Prince of Air (2 page)

“I am not,” Maisie said.

“Look at you,” he said. “Ringing a stupid bell for some girl to come and clean up after you.”

“But it's her job,” Maisie said.

Felix folded his arms across his new red Anne Hutchinson Elementary School baseball team T-shirt. That shirt bugged Maisie, too. She and Felix had both tried out for the team, and he'd made the A team while she'd been put on the C team.
You can keep your stupid C team,
she'd said to the coach, resigning before they even had their first practice, which, now that she thought of it, was today.

“I give up,” Felix said.

He started to walk toward the door.

“Where are you going?” Maisie asked him.

“Baseball practice,” he said.

Felix paused in the doorway.

“Why don't you come?” he said. “I bet the coach would take you back.”

“On the C team? Forget it,” Maisie said, angry that Felix would think she'd consider such a humiliation.

“Come on,” he said, giving her that look he gave when he wanted her to forgive him.

“No.”

“Please?” he said, the corners of his mouth turning up into a small smile.

Aiofe arrived, not making eye contact with either of them, just picking up the heavy tray and rushing back out with it. All of a sudden, watching her made Maisie uncomfortable. Sometimes having Felix for a brother drove her absolutely mad.

Felix flopped onto his bed even though he was still sweaty and his uniform was streaked with dirt. If his mother saw him, she would worry about the fine linens, the antiques, the rug hand woven in cashmere. Living in Elm Medona exhausted him. It was like living in a museum, only worse because his mother, Great-Aunt Maisie, and Great-Uncle Thorne were everywhere, watching him and breathing down his neck. If Felix could have one wish, it would be to move back upstairs to the servants' quarters. At least he could arrange his room there however he wanted, get into bed without taking a bath first, and touch anything he wanted, any time he wanted.

Samuel Dormitorio, his bedroom in Elm Medona, especially exhausted him. Named for Samuel Santiago, a Spanish duke and childhood friend of Great-Uncle Thorne's, the room had swords and old guns hanging everywhere, a terrifying bull's head with giant horns on it staring at him from the wall directly across from the bed, and an oil painting by some famous artist of Saint Sebastian with his body pierced by a million swords above the headboard. Anywhere that Felix looked, he saw weapons or something dead.

The creepy clock beside the bed, an ornate gold thing with miniature swords for hands, reminded Felix that he had exactly one hour before dinner. He missed his mother's spaghetti carbonara. Or even good old mac and cheese. Now they had to eat in the Dining Room, where the chairs were so heavy it took two people to move one, and Felix spent all his time worrying that he might break a piece of the stupid Pickworth china. Cook, as they called the woman who made all the food downstairs in the giant Kitchen, came from France, and dinner had names that Felix couldn't pronounce. A ham sandwich with white sauce on it was a
croque-monsieur
. A big stew with every disgusting thing Felix could imagine in it all at once was called
cassoulet
. Even worse, he had to dress up just to eat in there. Great-Uncle Thorne had dug up a tuxedo that almost fit Felix. The jacket sleeves and pant legs were too long, but a seamstress arrived one morning with a mouthful of pins and managed to hem everything by dinner that night.

Why would people want to live like this?
Felix thought, not for the first time. He worried that Maisie actually liked all this nonsense.

Last night she'd shown up at dinner wearing an old dress of Great-Aunt Maisie's, a ridiculous gold thing with a matching headband that had a big feather sticking out from it and a strand of pearls that hung all the way to her knees.

“Look!” Maisie had said happily, “I'm a flapper!”

“Whatever,” Felix had mumbled, yanking miserably on his bow tie.

His mother explained it away by reminding him how old Great-Aunt Maisie and Great-Uncle Thorne were.

“Who knows how long they have left, sweetie,” she'd said. “It's wonderful to let them have a little bit of their old lives back.”

One thing Felix knew for certain—he would
not
go back into The Treasure Chest. Felix had figured out that every time he and Maisie time traveled, Great-Aunt Maisie got healthier and younger. If they kept going back and she kept getting better, Felix would never return to his normal life as a regular twelve-year-old.

Reluctantly, he got off the bed to start to get ready for another awful dinner. Standing in the middle of the room, he glanced upward at the strangely painted ceiling. Most of the time, Felix averted his eyes to avoid scaring himself with thoughts of war and death, so he hadn't really studied the weird stuff up there. But now the giant eye painted in the very center of the ceiling caught his attention. It seemed to be looking right at him. Felix stepped back to see it better. One eye in the middle of a fist, the wrist and arm stretching across the dark ceiling.

Weird
, Felix thought, shuddering.

An owl swooped from one corner, its wings opened and painted so realistically they practically fluttered. Around the edges of the ceiling, geometric symbols in black and white lined the room.

“It's magic,” a voice boomed from the doorway.

Felix jumped, startled.

Great-Uncle Thorne laughed his booming laugh as he strode into the room.

“Joy of life, mercy, transformation,” he said, pointing with his walking stick. Today it had a jaguar's head at the tip and the jaguar had emeralds for eyes.

“Magic symbols,” Great-Uncle Thorne explained. “Clarity, truth, beauty.” He paused, and his eyes grew misty. “Samuel Santiago was a magician. From the time he was a lad, he practiced magic tricks.”

Suddenly energized, Great-Uncle Thorne's whole face lit up. “Why, some of his tricks are right here in this room!”

He went to the large ebony-and-ivory chest of drawers and began opening them, rifling through their contents, then slamming them shut. When he didn't find what he wanted there, he walked over to the heavy rolltop desk. With a grunt, he tried to roll the top back, but only managed to lift it a crack.

“Don't just stand there,” Great-Uncle Thorne roared. “Help me open the thing.”

Felix stood beside him, grabbed the edge, and on Great-Uncle Thorne's count of three, tried to lift it.

It moved another fraction of an inch, then stuck.

“This colossal abomination hasn't been opened since the Roaring Twenties, my lad. We need to put more muscle into our efforts.”

Again, Great-Uncle Thorne counted to three.

Again, he and Felix tried to lift the rolltop upward.

Again, it moved a tiny bit. Then stuck.

“Damnation!” Great-Uncle Thorne shouted.

Felix cleared his throat. “What is it we're looking for again?” he asked.

“How am I supposed to know, you pudding head!”

“Um . . . pudding head?” Felix asked.

Great-Uncle Thorne raised both hands, swinging his walking stick around wildly.

“How did I end up with such idiots for relatives?” he shouted.

“If you don't mind, sir,” Felix said, inching toward the door that led from Samuel Dormitorio to the bathroom, “I need to wash up before dinner.”

“Fine! Go, you dolt!” Great-Uncle Thorne said.

Felix saw him put his walking stick into the gap where they'd managed to open the rolltop just before he slipped into the bathroom, relieved to be away from the wrath and exuberance of Great-Uncle Thorne.

If Felix had to pick one good thing about moving into Elm Medona, it was the bathtub as big as the entire bathroom in the servants' quarters upstairs. He needed a small step stool to climb into it. The tub was so deep that it felt more like being in a swimming pool than a bathtub. It was made of mosaics that depicted ocean life against a blue-and-green background. Starfish, crabs, an octopus, sea anemones, and all kinds of fish swam and leaped across it. Real gold glittered for scales. Real jewels twinkled as their eyes, and an oyster shell held a real pearl.

The gold faucets sent hot water, cold water, or saltwater from the ocean just beyond Elm Medona. Another set of gold spigots offered lavender, lemon, or licorice oil to scent the bathwater, and a third produced bubbles.

Felix filled the bath with hot, licorice-scented bubbles, then lowered himself into the giant bath. A compartment carved into the wall held real sponges and loofahs from the Dead Sea, and Felix chose an especially large, porous one to rub off all his baseball field dirt. Although he thought he could sit in these bubbles all night, Felix reluctantly got out so he could dress for the dinner he dreaded.
What will tonight's be?
he wondered. Fish eyes? Some kind of meat he didn't want to eat, like rabbit or venison?

Just when he slipped into the ridiculous silk robe that he'd found in the closet, in walked a triumphant Great-Uncle Thorne.

“Shuffle!” Great-Uncle Thorne ordered Felix.

He held out a deck of cards with an intricate burgundy pattern trimmed in gold leaf.

“Don't you believe in knocking?” Felix said grumpily.

“Why would I knock to enter a room in my own home?” Great-Uncle Thorne boomed. “Now shuffle!”

Felix reached his hands out. They were all pruney from the long bath.

Great-Uncle Thorne wiped them with his own silk handkerchief, then thrust the deck of cards into them.

Dutifully, Felix shuffled.

“I will now put the cards into my pocket where they cannot be touched by man or beast,” Great-Uncle Thorne announced, taking the deck from Felix.

“Please observe,” Great-Uncle Thorne said, “that the pocket is empty.”

He leaned forward, and Felix agreed that the pocket was indeed empty.

“Now, lad, how many suits do you believe are in a deck of cards?”

Felix rolled his eyes. “I believe there are four,” he said, wishing Great-Uncle Thorne would leave him alone.

“And what are those four suits?”

“Great-Uncle Thorne—”

“WHAT ARE THOSE FOUR SUITS?” he shouted.

Felix took a deep breath. “Spades. Hearts. Diamonds. And clubs.”

“Clubs?”

“Yeah. You know, the little shamrock-shaped things?”

“Puppy toes!” Great-Uncle Thorne said. “Those are puppy toes!”

“Fine. Puppy toes.”

Satisfied, Great-Uncle Thorne told him to choose any two of the four suits. “Announce your two choices in a nice loud voice so we can all hear you.”

Felix glanced around. “All?” he said.

Great-Uncle Thorne glared at him.

“Hearts,” Felix said. “And diamonds.”

“Hearts and diamonds, ladies and gentlemen.”

“Right,” Felix said.

“Choose one,” Great-Uncle Thorne continued. “Hearts or diamonds.”

“Diamonds,” Felix said quickly, hoping to hurry this along.

“He has chosen diamonds, ladies and gentlemen. Which leaves hearts. Every suit moves from a two all the way to a nine. I call these the low cards of the suit. Agreed? And then it moves from a ten all the way to an ace. I call these the high cards. Agreed?”

“Sure,” Felix said.

“Please choose: High? Or low?”

“Low.”

“Ladies and gentlemen, this young man has chosen low. Or the two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, and nine of hearts. Of these low cards, please tell all of us which three you choose.”

Felix shivered in the silk robe.

“Two, three, and four,” he said.

“Two, three, and four of hearts? Wonderful. Now choose two of those.”

“Two and three,” Felix said, growing more and more miserable.

“Please choose one now, Felix. Of the two and three of hearts.”

“The two,” Felix said.

“Fantastic, dear boy! That leaves us the three of hearts. You have chosen the three of hearts! And voilà! If you remove the cards from my pocket, I believe
your
card, the three of hearts, is on the bottom of the deck.”

Sighing, and certain that there was no way Great-Uncle Thorne could know this, Felix removed the deck from his pocket, turned it over, and saw . . . the three of hearts!

“How did you—”

“Aha! Now I have your attention!”

Cook made steak frites for dinner that night, which was just a fancy name for sliced steak with french fries. For once, Felix thought dinner tasted delicious. Maisie was dressed in the chocolate-brown skirt she'd worn for the VIP Christmas party, so she looked more like herself than last night when she'd worn that ridiculous flapper outfit. Their mother didn't have to work late for a change, and she seemed more calm and relaxed than usual because she didn't have to race back to the office.