She walked ahead, following a damp passage clearly hewn from solid rock and supported by a chalky framework. The air was cool but not cold, the floor uneven and unpredictable.
“Careful of the rats,” she said. “They can pass leptospirosis.”
He stopped. “Excuse me?”
“Bacterial infection. Fatal.”
“Are you nuts?”
She stopped. “Unless you plan on letting one bite you or swishing your fingers in their urine, I’d say you’re okay.”
“What are we doing here?”
“Are you always so antsy? Just follow me. I want to show you something.”
They started back down the corridor, the roof just above his head. Her light beam revealed about fifty feet of tunnel ahead of them.
“Norstrum,” he called out to the blackness.
He wondered why he’d disobeyed and come, but the promise of an adventure had been too enticing to ignore. The caves were not far from the school, and everyone knew about them. Funny how no one ever used the word orphanage. Always the school. Or the institute. Who were his parents? He had no idea. He’d been abandoned at birth, and how he arrived in Christchurch the police never determined. The school insisted students know all they could about themselves. No secrets—he actually appreciated that rule—but there was simply nothing for him to learn.
“Sam.”
Norstrum’s voice.
He’d been told that Norstrum, when he’d first arrived at the school, had named him Sam Collins, after a beloved uncle.
“Where are you?” he called out to the blackness.
“Not far.”
He aimed his light and kept walking.
“It’s just up here,” Meagan said, as the tunnel ended in what appeared to be a spacious gallery, with multiple exits and a high ceiling. Stone pillars supported a curved roof. Meagan shone her light on the rough walls and he spied myriad graffiti, paintings, inscriptions, cartoons, mosaics, poetry, even musical lyrics.
“It’s a collage of social history,” she said. “These drawings date back to the time of the French Revolution, the Prussian siege in the late 19th century, and the German occupation in the 1940s. The Paris underground has always been a refuge from war, death, and destruction.”
One drawing caught his eye. A sketch of a guillotine.
“From the Grande Terreur,” she said, over his shoulder. “Two hundred years old. A testament to a time when bloody deaths were a part of everyday life here. That was made with black smoke. Quarrymen of that day carried candles and oil lamps, and they’d place the flame close against the wall, which baked carbon into the stone. Pretty smart.”
He pointed with his light. “That’s from the French Revolution?”
She nodded. “This is a time capsule, Sam. The entire underground is that way. See why I like it?”
He glanced around at the images. Most seemed conceived with sobriety, but humor and satire were also evident, along with several titillating pornographic additions.
“This is a pretty amazing place,” she said to the darkness. “I come here a lot. It’s peaceful and silent. Like a return to the womb. Going back to the surface, to me, can be like a rebirth.”
He was taken aback by her frankness. Apparently cracks did exist in her tough veneer. Then he understood.
“You’re scared, aren’t you?”
She faced him and, in the glow from her light, he caught sincerity in her eyes. “You know I am.”
“I am, too.”
“It’s okay to be scared,” Norstrum had said when he finally found him in the cave. “But you should not have come here alone.”
He knew that now.
“Fear can be an ally,” Norstrum said. “Always take it with you, no matter what the fight. It’s what keeps you sharp.”
“But I don’t want to be afraid. I hate being afraid.”
Norstrum laid a hand on his shoulder. “There’s no choice, Sam. It’s the circumstances that create fear. How you respond is all you can control. Concentrate on that, and you’ll always succeed.”
He gently laid his hand on her shoulder. It was the first time they’d touched, and she did not pull away.
Surprising himself, he was glad.
“We’ll be okay,” he told her.
“Those men yesterday, in the museum, I think they would have eventually hurt me.”
“That’s really why you forced things, while I was there?”
A hesitation, then she nodded.
He appreciated her honesty. Finally. “Looks like we’ve both bit off a lot.”
She grinned. “Apparently so.”
He withdrew his hand and wondered about her show of vulnerability. Through emails, they’d communicated many times over the past year. He’d thought he was speaking to a man named Jimmy Foddrell. Instead, an intriguing woman had been on the other end of the Internet. Thinking back, she’d actually reached out in some of those communiqués. Never like this—but enough that he’d felt a connection.
She pointed with her light. “Down those corridors you’ll eventually find the catacombs. The bones of six million people are stacked there. Ever been?”
He shook his head.
“Don’t.”
He kept silent.
“These drawings,” she said, “were made by ordinary people. But they’re a historical essay. The walls down here, for miles, are covered in pictures. They show people’s life and times, fears, and superstitions. They are a record.” She paused. “We have a chance, Sam, to do something real. Something that could make a difference.”
They were so much alike. Both of them lived in a virtual world of paranoia and speculation. And both of them harbored good intentions.
“Then let’s do it,” he said.
She chuckled. “I wish it were that easy. I have a bad feeling about this.”
She seemed to draw strength from this underground spectacle. Perhaps even some wisdom, too.
“Care to explain that one?”
She shook her head. “I can’t, really. Just a feeling.”
She came closer. Barely a few inches away. “Did you know that a kiss shortens life by three minutes?”
He considered her strange inquiry, then shook his head.