The Toymakers(28)

Somewhere along the way, she realised she had not thought of her mother or her father, nor even of Lizzy, in several weeks. Daniel himself was an outline in her mind; he might never have existed, were it not for the child turning inside her. Perhaps this was how lives changed: with new families always supplanting the last.

One night, when Kaspar arrived, she had rearranged the Wendy House floor. The bed she had shifted around, the curtains she had rehung; the nursery had been dismantled and rebuilt in a different corner.

‘I know what this is,’ announced Kaspar, depositing the evening’s supplies on the bed. ‘I’ve read about it in the Annals. This is what happens to polar explorers when they get trapped in their tents. It’s a kind of hysteria. The white madness!’

‘It is not hysteria. Or madness of any kind. It’s …’

‘Next time I come, I’m likely to find you’ve built a little temple to one of your new gods.’

‘It isn’t that bad.’

‘It isn’t?’ said Kaspar. ‘Then, I’d hazard, you won’t mind if I don’t linger tonight. I’m in the thick of it in my workshop …’

At first, eager that he not know how knotted she was feeling inside, Cathy shrugged – and, with a smile that was altogether too smug, Kaspar sauntered out of the door. He had only just breached the line of paper trees when he felt a ball of paper striking him on the back of the head. He paused, pretending it was merely a scrunched-up leaf, but when he strode on, Sirius hurtled to catch him. Only at the dog’s insistence did he look back. Cathy was standing in the doorway, pointedly not taking the next step. What spirit she had to indulge in his game of brinkmanship was clearly fading away.

‘Linger,’ she said – so, with his air of victory barely concealed, Kaspar strode back through the Wendy House door.

‘It’s something. It’s a start,’ said Kaspar. ‘And, truth be told, it was thinking of you that got me this far …’

‘Me?’ Cathy asked, uncertain whether to be flattered or unnerved.

‘Let me show you.’

On the ground between them was a small brown suitcase of perfectly utilitarian design. It was so unspectacular it didn’t even have a handle. Kaspar knelt and opened it up, but it remained as humdrum as ever; all Cathy could see was the black felt of its lining. It was only as Kaspar stood, dangled one foot over the open case and plunged it inside that she realised the blackness had unaccounted depths – for Kaspar’s foot seemed to have dropped below the bottom of the case, below even the lining of the floor. Then, after pausing to make sure of his balance, Kaspar lifted his second foot and planted it alongside the first.

Cathy studied him from every angle, while Sirius set up a pillowy hullabaloo. The case had swallowed Kaspar to the knots of his knees, but by rights it should not have reached his ankles.

‘Am I going to get a smile?’ asked Kaspar, ignoring the fact that he was wearing the biggest, most inane one himself.

‘Explain,’ declared Cathy, determined not to give him the satisfaction even as she battled to contain her surprise.

‘Well, you already know how Papa can do the most extraordinary things with space. I’ve been trying to unpick it ever since I was small – but it wasn’t until I started thinking about you in your hiding hole here that I started to see. And I was thinking: when you’re here, inside the House, how could you ever hope to prove how big the House was outside these walls? When you’re inside, why, it’s as big as it feels – and that’s all that matters. The perspective has shifted, don’t you see? From the inside out, this is what’s normal. And it’s the same for that little …’ He flicked a finger airily at Cathy’s stomach. ‘… creature in there. To that baby, your body’s the whole world. The universe entire. So, with that in mind, I started tinkering …’

Cathy waved her hand to order Kaspar out of the suitcase and took it upon herself to stand in his place. There was no unnatural feeling, no sensation that rippled in her ankles as she dropped in and found the bottom, some way below; it was the most ordinary thing in the world, and yet still she said, ‘I have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about.’

‘It feels like I’ve done something real here, something just like my father, punched my way through whatever’s been holding me back. Watch and learn, Miss Wray. Watch and learn. By the time this summer ends, I’ll have more space inside my packages than you could hope to believe. The real question is – how to sell them? I’ve been picturing “Emporium Hiding Holes”, for the perfect game of hide and seek. Or—’

‘Toyboxes!’ Cathy announced, at which Kaspar gave a wolfish grin. ‘Toyboxes bigger on the inside, so a whole bedroom could be tidied away. Just open it up and cram everything in. Think about that, Kaspar. What mother wouldn’t want a toybox like that?’

‘You’ve a wicked mind, Miss Wray. It is mothers, of course, who hold the purses …’

Cathy could virtually see the sales piling up in Kaspar’s mind’s eye. At once, he helped her clamber out of the box, snapped it shut, and darted away. ‘I’ve much thinking to do. Too much thinking …’

He stopped once before the doorway, to look back and make his goodbyes. As he did, a new look crossed his face; it seemed he was seeing her for the very first time. ‘It’s soon, isn’t it?’ he asked, considering her belly.