The four dreamwalkers were standing in an empty compartment of a stationary train. It stank of stale cigarette smoke. Through the door of the compartment and the window beyond, David could see another train — chocolate brown with a coat of arms and a sooty cream roof. Outside the opposite window was the bustle and wartime hurry of platform one, Paddington station, on December 18, 1940.
The people were wearing mostly dark gray or dun-colored coats, muffled up against the cold, their breath mingling with steam. An elderly porter trudged past, pulling a trolley of leather cases, and two young soldiers clumped the other way, rifles and kit bags slung over their shoulders. Everyone wore a hat of some kind, and several of the women had fur coats. David stared at it all with a bewildering sense of both familiarity and wonder, as if he’d just walked out onto the set of a period drama and had forgotten how to get back.
The spell was broken by Dishita’s voice. “You’ll need to be disguised, David. You’ll hardly blend in wearing that.”
Looking at the others, David saw that he was now the only one not dressed to fit the time and place. Dishita had on a long coat and a green woolen hat and scarf, while Théo looked like an adult in his raincoat, hat, scarf, and leather gloves. Petra was wearing a dark gray fitted winter suit that seemed far too elegant for someone who wasn’t supposed to be attracting any attention. She was even wearing lipstick, red like her beret. Somehow they all managed to make dressing in 1940s clothes look good. All three of them were looking at David expectantly.
David glanced down at the black dreamwalker suit he was wearing. “But how do I do it?”
“You’re in charge of your dreaming mind now,” said Dishita. “Decide how you want to be dressed and let your imagination do the rest. If you need inspiration, just look out of the window.”
David concentrated and tried to visualize some of the horrible clothes he’d seen Eddie wearing. Nothing happened.
“Don’t worry about it,” said Petra. “Relax. You’re trying too hard.”
David thought again: creased trousers, cream shirt, V-neck pullover, and squeaky leather shoes — vintage Eddie style. Seconds passed but he remained exactly as before.
“I can’t get rid of this stupid outfit.”
“Remember, you are not wearing that outfit at all,” Théo said. “Your mind has simply supplied it because that is what you were wearing when you went to sleep.” But he was already watching the platform and clearly losing interest in David.
“Don’t worry, I’ll dream up something for you,” said Petra, and suddenly David was dressed differently.
He caught a faint reflection of himself in the carriage window and felt even more like a film extra than before, in a blazer and stripy tie. For a moment it felt good to be dressed so smartly, but then he realized what he was wearing.
“A school uniform? Petra, thanks, but …”
“Ah, but I like you that way.” Petra gave him her brightest smile. “A young English gentleman. Head boy at a posh boarding school, perhaps.”
Théo smirked, and when David looked at Dishita there was no mistaking the doubt in her eyes.
“Never mind,” she said. “I’m sure you’ll get it in the end.”
David wondered how long it had taken Adam to first master this trick of disguises. He felt foolish as he followed the three dreamwalkers into the corridor and out onto the cold, dingy platform.
The exotic mixture of smells struck David first. Coal smoke and bitter-tasting steam were by far the strongest, but cigarettes and oil were there too, as well as a leathery, varnishy tang. Thinking about old things and the past, he’d been expecting mustiness, but this world around him was as fresh and vital as the present. And of course, at that precise moment, for David and the other dreamwalkers 1940 was the present. He looked about in wonder until a loud metallic whoosh made him jump. A new cloud of vapor rolled out across the platform, the result of some steam-powered event beyond his understanding.
“Look at the time,” said Dishita, pointing along the platform to where an ornate clock — the very one they’d seen back in the Archive — was visible above the vapor. “It’s 11:35. David, are you listening? We need to split up and find Eddie as soon as possible, and Adam won’t be far away when we do. The other team is already mingling with the crowds. Théo, you head to the main concourse — I’ve got to have a word with a policeman. Petra, find a good observation point over platform one. If we need to be in touch, call Misty, but only if you really need to.”
“Excuse me,” said a voice, and they turned to find a girl with black pigtails looking up at David. She wore a blue school uniform with a golden dolphin on her blazer badge. Around her neck was a cardboard box, which David remembered from history lessons would contain a gas mask. “Please, do you know if this is the train for Bristol?”
“Er …” said David, who didn’t have a clue. “Yeah, I think you’re okay.”
The girl looked at him with great curiosity.
“Ok-ay?” she said like she was trying out the word. “Are you an American?”
Dishita stepped forward quickly.
“I’m very sorry, but my Canadian friend here is mistaken. Please disregard everything he says. I’m afraid we really don’t know where this train is going. Good-bye.” And she dragged David away, leaving the girl staring after them.
“What are you doing?” Dishita whispered at the top of her voice. “What’s the third law of the Dreamwalker’s Code, David? What are the first and second laws, come to that? You might have sent that girl on the wrong train! We are guests in this time, remember? Uninvited guests. Haven’t you got that yet? We mustn’t do anything to disrupt the flow of history.”
“Okay, okay, I’m sorry …”
“And stop saying okay. You should’ve been at the briefing earlier. No one uses that word in London in 1940. Petra, look after David. And keep his mouth shut. Right, let’s go.”
Dishita and Théo moved off along the platform until they were quickly lost in the crowds and steam. They seemed to fit right in as busy passengers. There was nothing ghostly about them that David could see, but close to the bulk of the train, platform one was a gloomy place, and winter clouds were blocking any sunlight that might enter through the high glass ceiling.
Petra led David along the platform and away from the massive, gasping locomotives at the end of the line. The platform was very crowded. As expected there were children there, being herded into groups, some in school uniform but many not. The only thing they all had in common, apart from the gas masks, were the cardboard labels they wore around their necks. David stared around, fascinated. But would Eddie really turn up among this lot? And why would Eddie be here, anyway?
Glancing nervously up at the ceiling, Petra continued to pull David until they came to a pillared opening to the street. Above the pillars, the Victorian clock showed the time to be 11:41. A pair of policemen with shiny buttons and tall helmets strolled beneath it. Petra scanned the faces of the people around them as she dragged David into the shadow of a massive stack of sandbags that partly blocked the entrance.
“So, what is the first rule of the Dreamwalker’s Code, David?”
“Oh, don’t you start. It’s ‘be seen, but not noticed.’ I’m not stupid.”
“I know you’re not. But even in the shade a careful watcher might notice something unusual about you, like the fact that your breath isn’t visible in the cold air like everyone else’s. And there’s more light coming through the roof than is good for us. You will have to learn these things on the job, David.”
“So no walking through walls, then,” David said. “I’d love to try it, though. What’s the point of being a ghost if you can’t do cool ghostly stuff? But I couldn’t even change my clothes on my own. Perhaps I can’t do these things at all.”
“Nonsense!” said Petra. Then she gave him a crafty grin. “Come over here where we won’t be seen.”
She stepped into a narrow space behind the sandbags and David followed her. They were hidden from view, beside a patch of wall.
“Try it,” she said, pointing at the bricks.
David reached out and touched the wall experimentally. He couldn’t feel it exactly, but his hand seemed to be blocked by something solid all the same.
“The wall only stops you because your mind is reacting to it as if you were physically here. You need to tell your mind that this is a dreamwalk, David, that now you are only a ghost.” And with that Petra stepped into the wall and vanished from view.
It was such a weird thing to see. David wondered if he’d ever get used to it. He reached out again and bumped his fingers against the solid barrier, but then blinked as he saw his fingertips slide a little way into the wall. He drew his hand back quickly. He’d have to take this one step at a time. He felt a presence at his shoulder and turned to see Petra behind him.
“Yuck! The men’s lavatory,” she said with her nose scrunched up. “But at least now we know Eddie isn’t in there.”
“It feels funny,” whispered David.
“Yes, the first time. Your mind just needs convincing, that’s all. But you’re already making progress.”
“How do you work that out?” said David. “I couldn’t even dream up this costume. You had to do it for me.”
“Yes,” said Petra. “But I stopped helping you about three minutes ago. Now come, we mustn’t waste any more time.”
David looked down at himself. He was still wearing the school uniform Petra had chosen for him. Was he really dreaming it up on his own now? Despite this small triumph, he was still left with a strong need to prove himself, and he determined that if anyone was going to find Eddie today it would be him.