turn our lights on.’

  I turn my lamp on, relieved that it still works. We swerve right into an unlit brick tunnel, older than the first. Cycling on through the dark, we turn down another tunnel and I can hear water rushing nearby.

  ‘It must be like a patchwork,’ I think out loud. ‘There are tunnels that were built to service the sewers, disused bits of the Underground train system, old bunkers from the Cold War. Whitehall is riddled with tunnels – did you know that? Chambers and tunnels and vaults under the Houses of Parliament. And they’re connected by a tunnel that runs all the way under Covent Garden to Trafalgar Square! I bet the Guild has access to all of those, and more besides …’

  Liam grins back at me – clearly he’s feeling the same adrenaline rush as me. My head is reeling.

  ‘But surely people know about the tunnels?’ he shouts above the water noise.

  I raise my voice in reply. ‘I reckon only some of them. Probably nobody knows about all the tunnels – or all the entrances to them – except maybe the Guild.’ I’m only guessing, but it makes sense. There are as many pathways under t
he streets of London as along them.

  We pass into another tunnel, and now I can’t see the walls in the dark and our voices echo back at us. I have no idea where we are. In a glint of light we see a flight of stone stairs and dismount to take a look. Up the stairs we come to a metal door, which is locked. I get my Guild key out, and to my surprise it opens it. We push open the door and peer out, into a garden surrounded by tall, grand buildings.

  ‘Grosvenor Square Garden – near the Roosevelt Memorial!’ I say, amazed at the direction our underground journey has taken us.

  I close the door again before anyone can notice us. Then we go back down the steps to the subterranean world and continue on our journey. The cool air rushes over us as we speed down the tunnels, so pleasant after weeks of sweltering heat. After a few minutes, Liam stops suddenly, and I follow suit.

  ‘Listen,’ he says.

  We both fall quiet. There is a rumble in the earth, so deep I can feel it in my chest.

  ‘What is that?’ Liam asks.

  ‘I think it’s an underground train.’

  It’s strange – we’re so deep underground, but the world down here is anything but dead. I feel as though we’ve stepped inside a living thing – inside the body of London itself. We cycle on, through dark tunnels and lit tunnels, brick tunnels and plastic tunnels, tunnels that hum and creak with hidden activity, tunnels as quiet as the surface of the moon. A couple of times I think I hear the sound of human movement, and we freeze, but we see nobody.

  Finally, we stop in an unlit brick cavern. We can hear a torrent of water flowing close by, though we can’t see it.

  ‘It smells dreadful in here,’ Liam shouts.

  I look up at a hand-painted sign that hangs from chains on the ceiling. It’s rotting away, but the word ‘Ranelagh’ is still clear.

  ‘This must be the Ranelagh sewer,’ I shout.

  ‘I’ve heard of that – it used to flow into the Serpentine, but it was covered over hundreds of years ago by the city.’

  Liam takes his torch and points it down. I’m blinded for a second, but my eyes adjust. We’re standing near the edge of a precipice. Down below, a red river flows. The sewer, once called the Westbourne, one of the ancient rivers of London, seethes against the rotting brick. Far below the earth, we stare at millions of gallons of flowing red. If there were sulphurous flames and demons pacing in the darkness, it wouldn’t seem out of place.

  ‘Wow,’ I say dumbly.

  ‘It’s …’ Liam starts, but is also lost for words.

  I’m holding a hand over my nose and mouth, wishing we hadn’t left our protective gear in the Guild’s entrance hall.

  ‘I don’t think we should be breathing this in, do you?’ I feel exhausted at the prospect of the journey back. ‘Shall we go home?’

  ‘Sure.’

  We cycle north again, past countless branches in the tunnels. I see signs for Earl’s Court, the National Gallery and Buckingham Palace. I still can’t believe this is all down here, but with every passing mile, I come to understand how massive the network is. We enter a tunnel that bears the warning sign – Danger of death by suffocation – this tunnel is unventilated – but we carry on unharmed. As I see more of the underground network, it begins to seem more alien. We may as well be on another planet, so empty and lonely is this place.

  ‘Stop for a second,’ Liam says. ‘I think I saw something back there.’

  We dismount and walk back to a small side tunnel, mostly taken up by pipes and cables.

  ‘Just there.’ Liam points to a gap in the iron pipes. I press my hands to the cold metal. There’s a light shining through.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  I press my face closer. It’s a gap in the tunnel wall, where cables pass into a space beyond. What I see isn’t another tunnel, or a brick vault. It isn’t even a slimy cavern, but a large room, carpeted and wood-lined. The room is filled with row upon row of filing cabinets, stretching off further than I can see. Between the cabinets, men and women in business dress are moving, looking through cabinets, taking out files, talking to each other.

  ‘It must be a Guild room,’ Liam whispers in my ear. ‘Looks like they’re really old-fashioned about how they store their information.’

  I’m speechless. This, more than anything we’ve seen, makes my mind reel. There is so much space, so many filing cabinets, each filled with so many files. So much information. But about what? I begin to realise the scale of the Guild, and wonder how my life – and the life of my mother – is tangled up in this huge, intricate web.

  ‘What do you think is in those files?’

  ‘No idea – secret stuff,’ Liam says. ‘Maybe they’ve got a file on your mum in there …’

  He looks for a moment longer, then jumps down and goes back to the bikes. I stay, looking through the gap, watching the men and women as they walk through the maze of cabinets. Hundreds of feet under central London, and nobody outside the Guild knows about any of it.

  I want to get into that room, more than anything.

  ‘Come on,’ Liam says. ‘We ought to go back.’

  With a sigh, I go back to my bike. We ride on, down the brick passage. Suddenly there is movement in the tunnel ahead of us, a flash of light. I slam on my brakes, but Liam behind me has no time to react, crashing into my back wheel and sending us both to the floor in a tangle of bike frames. I scramble to get up, but there’s no time – the light is coming closer, with the sound of bicycles freewheeling.

  We look up to see two men, dressed in plain black, riding a pair of sleek road bikes. They look us over and exchange a confused look.

  ‘How did you get down here?’ one of them asks.

  ‘I might ask you gentlemen the same question,’ I reply.

  The one who hasn’t spoken grins.

  ‘Think you’re clever, kid?’

  ‘What do want, my grade point average?’

  The first one interrupts before he can fire back a witty riposte.

  ‘You’d better come with us.’

  ‘Really, Miss Oddlow, I had hoped it would be a bit longer before I saw you again.’ Professor D’Oliveira is seated in a green-leather chair behind an enormous desk. It’s polished black and gold, with metal sculptures of heads on the legs like figureheads on a ship. I would have reached out to touch the delicate carving if my wrists weren’t behind my back in handcuffs. The wood-panelled room is remarkable enough, even if we hadn’t reached it by a damp concrete tunnel, deep below Kensington. The tick tick tick of an ornate clock behind the professor is the only sound, as I think about my response. I settle for a question –

  ‘Where are we?’

  ‘Isn’t it obvious? You were trespassing in Guild tunnels, and now you’re in our headquarters.’

  We had passed through a cast-iron door that had claimed to be part of the London Sewerage Works, but had, in fact, opened into a hallway area where our captors had locked up the bikes. From there, we had passed into a sort of hall – a wide room with a number of people sitting behind desks. I assumed these were receptionists, and wondered how they all travelled to work in the morning. They couldn’t take the number twenty-three bus, that was for certain. Didn’t anyone notice these people disappearing under London each day?

  We were made to wait as the guards made enquiries with one of the receptionists, who made a call. Then we were shown down a maze of wood-panelled corridors, into a smaller reception room, and finally into the professor’s office.

  ‘Don’t you have anything to say for yourselves?’ she asks, looking between us. Liam hasn’t said a word since we arrived. He isn’t the sort of student who gets hauled up in front of the headmaster, and he isn’t enjoying being in trouble. ‘Not only were you trespassing on Guild land, but you had commandeered Guild property – the bikes.’

  ‘That bike is my mother’s,’ I say, looking her in the eye. ‘So I don’t think it counts as Guild property, do you?’

  There isn’t even a fl
icker on her face.

  ‘I think these handcuffs are cutting off my circulation …’ I say at last.

  She sighs, then nods to one of the guards who are still standing behind us.

  ‘Remove their restraints. Then you may leave.’

  The guard does as he’s told and the two of them go. The professor stands. Despite her age – and the stick she leans on – she is a formidable presence.

  ‘Agatha, you have overstepped every boundary today,’ she says slowly. ‘You will learn what you need to learn, when I am prepared to teach you …’

  I say nothing for a moment, letting her words sink in. ‘So you will teach me one day?’ I ask.

  Professor D’Oliveira sighs. ‘At this rate that day may never come. Today, you have proven yourself insolent, unreliable, reckless …’

  ‘I have an important lead in my investigation, though, which I’m trying to follow up,’ I say quickly.

  The professor frowns and shakes her head. ‘What lead?’

  ‘Well,’ I say, ‘I’ll offer you an exchange. If you tell me why my mother’s bike – the bike that she was supposed to have been riding when she died – is intact and stored in one of your organisation’s bike racks, then I’ll tell you my lead.’ I sound angry, and I am – how dare they keep secrets from me about Mum?

  ‘I told you that you should not be investigating. Why should I let you swan around in our tunnels, endangering the secrecy of the Guild?’

  ‘Your tunnels? It seems to me that most of the tunnels you’re calling your own actually belong to the London Underground,’ I say. ‘Or even the London electricity board, or the London sewer system. I’m a taxpayer – or my dad is, at least – so I think I have every right to be in these tunnels, as much as any citizen of Great Britain. Just because you joined up a few of them—’

  The professor holds up her hand to silence me, but she doesn’t look cross, and, in fact, she just laughs.

  ‘If we’ve trespassed,’ I go on, ‘then surely the Guild is trespassing every day! And what are you going to do to us anyway? Hand us in to the police? That wouldn’t sound good, would it? ‘Dear officer, we caught these two trespassing in our network of secret tunnels that extends across London for our super-private crime-fighting organisation, which is far better than yours – please don’t tell anyone. Oh, and we’ve got the bike here that supposedly one of our agents was riding when she died. It’s in surprisingly good shape, considering, isn’t it?’’