by L. L. Samson
Joe’s eyes grew round with horror.
“Nobody knew you were there because nobody cared,” she finished. “And that—” she threw the book down “—is the sad story of your life. I hope you’re happy.”
I hate it when people say that, don’t you?
Beyond them and unbeknownst to them, the amateur search crew had finally reached the location of the cave-in.
“Oh man,” whispered Linus. “Ophelia!” he yelled as loudly as he could.
Father Lou and Walter did the same. Tom put his fingers in his mouth and blew out a piercing whistle.
“All at once,” Father Lou said.
“Ophelia!” they shouted, the sum of their voices echoing back into their ears.
When the reverberating sound abated, a thick silence enveloped them. They barely breathed while listening for a reply, however faint. Thirty seconds passed. Forty.
“Let’s start digging,” said Linus. “What time is it, Walt?
“Almost 6 A.M.”
They began digging, removing the rubble bit by tiny bit.
Linus hoped they wouldn’t cause another shower of debris with their work, but what else could they do?
“And you know what else?” said Ophelia, not nearly finished. “After they found you, you became a hero. People came from seven miles away to attend your funeral. They buried you near the cave. You were pardoned by the governor of Missouri. People cried their eyes out, and some women were even appointed by committee to go into deep mourning for you.”
Joe shook his head. “Stop. Please.”
“Fine.”
“I understand. Them people liked me a whole lot better when I was dead than when I was alive.”
Ophelia hadn’t even looked at it like that. “Well, yes. I suppose that’s true.”
“Maybe I could make it up to them somehow.”
Ophelia snorted. “Yeah, right.” She returned the flashlight to its stony cradle. “Besides. None of it matters if we don’t dig ourselves out and get you back to the circle at our house.”
“What happens if we don’t?”
“Ever heard of the Wicked Witch of the West?” She knew, of course, that he hadn’t, as The Wonderful Wizard of Oz had yet to be written back in Joe’s time.
“No.” Reason took over inside Joe’s brain. “What is that book? And how does it know what happens to me?”
“You’re going to have a hard time believing this,” she said.
“I traveled through some kind of circle, girl. I could believe anything just about now.”
She explained as she dug, realizing how silly it all sounded, but finished with great detail regarding what would happen if a character failed to make it back into the circle by 11:11 A.M.
“But I didn’t come over like Tom did,” said Joe.
“It doesn’t matter.” She picked up a stone and threw it over her shoulder toward the end of the tunnel. “Once a book is opened and closed, no matter who opened it, it’s closed for good.”
“Let me help you dig, then.”
“No. You’re too dangerous.”
“You’ve given me good reason not to hurt you. Two work a whole lot faster ‘n one. Please.”
Ophelia brushed her hands together, dislodging some of the dirt. She crossed her arms. “All right. But you know the others are going to be digging for us on the other side, and if they cut through and find me dead, there’s no way you’re getting back to that attic.”
“I hear you.”
“Then let’s dig.”
Ophelia unfastened the measuring tape. And true to his word, Joe began digging and nothing more. He was strong and fast, and the pile of rubble abated (got smaller) that much quicker.
“Look here.” Joe stood up, a rather large stone in his hands. “Git that light!”
Ophelia handed it to him.
He aimed it on a hole in the tunnel wall.
“Oh. Wow,” said Ophelia.
The hole wasn’t much bigger than the seat of a kitchen stool.
“Looks like there’s a room in there.” Joe shone the light through the opening. (Ophelia had explained to him about batteries and electric power as best she could.)
“We should check it out,” said Ophelia. “I’m small enough to crawl through there, and there might be a way out.”
She did just that, then reached a hand back out for the flashlight. Joe placed it in her palm. She shone it on the wall to her right. “Yep, this is definitely a room.” Next, she shone the light on the wall facing her. “I see a door!”
She rose up, almost banging her head on the low ceiling. She shuddered. The iron door resembled the large oven door in the witch’s candy house from the story of Hansel and Gretel. “It’s locked tight. There’s no way we’re getting out this way, unfortunately.”
Ophelia turned back toward the spot where Joe was waiting for her, the flashlight beam illuminating the corner to the right of the hole. She screamed.
nineteen
Mystery Solved
or You’d Think They’d Be Able to, at Least Once, Get People Back to the Circle with Ten Minutes to Spare
The sound filled the chamber.
“Girl!” cried Joe. “What’s goin’ on?”
Stretched out in the beam of her flashlight sprawled a skeleton. In the corner where it had decomposed, its clothing was a collection of wrecked ribbons and rotted tatters.
Ophelia swallowed her fright. “A … a skeleton.”
Joe stuck his head through the hole.
“And … I think I know whose it is.”
Realizing that a pile of bones means no one any harm, and trying to summon up every bit of reason and pluck that life had bestowed upon her so far, Ophelia approached the now very deceased—judging by what seemed to be pants—man.
She dragged the light’s beam from the bottom of his feet upward. Something glinted down inside his ribcage. “A dagger!” she said. “He was stabbed and then stuffed in here!”
“Maybe you’d better get outta there,” said Joe.
Ophelia had to agree. She left the dagger where she found it.
She was excited as she climbed out.
Joe noticed right away. “What is it?”
“A mystery solved! After a hundred years, we finally know what happened to Aloysius Pierce.”
Hours passed as the Kingscross Rescue Team reinforced what remained of the ceiling overhead with fresh timber, while digging out the debris below. Both Linus and Walter wanted to help, but they also knew they would just get in the way.
“10 A.M.” reported Walter.
Ophelia sat back on her heels. “I just can’t do it anymore, Joe.” She placed her hands in the light. Her fingertips were inflamed (swollen) and red; scrapes and cuts bloodied the backs of her hands.
“You just sit for a spell,” Joe said, true kindness apparent in his tone for the first time.
“Thanks.”
She sat on the tunnel floor, leaned back against the wall across from the hole where they’d found Aloysius’s remains, and closed her eyes. It was already ten o’clock in the morning. She just couldn’t imagine that they’d get Joe back to the circle in time. What would it be like to watch someone dissolve so painfully in the acids between the worlds? She had hoped never to find out.
At least it will be a quick passing, she thought. She hoped. What if they just stayed that way for all eternity? Stuck between the worlds? It was a horrible thought. No, that couldn’t possibly be. Even Joe didn’t deserve that.
“I been ponderin’ somethin’,” Joe said “If’n that fancy feller could come and take me afore I was dead in that cave, then could I return to another place as well? Supposin’ we make it back to the circle in time.”
“Oh yes!” said Ophelia. “That’s the way it works. Why?”
Joe grabbed a stone. “I reckon I’d like to go back afore I killed Doc Robinson. I could do the diggin’ job, take the money he give me, and leave town.”
“That sounds like a fine plan to
me. And you’ve got the necklace.” Her voice dropped. “And that pretty egg.”
He leaned back down to grab more rubble. “You like that egg, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“It is pretty.” Throwing more debris aside, he continued, “I don’t want no fancy funeral or such only ‘cause I starved to death. I’d rather have folks be sad ‘cause I was a good man.”
A pale face suddenly appeared at the hole in the wall, and Ophelia opened her mouth to scream again. But she’d used up all of her screams.
“You two should be in class,” said Madrigal.
“Maddie, please,” Father Lou said gently.
“Oh, I know. I’m just beside myself with worry, Lou.”
Linus and Walter glanced at one another. Seeing this side of Madge was a good thing, but they both wished it could have been under better circumstances.
I’ve always found that circumstances precisely like the uncertain one down in that tunnel are where people reveal their most noble characteristics.
“It’s 10:30,” Walter whispered to Linus. “What about Tom? If we don’t leave for the attic soon, I don’t think we’ll make it in time.”
“I can’t leave her, Walt.”
“I know, mate. I can take him topside.”
“What if you can’t find the book? Last thing I knew, Ophelia had it in her pocket.”
See what I mean about Linus’s powers of observation?
“I suppose we’ll just have to give it a go regardless.” Walter wondered what else could possibly go wrong. “I’ll go get him.”
“For goodness sake, it’s only me!” Cato Grubbs’s head exited the hole completely. You couldn’t say the same for his body.
Relief washed over Ophelia. “How did you—”
“This room is in the basement of the house where I kept Quasimodo.”
A more foul dwelling I’ve yet to describe. If you must know what it is like, read about the trio’s adventure with the hunchback of Notre Dame. I refuse to put myself through the trauma of creating a “sense of place” for that hovel more than once. If that bothers you, you’ll simply have to make do and use your own imagination. I’m sure it’s up to the task. Thank you. Please use the door marked exit.
Cato’s secret comings and goings suddenly made sense to Ophelia. She once thought that he might have discovered some magic way to dematerialize and then show up again at another location. But how silly that was, she now realized. Cato was just as human as everyone else.
“How did you know we were here?” she asked.
“It’s all over the news.”
“But—”
“Never you mind, cousin. Why would I let you in on my secrets anyway? Anything I tell you won’t be true.”
“Well, that’s true.”
“All right, Joe. Let’s get you back to where you came from. I need you to get me that treasure.”
“How are you going to get him through that hole?” Ophelia asked.
“Never fear. I think of everything.” He held up a vial. As he dropped a foul-smelling liquid, something akin to rotten eggs mixed with nuclear waste, on the stones of the wall below the hole, they began to melt away.
“Joe,” whispered Ophelia, turning her back on Cato, her flashlight wedged under her armpit. “Here.” She flipped the book open to the page where Joe, Muff Potter, and Doc Robinson are arguing in the graveyard. “Keep your thumb here and don’t let him see that you’ve got it.”
Cato finished his task. “Come on, Joe. Let’s get out of here.”
Ophelia wanted to hug Joe. Instead, she said, “Good-bye. And you can do it, Joe. You can be a good man. You are a good man. Just remember that.”
“Oh please,” drawled Cato. “Stop. I’m about to gag on all of that sticky sentiment filling the room.”
Ophelia shone her light on the opening. Joe put one foot through, turned, stuffed something in her hand with a wink, and then he disappeared.
The egg.
Should she follow Cato and Joe? There could be another cave-in. But what if Walter and Linus found her gone? They’d think Joe was still with her, that she was in terrible danger.
The click of the iron door decided her fate.
Walter placed a hand on Tom’s shoulder. “We’ve got to get back right away, Tom. And I’m not sure we’ll make it back in time.”
Tom didn’t budge.
Ophelia’s flashlight beam had been weakening for the last fifteen minutes. It faced the rubble, the circle of the beam narrowing its circumference until only blackness remained.
She shook it, clicked the switch on and off, and then rapped it against the palm of her hand with no success. The sum of exhaustion, thirst, and fear multiplied. She tried again with the same results.
That did it. It was dark. She was hungry, she had been up all night, she was all alone, and she was cold too.
She sat down on the tunnel floor and allowed herself a good cry.
“We’re almost through!” said the captain of the rescue team.
“I hear her!” shouted Tom. “She’s crying!”
“She’s alive!” said Linus.
A team member pulled away a larger stone near the top, thereby removing the final barrier between the gang and Ophelia.
“Come on, mate.” Walter pulled at Tom’s arm. “Now!”
Tom jerked his arm from Walter’s grasp and scrambled up the pile.
“Tom!” Father Lou cried. “What are you doing?”
“I ain’t skeered!” he called over his shoulder. “Ophelia’s afeard, and I aim to get to her!”
He slid headfirst on his belly over the apex of the pile, flowing like water over the top.
“Head’s up!” a rescue worker yelled as more rocks and dirt fell onto the pile, closing Ophelia off once again.
When Ophelia heard Tom’s voice, the tears went from your customary cats-and-dogs rainstorm to a typhoon.
Through her tears she could barely see him as he slid over the top, and the emergency lights behind the rubble only served to silhouette the boy.
And then, another cave-in?
She reached out in the darkness, her hands coming in contact with his soft hoodie. He put his arms around her and held her to him as tightly as his skinny arms would allow. Which was surprisingly tight.
“There, there, Ophelia. There, there.” His voice was as calm as a baby asleep in her cradle.
So people really said that, Ophelia thought, finding his words more comforting than anything she had ever heard.
“There, there,” Tom repeated. “Everything is gonna be all right.”
She gulped down her tears. “Are you all right?”
“Just fine. They wanted me to get back to the circle, but I couldn’t leave you here in the dark all by yourself.”
“The time!” Ophelia’s breath caught in her chest.
“About near circle time. But I’m not afraid, Ophelia. You’ll be here with me. And I reckon that if I could see Becky Thatcher through, I can do the same for you.”
Ophelia hated to play favorites; but Tom, well, he’d wormed his way into her heart like none of the others had. She hated to see him go more than she hated dangling modifiers—and that’s saying something!
“I don’t have the book with me anymore, Tom. I just don’t know what’s going to happen. I’m so sorry.”
“You done … did … the best you knew how. I’ll be all right. You just wait and see!” His courageous words shivered with a fear he tried to hide.
“I’m not scared,” he whispered so quietly that Ophelia barely caught the words. “I’m not scared.”
Walter checked Linus’s watch. “Almost time, mate.”
Father Lou hurried up to the boys. “They’re through again. It shouldn’t be long.”
“It’s 11:10, Father.” Walter held up his wrist.
The priest closed his eyes. “Dear God.”
“There’s nothing we can do now,” said Linus, feeling the sting of tears at the corners of his e
yes. He cleared his throat.
“What’s that light?” a rescue worker said as a green light spread its fingers through cracks at the top of the pile.
Walter began the countdown.
They all held their breath.
Ophelia and Tom affixed their gaze on the stone circle they’d hastily assembled just in case. The glow lit up both of their faces, shedding off one color of the spectrum for the next: green peeling off to blue, blue peeling away to reveal purple, then violet, red-orange, yellow, and finally that pure white light gently covered them like a motherly presence.
No sparklers shot up from the floor this time, however. The white light simply intensified, and Ophelia hugged Tom to her, cradling his head against her shoulder.
“Three … two … one,” counted Walter.
They watched the changing light as voices of confusion erupted from the rescue crew.
The final white light shot through the rocks, swirled down among them, and then zipped off down the tunnel.
“What was that?” the captain said.
“I’ve never seen anything like it.” Madrigal’s eyes went from almonds to walnuts.
“It was … beautiful,” said Father Lou.
Linus ran forward. “Ophelia! Can you hear me?”
“I’m all right!” her muffled voice sounded into the tunnel. “Tom’s all right!” She began to laugh. “Tom’s just fine!”
Ophelia felt Tom relax. He pulled his head away. “See? I told you everything would be just fine.”
“And you were right!”
More stones were removed, and the work lights threw their beams against the walls. Ophelia could see Tom’s face, streaked with tears. “You are the bravest person I’ve ever met, Tom Sawyer.”
twenty
All’s Well That Ends Well … until the Next Time
or Tying Up Loose Ends—but Not All of Them, Mind You
Well, now I suppose you’ll want to know what happened after all of that, won’t you? Some writers prefer to end their stories so the reader will have to come up with the ending on their own. Heaven forbid if people live happily ever after anymore. Of course, happy endings aren’t guaranteed in real life. Loved ones die. People are injured and are never quite the same afterward.