“I believe you now, Tilly!” Emily cried. “I really do!”
“So can us orphings go on being friends?” asked Tilly.
“Yes, we can!” declared Emily with all her heart. “We really can!” She could hardly wait to tell this good news to Kipper.
She was so taken up with Clarabelle, however, and the startling new revelation about Tilly, it wasn’t until the two of them had left, leaving her once again in the crushing darkness, that the grim question leaped back into her mind. If not Tilly, then who?
THIRTEEN
The Trapdoor
Bong! Bong! Bong! Bong! Bong! Bong! Straining her ears, Emily counted as the gloomy clock, muffled by endless layers of stone walls, knelled the hours into her dark cell. Bong! Bong! Bong! Bong! Bong! Eleven o’clock, and still no sign of Kipper. Of course, he had not arrived until midnight the night before, so there was time yet for him to put in an appearance. Emily shut her eyes tight, thinking that if she could doze off, the time would pass more quickly. Then all at once, her eyes flew back open. Voices! She heard the sound of voices breaking through the heavy silence from somewhere! Emily stiffened, staring wide-eyed into the darkness and listening.
Was somebody coming to see her? Neither Kipper nor Tilly nor Aunt Twice would be likely to let themselves be heard visiting the prisoner at this hour. Who then? It was impossible to tell. Like the clock, the voices were muffled, and they had a curious hollow echo to them. But there was something else quite startling about the voices. They seemed to be coming from somewhere under the floor of the Remembrance Room! Closer and closer drew the voices until they were almost under the bench where Emily lay, and then gradually they began to fade away until at last they disappeared altogether.
Emily shivered. Was the darkness playing tricks on her? How could voices be coming from under a cellar floor? It wasn’t possible! In the end, persuaded that she must have become crazed from being alone in the dark and had imagined the whole thing, she drifted into a restless sleep.
She had no idea what time it had become when she was startled into sudden awakeness by the sound of a key grating in the rusty lock of her cell and then being carefully removed. Ready to feign sleep in a moment, she watched the door open slowly. A brass lantern with the wick turned down low appeared around the door, and right behind it was Kipper!
“Evening, Emily!” he said, calm as a sunny day at the shore, and just as cheerful.
Emily could only stare at him, speechless with happiness and surprise at seeing him right before her in the cell. Fear and the memory of strange voices imagined in the dark suddenly vanished.
“Come now, ain’t you going to say anything? Tuna got your tongue, as Pa always says?” Kipper grinned.
Emily threw her hands to her mouth. “Kipper!”
“Once again, as promised! Come to help you run away, Emily.”
“Run—run away?” stammered Emily.
“That’s right, run away to Pa’s and my place,” said Kipper. “Leastways ’til we could find a safer spot.”
Run away! Emily had never considered the possibility. But now the door to her prison was unlocked, and she could run away. She had a place to run to, which was an enormous consideration, and someone to look after her. Run away—the answer to everything! Or was it?
“I-I can’t,” said Emily.
“Can’t!” Kipper exploded. “Why not, Emily? This place addled your brain already?”
“I don’t think so. It’s just that … just that—”
“Just that what?” Kipper interrupted impatiently. “You best come up with some good explanation, Emily.”
“Well, what do you suppose would happen if I ran away?” said Emily defiantly. “Mrs. Meeching would believe that someone in Sugar Hill Hall had let me out, and who would be punished for it? It could be anyone she chose—poor Aunt Twice, or poor Mrs. Plumly, or even one of the old people. It could be Mrs. Poovey or Mr. Bottle or—or anyone! So I can’t run away, much as I want to. I can’t, Kipper!”
Kipper scratched an ear. “Guess I never thought
’bout any o’ that, Emily. But you’re right, I’m blessed if you ain’t. Danged snake lady! Well,” he said with a deep sigh, “ain’t much left to say excepting I will come see you as often as I can.”
Emily struggled to keep a solemn face. “Someone else will be coming to see me often too.”
“I expect you mean Tilly, who’ll be bringing you your lumps o’ bread and some o’ the other outstanding Sugar Hill Hall wictuals,” said Kipper. “I guess you ain’t going to be too happy ’bout seeing her, for more’n one reason.”
“For your information, I will be happy to see Tilly. Now what do you make of that?” Emily could no longer keep the happy smile from her face.
“What I make of it is that you’re just as addled as you can be,” replied Kipper. “What’s Tilly done now, repent o’ her wicked deeds?”
“It’s what Tilly hasn’t done, Kipper!” cried Emily. “She hasn’t drowned Clarabelle!”
Kipper stared at Emily as if he’d been struck by lightning but hadn’t fallen over yet.
“It’s true,” said Emily. “She brought Clarabelle to show me last night after you’d gone. That’s the someone else I meant—not just Tilly, but Tilly and Clarabelle!”
Kipper finally blinked. “Well, I’ll be a beached barnacle, as Pa always says!”
It was a long while before everything that could be said had been said about this wonderful news. But not until the subject of who had done the terrible deed of telling, if not Tilly, had been thoroughly, although unsuccessfully explored, did Emily finally remember something.
“Kipper!” she gasped. “I forgot to ask you—how did you get the key to the lock?”
Kipper grinned wryly. “I was commencing to think as how you never would ask! Mind if I take a seat?”
“Please!” said Emily.
They both perched on the hard bench with Kipper’s little lantern between them, and he told his story.
“Happens on my way out last night, I get this sudden notion, so I hightail it right into the kitchen and pick me up a lump o’ bread from the basket. I pour a dab o’ water over it and mux it up real good ’till it’s like a hunk o’ clay. Then off I go with it to the snake lady’s room.”
“You didn’t!” exclaimed Emily. She was already turning all goose bumps.
“I did!” said Kipper. “First I look, and there ain’t any light coming from under the door. Then I listen, and there ain’t any sound excepting the one o’ the snake lady snoozing. I happen to know that sound on ’count o’ one time when I was cleaning out her chimney, she dropped off, and she don’t snore when she snoozes, she snarls. Spits, too, right through her teeth. So, hearing the familar snoozing tune, I open the door, which luckily ain’t locked, and slide in slippery as a fish.”
Emily, all attention, shifted nervously on the bench.
Kipper lowered his voice to a hush, thoroughly relishing the telling of his tale to such a responsive audience. “Well, there’s her big ring o’ keys hanging right on her bedpost. Ain’t no need to ask anyone which key’s the one to the Remembrance Room, ’cause it’s standing out clearer than a whale in a bucket o’ sardines, as Pa would say. So I lift up that key and press it into my muxed-up bread lump. I got me a perfeck image o’ that key, and this here one’s made right from that bread lump! What do you think o’ that, Emily?”
“What—what I think of it is that you might have been caught, and you shouldn’t have done it,” said Emily, and then added in a rush of words, “but I’m so glad that you did!
Kipper beamed. After that, they just sat on the bench, swinging their legs happily. Then Kipper picked up his lantern and shone it around the room. The little spot of light explored the walls and ceiling, and finally arrived at the floor. There it stopped. The spotlight had discovered a darkened slab of wood fitted so closely into the stone floor it might have been part of the floor itself, except that it was fastened on one side with a heavy, r
usted padlock. Emily started when she saw it.
“Hey!” Kipper exclaimed softly. “Look at that, Emily. ’Pears to me to be the cover o’ some kind o’ well. But what’s a well doing here?”
“Long, long ago,” Emily said, “I remember Uncle Twice telling Papa of a well in the cellar of Sugar Hill Hall. He said he had never even bothered to open it up since it wasn’t needed. This might be that well, Kipper. But … but-”
“But what, Emily? Why do you got that pecoolyar look on your face?”
“I-I-I,” Emily stammered. “Oh, Kipper, if I tell you, you’ll say I’m addled again. I thought I was addled, too, and had imagined the whole thing.”
“What whole thing?” asked Kipper impatiently. “Ain’t any way I can decide ’bout it if you don’t tell me, Emily.”
“Well, some time before you came tonight, about eleven o’clock, I heard voices, and it seemed as if they came from under the floor. From under this very room, Kipper!”
“Voices?” Kipper looked curiously at Emily. “From under this room?”
“There!” exclaimed Emily. “You see, you do think I’m addled!”
“No such thing, Emily!”
“You—you mean you believe I did hear them?”
Kipper nodded. “O’ course I do! I ain’t surprised ’bout anything that could happen in this spooky mansion. Did you hear what the voices was saying?”
“They were too far away and hollow sounding,” Emily replied. “But—but do you suppose there might be another cellar under this one and not a well at all? Perhaps Uncle Twice just thought this was a well”.
“Ain’t anyone ever told me ’bout any cellar deeper’n this one, Emily, but that ain’t to say that there ain’t one. Nobody told me ’bout any well either.”
Kipper studied the old slab of wood, and then suddenly was down on his knees beside it. He twisted the old lock in his hands, and after he had studied it for a moment, tried jabbing his key into it. The key fit! Quickly, he wiggled it back and forth. There was the squeal of metal against rusty metal, and the old lock finally released its ancient, rusty grip. Kipper looked up at Emily with wild, excited eyes. “Now we’ll see what we shall see!”
“Be careful!” Emily cried. “If it is the well-”
“I ain’t going to drop into any old well. Never fear!” said Kipper. He removed the lock and then, with several sharp tugs and a long pull, lifted the heavy slab of wood. Clouds of choking dust flew out at the edges. Holding up his lantern, Kipper peered down over the ledge into the black hole.
“Dingus, Emily!” he breathed. “This ain’t any well. It’s steps going down someplace! Come look.”
Emily inched over toward Kipper. A moment later, she was looking down a flight of stone steps so long and blackened with filth and age they seemed like stairs to the middle of the world.
“Hello-o-o down there!” Kipper called out softly.
“Down there, down there, down there,” came echoing back.
“That’s a long stairwell,” he said. “If it goes to any other cellar, must be one what’s a jillion miles down.” He waved his lantern, and eerie shadows danced on the ancient steps.
“Would—would you like to go see what’s there?” asked Emily.
“Would you?’ Kipper asked right back. His eyes were huge in the lantern light
Emily hesitated a moment, and then finally nodded.
“All right then!” Kipper gulped. “I’ll go first with the lantern.”
As if some unknown horror was going to rise from the pit and grab him by the leg, Kipper put a hesitant foot on the first step and started down. Emily followed as close as she could behind him. It seemed half a mile later before they set foot off the last step and Kipper raised his lantern over his head to shine it around them.
“Wheeoo!” He gave a long, low whistle. “It ain’t a well nor a cellar. It’s a tunnel! Looks like the inside o’ a serpent’s belly, don’t it?” Kipper spoke with all the authority of having seen several. “Look at them walls black with the breath o’ his fire, and that slime oozing out o’ his innards.”
Emily shivered uncontrollably. The feeble glow of the lantern was barely able to break through the chill dark air, heavy with mold and decay, to pick out here and there the evil gleam of the slimy walls. It seemed as if she and Kipper must surely be the first living things to have entered the serpent since it turned to rock centuries earlier. But as Kipper slowly lowered the lantern to shine it on a rough kind of path under them, its light picked up a tiny sparkle from something lying at their feet. Emily stooped quickly to pick up the small object that made it, and then held out her hand to Kipper. In it lay a brass button marked with stars and anchor. It was dented from having been stepped on heavily, but hardly tarnished, as if it had only recently fallen there.
“Captain Scurlock?” Emily whispered, questioning.
“Maybe,” Kipper said. He lifted the button from Emily’s hand and held it close to the lantern. “Or one o’ his ugly crew. But doing what? Looks like more questions, Emily.” He shoved the button in his pocket and then raised the lantern, shining it to the left of where they stood. The light revealed a solid wall of blackened rock only a few feet away. “See? Ain’t any way out o’ this tunnel excepting the way we just came down, and we both know there ain’t anyone but us has used them steps in a long, long time. Looks like they just been using this as a meeting place, though beats me why. There’s lots cozier places in this world.”
Kipper paused to shine his lantern in the opposite direction. The light hit a solid wall as well, but only of darkness, not rock. “This is where they come from, Emily, whoever they be. I got to admit, I’m scared to go on. But right now curious is getting the better of coward. You game to go on?”
Emily wanted to shake her head. She did not want to go into that terrifying blackness. But there were still questions, so many questions, to be answered. What if the tunnel would provide the answers? One answer. Any answers.
“I—I’m game,” Emily said.
“Thought you would be,” said Kipper.
They started down the grim, dark tunnel.
FOURTEEN
The Jolly Sailor
The darkness in the tunnel seemed dense as stone. Kipper’s small lantern light bobbed about with hardly more effect than if he’d been holding a firefly on a chain. They could barely see the pools of murky water that lay along the path under still, deadly grey vapors, the evil breath of the sleeping serpent. Two rats scurried by, sending a cold rush of air up their legs. Emily stifled a shriek, and the lantern in Kipper’s hand shook violently. But nobody suggested going back. They simply went on.
And on. With blackness closing in behind them, and blackness barely opening ahead, there was no way of telling how far they had come or how far they might have to go, twisting and turning. There was no way to measure time or distance. But just as Emily began to wonder if they might not wander down the tunnel forever, Kipper clutched her arm.
“Look, Emily!”
They had finally arrived at a flight of steps that was a twin to the one by which they had climbed down into the tunnel.
“Are we going up them?” Emily whispered.
“Looks like we ain’t got anyplace to go but up, or back,” Kipper replied. “See, Emily, beyond them steps is a rock wall same as the other. Appears the tunnel runs from where we come from to where we got to, and no more.”
They stood still a moment, looking up and listening. There was only silence from above. Then Kipper motioned to Emily and began to climb the steep stairs. When he reached the trapdoor overhead, he drew a deep breath and pushed the door up a crack. Then he gave a low whistle. “Wheeoo!”
“What is it, Kipper?” Emily asked.
“Dingus, Emily!” Kipper turned to her with the oddest expression on his face. “I think what we just arrived at is the cellar o’ the tavern near Pa’s fish shop.”
Emily didn’t know whether she wanted to laugh or cry over this discovery. All that treacherous
journey only to end up at a place near Kipper’s home! And the comical look on Kipper’s face!
Kipper peered through the trapdoor again. “Now I’m certain as I can be. We’ve come to the cellar o’ The Jolly Sailor, which I run errands for and the like. This is where the wine and the spirits get kept. Why, dead ahead’s that big old keg what’s been warmed by my bottom more times than a fish flaps his fins, as Pa always says. Come ’long, Emily, let’s go on up!”
They scrambled quickly through the open trapdoor, and then Emily was able to study the room they entered. Two whale oil lamps on the walls dimly lit up row upon row of waiting bottles, staring across the room at one another with vacant cork eyes. Huge blackened kegs studded the floor with no semblance of order at all, as if they were the abandoned toys of a giant’s child grown tired with his game. It was like nothing Emily had ever seen before, until suddenly her eyes fell on something totally familiar, something she had climbed over time and again in her own family attic.
“Kipper!” she cried. “My two trunks over there in the corner! What are they doing here?”
She threaded her way around the giant kegs to where the trunks lay. Kipper ran to her side. The locks had been pried off both trunks, so it was an easy matter to lift the lids and look in.
“Empty!” said Kipper with disgust. “Beats me what the scurvy lot what frequents this ’stablishment wants with silk dresses and lace petticoats no bigger than would fit a tadpole. And ain’t anybody what can get much payment for old clothes no matter how fancy they once was.”
“But Kipper,” Emily said, “it wasn’t just my clothes in the trunks. All Mama’s jewels were in the trunks, too! Everything!”
Kipper’s jaw fell open. “Wheeoo!” he whistled. “Well, ain’t no explaining how the trunks got here, but ain’t any question why. I wonder ’bout—” He was interrupted by a sudden, wild explosion of laughter bursting down the cellar passageway.
“Another whoop-de-do going on in the private room,” said Kipper darkly. “I ain’t ever been ’lowed in there, but from the looks o’ the crew what is, that Cap’n Scurlock being one, I ain’t missing much. You know, Emily, once I—”
Peppermints in the Parlor Page 11