At the end of the cavern, the path branches off down channels, streams disappearing into holes in the walls. Small narrow caves, winding. I could just about get down one if I was hunched over like Quasimodo. Looking round I see others in the walls. Some are draining off the water. Others are dry, dusty. Off into the mine. Or maybe not. Was this cavern part of the mine? I doubt it somehow.
I venture a few feet into the nearest cave. Not far. Something about it makes my scalp prickle. I touch the walls. They feel-ribbed. These are not natural. These have been dug.
I say nothing about it, but something about the caves draws the kids.
By what I guess to be the end of the day, they're going into them, but not far, never out of sight of the main cavern, on my instructions. Last thing we need is any of them getting lost.
Also, by the end of the day, the caves have been given a name.
The children call them the narrows.
"Like a big worm's been through them," Jean whispers. "Isn't it?"
I give her hand a squeeze. "Don't."
We're at the far end of the cavern. It's late, as we reckon time now. The children and Frank are asleep around the dying fire. Jean and I… we're warm enough and restless enough to pull away. I shine a torch down one of the narrows. It glances off the ribbed, irregular stone. I can see about ten yards down it, before it bends right and is lost to view.
"They're weird, aren't they," she whispers.
"Yeah." We move to the neighbouring entrance. "The kids seem to like them, though. Gives 'em something to occupy themselves with."
"Aye, well. Just don't let them go playing in it. Bloody easy to get lost or stuck, place like this."
"Mm." I shine the torch again, then frown. "Hang on."
"What?"
"Look." I cross back to the first cave. "See that?"
"Bends right. Aye. So?"
"Look." I step to the right and shine the torch down its neighbour. "See?"
The neighbouring tunnel extends in a straight line for longer than the first-fifteen, twenty yards, easily-before veering off and up. Its walls are smooth and unbroken, right the way through.
"That can't be," says Jean.
"I know."
We cross back to the first one and look again. "Must be a dead end," Jean says.
"Mm. Hang on." I venture down the tunnel, shining the light.
"Paul!" she hisses.
"It's okay. I'll be right back. Just… "
I trail off; I've reached the bend in the first narrow. No dead end; the torch picks out another long low tunnel, stretching away from me.
I can't see a break in its walls either. But there must be. Some trick of light and shadow the composition of the walls lends itself to somehow. Must be. An optical illusion, that makes the entrance invisible.
"Paul?"
"There's a tunnel," I say. "It must… Jean?"
"Aye?"
"Go to the next narrow," I say. "Just hang about there."
"But-"
"Just try it."
Muttering, she does. I start down the cave, stooped, flashing the torch side to side. This narrow and the second are about five yards apart, if that. A yard; that's about a pace for me. I count my steps: one, two, three, four… "Jean?"
"Paul?" Her voice is faint.
"Jean?" I shout a little. "Can you hear me?"
"Where are you?"
I shine the torch around. The walls are unbroken. I flash the beam ahead. "Can you see that?"
"See what?"
"The torch light. Is it coming through into your narrow?"
"No, it bloody isn't, Paul, and it's bloody dark out here. Will you come back now, please?"
"Okay." I feel a beading film of sweat on my forehead. The narrow looks straight and level but it must go under or over the neighbouring one. It's the only explanation.
I backtrack to the bend in the narrow. Shine the torch around-
This isn't right.
I left a long straight tunnel, with the main cavern at the end to my left, but where the main cavern and Jean ought to be there's just a flat wall of black and yellow stone, the narrow branching left and right. And to my right, where there was a dead end, the narrow now extends on for as far as I can see and there are very visible openings in it-two on the left and one on the right-where other narrows branch off.
Panic squirms low down in my belly. I turn back towards the T-junction. "Jean?" I shout, and I can't quite keep my voice level.
"Paul?"
It's coming from behind me, down the mysteriously extended narrow. "Jean!"
"What?" She sounds pissed off. "Where are you?"
Good question. "Jean, just keep shouting to me, alright? I'm sort of-lost here."
"Lost? How the hell are you-"
"Jean, just do it!" I yell. First time I've really lost it since we got down here. Since the bomb, in fact.
"Okay. Okay. Can you hear me?"
"Yes, just about. Keep talking."
"Talking? More like shouting."
"Just keep it up."
I head towards her voice. My hand is shaking on the torch.
"What should I say?"
"Anything. Sing if you want."
"Sing? I canna sing for toffee."
"It doesn't have to be tuneful."
She breaks into a halting rendition of "Scotland the Brave." I can see what she meant. At least it's not "You Canna Shove Yer Granny Aff the Bus." Small mercies again.
It rings in the narrow. I pass the first of the entrances on my left. When I reach the second, I realise her singing's coming from there.
There's no guarantee that sound's a reliable indicator of location, as everything else I'd normally rely on has gone screwy, but what else can I do? I start down this new narrow. It slopes steeply upward, but I follow it.
The singing gets louder. Water splashes around my ankles. Something white and blind wriggles past on its way down. I keep on climbing. The water flowing down this narrow is fast and cold and quite deep. Why didn't any of it spill out into the other, longer one I've left behind?
The singing stops. "Jean?" I shout.
"Alright, alright." I hear her coughing. Then she starts again, the
Mingulay Boat Song this time.
"Heel ya ho, boys, let her go, boys, sailing homewards to Mingulay… "
Where is Mingulay anyway? The Hebrides? Orkneys? Shetlands? I'm pretty sure it's an island of some kind anyway.
The singing's good and loud, at least. The narrow steepens till it's almost vertical. I clamp the torch between my teeth and use my hands to climb.
At last, I reach the top. Been climbing too long. Flat floor, water gushing across it, and I can hear Jean's voice, loud and clear, close to. I look up; the narrow has a mouth and water glistens beyond it. It opens out. I hear voices, too.
Someone shouts as the beam of my torch flashes from the narrow-mouth and I stumble out, almost falling headlong into the lake. Across the water on the bank, Jean and Frank and the others spin from the mouth of the narrow I entered and stare at me dumbfounded.
"No one goes in there," I say later, huddled round a fresh fire some way from the circle of children, sharing its warmth with Jean and Frank. "No one."
Frank looks at me doubtfully. "Paul, I know you've had a shock, but-"
"No buts," I say. "I didn't imagine what happened in there."
"Are you sure?" he asks gently.
I glare at him. "Frank-"
"Paul, all I'm saying is we've all been through a hell of a lot. You especially. You've been responsible for all of us. It'd be unbelievable if you didn't feel the strain somehow. And you have to keep everything so bottled up and reined in, it's not surprising if-"