WHEN THEY GOT TO THE BALLROOM, Fred melted into the crowd. Gertie was glad to see that everyone around them (except for the waiters in double-breasted white jackets with silver trays) was decked out in strange costumes. It made her and Kolt seem normal and not two time travelers from an ancient order of Keepers, responsible for the fate of humankind.
A jazz band was in full swing. People were dancing madly, throwing their heads back with laughter and kicking their heels in the air. Soon, Gertie was so swept up in the excitement that she nearly forgot why she was there.
“The watch!” she told herself. “Focus on the watch.”
The air in the ballroom was thick with cigarette smoke, and it was hard to breathe. After sampling a few of the delicious things being carried around on silver trays, Kolt motioned for Gertie to follow him out a side door. They found themselves in a well-lit corridor of thick carpet, where there were rows and rows of doors with brass numbers on them.
“What’s with all the smoking?” Gertie said.
“It’s the 1920s! People had no idea it was bad for you.”
Gertie held up her arm with the watch on it. “How are we ever going to find the person this watch belongs to with all these people dancing and screaming?”
Kolt didn’t seem at all fussed. “Dealing with chaos is part of a Keeper’s job,” he said. “You must learn to act and think quickly!”
“Right,” Gertie said, remembering the Keeper’s motto. “It could always be worse, I suppose.”
“Yes, it could, very much so.”
Gertie brought the watch to her ear and listened to the purr of springs and wheels inside the golden case. “It’s not glowing anymore,” she said. “What does that mean?”
“It doesn’t have to glow all the time. Just imagine we’re in an ocean of fish,” Kolt said. “You have to move with the current. Remember that the item wants to be found and will glow or heat up, or even vibrate when you get close to the target.”
“So I’ll just move with the current?”
“Yes, Gertie, glide in the stream, but stay alert. You’ll find clues if you look for them.”
Three waiters rushed past with an enormous bouquet of fruit set in ice.
“I didn’t think it would be this hard to find the woman, Mercedes what’s-her-name,” Gertie said, looking at her wrist. “It’s just a little watch.”
“Mercedes Gleitze,” Kolt reminded her. “And this is your first solo mission.” He smiled. “So just do your best.”
A pair of men in overalls and thick gloves grunted under the weight of an ice swan balanced on their shoulders. Then another man rushed forward to open the ballroom door.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” came an amplified voice from inside, “may I present to you Great Britain’s first ever female swimming champion, who will attempt a cross-Channel paddle from France to England tomorrow before dawn . . . introducing the marvelous and daring Miss Mercedes Gleitze!”
“That must be her!” Gertie cried, her voice drowned out by the applause. The watch was glowing violet, and had begun to pulse.
Kolt bolted through the doors into the ballroom, but, when Gertie tried to follow, a man in a gray pinstripe suit with shiny hair blocked her path.
“And where is it, mademoiselle, that you think you are going?” said the maître d’hôtel. He glared at Gertie, smoothing the ends of a thin moustache.
For a second, Gertie was tempted to just tell the truth. She imagined herself explaining that she had traveled through time from a magical island over a graviton bridge through a dinosaur orchard, via an abandoned city of the future full of robot pets and brain cards, with a man who was a hundred years old, or maybe two hundred.
The other option was to simply push past him. It might have worked—or at least caused enough of a scene to get Kolt’s attention—but the door had already swung closed.
Gertie pointed in the direction of the ballroom, where, at that moment, on stage, stood the champion swimmer to whom the timepiece belonged. “But sir, I have to see the woman in there. We have important business.”
“Believe me, we would all like an audience with the daring Mademoiselle Gleitze, but the Ritz Ballroom is not the place for young ladies, even polite ones such as yourself.”
“But!” Gertie protested, “I have to—”
“No buts, please no buts, I ’ate buts,” the man insisted. “You must come with me, ma petite fille.”
Gertie was going to shout for Kolt but knew he wouldn’t have heard above the din of cheering that now filled the ballroom.
When the man motioned for a waitress to assist in the capture of “a lost child,” Gertie had little choice but to be escorted down the long corridor.
Pushing through some double doors, they passed through the kitchen, where men and women with tall white hats stood on ladders over enormous metal pots with boat oars. There was so much steam in some places that Gertie considered trying to escape. If she could make it outside, back to the Time Cat, she knew Kolt would find her eventually. Robot Rabbit Boy was there too—probably still frozen to the bumper.
“We are now entering the ’all of desserts,” the man said, “You must be quiet—step in silence, mademoiselle, for the most dazzling cakes in ze ’ole world are in the final stages of beautification.”
Despite her frustration, Gertie marveled as whole teams of skilled workers bent over enormous, revolving ceramic bowls of colored mixtures. Others were laying tablecloths of yellow marzipan over mountains of fruitcake.
A master pâtissier patrolled the room with a magnifying glass and spoon, stopping from time to time for mouthfuls and then spitting into a bright pink handkerchief with either a word of praise or something vulgar that made the waitress cover her ears. In the background, one of the cooks was playing a delicate stringed instrument that was as tall as a person and twice as heavy.
“Music is the secret. . . .” The man winked at Gertie. “You must keep fruit in a trance so it doesn’t get scared and go sour.”
Gertie looked at the waitress and whispered, “I never knew blueberries had feelings?”
The waitress nodded. “It’s one of the hotel’s many secrets.”
When they entered a narrow white passage with wooden planks for a floor, they stopped beside a rack of heavy coats. The waitress took one down from a brass hook and helped Gertie get into it.
“Cold storage,” the man explained, putting on a tiny gingham moustache scarf.
Through the freezing air they marched past giant blocks of ice with teams of men and women chipping them into different animals.
At the end of the frosty chamber, they stepped through a heavy white door that was frozen on the inside with a thick layer of clear ice. Outside was another set of brass hooks. After hanging their coats up, the man pushed a fat button on a wall and a door opened.
“We have now arrived at the correct elevator for mademoiselle.”
He smiled and ushered Gertie toward it, but she stood there not moving, with the sense that something horrible was about to happen. She turned and looked for somewhere to run, but was blocked on all sides.
Finally the waitress took Gertie’s arm and forcefully led her inside. “C’mon, miss, it’s down to the basement for you.”