They grinned at each other.
Anjali picked up an embroidered silk garment—I couldn’t tell if it was some lord’s ceremonial cloak or just a fancy bathrobe—and selected a spool of thread in a matching shade of teal. She threaded a needle and began sewing with quick, tiny stitches. It looked so easy when she did it.
“Hey, Elizabeth,” she said seriously, her eyes on her sewing, “I’m really sorry I forgot to tell you how to get out. I feel like such a lamebrain.”
“That’s okay. It all worked out.”
“I know. But I’m still sorry.”
“Well, if you’d just waited a little while, I could have used my own key—Doc just gave me one.”
“Wow, congratulations!” Anjali put down her sewing and gave me a hug. “Let’s see! Oh, a binder clip? Cool!”
“Hey, that reminds me. I better give you yours back,” said Marc, handing her the barrette. She clipped her hair up with it.
“So what was Zandra like—the page who got fired?” I asked. “Doc and Ms. Callender were talking about her.”
“I didn’t like her,” said Anjali. “All she cared about were things—clothes and vacations and music players. She always wanted the newest, most expensive stuff. I wasn’t that surprised when they caught her stealing.”
“But why a vase?” I said. “That doesn’t make sense.”
“I know,” said Anjali. “Why would she care about a Ming vase? You can’t wear it. She must have been planning to sell it.”
“She’s too dumb to think of that herself,” said Marc. “I bet she was working for someone.”
“Who?” I said.
“That’s the big question,” said Marc.
“What about the other page, the one who disappeared?”
“Mona? I really liked her,” said Anjali. “But something was freaking her out. Before she left, she started getting really jumpy, but she wouldn’t talk about it. Then one day she turned in her key and just . . . disappeared.”
“What was she scared of? Was it really that gigantic bird? That sounds so unbelievable. At least—it did before I saw the Grimm Collection.”
“I know, that’s why I wasn’t sure I should tell you at first,” said Anjali. “I thought you’d think I was crazy. But now you’ve seen some magic firsthand. And if you think about it, there are plenty of gigantic birds and fantastic creatures in fairy tales.”
I remembered how scary the Snow White mirror was, and it didn’t even have claws. “All right, so where did you hear this rumor about the bird?”
“I overheard some of the patrons talking about it,” said Anjali. “Then that creepy little art dealer said something to me.”
“The one who keeps staring at you?” I asked.
Anjali nodded. “He told me to keep an eye out for an enormous bird and to make sure I didn’t carry anything valuable around alone. He even offered to walk me home.”
“Eeewww!” I said. “Are you sure he wasn’t just trying to . . . I don’t know, get close to you?”
“I can walk you home anytime you want,” said Marc. “You don’t need any slimy patrons to take care of you. I hope you told him that.”
“I told him no thanks,” said Anjali. “But he sounded like he meant it about the bird, and the other patrons seemed to believe it. Those Russian guys who play chess all the time—they said they stopped playing in Washington Square Park because the bird tried to attack them. And right before Mona disappeared, I thought I saw something hovering in the sky.”
“Where? Did you tell Doc?”
Anjali shook her head. “Outside the repository. But it was gone too soon. I wasn’t sure what I saw.” She finished her robe and snipped off the thread with scissors. “Enough about all this. It’s too creepy. Hey, is there any fun stuff to work on?” she said with determined cheerfulness.
“Check the cabinet,” said Marc.
“Fun stuff?” I asked.
“Magic.” Anjali walked over to a large gray cabinet with double doors at the end of the room. “This is where they keep items from the Grimm Collection that need repair.” She unclipped her barrette, letting down a cascade of black hair, and pressed the barrette to the handle. “Open, friend, so I can mend,” she intoned. The door swung open. “Oh, we’re in luck! Table-Be-Set! Anybody hungry?”
“The French version or the German?” asked Marc.
“German. The French one’s out on loan, as usual.”
“Too bad. Well, better than nothing. I’m starving—I didn’t have time to eat after practice.”
“What’s Table-Be-Set?” I asked.
Anjali reached into the cabinet and pulled out a little wooden table. “Don’t you remember in the Grimm story ‘Table-Be-Set, Gold-Donkey, and Cudgel-in-the-Sack’? The table sets itself with food when you tell it to.”
“Why’s it in the repair cabinet? Is it broken?”
“I doubt it—it probably just needs a good cleaning, as usual.” Anjali consulted a piece of paper tied to one leg. “Yup. Somebody spilled beer or blutwurst or something. We’re going to have to scrub it, so we might as well have a snack first. Table, be set!”
In the twinkling of an eye, the table was covered with steaming dishes, so many of them that it bowed slightly in the middle and gave a little creak.
“Wow, that looks good! But isn’t this—I mean, should we be doing this?” I objected. “Aren’t we not supposed to touch anything magic?”
“It’s like milking a cow. The table gets antsy if it goes too long without feeding people. And we’ll have to touch it anyway, to clean it.” Anjali lifted the lid of a dish. A savory smell, heavy on cabbage, filled the room. “Want to start with the sausages or the potatoes?”
“Sausages, definitely,” said Marc.
“Okay . . .” She lifted more lids and poked around with a fork. “You can have blutwurst, zervelatwurst, bockwurst, plockwurst, leberwurst, knackwurst, and, of course, bratwurst. And what’s this? Weisswurst, I think.”
“Some of each, please,” said Marc.
Anjali handed him a plate piled with wursts. “What about you, Elizabeth?”
“Um, I’m not crazy about sausage—maybe just some potatoes?”
“Okay,” said Anjali. “Kartoffelbällchen, kartoffeltopf, kartoffelkroketten, kartoffelbrei, kartoffelknödel, kartoffelkrusteln, kartoffelnocken, kartoffelpuffer, kartoffelklösse, or kartoffelschnitz? Or maybe some schmorkartoffeln? Or just plain fries?”
“I don’t know—surprise me.”
“Here. Überbackene käsekartoffeln, my favorite. It has cheese.”
“Thanks.” It was delicious and very rich—tender potato slices, with a creamy cheese sauce. “How do you know all those names?” I asked.
“I looked them up. I wanted to know what we were eating.” Anjali peered under more lids.
“You know Anjali—she loves to look things up. Any spätzle?” asked Marc.
“What’s spätzle?”
“Sort of a cross between homemade pasta and dumplings,” said Anjali. “Oh, here’s hasenpfeffer! I love hasenpfeffer!”
“What’s hasenpfeffer?”
“Stewed rabbit with black pepper.” She dished herself a plate. “Mmmm! Don’t tell my parents—we’re vegetarians at home.”
“Can I have some of that too?” Marc handed her his plate.
“One thing I don’t get,” I said, taking another bite of cheesy potatoes. “If these magic objects are so strong and powerful, how come you don’t have people using them to take over the world? Or do you? Is that what the thieves are after?”
“I wondered that too, when I first got here,” said Anjali. “But a lot of them aren’t as powerful as they sound, to begin with, and we have modern technology now.”
“Yeah,” said Marc. “There’s magic swords and sticks that can beat people up, but that’s nothing compared to guns and bombs.”
“Or like the enchanted ram’s horn that lets you speak to someone miles away,” said Anjali. “Hello? Cell phone, anybody? Or the f
lying carpet. It’s nice, but it’s not like we don’t have airplanes. These things are amazing, collectors love them, but they wouldn’t be that much help conquering the world.”
“Yes, but surely there are some things in the collection that haven’t been invented yet. Like invisibility cloaks. Or what about the lamp in that Grimm story ‘The Blue Light,’ where the dwarf appears and grants wishes whenever the soldier lights his pipe with the magic light? That would be pretty useful for taking over the world.”
“Yeah, that’s true. But most powerful objects have minds of their own—I wouldn’t count on being able to control them.”
“I guess,” I said.
“Time for dessert?” asked Marc.
“Maybe we should do a little, you know, work first,” said Anjali, looking in the cabinet again. “Here’s a pair of flying sandals; it looks like they need a buckle replaced.”
“Flying sandals?” I said. “Like, actual flying sandals?”
“Flying sandals,” said Anjali, holding them up. They had wings on their heels. They looked like the ones that had fluttered at me. I wondered how they’d gotten here so quickly.
“I can do that,” said Marc. He opened a cabinet drawer and sorted through buckles.
“And here’s the brimming bowl,” said Anjali, holding a stone bowl full of water, which was dripping from the bottom. “I need caulk.”
“Try the plumbing supply cabinet,” suggested Marc.
“Got it. Elizabeth, can you give me a hand?”
“Sure,” I said. I held the bowl over the sink while she worked on it. It seemed pretty incredible that we were using ordinary, everyday silicone gel to caulk an endlessly brimming magic basin.
“Thanks, Elizabeth, I think that’s good now . . . Merritt! What are you doing?”
Marc had taken off his shoes and was buckling on the winged sandals. “I have to make sure the buckle holds, don’t I?” He jumped up into the air and glided forward like an airborne ice skater. He made it look so easy. “Need anything from up here?” he said. I stared, my eyes wide. Bits of dust came raining down. I sneezed, rubbing the dust out of my eyes. “Sorry, Elizabeth,” he said. He did a loop de loop and landed with a flourish.
“Flying sandals!” I said. “Flying. Sandals.”
“Want to try?”
“Really? Me?”
“Of course.”
“But—but don’t you need some special—I don’t know . . .”
Marc laughed. “You’ll get the hang of it; it’s not that hard. I’ll show you.” He unbuckled the sandals and handed them to me.
His feet were much bigger than mine, but the sandals still fit me. Magic, I thought. “How do I get them to work?” I said.
“Jump as high as you can and start the wings. You have to sort of flutter your heels.”
I tried it. I had gotten about six inches off the ground when my feet shot straight out from under me. I landed hard on my rear.
Marc started to laugh, but Anjali frowned at him and he straightened his face. “That was a good start, Elizabeth, but you have to sort of follow your feet with your body,” he said. “Keep your weight centered right above your feet.”
“You better spot her,” said Anjali, hauling me to my feet.
I tried again, this time with Marc standing behind me, his hands under my upper arms. His closeness was as strangely thrilling as the winged sandals on my feet.
He pushed me forward over the sandals. I lurched forward, then back; I almost fell again, but he lunged and caught me, pushing me straight.
After a couple more falls, I started to get the hang of it. It was a little like skating, only slipperier—there were more directions for my feet to fly off in. I had to sort of teeter and glide, teeter and glide.
“What are you doing?” The voice came from the door, startling me so that I fell over.
Fortunately, I was high enough off the ground that I didn’t hit my head. I just hung upside down from my feet, the wings at my heels beating furiously.
Aaron snorted. He was standing in the doorway.
“Oh, hi, Aaron! You startled us,” said Anjali.
“Why’s Elizabeth hanging upside down? Why are you showing her this stuff?”
“It’s okay, Aaron. I know about the magic. I passed the test and Doc gave me the key.” I fished it out of my pocket and held it up—that is, down.
“They gave you a key? And the first thing you do is play with the magic?” He sounded as stern as Mr. Mauskopf giving back exams.
“I’m not playing,” I said with as much dignity as I could muster while hanging upside down. “Marc fixed these sandals, and I was testing them.”
Aaron bent over so that he was looking at me right-side up. “Oh, you were ‘testing’ them, were you? I have to say it’s a little hard to take you seriously with your hair standing straight up. Though you do look kind of cute that way,” he said. “Like a broom with a face.”
“Thanks—your hair’s pretty funny too,” I said, feeling as witty as an eight-year-old. I put my arms down and lowered myself onto the worktable. I had a little trouble getting my right foot to come too. Aaron guffawed.
Anjali distracted him. “Want some dessert?” she offered. “We were just about to have some.”
“Well . . . maybe just a little.”
“Table, be cleared!” said Anjali. All the kartoffel-this and kartoffel-that and something-wurst and something-else-schnitz vanished in a twinkling, leaving drips and crumbs in their wake. She gave the table a perfunctory wipe with a sponge and said, “Dessert now, please. Table, be set!”
The table groaned again. Even in my wildest childhood dreams, I had never seen so many cakes and tarts and puddings.
Marc and Aaron helped themselves.
“What would you like, Elizabeth?” asked Anjali.
“It all looks so good. Maybe that chocolate cake in the corner, the one with the cherries and cream?”
“One slice of Schwarzwälder kirschtorte, coming up.” She handed me my plate and helped herself to apple strudel. “So, Aaron,” she said, “what’s up? Were you looking for something?”
“Just you,” he said. “I mean, I wondered where you disappeared to,” he added, a little stiffly. “It’s after closing time. Doc will be locking up soon.”
Anjali looked at her watch. “Oh, you’re right. Time flies. Table, be cleared! Sorry, little thing, I’ll give you a thorough cleaning next time.” She patted it.
I helped her put the table back in the cabinet and we all gathered our things to get ready to go.
Then suddenly Anjali screamed.
“What? What is it?”
“Anjali!”
Both boys ran over to her. She was pointing to the skylight, her other hand at her neck. “There! It’s really there, the bird!”
Chapter 10:
A mysterious menace
Anjali was right—something was outside the skylight. The shape was dark and hard to make out against the evening sky, but we could clearly see a hooked beak and huge yellow eyes. Then, with the beat of what looked like a giant wing, it was gone.
I found I was trembling.
“Wow, that really was a giant bird!” Marc sounded freaked out. “Are you okay, Anjali?”
“I’m fine. Just scared,” said Anjali.
“You’re not walking home alone. You’ve got to let me take you,” said Marc.
“Marc—you know you don’t have time!”
“Let me, then,” said Aaron.
I noticed nobody was offering to walk me anywhere. “You think the bird’s after Anjali?” I asked.
“She saw it once before,” said Marc. “It could be following her.”
“We’d better tell the librarians,” said Aaron.
Marc and Anjali looked at each other. “He’s right,” said Anjali. “They should know.”
Doc was already gone, but we found Ms. Callender on Stack 6. “Oh, how scary!” she said. “What was it doing, just looking through the window? Or did it t
ry to get in?”
“It was looking through the skylight,” said Anjali. “It flew away as soon as I saw it, like it noticed me noticing it. What do you think it wanted?”
“Were you working on any Special Collection objects?” “Yes, the winged sandals and Table-Be-Set—the German one.”
“Well, this is very troubling. We’ll have to talk to Dr. Rust tomorrow. You better all be extra careful. Are you going home together?” Ms. Callender asked.
“Good idea,” I said. “Let’s go together.”
“Yes, honey,” said Ms. Callender. “Stick together and stay safe.”
The four of us put our heads down and hurried through the cold. Anjali’s building wasn’t far, just a few blocks away. As we reached her corner, a sharp, icy wind caught us and shook us. I pulled my collar up around my neck and wound my scarf around it, but the wind came in anyway.
“Why don’t you replace that top button?” asked Anjali.
“You saw how I sew.”
“You should have told me upstairs; I would have done it for you.”
“Thanks, maybe I’ll take you up on that next week.”
“You know what? Come upstairs and I’ll sew it now,” she said.
“Oh, that would be great. Are you sure?”
“Of course. It’s easy.”
“Thanks, Anjali!”
We said good-bye to the guys at Anjali’s door. She lived in one of the grand apartment buildings on Park Avenue. I often walked past them and peeked in at their gilded, marble-lined lobbies, but I’d never been inside. A doorman in a uniform, with brass buttons and a peaked cap, hurried forward to open the door. “Good evening, Miss Anjali,” he said.
“Thank you, Harold,” she answered without a trace of embarrassment, as if men in uniform opened the door for her and called her Miss Anjali every day of her life. Well, I guess they did.
The elevator had satinwood paneling and leather upholstered benches. We got off on the fourteenth floor. There were oil paintings hanging on the walls and a vase of fresh flowers standing on a little table. Anjali opened the door on the right. A delicious, spicy smell spilled out onto the landing. I followed her in.
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