hollow wooden sounds on her breast, ‘you’d be in something like a desert with sharp dunes, if you know what I mean. It goes up and down like wild waves on a stormy ocean, if that isn’t mixing my metaphors.’
‘I think it is, my dear,’ admonished her husband gently, his hooked nose bobbing up and down, ‘but you’re entitled. It’s not easy to describe our roof with just a single simile or metaphor.’
‘So keep away from the centre of the attic and the edges?’
‘Precisely,’ replied the policeman to Alex. ‘You’d make a good witness, you know. You catch on quickly.’
‘But why are some of the creatures we’ve met so strange?’ asked Chloe. ‘I mean, like the villagers.’
‘Ah,’ explained Punch, ‘that’s because there are insiders and outsiders. The villagers are insiders, they’re of the attic, so to speak. They belong here. They are indigenous – I can tell by your expression you know what that means – while we are not. Of course, many of the creatures in the attic are immigrants, like us. Some of us came here by accident or design – like yourselves – others were banished here, exiled. Like us. You are people and as such will come up against a lot of hostility from things that used to be inanimate and now have life of a sort. Objects which were mistreated in the real world – or simply felt they were mistreated.’
‘The villagers acted very peculiarly,’ said Chloe, involuntarily copying Punch’s manner of speech. ‘Very peculiarly.’
‘That’s because they see you as phantoms. In their eyes you have a certain translucency. They can’t see right through you – as through something transparent, like a window – but you have – now what’s a good simile? – yes – you’re like a jellyfish to them. They think you want pictures of your ancestors. Did they give you any photo albums? Yes? There you are then. They think that’s what you’re after.’
‘Oh. That’s why they sort of jumped back in fright when they came across us? That explains it. But I’ve got another question. A very important one. You can’t tell us where we can find any watches, can you? We’re looking for a special pocket-watch that belongs to a neighbour of ours.’
‘No, I can’t, I’m afraid. You need a map for that. There’s a map not far from here. Watches? That sounds like something a board-comber would look for. It’s my guess most of the watches in the attic have been collected at some time. You need to find the whole collection.’
‘Where?’
Punch shrugged. ‘I’ve no idea, have you?’ he asked his wife and the policeman. They shook their wooden heads. ‘Maybe beyond the Great Water Tank, which is close to the centre of the attic. None of us have been over the Great Water Tank. None of us ever wanted to go there.’
Alex said, ‘What about trapdoors? We don’t seem to see any of those any more.’
Punch said, ‘There are trapdoors, though where they lead is anyone’s guess. You’ll find them if you look, mostly in the dark corners. But be careful if you go down them. You might find yourself in an even stranger place than the one you’re in now. Chinese boxes within boxes, so to speak. If you have to come back up again, it might not even be here, but somewhere else. And the further away you get from your original entry point, the more difficult it’s going to be to find your way back. Do you understand?’
‘I think so,’ replied Alex. ‘Yes. Don’t go down.’
‘It’s probably best not to,’ Judy confirmed. ‘You could find yourselves in all sorts of trouble.’
‘By the way,’ asked Punch, ‘did you go round or come over the mountain of weapons?’
Alex said, ‘Over.’
‘So you met our monster?’
‘You mean Katerfelto,’ said Alex. ‘I sorted him out all right, with – well, I sorted him.’
‘How very brave,’ murmured Judy. ‘He’s terrifying, isn’t he? It’s all those weapons collected in one place. They’ve seen death, you know.’
‘Dispensed death, my dear,’ said Punch, patting his wife’s wooden hand with a clunking sound. ‘Dispensed death in anger. One weapon on its own has very little power, but so many gathered in one place … The dark spirits of gun, sword and shell seep out, mingle like gases, and become Katerfelto. An evil cocktail of terrible spirits. You can’t experience such horrors as they have seen and made – yes, they have made horror – and come away without absorbing something very dark.’