Moving Pictures

grinnin’.”
    “Gaspode!”
    “Well, you’ve got to look on the bright side, haven’t you?” sneered the dog. “Can’t go around bein’ miserable jus’ because you’re in some lost underground tomb with a mad cat lover an’ a torch that’s goin’ to go out any minute—”
    “Keep going! Keep going!”
    They half-fell, half ran down the steps, skidded unpleasantly on the seaweed at the bottom, and headed for the little archway that led to the wonderful prospect of living air and bright daylight. The torch was beginning to scorch Victor’s hand. He let it go. At least there had been no problems in the passage; if they kept to one wall and didn’t do anything stupid they couldn’t help but reach the door. And it must be dawn by now, which meant that it shouldn’t be long before they could see the light.
    Victor straightened up. This was pretty heroic, really. There hadn’t been any monsters to fight, but probably even monsters would have rotted away centuries ago. Of course it had been creepy, but really it was only, well, archaeology. Now it was all behind him it didn’t seem so bad at all…
    Laddie, who had been running ahead of them, barked sharply.
    “What’s he saying?” said Victor.
    “He’s saying,” said Gaspode, “that the tunnel’s blocked.”
    “Oh, no!”
    “It was prob’ly your organ recital that did it.”
    “Really blocked?”
    Really blocked. Victor crawled over the heap. Several large roof slabs had come down, bringing tons of broken rock with them. He pulled and pushed at one or two pieces, but this produced only further falls.
    “Perhaps there’s another way out?” he said. “Perhaps you dogs could go and—”
    “Forget it, pal,” said Gaspode. “Anyway, the only other way must be down those steps. They connect with the sea, right? All you have to do is swim down there and hope your lungs hold out.”
    Laddie barked.
    “Not you ,” said Gaspode. “I wasn’t talking to you. Never volunteer for anything.”
    Victor continued his burrowing among the rocks.
    “I don’t know,” he said, after a while, “but it seems to me I can see a bit of light here. What do you think?”
    He heard Gaspode scramble over the stones.
    “Could be, could be,” said the dog grudgingly. “Looks like a couple of blocks have wedged up and left a space.”
    “Big enough for someone small to crawl through?” said Victor encouragingly.
    “I knew you were going to say that,” said Gaspode.
    Victor heard the scrabble of paws on loose rock. Eventually a muffled voice said, “It opens up a bit…tight squeeze here…blimey…”
    There was silence.
    “Gaspode?” said Victor apprehensively.
    “It’s OK. I’m through. An’ I can see the door.”
    “Great!”
    Victor felt the air move and there was a scratching noise. He reached out carefully and his hand met a ferociously hairy body.
    “Laddie’s trying to follow you!”
    “He’s too big. He’ll get stuck!”
    There was a canine grunt, a frantic kicking which showered Victor with gravel, and a small bark of triumph.
    “O’corse, he’s a bit skinnier’n me,” said Gaspode, after a while.
    “Now you two run and fetch help,” said Victor. “Er. We’ll wait here.”
    He heard them disappear into the distance. Laddie’s far-away barking indicated that they had reached the outside air.
    Victor sat back.
    “Now all we have to do is wait,” he said.
    “We’re in the hill, aren’t we?” said Ginger’s voice in the darkness.
    “Yes.”
    “How did we get here?”
    “I followed you.”
    “I told you to stop me.”
    “Yes, but then you tied me up.”
    “I did no such thing!”
    “You tied me up,” repeated Victor. “And then you came here and opened the door and made a torch of some sort and went all the way into that—that place. I dread to think of what you’d have done if I hadn’t woken you up.”
    There was a pause.
    “I really did all that?” said Ginger uncertainly.
    “You really did.”
    “But I don’t remember any of it!”
    “I believe you. But you still did it.”
    “What—what was that place, anyway?”
    Victor shifted in the darkness, trying to make himself comfortable.
    “I don’t know,” he confessed. “At first I thought it was a temple. And it looked as though people used it for watching moving pictures.”
    “But it looked hundreds of years old!”
    “Thousands, I expect.”
    “But look, that can’t be right,” said Ginger, in the small voice of one trying to be