The Black Room

by Gillian Cross

  As soon as he bent down, the boy’s head whipped around. The pale eyes peered suspiciously.

  “Hi.” Tom looked up, straight at him. “You OK?”

  He said it in the friendliest voice he could and grinned cheerfully. But the boy didn’t respond. For a second he just stared, obviously startled at being spoken to. Then he glowered and turned his back ostentatiously, shielding the sweets with his body.

  Right, Tom thought. If you’re going to be like that, I’ll do it another way. As the fat hand reached into the paper bags, Tom took his chance. His fingers flew to the zipper toggle, and he struggled with the knot, trying to untie the little braid.

  But he couldn’t. The knot was pulled tight, and the braiding made it almost impossible to pull it apart.

  So he simply picked up the bag and walked off with it.

  He’d never stolen anything before. Even while his fingers were closing around the handles, he was telling himself that he wouldn’t really do it. But his arm kept moving, and the boy didn’t turn around, and suddenly—there Tom was, on the other side of the square, with the bag in his hand.

  He slipped between two shops, into the parking lot, and then ran, as fast as he could, heading out of town toward the park and Robert’s house. There was one shout from behind him, and then—nothing. When he glanced over his shoulder, there was no one racing after him.

  He slowed to a walk and started imagining what it would be like to wave the braid in Robert’s face. He wanted a really good punch line. Something smart and snappy that would really maximize the shock—without sounding as though he cared too much. He imagined himself lounging casually against the side of the doorway, saying something short and witty.

  He hadn’t counted on being angry.

  When Robert opened the door, all the cool, clever things Tom had meant to say went right out of his head. He just pushed the sports bag forward and shook it furiously.

  “Look,” he said roughly. “Look!”

  For a second, Robert didn’t understand what Tom wanted him to see. Then Tom thrust the bag at him, zipper uppermost, so that the toggle was right under his nose.

  “Look!”

  Robert froze and all the color drained out of his face. He reached out a hand toward the braid and stopped before he touched it, as if he thought it would burn him.

  “Where did you get that?” he whispered.

  “Don’t you know?” Tom flipped the braid with his finger. “I thought you were the expert. Why don’t you tell me where it comes from?” He pushed the bag at Robert again, harder this time, trying to knock him off balance.

  But he wasn’t strong enough. Robert caught him by the arms, pulling him forward. “Where did you get that braid?”

  For a moment Tom couldn’t speak. It was like a horrible joke. He’d spent years nagging Robert to be more aggressive (Stand up for what you want. Assert yourself. Don’t take “no” for an answer), and now all that had backfired on him.

  “Tell me!” Robert shook him again, impatiently. “Where did you find it?”

  “Why?” Tom struggled to get the words out. “What’s the big deal?”

  For a moment he thought he was going to get hit again. Robert caught hold of the braid and flapped it in his face.

  “Can’t you see how the hair’s braided into it? That’s what Lorn does. She must have made it!”

  “Lorn?” Tom couldn’t make sense of the words. “What are you talking about? I thought Lorn was some kind of midget fairy. How could she make anything as big as that?”

  Robert closed his eyes and spoke very slowly. “Why don’t you listen—instead of trying to be clever? It hasn’t got anything to do with fairies. Lorn’s a real person—like you and me. And when I was in the cavern, I was still here, wasn’t I? Even if I was like a zombie.”

  Tom stared. I don’t want to hear this. It’s crazy.

  But Robert’s voice went on relentlessly. “That’s Lorn’s pattern, Tosh. And I’ve got to find her. If I can’t get her out of the cavern before the winter comes, she’ll die of cold. So are you going to tell me where you got it from—or do I have to beat it out of you?”

  Tom dropped the bag and put his hands in the air. “Calm down. Of course I’ll tell you. For what it’s worth. I swiped it from a boy in town.”

  “You stole it?”

  “Only so I could show you the braid,” Tom said defen sively. “And he was a stupid kid. Too busy guzzling sweets to notice what was going on.”

  “You didn’t have to take it. You should have asked him where he got it from.”

  “Why would I care?” Tom was beginning to feel annoyed now. “It’s just a few bits of wool twisted together, Robbo. It doesn’t mean a thing to me.”

  They were still standing at the front door, Robert inside the house and Tom outside. Suddenly, Robert stepped over the threshold and pulled the door shut behind him. He bent down and picked up the sports bag.

  “Come on,” he said. “We’ll go back, and if the boy’s still there, we can ask him about it.”

  “Yeah, right,” Tom said sarcastically. “Hi there! I’m the one who stole your bag. And now I’d like you to answer a few questions. That’s really going to work, isn’t it?”

  He turned to go, but Robert’s free hand shot out and closed around his arm.

  “I’m not messing around, Tosh,” he said. Dangerously. “I’ve got to find Lorn. So either you come and point out the boy—if he’s still there—or else I go by myself. And if there’s any fuss about the bag getting stolen, I’ll tell the police where to find you.”

  “You wouldn’t do that,” Tom said, trying to pull his arm free. “Not to me.”

  “Oh no?” Robert raised his eyebrows. “We’re past all that, Tosh. You changed the rules when you threatened to dig up the cavern.”

  “But I didn’t actually mean—”

  Robert’s face didn’t change. Tom had never seen that calm, determined expression before. He didn’t fancy his chances if he tried to run off.

  “You really want to find this girl,” he said. “Don’t you?”

  “I have to find her,” Robert said. “Before it’s too late. It’s very, very important—and I’ll do whatever it takes.”

  “OK,” Tom said slowly. “We’ll go back and look. As long as I don’t have to talk to him.”

  “That’ll do.” Robert began walking across the garden, pulling Tom along with him. “All you need to do is show me the right person.”

  “He’s probably gone by now.”

  “Then we’ll go back next Saturday,” Robert said steadily. “And the one after that and the one after that, until we find him.”

  Tom tugged at his arm again. “You don’t have to keep hold of me. I said I’d come.”

  Robert gave him a sharp look and then let go. “OK,” he said. “But it’s the same deal.”

  Tom marched along without saying anything else. He just wanted to get it over with. All they had to do was go to the square and take a quick look around. He was pretty sure the boy would have cleared off by now.

  But he hadn’t.

  He was standing over on the other side of the square, with his back to them, talking to a big man with a gray, heavy face. And he was making excuses. Tom could tell he was, even without hearing his voice. He kept shifting from foot to foot, leaning forward to speak in hesitant bursts and then stopping short.

  The man wasn’t saying anything. He was standing very still, and his face was without any kind of expression apart from a terrible close attention. Whatever the boy said, the man didn’t make any kind of reply. He just let the boy go on and on with his jerky excuses. It was like watching a worm writhing on the end of a hook.

  Tom shivered and stepped back slightly.

  Robert was watching him. “You can see him, can’t you?” he said quickly. “Where is he?”

  Tom looked at the man’s cold face and his narrow, closed mouth. “Don’t try and talk to him now, Robbo. His dad’s there. ”

  “So
?” Robert made a small impatient movement. His eyes traveled slowly around the square until they reached the right place. Then he glanced around. “That’s him. Isn’t it?”

  “He won’t tell you anything,” Tom said. “Not while that man’s there. He’s afraid of him.”

  The man was talking now, but only his lips were moving, like wet, red worms. His face was heavy and unhealthy, like something bodged out of dirty white clay.

  Robert watched him for a moment. “You don’t know,” he said. “Not just from looking. He might be fine when you talk to him.”

  “But suppose he’s not fine.? Suppose he just takes the bag and walks off? What are you going to do then?” Tom shook his head and edged backward. He had no intention of going anywhere near that man.

  “Hang on a minute.” Robert caught hold of Tom’s sleeve. “Maybe he’ll go off somewhere. Then we can get the boy on his own.”

  But it didn’t happen like that. Almost as he said it, the man did turn around and walk off. He went briskly out of the square and down the road toward the parking lot. But the boy went with him, almost jogging as he tried to keep up.

  Robert tugged at Tom’s sleeve and pulled him across the square. But as they reached the edge of the parking lot, the boy and his father were already climbing into a car. Robert broke into a run, but Tom could see that was pointless. He stayed where he was, watching the car back out of its space and drive away. It turned left out of the lot and then right, so that it disappeared almost instantly.

  That’s it, then, Tom thought. We’ve lost them.

  He was amazed at the sudden burst of feeling that swept through him. He could have laughed out loud from sheer relief.

  10

  THE NEW CAVERN WAS FULL OF NOISE AND TERROR. PEOPLE began to blunder around, shouting and pushing at each other as they struggled to get away from the break in the wall. Lorn tried to talk above the yelling, to get them to calm down. But her voice wasn’t strong enough, and she couldn’t make them hear her.

  It was Perdew who stopped the chaos. He lifted the glowing wood high above his head, so that it flared suddenly brighter, and as the others turned to look, he bellowed at them. “DO YOU WANT IT TO HEAR YOU?”

  That brought immediate silence. Total and terrified. Perdew let it register with everyone. Then he looked at Lorn.

  “OK,” he said. “What do we do now?”

  “We’ve got to fill all this in!” Tina said, not waiting for Lorn to answer. “Put it all back just the way it was, before we ever started digging!”

  “No!” Lorn said. “No, we can‘t!”

  She hadn’t worked out what else they could do. Not yet. But she knew that they had to be down under the earth. It was like hearing a voice in her head. No one will get you down there. You’ll be safe under the ground. The idea of abandoning the new space they had made filled her with panic.

  “So what are we going to do?” Perdew said steadily. “Sit here and wait to be eaten?”

  “Of course not!” Lorn forced herself to start thinking. “We’ve got to do something—but we can’t fill in everything we’ve dug out. How could we ever collect enough earth?”

  “OK.” Perdew wasn’t going to let it drop. “If we can’t use this, then we’ll have to find a new cavern after all.”

  Oh no, Lorn thought. You’re not getting away with that. She looked straight back at him. “You want to go out exploring? In the cold?”

  For the first time, she felt a response from the others. She could see them imagining what it would be like trekking over the hard, frosty earth, with the icy air eating into their bones. It was too late for exploring now, and they all knew it. They had to stay where they were.

  “So what are we going to do about this hole?” Dess said. Not belligerently like Perdew, but desperate for an answer.

  “We‘ll—”

  We’ll have to talk about that, Lorn was going to say. But the words came out differently. Because suddenly she saw what they could do.

  “We’ll build a wall,” she said.

  No one was expecting that. She felt their surprise—and then their bewilderment. They didn’t understand what she meant.

  She turned toward the fallen earth, eager to explain. “Bring the light here, Perdew. So everyone can see.”

  The wood had almost burned through, but Perdew carried it over to her, standing to one side of the hole to light it clearly.

  Lorn swept her arm in a wide arc in front of the wall. “We can build a barrier right across this end. With big stones. If we make it thick enough, it will keep anything out—and we’ll still have the space on this side, to use as a storeroom.”

  She saw them nod as they started to take it in, and she knew they were going to agree.

  “That would solve a lot of things,” Shang said thoughtfully. “If we put the stores down here, we’ll have more room up above.”

  “It won’t solve anything,” Perdew said. “It’ll just leave us back where we started—in the old, dangerous cavern. We have to move.”

  But he wasn’t sounding so fierce now. He’d lost, and he knew it. Lorn didn’t bother to argue anymore. She raised her voice and spoke to the others. “What do you think? It means going outside to rind stones. Can you deal with that?”

  Before anyone could answer, Perdew caught his breath sharply. The wood he was holding had burned right down to his hand. He flicked it into a corner and watched it disintegrate into a pile of glowing embers.

  “It’s going to be tricky building a wall in the dark,” he said sourly as the light faded.

  “I can cope with darkness,” Lorn said. “I’ll stay down here and build the wall.” She turned sideways, toward Bando. “You’ll help me lift the stones, won’t you?”

  As the last light flickered away, she saw him grin. “Yes! I’ll help you! I’ll carry the stones—and you can tell me where to put them.”

  Perdew shrugged, looking resigned. “OK. I give in. Let’s start stone hunting. You’d better wait at the bottom of the ramp, Bando, so you’ll be ready to take the stones.”

  “Yes! I’ll be ready!”

  Bando bounded forward, toward the ramp, and Perdew hustled everyone after him.

  Lorn was left on her own in the dark. She took a long, deep breath. Then—once she was sure that no one could see her—she stepped through the break in the wall, into the empty tunnel beyond.

  She could feel it stretching left and right, going off into the distance. It was a huge space, bigger than anything they could have dug on their own. The creature that had made it must be vast and dangerous, and she knew she ought to be afraid. But she wasn’t. Instead, she felt something strange and irrational drawing her on, like a voice calling to her. Come in. Come deepes: You’re safe down here....

  She didn’t want to wall off the tunnel. She wanted to explore it.

  She listened for a second, to make certain that no one was coming. Then she took another step down the tunnel. And another and another. Concentrating on the feel of the air and the soft sound of her feet on the bare earth. Her mind picked up sounds and smells, sorting them into the complex, intricate patterns they made and building a model of the space around her.

  Now she could tell that there was more than one tunnel. More than two. She clicked her tongue against the roof of her mouth and heard the sound go off in all directions. Where did the tunnels lead? How many were there? ...

  She couldn’t untangle the pattern without moving farther in. Something strange and familiar tugged at her mind, and she took another step....

  Patterns in the dark... Three and four and five.

  More...

  Over, under; over; over; under:

  Flat and round and square ...

  Each one different ...

  It wasn’t a picture in her mind and it wasn’t a voice. But there was something.... if only she could catch hold of it.... Some sharp, inexplicable impression. She reached out toward it—

  —and then Bando called from the ramp.

 
“Lorn! Lorn! Dess and Ab are coming—with lots of stones! We can start the wall now!”

  Lorn’s mind came floating back from somewhere far away. I don’t want to build a wall. I want to keep the way open and explore. But she couldn’t do that. The others wouldn’t let her, and she’d never be able to persuade them.

  “Lorn! Are you there?”

  She turned quickly and walked back through the hole, shouting an answer to Bando. “Yes, I’m here. Bring the stones across and we’ll get going!”

  SHE MEANT TO BUILD A PROPER, SOLID WALL. ONE THAT blocked the hole completely. And she would have done it—if Bando hadn’t started by making a mistake.

  He came across from the ramp with two big stones in his arms. Even he was staggering under their weight, and when Lorn told him to put them down, he dropped them so quickly that she had to jump backward to avoid them.

  “Be careful!” she said. “You nearly squashed my toes.”

  She didn’t speak sharply, but Bando was horrified. “Did I hurt you? I didn’t mean to hurt you, Lorn! I’m very, very sorry. Are you all right?”

  He was still apologizing when Shang shouted from the ramp, with the next load of stones. Lorn sent Bando straight off to fetch them, to get him thinking about something else.

  It was only when he’d gone that she realized there was a space between the two stones he’d dropped.

  Quite a big space. Big enough for me to crawl through....

  The thought was there before she could stop it, shocking and enticing. She tried to blot it out, but she was too late. The idea had formed in her mind. If she left the stones where they were, she could make a secret passage through the wall.

  It wouldn’t be right, of course. It would mean deceiving the others. She couldn’t possibly do it.

  But if she did, no one would ever know. Bando would put the rest of the stones exactly where she told him, without asking questions. And by the time the others came down to look at the wall, the opening could be hidden behind a loose stone. Everyone would feel safe—and she would be free to explore the tunnels whenever she wanted to.