Getting outside turned out to be anticlimactic. The big house was silent as a tomb after the gaslights were turned out, and Alice found the back door beside the kitchens unlocked. She eased it open, gasping a little at the blast of chill night air. Gravel crunched softly under her feet, but that was surely too quiet for anyone inside the house to hear. She let the door close gently, touched the matches and her candle in her pocket, and looked across the lawn at the low, dark shape of the library.

In the back of her mind, all the way from her room, had been a voice telling her she shouldn’t be doing this at all. It wasn’t just worry about being caught, by Mr Black or Mr Wurms. This was against the rules, a boundary Alice had carefully stayed on the right side of nearly her entire life. Just the thought of it brought up a picture of her father, and the look he’d given her on the very few times she’d strayed. It hadn’t been an angry look, just a sad, disappointed one, and Alice would rather have torn her heart out with her fingernails than see it on his face again.

But, she reminded herself, her father was gone. He was gone, and if there was any possibility of getting him back, it lay across the lawn in that dark, windowless building. Some things are more important than following the rules.

Aren’t they?

She shook her head and started across the lawn, avoiding the path – it was visible from the house – and staying close to the edge of the woods. Not too close, though. The forest frightened her more than she cared to admit. The only forests Alice had ever visited had been tame, gentle things, airy well-tended parks, and of course she’d never gone at night. This forest was different, ancient and dark, and all she could see was a solid wall of black foliage rising into the sky to blot out the stars. Each gust of wind brought a rush of whispering leaves, rising and falling like the sound of surf on a beach. The wind was cold too, cutting right through the thin cotton of her nightshirt. Her skin rose in goosebumps, and Alice hugged herself and wished she’d been a little less cautious in her planning.

The library seemed almost a part of the forest, a great black hump of a building looming up among the trees like an ancient standing stone. She could see the gleam of moonlight on the great bronze door, and she hurried over to it. The big metal ring was so cold, her hand burned where she touched it, but she gritted her teeth and hauled, expecting the scream of protesting hinges.

Nothing happened. The door was stuck fast; Alice might as well have been hauling on a ring set directly into the wall.