Keeper of the Black Stones (10 page)

After what felt like hours of arguing with myself, but was probably only moments, exhaustion overtook me. I felt that humming again, and it began to lure me into a stupor. I dropped into a fevered, disturbed sleep, and dreamt of ancient armies, time travel machines, and losing Doc to both.

By noon on Saturday the house was, for the most part, put back together again. We'd finished organizing and moved on to cleaning. Nothing was missing, so it looked like the thieves had missed whatever they were seeking. Not that Doc was admitting anything of the sort – he maintained that we were lucky they hadn't taken anything, and left it at that. The garbage cans, though, were full of broken glass, frames, CD cases, and light bulbs. We even threw away the old globe, which had cracked in the chaos. Paul finally left around 2 that afternoon, though he made it clear that he would return later that night to check on us and make sure that we were okay.

It was downright gorgeous outside, but I was in no mood for sunshine or singing birds. Instead, I retreated to my bedroom and cranked out my physics homework. I wasn't looking forward to the work, but I needed a distraction, and the painstaking logic and step-by-step process of physics was the most distracting thing I had available. I lost myself to it, and then went on to the final act of Shakespeare's
Richard III
for English Lit. By 5PM I'd put in three solid hours of work and was paying the consequences; my stomach was protesting, my head hurt, and I was bored out of my mind. I got up, stretched, and walked down the stairs and into the kitchen, toward
the mouthwatering smell of food.

I paused at the dining room table and looked down. “Three plates? Are we expecting someone?” I asked quietly. I didn't want to startle my grandfather, still unsure how much I trusted his sanity. If I scared him, I thought, there was no telling what he might say or do. And I wasn't prepared to deal with that quite yet.

Doc turned from the stove, where he'd been stirring some sort of sauce. “Out of hibernation I see,” he answered with a smile. “Yes, actually, my old friend John Fleming is going to join us for dinner. Have I told you about him? We were best friends from grade school through college. Absolutely inseparable. We've been close ever since.”

John Fleming … I knew that name, though it took me a moment to remember where I'd heard it. Then it struck me – this man featured largely in Doc's journal, along with his son Nicholas. They had taken Doc to the infamous stone, and started the entire chain of events. The question was, though, whether this John Fleming was actually real. Did he truly exist, or was he part of the imaginary world of the journal? I had never heard of or met the man, which seemed odd, especially if he and Doc were so close. Did Doc really expect someone to show up? I didn't think I could handle sitting down for dinner and watching Doc talk to an imaginary friend.

“Does he live far away?” I hedged, wondering about this imaginary best friend.

“He lives in Woodstock, so not very far at all,” Doc replied. He walked past me and placed three wine glasses on the table.

I took a breath and asked the question foremost in my mind. “Why haven't I met him before?”

“Excellent question,” Doc replied. He shrugged casually. “Unfortunately I can't give you a very good answer. We both have busy lives. A poor excuse, I'm afraid.”

I grunted. That response was a little short on the detail, and didn't answer the question at all. Hardly an assurance about this John Fleming's existence. I walked into the den and looked out the window, thinking, then did a
double take.

“Someone must be lost,” I mumbled, staring.

“Why's that?” Doc asked from the kitchen.

“There's a limo parked outside,” I replied.

Doc gave a shout. “Ah! That would be John.”

I looked back at Doc in shock, then turned back to the window. So this John Fleming was real. And rich. My curiosity went up several notches, and I went to answer the door.

Doc's personal-recipe pot roast was great.

The company was slightly … odd.

I was happy to see that Mr. Fleming was, in fact, real. According to Doc, he and Fleming were the same age, though I never would have guessed it. Doc was tall, fit, and lean, while Mr. Fleming stood several inches shorter and carried a good 60 to 70 pounds more than his frame required. He was going soft around the face, and looked worn out. And his behavior seemed off, like he had a secret that he didn't want to tell, or didn't actually want me there. I had the distinct feeling that he wanted me to leave him alone with my grandfather, though I had no intention of doing so. I didn't trust the guy.

I wondered again why I had never met this man before. I'd lived with Doc for nearly three years now, and had never heard of John Fleming. Was Doc keeping him secret for some reason? Did he and Doc have some sort of sordid past? And what about his involvement with the infamous stone? Doc's journal had an entry about how he distrusted both John Fleming and his son, and now the man was here in our house. Were we in some sort of danger? Why was he here now, suddenly having dinner with us?

One thing was obvious – they weren't going to talk about anything even
remotely interesting. The conversation ranged from playing baseball in Shepard's Park when they were kids to remembering old friends who had passed away. As the evening wore on and the shadows outside grew longer, the conversation between the two became very stale. After two and a half hours I had lost interest in Mr. Fleming's arrival, and completely forgotten about the journal. I was bored out of my mind, and beginning to wonder if dinner would ever end.

Doc glanced at me and coughed. “Jason, you look distinctly unhappy. Do you have plans?” he asked.

I jumped at being directly addressed, then flushed. “I was going to go hit some golf balls with Paul, but it can wait,” I lied.

Doc chuckled. “Why should it? If I were fourteen years old, I wouldn't want to sit and listen to two old men talk about their sixty-year-old exploits and triumphs. Take off and make sure to thank Paul again for his help.” He waved his hands in my direction in a shooing motion, giving his blessing.

I didn't wait for him to repeat himself or change his mind. I stood up so quickly that my chair fell over, and rushed to the other side of the table to shake Mr. Fleming's hand. “Itwasnicemeetingyou, sir.” I could hear my words coming out in a jumble, but I was beyond caring.

“Son, the pleasure was all mine, I assure you,” he answered, his mouth turning up in a faint smile.

Nodding, I turned and left the room. I grabbed my golf shoes on the way through the mudroom and slid my baseball cap on, then darted out the front door. Twenty feet down the street I realized that I'd forgotten my golf clubs and skidded to a halt. Paul and I didn't actually have plans to play golf, but the excuse wouldn't hold up if I didn't make it believable. I turned and ran back toward the house.

Like most basements, ours had both indoor and outdoor access. This always came in handy when I wanted to get in undetected. Or avoid more boring conversation. I ducked past the front door, raced around to the side of the house, and opened the bulkhead door to the cellar. I had stashed my golf clubs down here at the start of the winter.

Our basement looked like any other basement in New England. A wood-burning stove sat at the far end of a large, open room, and exposed concrete walls matched the floor's stark gray surface. The room ignored the concept of ‘décor' for the most part, the one exception being a painting of five dogs playing poker. This was a purely functional area. No one came down here unless they were searching for something or looking for a place to store it.

For this reason, the basement contained a strange array of goods: three bikes, two bags of salt for the winter, an unused weight set, kitty litter – despite the fact that we had an outdoor cat – and roughly three thousand cardboard boxes in various sizes. Three small, thick windows sat at the top of the outer wall, complete with a lot of cobwebs, and a set of several vents ran into the walls of the house. These allowed heat from the wood-burning stove to rise up and dissipate throughout the main building. They also, of course, carried noise from the basement up into the house. And vice versa.

I swear on all things holy that I didn't mean to hear the conversation between my grandfather and Mr. Fleming. I suppose I could have tuned it out if I'd been so inclined. It was such a stroke of luck, though, that I couldn't ignore it. Given Doc's recent behavior, listening to a suspicious conversation should have been the first thing on my list. I wasn't a natural spy, though, and I hadn't thought of it. Now I got my answers through so much dumb luck.

“Jason reminds me of my granddaughter, Tatiana,” Fleming said. It was the first thing I heard, mostly because of the radar that always detects your own name being mentioned. I froze, thinking for a moment that he was in the room with me, and glanced around for him. Then I spotted the registers and realized what I was hearing.

“How is she holding up?” My grandfather's voice became hollow and supernaturally deep as it echoed through the registers.

I put my golf clubs down and moved quietly toward the nearest register, where their voices were emerging.

“Better than I am. She's tough like her mother, God rest her soul.”

The two men remained silent for a moment and I reached over to lift a
box of Christmas ornaments away from the register. This, I wanted to hear.

“You're sure it wasn't discovered?” Fleming asked now, lowering his voice.

I pricked my ears and leaned closer. Lowered voices were harder to hear, but they were also more intriguing. Lowered voices meant secrets. And – perhaps – answers to my questions.

“Yes, John, I'm sure,” Doc replied. His voice sounded suddenly very tired.

“We can't keep this secret forever, my friend. Even from our families. I'm afraid it's only a matter of time,” Fleming said. “This break-in confirms that someone out there already knows.”

My breath caught in my throat. So the robbers
had
been looking for something. And this John Fleming character knew all about it, and thought that we might be in danger. I thought back to Doc's journal entries, and the pieces started to fall into place. Doc let out an exaggerated sigh, as though he were annoyed with his friend's concern, and had heard it all before. He must have made some sort of gesture, because Fleming changed the subject.

“What's my son been up to?” he asked unhappily. “Have you seen him lately?”

Doc paused for a moment before answering. “He's trying to crush Henry Tudor's army.”

At that, my blood ran cold. This was exactly what Doc talked about in his journal, and just served to confirm my worst fears. Fleming was in on it, then, and was either leading Doc on intentionally or involving him in some very risky business. Neither possibility made me very happy.

“Well I already knew that,” Fleming answered. “Has he acquired another stone?”

“No, and you don't sound very concerned about my declaration,” Doc replied, frustrated.

“Change the outcome of the War of the Roses and make the end of
Richard III
inaccurate,” Fleming said with a trace of amusement. “I still don't understand why you're so concerned. It's secondary to our true objective of
bringing Nicholas home.”

“It's more than that, John, and you know it,” my grandfather snapped. “We've been over this before. Nicholas, for reasons I can't begin to fathom, seems to be hell bent on distorting history and recreating it in his own image. We cannot let him succeed! It would jeopardize our entire world.”

“What happens if he does?” Fleming retorted, too quickly. “We may, in fact, be better off with a different version of history. Henry VIII was not a nice man. He killed hundreds of his own people, not to mention a few wives. And what his offspring did to the country … to Europe as a whole…”