by Gilbert Ford
Mr. Fox swung his head around from the cupboards. “Oh, there she is,” he said. He appeared to be packing boxes with dishes. “Out double-crossing your own kind?”
“I don’t know what you—”
“Silence!” said Madame Destine.
Houdini flapped his wings on Madame Destine’s shoulder.
“John has been getting more phone calls,” said Madame Destine. “Now it’s a woman’s voice. They’re looking for me. Probably have the phone tapped.”
“Who?” Maria asked. She found it hard to believe that Ms. Madigan had tapped her house.
“Don’t play coy with me, Maria. The police!”
Maria knew she should tell her mother about Officer O’Malley questioning her and the bait falling out of her pocket, but she didn’t want to send her mom into a rage. “Are you sure they’re onto your scam? Did they tell you what they want? Maybe it’s about something else. Just talk to them,” said Maria.
“Don’t be foolish. Of course they’re onto the scam!” said Madame Destine. “How else could they deduce that I’m connected with the number?”
“You stupid kid,” said Mr. Fox. “You think you know everything!” He bit off a chunk of duct tape and wrapped it around a box.
Maria knew it was definitely too late to tell her mother about the library newsletter photo. Besides. She’d never believe that the librarian was really after her signature. But Ms. Madigan was hardly a threat. Surely it would all blow over! “I think you’re overreacting,” said Maria.
“Overreacting? A police officer asked to speak to me. We’re gonna have to always be watching our backs now.” Madame Destine sighed, falling into her chair at the table. “Besides, this city has gotten far too expensive to piece together a living from small cons. Now’s as good a time as any to relocate. It’s time to move.”
“We’re moving?” Maria asked. She took in the boxes in the kitchen and Mr. Fox packing. “But why? Where will we go?” Maria tried to imagine living someplace else. Would she be able to see Mrs. Fisher? And what about Sebastian and her library?
“Well, we have two options if we stay: starve on small cons or do jail time. Do you want me to go to jail?” asked Madame Destine.
“Aye!” agreed Mr. Fox. “Your own dear mother.” His lips curled.
Madame Destine crept delicately behind Maria, placing her hands on her shoulders. “What will happen to you if we’re caught, Maria?”
Maria shrugged, but the warmth of her mother’s hands caressed her shoulders, reminding her of the times she had been sick or unhappy and Destine had taken care of her.
“You are a minor, so you are off the hook,” said Madame Destine. “But Fox and I will do time.”
“DO TIME! TIME!” echoed Houdini.
Madame Destine stopped rubbing Maria’s shoulders and placed her hands on the back of her chair. Houdini beat his wings. “Who will take care of you if we’re sent away?” Madame Destine asked in a sweet tone. “Who will be there to cheer you up with an ice cream sundae when things are looking gloomy?” Madame Destine crept around the chair so that their eyes met. “Who will be there to pat you on the back for a job well done when you follow your cues and the con is a success?”
Maria tried to imagine a different life. One without a parent. The thought terrified her. She’d been told about her unstable father, who’d left them penniless before he disappeared when she was a baby. Maria couldn’t lose her mother, too. Her eyes began to well up, but she lifted her chin proudly so she could show her mother that she hadn’t broken her spirit.
“Do you want to be put in foster care?” Madame Destine asked softly, tilting her turban toward Maria. “This life may not be all daisies and buttercups, but you know what? I’ve been true to you in good times and bad.”
Maria trembled. “I don’t want foster care.” She wiped her eyes and sniffed. “Nothing’s gonna happen to us! I swear!”
Madame Destine stared at her daughter intently. “Grow up!” she said, and brushed Maria off with her hand. “I don’t know who you been talking to, or where you’ve been disappearing, but it’s gonna stop!”
Maria didn’t want to leave her library and her familiar sidewalk. She’d miss the tiny closet she’d known for as long as she could remember. And then there were Sebastian upstairs and Mrs. Fisher. She’d miss the widow’s kindness.
“It’s too late to change what’s been done,” Madame Destine said. “We’ve got to move, and it’s all your fault.
“YOUR FAULT! YOUR FAULT!” mimicked Houdini.
Maria backed into some boxes.
Madame Destine smoothed down her dress before she reached for a box. “Don’t think this is all there is,” she said.
Maria took a deep breath and rushed for her closet.
“Double-crossing little…” muttered Mr. Fox.
Maria slammed her door and flung herself onto her dingy mattress. “Edward?” she whispered, her voice trembling. “Please, are you there, Edward?” But the air remained still and stale.
Maria lay in the dark closet and stared at the blob of hanging coats. She realized there was no going back to the way things were. She was in this mess far too deep.
15
Making Contact
The next day, Maria headed to the library. She was going to miss this place when she moved. She scanned the front desk for Ms. Madigan, but she must have been at lunch, which gave Maria time to do her research.
She spread the New York Times, open to the obituaries, and carefully wrote down the names of every person listed. Then she made diagrams of family trees with corresponding fortunes. She needed to have an understanding of who possessed what, and where a fortune might go once a relative had kicked the bucket. Maybe if Maria discovered another con to buy them time, her mom would be less inclined to move. After all, they were in no real danger of being discovered by the authorities.
Maria thought this work quite dull. She drew a face of an elderly woman in the margins of her notebook and gave her glasses like Mrs. Fisher’s and even that plaid cape she’d worn the day Maria followed her home. Maria wondered when she would see her friend again.
She whispered the word friend. It sounded lovely.
She leaned back in her chair. She still needed to visit the Strand to see if there were lost books by the Beat poets. If only Edward would send her another clue! But even if she had an excuse to see Mrs. Fisher, she’d still have to sneak out. Her mother would never let her go.
Maria sensed that she was being watched again. She snapped out of her thoughts and quickly turned in her chair. There, observing her every move, was Sebastian. He was nosier than Ms. Madigan!
“Hey, Sebastian,” Maria said. “You spying?”
“I wasn’t spying on you. I was WATCHING you,” Sebastian said, coming out from behind the bookshelf. “I was trying to figure out why you were reading about dead people in the paper.”
Maria could tell that he was holding something behind his back. She stretched her neck to peer around him, but Sebastian moved with her. “What do you have there?” she asked him.
“I—well, you said not to contact you by phone or by knocking on your door, right?”
Maria nodded.
“Well, you didn’t actually say not to contact you AT ALL, so I brought you one of these.” Sebastian pulled his hands from behind his back and held out a purple-and-green plastic device with a dinosaur on it.
It was a toy, and it was clearly for little kids. Maria rolled her eyes. “Why this?”
“It’s a walkie-talkie,” said Sebastian. He puffed out his chest and flashed his gap-toothed smile.
Maria reluctantly took the light piece of plastic from Sebastian. It resembled a cell phone but had no numbers on it. “How does it work?” she asked.
“You’ve never seen one of these?” Sebastian asked, tilting his head as if he didn’t believe her.
Maria narrowed her eyes. “I’m homeschooled, okay?”
“Okay, okay. I get it now.” Sebastian hel
d up the device. “You switch on the knob to turn up the volume and press the button to speak. Try it.”
Maria pressed the button and said, “Like this?” She heard her voice come out of Sebastian’s walkie-talkie right as she said it. “Wow!”
“Take yours to the other side of the library, and I’ll stand by the door. Let’s see if the reception reaches.” He spun around and ran for the door.
Maria backed into the bookshelves in the far corner of the library. She heard static from her walkie-talkie and Sebastian’s voice flowing through it.
“This is about the distance from me upstairs and you down below. How good is my reception?”
It took Maria a moment to process the enormity of Sebastian’s gift. This was no childish toy! This was a lifeline!
Maria pressed the button on her walkie-talkie and said, “Reception’s good.”
She met Sebastian in the middle of the library, unable to cover her smile. “Where did you get this?” she asked him.
“Oh, it was something I got a few years ago for my birthday. I knew it would come in handy someday.”
Maria cradled the device in her hand like a prize, as if it were the buried treasure in Mrs. Fisher’s apartment. Her eyes met Sebastian’s. “Thanks. Really, thank you.”
Sebastian smiled. “Now you have to let me help you find that treasure.”
“Okay,” she said in barely a whisper, pushing the toy deep inside her pocket. Then, with more confidence, she added, “I’ll contact you as soon as I get another clue!”
“I’ll be waiting for further instruction,” said Sebastian, and gave her a salute.
“Maria! May I have a word with you?”
Maria spun around. Ms. Madigan had returned from her break. Maria’s smile sank. She was so excited about the walkie-talkie, she’d forgotten to keep an eye out for the librarian. She glanced at the exit, but there was no way to speed out of there gracefully. Slowly, Maria nodded. “Sure,” she said, but edged her way to the door.
“I researched your mother’s nonprofit on that business card, and I just wanted to know if everything is … okay at home.” Ms. Madigan kept up with Maria as they moved.
Maria felt sick. She wanted to bolt, but she only responded, “Yes.”
Ms. Madigan hesitated. “I know it is none of my business, but if your mother is in trouble, maybe we can help her look for quality work. The library has services—”
“No!” Maria said, and backed away. Ms. Madigan WAS onto her now. Her mother was right: Maria had exposed them to someone potentially dangerous.
“Yes, Maria, we can.” Ms. Madigan reached out and held Maria’s arm. “I can help her find legitimate employment.”
Maria glared at Ms. Madigan’s hand and kept moving toward the door. “No, Ms. Madigan. We don’t need any help, thank you.” She knew she had to get out of there before she said too much.
Ms. Madigan’s grip tightened. “Maria, I’d like to help you.”
Maria started to tremble. If she told Ms. Madigan everything, her mother would go to jail and Maria would be sent away to foster care. If she said nothing, then Maria would be moving away. Either way she would lose. But at least she would have SOMEONE if she moved with her mom. She looked directly into the librarian’s worried eyes and tore away from her grip. “I have to go, Ms. Madigan!”
Maria pushed through the door to the library.
“Wait! Maria!” she heard the librarian call after her.
Maria ran several blocks before she realized she’d left her research back at the library. She slowly retraced her steps. That notebook carried all the evidence Ms. Madigan would need to prove that Madame Destine was a fraud. She sat on a stoop near the library so she could think. The toy in her pocket dug into her hip.
The toy!
She pulled out the walkie-talkie and pressed down hard on the button.
“Sebastian?” she said. “Are you there?”
She waited for five long seconds before static boomed from her toy. “You left me at the library!”
“Can you grab my notebook I left at my table? I’m just down the block.”
“Sure thing, over and out.”
Maria jumped up from the stoop and waited. Then she saw him: Sebastian clutching her notebook and racing to meet her. Maria couldn’t help but smile and wave.
“Sebastian, have you ever been to the Strand? It’s a bookstore.”
“No,” he said, “but I can look it up on my phone. Why?”
“Remember when the librarian was talking about hard-to-find books by the Beat poets? He said they were valuable?”
“Yeah,” Sebastian said. “So what?”
“I’m just curious how valuable,” she said. “You feel like coming with me to the city?
Sebastian looked at his phone and shrugged. “I still have a few hours before my mom wants me home.”
“Let’s go!” said Maria.
* * *
Maria and Sebastian got off the train at Union Square to a bustling sidewalk of pedestrian traffic. They turned right down Broadway and weaved through street crowds, until they stopped before carts containing used books. The building beside the carts displayed STRAND BOOKS on a red awning.
“This must be the place,” said Maria, before pushing open the door to find herself in a store filled with people and a couple million books. “But where do we start?”
“I’ll check upstairs,” said Sebastian, trailing behind her. “Let me know what you find by walkie-talkie.”
Maria nodded and turned the volume up on the plastic device. Then she weaved her way through the stacks. Most of the books appeared to be new, so she rushed to the basement for the used books. Fiction. Poetry. Psychology.
Suddenly her walkie-talkie buzzed. “Maria. It’s on the third floor. Come on up!”
Five minutes later, Maria and Sebastian stood in the rare book room. It was much quieter and less busy than the main store. The spines of most of the books looked a lot older, too. There were even some behind glass.
A woman with slick black hair took off her glasses and smiled. “Are you two looking for something?”
Maria pursed her lips and tried to make her most serious face. “Yes. We were wondering what makes a book rare.”
“Usually first editions of popular books. Age can be a factor, or even scarcity.”
“What’s the most valuable book you sell?” asked Sebastian before he sneezed.
The woman laughed. “Bless you!”
Sebastian sneezed again. “Sorry! I’m allergic to something in here.”
“That’s okay,” the woman said. “To answer your question, I don’t know, maybe James Joyce’s Ulysses?”
“But how much does it sell for?” asked Maria a little impatient.
The clerk stood up and walked around the desk. “They range in price. Anywhere from ten dollars to a couple of thousand.” Then she turned to Sebastian. “But Ulysses is priced at thirty-eight thousand dollars.”
Sebastian’s mouth fell open. “No way!”
“It’s true,” said the clerk, laughing. “Are you two interested in starting a collection of rare books? We have a first edition Curious George for around four thousand five hundred dollars.”
Maria and Sebastian looked at each other with wide eyes. “No thank you,” said Maria. “Do you have anything by Jack Kerouac that is … really rare?”
The clerk gave Maria a puzzled expression. “Maybe a first edition of Dr. Sax,” she said. “It’s only four hundred fifty dollars, so it’s not super rare.”
“Thank you,” said Maria before turning to Sebastian. “The treasure isn’t gold and silver hidden behind a painting.”
“No?” said Sebastian.
“I think we’re looking for the lost books of the Beat poets. With the price of that James Joyce book? the rarer the better.”
Suddenly Maria thought about Mrs. Fisher’s books in her apartment. If some of them were lost or missing, then Edward’s riddle would make sense. They might even be
worth money. And maybe one of them contained Beat poetry.
* * *
A day later, Maria found herself back at Mrs. Fisher’s apartment with the widow shaking her head. “I’m sorry, Maria. You can go through my books, but I don’t possess anything that could be that valuable.”
Maria browsed through Mrs. Fisher’s books anyway. “But it would make sense. Your husband’s press, the missing Beat poet manuscripts.”
Mrs. Fisher stroked Archimedes’s fur. “My husband’s printing press could have produced some of those works. He stored them in the basement years ago, but he told me he got rid of them when the publishing house folded, just before he died. He was so upset, we never talked about it again.”
“Can we go down there and check?” asked Maria.
“Not without disturbing the tenants on the first floor. Besides, that was years ago!”
Maria hated being at a dead end. If it wasn’t art and it wasn’t rare books, then what else could the treasure be? She hated that Edward wouldn’t just tell her where the treasure was.
The only thing she could do was wait for another clue.
16
The Getaway
A few days after visiting Mrs. Fisher, Maria lay on her bed with her notebook. She could feel the lump of the walkie-talkie hidden under her mattress. It reminded her of a fairy tale she’d read called “The Princess and the Pea,” only in reverse. Here she was penniless but happy to sleep in discomfort. The lump was just a reminder she was no longer alone. She had Edward and Mrs. Fisher—and Sebastian, a kid her own age.
A frosty chill caused the hair to stand up on Maria’s arm. Then she felt a tingling at the back of her neck.
“Edward?” Maria asked while she felt around her mattress for a pen. “Where’ve you been? I’ve been waiting to talk to you!” Maria lined herself up in position over the paper, her pen resting between her knuckles. “Okay, Edward. Talk to me.”
* * *
After ten minutes, Maria opened her eyes and shook her head. She was groggy, but in front of her was a message written in beautiful script: