The Map World Trilogy

Part Two

Hattie read the passage over and over again. She was puzzled. Part of her thought, I’d better get this to Uncle quickly, the other part thought: He would go spare if he knew I’d read this, the middle part of her was thinking about what she was going to have for tea this evening, but that was deemed irrelevant considering the circumstances. ‘Peculiar occurrences?’ she said aloud to herself, trying desperately to gather sense and meaning from it. ‘Beneath the library? There is no beneath. There is the rotten cellar where Uncle goes to make his chutneys, but that’s it! What does all this mean? And why the fancy trickery?’ Question after question muddled her brain, what does WWH mean anyway? Uncle doesn’t like quiche! The latter being a phrase that annoyed Hattie more than puzzled her.

She glanced up at the old clock on the wall, the one that had continually teased her and ran at half speed when the shop was open; 6.26pm. The one time I need more time to think and the bloody clock runs quicker! Hattie thought to herself. Half an hour was not a great deal of time for anyone to find a secretly secret place, meet a secret person who had an obvious  fancy for quiche nor decide whether or not to see what all the fuss was about. Hattie was in a pickle.

A cough. It was definitely a cough. It was unmistakably Uncle’s cough mores the point, came from behind the large wooden door that led out the back. The cough was accompanied by loud muttering and a great deal of noisy pottering. Uncle’s just there! Panic struck Hattie like a bolt of lightning. Not only the book...but if he realised that I had intervened and read his secret message from a secret person on a secret sliver of paper that turned itself into a flare and almost set fire to my hand let alone the shop...well it just doesn’t bare thinking about what he would do! More than likely throw a complete wobbly...turn a shade that could only be described as beetroot and throw me out of his house quicker than anyone could say ‘Bring a quiche!’ She grabbed the paper from the desk and turned off the desk light. In the darkness Hattie listened. She could still hear Uncle lurking about behind the door moving papers in his conventional sense – normally thrown around here there and everywhere. For a man who was extremely house proud with the library, his filing system left a lot to be desired.

The good news was that Uncle Horace was still back there, the bad news was that Hattie couldn’t see a thing! Not a position one wants to be in when time is short and you are surrounded by thousands of heavy rectangular objects ready to drop onto your head from their shelves given the slightest nudge from a misplaced elbow. ‘Hmm....’ she uttered quietly.

Time was against Hattie. She had moved herself away from the desk, her eyes adjusting slowly to the blanket of darkness that was now the library. It looked considerably different in the dark, unfamiliar. She could faintly make out the rows of books that she has become all too familiar with. The street light from outside provided just enough light for her to tip toe her way towards these, but not enough to stop her from colliding into the bags that Uncle had left on the floor earlier. There was a large clonk as her foot hit what seemed to be a brick and she fell forwards in slow motion, outstretching her arms in the hope they would break her fall.

 She hit the deck. The stone slabs hurt a lot, her hands were stinging from the cold sharp pain. She rose to her knees and realised that the paper was gone! ‘Oh no!’ she exclaimed. Hattie’s eyes hurriedly searched for the missing object, looking for a little glimmer of hope from the shiny paper. ‘Where is it?!’ The heavy wooden door heaved itself open. Light from Horace’s ‘office’ penetrated the darkness, Hattie froze.

‘Hello?’ her Uncle’s distinctive voice bellowed out, nervously. ‘Who’s out there? Hattie is that you?’

Hattie could feel a bead of sweat skating down her forehead and dribbling itself onto her nose. Her breathing deepened; her heart racing at a million beats per second. ‘Stay calm Hattie’ her inner voice shouted out. She could hear her Uncle walking towards the desk, merely a few feet away from her. Hattie glanced backwards towards where he was, she couldn’t see him – more importantly, he couldn’t see her. On her hands and knees she swiftly decided to make a move, the stinging sensation burning up through her wrists as she did so. But where was the paper? Uncle’s going to find it for sure. I am in so much trouble. Forget trouble, if he catches you like this on your hands and knees in the darkness, he will have you committed! The book shelves were in sight. Hattie scuttled behind them, hiding her body. As she peered through the room, she could see Uncle at the desk, one hand on his hip the other gripping a large object firmly– a cricket bat! ‘This gets better!’ she thought.

Uncle slowly leered over the desk in front of him, nothing. His gaze turned towards the book shelves. Hattie hid. She carefully positioned her eyes between the books, and followed Uncle Horace as he made his way round to the front of the desk where the bags of bricks lay. ‘If I find you, you’ll be for it!’ he growled, slapping the bat against his other hand – in an attempt to make clear his proposition. Hattie understood it fully! Horace’s foot glanced against the bags and he quickly looked down. ‘Tut’ he said to himself, followed by a sigh. Horace leaned over and turned on the desk light. ‘Bloody mice been at the bags!’ Horace looked up at his library to try and spot one of them cheekily mocking him from a far, Hattie ducked down quickly unnoticed. ‘One day.....one day, I will get you, mark my words Mr Mouse!’ He placed the bat down on the desk and hitched up the bags in his arms. ‘One day’ he said once more as he made his way out of the room, flicking the light off as he went.

The creak and thud of the door, marked his departure. A huge sigh of relief came from Hattie’s mouth, her heart, now exhausted, calmed itself down. The message! The thought rose from Hattie instantly, her body (in shock) leaped up and tried hard to get itself together – sparked into action, without a moment to think. ‘Did he find it?’ Hattie wondered, gripped by worry. She looked back to the desk, which was once more covered by the night’s sky and a tiny orange tint from the street light.

 She moved over towards it, listening for a reprise of Uncle’s formidable entrance. She scoured the stone tablets on the floor, their uneven surface basked in an orange hue. She couldn’t see it anywhere! It were as if it had taken flight from her falling hand and moved onto to pastures new, far away from the dingy dark library. Hattie’s hands lapped around her mouth and nose, pressing themselves firmly there in disbelief and panic. She tried hard to recall what the message said. 7pm sharp....beneath the library.

What’s the time now? She thought. Must be nearly seven.  Hattie had to quickly make a rash decision. Her inquisitive mind wanted desperately to go and see what this message meant, whether she bought a quiche with her or not. Beneath the library. Hattie toyed with the idea in her head, ‘the only beneath is the cellar, a good a place as any to start.’ Her mind was made up – although the thought of a mini adventure, despite what her Uncle would do, was the only catalyst Hattie needed to reach this decision and thus was not a very challenging one to make at all!

The narrow passage of stairs down to the cellar were situated next to the infamous non-fiction section. They were marked by a large wooden sign that hung upon a chain, exclaiming: DO NOT ENTER...STAFF ONLY in large red lettering. Hattie looked down the stairway it was pitch black down there. It was always pitch black, even if the sun was beating heavily down on the library, picking up the glittery dust particles in the air, this passage was always dark. On the wall, high up about two feet down the stairway, there was an ornamental torch sitting upright in its holder. Uncle had bought this about a year or so ago to add a sense of drama and mystery to the passage – stopping the more nosey of his customers from poking their beaks into a place that was out of bounds. It worked. When faced with a deep dark tunnel and one ominous torch placed next to it, people tend not to bother in settling their curiosity – it also gets a few tongues wagging, which is good for business!

A match. Uncle had a stash of these in the desk drawer to light his pipe with. Hattie left the passage entrance and darted off to get a box of matches. She hurriedly rummaged through the drawer, clasping all manner of objects that people tend to put in their drawers – most notably a broken light bulb and a menu for the Chinese takeaway down the street. She grabbed the matches and returned to the gloomy stairway. Hattie carefully released the chain from its hook and let it dangle freely, brushing the floor lightly as it did so. She held the match box in her hand and pushed it open, taking out a single match. She stuck the stick on the side of the box and released a flash of light into the darkness that flickered wildly in the draft from the tunnel. ‘Here goes’ she said reluctantly. Hattie moved the flame closer to the torch, keeping her distance from the object on the wall. It erupted with a roar of fire. ‘So much for ornamental,’ she uttered, shaking out the match stick and dropping it on the step. The torch cascaded colour down the passage, the first time that Hattie had ever seen the rough and treacherous staircase that plummeted down into the dark abyss. Torch in hand, Hattie made her descent cautiously down into the unknown.

More to come soon......please feel free to comment and don't forget to vote :)