by Greg Cox
“Hickory, dickory, dock,” she recited. “What does that even mean, anyway? Are they just nonsense words or some sort of code?” Anxious to solve the mystery, she brainstormed fiercely. “Hickory, dickory, dock abbreviates to H-D-D, and if we replace each letter with the corresponding number of the alphabetical sequence that gives us 7-4-4, or seven hundred and forty-four, which is the sum of four consecutive prime numbers … or am I overthinking this?”
“Maybe a little,” Cole said.
“Okay, back to square one,” she said. “Hickory, dickory, dock, the mouse ran up the clock.” She drew nearer to the grandfather clock. “What if that wasn’t just referring to the clock tower, but a clock in the tower?”
“Like that one?” Cole strolled over to examine it as well. “How’s the rest of the rhyme go? ‘The clock struck one, the mouse did run,’ etcetera.” He contemplated the unmoving hands on the clock face. “This dinosaur isn’t striking one anytime soon.”
“You’re right. This clock hasn’t moved past midnight in decades, if it ever did at all.” Cassandra’s eyes narrowed suspiciously. “Let’s remedy that, why don’t we?”
Holding her breath, she reached out and moved the hour hand from twelve to one. At first nothing happened, and Cassandra feared that she had jumped to the wrong conclusion; then rusty hinges squeaked like a startled mouse, and a wooden panel slid open beneath the clock face revealing a hidden niche nestled in the trunk of the clock. Twin flashlight beams converged on the concealed hiding place, which was found to contain a single hardcover book.
“Hot damn, little—”
She shot him a warning look.
“I mean, Cassandra,” he corrected himself. “Remind me to ring you the next time I misplace my car keys!”
“Well, this is my job.” She rescued the book from the clock and lifted it up to read the title on the front cover:
Mother Goose’s Melodies. Volume Three of Three.
“Mission accomplished,” she said with relief. This was one part of the spell book that wouldn’t be ending up in Mother Goose’s clutches. “Now I believe I said something before about not sticking around longer than necessary?”
“That was the plan,” Cole confirmed. “Let’s get the hell out of the Hell Room.”
“My thoughts exactly.”
Cassandra tucked the book under her arm as they started for the real exit, as opposed to the suicide door. They only got a few steps, however, before the trick door slammed open behind them, causing them to spin around in surprise. Cassandra’s eyes widened and her jaw dropped.
“Oh no,” she whispered.
Mother Goose stood framed in the open doorway, cackling jubilantly. A cold wind rustled her shawl and skirts. A gnarled wooden cane rested on the floor before her, as though the old woman had just dropped it. Cassandra had not yet met Mother Goose in the flesh, but she recognized her at once from the storybooks.
“Who the—?” Cole blurted. “How?”
Good question, Cassandra thought. Peering past the crone, she looked for Mother Goose’s gander but caught no glimpse of it in the open air beyond. So how exactly had Mother Goose reached the tower room by way of the suicide door?
“That’s her?” Cole asked. “Mother Goose?”
“Or a reasonable facsimile thereof.” Cassandra clutched the book to her chest, unwilling to surrender it without a fight. She glared defiantly at the crone. “If you’re here for the book, think again.”
“But you did all the thinking for me, Cassandra,” the older woman said, taunting her. “Well done, my dear. I knew that if anybody could crack this Puzzle House—and find me the last part of my book—it would be you.”
That Mother Goose knew her by name was troubling, and that she seemed to be implying that she already had the other two-thirds of the spell book was even more so, but Cassandra didn’t let that rattle her. “Sorry, I didn’t find this for you.” She nudged Cole toward the door. “Come on, Georgie. We’re leaving.”
“That’s what you think!”
Moving surprisingly quickly for an old woman, Mother Goose sprang forward and snatched the silver candelabra from the table. Her voice rose as she chanted:
Jack be nimble,
Jack be quick,
Jack jump over the candlestick!
With a sudden whoosh, the black candles ignited. Gripping the central column of the candelabra, she pointed it at the open door. Flames sprayed across the room. A wall of fire erupted in the doorway, barring the way to the stairs.
“Jump over that, children, if you dare!”
Cassandra and Cole looked at each other in dismay. Roaring flames stood between them and escape, trapping them in the Hell Room with Mother Goose, who swung the lighted candelabra toward them, brandishing it like a weapon. Cassandra knew a magical flamethrower when she saw one.
“Change your mind about giving me my book,” Mother Goose said menacingly, “or shall we see how high this Jack can jump?”
Cassandra hesitated, torn between the immediate threat and the greater danger of allowing Mother Goose to get the final piece of the spell book. She suspected she knew what Jenkins would advise, but he wasn’t the one facing imminent incineration—and the person responsible for putting Cole in this position in the first place. Her gaze fell upon the scorched chair at the table and she realized she had no choice. Humpty Dumpty was a theoretical threat; George’s life was in danger right this very moment.
“Sorry, universe,” she murmured as she stepped forward and laid the book on the table in front of Mother Goose. “Go ahead. Take it. One Librarian or another will outsmart you in the end; scarier bad guys than you have learned that the hard way.”
“We’ll see about that, dearie.” Mother Goose snatched the book from the table and held it up victoriously. “At last! I am complete again … and nothing is beyond the power of my rhymes!”
Cole looked at Cassandra. “Let me guess. Our goose is cooked?”
“I’m afraid so,” she said. “Sorry.”
Baird would try to disarm Mother Goose somehow, Cassandra assumed, but hand-to-candlestick combat was not exactly her forte. She was trying to calculate some kind of workable solution to the problem when things got … stranger.
“Enough dillydallying,” Mother Goose said, her voice sounding much more hoarse all of a sudden. She hurled the candelabra away from her. “Time to fly away home!”
Feathers sprouted from Mother Goose’s clothes and face as the crone underwent an abrupt metamorphosis. Her craggy face elongated, forming a large beak, which plucked the book from her fingers a heartbeat before they transformed into the wing tips of an enormous goose, albeit one wearing a hat and shawl. Gripping the stolen book tightly in her beak, while a pair of scaly orange feet took hold of the fallen cane, Mother Goosier turned around and took off through the suicide door into the open air. Immense white wings carried her aloft, taking volume three of the spell book with her. A loud honk taunted Cassandra as the goose flew beyond their grasp.
Cole blinked and rubbed his eyes. “Did I really just see that?”
“I’m afraid so.” Cassandra was a little less floored by the transformation, having witnessed equally miraculous things in the past. She ran forward to stamp out the fallen candles. “It could be that her spells are getting more and more powerful, especially now that she has all three parts of her book.”
Just like Prospero grew stronger, she thought, as he reacquired his lost objects of power.
Although she managed to extinguish the burning candles, the fire in the doorway was still blazing—and spreading. The flames ignited the thick black drapes on the walls, threatening to turn the chamber into an inferno. The Hell Room was rapidly living up to its name, which meant that she and Cole had to make a hasty exist if they didn’t want to go the way of the late Mr. Wilshire.
Cole contemplated the wall of flames between them and the stairs. The heat from the blaze drenched his face in perspiration. He took a hesitant step toward the doorway.
“Maybe if w
e make a dash for it…?”
Cassandra doubted they could make it through the fire unscathed. She dragged him toward the other door instead, the one that led to nowhere … yet.
“I may have a better option,” she said, working her phone, “if somebody picks up in time.”
Fortunately, she had the Annex on speed-dial. Even still, she anxiously watched the spreading flames while listening impatiently to the ringing at the other end of the line.
Come on, come on, she thought. We haven’t got all night here.…
Smoke and flames filled the Hell Room, making her grateful for the fresh air blowing in through the suicide door. Any chance of making it through the other doorway had gone up in flames by now, so they had run out of escape routes—unless somebody picked up the damn phone already!
Ring after ring chipped away at her odds of surviving. Then, just as she was starting to fear that she would be shunted to voice mail, Baird’s voice picked up at the other end of the line.
“Cassandra? What’s up?”
“No time to explain!” Cassandra said, coughing through the smoke. “I need you and Jenkins to open the Magic Door now.” She took a moment to visualize a globe, then zeroed in on their exact location in terms of longitude and latitude. “I’m sending you the coordinates … and a photo of the door, too.” She snapped the pic and sent it along with specs. The smoke invaded her throat, making it hard to speak. “Hurry, Eve!—cough—We haven’t got a lot of time.…”
“We?” Baird asked. “What’s happening? You sound terrible.…”
“The Door! Please!”
She lowered the phone and stared expectantly at the open doorway, which still offered nothing but a straight drop to oblivion. Cole was right beside her, backed up to the brink of the drop-off by the encroaching flames. The wind coming through the doorway slowed the flames, even as it fed them as well.
When the wind blows, she thought.
“What’s going on?” Cole asked urgently. “What Magic Door were you talking about?”
She doubted that a stiff breeze could save Cole this time. “Wait and see. Any minute now.…”
Caught between the fire and the fall, she prayed that Baird could get the Magic Door open in time—and in the right place. The Magic Door had gotten more reliable over the years, as she and Jenkins had fine-tuned its targeting mechanism, but it was still only approximately accurate sometimes, and the Wilshire Puzzle House had a lot of doorways to latch on to, sensible and otherwise. She really hoped it found the right door this time, before she and Cole not-so-spontaneously combusted.
“Do we jump?” he asked, peering over the edge. “Don’t tell me we’re jumping.”
“Wait for my signal … and believe in magic.”
The six-legged table had become a bonfire. The grandfather clock was being burned at the stake. The fire was practically licking the trapped pair’s heels when, just in time, a blinding flash of white light illuminated the doorway. Eldritch energy crackled almost as loudly as the flames consuming the chamber.
Thank you, Eve. Cassandra took hold of Cole’s hand. “Now! Jump!”
He balked at the brink. “But—”
“You just saw a woman turn into a goose!”
“Good point.”
Escaping the hungry flames, they leaped through the doorway.…
20
Oregon
… and landed in the Annex.
Cassandra gulped in the slightly musty air of the Library, which tasted wonderful after the suffocating inferno of the Hell Room. Soot and a distinctly smoky aroma still clung to her hair and clothing, which were only slightly singed. Cole gasped beside her, no doubt surprised and relieved to find himself alive and well, as opposed to splattered on the ground outside the crooked house. He let go of her hand.
“Hot damn!” he exclaimed. “That’s some primo magic!”
Baird and Jenkins and the rest of the team were already present, along with two strangers whom Cassandra assumed were the Daughters Goose. Everyone was staring at her and Cole as they made their dramatic entrance, reeking of smoke. A chick in a birdcage, which now occupied the office for some reason, cheeped in excitement.
“Cassandra?” Baird said anxiously. “Is everything all right? You sounded like you were in trouble.”
“Were,” Cassandra stressed. “Not anymore, thanks to you.”
“But what was—?”
“Just a minute.” Cassandra dialed Miami on her phone. “Hello, 911. I’d like to report a fire at the old Wilshire estate.… Oh, you know about that already? The trucks are on their way? Glad to hear it. No, I don’t want to leave my name or number.”
She hung up and put away her phone. She had done her part; it was up to the Miami Fire Department now. She hoped they could save the Puzzle House, but given the mansion’s history of hellfire and brimstone, she wouldn’t be surprised if the house suffered the same fate as the late Ezra Wilshire—that is, reduced to ashes. There would, perhaps, be something fitting about that.
“Sorry,” she said to Baird and the others. “Where were we again?”
“Forget that.” Cole gaped at his new surroundings. “Where the hell are we anyway?”
“Oops, where are my manners?” Cassandra said, sympathizing with his confusion. Mere moments ago, he’d been in a burning clock tower on the other side of the continent. “Welcome to the Library.”
“Oh joy,” Jenkins said, frowning. “Another visitor. I was unaware that this was Bring a Goose to Work Day.” He swept a disapproving gaze over Cole and the other two guests. “If I’d known we were expecting this much company, I would’ve straightened up more. Perhaps ordered some light refreshments?”
His sarcasm was not lost on Cassandra. “Jenkins—”
“Might I remind you all,” he said sharply, “that the Library is not a safe house, let alone a shelter for wayward strays.”
“Hey!” Cole protested. “Who are you calling a stray, Bow Tie?”
“My thoughts exactly,” said the older of the two women, whom Cassandra deduced to be Mary Simon, the children’s librarian from Ohio. “That’s hardly what I call a hospitable attitude, Mr. Jenkins.”
“You tell him, Mary,” added the younger woman, whose English accent pegged her as Dr. Gillian Fell of Northumberland. “I expected better from a man of your obvious breeding and culture.”
“No offense intended, ladies, gentleman,” Jenkins said. “My issue is with certain reckless Librarians, not your good selves.”
“I’m sorry, Jenkins,” Cassandra said, “but I didn’t have any choice. This secret room was on fire and—”
Jenkins wrinkled his nose at the sooty odor emanating from her clothes. “I appreciate the extremity of the situation, Miss Cillian, but the security of the Library is no small matter. This institution is not open to the public for a reason.”
“I’ll vouch for Gillian,” Stone said, standing close enough to her to make Cassandra raise an eyebrow. Something about their body language made her wonder what exactly had gone on between them over in the UK. Certainly, it wouldn’t be the first time Stone had his head turned by a pretty face.
None of my business, Cassandra thought, as long as she doesn’t turn out to be a master assassin like Lamia.…
“And Mary is all right by me,” Ezekiel said, “for a stubborn old lady, that is.”
“I’ll take that remark in the spirit in which I hope it was intended,” Mary Simon said. “But I’ve still got my eye on you, you young scamp.”
“And you can trust George,” Cassandra stated, realizing as she said it that she couldn’t imagine Cole having any ulterior motives. He had been nothing but straight with her all the way through the crooked house. “And I’m guessing that the others had good reasons for bringing their guests to the Library, just like I did.”
“Be that as it may,” Jenkins said, “there is still the matter of security. It’s all very well and good that you each trust your respective charges, but—”
Cas
sandra cringed inside, fearing that he might bring up that one time, back in the beginning, when she had betrayed the Library in a moment of weakness. A great deal of water had flowed under the bridge since then, and she liked to think that she had fully regained her teammate’s trust, but Jenkins had a very long memory.
“—this sets a dangerous precedent,” he concluded, not mentioning her past treachery at all.
Cassandra felt a warm glow of relief. Maybe all was forgiven after all?
“Look, Jenkins.” Stone placed a protective arm around Gillian’s waist. “I get that you’re just trying to protect the Library, and that we’ve been double-crossed before, but Mother Goose has already targeted these people once already. We can’t leave them unprotected while she’s still out there.…”
“Plus, we might need their help,” Cassandra argued. “I couldn’t have found that last part of the book without Cole … even if we weren’t able to hang on to it.”
“Ditto with me and Gillian,” Stone said.
Various eyes turned toward Ezekiel, who shrugged.
“Well, I absolutely could’ve found it on my own,” he insisted, “because I’m just that awesome but, sure, Mary knows her stuff where all this Mother Goose business is concerned.”
“Humility is a virtue, Ezekiel Jones,” she chided him, “but ours was a successful collaboration, at least up until the end.”
“Very well,” Jenkins conceded, surrendering to the inevitable with a world-weary sigh. “You’re the Librarians. Ultimately, it’s your call.” He wagged a finger at them nonetheless. “But let’s not make a habit of it, shall we?”
“That won’t be an issue,” Baird pointed out, “unless we can stop Mother Goose from putting Humpty Dumpty back together again … and unmaking the universe in the process.”
Cole did a double take. “Say what?”
“I may have left that part out,” Cassandra admitted. “Let me try to explain.…”
* * *
“Make no mistake,” Jenkins said, addressing all present. “The situation is dire.”
He stood facing the Librarians, their Guardian, and the three Goose heirs, who were seated at the conference table. Jenkins was still not entirely happy about the visitors’ presence in the Annex, let alone including them in the briefing, but he conceded that they had a stake in the proceedings as well. There was, he reflected, something of precedent in that regard. Past Librarians had worked with Mother Goose and her heirs to resolve previous crises, including the delicate negotiations that resulted in the Treaty of 1918, which had held for nearly a century … until the current unpleasantness put the entire cosmos in jeopardy.