The Strangers

by Jacqueline West

  Rutherford straightened his smudgy wire-rimmed glasses, looking puzzled. “But isn’t it one of the ingredients used in creating Calling Candles?”

  “Calling Candles? RUTHERFORD DEWEY.” Mrs. Dewey’s voice changed from a flute into a trombone. “I don’t use such items, and I expect you to be wise enough never to use them either,” she added more quietly. “Making such a thing—and using it—takes dark and dangerous magic.”

  “I see,” said Rutherford calmly. He plucked another leaf. “And what do Calling Candles look like?”

  Mrs. Dewey let out a sigh that could have inflated a hot-air balloon.

  “If I can’t identify a Calling Candle, isn’t it possible that I could use one by accident?” Rutherford asked, before Mrs. Dewey could speak. “Like sitting down for a picnic in a patch of Poison Oak?”

  “Rutherford . . .” Mrs. Dewey pressed one hand to her forehead. “Calling Candles are bluish, and have a powdery silver surface, a bit like frost on a windowpane. They can also be used only once, and it’s awfully unlikely that you would happen to find one, light it, and say someone’s name into the flames by accident.” Mrs. Dewey halted. She pressed her lips together and stared down at her grandson. “I’ve told you more than enough. And don’t you even try to read it out of me. You know I can keep you out.” She examined the glass jar. “I believe that’s enough Mallow to last for the winter—unless either of you is expecting to have an especially frightening one.” Mrs. Dewey gave a little start and turned toward Olive, looking as though she’d like to take those words back. “And I’m sure there’s no reason you would,” she added.

  Olive nodded at Mrs. Dewey. But she wasn’t nearly so sure.

  After waving good-bye to Rutherford and his grandmother, Olive headed up the street, hurrying past the deserted gray hulk of the Nivens house before cutting across her own front yard. She ducked under the canopy of cobwebs and clomped onto the porch. Dead ferns whispered from their hanging baskets. The porch swing creaked softly in the breeze. Olive tested the doorknob, making sure it was still locked, before fitting the key into its slot.

  The door opened inward with a groan.

  Olive sniffed the now-familiar scents of dust and wax and old wood, and listened to the silence that washed in to erase the sound of the opening door. Along the hall, dust motes glimmered in a beam of faint sunlight, beckoning her onward. For a moment, Olive felt sure that the house wasn’t just watching her, but recognizing her. With a last deep breath of crisp autumn air, she stepped over the threshold.

  “Hello, Olive,” said a voice from the parlor doorway. Horatio’s wide orange face peered out into the hall.

  “Hello, Horatio,” Olive answered, locking the door behind her again. “Anything strange happen today?”

  “Not a thing. Unless you call Harvey chaining himself to the upstairs banister ‘strange,’ and I no longer do.”

  Olive dropped her backpack to the hardwood floor. “Was he being Hairy Houdini again?”

  “He was.”

  “And did you rescue him?”

  “I did.”

  “Thank you, Horatio.” Olive tossed her jacket over the knobby brass coatrack and headed for the staircase. “I’m going to pay Morton a visit before my parents get home.”

  “An excellent idea,” said Horatio, stepping back into the parlor with a swish of his plumy tail.

  “Oh, by the way,” Olive called over the banister, “what did you mean about us not having to fight alone?”

  Horatio didn’t turn around. “Nice try, Olive.”

  Olive let out a sigh. Then she jogged the rest of the way up the staircase.

  In the upstairs hall, Olive pulled the spectacles out of her collar and settled them on her nose. The paintings along each wall rippled to life. Inside one frame, the silvery lake sent delicate waves toward the shore. In another, bare trees rattled above a moonlit path. In the painting of the Scottish hills, bracken tossed and fluttered like a golden sea.

  Olive remembered the taste of that silvery lake water filling her mouth as the rising waves dragged her under. She remembered the darkness swirling behind those bare trees, rushing down to surround her like a swarm of shadowy insects. She remembered the hole waiting in that golden bracken—the hole that had nearly trapped her until her body turned to paint and she was stuck there, not living, not dying, forever.

  With a shudder, Olive hurried toward the painting of Linden Street.

  The canvas squished around her like a sheet of warm Jell-O. She plunged through the frame, headfirst, and landed with a whump in the misty grass on the other side.

  The Linden Street of a century ago wound its way up the hill before her. The houses along the street were sleepy and silent, but here and there, burning candles bobbed behind lace curtains. The wary eyes of painted neighbors peered out at Olive as she raced by.

  On the sidewalk before one towering gray house, a small boy in a large white nightshirt was waiting. He straightened up as Olive drew nearer.

  “Catch!” he yelled.

  Olive ducked.

  A rock zoomed straight toward the crown of her head. Just before it could smack her, it arced backward and rolled to a stop near the boy’s bare feet.

  “Morton!” Olive shouted. “That was mean!”

  “I told you to catch it,” said Morton.

  “You know I’m not a good catcher!”

  “Yes, but I also knew it would come right back again before it even hit you,” said Morton. “Probably.”

  Olive stalked past Morton and plunked down on his front steps, still scowling.

  Morton wavered on the walkway in front of her. “I didn’t think you were coming today,” he said, after a moment. “I waited and waited.”

  “Keep throwing rocks at my head, and I won’t come at all,” said Olive.

  Morton dug one toe into the ground and twisted from side to side, his tufty white hair turned translucent by the glow of a neighbor’s candle. Olive watched his head droop lower and lower until she thought it might topple him straight to the ground, like a pumpkin on a skinny stem.

  “I’m sorry I was late,” said Olive at last. “I stopped at Mrs. Dewey’s house for a little while.”

  Morton didn’t look at her. “You’ve hardly been here all week.”

  “I’m sorry,” said Olive again. “I had lots of homework. And it was my birthday last weekend, and I’ve been decorating the house for Halloween.”

  From the slump of Morton’s shoulders, Olive could tell that her explanation wasn’t helping. He plopped down on the grass beyond the stoop and wrapped his arms around his knobby knees. “Did you get presents?”

  “Yes.”

  “What did you get?”

  “Rutherford gave me a book about Renaissance paintings. My mom and dad gave me a new coat and some sketchbooks and a locker mirror.”

  “A locker mirror?”

  “A little mirror to hang in my locker at school. The frame is all made out of numbers, and it says ‘Here’s looking at Euclid!’ on the front.”

  Morton frowned. “I don’t get it.”

  “Me neither.”

  Morton rested his chin on his folded arms. “I would have given you a birthday present,” he said.

  For a minute, neither of them spoke. Then Morton said, in a clearer, firmer voice, “When it’s my turn with the spectacles, we should have another birthday party. For you and me. And you should have to give me presents for all the birthdays that I’ve missed.”

  Olive’s heart gave a nervous leap—and it wasn’t at the thought of having to buy Morton dozens of presents. She had promised him that if she didn’t find his parents by the end of November, he could have the spectacles in order to search for them himself. Olive had looked everywhere for some sign of Mary and Harold Nivens. She’d searched the house, she’d explored Elsewhere, she’d even questioned
her neighbors on Linden Street (one of whom had turned out to be a painting herself), but she’d found no promising clues. For a while, Olive had hoped that by re-creating Morton’s parents in Aldous’s magical paints she could sidestep the problem completely. But her portrait of the Nivenses had turned out all wrong—and now, with only one month to go, she was no closer to finding the real Nivenses, either.

  “You know how dangerous it will be, don’t you?” she asked, looking down into Morton’s moon-like face. “Elsewhere is full of things that can hurt you or trap you. And the outside is even worse. You’ll have to keep your skin covered up, so no one figures out the truth about you, and so you don’t get hurt by light, or fire, or—”

  “I’m already trapped in here,” Morton interrupted. “And I’m sick of missing everything. School. And birthdays. And Halloweens.” He hopped to his feet. “I miss everything.”

  Before Olive could reply, Morton charged toward the stoop and started kicking at the porch banisters, his bare feet smacking against the sharp-edged wood. The posts began to splinter.

  “Morton!” Olive jumped up. “Don’t! You’ll hurt yourself!”

  “It doesn’t matter,” said Morton, stopping. The banisters straightened themselves, splinters mending, paint sealing. “Everything just goes back to the way it was.” Morton looked down as a fresh red wound on his foot faded back into unbroken skin. “I don’t like it.”

  Olive stood beside him, her hands shoved uselessly into her pockets. The folded flyer dug its corner into her palm.

  “Morton,” she began, “what if there was a way for you to come out of Elsewhere for a little while?”

  Morton’s head rose.

  “Just for Halloween,” Olive added. “But you would miss one less thing.” She paused, chewing the inside of her lip. “Do you think you would like that?”

  Morton looked up at her, narrowing his eyes. “Do you think I would like it?”

  “Yes. I think so.”

  Morton gave her a knowing nod. “I thought so too.”

  • • •

  Olive had gotten back out of the painting and down the stairs to the kitchen just in time to hear the front door bang.

  “Hello, 12.02-year-old!” called Mr. Dunwoody from the entry.

  “I believe it would be 12.0178, dear,” said Mrs. Dunwoody.

  “I’m rounding up,” said Mr. Dunwoody, striding down the hall and through the kitchen door. He beamed at Olive, who was settled innocently at the table with her worn copy of Alice in Wonderland. “How many times would you say you’ve read that book?”

  “I don’t know,” said Olive. “Maybe thirty?”

  “Wrong!” sang Mr. Dunwoody. “Seventeen. I’ve kept track.”

  Olive slipped a bookmark between the pages and watched her mother set a pot of water on the stovetop. “Um . . . Mom and Dad?” she began. “Remember how I said I wasn’t going to dress up and go out on Halloween this year?”

  “Yes,” prompted her parents.

  “Now I think I will.” Olive rubbed her fingers across Alice in Wonderland’s worn cloth cover. “But I need to come up with a costume, fast.”

  “Let’s see.” Mr. Dunwoody adjusted his glasses. “I’ve got a simple one: You could cut arm and leg holes in a large box, and wear a plant on your head.”

  “What?” said Olive.

  “You would be a square root. Get it?”

  “No,” said Olive.

  “How about Hypatia?” Mrs. Dunwoody suggested, taking a box of pasta from the cabinet. “All you would need is a toga.”

  “Who?” said Olive.

  “Hypatia,” Mrs. Dunwoody repeated. “The first famous woman in mathematics? The last librarian of the library of Alexandria?”

  “I don’t know,” said Olive. “That doesn’t sound very Halloween-y.”

  “You don’t think so?” Mrs. Dunwoody’s eyebrows went up. “She was accused of being a witch and killed by an angry mob.”

  “Oh,” said Olive as the word witch sent a gush of ice water through her stomach. “Maybe.”

  Mrs. Dunwoody turned back to the stove. “Ninety-two . . .” she counted to herself, shaking a stream of pasta shells into the pot. “One hundred and ten. There we are.”

  Mr. Dunwoody, who had been watching the noodles plop into the water, bolted suddenly upright. “Eureka!” he exclaimed. “You could be Archimedes, leaping out of the bath after discovering his principle of displacement! You wouldn’t need a costume at all!” Mr. Dunwoody tapped his chin thoughtfully. “Of course, it might be wiser—if more inaccurate—to wear a towel.”

  “That might be a little too scary,” said Olive.

  “I think it’s a wonderful suggestion, darling,” said Mrs. Dunwoody, patting her husband’s shoulder. “Perhaps you should use it yourself.”

  Olive pictured her father opening the door to a cluster of trick-or-treaters while wearing this particular Halloween costume. If the house itself didn’t scare them away, Mr. Dunwoody in nothing but a bath towel probably would.

  “Thank you,” she said, before her parents could supply any more ideas. “I’ll think of something.”

  Olive hoped she was right. She had to think of something, for Morton’s sake. And she had to think fast.

  3

  THE NEXT MORNING, Olive tore up the stairs with two strawberry waffles still bouncing in her stomach. If she was going to leave the house after dark, she was going to bring protection along—which meant she had a lot of work to do in very little time.

  She raced down the hall into the pink bedroom. The sky outside was too gray and dim to send the usual scattering of sunny spots through the curtains, but the air held its familiar scent of mothballs and dust, along with a whiff of dried flower petals so faint that it was almost an illusion.

  Olive placed the spectacles on her nose and headed for the room’s single large painting: an ancient town somewhere in Italy or Greece, with a huge stone archway guarded by two towering stone soldiers. Olive dove toward the painted arch, feeling the surface of the canvas wriggle around her as she plunged into the tiny entryway beyond.

  There was no light here; nothing but the faintly glowing band that outlined the edges of a door. Olive lunged through the darkness, grasping the doorknob. The door swung open before her with a low, heavy groan, like a very large creature turning over in its sleep.

  A narrow flight of wooden stairs angled upward from the doorway. Olive climbed them gingerly, avoiding the papery corpses of wasps and dehydrated flies that clustered in the corners. At the top of the staircase, Olive paused, blinking around at the cluttered attic. A few streaks of dusty daylight fell through the round windows, scattering shadows everywhere. Antique furniture draped in ghostly white sheets loomed against the walls. Stacks of old steamer trunks towered toward the rafters. Silent clocks, unframed canvases, dead telephones, and one small, battered cannon glinted at Olive from the corners. If there was anywhere in the old stone house to find an interesting Halloween costume, it was here.

  Olive crept toward the center of the room, where Aldous McMartin’s easel stood in its patch of pale sun. Olive had brought the easel back to its place after Annabelle had fled with Aldous’s last painting, and now she noticed that the attic’s other furnishings seemed almost to lean away from it, as if it were some strange, potentially dangerous animal. Its shelf was bare now, its drop cloth gone—and still the sight of the easel, patiently waiting, made the back of Olive’s neck start to prickle. The prickle grew into a chill that stiffened the strands of her hair.

  Olive knew what this meant. She was being watched.

  She whirled around to find herself staring down the length of a cardboard tube, straight into one glittering green eye.

  “Ahoy there, matey,” growled the cat at the other end of the tube. “I spotted ye through my spyglass. Not much escapes the single eye of wily Captain Bla
ckpaw!” The cat leaped away from the hat rack where his “spyglass” was braced, and Olive caught a glimpse of a tiny leather eyepatch and a splotchily colored tail before he bounded off into the rafters.

  “Ahoy, Captain,” Olive called toward the ceiling. “How are things on board ship?”

  “Smooth sailing,” snarled Harvey’s voice from above. “Ye know the old adage: ‘Red sky at night: A sailor’s stoplight. Green sky at dawn: Sailor, sail on!’”

  “Green sky?” Olive repeated.

  Harvey executed a tumbling leap from one rafter to another. “Prepare to set sail for the islands!” he commanded his imaginary crew. “All paws on deck!”

  “Um . . . Harvey? Or Captain Blackpaw?” Olive began, watching the cat dive-bomb a dusty armchair and spring back toward the beams. “I came to ask you something.”

  “Ask away! Ha-HA!” roared Harvey, scampering across the shoulders of an old sewing dummy.

  “Today is Halloween. And I’m going to take Morton out, in disguise, so he doesn’t have to miss it.” Harvey paused, aiming his one un-patched eye in Olive’s direction. “Rutherford is coming along. Leopold and Horatio said they would escort us, so I have to make their costumes too,” Olive went on. “And I wondered—will you come with us? In a costume, I mean?”

  Harvey lost his footing on the sewing dummy. He hit the attic floor with a thump. A moment later, his face reappeared, inching out from beneath a velvet love seat.

  “Will I?” he whispered.

  “That’s what I just asked you.”

  Harvey’s eyes were glazed. “That’s what you just asked me.”

  Olive watched Harvey’s gaze drift worshipfully toward the rafters, as if all the heroes of history and literature were gathered there in invisible feline form.

  “I’ll take that as a yes,” said Olive. “I’m in a big hurry already, so I hope you won’t mind making your own costume. Will you?”

  “Will I?” Harvey echoed, still staring at the ceiling.