“We should go,” Constance said in an apologetic tone. “We need to do what he said, Kate — we need to go back to the bay forest.”
“We aren’t going to the bay forest,” Reynie said, and the others looked at him in surprise. His expression was very grim but determined.
“Where are we going, then?” Constance asked.
“To save Mr. Benedict. We’re his only chance now.”
“But we don’t even know where —”
“Oh yes, we do,” Reynie said.
It was long past midnight, and the full moon’s reflection no longer shone at the bottom of the village well — no twin moon down there now — but as Reynie pointed out, Mr. Benedict would have counted on their solving the clue regardless of the hour, just as he would have counted on Kate’s ability to retrieve whatever he’d left for them. And indeed, it took Kate mere seconds to fetch her rope from the top of the silo (where Crawlings had untied Constance in order to capture her) and secure it to one of the posts that used to hold up the well’s missing roof. Flinging off her shoes, she climbed down into inky darkness.
“I have it!” Kate called after splashing around only a moment. She soon climbed back up with a sealed glass jar. It had been anchored beneath the water, she said, with a short length of cord and a heavy rock. And inside it was a map.
After all the confusion and mystery, the final leg of the children’s journey seemed strangely straightforward. The map was simple and easily read, and on it, near the top of the southernmost mountain, was a boldly marked X. There wasn’t even a need to decide on a route; they could just follow the Salamander’s tracks across the meadow.
“Find a seat,” Kate said after she’d helped everyone into the Salamander. She took her position at the wheel. The Salamander’s interior was rather like that of a normal touring boat, with storage compartments lined beneath the gunwales and two short rows of uncomfortable benches. Reynie, taking a seat on the front bench, kicked something over on the floor beneath. Kate’s bucket.
Kate took it from him without a word. The bucket’s recovery was small consolation, but she did seem to stand a little taller with it belted to her side. She took a last look at the ruined shelter door, beyond which, in the moonlit gloom, Milligan remained trapped with the Ten Men. She grimaced and turned away. She grabbed the wheel, shifted a lever, and the Salamander started forward with a powerful lurch.
Reynie, Sticky, and Constance flew backward off their benches.
“Hang on!” Kate called, her ponytail streaming out behind her.
The Salamander roared out of the village and into the meadow, where its floodlight plainly revealed the twin tracks of crushed grass. Kate steered into the tracks and followed them. She swerved only once — to avoid the prone bodies of Martina Crowe and Garrotte the Ten Man, both of whom lay unconscious but otherwise unharmed in the middle of the meadow, where Milligan had ambushed them on their way back from reporting to Mr. Curtain. The other children never saw what Kate saw. Nor did Kate ever tell them how tempted she had been not to swerve. But she did, and the Salamander rumbled on.
Soon they were rising up the lower slope of the mountain. The slope grew steeper and steeper, and before long the other children were covering their eyes, afraid to look, for the view from the Salamander floor (they hadn’t managed to recover their seats) was of nothing but moon and sky. There seemed to be no ground beneath them at all.
Kate stood at the helm, her teeth gritted and every muscle tense. She had a better view than the others and was straining to make out the Salamander tracks, which had grown much harder to find as the meadow gave way to rock. (It would make for a bad end if she unwittingly veered off the route and into some hidden ravine.) Kate was also paying close attention to the feel of the machine beneath her. The Salamander’s engine was working at full capacity, yet their speed had slowed considerably and the treads had begun to slip. When the slope grew even steeper and the Salamander’s progress slowed to a crawl, Kate shut off the engine. They were very near the mountaintop. From this point it would be faster to hike.
The others opened their eyes and felt their stomachs drop. They appeared to be suspended in the sky. Kate was studying the map by flashlight. “The cave’s not far. Let’s go.”
Outside the Salamander they discovered a goat path, which made their climb easier. The air here was sharp and cool, and vegetation was scarce. A few mountain flowers and weeds poked out between the cracks of boulders, and a few stunted, twisted trees stood in patches of sandy soil, but mostly there was only rock. Reynie was wondering how a plant as fragile as duskwort had ever existed in such a place when Kate broke in on his thoughts.
“We’re here,” she murmured, pointing.
There was no mistaking the cave. Bright light poured from its entrance as well as from smaller openings in the rock above it, giving the appearance of an enormous stone jack-o’-lantern with a candle inside. The light even appeared to flicker as a candle would. It took Reynie a moment to realize that the flickering effect was created by someone passing back and forth across the light source, somewhere down inside the cave.
Reynie gave an involuntary shudder. He had hoped never again to see Mr. Curtain. Yet now, twelve months and thousands of miles later, the time had come.
Elsewhere on the island, in the storm shelter of the abandoned village, a most unpleasant negotiation was coming to an end.
When the children had fled in the Salamander, they had thought they were leaving Milligan chained to a beam, alone in the darkness with two Ten Men. They weren’t entirely correct, however, for even as Kate was descending into the well to retrieve the map, the Ten Man known as Crawlings was regaining consciousness. He lay on the ground near Milligan’s feet, blinking groggily and drooling, trying to get his wits about him. The shelter was dark, illuminated but faintly by the moonlight shining through the ruined doorway. Crawlings became aware of McCracken talking. Then he heard the rumble of the Salamander on its way out of the village. With a groan he hauled himself to his knees, rubbed his eyes — and saw Milligan holding a laser pointer.
“Hold still,” Milligan said, and Crawlings froze.
“Welcome back, Crawlings,” said McCracken’s voice from behind him.
