Her name’s Grace, from Prestonfield. She was going home from a play date when she saw a cute teddy waving at her from the window. The poor thing doesn’t know how long she’s been here for. She’s scared and wants to go back to her mum and dad. I imagine this is the same room Katie would have found herself in. How she must have been so, so afraid, trapped in here.
‘I need to ask you something very important, Grace, okay?’
‘Okay,’ she replies.
‘Have you seen a little boy called Ollie, or Oliver?’
She shakes her head.
‘Are you sure? I can show you a picture, if you like.’
‘I haven’t seen any little boys here. It’s you, me, Wilson and him sleeping below me. But he’s not little.’
It was worth a shot, I guess. Eliminating what is not true is just as important as knowing what is true. Something I came across on a science podcast: we learn as much from failed experiments as we do from successful ones. But I wasn’t supposed to become the experiment. Then again, there is no ‘outside’ of the experiment. The observer has a bearing on the outcome and is therefore always part of the process, whether they know it or not. I think that’s how it goes . . .
A faint wail comes through the wall. It conjures up the anguished sound of slowly rending sails. I press my ear against the wall and hear several muffled voices.
‘Can you hear that, Grace?’ I ask.
‘Hear what?’
‘Nothing,’ I say. ‘Go to sleep.’
‘I’m scared. Can I come sleep with you?’ she says in a tiny voice.
‘Sure, if you want to,’ I say, budging over.
Don’t want to alarm her with the terrors I hear weeping through the fabric of the walls. Grace climbs down the bunk and curls up in the sheets beside me. Soon enough, she’s fast asleep. I try my phone again, but still can’t get a signal. I write a message for Priya and Jomo anyway, in the hope it might slip through.
The door clicks open, and light from the corridor pierces the darkness. I don’t recall falling asleep. I’m groggy as hell. Grace wakes with a start. She sits up, rubbing her eyes. Wilson walks in and places a bundle he’s carrying on top of the chest of drawers.
‘You are to get dressed in the appropriate attire,’ he says and leaves us.
Give me strength: black dress of dubious fabric, white apron, little cap and clogs. The hell? The fabric’s old and there are patches where it’s been mended. The black’s so faded it’s become grey. Grace has one too and she looks like a little French maid in it. I slip the dress on. It’s at least three sizes too big and hangs off my frame. I keep my trousers on. No way I’m taking those off. And I don’t do clogs either. Apron, maybe . . . Okay then, yes. I don’t even know what I’m supposed to do with the cap. I throw it on my head askew. I don’t care.
Wilson comes back and we follow him to the kitchen. Through the window, there’s a male figure in overalls shovelling snow in the back garden. Each shovel load apparently has to be taken all the way to the back fence where he’s building a pile. The clouds outside have broken and patches of blue appear in the gloom. It’d have been easier to let the snow lie until it melted. My dagger’s stuck along with some knives on a magnetic strip on the wall.
‘I’ll teach you to make the master’s breakfast. Weekdays he takes a bowl of oats, two slices of toast, one boiled egg and a cup of black tea with two sugars,’ says Wilson. ‘Afterwards, he’ll have grapefruit or mandarin. Understood?’
I nod.
The morning’s hazy, like I’m in a strangemare. It’s all so surreal. Gran must’ve been worried when I didn’t come home last night.
On Wilson’s nod, I start making the porridge. Luckily Gran showed me how. But why am I cooking porridge in this strange house?
When will I wake?
He turns to Grace, who is taciturn, but she follows Wilson’s instructions on sweeping the floor to the letter. Her little hands tremble as she works. Breaks my heart; Izwi’s nearly her age and I would never have allowed her to endure this.
Wilson then sets out a silver tray with a teapot – smells like Earl Grey – a tea cup with gold trim and a sugar basin. This is also silver. He’s clumsy; uses both hands to pick up each object as though he’s a child with small fingers. He works with concentration, but now and again checks to make sure I’m following.
Soft rays of sunlight stream in, whitened by lace curtains, grazing my tired face like a gentle hand.
In the daylight an umbilical cord from my belly becomes visible. It’s a ghostly thing made of grotesque curls, like an old telephone handset cord, running all the way down to the floor. It’s so faint that it’s no wonder I missed it in the dark. It trails along the floor towards the hole I fell into last night and disappears.
What kind of sorcery is this? Grace has one too. And so does Wilson, though his cord is thicker, denser and darker than ours.
I tug at my stomach to see if I can remove it, but that doesn’t work. Totally freaks me out seeing this thing going through my navel to my insides. I curse Callander for not helping with all that book knowledge of his, when I told him about the children. Why didn’t I stick to delivering messages? It was a nice little gig, but there I went, trying to stick my beak in the big league. Look where it got me, trying to be some kind of hero.
The porridge’s done now and Wilson passes me a bowl. ‘One tablespoon of sugar,’ he instructs. I add it and stir. And then we set the breakfast on a table in the conservatory. After we’re done, Wilson makes us throw everything in the bin – because the person we’re making breakfast for isn’t there. It’s such a waste, and also like digging a hole and filling it up again. I find I’m annoyed more than anything and I refuse the scraps of food Wilson offers afterwards. I’ve read enough fairy tales to know you don’t accept the food. I’ll get by on what’s in my backpack. The hunger starts to bite, though, when he sets us to deep cleaning the kitchen. Grace and me have to take everything out of the drawers and wipe the place down, floor to ceiling. It’s back-breaking work and I spend every second plotting my escape.
Late that night, the doorbell rings. I shudder at the gleeful look on Wilson’s mug as he goes to open the door. We’re finishing off the cleaning and my phone says it’s just struck twelve – midnight – when Wilson returns. He’s carefully carrying an old-fashioned glass milk bottle with both hands. He keeps it close to his chest. There’s a milky fluid in it, swirling like a turbulent cloud. It has a strange glow, a kind of effervescence coursing through it.
A big man’s behind Wilson. He has a thick beard and looks like a mountain man dressed in a crisp white uniform. He wears a white cap with a black brim, and a bowtie completes the look. His arms are hairy in that short-sleeved shirt and his eyes are hidden behind dark sunglasses. He carries a brown sack in one hand.
‘Say hello to the Midnight Milkman, children. He’s come to collect his prize,’ Wilson says with relish. ‘Which one of these two pretty little things would you like?’
Grace hides behind me, seeking protection. She holds onto my dress. I take off the rubber gloves I’m wearing and throw them onto the floor.
The Milkman takes his time, looking at me from behind the dark glasses. Then he points down at Grace and beckons her with his finger.
‘No!’ I say. Something spikes in me, real indignation. I’m not letting this child out of my sight.
‘Stay in your lane, Sunshine. You’re alright. Nothing to worry your pretty little head over,’ says Wilson, rubbing his hands. ‘He likes them young, you see. Older bodies have nothing to give – that succulent youth is what he needs. Come on, Grace, do as you’re told. It’s rude to keep grown-ups waiting.’
‘She’s not going anywhere,’ I declare, and clench my fists.
Wilson reaches out with both hands and yanks hard. I’m wrenched by something in my stomach and fall to the floor in agony. Grace screams and kneels next to me, gripping my arm so tightly her fingernails dig in. I try to get up, but I’m pinned to the floor. All I can see is the Milkman’s spit-polished shoes walking towards me.
‘Don’t do this, Wilson,’ I say, gasping with pain.
‘You have a lot to learn, Sunshine,’ he smirks. ‘The work cannot be stopped now. Things are in motion. The Midnight Milkman cannot be denied, not when the house owes him for his nectar.’
The Milkman yanks Grace up by her hair and throws her onto the floor next to me. He takes a zip tie from his pocket and uses it to bind her hands behind her back. She wriggles and fights, but the Milkman’s too strong. It’s not a fair match and is terrible to watch. I try to stop him, but he stamps on my hand, and I cry out. He slaps duct tape over Grace’s mouth. Then he lifts her, dumps her in the sack and ties it up.
‘Let her go,’ I scream helplessly.
The big man lifts the sack easily, like there’s nothing but air in there. He slings it over his shoulder and heads for the exit. I push up to my knees. The thing pulling my string’s eased off. I follow him and Wilson through the corridors to the front door.
This is not a fight I can win, but I beg them to let Grace go. I feel weak and defeated and can only watch helplessly as the Milkman throws Grace in the back of his milk float, like she’s a sack of potatoes.
The float’s an electric three-wheeler. Its white paint has been defaced by hand-drawn pictures of flowers, poorly drawn impressions that could only have been done by a child.
I’m too weak to stop them – I can’t fight the pain in my guts. The Milkman climbs into the cab and drives slowly back down the driveway. Rage swells up inside of me. There’s nothing I can do.
‘Hang in there, Grace. I’ll find you,’ I shout. ‘I’m coming to get you.’
Wilson shuts the door. I don’t see which way the milk float goes. And I can’t even imagine what they’re planning to do to that little girl. The terror in her large eyes haunts me. I feel like I’ve failed. But if this isn’t where Ollie is, at least now I know who took him.
‘Come on, Sunshine. It’s over and done with now. No one ever comes back from the farm,’ says Wilson. He grabs the back of my neck and pushes me towards the kitchen. ‘It’s time to feed the house.’
He takes the milk bottle from the countertop and shuffles to the trapdoor in the kitchen floor.
‘Don’t just stand there, open it,’ he says. I do as asked, he unscrews the lid and then slowly pours the white liquid down the dark hole. ‘I want you to watch very carefully. You’ve got to eyeball it . . . half a bottle should do for now.’
The ‘milk’ floats down slowly, more gas than liquid, swirling as it does. I can feel the floor move underneath my feet, an urgent motion, and I imagine the lips of a hungry baby suckling. The whole thing is disgusting somehow, but I have no choice except to watch.
‘There you go,’ says Wilson in a syrupy tone. ‘You look after us, we look after you. Drink the nectar.’ He pours a final drop then stops and closes the bottle.
I hear a sigh of disappointment from the walls around us.
‘I know, I know . . . There’ll be more next week,’ Wilson coos.
The house burps, a foul odour escaping from the hole into our faces. I close the damn trapdoor in a hurry.