Henry & Eva and the Famous People Ghosts

by Andrea Portes

  Henry took one look at it and started crying. He was five. He’s always been what we call “sensitive.” I think it’s something about all those neurons buzzing around in his brain, like he can pick up the signals of all God’s creatures. Feel for them. Empathize with them. Just be in their place. Just be them.

  And in that moment, the moment of seeing the menagerie of killed animals, it was as if Henry experienced the pain and sadness of not just the animals before us, but the animals left behind. The mother cub, the pack, the baby gazelle now orphaned.

  And I remember Uncle Claude being confused by this little display. Dumbfounded. He actually thought “the kids” would love it. Like we’d think it was a sort of zoo-meets-museum and climb aboard. He had no idea who he was dealing with. Just like he had no idea who he was dealing with later when he asked if Henry wanted to come out and wait in a blind all day while he was going to shoot deer.

  Shoot. Deer.

  I mean, first of all, Henry. And second of all, Henry would never do anything to a deer except maybe try to make friends with it by using a soft calming voice and an app he specially designed to speak Deerish, or whatever you want to call their particular language.

  So, that was a hard no on shooting deer.

  But I remember the way Uncle Claude and his friends got all gussied up for the shooting—uh, hunting. In camo outfits and funny hats. As if it mattered. I mean, they were just going to be sitting in a blind, which, true to its name, like obscures everything about you from sight. The way they were dressed, you’d think these guys were going to liberate a country. But nope, just sitting in a tin box sort of suspended in the air, waiting for the poor deer to come by and eat the deer food laid out for them. Then shoot them.

  Pretty noble.

  My mother and father just sat there on the back deck, squiggly mouth smiles on both of them. It’s a relief that Henry had no desire to go, because cats would have sprouted wings before my mother let that happen. Dogs would have jumped over the moon.

  But here, on my way down to the New Kingdom Egyptian statues, I listen to the sounds of the guards raising their voices, some kind of a struggle, a loud crash, and then more pandemonium. And I hope to God Henry and Zeb aren’t sitting ducks underneath a blind.

  6

  THE PROTECTOR OF the sun god statues are supposed to be facing out over the gardens, which is exactly the opposite of where I am. The only direct way is straight through the castle, and I think we all know that’s a really bad idea.

  So, again, it’s back to navigating this maze while walking on eggshells, trying not to get caught by the Midwestern Mastermind and his dastardly crew of illiterate guards.

  I am managing just fine, slithering my way through the servants’ quarters, downstairs from all the commotion, when I look over and see, through a tiny window, a row of trucks like an army battalion being loaded in with precious art. Said art, FYI, is being handled the way most people would treat a potato sack. I mean, are these guys mindless or what? What good is it to steal irreplaceable artifacts and bazillion-dollar paintings if you break them apart on the way?

  Apparently, I’m not the only one who feels that way, because despite the driving rain I see the Midwestern Mastermind’s skinny, hunched-over body come barreling out of the side entrance, gesticulating wildly with his hands. I have a pretty good idea what he’s saying, and I bet if he were in school he’d get in trouble for some of his word choices.

  The minions just stand there, taking in his harangue and nodding, until he gives them a final piece of mind and storms away. At which point, they all look at one another and shrug, then go back to doing it the exact same way.

  Poor Midwestern Mastermind.

  He should have hired some more artistically inclined criminals. French criminals, for instance. Or Italian ones. Now, that would make the whole thing much more chic! But no, he hired Tweedledee and Tweedledumber and the rest of their tweedly crew.

  Poor Midwestern Mastermind? What am I talking about? The Midwestern Mastermind is the one trying to “take out” my kid brother and his new BFF. I must be losing my mind in all this chaos. They’ll find me one day in the attic of the castle, my hair wild and frazzled, missing teeth, with a thousand cats who I’ve all named RumpleMeowskins. RumpleMeowskins Number One. RumpleMeowskins Number Two . . . all the way up to a thousand. I will survive on a diet of berries and rainwater.

  By the time I actually make my way down to the Egyptian statues, the rain is coming down in buckets again. As if the angels themselves are just gleefully throwing down pail after pail of water from the heavens, mad with holy power. I debate whether to stand right next to the statues or to stand nearby.

  Pros of standing next to the statues: Can be seen by Henry. Cons of standing next to the statues: Can be seen by the Midwestern Mastermind and his motley crew.

  Okay, the best thing to do is stand nearby and look for a sign. But what if Henry and Zeb are standing by looking for a sign? And then we are all just hiding, standing around looking for a sign and not seeing one another.

  I know. A bird sound.

  A bird sound is definitely in order.

  “KAW-KAW!”

  The sound throws itself out into the rain, muddled by all the raindrops.

  I sit there, waiting for a reply. . . .

  Nothing.

  Okay, maybe a different bird. Like an eagle.

  “KAH-wa-wa-wa. KAH-wa-wa-wa.”

  Okay, my eagle call definitely leaves something to be desired. I resolve to work on it.

  I listen, waiting for the reply.

  Again, nothing.

  Sigh. What am I thinking? Henry is clearly waiting for a more obvious sign. I need a bird that’s not indigenous to the Northern California coastal area. One that will stick out in his mind.

  Okay, what about a prairie warbler? That’s distinctive. And Henry will know it’s not an actual bird but a fake bird and, therefore, me. If you’re wondering how we know all these bird sounds, see: Our dad. Environmentalists generally cannot get enough of nature, hikes, recognizing birds by their calls, and even recognizing animals by their “droppings.” I know, gross.

  Okay, let’s try the prairie warbler, shall we? It’s a little whistle that crescendos, getting fast, and then stops.

  “Chirp. Chirp. Chirp chirp chirp chirp chirp.”

  I listen.

  “Chirp. Chirp. Chirp chirp chirp chirp chirp.”

  And again.

  Nothing.

  Epic fail! They are not even here! Or anywhere around! And I am standing out here in the pouring rain whistling to myself like an idiot.

  But then I hear it.

  Across the gardens.

  “Chirp. Chirp. Chirp chirp chirp chirp chirp.”

  Oh my God, it’s him. It’s Henry.

  I chirp back.

  “Chirp. Chirp. Chirp chirp chirp chirp chirp.”

  And now he chirps back, getting closer.

  “Chirp. Chirp. Chirp chirp chirp chirp chirp.”

  I can see some rustling movements through the gardens, the foliage swaying this way and that. I decide to quit chirping while they find me, as a safety precaution in case the criminals are nearby.

  “Eva!” A whisper, elated. Henry peeks out of the foliage. “Oh, what a relief! We were quite worried.”

  And now Zeb peeks out from behind a shrub. “Whistle codes. I can’t believe it. You guys are so cool.”

  Henry and I grab each other, hugging. Usually we avoid such displays but I think we can all agree there is nothing usual about today.

  “Henry,” I whisper during our hug, “I saw the ghosts!”

  Henry frowns. “Which ghosts?”

  But now the hug is done. So I try to talk out of the side of my mouth so Zeb can’t hear. “You know, our ghosts?”

  Zeb’s mouth twists in confusion. “You guys have ghosts?”

  Henry and I share a glance. Henry shrugs as if to say, go ahead.

  I take a deep breath, then explain. “They’re our anc
estors. From the 1800s. We didn’t go looking for them. They just kind of showed up. And kept showing up. At the weirdest times. They’d be kind of annoying if they weren’t sort of hilarious.”

  Zeb turns to Henry. “Um, do you think maybe your sister drank the adult punch?”

  But Henry steps forward. “Beaumont? And Plum? And—”

  “Yes, yes, and August and Sturdy and even Maxine. All of them. They came out of the paintings on the ceiling and then morphed in front of me. It was August and Sturdy’s idea and, apparently, they wanted a real showstopper.”

  Zeb looks at me, concerned. “Hold up. Are we talking actual ghosts here?”

  Henry turns to him. “Yes. People who were once alive and now inhabit the spectral plane. I know it sounds crazy but—”

  “There’s no time to explain it now, Henry. We have to go! They said there are spirits all over this place. Spirits that will help us. Spirits that we can summon—”

  “Okay, we’re summoning spirits now. Maybe we could summon some aliens, too? Also some french fries, because I am starving,” Zeb jokes.

  “I’m serious, Zeb. Henry, we have to go under the chapel. That’s where they said we’ll find them.”

  “Underneath the chapel? Are there catacombs? A sarcophagus, possibly?”

  “Whatever it is, we have to go!” I urge him.

  Zeb steps forward. “Catacombs? Sarcophagi? I’m not exactly sure what is happening right now but I am so down with it. Let’s go!”

  Henry and I look at him.

  Zeb is truly one of a kind.

  “All right,” Henry begins, “we have to determine how to get underneath the castle without alerting this band of criminals.”

  “I call them the tweedles. Because they’re Tweedledee and Tweedledumber. And they have a criminal mastermind telling them all what to do. A Midwestern mastermind. Sometimes I just call him MM.”

  “I love M&M’s,” Zeb says, wistfully.

  Henry and I both look at him.

  He shrugs. “What? I said I was hungry.”

  But Henry is already on his way. “Come on. There must be a back stairwell.”

  Zeb and I look at each other, following Henry through the maze of rosebushes, heading out toward the chapel in the rain. It hasn’t let up. Good news and bad news.

  Good news: This merry band of tweedles might get stuck in the mud. Bad news: the roads are still closed.

  No one is coming to help. It’s still up to us.

  7

  AFTER ABOUT TEN minutes of looking for a back entrance to the chapel, Zeb sits down on a stone bench in front of a wall of ivy. Henry and I are trying to decipher a tourist map of the grounds but it’s a faded one we grabbed out of the garbage, with at least two coffee spills and about five crinkles. Still, better than nothing.

  “Look at this. So cool.” Zeb is admiring an insignia on the bench depicting Hades and a group of shrouded figures passing over the river Styx, a grim reaper at the helm, his skull barely perceptible behind his robe. “See, they’ve even engraved the coins to pay for passage to the underworld.”

  “It’s a triptych,” Henry tells him, “showing each part of the journey: real world, Styx, the underworld.”

  Henry and I rebury our heads in the map. Then we hear him.

  “Uh, guys?”

  “Zeb, we’re kind of concentrating over here.”

  “Yeah, cool, but, guys?”

  “Just a second.” I try not to sound annoyed.

  “All right, well, I kind of just touched these gold coins in this picture and then this wall just kind of, um, opened,” Zeb says, cool as a cucumber.

  Henry and I both look up from our map.

  And, indeed, the ivy wall behind the bench has opened up to reveal what looks like a long and winding corridor into darkness.

  Gulp.

  “Sort of looks like it could go . . . under the chapel, yeah?” Zeb ponders.

  “Uh, yeah.” I look at Henry.

  Henry beams like the sun. “Well done, mon amie!”

  The three of us hesitate a bit at the foot of the entrance.

  “We’re all still really into this, right? Like we’re totally gonna do this?” Zeb asks.

  The air from the passageway is colder than the rest of the castle. It swirls around our ankles, seeming to pool there.

  “Uhhh. Yeah,” I mumble.

  “N-no choice,” Henry stutters. “This must be the way.”

  He steps into the opening. Zeb and I follow behind.

  We tiptoe together into the passageway, then, about twenty feet in, we hear the sound of something squeaking and then latching.

  “What was that?” Henry turns.

  Zeb takes a few steps back. Turns around.

  “Uh. Well, I don’t think we should panic or anything but, um . . . that viney secret-passageway door we went through . . . just closed.”

  8

  AT THE NEWS of the closed passage behind us, Henry and I stand, frozen.

  Zeb tries to make it better. “I do feel like there’s a bright side here.”

  “And what is that?” I ask.

  “Well, I mean, there could be like flying zombies in here, so, right there we’re ahead of the game.”

  Flying zombies.

  “And look—there’s some light ahead.” He jogs several feet in front of us and stops at a fixture casting a weak glow into its immediate vicinity. Several more line the wall of the corridor. “Sconces! I mean, without sconces it would be pitch-black in here. So I would definitely put that in the positive column,” Zeb assures.

  “He’s right,” Henry admits. “Let’s think about this for a second. Our ancestor ghosts advised us to search here. Under the chapel. It’s not logical they would send us into danger.”

  I think about it. “That’s true. So, let’s just keep going and see where this leads.”

  The passageway winds down in a swirl, farther and farther underground in a circular slope.

  Zeb chuckles. “I kind of wish I had my skateboard.”

  Henry interrupts him. “Shh. Listen, above. Do you hear that, Eva?”

  The three of us stop.

  Up above we can hear the sound of the tweedle thugs barking out orders at the wedding guests, who are now technically hostages, but I can’t bear to call them that.

  “Lady, I said it once. Don’t make me say it again. If you just calm down, stay still, you’ll get out of here alive. Get it?” This is also not a California accent.

  “How can we even hear them?” Zeb asks, craning his head upward.

  “There must be some sort of ventilation system.”

  BANG.

  The three of us freeze.

  BANG. BANG.

  All of us staring at one another.

  We hear the frantic voices of the wedding guests. A commotion and a flurry of activity.

  “Make sense now, ladies?” The tweedle speaks, puffed up on power.

  Was that a . . . gun?

  “We have to help them.” I look at Henry.

  “We are helping. Let’s just hurry.” Henry bounds down the passage, double speed.

  I follow, Zeb close behind me.

  “Again,” he says, “it’d be a really good time to have a skateboard.”

  9

  AFTER WHAT SEEMS like a thousand years, we arrive at the bottom of the passageway, which is like an underground cave.

  Henry and Zeb are inspecting the walls, which almost seem a bit damp in the musty cold of the underground cavern.

  “Whoa. Check this out.” Zeb turns to us.

  Henry and I inspect the wall where Zeb is looking. There is writing.

  “Is that Spanish? Kind of looks like Spanish.” Zeb squints.

  “It’s Latin.” Henry squints at the letters, carved like some old graffiti in the side of the cavern. Pigeon scratches:

  “fabulae non morietur

  potest somnus solum legendas”

  Zeb and I are both sounding it out, probably butchering it.

&nbs
p; “Fab—u-lay. Non. Mori—eter. Po-test Some-nus. Sooo-lum. Legend-us.”

  Henry figures it out. Of course:

  “Legends cannot die.

  Legends can only sleep.”

  He turns to us. We both look back at him.

  “Kind of sounds like something you’d hear them saying on, like, that E! channel or something. You know?” And Zeb is right.

  “Well, maybe we’re supposed to say it or something,” I suggest. “Maybe it’s an incantation. So if we say it, something will happen.”

  “You mean like a door will open so we can get out of here?” Zeb asks.

  “Or, perhaps the ghosts we were promised will finally arrive,” Henry suggests.

  “That would be sick!” Zeb grins excitedly.

  “Right,” I say. “So perhaps we should all say it together. In tandem.”

  Zeb nods. “Okay, one, two, three!”

  “Fabulae non morietur potest somnus solum legendas!”

  We all say it in synchronicity, expectant and loud.

  Then we listen, possibly waiting for a puff of smoke, a tremor in the earth, or perhaps a giant boulder rolling toward us.

  Nothing.

  No. Thing.

  Just exactly as it was before.

  Not even a shift in the air.

  We look at one another, each of us feeling rather stupid.

  “Well, that was anticlimactic,” Henry admits.

  “Maybe we should have had wands or something . . . ?” Zeb says.

  I fold my arms. “This isn’t Hogwarts.”

  Zeb shrugs. “You’re the one who was talking about family ghosts or whatever.”

  The three of us stand there, at a loss for words.

  Our sullen silence is interrupted, however, when we hear a distinct voice echoing down the chamber.

  “You ever find those stupid kids?”

  I’d know that voice anywhere.

  The Midwestern Mastermind.

  In pursuit.

  Of us!

  10

  WHEREVER THE VOICE is coming from, it’s not the direction we took. However, the Midwestern Mastermind’s voice is definitely getting closer.