The Strangers (10 page)

A gust of wind swirled through the open door. Olive twisted the doorknob in her hand, recalling the feeling of relief that had swirled through her in the same way when Delora promised that the Dunwoodys were alive.

“And I assure you, I know a bit about magic myself,” Doctor Widdecombe went on, giving Olive a twinkly little smile and wink. “Letting us examine this house will be anything but a waste of time.”

Olive took a breath. She glanced around at the faces of her guests all gathered in the entrance, watching her, and felt like one smallish malamute trying to pull a house-sized sled.

“All right,” she said, forcing her impatience down. “We can search the house first.”

Doctor Widdecombe beamed.

Olive pushed the heavy front door shut.

“Olive dear,” said Mrs. Dewey brightly, “would you mind if I used your kitchen?” She held up a shopping bag full of things that couldn’t have been bought in any store for a thousand miles. “We have some indoor charms to concoct, and my Locksleaf needs to simmer for another ten minutes, at least.”

Olive nodded. The adults headed down the hall toward the kitchen, Mrs. Dewey tip-tapping in her little high heels, Doctor Widdecombe strolling after her, and Delora drifting behind them both like black velvet smoke.

“Can I help?” Walter offered. “I could—”

“No, Walter,” said Delora over one shoulder. “We’ve no need of you.”

Walter’s shoulders sagged.

Harvey bumped against Olive’s shin. “Reconnaissance mission under way,” he muttered from the corner of his mouth. “Agent 1-800 is on the move.” With a sharp nod, he slunk after the disappearing guests.

Olive, Rutherford, and Walter stood together in the entryway. Even without his ghoul costume, there was something strangely out of scale about Walter. Maybe it was that too-deep voice coming from his skinny neck. Maybe it was the long, bony arms that seemed to reach almost to his knees. Maybe it was the way he towered a full head and shoulders over his aunt and uncle, while they still treated him like a child. None of it made Olive feel any more comfortable around him.

Olive kept her arms folded tight across her chest. Horatio and Leopold flanked her like fuzzy gargoyles. Walter shifted on his feet, casting occasional sad looks along the hall toward the kitchen. Only Rutherford seemed at ease.

“Tell me, Walter,” he began brightly, “what was it like to grow up with a world-renowned magical authority like Doctor Widdecombe in your family?”

“Mmm,” said Walter. “Um . . . He only married my aunt Delora a couple of years ago.” Walter’s bony shoulders began to rise. “And she’s always traveled a lot, so I didn’t see much of either of them until my mother died and Delora took me in. She calls me her apprentice, but it’s not really—
I’m
not really—I’m not like her
.
” Walter’s shoulders had risen to his ears at this point. Olive wondered if they would keep rising until they came together above Walter’s head. “I’m grateful for everything Doctor Widdecombe—I mean Doctor Uncle—I mean Uncle Byron has done for me,” Walter went on. “I’d like to show him—show
both
of them—that I
do
have promise. That teaching me wouldn’t be a waste. But I’d need to surprise them, or do something really important, or . . .” Walter trailed off. The bony shoulders shrugged. “It’s hard to impress somebody who’s already the best at everything you try.”

Olive felt a pang of recognition. She felt that very same feeling every time she picked up a calculator to check her math homework, and one of her parents gave the answer faster than Olive could press the equals button. She looked up at Walter, chewing on her lower lip and thinking that he’d probably just said more words in a row than he’d said in all their other conversations put together.

“Well,” announced Mrs. Dewey from the kitchen door, “the leaves are simmering. I’ll make us all some tea in a bit.” She clicked back down the hallway, followed by Doctor Widdecombe, with Delora on his arm. Harvey skulked behind them like a splotchy shadow. “Olive, have you eaten today?” Mrs. Dewey continued. “Perhaps I’ll make some lunch as well.”

“Lunch would be delightful,” said Doctor Widdecombe before Olive could answer. “But first, we will whet our appetites with a thorough search.” He gestured toward the library doors. “Shall we begin?”

“The three of us will guard what ought
not
to be discovered,” Horatio murmured to Olive as the others headed toward the library. “And Olive,” he added, while Harvey zoomed up the staircase and Leopold marched toward the basement door, “give away as little as is necessary. Even to our allies. Each time a secret is shared, it grows less safe.” With a last sharp look at Olive, he turned to follow Harvey up the stairs.

A creak echoed through the hallway. Doctor Widdecombe had thrown open the library’s double doors. By the time Olive caught up with them, Doctor Widdecombe had led everyone inside. Light from the tall windows glazed the fireplace’s painted tiles. Oriental rugs stretched across the floor, their patterns paling in the sun. Shelves bearing thousands of books towered to the ceilings, the gilt and leather of their spines glimmering in the grayish daylight.

Delora gave a delicate gasp.

“Wow,” Walter murmured.

Rutherford and Mrs. Dewey, who had seen this room before, kept quiet.

“What a trove!” Doctor Widdecombe exclaimed, striding to the center of the room. “There must be thousands of volumes here!”

Olive’s stomach gave a twist. Once, her father had helped her estimate the total number of books in the library, but she couldn’t remember the answer anymore—and these thousands of books seemed small and unimportant now anyway. She hovered beside her mother’s desk, tapping her fingers impatiently on its surface.

“Wow,” said Walter again, tilting his head sideways to read a row of spines. “Are they all about magic?”

“No,” said Olive quickly. “None of them are. I’ve looked.”

“How very odd,” said Doctor Widdecombe. “Perhaps the McMartins hid their grimoires and recipes and bestiaries in a more unexpected location, for safekeeping.”

Olive scuffed her toes along a curlicue in the faded rug. “Maybe.” She glanced up, meeting Rutherford’s eyes. He stared back at her for a moment, frowning slightly.
Please don’t tell them,
she thought.
Please don’t tell them.
Still frowning, Rutherford gave a little nod.

“And this must be another of Aldous’s artworks,” Doctor Widdecombe went on, approaching the huge painting of several white-gowned girls dancing in a meadow. He gazed up at it in silence for a moment, his hands clasped behind his back, his coat buttons straining across his belly. “He was truly a talent, wasn’t he? I might even use the term ‘genius.’” He turned to look at Olive. “I don’t suppose you would permit me to enter one of the paintings, would you, Olive? As a magical academic, I find these living works of the utmost interest, both compositionally and historically . . .”

Inside of Olive’s collar, the spectacles seemed to flare with a sudden chill. It didn’t feel right to say no to grown-ups—especially to grown-ups who were trying to help her—but the thought of Doctor Widdecombe squishing his body into those frames and strutting through those painted worlds made Olive want to shove him off the porch and send him rolling down Linden Street like a big tweed bowling ball. “Um . . . maybe another time,” she said. “After we’ve finished searching the house.” She turned toward the doors. “Shouldn’t we be—”

“Doctor Widdecombe,” Rutherford interrupted, “have any other practitioners of magic used paint the way Aldous McMartin did, to create or trap living beings?”

Olive sent Rutherford an impatient look, but Rutherford was too busy watching Doctor Widdecombe to notice.

“None so successfully as Aldous McMartin,” said Doctor Widdecombe sagely. “A few have tried and failed. A witch named Fiona Albumblatt experimented with moving ink in the early nineteenth century, but this just meant that all of her spells scrambled themselves after she wrote them down. And of course magicians have worked with living clay for years: golems, dolls, and so forth. But none was an artist like Aldous McMartin. He was in a category of his own.”

Olive felt the back of her neck begin to prickle. She glanced around. Mrs. Dewey was watching her with a sympathetic expression.

“Shall we move along?” Mrs. Dewey asked, giving Olive’s shoulder a sweet-scented pat.

“What do you think, Delora, my love?” asked Doctor Widdecombe.

Delora flowed to the center of the room. She raised her hands, closed her eyes, and made a series of wobbly turns, like a sleep-deprived ballerina.

Olive heard Mrs. Dewey give a little sigh.

“Yes,” Delora whispered. “The secret of their power is not here.”

“Let’s carry on,” said Doctor Widdecombe. “Olive, lead the way.”

Olive darted into the hall. The others trailed unhurriedly behind her.

They dragged through the formal parlor—the cold, frilly room where Annabelle had sat while her grandfather painted her portrait, many decades ago—and then into the high-ceilinged dining room, moving so slowly that Olive thought her skeleton might pop out of her skin and run restlessly ahead. Walter gazed around, silent and bug-eyed. Delora sniffed and pawed at the air. Doctor Widdecombe pressed his nose right up to every shelf and photograph and cabinet and painting, like someone visiting a museum. When they finally reached the kitchen, he even began pulling out the drawers, removing objects and holding them up to the light.

“How interesting!” he announced, lifting an antique device that might have been a cheese slicer or a comb for someone with extremely thin hair. “And pickle tongs! Fascinating! This is truly a McMartin time capsule!” he exclaimed, while Olive’s toes tapped faster and faster on the floor. “Olive, I’m sure my enthusiasm seems extreme, but for a historian like myself, this is equivalent to a private tour of Windsor Castle—or of Pharaoh Tutankhamen’s tomb!”

“His tomb?” Olive repeated, with an unpleasant little wrench in her stomach.

“If you would permit me, Olive,” said Doctor Widdecombe, picking up what looked like a tiny pizza cutter with ruffled edges, “I would like to write an article about this house for
The Abracademic Magicologist
. I’m a frequent contributor, and I’m certain that—”

“Hush!” breathed Delora. Her voice was just a whisper, but everyone obeyed. “Do you hear?”

“Hear what, Aunt Delora?” Walter prompted, hovering anxiously behind her.

“Hush!” Delora commanded again.

“Why ask questions if you don’t want any answers?” asked Mrs. Dewey, sounding slightly annoyed.

But Delora didn’t seem to hear. With her eyes closed, she sashayed between the countertops, both hands batting the air before her face as if she were being swarmed by invisible bees.

“Delora’s gift is very sensitive,” Doctor Widdecombe murmured, watching his ladylove swat at the empty air. “It needs silence and patience in which to make itself known.”

Everyone watched, keeping quiet, as Delora spun slowly around and nearly smacked into the refrigerator.

“It is near,” she breathed, her eyes still closed. Her hands patted at the refrigerator door. “Darkness. Great, great power.”

Olive glanced at Rutherford. He was staring at Delora intently, his whole body craning in her direction. Olive knew he was trying to read Delora’s mind, but with her eyes closed, he was finding it very hard. What would the inside of a mind like Delora’s look like, anyway? Olive pictured a cemetery where, instead of graves, there were rows and rows of ringing telephones.

“Lead us, my love,” whispered Doctor Widdecombe. “Be our guide.”

Delora hesitated, her body swiveling from side to side like a black velvet satellite dish. Then, with her head turned toward the house’s interior, she froze. Her eyes popped open. “This way,” she announced.

Delora streaked across the kitchen, sleek black hair flying behind her. The others hurried after. Before any of them could catch up, Delora had thrown open the basement door.

A breath of air, colder than the autumn winds outside, floated up from the darkness. The group clustered in the doorway. The ancient wooden steps below them seemed to dwindle down into nothing, erased by blackness before they could reach the floor.

Without another word, Delora plunged down the steps. In a moment, she too had vanished into the dark.

“Be careful, my love!” Doctor Widdecombe called, setting a tentative toe on the first step. The wood groaned loudly. “These stairs do not look structurally sound!”

“There’s a light at the bottom of the steps!” called Olive at the same time.

But both of their words were lost in the rising wave of Delora’s scream.

E
VERYONE GALLOPED DOWN
the basement stairs.

“Delora, darling!” cried Doctor Widdecombe, taking the lead. He teetered heroically down the squealing steps. “Are you all right? Speak to me!”

“We’re coming, Aunt Delora!” Walter rumbled from the back of the crowd.

“What on earth?” puffed Mrs. Dewey, who was squished in the middle between Olive and Rutherford.

The basement was too dark to see Delora, or whatever it was that had made her scream. Standing on her toes, Olive grabbed the chain of the hanging lightbulb. Its yellow glow pushed the blackness into the corners, uncovering the cobwebbed rafters, the dusty, junk-strewn shelves, and the cold, uneven stone walls. Patches of flaking plaster clung here and there. Mortar crumbled between the stones like very old cheese in a very old sandwich.

In one corner where the darkness never quite disappeared, a pair of bright green eyes glittered, and Olive knew that Leopold was in his station atop the trapdoor. Olive also knew that the trapdoor led to a dirt-walled tunnel, which wound its way to the hidden stone room where Aldous had concocted his paints. Aldous’s ingredients—bony, oily, powdery, and sometimes many-legged—still waited there in rows of foggy glass jars. Olive knew firsthand that trying to create and use these paints could be disastrous. The thought of Doctor Widdecombe or Delora or even Mrs. Dewey finding out about them made Olive’s heart sink like a sponge soaked in ice water.

But, fortunately, it wasn’t the trapdoor that had caught Delora’s attention.

Delora stood in a corner near the washing machine, swaying slowly back and forth.

“Delora, my precious rose, what is it?” Doctor Widdecombe asked—although Olive noticed that he stopped several steps away from where his rose was currently planted.

“It is here,” Delora whispered. “I could feel it, branching up through the entire house.” She spread her hands toward the stone wall. “The cold! The power! The root of the darkness!”

Doctor Widdecombe edged toward the wall. His knees creaked as he bent down. “‘Aillil McMartin. Angus McMartin, 1793.’” He straightened up again so suddenly that everyone else jumped. “Of course!” he announced. “These are
gravestones
! Argyle and Athdar and Alastair McMartin—it must be the entire McMartin line!”

“Yes,” said Olive. “I know.”

Doctor Widdecombe wheeled around. “You know?” he repeated.

“Back in Scotland, when their neighbors destroyed the McMartin home, Aldous saved all the bits of the family plot that hadn’t been wrecked,” she said, repeating the story that the cats had once told her, what already felt like a century ago. “So he took the gravestones and . . . everything that had been under them. And then he brought them here.”

“Graves?” Walter’s deep voice wobbled. “Doesn’t that—mmm—doesn’t that bother you? Knowing they’re down here? In your house?”

Olive tried to recall how she’d felt when she first discovered the gravestones, in the dim basement, under the watchful eye of a huge black cat. It hadn’t been pleasant, she was sure. But over time the gravestones had become just one more strange thing in a house full of strange things. At least the gravestones had never climbed down from the walls and tried to drown her.

“They’re only gravestones,” she said, sounding braver than she felt. “They can’t do anything.”

“I’m afraid that you are wrong,” said Doctor Widdecombe. “Come closer, Olive. Look.”

Olive edged across the basement toward Doctor Widdecombe. She bent over beside him, bringing her own face nearer to the crumbling stone wall.

“Do you see what is happening here?” Doctor Widdecombe asked.

Olive squinted. “I guess that
Athdar
one looks a little bit crumblier than before. But that might be because the dryer wobbles and hits it sometimes.”

“Not their texture,” said Doctor Widdecombe. “Their color.”

Olive squinted at the wall again. Where the gravestones had once been a dirty grayish brown, now they were more of a brownish gray. Or a blackish gray. Or just black.

“They are quite a different color from the rest of the stones, wouldn’t you agree?” prompted Doctor Widdecombe.

Olive nodded, frowning. Over her shoulder, she glanced at the green eyes gleaming from the darkness.

“Next, note the temperature,” Doctor Widdecombe went on, as though they were examining a specimen in a laboratory. “It’s rather unsettlingly low.”

“The walls are always cold,” said Olive.

“
This
cold?” Doctor Widdecombe took her gently by the wrist and pressed her palm to Angus McMartin’s headstone.

The shock was so immediate and so strong that at first Olive couldn’t tell if her skin was freezing or burning. She jerked her arm away. A print of her hand, as clear as if her palm had been coated in paint, smoked against the surface of the stone, a deeper black against the dark gray. It faded swiftly away again.

“
This
is what the McMartins want back,” Doctor Widdecombe said authoritatively. He turned to look at the others, his voice ringing through the stone room. “A constant source of power. A link straight through the past, to the magic of each ancestor, the identities preserved to feed and fuel all the heirs to come. I have heard of this before, in other magical families—but never have I seen such a large or perfect collection.”

“Why is it changing now?” Olive asked, holding her still-prickling hand against her side.

“Imagine a reservoir,” said Doctor Widdecombe, shaping his meaty hands into a bowl. “Over time, the pool fills with rain, rising higher and higher. But no one uses the water inside. At last the water grows so high, its mass so huge, that it overflows—or it seeps through the walls around it, weakening and rotting everything that it can reach.” Slowly, Doctor Widdecombe spread his fingers. The bowl disintegrated.

Horatio’s words—
The McMartins are seeking someone to train. Someone to take on this house
—floated back through Olive’s mind. “The house is looking for an heir,” she said softly. “It needs someone to use its power.”

Doctor Widdecombe gave an admiring nod. “Precisely,” he said. “And it is growing stronger with each passing moment.”

Delora lunged across the room. “Olive, you must get out of here!” she cried, grabbing Olive by both shoulders. “That it hasn’t corrupted you already is astonishing! The McMartins will never leave you in peace,” she breathed, her silvery eyes staring straight into Olive’s. “Not as long as you remain in this house!”

Once more, Olive glanced over her shoulder. The green eyes stared steadily from their corner.

The cats needed her. She couldn’t leave them to face the McMartins alone, not when the danger was Olive’s own fault. And Morton, and all of the people inside Elsewhere . . .

“But I can’t leave,” she told everyone. “I
can’t
.”

Doctor Widdecombe stepped forward. “Olive, your safety is at greater risk with every second you stay here.”

“But I don’t—”

“You must get away from this place!” Delora shrieked, her hands tightening around Olive’s arms until Olive winced. “Get away!
Leave this house!
”

A black streak shot through the gloom and planted itself before Olive’s feet.

“I will ask you to remove your hands from Miss Olive, madam,” Leopold boomed, making himself so rigid that the tips of his ears reached well above Olive’s knees.

Delora blinked as if she’d just woken from a daydream. Her grip slid weakly from Olive’s arms.

Leopold remained in place, glaring up at Delora.

“Leopold,” Olive asked, “didn’t you notice that the gravestones were changing?”

Leopold’s eyes flicked warily around the room. “That is classified information, miss.” His voice dropped to a whisper. “And I suspect that we are
not alone.
”

“It’s all right,” said Olive. “Please tell us.”

Leopold’s chest inflated still further. He raised his chin. “Very well, miss. It is correct that the stones have altered. Observation, rather than action, has been our chosen course.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Why
would
we tell you?” Leopold asked, looking surprised. “There is nothing to be done. The stones have changed many times over the years. They’ve altered very frequently over the course of the past few months, as Annabelle, and Aldous . . . and
you,
” Leopold added, under his breath, “have used the house’s powers.”

“What about lately? Have they gotten better?”

“Yes. Better,” Leopold said. “And then worse again. And then . . .”

“And then what?”

Leopold blinked. “Even worse.”

“And so the guard on the wall watches the water rise and does nothing,” said Doctor Widdecombe. “It rises so very slowly, after all—until, very slowly, it rises over the wall, and floods the entire town.”

Leopold’s chest rose until it bumped into his chin. “I don’t believe you are a member of this brigade, sir,” he said tightly.

Doctor Widdecombe turned to Olive. “Under these circumstances, it would be neither wise nor kind of us to allow you to remain here until the danger is removed.”

“Removed?” Rutherford piped up. “Are you suggesting extricating the gravestones from the foundation? Because I think that might seriously damage the house’s structural—”

“No,” Delora cut him off. Her mirror-like eyes traveled up to Doctor Widdecombe’s face, then glided through the darkness to land on Mrs. Dewey. “But there are ways.”

“What ways?” asked Olive.

Delora’s mouth opened, but it was Mrs. Dewey’s voice that spoke next.

“Absolutely not.”
Her tone was sharp enough to slice bread. She stepped into the center of the chilly room, folding her arms across her chest. “We will not do anything so risky or reprehensible. It goes against everything we stand for.”

Delora raised her hands warningly. “You ignore my warning at your own peril, Lydia.”

“I think I’ll take my chances,
Debbie.
”

Delora jerked back as though Mrs. Dewey had yanked a hair out of her nose.

“That’s right,” Mrs. Dewey went on. “I remember when you were still just Deborah Schepkey from Cleveland.”

“Cleveland?” Doctor Widdecombe’s eyebrows rose. “You told me that you were raised in the Northeast by a band of traveling fortune-tellers.”

“If you—
any
of you—feel so terribly threatened by what might be contained in this house,” Mrs. Dewey resumed, before Delora could get her gaping mouth to work, “then why don’t you leave it?”

“But—” Olive interrupted. “What about what Delora said? Why—”

“Lydia is right, my black dove,” said Doctor Widdecombe, putting his hand gently on Delora’s arm. He didn’t seem to hear Olive at all. “It would behoove us all to calm ourselves and collect our thoughts. This sort of arguing is unworthy of us. We shall depart.” He ushered his wife toward the staircase. “Walter?”

“I think—I think I’ll stay here,” said Walter. His deep voice echoed against the stones. “For a little while.”

Doctor Widdecombe shook his head. “To each his own,” he said, as though Walter had just ordered oatmeal at an ice cream parlor. He and Delora creaked up the steps into the daylight.

“May I go with them, Grandma?” Rutherford asked, darting after. “Not because I’m afraid of this house,” he added, “but because I’d like to ask Doctor Widdecombe some questions about protective charms.”

“You may,” said Mrs. Dewey.

Rutherford scampered up the stairs.

Mrs. Dewey let out a breath. She looked from Walter to Olive, her mouth forming a tiny smile. “Now,” she said, “why don’t you two join me for a little lunch?”

• • •

In the kitchen of the old stone house, grayish daylight wound its way through the vine-covered windows. Patches of light gleamed on the worn wooden table and glittered in the cups of Mrs. Dewey’s steaming tea. Olive stirred several sugar cubes into hers. Walter sipped his tentatively, his long, knobby fingers forming a complete loop around the cup.

“Is—mmm—is there Matchstick Mallow in this?” he asked.

Mrs. Dewey’s little pink smile widened. “Very good,” she said. “You must know your infusions.”

Walter shook his head. “No,” he said. “No. I don’t. I just—I just read a lot.”

Olive took a drink of her tea. She thought she could feel her heart beating a bit more solidly, the slump of her spine starting to straighten. It could have used a few more sugar cubes, but the tea was making her feel a bit braver, anyway.

“Mrs. Dewey?” she asked, reaching for another slice of Mrs. Dewey’s frosted pound cake.

“Yes, Olive?”

“The thing that Delora said—about removing the root of the power?”

Mrs. Dewey’s face tightened. “Yes?”

“Why shouldn’t we try it?”

“Because, Olive, that sort of magic is precisely the things that the S.M.U.D.S. hopes to stamp out. It’s dark, dangerous, nasty stuff. And it has the potential to go dangerously, nastily wrong.”

“But what if it went
right
?” Olive persisted. “We might be able to get rid of Annabelle and Aldous and get my parents back all at the same time!”

Mrs. Dewey picked up a crumb that had landed near Olive’s elbow. “Just because it takes time and skill to bake a cake, should we give up on baking cakes completely?” Mrs. Dewey asked. “Should we eat raw eggs and spoonfuls of flour and sugar instead? Should we just put birthday candles in a stick of butter?”

“. . . No,” said Olive, biting into her third slice and thinking of how sad a world without cakes would be.

“The same things are needed here,” said Mrs. Dewey. “Time and skill.”

“Okay.” Olive took a gulp of tea. “Then what if we just called Annabelle here, right now, and offered her whatever she wants in exchange for my parents?”

Mrs. Dewey looked at Olive sharply. She tugged the teacup out of Olive’s hands. “If we wait for Annabelle to turn up on her own, we’ll have the upper hand. If we seem desperate, it will show her how much power she has.”

Olive thumped her heels impatiently against the legs of her chair. “So what do we do next?”

“Well,” said Mrs. Dewey, setting down her own teacup with a delicate click, “Byron and Delora and I will continue our work together—once I make peace with Delora, that is. She really
is
a gifted messenger, even if she is a flake.” Her eyes shot to the other side of the table. “Don’t tell your aunt I said that, Walter.”