Muddle and Win by John Dickinson Read Free Book Online Page A

steps leading either up or down. A gallery ran around the chamber, far above Muddlespot’s head. More arches opened from it, one after another. The archways were not round or pointed but parabola, intersecting at the ceiling with an ordered complexity that could only have been conceived by someone who really
liked
that sort of maths.
    Everything was made of glass, or some transparent crystal. He could see through walls and through floors, to other chambers and corridors far above his head, or many, many levels below his feet. It was dizzying. It made him feel that the floor was about to give way and send him tumbling through layer after layer of thought. Some of the surfaces were plain; others were patterned with complex translucent designs like mosaics of stars or unicorns rising from waves. These broke up the passage of light, discreetly concealing whatever lay beyond them. In a corridor a level below this one was a row of doors. Muddlespot could just make out the lettering on some of them. FRENCH SUBJUNCTIVE , one said. And next to that was DECLENSION OF IRREGULAR FRENCH VERBS .
    The corridor stretched on and on to the left and right. There must have been a thousand doors of it. And beyond it was another, and another, and  . . .
    Music seemed to be playing somewhere, but he couldn’t catch what it was or which direction it came from.
    ‘
Un
usual,’ he murmured to himself.
    He had thought that the mind of a schoolgirl would be a rather small place. He had imagined that there would be bright colours and childish pictures, and lots of things like bowling alleys and swings and slides. He had been rather looking forward to the slides.
    ‘
Unusual, unusual
,’ echoed the crystal passages, as if they agreed with him and were also a little proud of it. They spread in all directions, intricate and yet ordered. Everything had symmetry. Every feature had its mirror image. There was no dust. There was no movement. There was no sound of voices. There were a million ideas in Sally’s head, but they didn’t go wandering about. They stayed in their rooms until they were wanted. And when they were wanted, they had to move quickly.
    Feeling very small, Muddlespot climbed a flight of broad stairs to reach another chamber. There was a crystal figure in the middle of it. A graceful torso rose from a block of sculpted ice. The head was a man’s, with a full beard. He was crowned with leaves. Blank-eyed, he gazed along his outstretched, smoothly muscled arm. His index finger pointed to one of the chamber’s six arches. Above the arch was written in words of gold, LOOK FOR THE RIGHT .
    ‘The right,’ grumbled Muddlespot nervously. ‘Yeah, yeah, right.’ But he went the way that he was pointed. It led down another long corridor and past a court where a fountain was playing. He crossed the open space quickly. On the far side was a higher, wider arch and above it, again in gold letters, were the words IT IS BETTER TO GIVE THAN TO RECEIVE .
    ‘I don’t believe it,’ muttered Muddlespot.
    And: ‘She
can’t
be for real!’
    In their niches, statues brooded silently. Their blank eyes looked down on him.
Oh yes she can
, they seemed to say.
Yes she can
.
    There was another flight of stairs, as wide as a basketball court and very long. Muddlespot panted up it, hurrying because he knew there couldn’t be much time before the squadrons of angels he had seen leaving earlier gave up their search and returned to their posts. At the top was another arch. Beyond it was a chamber. This was the place.
    The ceiling was set with stars. A pantheon of crystal statues, marked with names such as TRUTH, WISDOM, FAIRNESS and CALM , stood in a semicircle around the centre of the room. And opposite, curving round the far wall, were two huge arched windows. The windows looked out onto the world in which Sally lived. He saw the room that had spun before his eyes during his desperate flight and jump. He saw a formica tabletop, on which were laid