I will stop writing now because I think Jackson has got the trolley sort of working. At least working well enough to push it along. I hope there are no more delays so I will write the next part when we get to the warehouse and stop. With the delay caused by mending the wheel, and the battle and the fact that we are going too slowly anyway because of the trolleys, we are more than two hours over schedule. I heard Blue saying to Einstein that he was worried that we might not get to Heathrow before it got dark and whether we should go back and try again another day when we would be better prepared, but Einstein said we should carry on or all that time and effort would have been wasted.

I hope, really hope we are going to get there in time and be able to go home today, although I am already quite tired of walking and we haven’t even come that far. Not very far, but the museum feels like a long way away, a million miles. I hope my friends there are all well and maybe they are wondering where we are and what we are doing and when they read this journal they will know.

Chapter 23

23

At last it was growing dark. Shadows were creeping out of the corners in the museum, pooling like spilt oil. It had been a long day. Gripped by fever, his guts churning, Paul had sat in his den and waited, barely moving. Hot and cold at the same time, shivering, sweating, dribbling, burping – thick, caustic belches bubbling up his gullet like poison gas.

At least he hadn’t been troubled by Boney-M for a few hours. The little monster gave him a headache with his constant shouting. He’d rattled around for a while in the morning, limping and moaning, picking up crap in his beak, shaking it and dropping it, claiming that it was him that had made the new dangerous kids leave the museum, the little liar, and then he’d disappeared. It had been quiet up here since then. Just the sound of the wind gently probing, trying to get in. And every now and then distant thin voices would drift in through the cracks. Like insect voices. They’d tickle Paul’s mind then dissolve into silence. There had been a numb feel to the day, like nothing mattered. In the end even the wind had given up its nagging.

And Paul had waited, through the long, dull hours, and planned his move. Waited for when he could sneak down there and pick one of them off. A small one – a young one – too dangerous otherwise.

Couldn’t risk a fight.