Tunnels (26 page)

Back out on the landing, Will paused to admire an impressive light orb supported by a ghostly bronze hand protruding from the wall.

"These lights, where do they come from?" he asked, touching the cool surface of the sphere.

"I don't know. I think they're made in the West Cavern."

"But how do they work?" Dad had one looked at by some experts, but they didn't have a clue."

Cal
regarded the light with a noncommittal air. "I don't really know. I do know that it was Sir Gabriel
Martineau's
scientists who discovered the formula—"

"
Martineau
?" Will interrupted, recalling the name from the entry in his father's journal.

Cal
carried on, regardless: "No, I couldn't really tell you what makes them work — I think they use Antwerp glass, though. It has something to do with how the elements mix under pressure."

"There must be thousands of these down here."

"Without them we couldn't survive,"
Cal
replied. "Their light is like sunlight to us."

"How do you turn them off?"

"Turn them off?"
Cal
looked at Will quizzically, the illumination bathing his pale face. "Why in the world would you want to do that?"

He started down the landing, but Will stayed put. "So are you going to tell me about this
Martineau
?" he demanded.

"Sir Gabriel
Martineau
,"
Cal
said carefully, as if Will was showing a distinct lack of respect. "He's the Founding Father — our savior — he built the Colony."

"But I read he died in a fire in… um… well, several centuries ago."

"That's what they'd have you
Topsoilers
believe. There was a fire, but he didn’t die in it,"
Cal
replied with a scornful curl of his lip.

"So what happened, then?" Will shot back.

"He came down here with the Founding Fathers to live, of course."

"The Founding Fathers?"

"Yes, the Founding Fathers, OK?"
Cal
said in exasperation. "I'm not going into all that now. You can read about it in the Book of Catastrophes, if you're so interested."

"The Book…?"

"Oh, just come on already,"
Cal
snapped. He stared at Will and ground his teeth with such irritation that Will refrained from asking any further questions. They continued down the landing and went through a door.

"This is my room. Father arranged another bed when he was told you had to stay with us."

"Told? Who by?" Will asked in a flash.

Cal
raised his eyebrows as if he ought to know better, so Will just looked around the simple bedroom, not much larger than his own back home. Two narrow beds and a wardrobe almost filled it, with very little space in between. He perched on the end of one of the beds and, noticing a set of clothes left on the pillow, glanced up at
Cal
.

"Yes, they're yours,"
Cal
confirmed.

"I suppose I could do with a change," Will muttered, looking down at the filthy jeans he was wearing. He opened the bundle of new clothes and felt the fabric of the waxy trousers. The material was rough, almost scaly to the touch — he guessed it was a coating to keep out the damp.

While
Cal
lay back on his bed, Will began to get changed. The clothes felt strange and cold next to his skin. The pants were stiff and scratchy, and they fastened with metal buttons and a belt tie. He wrestled into the shirt without bothering to undo it, and then slowly wriggled his shoulders and arms as if trying to get a new skin to fit. Last of all, he shrugged on the long jacket with the familiar shoulder mantle that they all wore. Although glad to be out of his filthy clothes, the replacements felt stiff and restrictive.

"Don't worry, they loosen up once they're warm,"
Cal
said, noticing his discomfort. Then
Cal
got up and clambered across Will's bed to get to the wardrobe, where he knelt down and slid out an old Peek
Freans
cookie tin from beneath it.

"Have a look at these." He put the tin on Will's bed and pried off the lid.

"This is my collection," he announced proudly. He fished around in the tin, taking out a battered cell phone, which he handed to Will, who immediately tried to turn it on. It was dead.
Neither use nor ornament
: Will remembered the oft-used phrase his father would trot out on such occasions, which was ironic considering most of Dr.
Burrows's
prize possessions didn't fit into either category.

"And this."
Cal
produced a small blue radio and, holding it up to show Will, he clicked on the switch. It crackled with tinny static as he swiveled one of the dials.

"You won't pick up anything down here," Will said, but
Cal
was already taking something else out of the tin.

"Look at these, they're fantastic."

He straightened out some curling car brochures, mottled with chalky spots of mildew, and passed them to Will as if they were priceless parchments. Will frowned as he surveyed them.

"These are very old models, you know," Will said as he browsed through the pages of sports cars and family sedans. "The new Capri," he read aloud and smiled to himself.

He glanced at
Cal
and noticed the look of total absorption on the boy's face as he lovingly arranged a selection of chocolate bars and a bag of cellophane-wrapped candies in the bottom of the tin. It was as if he was trying to find the perfect composition.

"What's all the chocolate for?" Will asked, actually hoping that
Cal
might offer him some.

"I'm saving it for a very special occasion,"
Cal
said as he lovingly handled a bar of Mars Bar. "I just love the way it smells." He drew the bar under his nose and sniffed extravagantly. "That's enough for me… I don't need to open it." He rolled his eyes in ecstasy.

"So where did you get all this stuff?" Will asked, putting down the car brochures, which curled slowly back into a disheveled tube.
Cal
glanced warily at the bedroom door and moved a little closer to Will.

"Uncle Tam," he said in a low voice. "He often goes beyond the Colony — but you mustn't tell anyone. It would mean Banishment." He hesitated and glanced at the door again. "He even goes Topsoil."

"Does he now?" Will said, scrutinizing
Cal
's
face intently. "And when does he do that?"

"Every so often."
Cal
was speaking so softly that Will had difficulty hearing him. "He trades things that…" He faltered, realizing that he was overstepping the mark. "…that he finds."

"Where?" Will asked.

"On his trips,"
Cal
said obliquely as he packed the items back into the tin, replaced the lid, and pushed it once again under the wardrobe. Still kneeling, he turned to Will.

"You're going to get out, aren't you?" he asked with a sly grin.

"Huh?" Will said, taken aback by the abruptness of the question.

"Come on, you can tell me. You're going to escape, aren't you? I just know it!"
Cal
was literally vibrating with excitement as he waited for Will's response.

"You mean back to
Highfield
?"

Cal
nodded energetically.

"Maybe, maybe not. I don't know yet," Will said guardedly. Despite his emotions and everything he felt for his newfound family, he was going to play it safe for now; a small voice in his head was still warning him that this could be part of an elaborate plan to ensnare him and keep him here forever, and that even this boy who claimed to be his brother could be working for the Styx. He wasn't quite ready to trust him yet, not completely.

Cal
looked directly at Will.

"Well, when you do, I'm coming with you." He was smiling, but his eyes were deadly serious. Will was taken completely unawares by this suggestion and didn’t know how he was going to answer, but at that point was saved by a gong sounding insistently from somewhere in the house.

"That's dinner, Father must be home. Come on."
Cal
leaped up and ran out the door and down the stairs to the dining room, Will following closely behind. Mr. Jerome was already seated at the head of a deep-grained wooden table. As they entered, he didn't look up, his eyes remaining fixed on the table in front of him.

The room couldn't have been more different from the sumptuous drawing room Will had seen earlier. It was spartan and the furniture basic, appearing to be constructed from wood that had endured centuries of wear. On closer inspection, he could see that the table and chairs had been fabricated from a mishmash of different woods of conflicting shades and with grains at odds to each other; some parts were waxed or varnished, while others were tough with splintery surfaces. The high-backed dining chairs looked particularly rickety and archaic, with spindly legs that creaked and complained when the boys took their places on either side of the sullen-faced Mr. Jerome, who barely gave Will a glance. Will shifted in his seat, trying to get comfortable and wondering idly how the chairs could accommodate someone of Mr. Jerome's impressive bulk without giving up the ghost.

Mr. Jerome cleared his throat loudly and without any warning he and Cal leaned forward, their eyes closed and their hands folded on the table in front of them. A little self-consciously, Will did likewise.

"The sun shall no longer set, nor shall the moon withdraw itself, for the Lord will be your everlasting light and the dark days of your mourning will be ended," Mr. Jerome droned.

Will couldn't stop himself from peeping at the man through his half-closed eyes. He found all this a little odd — no one would have
ever
thought of saying grace in his house. Indeed, the closest they ever got to anything resembling a prayer was when his mother yelled, "For God's sake, shut up!"

"As it is above, so it is below," Mr. Jerome finished.

"Amen," he and Cal said in unison, too quickly for Will to join in. They sat up, and Mr. Jerome tapped a spoon on the tumbler in front of him.

There was a moment of uncomfortable silence during which no one at the table looked at anyone else. Then a man with long greasy hair shambled into the room. His face was deeply lined and his cheeks were gaunt. He was wearing a leather apron, and his tired and listless eyes, like dying candle flames in cavernous hollows, lingered briefly on Will and then quickly turned away.

As Will watched the man make repeated trips in and out of the room, shuffling to each of them in turn to serve the food, he came to the conclusion that he must have endured great suffering, possibly a severe illness.

The first course was a thin broth. From its steamy vapors, Will could detect a spiciness, as if copious amounts of curry powder had been ladled into it. This came with a side dish of small white objects, similar in appearance to peeled gherkins. Cal and Mr. Jerome wasted no time in starting on their soup and, between loud exhalations, they both made the most outrageous noises as they sucked the liquid from their spoons, splashing large amounts of it over their clothes and simply ignoring the mess. The symphony of slurps and loud gulps reached such a ridiculous crescendo that Will couldn't stop himself from staring at both of them in utter disbelief.

Finally, he picked up his own spoon and was just at the point of taking his first tentative mouthful when, out of the corner of his eye, he saw one of the white objects on his side plate twitch. Thinking he'd imagined it, he emptied the contents of his spoon back into his bowl and instead used the utensil to roll the object over.

With a shock he found it had a row of tiny, dark brown pointed legs neatly folded beneath it. It was a grub of some kind! He sat bolt upright and watched with horror as it curved its back , its miniscule spiky legs rippling open in an undulating wave, as if to greet him.

His first thought was that it had gotten there by mistake, so he glanced at Mr. Jerome's and
Cal's
side plates, wondering if he should say something. At that very moment,
Cal
picked up one of the white objects from his own plate and bit into it, chewing it with gusto. Between his thumb and forefinger, the remaining half of the grub twitched and writhed, oozing a clear fluid over his fingertips.

Will felt his stomach heave, and he dropped his spoon in his soup dish with such a crash that the serving man came in and, finding that he was not wanted, promptly exited again. As Will tried to quell his nausea, he saw that Mr. Jerome was looking straight at him. It was such a hateful stare that Will immediately averted his eyes. As for
Cal
, he was intent on finishing the still-writhing half-grub, sucking it into his mouth as if he was devouring a very fat strand of spaghetti.

Will shuddered; there was absolutely no way he could bring himself to drink his soup now, so he sat there feeling distinctly unnerved and out of place until the serving man cleared the bowls away. Then the main course appeared, a gravy-soaked mush just as indeterminate as the broth. Will prodded suspiciously at everything on his plate just to make sure that nothing was still alive. It seemed harmless enough, so he began to pick at it without enthusiasm, quailing involuntarily with each mouthful, all the while accompanied by his fellow diners' gastronomic cacophony.

Although Mr. Jerome hadn't said a single word to Will during the whole meal, the unbridled resentment radiating from him was overwhelming. Will had no idea why this was, but he was vaguely beginning to wonder if it had something to do with his real mother, the person no one seemed to be prepared to talk about. Or perhaps the man simply despised
Topsoilers
like him? Whatever it was, he wished the man would say something, anything at all, just to break the agonizing silence. From Mr. Jerome's demeanor, Will knew full well that it wouldn't be pleasant when it came; he was prepared for that. He just wanted to get it over with. He began to sweat and tried to loosen the starched collar of his new shirt by running his finger inside it. It seemed to Will as if the room were filling with a chilled and poisonous aspic; he felt suffocated by it.