Magic in the City

by Heather Dyer

  “Yes, we do!” said Simon. “We’ve got all the time we want now. You said so yourself.”

  “But even if she is home,” said Hannah, “you’ll never find her. Do you know how many rooms there are in there?”

  “Seven hundred and seventy-five,” said Simon, pushing open the enormous wrought-iron gates.

  “Hey!” said Jake. “Wait up! I don’t want you wandering off. You’ve got the stopwatch, remember?”

  But Simon was already heading across the forecourt. Jake made an exasperated sound. He turned to Hannah. “Wait here,” he said. “We won’t be long.”

  “I’m not waiting on my own!” said Hannah.

  So they leaned their bikes against the railings and set off after Simon.

  The windows of the palace seemed to watch them approach. But the palace guard stared ahead, unseeing, as they passed, and the sentries in their boxes remained as stiff as the figures in a cuckoo clock. The children walked straight up the steps, through the Grand Entrance and into a foyer with a domed ceiling so high and so ornate that when you looked up, it felt as if angels might start singing.

  Simon ran up a wide, red-carpeted stairway and disappeared. Jake followed him.

  “Do you even know where you’re going?” cried Hannah.

  The boys ignored her.

  Hannah noticed a carousel displaying leaflets and brochures. So she helped herself to a map of the palace and put it in her pocket. Then she hurried after the others.

  At the top of the stairs was an enormous room where everything was white and gold. There were huge mirrors with fancy gold frames, gold-upholstered chairs with legs carved into lion’s feet, and crystal chandeliers cascading from the ceiling. Jake tried to lift a golden candlestick, but it was too heavy.

  “I don’t think we should touch anything,” said Hannah nervously.

  Together, they wandered through one grand room after another: rooms with yellow satin couches long enough to seat ten people and huge porcelain vases big enough to climb inside. Now Hannah knew how Belle must have felt when she entered the Beast’s castle without knocking. Once, out of the corner of her eye, she glimpsed a movement on the far side of the room and saw a timid-looking girl staring back at her. “Oh!” she said. “I’m sorry! We just —” Then she realized she was speaking to her own reflection in a mirror.

  “Who are you talking to?” said Jake.

  “Nobody!” said Hannah, flushing.

  They went through the Blue Drawing Room and the Green Drawing Room and the White Drawing Room, and presently they came to the Throne Room. It was empty except for two red-velvet thrones positioned side by side on a raised platform at the far end of the room, with a red-velvet curtain on the wall behind them. Simon immediately went investigating behind the velvet curtain. Jake sat on one of the thrones. Despite his runners and the camera hanging around his neck, Jake looked surprisingly regal with his hands resting on the throne’s upholstered arms. After a moment’s hesitation, Hannah sat down on the other one. It gave her a funny feeling, sitting up there looking out across such a grand room. It was like being on stage.

  “Do you think she likes being queen?” said Hannah.

  “Of course she likes it,” said Jake. “She’s rich, isn’t she?”

  “Just because she’s rich,” said Hannah, “it doesn’t mean she’s happy. Money isn’t everything, you know.”

  “It is if you don’t have any.”

  “It must be hard work, though. Don’t you think?”

  “Cutting ribbons and waving? That’s not work.” Jake gestured angrily at the room around them. “Why should one person have all this,” he said, “when others don’t even have one house of their own? And this isn’t her only home, you know. There’s Clarence House and Sandringham and Windsor Castle and Balmoral and …” He paused. “Where’s Simon?”

  “I don’t know,” said Hannah, looking around. “He was here a minute ago.”

  “Simon?” said Jake. He got down off his throne and pulled back the red curtain. Behind it was a door marked PRIVATE. The door was ajar, revealing a red-carpeted staircase.

  “SIMON?” yelled Jake.

  There was no reply, but a door banged faintly somewhere far away.

  “I knew it!” said Jake. “I knew he’d do something like this.”

  They ran up the stairs and along a red-carpeted corridor calling, “Simon? Simon!” But there was no answer. Jake tried several doors, but most of them were locked, and those that weren’t opened into storerooms or linen cupboards. There was no sign of Simon.

  “Let’s go back to the Throne Room,” said Hannah. “Maybe he’s waiting for us there.”

  Jake glanced at his watch. “We haven’t time. We’ll have to leave without him.”

  “We can’t do that!” said Hannah. “Anyway, we’ve got all the time we want. We’ve got the stopwatch. Remember?”

  “No, we don’t,” said Jake. “Simon has the stopwatch. Remember?”

  Hannah looked at Jake in horror. He was right. As soon as the stopwatch got to zero, time would start again, and they would be caught trespassing in Buckingham Palace! “Quick,” she said, turning on her heel. “Let’s get out of here.”

  But it was too late. The moment the words were out of her mouth, she felt a popping in her ears and all the sounds were back again: the gurgle of the central heating, the drone of distant traffic and the murmur of voices from behind closed doors. Then, around the corner came a butler carrying a silver teapot on a silver tray. He stopped short when he saw them. “Hello,” he said. “And who are you?”

  For a moment, Hannah and Jake just stared at him. Then Jake yelled, “Run!”

  CHAPTER 11

  SIMON AND THE QUEEN

  Later, Hannah realized that if they had simply apologized and explained that they were looking for Simon, the butler might even have helped them. But they didn’t stop to think. They ran. Back along the corridor they went and down another flight of stairs, taking them two at a time. When they got to the bottom, they burst through double doors into a busy kitchen full of cooks in tall white hats.

  “Hey! Out of my kitchen!” yelled the head chef.

  Hannah and Jake dodged this way and that, ducking trays and hot plates. There was a crash as one chef dropped a platter of profiteroles, which scattered over the floor.

  “Sorry!” cried Hannah.

  The children charged through another set of doors into a room where lots of well-dressed people were having brunch. Diners paused with their forks halfway to their mouths as Hannah and Jake rushed past with several chefs in pursuit.

  “Stop right there!” yelled a waiter.

  The children ran through a door marked EXIT, up three flights of stairs and along yet another red-carpeted corridor. Jake tried the handles of several doors, but they were all locked. Then, at last, one opened. They rushed inside and slammed it shut behind them — and not a second too soon. The stampede of running feet and raised voices came barreling along the corridor, went straight past and disappeared. Somewhere, an alarm had started ringing.

  Hannah and Jake looked around. They were in a small room lined with bookshelves. There was a leather sofa in front of a fireplace and an oil painting above the mantel. Hannah ran to the window. To her dismay, she saw that the palace guard had surrounded the Grand Entrance, bayonets at the ready. Several police cars had pulled up outside the main gate, and officers with sniffer dogs were crossing the forecourt.

  “Oh, Simon!” she wailed. “Where are you?”

  ***

  Simon had tried one door after another but had found only locked doors, storerooms and linen cupboards. He was beginning to think the others were right and he would never find the queen when he felt a ringing in his ears. Suddenly all the little sounds were back: the drone of distant traffic, a dog barking somewhere far away, muted conversations. Then a door opened at
the far end of the corridor and a voice said, “Thank you, ma’am,” and out came a butler carrying a tall silver teapot on a tray.

  Simon waited until the butler had gone, then knocked on the door. Inside, dogs started yapping.

  “Come in!” called a shrill voice.

  Simon entered. It was an office. There were filing cabinets around the walls, the floor was strewn with papers, and peering out from behind a computer screen was the queen. Her eyes were large behind her glasses.

  “Hello!” said Simon.

  The queen looked Simon up and down. “Hello,” she said. “And who might you be?”

  “I’m Simon Grubb,” said Simon.

  “How did you get here?”

  “Through the door marked PRIVATE.”

  The queen removed her glasses and peered at Simon. “Did no one try to stop you?”

  “No,” said Simon. “I stopped them.”

  “I see,” said the queen. But it was clear that she didn’t.

  “I stopped time,” explained Simon. He took the stopwatch out of his pocket. “It’s magic. I’ll show you, if you like.”

  “I’d love to see your magic trick,” said the queen. “But I’m afraid I don’t have time.”

  “Yes, you do,” said Simon. “You’ve got all the time you want, now.”

  “If only that were true.”

  “It is!”

  The queen stood up and reached for Simon’s hand. “Come along, young man,” she said. “Let’s go and find your mother.”

  Simon took the queen’s hand. Then he said, “Time is motion,” and pressed the button on the stopwatch.

  Instantly, the corgis stopped panting. The clock on the mantelpiece stopped ticking. The sound of distant traffic disappeared. Only a thick, muffled silence remained. The queen frowned. She waggled a finger in her ear and opened and closed her mouth. “What happened?” she asked.

  “I’ve stopped time,” said Simon.

  The queen glanced at her watch. Then she looked at her dogs. All three of them were standing as stiff as stuffed animals, with eyes like buttons. “My dogs!” she cried. “What’s wrong with my dogs?”

  “Don’t worry,” said Simon. “They’ll come back to life when time starts up again.”

  “Starts up again?” said the queen faintly. She went to the window and threw it open. All of London was silent. The queen replaced her glasses and looked at Simon properly for the first time. “Magic, you say?”

  Simon nodded.

  The queen went to the door and looked left and right along the corridor. “Is anyone there?” she called. There was no reply. Cautiously, she ventured out. Simon followed. They hadn’t gone far when they encountered the butler with the silver teapot on a tray. “Johnson?” said the queen.

  Johnson did not move. The queen went close and tapped his shoulder. “Johnson?”

  Nothing.

  “Good grief!” said the queen. “Has everybody stopped?”

  “Everyone but us,” said Simon.

  “How absolutely marvelous!”

  It was as though the queen had woken from a long, long sleep and was seeing everything for the very first time. On the landing, she pirouetted in a slant of sunshine, then she paused to admire a pigeon suspended in mid-flight just outside the window. “What beautiful feathers it has,” she remarked. “Like rainbows on an oily puddle.” When they came to a group of tourists standing motionless in the White Drawing Room, the queen circled them slowly. “Remarkable!” she said. Then the queen took Simon to the kitchen. “I’ve never been down here,” she said.

  The kitchen was full of chefs who had frozen in the middle of mixing, stirring and chopping. Simon and the queen wandered around, dipping their fingers into cake batter, soups and sauces.

  Then the queen opened a fridge and drank some orange juice straight from the carton. “I feel ever so naughty,” she said. “Don’t you?”

  “Not really,” said Simon.

  The queen sighed. “You’re probably used to doing whatever you like. But I’m not.”

  “But you’re the queen!” said Simon. “You can do whatever you want.”

  “Don’t you believe it! There’s always someone telling me what to do and where to go. They even tell me what to wear.”

  “It’s the same for me,” said Simon. “They never let me go out on my own.”

  “Me neither!” said the queen.

  “They say I need looking after.”

  “And me!” cried the queen.

  “ — and whenever we go in the car,” said Simon, “I never get to ride up front. I always have to sit in the back.”

  “So do I!” said the queen. She sighed. Then she said, “Tell me, Simon, do you like ice-cream sundaes?”

  “Yes.”

  “Me, too,” said the queen. So she rolled up her sleeves and went through the kitchen, opening cupboards and freezers. Together they filled an enormous crystal bowl with a mountain of ice cream in various flavors. Then they smothered the ice cream with whipped cream, strawberry sauce, maraschino cherries, chocolate sprinkles and miniature marshmallows. Finally, the queen stuck in two long-handled silver spoons. “Let’s eat this in the garden,” she said, and she picked up the bowl with both hands and carried it outside.

  They had left the kitchen just in time. As the queen set down the bowl on a wrought-iron table, the birds began singing, the wind moved in the trees and a blackbird flew into the bushes with a trill of alarm.

  Time had started up again.

  CHAPTER 12

  THE MAGIC CAMERA

  “I don’t get it,” Jake said, glancing at his watch. “Where is he? Why doesn’t he just stop time again?”

  “For all we know,” said Hannah, “he has.”

  They thought of Simon, wandering lost and lonely through the seven hundred and seventy-five rooms of Buckingham Palace. It could take him days to look in all of them. Sooner or later, he would have to give up. Time would start again. They’d be arrested and escorted from the palace through a crowd of reporters. Their parents would see them on the six o’clock news — and so would everyone at school. Hannah glanced at her monster-feet slippers. “Look at me!” she cried. “I’m not even dressed!”

  Jake pointed his camera at Hannah and pressed the button.

  “Don’t!” said Hannah, making a grab for the camera.

  “Chill!” said Jake, holding it out of reach. “I’m not taking pictures. I’m trying to figure out how this thing works.”

  “Why don’t you figure out how to get us out of here instead?”

  “I am. This thing is supposed to be magic. Philippe Fontaine gave it to me.”

  “Magic?” Hannah looked at the camera with interest. “You didn’t tell me he’d given you a camera, too. What does it do?”

  “Nothing. I think it’s broken.”

  “Perhaps you’re not doing it right.”

  “Of course I’m doing it right!” said Jake. “Try it yourself if you don’t believe me.”

  He passed her the camera. It was large and heavy and had a lens like the end of a telescope, which you could turn to focus. Hannah put the strap around her neck. There was a fine black crosshair on the viewfinder, which made looking through the camera feel like looking down the barrel of a gun. Hannah moved the black cross around the room until it came to rest on Jake’s frowning face. “What happens if I press the button?”

  “Nothing.”

  Hannah pressed it. There was a loud click, but, somewhat to Hannah’s relief, nothing happened. She pressed it a few more times, just to be sure. “Didn’t the magician give you any instructions?”

  “Nope. All he said was that it was a magic camera and that it would put me in the picture.”

  “What picture?”

  Jake shrugged. “ ‘Straight from the brochure to the poolside,’ �
�� he said, “ ‘the Magic Camera puts you in the picture.’ ”

  Hannah moved the black cross around the room until it settled on the painting above the mantel. It was an oil painting of an old English galleon in full sail. There was a little brass plaque set into the frame that said Falcon —1578. Hannah turned the lens slightly, and the painting came sharply into focus. She zoomed in until she could see the sea spray leaping over the decks. It was so realistic that she almost felt that she was really there, on the deck of the Falcon. “Straight from the brochure to the poolside,” she murmured. “The Magic Camera puts you in the …”

  Hannah froze. Slowly, she lowered the camera. Her face was pale.

  “What’s up?” said Jake.

  “I nearly took a picture of that picture!”

  “So?”

  “Don’t you see?” said Hannah. “The Magic Camera puts you in the picture. If I’d pressed that button, I could have gone into the painting.”

  Jake looked at the Falcon uncertainly. “But it’s only a painting,” he said. “It’s not a photograph.”

  “Who said it had to be a photograph?”

  Hannah imagined standing on deck in just her fluffy pink robe and monster-feet slippers. What would her parents have said when Jake told them that she was stuck in an oil painting and that if they ever wanted to see her again they’d have to buy the painting and hang it in their front room?

  “I knew that magician was bad news,” said Jake. He reached for the camera. “Give it here.”

  “What? Why?”

  “I’m going to smash it. It’s dangerous.”

  “Just a minute,” said Hannah. “Let’s think about this.”

  “What’s to think about? Who wants to get stuck in a picture for the rest of their lives?”

  “But we wouldn’t get stuck,” said Hannah. “Not if we took a picture with us to come back to.” The more she thought about it, the more thrilling it was. It was almost as good as the magic carpet. They could go anywhere in the world — anywhere they had a picture of, at least — and come back again at the click of a button.