Books Of Elsewhere: The Strangers Part 18

Inside, the room was utterly dark. There were no windows, not even covered by curtains, and no other sources of light. Nothing glinted or glimmered in the distant glow from the front door.

"Well," whispered Rutherford bravely, "I shall go first." He edged through the open door.

With a deep breath, Olive followed. She shut the door quietly behind them.

Within the blackness, Olive stretched her arms out, testing the air. She hadn't taken two steps before she hit something with her fingers-something soft and furry, and then something heavy and rough, and then something that felt like silk. Beside her, she could hear Rutherford rustling through the fabric too.

"We must be in a closet," Olive whispered, patting at the wall of cloth. Her hands traveled up, still patting and poking, until suddenly they were patting and poking at something not made of fabric at all.

The thing was about the size of a basketball, but lumpier and slicker. The ridge of one large b.u.mp stuck out of one side. Beside the b.u.mp were two matching pits, which led down to cheeks, which thrust outward into something that was not a nose, but a muzzle: a long, tooth-filled maw.

Olive let out a shriek, m.u.f.fling it in her sleeve a second too late.

"What is it?" Rutherford's worried voice asked, from somewhere in the darkness.

"It's a severed head!" Olive squeaked. Diving toward the door, she groped along the walls, searching for a light switch. She found one just to the right of the doorway, but when she tried to turn it on: Nothing. She flipped the switch again and again, as a growing panic buzzed through her body. Of course, Olive realized. The lights wouldn't work in a house where no one had paid the electric bill for months, but she was still stubbornly jiggling the switch when a needle of blue-white light poked through the darkness.

"Did you say 'a severed head'?" Rutherford whispered, aiming the miniature flashlight at Olive's face.

"Why didn't you say you had a flashlight?" Olive hissed back.

"Because I knew we could only use it in dire circ.u.mstances, or the light would make us too easily detectable," Rutherford explained, swinging the beam across the room.

They were indeed in a closet: a well-stuffed storage closet the size of a small bedroom. A row of clothes-old wool coats and velvet cloaks and silky robes-made a solid wall of fabric ahead of them. And on the shelf just above the clothes was a b.u.mpy, hollow-eyed, rubbery face.

Olive stepped closer. The face was made of plastic, with holes for eyes, and rows of molded, snarling teeth. "It's just a mask," she breathed. "A werewolf mask."

A werewolf mask.

Olive's memory shot to the painting in the kitchen, where the stonemasons worked on their never-finished wall. They had seen monsters-three or four monsters-hurry through the old stone house on Halloween night. They had mentioned werewolves, Olive was sure of it. She remembered the second builder's nervous voice. And there was a mummy. . .

Olive lunged toward the closet's high shelf, groping along it until she found another mask: a second werewolf. Behind it was the deflated face of another werewolf. And then, finally, a mummy mask, with everything but its empty eyeholes covered in strips of rubber bandages.

"Four masks," said Olive. "Two for my parents. That would leave one for Walter, and one for Annabelle." Olive looked up at Rutherford, who was peering over her shoulder. "Did Walter have the chance to change costumes that night? Or was there another person helping Annabelle? Three werewolves, plus one mummy, plus one ghoul . . ."

"Wait," Rutherford whispered. "Say that again."

"Three werewolves, plus one mummy, plus one ghoul-"

"Three plus one plus one is five," Rutherford interrupted, his eyes going distant. "Three and five are both prime numbers. One is not generally considered a prime number."

A breath caught in Olive's lungs. She felt her rib cage expand, as if there wasn't room inside for all of that air and her beating, bouncing heart.

"The list of primes, excluding one, is as follows: two, three, five, seven, eleven, thirteen, seventeen, nineteen . . ." Rutherford's voice sped quickly on, while his body swiveled slowly back to the row of clothes. ". . . twenty-three, twenty-nine, thirty-one, thirty-seven . . ."

With both arms, Olive thrust the clothes apart.

The closet extended far beyond the rack of clothes. A deep, narrow s.p.a.ce dwindled away before them, its dark walls lined with stacks of old hatboxes and leather trunks. In the distance, nearly hidden behind a wall of boxes, were two big brocade armchairs.

Two armchairs that were occupied by Mr. and Mrs. Dunwoody.

By the narrow beam of Rutherford's flashlight, Olive could see that her parents' eyes were closed, and their heads were flopped back against the chair cus.h.i.+ons. Mr. Dunwoody's face looked oddly naked without his thick gla.s.ses, but otherwise, her parents looked perfectly normal. And perfectly alive.

"Dad!" Olive cried. "Mom!"

She dove into the back of the closet, knocking down the boxes, sending stacks of storage spilling across the floor.

"Perhaps you should keep your voice down, Olive," Rutherford whispered.

But Olive wasn't listening.

"Mom!" She shook her mother's arm, feeling its warm, wonderful alive-ness even through its cardigan sleeve. The arm flopped back over the armrest the moment Olive released it. She grabbed Mr. Dunwoody's hand. "Dad, can you hear me?"

"They appear to be under some sort of sleeping spell," said Rutherford as Mr. Dunwoody let out a resonant snore. "Perhaps that explains why I was able to read their thoughts, even from a greater distance."

"It certainly explains why Walter was rooting around in our garden!" Olive growled, her happiness sliding back into anger. "Let's get Doctor Widdecombe and Delora, and they can help-"

There was a creak of disused hinges. A flicker of firelight filled the opening closet door.

Doctor Widdecombe stood in the doorway. Delora, holding a gla.s.s-shaded lamp, hovered in the hall behind him. Their faces wore matching expressions of worry and surprise.

"Delora!" Olive stumbled over the heaps of boxes, rus.h.i.+ng toward the door. "Doctor Widdecombe! Walter is the one who took my parents!"

Doctor Widdecombe looked down at Olive. His worried eyes began to crinkle, and his beard began to twitch, and then he placed both hands on his belly and let out a long, jolly chuckle. Delora smiled in spite of herself, hiding her mouth behind one pale hand.

"Walter?" repeated Doctor Widdecombe, between hearty Ho-ho-ha's. "You think Walter could manage such a thing, in secrecy, with or without the help of a greater magician?" He laughed once more-Ha-ho-hoom-and then patted his belly in a contented way. "No, Olive," he said, still smiling cheerily down at her. "We are the ones who took your parents."

20.

NEXT TO OLIVE, Rutherford froze. The beam of his flashlight had come to rest on Doctor Widdecombe's tweed lapel, and it stayed there, casting its bluish light over the edge of the professor's round, smiling face.

Olive's arrangement of thoughts, everything she knew or thought she knew, slipped out of place and tumbled downward, filling her brain with a shattered mess. "What?" she said. "But-why?"

"Our plan was, as you were the only inhabitant who knew everything about the McMartin house," Doctor Widdecombe began, "to remove your parents, and then to let you lead us directly to the house's most valuable secrets-the familiars, the grimoire, Elsewhere and how to enter it, the ingredients for Aldous's paints, and so forth. You proved to be extremely stubborn about sharing these things, however. So our next course of action involved removing you." He folded his hands behind his back, still smiling. "If you vacated the house, we would have time to search it in perfect privacy, at our leisure. With your parents gone, we a.s.sumed that you too would wish to leave the house-to stay with Mrs. Dewey, perhaps. In time, we would have reunited you with your family, someplace safely far from here."

"But you just wouldn't leave," Delora put in, widening her silvery eyes.

"Yes, you turned out to be astonis.h.i.+ngly stubborn," said Doctor Widdecombe pleasantly. "Our plan was to draw the McMartin shades out of their resting places and set them loose in the house, which we successfully did. And still, even with your house full of those hateful things, you refused to depart." Doctor Widdecombe gave an aggravated little shake of his head. "We were discussing our next move-something that wouldn't require the destruction or weakening of the house itself, of course-when we were interrupted by tonight's intrusions. And here we are." Doctor Widdecombe smiled down at the two of them, joggling gently on his feet.

Rutherford had been staring, slack-jawed, at the professor. His mouth slammed shut with an audible click. "It was you?" he asked. "An expert on magical history, and an academically honored author?" His voice grew louder and faster. "You deceived us!" he shouted. "Olive, my grandmother; all of us!" He stepped closer to Doctor Widdecombe, his eyes coming in line with the professor's straining coat b.u.t.tons. "Why couldn't I tell that you were plotting against us?" he demanded. "I've read your thoughts for days now, and-"

"And learned nothing; yes, I know," said Doctor Widdecombe mildly. "You see, we were well aware that you were a reader long before we arrived on Linden Street. It is not so difficult for accomplished witches like ourselves to control our thoughts while in your vicinity, to avoid eye contact, and so forth. I did dislike deceiving you," he went on, sounding almost apologetic. "You are a talented boy. Don't let this failure discourage you."

Rutherford looked as though he might explode.

"But why?" Olive asked, moving to Rutherford's side. "Why did you do this?" She glanced back at her parents' faces, still fast asleep in the flickering lamplight. "Are you working for Annabelle?"

"Goodness, no," said Delora.

"We would like to be rid of her as much as you would, Olive." Doctor Widdecombe brought his face closer to Olive's, like an instructor explaining a particularly important fact. He smiled a glinting, hungry smile. "It's because of your house, Olive."

"My house," Olive echoed.

"The simple truth is, it should not be your house," Doctor Widdecombe said gently. The oil lamp flared, edging his huge body with ripples of darkness. "And it isn't your house. It requires-no, it deserves a great magician to inhabit it, to make use of its treasures, its legacy, its wealth of knowledge. It deserves a worthy heir. And you, Olive, as I have said from the start, are simply an ordinary little girl." Doctor Widdecombe placed one heavy hand on Olive's shoulder. "But now that you know so much, and remain so stubborn, we have no choice but to get rid of you permanently."

A flood of ice filled Olive's body. She shuddered as the truth sank in: They were stuck in a closet inside an enemy's house, blockaded by two powerful witches, with her parents sound asleep just a few feet away. They were trapped.

Rutherford's mind had clearly leaped to the same conclusion. "What about Walter?" he asked, stalling. "Did he fool me with his thoughts too? Or didn't he know anything about this?"

Doctor Widdecombe and Delora exchanged a bemused smile.

"Walter knows nothing at all," said Doctor Widdecombe.

"I have been burdened with him since my sister pa.s.sed into the dark realm," said Delora. "She was as much a simpleton as Walter, but I promised to teach him all I could." Delora gave a lofty sigh. "However, there are some who just cannot be taught."

"Walter was merely supposed to keep an eye on you," Doctor Widdecombe added. "His task was to report back to us about your doings, nothing more."

Olive frowned. "If he wasn't working with you, then why did he try to sneak into my house? Who was he going to steal the McMartins' things for? Why-"

"That's enough," said Doctor Widdecombe, brus.h.i.+ng her words away with a wave of his hand. "As much as I enjoy teaching the young, there comes a time for words to end and for actions to take their place. Hold still, Olive," he continued, tugging a silk handkerchief out of his pocket. His other hand tightened its grip on her shoulder. "This first part is completely painless."

He cupped the handkerchief in his palm. Olive jerked backward, but Doctor Widdecombe's hand on her shoulder was too heavy and too strong. She watched the handkerchief coming closer, about to cover her nose and mouth, and she caught the faintest whiff of something bitter rising from the fabric.

But before he could clamp the cloth over Olive's face, a change came over Doctor Widdecombe. The same change came over Delora, who was still hovering in the flickering hallway just behind him. Simultaneously, they stiffened, their faces going perfectly blank, as if they'd been listening to a long and detailed lecture on the merits of unwaxed dental floss. Their bodies rocked slowly backward. Then, like two mismatched dominoes, they toppled over, revealing Walter standing in the hallway behind them, his empty hands still raised in their direction.

Their bodies. .h.i.t the floor with a resounding crash. The lamp that Delora had been clutching shattered on the floorboards, its oil spattering from the broken gla.s.s base, its flames shooting upward and outward into a roaring fountain of fire.

21.

WALTER WAVERED AT the edge of the burning puddle, looking too stunned to move.

"We need to stifle the fire!" Rutherford shouted. "Hurry!"

Olive lunged back into the closet, grabbing a heavy wool coat from its hanger. She flew back through the door, tossing the outspread cloth over the flame, and Rutherford stomped on it with both slippered feet.

Almost as quickly as it had begun, the fire was out. Darkness filled the hallway once again, except for the beam of Rutherford's flashlight, which was now focused on Walter's face.

"Mmm . . . sorry . . ." said Walter, s.h.i.+fting awkwardly on his skinny legs. "I didn't think about the lamp."

"Are they dead?" Olive nudged the scorched coat aside to look at Doctor Widdecombe and Delora. The fire had begun to singe Delora's flowing black skirts, but her face was still completely blank.

"Mmm . . . no. They're just frozen. I think."

"How did you do that?" Rutherford asked. He stared at Walter's empty hands. "You can perform spontaneous spell-casting?"

"I don't know," said Walter. "I didn't know I could."

"What's spontaneous spell-casting?" Olive turned to Rutherford.

"It's magic performed without the use of herbs or symbols or tools of any kind," Rutherford explained. From the way his flashlight beam began to bounce in the smoky air, Olive knew that he was jiggling very excitedly. "Only force of will, concentration of powers, and occasional words are required. It takes a highly gifted witch to do it."

Olive remembered Annabelle McMartin's hand flicking through the stormy air above the painted lake, lifting the spectacles from Olive's neck, tossing a ball of fire that exploded against Lucinda Nivens's chest. "I've seen Annabelle do it," she murmured.

"I'm not working for her. I swear," Walter rumbled. "I knew something was wrong. Two days ago, I found your parents in here. I thought-if I had a spellbook, I might find a way to get rid of the shades. Or I could stop Aunt Delora and Doctor Uncle-I mean Uncle Doctor-I mean-"

"But you were looking for the grimoire long before that," said Olive, a sliver of suspicion still p.r.i.c.kling her mind. "And I saw you in the garden, looking for ingredients."

Walter's Adam's apple bobbed. "I wanted to make them proud. Before I knew." He looked down at the silent figures of his aunt and uncle. "And I guess I didn't need ingredients anyway."

"No," said Olive, gazing at Doctor Widdecome. His broad belly rose and fell peacefully. "I guess you didn't."

"Fascinating," Rutherford breathed.

"So, can you wiggle your fingers or something and wake my parents?" Olive asked.

Walter's eyes widened. "Mmm . . ." he rumbled. "I'm not sure. This was the first time it worked." He held up his hands, aiming them shakily at the back of the closet. "I'll try. But it might freeze them instead . . ."

"Never mind," said Rutherford quickly. "There's somebody else who'll know exactly what to do."

As it happened, Mrs. Dewey owned a rolling cart, which she kept on her patio to wheel potted plants in and out of the sun. This made moving four inert bodies from the Nivenses' house to the Deweys' considerably easier. However, it still took the collected efforts of Olive, Rutherford, Mrs. Dewey, and Walter to squish the heap that was Doctor Widdecombe onto the cart and out through the back door.

The hard work didn't bother Olive one bit. Relief and joy surrounded her like a warm, fuzzy blanket. She felt herself beginning to relax, to cuddle down into the comfort of it . . . and still, something kept tugging at the blanket's edge, uncovering her toes to the cold.

Once everyone was arranged in Mrs. Dewey's kitchen, the Dunwoodys propped comfortably in chairs, and Doctor Widdecombe and Delora plopped uncomfortably in a corner of the floor, Mrs. Dewey and Rutherford sprang into action, grinding tiny star-shaped seeds into powder, measuring cups of sugar and something equally pale and sparkly that wasn't sugar, and heating water in the big bra.s.s teapot. Olive stood between her parents, not wanting to take her hands off of their sleeping shoulders. A persistent, chilly wrongness p.r.i.c.kled at the back of her neck.

"Well, I am absolutely livid," said Mrs. Dewey, pounding some small silvery pods with a meat-tenderizing hammer. "I know Byron and Delora can be arrogant at times, but I had no idea that they were so greedy, so short-sighted, and so monstrous as to do a thing like this. I am so sorry, Olive," she went on, with a wham that sent one pod flying toward Mr. Dunwoody's nose. It bounced off one nostril and landed in his lap. Mr. Dunwoody didn't move.

"I would never have brought them here if I had suspected . . ." Mrs. Dewey gave the pods another wham. "If it wouldn't be setting a bad example for the three of you, I would be burying them in the garden manure right now."

"Mmm . . . What are you going to do with them?" Walter asked, from his spot beside the warm stove.

"We could put them Elsewhere," said Rutherford.

"No," said Olive.