Chapter 10 CHAPTER FIVE: AIRMAIL PAPER-2

Will set off at once toward the sound, and Lyra followed behind as he plunged down a narrow alley shadowed from the moonlight. After several twists and turns they came out into the square in front of the stone tower they'd seen that morning. Twenty or so children were facing inward in a semicircle at the base of the tower, and some of them had sticks in their hands, and some were throwing stones at whatever they had trapped against the wall. At first Lyra thought it was another child, but coming from inside the semicircle was a horrible high wailing that wasn't human at all. And the children were screaming too, in fear as well as hated.

Will ran up to the children and pulled the first one back. It was a boy of about his own age, a boy in a striped T-shirt. As he turned Lyra saw the wild white rims around his pupils, and then the other children realized what was happening and stopped to look. Angelica and her little brother were there too, stones in hand, and all the children eyes glittered fiercely in the moonlight. They fell silent. Only the high wailing continued, and then both Will and Lyra saw what it was: a tabby cat, cowing against the wall of the tower, its ear torn and its tail bent. It was the cat Will had seen in Sunderland Avenue, the one like Moxie, the one that had led him to the window.

As soon as he saw her, he flung aside the boy he was holding. The boy fell to the ground and was up in a moment, furious, but the others held him back. Will was already kneeling by the cat. And then she was in his arms. She fled to his breast and he cradled her close and stood to face the children, and Lyra thought for a crazy second that his daemon had appeared at last. "What are you hurting this cat for?" he demanded, and they couldn't answer. They stood trembling at Wills anger, breathing heavily, clutching their sticks and their stones, and they couldn't speak. But then Angelicas voice came clearly: "You ain from here! You ain from Cigazze! You didn't know about Specters, you don know about cats either. You ain like us!"

The boy in the striped T-shirt whom Will had thrown down was trembling to fight, and if it hadn't been for the cat in Wills arms, he would have flown at Will with fists and teeth and feet, and Will would have gladly joined battle . There was a current of electric hated between the two of them that only violence could ground. But the boy was afraid of the cat. "Where you come from?" he said contemptuously. "Doesn't matter where we come from. If you're scared of this cat, I'll take her away from you. If shes bad luck to you, shell be good luck for us. Now get out of the way."

For a moment Will thought their hated would overcome their fear, and he was preparing to put the cat down and fight, but then came a low thunderous growl from behind the children, and they turned to see Lyra standing with her hand on the shoulders of a great spotted leopard whose teeth shone white as he snarled. Even Will, who recognized Pantalaimon, was frightened for a second. Its effect on the children was dramatic: they turned and fled at once. A few seconds later the square was empty. But before they left, Lyra looked up at the tower. A growl from Pantalaimon prompted her, and just briefly she saw someone there on the very top, looking down over the battle-mented rim, and not a child either, but a young man , with curly hair.

Half an hour later they were in the flat above the cafe. Will had found a tin of condensed milk, and the cat had lapped it hungrily and then began to lick her wounds. Pantalaimon had become cat-formed out of curiosity, and at first the tabby cat had bristled with suspicion, but she soon realized that whatever Pantalaimon was, he was neither a true cat nor a threat, and proceeded to ignore him. Lyra watched Will tending this one with fascination. The only animals she had been close to in her world (apart from the armored bears) were working animals of one sort or another. Cats were for keeping Jordan College clear of mice, not for making pets of.

"I think her tails broken," Will said. "I dont know what to do about that. Maybe it'll heal by itself. I'll put some honey on her ear. I read about that somewhere; its antiseptic...." It was messy, but at least it kept her occupied licking it off, and the wound was getting cleaner all the time. "You sure this is the one you saw?" she said. "Oh, yes. And if theyre all so frightened of cats, there wouldn't be many in this world anyway. She probably couldn't find her way back." "They were just crazy," Lyra said. "They would have killed her. I never seen kids being like that."

"I have," said Will. But his face had closed; he didnt want to talk about it, and she knew better than to ask. She knew she wouldnt even ask the alethiometer. She was very tired, so presently she went to bed and slept at once. A little later, when the cat had curled up to sleep, Will took a cup of coffee and the green leather writing case, and sat on the balcony. There was enough light corning through the window for him to read by, and he wanted to look at the papers. There werent many. As hed thought, they were letters, written on airmail paper in black ink. These very marks were made by the hand of the man he wanted so much to find; he moved his fingers over and over them, and pressed them to his face, trying to get closer to the essence of his father. Then he started to read .

Fairbanks, Alaska Wednesday, 19 June 1985 My darling—the usual mixture of efficiency and chaos—all the stores are here but the physician, a genial dimwit called Nelson, hasn't made any arrangements for carrying his damn balloons up into the mountains—having to twiddle our thumbs while he scrabbles around for transport. But it means I had a chance to talk to an old boy I met last time, a gold miner called Jake Petersen. Tracked him down to a dingy bar and under the sound of the baseball game on the TV I asked him about the anomaly. He wouldn't talk there—took me back to his apartment. With the help of a bottle of Jack Daniels he talked for a long time—hadn t seen it himself, but he d met an Eskimo who had, and this chap said it was a doorway into the spirit world. They d known about it for centuries; through and bringing back a trophy of some kind—though some never came back. However, old Jake did have a map of the area, and he d marked on it where his pal had told him the thing was. (Just in case: its at 69°0211" N, 157°1219" W, ona spur of Lookout Ridge a mile or two north of the Colville River.) We then got on to other Arctic legends—the Norwegian ship thats been drifting unmanned for sixty years, stuff like that. The archaeologists are a decent crew, keen to get to work, containing their impatience with Nelson and his balloons. None of them hasever heard of the anomaly, and believe me Im going to keep it like that. My fondest love to you both. Johnny.

Umiat, Alaska Saturday, 22 June 1985 My darling—-so much for what did I call him, a genial dimwit—the physician Nelson is nothing of the sort, and if Im not mistaken hes actually looking for the anomaly himself. The holdup in Fairbanks was orchestrated by him, would you believe? Knowing that the rest of the team wouldn't want to wait for anything less than an unarguable reason like no transport, he personally sent ahead and canceled the vehicles that had been ordered. accident, and I was going to ask him what the hell he was playing at when I overheard him talking on the radio to someone—describing the anomaly, no less, except he didn't know the location. Later on I bought him a drink, played the bluff soldier, old Arctic hand, "more things in heaven and earth" line. Pretended to tease him with the limitations of science—bet you cant explain Bigfoot, etc.—watching him closely. Then sprung the anomaly on him—Eskimo legend of a doorway into spirit world—invisible—somewhere near Lookout Ridge, would you believe, where were heading for, fancy that. And you know he was jolted rigid. He knew exactly what I meant. I pretended not to notice and went on to witchcraft, told him the Zaire leopard story.

So I hope hes got me down as a superstitious military blockhead. But Im right, Elaine— hes looking for it too. The question is, do I tell him or not? Got to work out what his game is. Fondest love to both—Johnny. Colville Bar, Alaska Monday, 24 June 1985 Darling—I wont get a chance to post another letter for a while—this is the last town before we take to the hills, the Brooks Range. The archaeologists are fizzing to get up there. One chap is convinced hell find evidence of much earlier habitation than anyone suspected. I said how much earlier, and why was he convinced. He told me of some narwhal-ivory carvings hed found on a previous dig—carbon 14-dated to some incredible age , way outside the range of what was previously assumed; anomalous, in fact. Wouldn't it be strange if they d come through my anomaly, from some other world? Talking of which, the physician Nelson is my closest buddy now— kids me along, drops hints to imply that he knows that I know that he knows, etc. And I pretend to be bluff Major Parry, stout fellow in a crisis but not too much between the ears, what. But I know hes after it. , although hes a bona fide academic his funding actually comes from the Ministry ofDefense—I know the financial codes they use. And for another his so-called weather balloons are nothing of the sort. I looked in the crate—a radiation suit if ever Ive seen one. A rum do, my darling. to my plan: take the archaeologists to their spot and go off by myself for a few days to look for the anomaly. If I bump into Nelson wandering about on Lookout Ridge, Ill play it by ear. Later. A real bit of luck. I met Jake Petersen s pal the Eskimo, Matt Kigalik. Jake had told me where to find him, but I hadn t dared to hope he d be there. He told me the Soviets had been looking for the anomaly too; hed come across a man earlier this year high up in the range and watched him for a couple of days without being seen, because he guessed what he was doing, and he was right, and the man turned out to be Russian , a spy. He didn't tell me more than that; I got the impression he bumped him off. But he described the thing to me. Its like a gap in the air, a sort of window. You look through it and you see another world. But its not easy to find because that part of the other world looks just like this—rocks and moss and so forth. Its on the north side of a small creek fifty paces or so to the west of a tall rock shaped like a standing bear, and the position Jake gave me is not quite right—its nearer 12" N than 11. Wish me luck, my darling. Ill bring you back a trophy from the spirit world. I love you forever— kiss the boy for me—Johnny. Will found his head ringing. His father was describing exactly what he himself had found under the hornbeam trees. He, too, had found a window—he even used the same word for it! So Will must be on the right track. And this knowledge was what the men had been searching for... So it was dangerous, too. Will had been just a baby when that letter was written. Seven years after that had come the morning in the supermarket when he realized his mother was in terrible danger, and he had to protect her; growing realization that the danger was in her mind, and he had to protect her all the more. And then, brutally, the revelation that not all the danger had been in her mind after all. There really was someone after her—after these letters, this information. He had no idea what it meant. But he felt deeply happy that he had something so important to share with his father; that John Parry and his son Will had each, separately, discovered this extraordinary thing. it, and his father would be proud that Will had followed in his footsteps. The night was quiet and the sea was still. He folded the letters away and fell asleep.