I guess it helps, though. When I finish, I wipe my face with the curtain, pull it aside and take a deep breath. I crawl out from under the trolley and the room is blacker than black. There are no windows – not even in the door to the corridor – so I really can’t even see my hand in front of my face.

The smell of the candle that’s just been put out gives me an idea. I grope around until I find it. It’s in a metal holder on a little table and on the table is – oh, the relief! – a box of matches. Trembling, I take one out, and use it to relight the candle.

I wonder if I preferred it when it was completely dark? Now I can see the three coffins: a white one with flowers painted on it, a black, shiny one with brass handles, and the one that I was hiding under. This is a simpler one in plain wood.

I ease the candle from its holder and bring it over to the coffins. My hand is shaking so much that little bits of melted wax are splattering on the coffin lids, while dark shadows skip and hide in every corner. Each of the coffins, I see, has a pink Post-it note stuck on the lid.

I hold up the light to read the first note on the black coffin. It says, simply, Mr D. Dyson. The next one reads Mrs E. Armstrong. I swallow hard, because I know what the one on the wooden coffin – the one I was hiding under – will say. Sure enough, there it is.

Mr K. H. McKinley.

Before I open the lid, I carefully look round the rest of the room, in case there are boxes of stored items, or shelves or cupboards …

Nothing.

I have lost track of time. I don’t know when – or for that matter if – Kez will be back. But I know that the only chance of getting the Dreaminator is to open the wooden lid and find out if it’s there.

With one shaking hand, I hold the candle up; with the other, I nudge the lid, half hoping that it is fastened down so that I won’t have to do what comes next. It isn’t, though: it moves. I squeeze my fingers under the edge, lifting and pushing until the lid slides away, and I glimpse the white satin lining of the box.

I turn my head. I can’t even watch what I am doing with my own hands. My eyes are screwed shut and I push too hard. The coffin lid clatters to the floor causing a tremendous noise in the small room and I drop the candle, but it doesn’t go out.

I bend to retrieve it, and rise up slowly, slowly, panting with terror at what I might see. Swallowing hard, I peer in.