The Strangers

by Jacqueline West

  “Good,” said Olive.

  While Harvey disappeared back into the clutter, Olive rushed toward the nearest corner and tore into a stack of boxes. The first three were filled with a set of fancy china. In the fourth, she found a cache of spidery lace doilies, and in the fifth, she uncovered a stack of old tablecloths, some thick and silky, some as delicate as tissue paper. An idea began to flicker in Olive’s mind.

  As she hauled the tablecloths out of the box, she couldn’t help but picture them draped across the dining table two floors below, with the McMartin family gathered all around. McMartin hands had brushed this lacy tablecloth. These linen napkins had lain in McMartin laps. As though they were used tissues instead of fancy fabrics, Olive dumped the cloths into a heap on the floor. They wouldn’t remind her of the McMartins when she was done with them.

  In one small metal trunk, she uncovered a pair of old driving goggles—the kind people wore when twenty-five miles per hour seemed astonishingly fast—and a pair of leather driving gloves. Olive wriggled her hands into the gloves. She placed the goggles on top of her head. Then she hurried across the floor to look into one of the mirrors, still arranged in the circle where she had left them months ago. Looking back at her from the dusty reflection was a gangly girl in spectacles, with what looked like a pair of bulbous eyes poking out of the top of her head, and two big, brown, claw-like hands.

  “Rraaahhhrrr,” she growled at the mirror. And, all at once, Olive knew just what she was going to be for Halloween.

  With an armload of tablecloths, several wire hangers, some curtain fringe, the goggles and gloves, and an old silk sash, Olive ran back down the attic stairs through the painting and along the hall to her own bedroom. There, she hunkered down for several hours of secret and serious work.

  • • •

  At precisely 4:00 that afternoon, there was a knock at the front door of the old stone house.

  Olive skidded along the slippery wood of the downstairs hall. She stood on her toes to peer through the window. Two brown eyes, blurred by a pair of smudgy glasses, stared back at her.

  Olive gave her wire-hanger wings a last tweak. She pulled down the driving goggles, which she had painted with wisps of flame. Then she yanked open the door.

  “Grrraaaawwwwlllaallllwww!” she roared.

  Rutherford blinked calmly back at her. “Good afternoon.”

  Olive pushed the goggles onto her forehead. Rutherford was dressed in spotless beige slacks and a tweed jacket, with a bow tie knotted snugly under his chin. It was a change from his usual uniform of wrinkly dragon T-shirts, but it certainly didn’t make Olive think of Halloween.

  “Why aren’t you in a costume?” she asked.

  “I am,” said Rutherford. “I’m a medieval historian who teaches at a university, obviously. I’m wearing a blazer.”

  “Oh,” said Olive.

  “And what are you?” Rutherford asked as Olive stepped aside to let him into the hall.

  “I’m a jabberwocky. See?” Olive held up her hands in the old leather gloves, with wooden tent pegs poking through the knuckles. “The claws. The wings.” She pointed one tent peg at her goggles. “The eyes of flame.”

  “And the brown sweat suit with painted squiggles?”

  “They’re supposed to look like scales,” said Olive, shutting the front door. A draft of cool air, spiced by the scent of burning leaves, wafted along the hallway.

  “And what is he supposed to be?” asked Rutherford as a furry green blob tried to slink inconspicuously up the staircase.

  Olive grabbed Horatio before he could skulk out of sight. “He said he didn’t care what he was, so to go with my costume, I made him a mome rath.” She adjusted the plastic pig snout tied around the cat’s face. “Isn’t he perfect?”

  Above the snout, Horatio gave Olive a look that said he would like to see a long, slow bout of food poisoning inflicted on anyone who had ever dressed up her cats for Halloween.

  “And wait until you see the others,” Olive whispered, leading Rutherford across the entryway. “I made Leopold’s costume just the way he requested it. Harvey’s making something for himself. But the surprise turned out best of all.” She glanced along the hallway toward the kitchen, where Mr. and Mrs. Dunwoody were cheerfully dividing their total number of candies among the estimated total of trick-or-treaters. “Let’s get them while my parents are still busy. Come on.”

  Followed by a reluctant Horatio, Olive and Rutherford hustled up to the pink bedroom.

  Olive put on the spectacles and Rutherford held Horatio’s green tail as they climbed through the picture frame and entered the attic.

  A cat the size and color of a miniature panther stood waiting for them at the top of the narrow wooden staircase.

  “Good evening, miss,” said the cat, with a dignified bow. “Good evening, sir.”

  “Good evening, Leopold,” said Rutherford. “From the medals and sash, I would guess that you are portraying a high-ranking military officer, but I am not certain which one.”

  Leopold puffed out his glossy black chest. “The Duke of Wellington,” he replied, in his deepest voice. “At your service.”

  “Ah! Fascinating, although the Napoleonic Wars are beyond my areas of expertise,” said Rutherford, beginning to jiggle excitedly from foot to foot. “My knowledge of anything beyond the sixteenth century is fairly spotty, although I’m an expert on the Middle Ages in Western Europe—Britain and France in particular.”

  “Where is Harvey?” Olive asked, before Rutherford could go on. “Is he ready?”

  “I’m sure he’s planning his grand entrance,” said Horatio.

  On cue, a lumpy shape in a hooded robe shuffled out onto the rafters. It paused beneath a cluster of empty cans that dangled like church bells from the ceiling. With a jump, it grasped the rope that dangled between the cans, setting off a cacophonous clanking that grew louder and louder as it swung back and forth.

  “Sanctuary!” the lump howled. “Sanctuary!”

  “What is that?” Olive asked.

  Horatio let out a sigh. “The Hunchcat of Notre Dame, naturally.”

  Harvey plummeted from the rope to the floor and lumbered toward the others, squinting one eye and dragging one leg. He gave Olive a clumsy bow. “Mademoiselle,” he mumbled.

  “Come along, Quasimodo,” said Horatio, turning back toward the stairs with a sweep of his green tail. “If we want to return home before it gets too dark, we had better be on our way.”

  The upstairs hallway was quiet, with only the distant murmur of Mr. and Mrs. Dunwoody’s voices floating up from below. The silvery lake and the moonlit forest flickered softly in their canvases. All along the hall, glints traveled over the gilded frames, brightening and fading away.

  “All clear, miss,” Leopold murmured as Olive straightened the spectacles on her nose.

  They climbed swiftly into the painting of Linden Street.

  “Fascinating,” Rutherford whispered as they hurried up the row of deserted front yards. “There’s Mr. Fergus’s house. That side must have been entirely remodeled since this painting was completed. And there’s the Butlers’! I wonder why—” Rutherford’s toe bumped an acorn. It skittered a few paces along the deserted street before wheeling back again. “Fascinating!” Rutherford interrupted himself. “I wonder if that acorn would return to its original spot at the same speed no matter how hard I kicked it!”

  Rutherford was still kicking at acorns when they reached the walkway to the tall gray house. On the porch, a boy in a white nightshirt stood with his arms folded, scowling down at them.

  “Happy Halloween, Morton!” called Olive.

  “You look funny,” said Morton.

  “It’s my costume.” Olive approached the porch steps. “We’re all in costumes.”

  Morton’s frown deepened. “What is that supposed to be?” he asked, nod
ding toward Horatio.

  Muttering something inaudible, Horatio attempted to hide himself in a patch of long grass.

  “I’m a jabberwocky, so he’s a mome rath,” said Olive. “See his snout?”

  Morton’s round, pale face turned back toward Olive. “That’s not very scary,” he said. “I thought you were supposed to look scary for Halloween.”

  “You’re going to be the scary one,” said Olive. She pulled Morton’s costume from its hiding spot beneath her sweatshirt.

  Layers of the McMartins’ ancient tablecloths fluttered eerily toward the ground. The delicate sheets were stitched together at the top and tattered at the bottom. Between the layers, Olive had dabbed tiny pictures in glow-in-the-dark paint, so that skeletons and jack-o’-lanterns and monstrous faces flickered through the fabric, like lanterns in a lacy mist.

  “Golly,” Morton breathed. He reached out one finger to touch the costume. “How does it glow like that?”

  “I used glow-in-the-dark paint,” said Olive, smiling proudly. “And if you have this costume covering you up, you can come out with us and do everything we do. You can go trick-or-treating, and walk around the neighborhood, and come to our school carnival, and nobody will notice a thing.”

  Morton’s eyebrows rose. He gave the costume another careful poke.

  “Here,” said Olive. “I’ll help you put it on.”

  “That is very clever,” said Rutherford as Olive made Morton’s eyes meet up with his costume’s eyeholes. “It will keep your painted skin safe from both natural and artificial light, on top of disguising you very effectively. No one will notice how strange you look up close.”

  Morton’s eyes narrowed. “You look strange from far away.”

  “I hate to interrupt this cheery reunion,” said Horatio, “but we ought to be on our way before Olive’s parents notice our absence.” He headed toward the street, muttering grumpily to himself. “. . . Although why you humans have decided to celebrate all that is dark and wicked by dressing up in ridiculous costumes and gorging yourselves on candy is beyond my comprehension.”

  Rutherford darted after the cat. “Well,” he began, “the origins of Halloween, or All Hallows’ Eve, date back to . . .”

  The rest of the group hurried after them.

  In the downstairs entryway, Olive made sure that every inch of Morton’s paint-streaked skin was cloaked by his costume. She tucked the spectacles on their ribbon back inside her collar and glanced around at her friends. A faint flutter, half fear, half excitement, stirred in the bottom of her stomach.

  “Mom! Dad!” she called down the hallway. “We’re leaving!”

  Mr. and Mrs. Dunwoody’s smiling faces appeared around the edge of the kitchen door.

  “Oh, don’t you all look marvelous!” Mrs. Dunwoody exclaimed, bustling closer.

  “Very frightening,” Mr. Dunwoody agreed. “Rutherford, are you supposed to be an IRS agent?”

  “I’m a professor of medieval history,” said Rutherford.

  “Oh, yes, of course,” said Mr. Dunwoody. “The blazer. I should have known.”

  “And this is our friend Morton,” said Olive, gesturing to the hooded ghost. “He lives . . . nearby.”

  “Very nice to meet you, Morton,” said Mrs. Dunwoody.

  The ghost held out a sheet-covered hand.

  “All right, everyone, hold still for a quick photo!” said Mr. Dunwoody, raising the camera. “Move a bit closer together. Morton, turn fifteen degrees to your right. Olive, grab Horatio, would you? He seems to be trying to hide. Now give me your scariest poses. Say ‘supernatural numbers’!”

  “Supernatural numbers!”

  The camera flashed.

  Outside the old stone house, afternoon had dwindled into evening. The porch swing groaned softly on its chains. The ferns whispered to each other like watchful neighbors. Along the street, where the real neighbors usually watched and whispered, smiling pumpkins flickered on stoops, and golden lights glowed through open doorways. A few sparse clusters of children—more children than Olive had ever seen on Linden Street—scurried from door to door. As Olive watched from the top of the porch steps, one group of undersized pirates reached the path to the old stone house. They paused, their eyes traveling across the overgrown lawn to the chilly stone walls and darkly glimmering windows, up and up and up to the black peaks of the rooftops, where the branches of the trees rattled and scratched like skeletal hands.

  The pirates ran away so fast that one of them lost his clip-on earring.

  “Mom and Dad may have overestimated the number of trick-or-treaters they’ll get,” said Olive.

  Morton stood beside her on the porch’s worn floorboards. The breeze made his costume shift and shimmer, the painted faces grinning out at the street before hiding themselves again. His eyes traveled left, toward the upper floors of the old Nivens house—still dark, still gray, and still deserted—that loomed above the lilac hedge.

  “It changed again,” he said. “Last time, it was summer. Everything keeps changing.” He kicked a dry leaf that had landed on the porch floor. It skittered down the steps and caught a rising draft of wind, sailing away over the lawn and out of sight. With the toe of the white sneakers that Olive had lent him, Morton gave the porch railing a kick. His shoe left a smudge that didn’t fade away. Morton let out a laugh. “Let’s go!” he shouted, hopping down the steps.

  “Let’s head to the right, and then loop around and proceed down the street,” said Rutherford, following him. “That way we can visit the greatest number of houses without backtracking.”

  “An excellent stratagem, sir,” said Leopold, striding after, with Harvey shuffling and squinting behind.

  With her toes poised at the edge of the step, Olive felt a shudder twitch through her body. The hair on the back of her neck started to prickle. Suddenly the purplish sky seemed too dark, the air too chilly, the big house behind her too quiet, as if it were holding its breath, waiting for her to go away. She glanced down at Horatio.

  “The house will be safe while we’re gone, won’t it?” she asked.

  “This house is secure, Olive,” Horatio answered. “Spells guard it; protection surrounds it. Besides, everything that Annabelle wants is out here.” Olive swallowed hard as the cat’s green eyes traveled from the spectacle-shaped bump under her collar down to the sidewalk, where Leopold and Harvey were marching and lumbering along. “As long as we all stay together, we should be safe.”

  Olive nodded. “I want Morton to have a real Halloween,” she said. “I’m not going to let the McMartins take one more thing away.” She watched the glowing ghost bounce impatiently up and down on the sidewalk. A little bit of Morton’s excitement seemed to flutter back to her, like a summer breeze winding through a cool autumn night. “Let’s go trick-or-treating!” she said, rushing down the steps with Horatio beside her.

  They wound their way up and down the street, keeping far away from the empty windows of the Nivens house. Mr. Hanniman was giving out candy necklaces. The Butlers had SweeTarts and Skittles. Mr. Fergus was distributing granola bars, but at least they were the kind with chocolate chips. All the neighbors exclaimed over Olive’s creative costume, and Morton’s scary costume, and the cats’ adorable costumes, and then asked what Rutherford was supposed to be.

  “Perhaps I should have carried my encyclopedia of the Middle Ages,” Rutherford said to Olive, after explaining the significance of his blazer for the tenth time.

  “When we’re done, you can have all of my candy, Olive,” said Morton loudly, bumping Rutherford off the sidewalk.

  “Well, we’re not done yet,” said Olive. “Don’t forget about the carnival!”

  “The carnival!” Morton exclaimed, running ahead, with Harvey gallumphing at his heels. “The carnival!”

  Morton’s anticipation was contagious. Olive could feel it fizzing through her like bubb
les in a just-opened bottle of pop, making everything seem lighter. But she couldn’t get careless now, she reminded herself. It was up to her to keep an eye on everyone else. Above them, the purple sky was deepening to black. The moon, like a sliver of sharpened bone, slit the trails of passing clouds. If a living painting was going to creep up on them, now would be its perfect chance—when the night would hide them all, and the familiar houses of Linden Street were dwindling into the distance. Olive cast a glance over her shoulder. For a moment, the rooftop of the old stone house pierced through the net of black-branched trees. Then the group turned a corner, and the last trace of the house disappeared from sight.

  “We just need to stay in busy areas,” said Rutherford. Olive gave a little jump, startled that Rutherford had read her thoughts so clearly. “There are witnesses all around us,” he went on. “We’ll be safe.”

  Rutherford was right. The closer they got to the junior high, the more crowded and noisy the darkening streets became. By the time they reached the last block, they were being carried along on a steady stream of kids in costumes. The cats hissed at a pack of werewolves. Rutherford was smooshed against a glittery red devil. Olive found herself sandwiched between a headless horseman and a tall gray ghoul.

  She glanced up into the ghoul’s tattered hood. Hidden inside was a crumbling pit where a nose should have been, lips that shriveled back from yellowing teeth, and two sagging black sockets with living eyes glimmering in their depths.

  Olive looked quickly away again.

  Ahead of them, the junior high was lit up like a giant brick jack-o’-lantern. Warm yellow light and bursts of music streamed from its open doors. For the first time ever, the sight of school filled Olive with a rush of comfort.

  “Listen, everyone,” she said softly, urging the group into a huddle just outside the front doors. “They don’t usually allow pets inside, so you three cats will have to be careful not to let any grown-ups see you.”

  “Don’t worry, Olive,” Horatio murmured. “We can be discreet. At least, two of us can.” He shot a look at Harvey, who was sweeping a hunchbacked bow to a girl in a Gypsy costume.