by Ellen Potter
Roo stayed in her little cave for hours, watching the river change colors. Each time she thought she would finally come out of hiding, the river kept her rooted, enchanting her as its waves shifted from silver to copper to indigo. Evening approached, and she watched the sun slide down in the sky until it was just a splinter above the dark water. Layers of coral and pink smudged the horizon, peppered by a flock of Canada geese, their gulping barks bouncing off the surface of the river.
It began to grow chilly. Roo stretched her sweatshirt over her knees and huddled for warmth as she stared out at the water, black and silver now and moving gently, like a mind before sleep.
The water hissed suddenly. She remembered how it had reminded her of a snake when she first saw it. It hissed again, louder this time, and Roo lifted her head off her knee, frowning out at the river. There was a shadow moving along the southern edge of the island. It was long and narrow and it glided smoothly, like an alligator.
For the first time that day, Roo poked her head out of the cave. She glanced around quickly, making certain that no one was nearby. Then she crawled out of the cave and stood, stretching her cramped limbs. A cloud had drifted over the crescent moon, making the night so black that Roo had to search the river for some time before she spotted the shadow again. It had glided surprisingly far along the perimeter of the island. It drifted closer and closer to her before finally stopping several yards away. There it stayed, near to the banks, bobbing on the waves. Slowly, Roo approached the thing, making small decisions about it as she went along: It has a round head, a long snout. A bird? Too large for a bird. There, it moved! Some sort of animal?
When she finally reached it she saw that it was not an animal at all. It was a canoe, and sitting inside it was a boy of about fourteen with very pale hair tied back in a short ponytail. By the time she realized who she was looking at, she found that he was staring right back at her.
“You’re that boy,” Roo said, remembering to keep her voice low despite her surprise. “The Faigne.”
The boy smiled at her, as though he were pleased she had heard of him. “You can call me Jack.”
“What are you doing here?” she asked.
“The river took me,” he said. “She was curious about you.”
“That’s not true. You paddled over here, I saw you.”
“I was curious too,” he said simply.
The moon sailed out from behind the clouds. Now she could see the boy more clearly. In the past, Roo had never thought much about boys. They had only ever teased her or called her trailer trash. Certainly she had never thought about the way they looked. But this boy, Jack, was so beautiful that it was alarming. She stared at him, as though his beauty were some sort of trick. He stared back in such a frank, pleased way that it embarrassed her.
“Do you really live on the river?” she asked him, trying to regain her composure.
“That’s right.” He watched her with an easy smile. He seemed to be asking his own questions about Roo without speaking a word, and finding the answers in her face.
“Where’s your family?” she asked.
He gestured vaguely toward the far shores.
“Why don’t you live with them?” Roo asked.
He hesitated, then replied lightly, “I prefer the river.”
But Roo knew better. She knew that unless things were very bad at home, you still would rather be with your family.
Suddenly a black shadow swooped down from the sky. It was a heron, the tip of its tremendous wing skimming the air just above Jack’s head. It gave off a single harsh croak then flew away again.
“Someone’s coming,” Jack said, and with a push of his paddle, his canoe slid away.
Roo ran back into the little cave, squeezed in, and peered out of the opening in time to see Jack’s canoe melt into the black sky and disappear. The wind began to settle. The river seemed to stretch itself out, smoothing out its ripples, and the air grew less chilled. In a moment a pair of legs passed the cave opening. Mrs. Wixton. Roo heard her footsteps stop a few yards away, then they retraced their path past the cave. Soon the house door thumped closed and all was quiet again.
She should go in, she knew she should. But instead she watched the black water late into the night, listening carefully for the hiss of a canoe paddle and the slow flapping of a heron’s wings.
She hadn’t meant to fall asleep, and when she awoke, it was to the sound of a violent downpour. She had no idea what time it was. From the lifting darkness outside, she guessed it was early morning. Five or six o’clock maybe. She poked her head through the cave’s opening to blink out at the rain. It bullied the island with its hard pecks, while thunder roared across the water and lightning flashed in the sky.
Roo glanced up at the house. The lights on the first floor were off. There were no lights on in the east wing and one light in the west wing. Mrs. Wixton was probably in a state of panic by now. Good.
Roo crawled through the opening and made a run for it across the rocks and over the muddy lawn to the front door. Once in her bedroom she sat on her bed and steeled herself for Mrs. Wixton. The old lady would certainly be listening for her in the next room. But when minutes passed and she didn’t appear, Roo stole into the hallway and peered into Mrs. Wixton’s bedroom. It was empty, the blankets on the bed neatly arranged.
The rain was pounding against the windows, but underneath the sound Roo now could hear another one coming from down the hall—the sound of someone crying.
Stupid woman! Roo thought. Ms. Valentine will hear her!
Roo hurried down the hallway, her anger growing by the second.
“Stop it! Stop it, Mrs. Wixton!” she called out as loud as she dared to. “I’m right here!”
She followed the awful bawling into the children’s dormitory. Here it was loudest but when she looked around, she found that the room was empty. There was a sudden, distant drumming sound—a fist against a wall maybe—and the crying changed to shrieks, raw and anguished. It was not Mrs. Wixton who was crying. The voice was too high, too young.
Every so often, people do things that are difficult to explain. Out of the blue, a person might suddenly feel like she should pull back a loose wallboard in her barn only to discover an abandoned litter of kittens hidden there. That morning, as the watery orange sun began to rise, Roo noticed a tiny, guttering light enter the children’s dormitory and dance across the floor. It climbed the far wall, like a spider lit from inside, until it finally settled on the brass latch of a little cabinet door set in the wall. Roo walked up to it, reached out to touch the light, and it was gone. All that was left was her hand on the cabinet latch and the oddest feeling that she should open it.
Chapter 10
Roo unhooked the latch and gave the cabinet door a yank. She thought it felt too heavy for such a small door until she realized that it was actually much larger than it looked. In fact, it was not a cabinet at all, but a door that stretched all the way down to the floor, its edges cleverly concealed in the beadboard wainscoting. As the door opened, cold damp air rushed out, smelling of stone and mold. Inside was a tunnel, neatly hewn out of granite. The ceiling was low but the tunnel was wide, and so long and dark that Roo could not see the end of it.
Roo stepped in, careful to let the door stay slightly ajar. There were gas lamps fastened to the wall, their glass globes shrouded in dust. Whatever this was, it looked as if no one had been there for a very long time. The crying was louder here. The farther Roo walked down the tunnel, the louder the crying became, until it seemed to pulse out of the stone walls. Roo could make out rhythms in the way the voice rose and fell, as if it were saying something, though she could not hear any real words. Finally the crying grew so loud that Roo squinted through the darkness, almost expecting to see the filmy shape of the Yellow Girl emerge in front of her.
Instead, she saw a door. It signaled the end of the tunnel. The pitch of the crying rose, like a question, then stopped. The crying had come from the other side of the door, R
oo was sure of it. Reaching out, her hand closed over the knob and she turned it a little, making it squeal softly. She winced then paused to listen. There was only silence, but she sensed the person on the other side of the door was listening for her too.
Taking a deep breath, she gripped the knob and tried to turn it more. It wouldn’t move. She pushed against the door, but it wouldn’t budge either. It must have been locked from the other side.
“Is someone in there?” Roo whispered. She waited, but there was no answer. Stepping back, she looked around to see if there was another way in. There were no other doors, just solid stone walls all around.
Still, something caught her eye. It was on the wall near the floor, a disc of smooth blackness. Roo walked up to it, then crouched down to get a better look. It was an opening in the wall, perfectly round and so cool to the touch that it must have been lined with metal, though it was too dark to see.
Roo dropped down on all fours and ducked her head inside. She couldn’t see much, so she shimmied her body into the opening, crawling cautiously across the slick, cold metal. A second later she realized her mistake. The metal floor suddenly gave way beneath her, inclining so sharply that she found herself shooting headlong down the slippery tube. It was so surprising that she slid down several yards before she thought to brace herself against the sides, stopping her descent. But this was no good either, since she couldn’t turn around in the tight space and it was too steep to climb back up to the top. She had no choice but to keep going down.
Stretching her fingers out ahead of her, she pressed them against the metal, which enabled her to awkwardly crawl downward. The tube went on and on. She could not see the end of it. Her arms soon grew tired from holding herself back, so she relaxed her hands and let herself slide. She quickly picked up speed and just when she thought she’d better stop herself again, the tunnel angled up slightly, slowing her down.
In a moment, the tunnel walls opened out and she came to a halt on top of a flat metal platform. Cautiously, she rose and looked around. She was in a dark room with a low ceiling canopied with pipes. Wires hung down from some of the walls and there were large metal tanks in the corners.
She was in the basement.
It was then that Roo realized she had just traveled down the “body chute,” the tunnel that the old sanitarium had used to hide its human losses. The thought that she had slid down the same chute as so many dead children, bundled in yellow sheets, made the nape of her neck feel icy.
It was a long, long time ago, Roo told herself. Years and years.
Still, she hurried off the platform and gazed around the dark room, letting her eyes adjust so she could find a way out.
There. Along one of the walls, she could make out the shape of a door. She started toward it, but something ratlike passed close to her feet and made her jump. She never minded snakes or spiders or mice or other things that people were normally afraid of, but rats made her feel queasy. She stared around at the floor, trying to spot it so that it wouldn’t surprise her again. A movement from beside an overturned pail caught her eye, and a black shadow leapt forward. Roo sucked back her breath. But then she recognized the black squirrel. He approached slowly, stopping and starting, as if giving her time to remember who he was.
Roo knelt down and smiled. “Is this where you live? In this nasty basement?”
The squirrel stood up on its haunches, its bright eyes trained on her for a few seconds. Then it dropped down to all fours and scurried away behind a metal panel that stood, floor to ceiling, at one end of the room. The panel had many switches and timers, but there were wires dangling from the back of it that looked as if they had been cut.
Roo waited for the squirrel to return, and when he didn’t she followed him to see where he had gone. The panel, she discovered, had a flight of wooden stairs behind it, and the squirrel was sitting patiently on the third step, waiting. At the sight of her, he darted up the rest of the stairs and slipped through a small hole in the ceiling.
Roo frowned up at the hole, noting that it was, in fact, a gnawed-out bit of a trapdoor, lying flush with the ceiling. Climbing to the top of the steps, Roo put her hand flat on the little door and gave it a small push, expecting it to be locked. To her surprise, the door flipped over on its hinges, and a whoosh of warm, moist air hit her face. The smell was musty and earthy. High above her, she could see the pale early morning sky, making her think that she had found an entrance to the outside. But in a moment, she realized that she was seeing the sky through hundreds of tiny panes of glass shaped in diamonds and forming a clear dome that stretched up as high as the house itself.
Climbing the last step, she hoisted herself out of the basement and gazed around in astonishment. The glass dome enclosed what looked like an ancient, brittle jungle. Dead trees towered up out of the dirt floor. Their branches were thin, many broken and hanging, trapped within the spindly arms of other branches. Thick, ropy vines twisted around the dead trees, climbing up to the very top then tumbling down in thick gray sheets, like grim waterfalls. Clinging to some of the panes on the dome were brown creepers, pressing themselves against the glass as though pleading to be let out. Underfoot, there were spiny bushes and collapsed ferns and limp brown plants, and everything, all of it, was dead.
It was the saddest and most beautiful place Roo had ever seen.
“What happened here?” she whispered.
There was only silence, yet she could feel an answer trying to push out, mute but struggling to be heard. Stepping in farther, she saw a patch of slate gray beneath the undergrowth and found a flagstone footpath. She followed it, nudging away the dead plants that covered it most thickly as she went. The path twisted through the atrium, following the contours of a gentle incline until it ended below a shelf of rock that formed a small cliff. There were smaller rocks alongside the little cliff, and these Roo used as footholds to climb, with some difficulty, to the top of the rock shelf. Beside it stood a large boulder. Roo sat on it and looked down at the ruined garden, at the towering gray trees and the wraithlike tangle of drooping branches.
If there were ghosts in this house, she thought, this is where they would live.
A scratching sound from above startled her. She looked up in time to see a branch on one of the great trees shiver. She did not believe in ghosts, but still she held her breath as she stared at the tree. Its trunk was completely encased by a thick vine that coiled around it, right to the tip of the uppermost branch. And there, on the narrow end of the branch, was the black squirrel. Roo watched as he leapt to another branch and raced across it.
“How can you stand it, being the only living thing in this place?”
It was then that she noticed a patch of leaves on the ground, near one of the atrium walls, which were much darker than the rest—almost black. Sliding off the boulder, she walked to the dark spot and kneeled down to inspect it. To her surprise she found that the leaves were damp. Everything else in the garden was bone dry, yet here…She leaned forward and poked a finger deep into the leaves. The soil was wet too. She gazed around, looking for the water source, finally finding it when she glanced up. There was a broken pane on the dome, close to the edge. The morning light was growing brighter now, and the rain had stopped, but Roo could just make out the path of rivulets, trailing down the wall of the atrium and ending near the patch of damp leaves. She raked the thick layer of leaves to one side and yanked up the dead grass beneath it, exposing a patch of bare soil. With the sun beating down on the damp spot, maybe something could grow there.
She squinted up at the ceiling, searching for other broken panes, and found several more. It was all the encouragement she needed. Roo went to work, tugging at the dead grass and plants around the damp spots, gathering up the dried leaves and piling them in a corner. The black squirrel inched up to her once, to see what she was doing. He came so close that she could have reached out and stroked his fur, but Roo was so busy working that she hardly noticed him.
She worked for hours u
ntil she was drenched with sweat, and so thirsty that her throat stung. Finally, she sat back on her heels, exhausted but happy. The sun was pouring into the atrium now, bathing the garden in pale light. The little plots of bare dark earth looked so promising that she leaned down, put her ear to the ground, and listened.
Astonishingly, she heard nothing at all.
That had never happened before. Even in the crawl space under the trailer, in the middle of winter, she could hear life beneath the soil; it was a languid, subtle sound, but it was there.
In this garden, though, there was only silence. It was the nothingness of death. Frighteningly permanent. The garden had been erased from the world, in the same way that her father had been erased, extinguishing everything that he was—the good and the bad.
Once more she pressed her ear to the earth. Concentrating fiercely, her sensitive ears strained to hear a sound, the smallest sound. She stayed that way for a long time, motionless, eyes closed. Then, after many minutes, she thought she heard something. It was weak and frayed around the edges, and it came and went, like shallow, feverish breathing. Sometimes it fell silent for so long, Roo thought it had stopped altogether. But after a while it would start again, struggling. So fragile, so almost-not-there.
“Stay alive,” Roo pleaded.
Chapter 11
It was late morning when Roo finally left the garden. The door that led outside was badly warped and stuck tight, but with some effort she managed to budge it. A thick covering of ivy pulled away from the house as the door opened. Now she could see why she had never noticed the door before; the vines had grown so thickly over this side of the house that it had completely concealed it. This was the back of the house, too, where the space between the banks and the house itself was so narrow, and the drop so precipitous, that Roo hadn’t spent much time there.