The Golem's Eye

"Well, boys—we'll have to try. The only alternative is igniting a sphere on it, and that might damage the goods. If you, Fred, set your boots against the wall, we'll get extra leverage. Now, Nick—"
    While the discussion proceeded, Kitty bent down to inspect the bronze plaque. It was thickly covered in neat little wedge-shaped marks, arranged together to form what were evidently words or symbols. Not for the first time, Kitty regretted her own ignorance. Knowledge of obscure scripts was not something you were taught at school, and Mr. Pennyfeather had refused to allow his company to study the spell books they had stolen. She wondered idly whether Jakob's father would have been able to read this script, and what it would have told him.
    "Kitty, shift out of the way, will you? There's a good girl." Stanley had taken hold of one corner of the lid, Nick was on another, and Fred—who had an end all to himself—had braced a foot against the wall, just beneath the shelf. They were readying themselves for the first effort. Biting her lip at Stanley's facetiousness, Kitty got to her feet and moved away, wiping her face against her sleeve. Sweat was beading her skin; the air in the crypt was very close.
    "Now, boys! Push!" With snarls of effort, the men set to. Anne and Mr. Pennyfeather held lanterns up around the three to illuminate their progress. Light glistened on contorted faces, grinning teeth, dripping brows. Just for a moment, a faint grinding noise could be heard above their groaning.
    "All right—rest!" Nick, Fred, and Stanley collapsed with gasping cries. Mr. Pennyfeather hobbled around, clapping them soundly on the shoulders. "It moved! Definite movement! Well done, my lads! No sign of the interior yet, but we'll get there. Take a breather, then we'll try again."
     
    And so they did. And yet again. Each time, their gasps grew louder, their muscles cracking with the effort; each time, the lid moved sideways a little more, then stubbornly stopped again. Mr. Pennyfeather urged them on, dancing about them like a demon, his limp almost forgotten, his face contorted in the bouncing light. "Push—that's it!—our fortune is inches below your noses, if you just'll put in the effort! Oh—push, damn you, Stanley! A little further! Break your backs for it, boys!"
    Picking up a discarded lantern, Kitty idled about the empty crypt, scuffing her sneakers in the thick white mold, marking time. She dawdled to the far end of the chamber, almost to the wall, then turned and dawdled back.
    Something occurred to her, a half-perceived oddity waving vaguely at the back of her mind. For a moment, she couldn't pin down what it was, and the cheer that came from the others after a particularly successful heave provided further distraction. She spun on her heels, looking back toward the far wall, and raised her lantern.
    A wall—no more, no less.
    Then what was it that...?
    The mold. The lack of it.
    All around her, underfoot, the white mold stretched; scarcely a single flagstone remained free. And on both sides, the walls had been subjected likewise. The mold was gradually extending up toward the ceiling. One day, perhaps, the whole room would be swathed in it.
    Yet on the far wall, there was not a single scrap of mold. The blocks were clean, their outlines as sharp as if the builders had departed that very afternoon.
    Kitty turned to the others. "Hey—"
    "That's it! One more turn'll do it, lads!" Mr. Pennyfeather was practically capering. "I can see a space now in the corner! Another heave and we'll be the first to see old Gladstone since they tucked his bones away!"
    No one heard Kitty; no one paid her the slightest bit of attention.
    She turned back to the far wall. No mold at all... It didn't make sense. Perhaps these clean blocks were made of a different kind of stone?
    Kitty stepped across to touch the blocks; as she did so, her shoe caught on the uneven floor and she fell forward. She raised her hands to brace herself against the wall—and fell right through it.
     
    An instant later, she crashed hard against the flagstones of the floor, jarring her wrists and knee. The lantern bounced from her outstretched hand and clattered down beside her.
    Kitty screwed up her eyes in pain. Her knee was throbbing badly, and all her fingers tingled with the shock of the fall. But her strongest sensation was one of puzzlement. How had it happened? She was sure she'd fallen against the wall, yet she seemed to have passed through it as if