But tonight no one would know if she went up there, and so she got out of bed, put on her dressing-gown and slippers, and padded along the landing, careful to be extra-quiet. It might be a bit spooky in the attics at this time of night, but if so she would come back to her bedroom. Lucy went through the little door, remembering to duck her head because of the sagging bit of oak on the other side which smacked you in the forehead if you were not careful, and then she was there.
It was not spooky at all. It was exactly the way it always was: the exciting feeling of stored-away secrets, and the scents of the old timbers and the bits of furniture that long ago had been polished with the kind of polish you did not have nowadays. Lucy loved it. She loved the feeling that there were little pieces of the past scattered around up here, so that if you looked hard enough you might find them – maybe inside the old cupboard that stood in a corner, or locked up in one of the tea-chests, or folded inside the sewing-table with the green silk pouch under the top, or tucked away under the slopy bit of roof at the far end.
Usually she brought her birthday-present torch with her so that she could look at the photographs in the albums, or read bits from the old magazines. Sometimes there were things about her grandmother, which was very intriguing indeed, because there were big mysteries about Lucy’s grandmother. But she had not brought it tonight, so it was very dark and quiet. The rest of the house seemed suddenly to have grown very quiet, as well. It would have been nice to think this was because she had slipped through one of those magic chinks that take you into other worlds, but it would not be that at all; it would be everyone playing Mother’s game, whatever it was.
Lucy found the oil lamp which they used in power cuts, or if plumbers came up here to do something called lag-the-pipes, and which would give pretty good light. There were matches at the lamp’s base, fastened there with a rubber band – she was not really supposed to use matches but she knew how the oil lamp worked and she would be careful. She struck a match, and set it to the part of the lamp that was called the wick. There was a glass funnel thing that you had to slide down over the flame so that it would not burn anything.
The lamp made splashy yellow puddles of light, which Lucy liked. She set it against one wall, and thought she would see what was stored under the slopy bit of roof at the far end. She was just crawling across to a boxful of old photographs – old photographs were the best things of all up here – when there was a sound from beyond the attic door. Lucy looked round, because it sounded exactly as if someone had come up the twisty stairs, and was creeping very quietly across the tiny landing outside. It might be part of Mum’s game, although Mum had said nobody would come up to the second floor – there was only Lucy’s bedroom there, and the rest of the house was plenty big enough for the guests. They would put a little notice up at the foot of the second-floor stairs saying not to go up there, so Lucy could feel quite safe in going off to sleep as usual.
Probably whoever was out there was just somebody who had not seen the notice. Or perhaps the notice had fallen off. Lucy was not exactly frightened, but this was starting to feel a bit scary. The oil lamp was still burning, but she had closed the attic door, and she thought whoever was out there would not see it.