Escape to the World's Fair (10 page)

S
EARCHING FOR THE TEMPLE OF PROMISES

F
rances swore the Louisiana Purchase Monument was as tall as any building on Broadway. It was this
thing
with stone cherubs all over it, and wreaths, and eagles, and a statue of Thomas Jefferson, and there was a big shiny globe with a statue of a cheering fellow perched on top like a trophy. It was the first grand sight of the Fair when one walked in through the front gates. Or that's what Frances thought at first, until she saw the shining water of the Grand Basin, and then the giant domed palace across the water.

I don't know what to look at first!
she thought. The others walked next to her silently, and Frances could tell they were as awestruck as she was.

“What's the lou-weezy . . . the Louisiana Purchase?” Harold asked.

“It's the . . . it's . . .” Frances was so distracted by the splendor all around them that she had to scrunch her eyes shut to remember what she'd learned in school. “It's when Thomas Jefferson bought the Louisiana Territory from France. It's the hundred-year anniversary!”

Harold pointed to a sculpture of a woman wearing nothing but some drapes. “Who's that lady? Is she from France?”

“Sure,” Alexander murmured. “Whatever you say.”

Frances had to hold back a laugh. Alexander looked like he was in a trance, he was so transfixed by the scenery. It seemed that in every direction there was a spectacular palace adorned with sculptures and tall columns, and that there were flags flying from every soaring rooftop. . . .

“Wait!” Frances stopped in her tracks and turned around, scanning the skyline for the fake mountain peak. Finally she found it, looking just as it had been a half hour ago.

“The signal flag isn't up,” Jack said. “Don't worry, Miss DeHaven isn't here!”

“I know,” Frances said. “I just don't want to forget to watch for it!” There was so much going on all around them—for example the miniature trains that wound through the fairgrounds, the boats shaped like giant swans gliding around the lagoon—that she knew she could forget plenty of things.

“You know what else we should watch for?” Alexander said. “Food!”

“You're right,” Eli said, looking all around. “Something smells good.”

Frances noticed the stands and wagons that dotted the parkways as well, and her stomach began to growl as she read the painted signs. There were peanuts for sale, and pastries, frankfurter sandwiches, popcorn, waffles, bottles of something called “Dr Pepper,” pecans . . .

“Bananas!” Harold shouted. “They have bananas here!” Harold had never had one before.

Jack, though, seemed anxious. “Look, we can't just spend money all over the place.”

“We've got more than you think,” Alexander said. “Mr. Zogby gave us fifty cents each for admission to the Fair. But he didn't realize that for kids, it's only
twenty-five
cents to get in! So we have some left over.”

“Oh! Well, in that case,” Frances said, trying her hardest to sound stern and sensible. “Harold, you may have a banana. It's good for you. And maybe I'll have a small bite of something as well.”

• • •

“Mrrpfhuff?” Frances said a few minutes later. Her mouth was stuffed so full of honey corn that she couldn't even talk. Jack thought she looked like a squirrel hoarding nuts.

“I
said,
can I see the note that Zogby wrote in your book?” Jack repeated.

“Urff,” Frances mumbled, nodding, and stopped to fish her
Third Eclectic Reader
out of her pocket.

They were wandering aimlessly around the lagoon bridges with their hands and pockets stuffed with popped corn and pastries. Jack had too much on his mind to enjoy the food, though. He was trying to remember everything he could about the man that Zogby had told them to find.
Moses McGee, at the Temple of Promises.

Frances handed Jack her book, and he turned to the flyleaf corner to stare at the name Zogby had written in a quick, flourishing script:
Mr. C. McGee.

“What I don't get is why he wrote
C.
McGee,” Jack said, “when a moment later he said the fellow's name was
Moses
.”

“Never mind his name,” Alexander said. “We just have to find the Temple of Promises, right?”

“Right,” Jack said. They'd already asked the banana peddler and the fellow at the popcorn cart about the place, but they'd never heard of it.

“Maybe there's only palaces in this part of the Fair,” Eli suggested. “And there's another section with temples.” So far, every building they'd seen was a
palace
of some kind—they were just now walking past an enormous place called the Palace of Varied Industries, and across the way was a Palace of Machinery.

“Well, we'll find it,” Jack muttered. As far as he was concerned, the sooner they found Mr. McGee, the better. Then they'd have the reward money. And then—Jack wouldn't say this to anyone, of course—then Jack could go. He'd go back to New York, and of course he'd wonder about them, Eli and Alexander and Frances and Harold, but they'd be better off without him, and if he left them the reward money, that would also help, wouldn't it? They could go to California.

“I found this!” Harold cried, handing Jack a slightly crumpled booklet. “It was under that bench. It has a map!”

Daily Official Program,
the booklet's cover said. Jack turned to the map page, and Alexander and Frances peered over his shoulder.

“There have to be a hundred buildings here at least,” Alexander said. “And some of them aren't even listed on the map.”

“Wait!” Frances said, “Down here!” She pointed to the list of buildings at the bottom of the page. “It says Temple
 . . .
Temple of something.”

Jack squinted down at the type. “It says ‘Temple of Mirth'!”

They all looked up from the map and then at one another.

Eli shrugged. “That's the closest we've gotten so far. Let's go!”

• • •

The Temple of Mirth was along a long avenue labeled
THE
PIKE
on the map.

Frances could tell right away that The Pike was different from the rest of the Fair, with its grand plazas and stately places. The crowd was more boisterous, the signs gaudier:
NICKELODEON
and
BEER
GARDEN
and
DANC
E
HALL
.

“Oh!” she gasped. “These are the amusements! Like the boardwalk at Coney Island!”

“This is really something else,” Eli said, craning his neck to stare at it all.

The whole street looked like it was trying to be fifty different places all at once—a stone fortress, a model of Ancient Rome, a place called “Paris,” and even a ship, all shoved up next to one another. Frances kept her hand on Harold's collar. She knew how anything could distract him, and if he stopped for just a moment in this crowd they could lose track of him.

“Here it is,” Jack called from just a few paces ahead. “The Temple of Mirth!”

Frances felt Harold's shoulders stiffen, the way they did when he was scared.

Over the front entrance of the Temple of Mirth was a giant, sculpted face. A
clown
face—staring like an awful painted mask, with a grinning mouth and weird, arched eyebrows.

“Harold, it's just a fun house,” Frances told him. “You like those.”

“I don't like that clown. His nose has big nostrils.”

“There's nothing to be scared of,” Frances told Harold. Then she turned to listen to Jack and Alexander talking to the bored-looking fellow in the admission booth.

“Could you please tell us where we can find Moses McGee?” Jack asked him.

“Admission is ten cents,” the man muttered.

“But could you just tell us where Mr. McGee is?” Alexander asked. “Is he inside?”

“If he was, you'd still have to pay ten cents.” The bored young man picked at a button on the cuff of his shirt.

“So he's inside?” Jack asked.

“I didn't
say
that,” the bored man replied. But then something caught his eye behind Frances. “Hey!” he yelled. “You can't just run inside, kid!”

Instinctively Frances turned back to check on Harold. He was gone!

“That little redhead kid just ran inside the fun house!” the man snapped. “He has to pay ten cents!”

“Look, I'll go get him,” Frances explained.

The man leaned out of his booth and looked Frances up and down. “You've got a lot of nerve, going around dressed like
that,
” he said.

The last thing Frances wanted to discuss right now was her boys' clothes. “Sir, I'll just go inside and fetch my brother—”

Just then Alexander stepped up alongside her. “How she dresses is none of your business!” he said to the man indignantly.

Now Frances felt even more self-conscious with Alexander coming to her defense. Were her silly
pants
going to cause a scene while Harold was getting himself into trouble inside the fun house? “Never mind!” she muttered, and darted inside.

“And
you
have to pay ten cents. . . .” Frances heard the man call after her.

“Harold!” Frances called. “What are you
doing
?”

After a moment, Alexander joined her, followed by Jack and Eli.

“That's
fifty cents
you all owe me!” the man at the front yelled.

The four of them made their way down a dark corridor until they came to a doorway. Frances started to go in, but suddenly a figure appeared right in front of her and she leapt back. “Yikes!”

But the figure was her own reflection. And behind her, Jack's reflection.

“It's a mirror,” Jack said. “A maze of mirrors!”

They all began to walk slowly through the maze. “Harold!” Frances called again. She spotted him once, though the mirrors made it look like there were
four
Harolds.

“Ow!” Alexander called. “I just bumped into another mirror that I thought was a doorway!”

“I know! This place is making me seasick!” Eli said.

“I'm over here, Frannie,” Harold called. Frances followed his voice until she finally found him near the end of the maze. Then, one by one, the three boys joined them.

“I'm sorry!” Harold cried. “I wanted to get away from the clown!”

“I know, but you're getting us all into trouble!” Frances told him.

“We have to get out of here somehow,” Jack insisted. “We didn't pay admission, and if the Fair guards catch us we'll likely get kicked out of the Fair! Then we'll never find Moses McGee.”

Alexander snapped his fingers. “I think I saw a door out of here! One of the mirrors had a doorknob in it, right at the height where a doorknob should be. It's just a little ways back there. . . . I mean,
I think
. It's hard to tell in a place like this.”

“What if we close our eyes and just feel along the wall?” Jack suggested. “That way our eyes won't trick us.”

“Good idea!” Frances said. “But we have to be fast.” She could hear voices coming from the direction of the entrance (or what she
thought
was the direction of the entrance, at least).

“I'll lead,” Alexander said. He squinted his eyes shut and went step by step sideways down the corridor, keeping his hands along the mirrored wall. Eli followed, then Jack, Harold, and Frances.

“I found the door!” she heard Alexander say, and when she opened her eyes, there it was—a door standing ajar, with daylight coming through!

When Frances made it outside with Harold and the others, they were in a sort of narrow alleyway along the side of the Temple of Mirth.

“Close that door!” Jack said. “Quick, before someone sees!”

But just then Frances felt a hand on her shoulder, and she heard a woman's voice from right behind her.

“It is too late,” the voice said. “I have already seen.”

M
ADAME ZEE

“A
ll of you,” said the woman. “Come with me.
Quick.
”

The woman's face held no expression. She was older and looked stern, with dark hair pulled back tightly and a sharp chin. Her clothes were plain, and she had a badge pinned to her shirtwaist that said
OFFICIAL
CONCESSIONS
—
LOUISIANA
PURCHASE
EXPOSITION
.

She led them to the back end of the alley and then down another back-street that appeared to run behind all the buildings on the Pike.

“What's going on?” Jack asked, but really, he knew: They'd been caught.

“You are in trouble,” the woman said. “So you come with me. You hurry.” Her voice was all business.

We're sunk!
Jack thought. He glanced over at Frances and Alexander and Eli, and could see their faces were grim, too.

They passed street sweepers emptying their sacks of trash and Fair workers taking their breaks. Finally the woman stopped at a door in the back of a small, squat structure and motioned to the children to go inside.

Jack figured she was taking them to some kind of guard post where they'd be questioned. The fellow from the ticket booth at the Temple of Mirth would likely be there, too, and tell the guards what they'd done. Then it would be all over. They'd be ejected from the Fair. Or even taken to the police, who would give them over to Miss DeHaven. . . .

But then the woman pulled aside a curtain, and there were no guards—the room wasn't an office at all. It was some kind of parlor, with Oriental rugs scattered all over the floor. Elaborately patterned tapestries and drapes hung on all sides so that it seemed like they were inside an exotic tent instead of a room.
What is this place?
Jack wondered.

“I'm sorry!” Harold cried suddenly. “It's all my fault! I ran inside the funhouse without paying because I was scared of the clown! And then we were in the maze of mirrors and we wanted to get out!”

“We'll go back to the Temple of Mirth and pay what we owe,” Alexander offered.

The woman shook her head. “They are fools. You owe them nothing.”

“W-what do you mean?” Frances stammered.

“I mean it is no wonder you want to leave the Temple of Mirth!” the woman declared. “No wonder the little boy is frightened of the great big ugly clown face!”

Jack could hear just the faintest trace of an accent in the woman's speech. It wasn't German or Russian or Irish. It sounded a little like the accent of a man who had a pushcart on Jack's street back in New York. The man sold sweet cakes and bottles of rose water, but Jack couldn't remember where he'd come from.

The woman went on. “Who in their right mind wishes to walk in the labyrinth of mirrors? So many mirrors facing each other, such bad luck! No wonder you would wish to leave such a place! Is not a place of
mirth.
Bah!”

“Were . . . were you
helping
us just now?” Jack asked.

“Yes!” cried the woman. “Of course I help you. Every day I walk past that infernal place and see the people come out. They are green in the face. The little children, they are crying from fright. They all waste their ten cents. The man who runs that place, Mr. Fernand, he is a scoundrel!”

At the mention of the name
Mr. Fernand,
Jack saw Frances's eyebrows go up, and Jack knew what he had to ask. “So . . . there's no Mr. McGee there?”

The woman looked at Jack with a curious expression. “There's no Mr. McGee, my child. Not anymore. But you may call me Madame Zee.”

Jack's head started to spin.
No Mr. McGee?
Maybe she thought he was talking about someone else. At any rate, they had reached a dead end here. “Um . . . well, thank you for all your help, Madame Zee. . . .”

“We really appreciate it,” Alexander added. “But we ought to go. We need to—”

“Oh! Do not leave!” Madame Zee said suddenly. “You must stay.” She lowered her voice. “I see how your clothes are. I think you have had some hard times and that you are on your own, yes?”

Eli nodded. But Frances seemed more suspicious. “Why would you help us?” she asked.

Madame Zee sighed and sat down on the parlor couch. “So many people come to me for help. I tell them their fortunes. They always want to find something that they've lost, or someone who is gone.” She looked down at her hands and her voice grew softer. “All I can give them are words. I tell them things that will happen in their lives.”

“You mean, you give them warnings?” Jack asked.

Madame Zee shook her head no. “I do not call them warnings. People don't like those. You give them a warning, they think it will not happen to them. My own son, for instance. He went to work for some bad people. I tell him he will get hurt! But he never listened. . . .” She took a deep breath. “Never mind. I will not speak of sad things now. Anyway. I do not warn people anymore. I simply tell them things I think will happen.”

“And do they really?” Harold asked.

Madame Zee shrugged. “I never know. The people come for their fortunes and then they leave. But you children, I can give you a place to sleep, offer you food, mend your clothes. These are
real
things! And then . . .” She looked right at Jack again. “You remind me of someone I used to know.”

Jack felt self-conscious under her steady gaze. “I do?”

“Yes,” she said, her voice quavering and her eyes starting to fill with tears. “Someone I miss very much.”

Jack didn't know what to do. He noticed Frances had narrowed her eyes the way she did when she didn't quite trust something, and Alexander and Eli wore skeptical looks. Jack had heard about fortune-tellers—they were supposed to be charlatans who couldn't really predict the future. Madame Zee had practically admitted that herself when she said she didn't know if the things she foretold ever really happened! So it was very possible that those tears of hers were just an act.
Right?

He was still considering this when Harold broke away from Frances's side and ran over to the sofa. “My name is Harold and I'm sorry you are sad.” He opened his arms and gave her a big hug. Clearly
he
believed Madame Zee.

Madame Zee wiped her tears and smiled. “Thank you, young Harold. Now, the rest of you, what are
your
names? And you will stay here, yes?”

Jack exchanged looks with Alexander, who shrugged. Frances rolled her eyes, and Eli gave a crooked half smile that seemed to say,
Guess we're stuck here.
The older boys hadn't given a signal yet, after all, and the reward was still waiting. And they couldn't very well leave Harold behind.

“Yes,” Jack told her. “We'll stay.”