The Books of Elsewhere, Vol. 1: The Shadows Page 10

  Her hands shook. A funny feeling, like static electricity, ran down her back and pooled in her stomach. Olive scrambled on her hands and knees along the wall, looking at the stones, and finally wedged herself behind the corner of the washing machine. Yes, there were more carvings in this corner. Jagged loops and swirls that might once have been letters arced above a tiny willow tree, half of its boughs worn away by time. On the intersecting wall, Olive found another letter M. This one was attached to a small c. The rest of the word was erased completely, but Olive knew what it must have said. Below the M and the c was a number: 17-something. Olive couldn’t make it out. The next digit might have been a 3 or an 8, but she couldn’t be sure.

  With the flashlight clamped between her jaw and her shoulder, Olive sidled to her left, away from the washer and dryer, toward the largest, emptiest part of the basement. She ran her hands desperately along the wall, brushing away cobwebs and flakes of stale plaster and paint. Halfway along, she found another marking cut into the stone. This one seemed less worn, perhaps because it had been partly covered. Olive scratched away the last bits of dirt and paint. Here Lies Alfred McMartin, said the carving. Memento Mori. 1623.

  Olive stopped breathing. These were gravestones. And if they were gravestones . . . where were the graves?

  The back of her neck began to prickle. She turned slowly to her left and looked over her shoulder. Two glowing green eyes stared back.

  She tilted the flashlight. The outline of a huge black cat, just inches away, glinted in its beam.

  “Leopold?” she whispered.

  The cat didn’t answer.

  “Leopold,” said Olive as another prickly wave raced up her neck and into her scalp, “how old is this house?”

  The black outline that was Leopold made a low growling sound. “I can’t tell you that, miss.”

  “Leopold . . .” Olive whispered, not sure that she wanted to ask the next question, “. . . how old are you?”

  The cat said nothing. His green eyes didn’t blink. Olive’s words wavered, unanswered, in the cold air.

  The warning from Morton’s neighbors spilled through Olive’s mind like a river of ink, dying everything a new color. She had been fooled. Tricked. Manipulated by three furry demons guarding a house built on gravestones. And here she was, alone with them. For the whole night.

  Olive thundered up the basement stairs so fast that she fell forward and climbed half the flight on all fours. Between her scrambling feet, she caught a last glimpse of Leopold’s glowing eyes, still watching her from the dark corner.

  15

  OLIVE SLAMMED THE basement door behind her and skidded along the hallway, whooshing around the banister at the bottom of the staircase. “Annabelle!” she shouted, even though she knew Annabelle probably couldn’t hear her. “Annabelle!” Olive pounded up the steps, wishing her legs were long enough to take them two at a time. There were no cats to be seen in the upstairs hall, but Olive turned on every light anyway, telling herself that tonight she wasn’t going to worry about wasting electricity. She would leave every light in the whole house burning if she felt like it.

  The violet room was dim and silent. A bit of sunlight, fading behind the thick trees, slipped in through the lace curtains. Olive flipped on the lights and managed to put on the spectacles, in spite of her shaking hands.

  In the portrait above the dresser, Annabelle stirred with surprise, hurriedly wiping something away from her cheek.

  “Annabelle?” panted Olive. “Can I come in? It’s kind of an emergency.”

  “Of course, Olive,” said Annabelle. “It’s been weeks since I’ve seen you. I’ve been hoping you would come.”

  Before Annabelle finished speaking, Olive had scrambled up onto the dresser and landed on the pillowy couch inside the portrait.

  Annabelle sat at the tea table, dabbing at her eyes with a piece of lace that looked much more decorative than absorbent. “Would you care for a cup of tea?” she asked.

  “No, thank you,” said Olive. “Annabelle, I have to ask you something. But it might sound . . . weird.”

  Annabelle’s eyebrows went up in concern. “You may ask me anything, Olive.”

  “Well,” said Olive, tugging at a purple tassel in the mound of pillows, “you know about this house. So maybe you know about . . . the cats?”

  Annabelle tilted her head the tiniest bit. “The cats,” she said slowly. “Yes.”

  “The people in one of the paintings told me that the cats are . . . that the cats”—Olive swallowed hard—“that the cats are witches’ familiars. That they’re evil.

  That they’re trying to get rid of my family because they want to get the house back for somebody who used to own it. And it has something to do with the basement. Because . . . because there are gravestones in the basement. Really, really old gravestones.” Olive clutched the tasseled pillow to her chest like a shield. “And my parents are going to be gone for the whole night, and I don’t like Mrs. Nivens, and I don’t know anybody else, and I’m scared.”

  Annabelle closed her eyes. Olive watched her closely, holding her breath. Any second now, Annabelle would open her eyes and look down at Olive with a mix of pity and disappointment, and she would say, “Olive, I’m afraid you’ve lost your mind. Now, why don’t you toddle on down to the closest mental hospital?”

  Annabelle opened her eyes. She looked down at Olive. Her eyes weren’t full of pity or disappointment. They were circles of honey-colored paint. “Olive,” she said, “I’m afraid that what you’ve heard is true. Those cats are, quite frankly, dangerous. But you can stay with me. You can stay with me just as long as you want to.”

  Olive felt so relieved, she thought she might cry. “Thank you,” she whispered.

  Annabelle reached out and patted Olive’s hand. Olive tried not to shudder at the chill of Annabelle’s skin. “Sometimes it’s hard to know whom to trust,” Annabelle said softly. “And heaven knows we all make mistakes.” Here Annabelle made a dainty choking sound and pressed her fingertips to her mouth.

  “Annabelle, are you—crying?” Olive asked hesitantly, knowing that many people didn’t like to admit it if they were.

  Annabelle sighed. “Oh, I’ve been having a bit of a weep, yes. But I’m just being silly.” Then she buried her face very suddenly in her handkerchief.

  “What’s wrong?” asked Olive, who thought that grown-ups hardly ever cried—except when they dropped things on their toes, of course, like her father had when they tried to haul the oak hutch up the staircase.

  “Oh,” Annabelle sniffled, “I’m just remembering something. Something my grandfather gave me a long, long time ago, and I lost it. He would be so disappointed in me if he knew.”

  “Well, where did you last see it?” Olive asked. This was what Mr. and Mrs. Dunwoody asked Olive every time she lost something important. In the single summer when Olive had worn a retainer, she found it in the freezer, in one of her slippers, under the bathroom sink, and in the basket at the bottom of the laundry chute, on four separate occasions.

  “It was so long ago,” said Annabelle. “I don’t know how I could have lost it. It was the loveliest thing I’d ever been given. And—it’s funny—but I have the feeling that it is still in this house somewhere.”

  “What was it?” asked Olive, who was already getting a strange sinking feeling in the bottom of her stomach.

  “It was a necklace,” said Annabelle. “A beautiful gold necklace with a filigree pendant. Grandfather had it made especially for me.”

  Olive swallowed hard. She could feel the necklace thunking heavily against her chest, inside her shirt. Somehow, she didn’t want to tell Annabelle that she had it. Annabelle might be angry that Olive had put the necklace on in the first place. And Horatio had warned her to keep it hidden—although, of course, she couldn’t trust Horatio anymore. Whatever the reason, a little niggling warning in her brain kept stuffing the truth back into its hiding spot. “Maybe if you take a look around, you’ll remember the last pla
ce you had it.”

  “Maybe,” said Annabelle slowly, “but that would mean getting out of this portrait.”

  “Can you do that?”

  “I can if you let me,” said Annabelle, giving Olive a sharp look. “Someone has to let me out. Just like you did with the dog.”

  “You know about that?” asked Olive.

  Annabelle blinked, hesitating for a split second.

  Then she said, “I could hear the commotion all the way up here.”

  “But I didn’t want the dog to come out. He was chasing one of the cats.”

  Annabelle’s eyes glowed. “Yes, a cat. But you untied the dog. You set him free.” She looked at Olive closely, her eyes like two gold candle flames. “I helped you, and now you can help me. Isn’t that what friends do? Will you set me free, Olive?”

  Annabelle held out her hand. Olive took it. It was very smooth and pale, and very, very cold.

  Annabelle stood up. She smiled. “I haven’t left this room in seventy years,” she said. She climbed onto the couch and sat, sidesaddle, on the picture frame, still holding Olive’s hand. Then she swung her legs gracefully through. Olive hurried after her.

  16

  IT FELT FUNNY, walking through the house with a person who hadn’t been there at all—not really—just a few minutes before. Olive glanced up at the young woman next to her, with her carefully combed brown hair and pearls and long gauzy skirts. She felt as though a princess in one of her fairy tale books had climbed out and was waiting to be shown around the house. Except, of course, that Annabelle knew her way around.

  At every doorway, at every picture and piece of furniture, Annabelle paused. “It is so good to move around this house again,” she said. “I have missed it so much. My house. My old home.”

  My house, thought Olive, but she didn’t say this out loud. It was so good to have company, she didn’t want to start an argument.

  In front of the painting of the forest path, Annabelle stood looking for so long, smiling and not saying anything, that Olive began to get anxious. Then Annabelle shook her head, as if she was clearing a thought away. “I’m sure we’ll find my necklace,” she said. “I can tell that it’s nearby.”

  After they had walked all around the upstairs, Olive led Annabelle toward the first floor, but they never made it. Annabelle stopped with a gasp halfway down the stairs.

  “There,” she whispered. “There—I remember that place. That is where I left it.”

  Olive looked back. Annabelle was pointing at the painting of the silver lake—to the very spot where Olive had first seen the necklace. Olive could feel her heart starting to pound against her rib cage. Part of her wanted to pull out the necklace, offer it to Annabelle . . . but another part of her said no. It said no very, very loudly. And what had Horatio told her? That she shouldn’t show the necklace to anyone. Besides, she couldn’t take the necklace off. What would Annabelle do if she realized that her precious lost present was stuck around Olive’s neck?

  “Put on the spectacles, Olive,” said Annabelle. Olive’s hands obeyed, even though Olive’s head didn’t want to. Annabelle took Olive’s hand, and again Olive noticed the icy cold of Annabelle’s touch. With Annabelle leading the way, they climbed into the picture of the silvery lake.

  Annabelle headed toward the water, her tiny pointed boots making sharp prints in the sand. Olive stumbled behind her. The ripples in the lake seemed to get rougher, wilder, as they approached.

  Annabelle stopped at the shore. She glanced up and down the beach, where the lake had scattered small red and black stones, and looked into the water. “I think it is a few feet farther out in the water,” she said to Olive without turning. “There is an old rowboat in the reeds over there. Get it.”

  Olive looked where Annabelle was pointing. To her surprise, there was a weathered wooden rowboat half covered by the waving reeds. She hadn’t noticed it before. Olive dragged the boat along in the shallow water until it stood in front of Annabelle. Annabelle climbed in first, taking up the oar, and Olive climbed in after her.

  Annabelle began to row. For a delicate-looking woman, she rowed powerfully.

  “Do you see anything?” asked Olive, peering out into the water.

  “Not yet,” said Annabelle.

  They were quickly beyond the shallows, but Annabelle kept rowing. Soon they were ten feet, twenty feet, fifty feet from the shore.

  “I can’t see the bottom anymore,” said Olive nervously. “Do you think the necklace is out this far?”

  This time Annabelle didn’t answer. She rowed farther into center of the lake. Here the water no longer looked silver, but black, and the evening sky above looked cold and distant.

  “Would you like me to take a turn rowing?” offered Olive, trying to keep the tremble out of her voice.

  “I don’t think so,” said Annabelle. Then, as Olive watched, Annabelle hurled the wooden oar far out into the water. The waves were choppy now, and the oar bobbed and flickered in the ridges, moving farther and farther away.

  “You see, I know where the necklace is,” Annabelle said softly, giving Olive the tiniest of smiles. “I knew even before you let me out of my portrait.”

  “You did?” Olive gulped.

  “Yes. I’ve been watching you. You’ve been in and out of paintings all over this house. Sometimes you’ve only gotten in the way—like when you took that little boy back out of the forest. But other times you’ve done just as we wished, like setting the dog loose. And letting me out.” Annabelle leaned closer to Olive. Her voice was low. “And I know something else. I know that you can’t take the necklace off now that you’ve put it on. That’s how it works. You will wear it until you die.”

  “Until you die?” Olive whispered.

  “Not me,” Annabelle said. “I’ve already died. You.”

  Annabelle stood up. The boat rocked crazily. The waves plunged and rose. And then Olive saw something she had seen twice before—a thick, black shadow, pouring across the sky like oil, turning everything beneath it cold and dark.

  Annabelle raised a hand. Between the rowboat and the shore, a path of smooth black stones appeared on the water. Annabelle stepped out onto the path, making her way gracefully toward the land. The stones dissolved into the water behind her.

  She glanced back once at Olive, who was clinging to the side of the boat in the roiling black water. “Good-bye, Olive,” she said. “Someone should have told you not to take things that don’t belong to you. Speaking of which . . .” Annabelle made a sign in the air. Olive felt a wind as strong as a fist hit her rib cage. It ripped the spectacles from around her neck, carried them through the air, and dropped them into Annabelle’s waiting hand. Then Annabelle walked to the end of the path, onto the shore, and into the darkness.

  A large wave lifted the rickety little boat. For a second the boat hovered there on the crest of the wave, and Olive had the chance to look around at the shining, splashing darkness. Then the boat plunged back down the wave’s other side, dragging Olive—and, a second later, Olive’s stomach—with it.

  She hung on to the slippery wood with both hands. “Help!” she yelled to nobody at all. “Help me!”

  A flood of cold water splashed over the low sides, leaving Olive drenched. The wind was growing stronger, the waves were getting higher, and Olive was quite sure that she was screaming, even though she couldn’t hear her own voice.

  Another wave pummeled the boat’s side. Olive braced herself against the boat’s low walls, trying to balance it with her weight, but when the next huge wave crashed into the boat, Olive was tossed out of it like one noodle slipping out of a spoon and landing back in a huge bowl of soup.

  For a few seconds everything was black. Black, and cold, and wet. Olive realized that she was beneath the murky water of the lake, but with the darkness solid as marble on every side, she had no idea which way was up. Even with her eyes wide open, she couldn’t see a thing. This was probably for the best, Olive decided—she didn’t want to know jus
t what else might be swimming beneath her in the black water of the lake.

  Her lungs were already starting to ache. Olive made her body go limp, hoping she would float to the surface like a bubble. Sure enough, she felt herself being pulled very slowly in one direction. Olive kicked her legs, paddling wildly, her lungs threatening to burst—and then she was breaking through the surface, taking in huge gulps of air.

  The lake was still rocking like an overcrowded trampoline. Olive, struggling to keep her head above the water, was hoisted and dropped by rows of waves. She squinted through the darkness. There—in the distance—she could see a small square of light, where the picture frame held a lamplit view of the stairs.

  Olive began to paddle toward it, holding her breath whenever the waves crashed over her head. Once or twice, she swallowed a mouthful of lake water. It was mucky and oily, and tasted like molding leaves. The frigid water was turning her feet numb. She was exhausted; her arms and shoulders ached, but the little square of light was coming closer.

  A towering wave smacked her like a swatter landing on a housefly. The force of it pushed her down under the surface, but this time, Olive felt her feet touch the rocks at the bottom of the lake. She gave a strong push with both legs. Soon she was paddling, then crawling, onto the wet sand of the shore.

  Olive knelt there for a moment, panting and gasping. Then she took off at a run for the picture frame.

  “Somebody!” Olive yelled. “Anybody! Help me!” The shadows in the sky pulsed and thundered above her. Olive could hear the darkness roaring all around; she could feel it, grasping at her arms and legs, trying to pull her back. Olive glanced down at the shadows sweeping around her body. Was she imagining it, or were her feet changing color? Yes—they looked grayer, and different, somehow. They were streakier. Shinier. They looked like they had been made of paint.