Hollow City: The Second Novel of Miss Peregrine's Peculiar Children

surrounding us, I felt a sudden pressure in my ears and the light disappeared.

We stumbled away from the walls in a daze. Now the tracks and ties under our feet were new, as if they’d just been laid. The tunnel smelled somewhat less intensely of urine. The bulbs along it had gotten brighter, and instead of giving a steady light, they flickered—because they weren’t electric bulbs at all, but gaslamps.

“What just happened?” I said.

“We crossed into a loop,” said Emma. “But what was that light? I’ve never seen anything like that.”

“Every loop entrance has its quirks,” said Millard.

“Anyone know when we are?” I asked.

“I’d guess the latter half of the nineteenth century,” said Millard. “Prior to 1863 there wasn’t an underground system in London at all.”

Then, from behind us, another light appeared—this one accompanied by a gust of hot wind and a thunderous roar. “Train!” Emma shouted again, and this time it really was. We threw ourselves against the walls as it shot past in a cyclone of noise and light and belching smoke. It looked less like a modern subway train than a miniature locomotive. It even had a caboose, where a man with a big black beard and a guttering lantern in his hand gaped at us in surprise as the train strafed away around the next bend.

Hugh’s cap had blown off his head and been crushed. He went to pick it up, found it shredded, and threw it down again angrily. “I don’t care for this loop,” he said. “We’ve been here all of ten seconds and already it’s trying to kill us. Let’s do what we have to and get gone.”

“I couldn’t agree more,” said Enoch.

The pigeon guided us on down the track. After ten minutes or so, it stopped, pulling toward what looked like a blank wall. We couldn’t understand why, until I looked up and noticed a partially camouflaged door where the wall met the ceiling, twenty feet overhead. Because there seemed no other way to reach it, Olive took off her shoes and floated up to get a closer look. “There’s a lock on it,” she said. “A combination lock.”

There was also a pigeon-sized hole rusted through the door’s bottom corner, but that was no help to us—we needed the combination.

“Any idea what it could be?” Emma asked, putting the question out to everyone.

She was met with shrugs and blank looks.

“None,” said Millard.

“We’ll have to guess,” she said.

“Perhaps it’s my birthday,” said Enoch. “Try three–twelve–ninety-two.”

“Why would anyone know your birthday?” said Hugh.