The Extraordinary Education of Nicholas Benedict

by Trenton Lee Stewart

  Nicholas told Violet about everything—about his first disappointing trip to Stonetown, about running away after he found out about John, about meeting Mr. Harinton. She knew about the drill, of course, so he passed over this to tell her about the night before, about the realizations that had come to him.

  “You can see I paid a visit on my way back to the Manor,” Nicholas said, indicating the holes in the wall.

  Yes, I noticed those. I figured you must have found nothing or you would have told me immediately.

  “I don’t want to get your hopes up,” Nicholas said, “so let me tell you right off—there isn’t going to be any money coming from the treasure.”

  Violet nodded. She did not seem particularly disappointed. On the contrary, she seemed excited, perhaps because it was clear that Nicholas had solved the mystery and was about to tell her. She had yet to even touch her pie, and her hands kept going to her mouth as if to cover a smile. She actually seemed almost giddy.

  Nicholas wrinkled his brow. “Are you okay, Violet? You’re behaving kind of oddly.”

  Violet rolled her eyes. Quit stalling and tell me what you figured out. Please hurry. You must know the anticipation is killing me.

  And so Nicholas told her. He explained about the two libraries, one of them Mrs. Rothschild’s treasure, the other her secret gift to the public at large. Violet, awed, slowly shook her head as Nicholas spoke. He went on to tell her about his conversation with Mr. Collum and how they had seemed to come to an understanding.

  What about those missing pages? Violet wanted to know. The ones from the diary. Did Mr. Collum not tear them out, after all?

  “He never mentioned them,” Nicholas said, “and I didn’t bring them up. I’m glad that you did, though, because I think I have an answer for that, too. I think the last orphanage director, Mr. Bottoms, is the one who tore them out. I think they were all pages that referred to the observatory.”

  Please explain, and please hurry, Violet signed. She still seemed oddly eager, even though Nicholas had explained the most exciting parts.

  “It’s just a guess,” Nicholas admitted, “but I think it makes sense. Mr. Rothschild wouldn’t have torn the pages out so carelessly, and it seems strange that he never mentions the observatory anywhere in the diary. No, I think Mr. Bottoms found the diary, and I think he searched for the treasure, too, and he kept the diary hidden in that secret bureau drawer, where he could consult it whenever he wished. He kept searching until right before he was arrested, and he tore out those pages in case anyone found the diary.”

  Why? Violet signed with evident impatience.

  “Because Mr. Bottoms stole the telescope and sold it! He needed the money, see, because he had managed things so badly. He probably hoped no one would find out that the observatory even existed.”

  Nicholas paused, reflecting. Violet was about to start signing, when he said, “Do you know what else? I’ll bet Mr. Bottoms discovered the diary right after he became director, and he actually convinced himself that he could find the treasure. That’s what made him so careless and irresponsible with the orphanage funds. He thought he was going to discover riches any day, and the riches would take care of all the problems. But one thing led to another, the situation got worse and worse, he didn’t solve the mystery, and he turned desperate. It’s just like something John said to me on my very first morning at the Manor. He said Mr. Bottoms started out foolish and lazy and ended up foolish and crooked.”

  Thinking of John again, Nicholas lapsed into silence. He had at last become one of those orphans with someone to miss. He had a great deal more sympathy for them now.

  You miss him, Violet signed, reading his mind. She reached forward to fiddle with the lantern, turning the flame low and then up again.

  Nicholas sighed. “Of course I miss him. I sure wish I had that letter he wrote me. But I’m going to write to him soon. I guess you’ll want to write to him, too, won’t you? After I find out his address, I’ll give it to you.”

  Violet didn’t answer. Nicholas wasn’t even sure she had been watching his lips. She seemed fixated on the lantern, once again turning the flame down and then up again. He gestured to get her attention. “What are you doing, Violet? Do you see something wrong with it?”

  Violet shook her head. Finally it’s my turn to be mysterious, she signed.

  Nicholas frowned. “You’re up to something.”

  Yes. I have a surprise for you.

  Nicholas looked at the lantern, and the answer came to him. “You were signaling someone! But who—?” He turned to the doorway in time to see a figure stepping in from the windy darkness.

  “Who do you think, Nick? She was signaling me!”

  It was John.

  Nicholas cried out in astonishment.

  And then he fell asleep.

  When Nicholas opened his eyes, John was still there. It hadn’t been a hallucination, then. He hadn’t been dreaming this whole time. There sat John, eating a slice of blackberry pie, his eyes twinkling in the lantern light. There sat Violet, beaming, tossing her head toward Nicholas to alert John that he’d awakened. Nicholas sat up, and John put down his pie, and the friends embraced.

  “I can’t believe it!” Nicholas said. “How is this possible, John? How are you here?”

  John laughed. “You’re the genius, Nick. You tell me.”

  Frowning, Nicholas considered. John and Violet looked at each other, clearly amused. And suddenly he knew. Wide-eyed, he turned to Violet. “You! You… you asked your parents to adopt John? You’re the family that adopted him?”

  At exactly the same time, John and Violet tapped their noses with their fingers, then pointed them at Nicholas. They were grinning, immensely pleased with themselves. It was obvious that they had planned this response ahead of time.

  Nicholas was so excited he leaped to his feet. “But how did you do that, Violet? How did you convince them? How did you explain how you even knew about John? Surely you didn’t… wait a minute. You did, didn’t you? You had to! You told them about our secret meetings!”

  Yes, Violet signed. I had to. I knew they’d be upset that I’d been sneaking out. But I also knew they’d understand. I told them everything, and they agreed with me that we should adopt John. He needed a family, and he was already my good friend. Why not a brother, too?

  Nicholas laughed with pleasure. “Of course! It’s perfect!” He clapped his hands.

  “That’s what Mr. Collum was being so odd about, Nick.” John grinned and began helping himself to more pie. “Remember our last conversation, when I told you he’d asked me to do some filing, but then when I got to his office, he was on the telephone and sent me away? Remember how I thought they had changed the day of your trip to Stonetown? They were secretly arranging for the Hopefields to visit. Mr. Collum didn’t want you to know about it.”

  “I know he didn’t!” Nicholas cried, bridling at the memory.

  “And he didn’t want me to know about it, either,” John said, “because he knew I’d tell you. He sure is dense when it comes to these things. I couldn’t believe it when Violet told me he’d arranged it that way on purpose. At the time I thought it was just a bad coincidence. I hated not being able to tell you goodbye. I knew I was going to see you again soon, but still, I hated leaving you alone at the Manor.”

  “You wrote me that letter,” Nicholas said. “I appreciated that, even though I didn’t get it.”

  “I know,” John said, shaking his head. “We realized you must not have gotten it after you told Violet that I was gone. From what you told her, you clearly didn’t know what had happened.”

  I kept trying to tell you, Violet signed with a look of exasperation. But you wouldn’t listen!

  Nicholas slapped his forehead. “Back in your bedroom, when you said, ‘What about John?’—I thought you were asking where he was! But you were asking if you should go get him!”

  Violet nodded. He was sleeping just down the hallway. And I thought you knew it.


  “So, what happened to my letter, Nick? Did the Spiders get their hands on it?” John asked. When Nicholas confirmed this, he groaned and said, “I wish Mr. Collum had been more careful with it. If it’s any consolation, you didn’t miss much. I thought he’d tell you who had adopted me, so I just wrote, ‘See you soon, Giant Head.’ I knew you’d understand.”

  “I would have, if only I’d had a chance to read it,” Nicholas said. “For that matter, if Mr. Collum had told me it was the Hopefields who’d adopted you, I’d have known I would see you again, anyway.” He looked wonderingly at Violet. “Obviously, he doesn’t know that we’re friends, and he doesn’t know about our meetings. So you must have convinced your parents to keep all of this a secret. How did you manage that?”

  I begged them, Violet signed. I told them how Mr. Collum has been locking you in a room at night, and about the dunce caps and so on, and they agreed to keep quiet until they learned more. They thought you might not be telling the truth, but for the time being, they trusted my opinion that you were honest and that Mr. Collum is not a very wise man. They understood that you might be punished horribly if he learned about your sneaking out.

  “I’ve backed up everything Violet told them, of course,” John said. “They’re pretty shocked about how things are at the Manor. They’re wondering what they can do about it.”

  “As for that,” Nicholas said, “things are already starting to improve. It’s true Mr. Collum isn’t a wise man, but I’m beginning to think there’s hope for him.” He quickly moved on to his next question—he had so many, he’d have asked them all at the same time if he could. “But Violet, do your parents know that you came here tonight? Did they actually give you permission?”

  Violet shrugged. It really isn’t dangerous, you know. We just had to promise to stick together, to be careful, and to be back before midnight.

  “And we can’t come every night, Nick,” said John with an apologetic look. “Only two or three times a week.”

  But it only has to be this way for a while, Violet signed. Because we’re also going to try to adopt you.

  Nicholas started. “What?”

  We have to straighten out the finances, but we want to do it. The trouble is just that they won’t let an orphan be adopted unless the family has a certain amount of money. It’s a silly rule, but the lawmakers in Stonetown seem to think you can’t be properly cared for otherwise. My parents have some savings, as you know—that’s how they were able to adopt John—but it isn’t enough money to adopt two children, not on its own. If I don’t go to art school, though—

  “Wait, wait, wait,” Nicholas interrupted, waving his hands. “That’s what you were talking about earlier? No, no, that’s not an option. I appreciate it, Violet, but it simply isn’t an option. Art school is your dream! I didn’t crawl through that filthy, scary tunnel a dozen times so I could come live on the farm with you. I did it so you could go to art school next year.”

  But you can’t stay in that awful place. I asked my parents to adopt John as soon as they could because he was so miserable—you told me that yourself—but once we’ve figured out—

  Nicholas interrupted her again. “Please don’t feel bad, Violet. You did exactly what you should have done. And now you absolutely have to go to art school. It’s what I want! Sure, I’d love to be in your family, but Rothschild’s End is where I belong right now. I have a lot of work to do there, work that I want to do. Honestly! I don’t have to live with you to see you, right? The fact that we can all still meet up here makes everything perfect.”

  “What did I tell you, Violet?” John said.

  You said he would insist that I go, Violet signed with a rueful look.

  Nicholas made a bow to John. “I see some of my powers rubbed off on you.”

  But are you sure? Violet signed. Are you absolutely sure?

  “Absolutely, positively,” said Nicholas, and he said it with such conviction and such a reassuring smile that Violet relented.

  It was the most convincing lie he’d ever told. The thought of being in an actual family with Violet and John, with parents who sounded like the best parents imaginable, with silly little sisters to make him laugh—it was almost irresistible. But Nicholas had thought of Violet, how for her parents’ sake she’d insisted that she had a new dream, and her own example shored up his resolve.

  He knew he could be happy at Rothschild’s End if he worked hard enough. He knew many things now that he had not known only a short time earlier. He knew that despite all the good things happening now, John would still miss his parents, and Violet and her family would still miss her brother, and Nicholas would miss having John at the Manor, and when Violet went away to art school, he would miss her, too. And in a year or two, when he had finished all the books in the library and gone away to a university (for this was his plan), Nicholas suspected that he would miss not only John and Violet but some of the other children as well.

  Nothing’s easy, Nicholas thought, sneaking glances at his friends, who were serving themselves more pie. But some things help.

  Grinning with blackberry-stained teeth, John said, “Well, come on, Nick! Aren’t you going to fill me in on the treasure hunt? I see you knocked some holes in the walls. So what’s next?”

  Nicholas and Violet exchanged glances.

  “Treasure?” Nicholas asked with a blank expression. “Oh, yes—the treasure!”

  Don’t toy with him, Violet signed, giving Nicholas a stern look. Tell him.

  “She says to tell you,” Nicholas said. He saluted Violet and sat down. He did not begin right away, however, but savored this last moment before the mystery of the treasure was finally put to rest for all of them. Here they were once again, the three of them sharing secrets in the night, and once again Nicholas felt as if he were on the edge of everything. He knew that he would never forget this moment—that he wouldn’t have forgotten it even if his memory had been less than perfect—and he wished he could stretch it out forever.

  “Well?” John said, and laughed. “Are you going to tell me or not? What are those looks about? Wait, don’t tell me you’ve found it! Have you, Nick? Have you actually found it?”

  Nicholas looked at John. He looked at Violet. And then he grinned, tapped his nose, and pointed.

  Nicholas stepped back from the radio cabinet to look it over. Streaked with grime and draped with cobwebs, it would still need a good cleaning, but it should work—he felt sure he’d fixed the problem. Setting down his tools, he plugged the radio into his bicycle-powered generator, then climbed onto the bicycle and began to pedal furiously. Soon music was streaming out of the cabinet speakers, and Nicholas, satisfied and pleased, whistled along until he was out of breath.

  He would need help moving the cabinet into his “repaired items” corner of the basement (which was already becoming crowded), so for now he left it where it stood and turned his attention to a couple of smaller, portable radios in need of repair. He was in the middle of disassembling the first one when Vern appeared at the top of the stairs. The poor boy looked frightened, as always.

  “Hello there, Vern,” Nicholas called up. When Vern didn’t reply, he sighed and put down his screwdriver. “I assume you have a message for me?”

  Vern cast an anxious glance down the passageway.

  Nicholas could tell that something was afoot. “You’re allowed to speak to me if one of the staff tells you to, remember? The Spiders won’t punish you for that.”

  Vern nodded. In a squeaky voice he said, “Mr. Collum wants you to go and help Mr. Furrow with the… the… I can’t remember what you call it. Your seesaw with the two butter churns.”

  “My teeter-totter butter churner? What, is there a problem with the chain?”

  “I don’t know. It just stopped working right before me and Caroline were about to get our turn on it. I didn’t get a turn on it yesterday, either. And now it’s getting late, and—”

  “Sure, I’ll be right over,” Nicholas said. “Just let me grab some
tools. Don’t worry, you’ll get your churn turn, Vern!”

  Vern started to smile but caught himself. He nodded anxiously and turned as if to go.

  “Oh, say, Vern!” Nicholas called up as he began gathering tools. “Have you given any thought to my suggestion?”

  Vern gulped and shook his head. “I don’t think I can do that, Nicholas.”

  “Well, think about it, will you? Tonight’s the perfect night! Mr. Griese is on duty in the dormitory, and you know how he snores. It’ll be easy for you to sneak out.”

  Vern shook his head more vigorously.

  “All right, suit yourself. But if you change your mind, come on up. I’ll be leaving my room around midnight.”

  Vern nodded. Then shook his head. Then ran off.

  Nicholas smiled to himself. He had been setting up tonight’s project ever since he’d come back from Stonetown two weeks earlier. Two weeks! It was hard to believe so much time had passed. He had been extremely busy helping Mr. Collum put his suggested changes into effect, not to mention serving out his punishments. Luckily, Mr. Collum had seen that the most efficient course was to make Nicholas’s “extra duties” be this repair work in the basement, which he enjoyed tremendously. At any rate, the Spiders had all been doing double duties for their own violations, so there were scarcely any extra chores to be done.

  But Nicholas had not been content with repair work alone. He had cooked up several other projects, too, including the bicycle-powered generator and the teeter-totter butter churner (which had doubled butter production and which everyone enjoyed using), and almost all of them had been a success. He had even managed to help Miss Candace discover “on her own” that she needed spectacles. (She was delighted, though she did find it ironic that although she could see remarkably better now, she couldn’t find her medicine drops anywhere. Her entire supply seemed to have gone missing on the very day she made her trip to the optometrist.)