Valentine Cole's Journal

Entry #7

March 27, 1893
By my madly speeding watch and my frantic calculations, there were 45 minutes of indigo left. Pearl changed into better, more sensible clothes, because, as she informed me later, the last thing she wanted was to be rendered quite helpless by her dress in the surely bustling action of the Fernery.
I advised Pearl (by miming) to crawl through the house, so Ma and Pa wouldn't hear us. They may not have heard us anyway, with all their talking, but creaking floorboards are loud, and we weren't going to risk it anyway. As we walked down the stairs, I was confused. Why weren't there anyone in the Arcade? Pearl told me it was closed, however I meant that all the workers were gone, like Mr Pie and Mr Gravel. Pearl informed me it was Mr Spike and Mr Gable. I knew it had an 'I' sound! How could I forget? We headed to the Fernery, guided mostly by signs, not knowledge. It was gone anyway. We came to the Fernery, and we realised it was shrinking. Most of the plants were dead, or falling down. It was absolutely dirty, with stagnant ponds, green slime, grime on the ceiling and more. Ivy followed, exclaiming 'Whoa! It smells like a dirty aquarium in here!' We didn't want her to come and besides, she'd told Ma about the puzzles. Why would we trust her? She said that she was here to help us with our memories, and quickly quizzed us. 'What are the dolls that turn the signs called, at the front of the Arcade?' I answered, 'The Blue Boys'. Pearl answered, 'The Small Sailors'. They are apparently called 'The Little Men'. Grudgingly, we allowed Ivy to come with us. Soon, we suddenly encountered several monkeys. They were exactly like the monkeys in.. I think.. Pa's Monkey Book? I don't remember, unfortunately, but among them was a mandrill. One of the deadliest monkeys in the world. He had multicoloured skin, from red to blue- the like. It had fangs as long as someone's fingers. I was scared, but Pearl made things worse, talking about how once, a mandrill bit of a lady's face in the Congo. Absolutely horrible and scary, but soon we weren't worrying about that. We were worrying about the test, which had come into being in front of us. We had to add up all the hands, toes and tails of all the monkeys, including primates? And one of them had the bouquet! We needed to do the code. The mandrill wanted something from us. which apparently was in the safe, in the tree behind us. We had to figure out the exact calculations and then well needed to add it all up. Hopefully, we'd get it right and then we'd turn the dial to hit the exact number. None of us knew what was in there, but clearly the mandrill wanted it. We had to figure out the question, and fast. The Fernery was closing in on our heads, it was becoming ever smaller. We needed to hurry if we wanted to get out alive. Carefully, we read the test again, which went something like this-

SIX SPLENDID RAINBOW MONKEYS.
AND ONE HAS YOUR BOUQUET.
HE'LL TRADE IT FOR THE TREAT BETWEEN
THE SILVER LID AND TRAY.
COUNT UP ALL THE MONKEYS,
THEN ADD THE MONKEYS' TOES.
CALCULATE THE TAILS AND HANDS
BEFORE THE ROOM IMPLODES.
DISPLAY THE ANSWER ON THE WHEEL
AND HEED THE SOUND ADVICE:
YOU HAVE ONE CHANCE TO TURN IT
SO MAKE SURE TO BE PRECISE.
BEST FIND THE TOTAL QUICKLY
OR YOUR FATE WILL BE UNPLEASANT:
HOW MANY PRIMATES AND THEIR HANDS
AND TAILS AND TOES ARE PRESENT?

We needed to add everything up?! Well, this should be easy. Monkeys plus tails=six plus six, twelve! Then twelve hands- twenty-four! But the monkeys were coming closer for some reason. The tree were sort of leaning in, they were being pushed because of the ever shrinking ceiling. The gibbon was singing a war cry. But I wasn: focused on that- I'd just solved the puzzle. Six monkeys and six tails plus twelve hands and sixty toes-eighty four! The answer! But Pearl shot it down. 'The gibbon!' she said. 'It's not a monkey, it doesn't have a tail!' 'So eighty four minus fourteen. Seventy.' I replied. Ivy wanted to turn the wheel, and then Echo appeared. She seemed like she was trying to tell us something. Then we read the scroll again. The gibbon was a primate! She was counted! But Pearl felt we were missing something. She wished she could remember what primates were, but Ivy said the they are basically the scientific family of monkeys. Pearl realised- 'We're apes. We forgot to count ourselves-' she mumbled. We wuickly added it all up. 'One hundred and twenty-two!' I yelled. We turned the dial, and a bunch of grapes appeared., we turned around to see that the mandrill was holding the bouquet. Of course it had to be him! I was about to give the mandrill the grapes when Ivy- Ivy appeared, taking away the grapes, running towards the monkey and staring straight at him into the eye. 'Here, Mr Mandrill,' she said. 'Come on, give us the bouquet and you can have these.' The mandrill picked up the flowers. 'Do you like grapes?' said Ivy. 'But- you've got to trade.' I was petrified. The mandrill cqme closer and suddenly, he threw away the bouquet and grabbed Ivy on the hand. Ivy screamed for help, but the mandrill didn't even look at her. The last thing I saw of them was the great red and blue backside of the mandrill. Pearl was furious. She tried to run towards them, but I was forced to hold her, for the fear that she would be hurt was too great. We turned towards the entrance. Thankfully, the door was still there, but there were so many dead tree and logs in the way. If we could climb over them, we would be free. We needed to run, but Pearl was adamant she wasn:t leaving, not without Ivy. She was crying, but I told her there was only one more round. She needed to come with me, to finally finish this cursed game. Ivy, and Eddie and Linda and everyone else would come back. She nodded ,then quietly said 'The lollies.' I explained that we'd finished the lolly challenge hours ago. 'No, the ones in the bag,' she replied, looking at me again. Glancing at my bag, I remembered the special candies. As he lifted them out, the green striped candies, I handed one to Pearl and we quickly ate it. It tasted like a vanilla cream candy. We both waited for the magic to start, but nothing happened. We had to run to the door now, though. and there was no time. We needed to go. We were almost there when a huge tree crashed into Pearl. She sank under the huge weight, and soon went out of sight. I screamed. There was no sign of her, no feet, no blood either. There was a whoosh from up top, the sound almost like a stick flying through the air. I looked up just in time to see a sharp piece of glass. I was dumbfounded as the plunged through my chest and shattered at my feet- or in my feet, I should say. But it went straight through me as if I wasn't there. It had struck me dead on, only for me to survive. It wasn't possible. I waited for myself to bleed, to collapse, the life drained out of me. Soon, I realised-I could move. I could see. Yet things went through me as if I was a ghost. I was hit. I should've been dead, but the candy had saved my life. Quickly, I realised that I could save Pearl with this I went through the tree and managed to save her. We got through the Fernery door, running out as if our lives depended on this- which it did. Hearts pounding hard, the round was over. But at a severe price- we had lost Ivy. She way gone.