Facing the Hunchback of Notre Dame (10 page)

Note Ophelia’s use of the word lily-livered, a very antiquated phrase. She was being a bit redundant (unnecessarily repetitive) here because she literally called Frollo a “cowardly coward.” But this is dialogue; people say stupid things like that all the time, so a writer can get away with it. It helps develop a character better when their speech is their own—even if it is repetitive.

“So Frollo is a priest?” asked Linus.

Quasimodo nodded.

“Was he ever sincere?” asked Ophelia, sitting beside the enchanted circle and grabbing a sandwich for herself.

“When he was younger, yes. I don’t know if the person he’s become would have adopted a monstrous little—”

“Don’t say that!” interrupted Ophelia.

“Well, an orphan like me. He was very pious (holy). But then things started to change.”

“The alchemy?” Ophelia asked.

Quasimodo nodded.

During the Middle Ages, the time from which Quasimodo had been snatched, as well as in centuries before that, some men displayed an intense interest in something called alchemy. People searched for ways to turn everyday matter into gold using the creation of the philosopher’s stone. And they also sought for ways to live excruciatingly long lives because, let’s be honest, not enough troubles and germs exist in one normal lifetime. In short, some
folks tried to create supernatural happenings using everyday materials.

Nowadays most people look at that as sinister and, simply put, impossible (although there are a few who beg to differ). Suffice it to say, their knowledge of science was not as advanced. The periodic table of elements that tells us iron could never become gold did not exist then. Gold is; iron is. Both are what they are at their most basic level, and that is that. In other words, they are not like salt, which contains two elements — sodium and chlorine — or water, which has both hydrogen and oxygen. Certainly you see what I mean. If not, then count yourself as one of the dullards and please do not come study in my English department. Thank you.

Quasimodo clenched his hands together. “Frollo became different when he began locking himself away in his study for weeks at a time. He could see the Gypsy girl from the window too.”

“That didn’t help matters,” Walter said.

Ophelia said, “Why would he want to come here? To find you, obviously. But why does he need to find you?”

Linus, of course, had an idea. But he kept it to himself for now.

“I’d better get back to reading.” Ophelia sighed.

The guys decided they might as well get a good night’s sleep. Ophelia figured she’d stay on the blue sofa again and keep guard over Quasimodo. Most likely nobody would be coming through the enchanted circle tonight. Not if they were already here.

Ophelia crept downstairs, checked the locks on all the windows, made sure the doors were bolted (Portia and Augustus, two all-too-trusting souls, sometimes forgot to do this), and hoped and prayed that Frollo and Cato would wait until daylight to make their next move. Whatever that was going to be.

Around 3:00 a.m., Quasimodo tugged on Ophelia’s arm, awakening her with a start.

“What?” she cried out.

“Shhh! Look!”

Quasi pointed to the table where the wooden carving of the dancing woman was trying to unseat the princess on the horse. “My carvings!” he whispered with urgency. “They’re alive!”

Ophelia couldn’t believe what she was seeing. “Should we intervene?”

Quasimodo shook his head and gave an exaggerated shrug.

“Let’s just see what happens,” said Ophelia.

The dancer had a good hold on the princess’s arm, but the regal horsewoman was having none of it. She cocked a booted foot, placed it on the dancer’s chest, and gave a mighty shove. The girl went tumbling head over feet, and the princess galloped off behind the beakers.

The dancer then rolled into a ball and hardened back to her wooden state.

Quasimodo picked her up. “Oh, the poor girl.”

“Is it Esmeralda?” Ophelia asked.

“Yes.”

“I suppose that fight was about Captain Phoebus?” she asked.

“She’s in love with him, isn’t she? She really is.”

“He’ll be her downfall, Quasimodo. Don’t let Esmeralda be yours.”

Ophelia looked for the princess on the worktable, but she and her horse were gone.

Dear Linus and Ophelia
,

Ophelia snorted at that last part.
They have no idea
, she thought. She continued reading:

Ophelia rolled her eyes. Talk about unrealistic expectations.

Nothing but scientific jargon spilled onto the stationery from there on. It was Ophelia’s second time reading the letter from her mother. But she wasn’t reading it for sentimental reasons; she just
needed a break from
The Hunchback of Notre-Dame
, and Quasi had finally fallen back asleep.

The story was too tragic. Tragic beyond belief. It would be one thing for such sadness to befall a person who’d been given much at birth. But poor Quasi was forced to deal with such misery after life had handed him what amounted to a plate piled high with turnips and rutabagas and cranberry sauce. It was too much to bear.

She knew it was only a novel. And she knew its author, Victor Hugo, employed drama quite masterfully in his writing. He enjoyed turning up the heat, so to speak, by taking an already terrible set of circumstances and throwing in someone who didn’t deserve to deal with them. And while that plot device always makes for a good story, in real life it feels as if something in the universe has been tipped so far out of balance that only a miracle will right things again.

And that Esmeralda! Ophelia could barely read about such an empty-headed girl without wanting to throw the book out the trefoil window and into the rain. Times sure had changed, she realized. Not many readers would take to such a muttonhead (no offense to sheep) traipsing along the pages of a book. She could barely stand it.

“Thank goodness she didn’t come through the circle,” Ophelia muttered.

Quasimodo stirred. Ophelia rubbed his shoulder lightly, and he fell back into a deep slumber. She smiled as she remembered him telling her, just before he fell asleep, that he thought his favorite thing about Real World might be this wonderful mattress. And her, of course.

Having Quasimodo around helped Ophelia to see the many things she’d taken for granted all of her life, including her average face and body. After this experience, she never wanted to be more than what she was, I can assure you. For instance, she never dyed her hair, or plastered on makeup, or spent hours at the gym. Quasimodo taught her that she’d been given so much. He also taught her the beauty of gratitude, good health, and slipping through crowds unnoticed.

Around 4:30 a.m. an exhausted Ophelia opened her eyes for the first time in about ninety-three minutes. The smell of sulfur from a
burning match had awakened her. She saw two figures now dominated the attic space—you can probably guess who they were — and they were whispering about how to get Quasimodo out of the building without disturbing the rest of the household.

Ophelia quickly closed her eyes and kept them closed. She hardly dared to breathe in order to hear their faint whispers more clearly.

“I fail to comprehend why we cannot return with Quasimodo right here,” Frollo said.

Ophelia had never heard such a warm voice used in such a cool manner and with very little emotion evident.

That must be what his homilies sound like, she thought. (If you don’t attend a church founded before the 1600s or thereabout, homily is simply a fancy word for “sermon.”)

Frollo was much taller and thinner than Cato Grubbs, a rather corpulent (overweight) man who was even more corpulent up-close. The scientist had clearly gained weight over the years while traveling through the Book World.

Maybe the food tastes better over there, Ophelia thought, then shook herself mentally. Best to listen with a keen ear.

“This particular circle only works at 11:11 p.m. on the eleventh day of the month — coming, that is. Then, sixty hours later at 11:11 a.m., it opens up for the return passage.”

“So limited,” Frollo said with disgust.

“I got you here, didn’t I?” Cato reprimanded as he swept an arm over the painted circle. “Be my guest then.”

Frollo fumed and his breathing grew louder.

Cato looked through the powders. “In any case, we have to get Quasimodo back to the same portal that you and I came through. It’s a better portal, actually. I use this attic just for storage now.”

“And you are certain we can get him back to the exact place and time he disappeared?” Frollo asked.

“Fear not, Deacon Frollo. That won’t be a problem.”

“I’ll be tried for witchcraft otherwise.”

“So you’ve said many times. I’m sure it must have been frightening when that mob turned on you after your charge disappeared like a puff of smoke. It isn’t a good place to be in, is it?”

Frollo seemed to understand Cato’s moral lesson. “My being tried and hung for witchcraft and Quasimodo being jeered at by the crowd are two very different matters,” he hissed.

“Of course they are,” Cato muttered before changing the subject. “Just so we’re clear about the matter—you’ll be able to get Esmeralda’s necklace for me before I return to this world?”

Ophelia felt the distrust in Cato’s voice even from her spot on the sofa. She couldn’t say she blamed him either.

“Yes. I have a very clear plan in place for her to willingly give it over to me.”

I’ll bet
, thought Ophelia.

“Ah, here it is!” said Cato.

“So you have the powder?” Frollo asked.

“Here. Take it. You should find it most beneficial in your experiments.”

Frollo said nothing, not even offering the common courtesy of a simple “Thank you.”

“All right. Let’s go to my lab. We’ll come back here early in the morning and watch for them to leave. Then we’ll get Quasimodo and take him back to my house for safekeeping.”

“Why do we not just take him now?” asked Frollo.

Cato chuckled. “Why, look at us, dear deacon. I’m too fat; you’re too skinny. Even between the two of us, we couldn’t get that strong young man down two flights of steps with three teenagers and two adults fighting us as well. And then the priest across the street will surely hear the ensuing ruckus — “

“Quasimodo will obey me.”

Ophelia risked a small peek. Frollo’s eyes blazed.

“After what you did to him? Don’t count on it. At the very least, I’m not counting on it, so what I say goes in this world. Is that understood, Deacon?”

Frollo said nothing and turned to exit the room.

Cato placed another canister, one holding a stash of Dragon-well Lung Ching tea, into his brown leather satchel (small bag with a shoulder strap), muttering, “I need to lose some weight.”

Outside, the rainfall increased. The staccato on the roof now sounded more like running horses than the pitter-patter of little
feet. “And let’s hope the weather doesn’t make our return to your world impossible.”

Cato loved keeping current on the weather and such. He’d seen rain like this before. And he was smart enough to know that if it failed to slow down soon, then things might get messy indeed. “Oh, how I wish he hadn’t tagged along after me,” Cato whispered as he passed the sofa and headed out the door. “But now that I’m stuck with him, I might as well use him.”

After the men had left, Ophelia waited five minutes and then ran downstairs to wake up Linus.

She told him what had happened. “And just so you know who we’re dealing with, Cato isn’t a nice man at all, Linus. He’s asked Frollo to give him Esmeralda’s emerald necklace—which is the only thing she has from the mother she never knew—as payment for bringing Frollo across to the Real World. Isn’t that terrible?”

“Why did Frollo have to come?”

“He wants to make sure that Quasi reappears in the exact same moment he left Book World so Frollo won’t be tried for witchcraft.”

Linus rubbed his face with the hem of his T-shirt. “Let’s get Walt.”

“Do you know how to sneak over to the school?”

“Yep.”

“Do you know which room is Walter’s?”

“Yep.”

“How come I don’t know?” She felt left out.

“You’ve been doing a lot of reading lately.”

“Oh. Right. Let’s go.”

T
he floors at the Kingscross School for Young People deserved an award for high achievement in squeaking, groaning, and even some vociferous (loud or clamorous) popping noises now and then. One board in particular sounded like a canine’s sad cry. But despite the building’s protests at a pre-dawn invasion by the ruffians next door, Linus and Ophelia made it to Walter’s room without discovery. Perhaps the fact that Madrigal Pierce slept without her hearing aids contributed to their success as well.

In any case, Walter agreed that Quasimodo needed to be moved and quickly. “Do you think they saw us coming out of Father Lou’s?”

“I think so,” Ophelia said. “Cato said he didn’t want to alert the priest across the way, so he must have seen.”

“It’s still safer than the attic,” Linus said.

“Then let’s get him over to Father Lou as soon as the sun is up,” Walter said.