The Lieutenant Keeper reached out through the glowing walls of the sphere. When he pulled his hand back he held one end of a clothesline. He reeled it in. As the pegs dropped off, various items of clothing fell into Arthur’s lap, including a faded pyjama-like top and trousers, a strange hooded cape of some rough material the colour of mud, and a many-times-patched leather apron.
“Put the work suit on over your clothes,” instructed the Lieutenant Keeper. “You will need layers for warmth. Roll up the cape for later.”
Arthur put on the pyjama-like top and trousers, and then strapped on the apron, which was very heavy leather. As instructed, he rolled up the hooded cape. It was very thick and difficult to squash down. Arthur didn’t recognise the material.
“Stabilised mud,” said the Lieutenant Keeper as Arthur looked down on a rolled-up cape that was a quarter as big as he was. “Inexpensive and it offers sufficient protection against the Nothing rain in the Pit. While it lasts.”
“Nothing rain?” asked Arthur. He didn’t like the way the Lieutenant Keeper said the Pit either. He remembered that the Atlas had called it a huge sorein the foundation of the House.
“The Pit is so vast that clouds form partway down and there is constant rain,” said the Lieutenant Keeper as he reached back out through the barrier and retrieved a pair of wooden clogs stuffed with straw.
“The rain concentrates the Nothing pollution that pervades the Pit and carries it back down. Hence the name.”
“But what is the Pit exactly?” asked Arthur. All he knew from the Atlas’s earlier reference was that it was some sort of giant mine, and a danger to the House.
“Unfortunately, you will soon see for yourself. I fear you will have difficulty staying out of it. Once in, you should escape as quickly as you can. Now – put on the clogs. Keep your socks. They are not so different as to attract notice.”
Arthur slipped off his comfortable, arch-supported, computer-designed sneakers and put on the straw-stuffed wooden clogs. They felt loose and extremely uncomfortable. When he stood up he couldn’t take a step without his heels lifting out.
“I can’t even walk in these,” he protested.
“All the indentured Denizens wear them,” said the Lieutenant Keeper. “You cannot risk being given away by your footwear. Now, for the smog. It contains minute particles of Nothing, so it wears down Denizens and will almost certainly slay a mortal. Which hand did you hold the First Key in most?”
“The right,” said Arthur.
“Then you must put two fingers from your right hand up your nostrils and your thumb in your mouth while you inhale and recite this small spell: First Key, grant this boon to me, that the air I breathebe pure and safe, and keep from me all harm andscathe.”
“What?”
The Lieutenant Keeper repeated his instructions and added, “You may need to repeat this spell as it too will be worn down by the smog, and the residual powers of the Key will fade from your flesh. Do not stay overlong in the Far Reaches, particularly the Pit.”
“I won’t if I can help it,” muttered Arthur. “I guess I can always get out up the Improbable Stair if I really have to.”
The Lieutenant Keeper shook his head.
“You mean I can’t use the Stair?” asked Arthur. He knew the Stair was risky, but at least it had been an option. Like a parachute or a fire escape. Some faint hope of escape from disaster.
“You would never reach a favourable destination,” said the Lieutenant Keeper. “Not without a Key, or a well-practised guide.”
“Great,” said Arthur dolefully. He carefully put his fingers in his nostrils and his thumb in his mouth. It was difficult to say the spell around his thumb, but possible. He felt a tingling in his nose and throat as he said the words, and at the end of the spell let out an enormous sneeze that rocked him back on his heels.
“Good!” declared the Lieutenant Keeper as he quickly consulted his watch again. “Now we must return you to your destination. I have done all I can, Arthur Penhaligon, and more than I should. Be brave and take appropriate risks, and you shall prevail.”
“But what… please tell someone where I’ve gone—”
Before Arthur could say any more, the Lieutenant Keeper snapped a salute, turned on his heel to get behind Arthur and gave him a very hefty push. Arthur, arms cartwheeling, went straight through the strange liquid barrier and once more fell on his hands and knees on the cold stone floor. His left clog came off and clattered away, and his hood fell down over his face.
As Arthur struggled with his hood, a bright light shone on him. Arthur looked up and shielded his eyes from a lantern held high by a short, broad figure. The light was shrouded and blurred by the smoke, so for a second Arthur thought he was looking at some sort of pig-man; then he realised it was the thrusting visor of a helmet. The fellow also wore a bronze breastplate over a long leather coat and had a broad, curved sword thrust naked through his belt. More peculiarly, he had what looked like a miniature steam-engine in a harness on his back, that was sending a steady flow of smoke up behind his neck and small bursts of steam from out behind his elbows.
That one small engine couldn’t possibly be the cause of the thick smoke behind the looming figure. It was like a fog, so heavy that Arthur could only make out fuzzy lights and occasional blurry shapes moving in its midst. Noise was also muffled. Arthur could hear a distant roar, as if there was a crowd somewhere, but he couldn’t see it, and there was also a kind of metallic thumping noise that sounded like machinery.
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