CHAPTER TEN
The Botchers

The three adventurers made their way through the empty gallery, Milli and Ernest holding either side of Loyal’s bridle. Milli veered automatically towards the elevator but Loyal shook his head. ‘No—too noisy,’ was his clipped reply.

As they drew close to where the tour group was standing listening to Fritz, Loyal’s ears quivered. The children could see that he was tense. They all slipped behind a wide stone column that managed to completely obscure them. Just ahead they could see and hear the happy commotion as the St Erudite’s students wriggled into padded safety suits to take a ride on what Fritz called the Rocket Launch. Milli and Ernest caught the words ‘perfectly safe’ and ‘straight through the atrium roof and back’. It sounded thrilling and they couldn’t believe this highlight had been omitted from the first visit. They even felt a little bitter, thinking that they might have flown in the rocket themselves today had they delayed rejoining the toys. But there was no time to gaze regretfully at the group standing around the silver bullet that was starting to spit sparks. Loyal nudged them gently and steered them into a side corridor.

A dusty staircase led downwards into the bowels of the arcade. Across the top, to deter their descent, was a sign reading: Arcade Staff Only—Trespassers Prosecuted. They ducked nimbly around the sign, more worried about being seen than what prosecution might entail. Milli wondered how Loyal was going to navigate the stairs, but he balanced his weight on his rockers and used them like skis, sliding down the steps in slow motion.

Ernest began to seriously regret their decision when, halfway down, they came to a small landing where a medical trolley stood, packed with jars. He tried not to look too closely at the jars’ murky contents after he glimpsed one holding a collection of giant eyes suspended in a clear jelly. He shuddered, and hoped they were only glass, but they rolled around the jar in order to follow the group’s descent. Milli didn’t notice, too keen on being first to reach the basement, and Ernest thought it best not to point them out to her.

The stairs ended in a heavy metal door, the kind that, once opened, springs back immediately upon release. Above it was a sign that simply read Basement Level. They opened the door and stepped into a long corridor lit by overhead fluorescent lights. It took them some seconds to adjust to the brightness. The floor was flecked grey linoleum and highly polished, and the air smelled of cleaning agents, not dissimilar to how Ernest’s house smelled after his mother had gone on one of her cleaning binges. For some unaccountable reason, this sterile corridor was more frightening than if they’d stepped into a dark cave full of bats. It felt like a mausoleum—cold and devoid of life.

They had to tread carefully for they found the linoleum squeaked if they moved too fast. Loyal moved so smoothly and silently that the children concluded his rockers must be felt-lined. Both Milli and Ernest clung on to his reins, more for a sense of security than anything else. All the time they were conscious of the possibility of being discovered and felt extremely exposed walking down the middle of this deserted corridor with nothing in sight that might work to conceal their presence.

The hollow silence made the hairs on Milli’s neck prickle. ‘Where are we?’ she breathed.

Looking at the wide-eyed expression on Loyal’s face she could see he was thinking the same. Whatever the rocking horse had imagined finding, it wasn’t this. He didn’t know what to make of it. His spongy nostrils flared and his breathing quickened.

Ernest, too, was uncomfortable. His fingers holding the reins had gone rigid and he couldn’t seem to relax them. Whatever it was that lurked within the basement, Ernest was sure it was something much more sinister than a monster. Monsters, as a rule, could be outsmarted if you were quick-witted and didn’t panic. But he wasn’t sure he was ready to face whatever was concealed down here.

Other polished corridors branched off the main one, like ancillary roads running off a highway. Occasionally they came to a series of closed doors, most with glass panels. Some appeared to be supply closets, because when the children peered inside they could see containers with labels like Furry Appendages, Assorted Paws and Mechanical Limbs. In one they saw sacks spilling their contents of synthetic hair in different shades. Another supply room looked like a wrecker’s yard, with rusty saws, metal prongs and boxes spilling screws all over the floor. At the end of the corridor was a set of double swinging doors with a sign above that said Quiet Please—Surgery in Progress. That made them believe they might be in a toy hospital but then other rooms incongruously named Accessories Lab and Objects Blunt and Sharp completely confused them.

The sound of conversation reached them as they rounded a corner. They followed it to a door with Botchers’ Common Room written above it.

‘What on earth’s a Botcher?’ Ernest whispered.

Loyal’s brow creased and he shook his head to indicate that he could not enlighten them.

Milli and Ernest crept closer, with Loyal watching them, poised to spring at the slightest sign of trouble. They had to stand on their tiptoes to peer into the room and even then their eyes only just reached to where the glass panel began.

Nothing terribly exciting appeared to be going on inside the room, which looked a little like the waiting lounge in an airport where passengers sit counting off the time before boarding their flights. The occupants were mostly men in lab coats, bespectacled and greying. They were sitting in leather armchairs, reading papers or sipping coffee, and by the semi-recumbent positions of some you could tell they had been there for a while. They had a look of being temporarily marooned and nobody was making any move to resume their duties. In one corner was a bar where some people downed amber liquid from tumblers. Two men were engrossed in a game of chess. Another had nodded off in the midst of reading a journal, which had slipped from his hands onto his thighs. A very unhospital-like smell of alcohol and tobacco seeped from the room.

The children were just close enough to overhear the conversation of a pair seated near the door. One had a receding hairline and the other a carefully groomed goatee that he stroked at regular intervals.

‘How long before we have to get back to work?’ one of the men said.

‘At least an hour,’ his colleague replied, stretching his legs and glancing at his wristwatch.

‘Oh well, can’t complain. They should have school groups in more often.’ The balding man smiled.

‘Makes a welcome change from reconstructive surgery,’ added the bearded man and they both chortled with laughter.

‘God, this place is depressing,’ muttered another man nearby, putting down his newspaper.

‘Quit moaning,’ the bearded man snapped. ‘No one’s holding a gun to your head.’

‘Let’s see what you say if the truth ever comes out,’ taunted the other.

The children looked back at Loyal. He rolled his eyes frantically, indicating that they should come away. They crept back towards him and all moved a safe distance from the Botchers’ Common Room.

‘I think they might be toy doctors,’ said Ernest. ‘They seem to be waiting for the kids to leave before they can get back to work.’

‘What did that doctor mean by “the truth”?’ puzzled the rocking horse. ‘And what exactly is this work that can’t be resumed until the excursion is over? This is strange indeed.’

‘Perhaps they can’t be distracted by noise when working,’ suggested Ernest, even though he knew this was implausible. Whatever noise the children upstairs were making, it seemed unlikely that any of it would filter down as far as the basement.

‘Where to now?’ said Milli.

‘I think that might be enough for one day,’ Loyal replied, his voice rumbling with disquiet. ‘We need to report back to Theo. He will know what the next step should be.’

Ernest heartily concurred, but Milli wasn’t convinced.

‘Report back?’ she objected. ‘There’s nothing to report. We need to keep looking, at least for a little while.’

‘Very well,’ Loyal reluctantly agreed. ‘If that is what you think.’

‘But only for ten more minutes,’ put in Ernest. ‘We have to get back to the others. We can’t be left behind a second time.’

‘But we don’t have to get back,’ Milli reminded him. ‘We’re not officially here so we won’t be missed. We can make our own way home later.’

There was nothing to direct them through the maze of windowless corridors, so they headed down the nearest one in the hope that it might lead somewhere useful. But it stretched ahead emptily and Milli began to worry that they would have to abort their mission having discovered little of value. They were on the verge of heading back when the sound of banging and crashing drew their attention. There was a door ahead that was ajar and when they peeked inside they saw the messiest workroom they had ever laid eyes upon. It wasn’t a clinical room like the others they’d seen; in here were dusty bookcases, antique vases and old wicker furniture. The giant heads of stone gargoyles sat grinning on the floor and there was a statue of some classical deity so large its head touched the ceiling. There was a tea trolley holding plates of half-eaten sandwiches and dainty cakes that had only been nibbled at the edges. Various drawing utensils were strewn across the floor; tattered sheets hung from the overhead fan. There was an easel and numerous brushes in jars. Strange markings and rudimentary sketches even covered the walls, which were decorated with a silver grey wallpaper with a dragonfly imprint. Everywhere the children looked they saw strange objects: giant syringes filled with brightly coloured sizzling liquid, candelabra in the shape of intertwined test tubes, glass specimen domes holding beetles and exotic butterflies the size of bread-and-butter plates. The occasional tables were made from tree trunks with twisted branches for legs. A series of antique bird cages held colourful birds made of papier-mâché. A red velvet chaise lounge held an assortment of rare toys—a sailor bear, three French dolls, and a dragon with shimmering scales.

In the midst of the chaos stood a woman in black, tall and ghoulish. Her eyes were shut and she seemed to be lost in thought. A black cat leapt onto the tea trolley, sniffed indifferently at what it found there, then jumped down to rub itself around its mistress’s legs, purring for attention.

‘Not now, Socrates!’ snapped the woman. ‘Can’t you see I’m busy.’

The cat continued undeterred and the woman opened her eyes, the mood broken.

‘Infuriating animal!’ she muttered under her breath and began to hurl whatever small objects she could reach across the room. Socrates scuttled for cover and the children flinched as a coffee cup shattered against a pillar, followed by the pages of a notepad fluttering through the air and a storm of pens that rained down on the floor. Without so much as a glance at the damage she had caused, the woman settled herself comfortably at a large round table that held sheets of butcher’s paper and an assortment of crayons. She picked one up and set to work on a rather flamboyant sketch.

Now that she was seated the children were able to get a better look at her. She had long hair the colour of pitch on one side of her head; on the other it had been cropped as short as a pixie’s and dyed ox-blood red. There were dark rings under her eyes, as if she were sleep deprived, and her mouth was painted an extraterrestrial silver. Her skin was bluish-white which gave her the appearance of being frozen. She was as lanky as a bean stalk and dressed in a torn black lace dress, so flimsy that part of her skeletal chest was visible. On her feet were boots that came to arrow-sharp points, and she had a black leather jacket with metal studs on the upturned collar over her shoulders. A tattoo of a serpent wound its way up her pale arm.

Suddenly she jerked to her feet as if struck by an idea, and began an animated conversation with someone on the other side of the room. She batted her eyelids, gasped and giggled like a school girl, and patted her chest. The children strained to see who else was in the room but saw nothing but a marble bust propped on an antique barley-twist pedestal.

‘I am unworthy of your time, Brilliant One,’ the woman said. ‘But I will learn. Just be patient, grant me time.’

When Milli and Ernest looked at Loyal, his mane was bristling. What was wrong? Milli didn’t get a chance to ask because the woman began singing, closing her eyes and resting her cheek alongside the cold marble head. She clearly had difficulty holding a tune—no sooner had she started in one particular key than she jumped to another without showing the least awareness of having done so. What started as a chant grew in momentum and volume until the woman was standing on the table playing air guitar and belting out the words as if she were in front of an audience of thousands.

I’ve met Coco, Calvin and Gianni,
Luis, Marc and Armani,
They make handbags, blouses and evening wear,
But there’s one thing they can’t do and wouldn’t dare.

They couldn’t design a toy in a blind pink fit,
They’d need manuals, assistants and instruction kits.
In all the world there is only one Girl who can really get things done.
That girl is here for all to see,
They’ll never know my secrets, I’m a mystery.

My designs will go down in history!
I’m warped and twisted,
I’ll cop some flack.
Most people think I’m a maniac…

Milli’s and Ernest’s fear left them momentarily.

‘Don’t think she’ll be signing any record deals in a hurry,’ Ernest smirked.

‘Really?’ said Milli in mock surprise. ‘I think she’ll go far, whoever she is.’

Loyal’s face looked both surprised and troubled. ‘Are you saying that neither of you recognise that person?’ he asked.

Ernest squinted for a closer look and then let out an audible gasp. Milli struggled to comprehend.

‘What?’ she said.

‘That’s her,’ Ernest mouthed in disbelief. ‘That’s the curator.’