Adventures of a Cat-Whiskered Girl (5 page)

"Let's be getting back to the madhouse," Professor Tag said. "I need to change out of this hot dress and then check myself out."

"You're going to leave the hospital?" Molly asked.

"Yes, I will cut short my stay, pleasant as it has been," the professor said. "I have some research to do in the library."

"About Spookhuizen?" I asked.

"Yes. I want to know who Alexandra Van Dood was."

"
Was?
Don't you mean
is?
"

"I mean
was.
Don't you know a ghost when you talk to one?"

We walked back along the same road to the nuthatch. As we walked a little way behind the professor, who was hurrying, Molly and I conversed.

"Let me ask you a question. Do you feel at home here?"

"Here? You mean in Poughkeepsie?"

"I mean on our version of Planet Earth. Do you feel at home here?"

"I suppose I do ... Anyway, I feel as at home as..."

"As you did on the other version of the planet, or plane of existence, from which you came?"

"Yes."

"And let me ask you another question. Did you feel at home there, as though you belonged?"

I thought. "No, I guess not. Not ever. Not for a minute."

"Felt alien?"

"Yes."

"Alien there, and alien here?"

"That is not to say I don't like it here ... and there—and I love my uncle, Father Palabra. Just that I never felt..."

"At home?" Molly said. "By the way, did you know many cat-whiskered people in your home world?"

"Well, it's not all that common, but of course people have them."

"Know any personally?"

"I didn't go to a school, or have a whole lot of friends. Uncle Father Palabra educated me at home."

"Ever see anyone on the bus, or in a store downtown—anything like that?"

"No, now that you mention it..."

"Interesting."

It was interesting. Had I just assumed cat whiskers were a normal occurrence? Molly had a way of bringing up things that made me wonder why I had never thought about them before.

"Did you have a nice visit with Professor Tag at the laughing academy, dear?" Mrs. Gleybner asked me.

"He's checking himself out," I said.

"So soon? Usually he stays in until the end of the semester," Mrs. Gleybner said.

"He wants to do some research."

"Such a nice man," Mrs. Gleybner said. "We're thinking of ordering chicken chow mein, Chinese string beans, and egg drop soup. Does that sound all right to you?"

I told the Gleybners about visiting Spookhuizen with Molly and Professor Tag. I was sure they would be interested, but for some reason it didn't seem to make much of an impression. I think they were more
concerned with things in books, as distinct from things in real life. I thought probably when the professor found stuff out in his research, if he wrote about it, then they'd be all excited. It may be that so many people came into the shop every week, making so many claims that turned out to be empty, that they just tuned out any firsthand mention of UFOs or similar things. It was even possible that they didn't actually believe in flying saucers and didn't know they didn't. They politely listened when I told them we'd heard that flying saucers had been seen landing behind the old stone barn, and then asked questions about Molly, and whether she was a nice girl, and were they helping her get over being insane at the psychiatric place. They said I could invite her to supper sometime.

I thought a lot about Molly and the professor over the next couple of days. I was thinking I would go back to the loony bin the next Sunday and visit Molly—when she turned up in the store!

"Molly! What are you doing here? Did you take the streetcar from the institution?"

"I lit out, Audrey. I couldn't stand it there anymore. They serve shepherd's pie three times a week."

"Ick. Sounds disgusting. What is it?"

"You don't want to know."

"So, does your family know you graduated yourself from crazy college?"

"Get a hint, Audrey. My family is supernatural. They don't know where I am half the time, and I don't know where they are."

"They're supernatural?"

"Mostly."

"Who or what are they?"

"They're little weird people who live deep in the Catskill Mountains, bowling and brewing gin. They're almost never seen, and they dress like the seven dwarves."

"What, Molly? You're one of those Catskill Mountain elves? The ones sometimes said to be the ghostly crew of the
Half Moon?
The ones who played ninepins with Rip Van Winkle? Funny, you don't look elfish."

"Well, the men are pretty ugly, but we females are nice," Molly said.

"So you're not going back to the Catskills?"

"If I did, and if I could find my family, I'd spend my days crushing juniper berries or herding goats or something. They're completely old fashioned."

"So what are you going to do?"

"I thought I'd hang out with you for a while. I could sleep on the floor."

"The Gleybners have already suggested you come to supper. They're nice. I don't imagine they would object. Tell them you're an elf and they'll insist you stay."

"Not an elf exactly. More of a dwerg or a fee—anyway, something along those lines. By the way, this is Wednesday."

"So it is. What about it?"

"Don't you want to hike up to Spookhuizen tonight and see if any flying saucers land?"

"Oh, I hadn't thought about that! Sure. Let me tell Mrs. Gleybner you're staying to supper, and we can start out right after. It's chicken with peanuts and hot peppers tonight."

"Yum!"

Supper was just as I thought it would be. The Gleybners were crazy about Molly. The only way they could have liked her more would have been if she told them she was an extraterrestrial alien. But being a Catskill Mountain dwerg, which turns out to be Dutch for "leprechaun," was almost as good. The funny thing was, once they got done saying ooh and aah, and how exciting it was that Molly was descended from the little guys in the story about Rip Van Winkle, they treated her like an ordinary kid, one they liked and were interested in—which was nice. I could tell Molly enjoyed being with the Gleybners. I asked if it would be all right if Molly stayed with me for a little while.

"I can sleep on the floor," Molly said.

"No need for that," Mr. Gleybner said. "We have a perfectly nice folding cot in the closet. I'll just wheel it into your room after supper."

"We're going up to Spookhuizen tonight to see if any flying saucers land," I said.

"Don't get abducted. And take sweaters," Mrs. Gleybner said.

Even though Molly was little, with little short legs, she was a fast walker. I had to stretch to keep up with her.

"I wonder if we'll see flying saucers," I said.

"I hope so," Molly said. "I'm also interested in seeing your reaction to them if we do."

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"Oh, just what you think about them," Molly said. "You're an unusual person."

The apple fritter place was closed and dark, but the main door of the old stone barn was open, and we went in. The bats were awake and flitting around; we could hear their wings rustling. We hurried through and emerged in back with a lot of bats flying over our heads. The moon was already up, and it made the beech trees appear a hundred times spookier; also the roof of the old mansion shone silvery in the moonlight. The place was completely silent, and we breathed quietly and didn't even whisper.

I felt a little scared. It was a perfect setting for a ghost, and I was half expecting to see Alexandra Van Dood, but she never appeared. Molly and I stood in the shadow of the eaves of the old stone barn and watched and waited.

We didn't have to wait long. It was a clear night, and every one of the millions and millions of stars shone brightly. A shooting star flitted this way or that every few minutes. And some of the stars seemed to pulsate or throb ... and there were some that seemed fuzzy, or blurry, bigger than the other stars, and maybe not so bright. Some of these fuzzy stars moved, but they didn't flit or streak like meteors. After a while, I realized they were moving toward us—and they were not stars but fuzzy places in the sky.

Molly poked me. I poked back. The fuzzy lights were definitely closer, bigger, and they were moving slowly and gracefully across the sky.

And closer. And closer. And showing beautiful colors that changed. And closer.

I had sort of expected machines, metal machines, maybe making machine sorts of noises, maybe clanking, maybe whirring, maybe shooting fire like rockets, maybe with electric lights flashing on and off. It wasn't like that. They were quiet, almost silent—but I could hear them, or feel them. And instead of being
things made of metal, solid things, they seemed to be ... Well, I can't say what they seemed to be. Soft: I knew they were soft. And they were warm. And they made me feel ... content, and happy, and almost a little sleepy in a pleasant way.

Throbbing, vibrating, thrumming, I could feel it in my bones. And the saucers, more like gigantic fuzzballs, were really close. The whole place was lit up bright as day—only it wasn't bright, it was the softest kind of light. I'd say it was pink, but that is just as close as I can come to describing the color—it was no color I had ever seen. I could hardly take my eyes off the saucers, but I made myself glance at Molly. Her mouth was hanging open and her eyes were staring—just like mine. She looked stunned—happy but stunned. By this time I was experiencing the flying saucer fuzzballs as if they were music. And perfume: an amazing scent, it was like nothing I'd ever smelled—the closest I can describe is pineapple with a hint of mint or maybe catnip. It made me dizzy. And there was a taste in my mouth like the best cookies anyone ever ate, or never ate. It was also like taking a bubble bath.

And that was when they were still a couple hundred feet above us.

By the time they were at the level of the treetops, we were so full of bliss, we were probably drooling.
Also giggling. The fuzzballs bounced around, whirling and zigzagging—it was comical somehow. They were putting on a show for us.

I noticed there were lights flickering in the windows of Spookhuizen. The flying fuzzers bowled down the avenue of beech trees, bounced a couple of times, and settled onto the roof of the house. Then they either sank or extinguished, going out like matches. And it was over. They were gone.

"Wow! That was not what I expected," I said to Molly when I got my voice back. "I loved it! I love the saucers!"

"Did they go inside the house?" Molly asked.

"It sort of looked like it," I said. "But I'm not sure."

There was the house, dark and silent and deadlooking in the moonlight again.

"Do you want to wait around in case they come back?" Molly asked.

"I'm not sure I could stand it if they came back," I said. "I might flip my wig—no offense."

"None taken."

We made our way back through the dark barn. The lights were on in the lunchroom, and we could see the enormously fat Clarinda Quackenboss through the windows, bustling around. We went in. The place
was empty except for a couple of orange cats before which Clarinda was in the act of placing saucers.

"Ah, it's those girls!" Clarinda said. "You want apple fritters?"

"We just noticed your lights on," I said. "That was quite a show the saucers put on out back."

"Was it? I didn't notice. Too busy getting things ready," Clarinda Quackenboss said. "I open up on Wednesday nights in case the extraterrestrial aliens want fritters."

"Have any come in so far?" Molly asked.

"I was hoping for a big crowd, but all that's come in tonight are these two." She jerked her thumb at the cats. "You want some more milk with apple fritters crumbled in, kitties? No?"

The cats strolled out through the open door.

"How about you, girls?" Clarinda asked. "Apple fritters?"

"We filled up on Chinese food," I said. "Thanks anyway."