by Eli Brown
Clover entered a long cellar that had been expanded and reinforced with brick. The smell of the glue had penetrated the walls. The floor was cluttered with wooden crates and bulky objects half-draped under dust cloths. High windows let in the afternoon glow, shafts of dusty air that fell on the disorder of the room.
She’d never seen such a sundry collection: candelabra, wooden idols, antique lanterns, horn spoons, and precarious piles of books. A writing desk in one corner seemed about to collapse under the weight of leaning towers of paper. In another corner, a sleeping roll sagged next to the stove, a night basin, and a pile of unwashed dishes with its own population of flies. It seemed that the great explorer now traveled no farther than to empty his night pot.
“I would welcome a hand; do you mind?” He gestured to the piles of disorganized rubbish. “I’ve already moved this collection three times.”
Mr. Agate was pulling books from the shelves and tossing them into piles. Some of the crates were already nailed shut, some only half-packed with bundles of straw padding. Clover saw a hobbyhorse in one, a crystal vase in another. China plates and teacups sat half-buried in barrels of oats, the best way to protect them for a long wagon ride.
“I must disperse the oddities. Between the poachers and the vermin, no collection is safe these days.”
“Poachers?”
“They steal oddities and sell them to the highest bidder. It used to be the height of fashion to have an invisible Hairbrush in your salon or an Ice Hook that makes its own ice. But now that Senator Auburn is buying every oddity the poachers can get their hands on, no collection is safe.”
“What does Auburn want them for?”
“He has never stopped looking for a solution to Bonaparte’s advantage,” Mr. Agate said. “During the war, the Unified States had the material advantage: munitions, steel, provisions, cotton. We should have won easily. But Louisiana overwhelmed us with sheer numbers. Of course, I have a purely scientific interest in just what sort of oddity could duplicate a person, turning a single French soldier into thousands. But Senator Auburn’s interest is more . . . personal. The treaty of New Manchester is like a dagger in his heart.”
“How can Auburn defeat an endless army?” Clover asked.
“I hope we never find out. Imagine the horror. The Heron burned the entire Hawthorn Forest in a single day. The Wineglass turned Sojourner Valley into a muddy waste. Oddities used as weapons are a threat to our survival. But Auburn will do anything to get himself elected president. He’s trying to follow Bonaparte’s example. If he gets his way, we won’t have an election. We’ll have a coronation.”
Judging from the dark circles under his eyes, it was clear that Aaron Thomas Agate hadn’t slept in days. “Collections must be scattered, for everyone’s safety. We are entering a dark age.”
Clover saw a teacup dangling above his back pocket — in putting on his belt that morning, he must have managed to loop it through the handle and either hadn’t noticed yet or hadn’t taken the time to remove it. Clover wondered if the old explorer’s sanity might have been left somewhere on the muggy banks of the Melapoma River. Or maybe the basement air and locked windows had given him a touch of cabin fever. Or maybe this was what her father had warned her about, an example of what oddities would do to a mind.
Still, Clover’s mouth went dry and her heart fluttered like a fish on the line. She was close to answers. “My father told me to seek the protection of the Society — before he died.”
“Died? Constantine?” Mr. Agate covered his heart. “Then, my dear, consider yourself under our protection, such as it is. But . . . there aren’t as many of us as there once were. Our membership is in decline. Keeping even a single oddity is dangerous now.” He continued packing.
Clover gazed around the cluttered room. “Are these all oddities?”
Mr. Agate only grunted, moving a pile of books from one end of the room to the other. “You’ll want to admire the press, no doubt.” He pointed to a printing press with a great brass screw and lever. “We used to publish the journal on this old mule. Now, where did I put that spoon?”
Clover saw a broadsheet set in the printing tray. The lead letters were backward and ink had thickened to syrup in the crevices. At the bottom of the frame was the Society’s crest: an egg in a nest. There was not a bird within the egg, as one would expect, but a rabbit, sleeping peacefully.
Clover spoke the Latin inscription under the crest, “Custodia Insolitum.”
“It means ‘protection of the unusual,’” Mr. Agate said. “We bickered over that for some time, but I still say it’s a solid motto.”
Clover picked up a journal from a pile on the floor. The issue, though years old, was still more recent than any Clover had seen in Widow Henshaw’s collection, its pages bright and clean.
The introductory essay, “On the Purpose of Oddities,” was written by none other than Miniver Elkin. Clover’s breath caught in her chest as she read:
. . .a simple prism, which breaks light itself, was once considered a mere curiosity. Then Newton used it to launch a rational revolution. If we see oddities as baubles, as trinkets for the entertainment of parlor guests, we will have squandered our greatest potential. Every oddity is an opportunity . . .
“May I take this?” Clover asked, her voice clotted with emotion.
“Why not? We printed it before the poachers began using the journals as shopping lists. That was a golden era, when our collections were displayed in libraries and town halls. Even the black market has collapsed. There is only one buyer now, and the poachers sell everything to him. I thought if I hid well enough, I might be able to keep this collection together. One light to carry us through the night. But it’s just too dangerous.”
“So the Society . . . ?”
“We’re waiting out the storm. Our membership has” — Mr. Agate coughed — “dwindled.”
Then Clover remembered why she was really here. She opened her father’s bag and presented the Watch on her open palm. “At first I didn’t know what it was,” she said, “but I think I’m certain now. Mr. Agate, this is the Pocket Watch.”
“What pocket watch?”
“Don’t you know it?” Clover said. “It is necessary.” She studied his face but saw only puzzlement, jowls in need of a shave, a nose veined like the petal of a wilting rose.
“Whose collection did it come from?” Mr. Agate asked. “Why haven’t I heard of it?”
“Haven’t you?” Clover’s heart sank. She fell to her knees to dig through her father’s bag, feeling hope drain from the room. “Or maybe it isn’t the watch. It could be something else . . .” Her voice faltered.
“My dear, I haven’t time for games. Are you carrying an oddity or not?”
“I am! It is in the bag. If it’s not the watch . . .” She pushed the bag to his feet. “One of these things is odd,” she declared. “Important.”
“Odd how?” Mr. Agate asked, crouching over the bag.
“Hope,” Clover said. “My father said it was necessary.”
Mr. Agate licked his lips. “Which is it?” He fished out the lump of medicated beeswax Constantine had used to rub on arthritic joints. “Has it been catalogued?” He pulled the scalpel from its leather sheath.
“I don’t know.” Clover bit her lip. “Portions of this periodical contain intentional errors and outright fabrications.” It had been so easy to invent the Pocket Watch, a desperate fantasy.
“My dear, I don’t have time to fish through a sack of junk.”
“It’s not junk! These are medical tools. They belonged to my father, and he told me to bring them here.”
“But I don’t recognize any of these,” Mr. Agate answered. “If an oddity held hope, such a thing would be sorely useful right now.”
“Do you mean to say you have never heard of such an oddity?” Could her father’s secret be so powerful, Clover wondered, so crucial, that it had been hidden even from the Society scholars?
Mr. Agate gave her a
weary look. “Don’t fret. Today we flee to deeper obscurity. But someday, someone will resist the senator. Someone will be brave enough to hunt down those poachers and make them pay. Someday, someone will give us reason to hope . . . but today . . .” He trailed off and began packing again.
Tears welled in Clover’s eyes. “Mr. Agate, I have come so far to find you. My father’s last wish was that I place this oddity into your care.”
“Maybe it’s been noted in one of the foreign lists . . .” He disappeared, muttering, behind a bookshelf.
As she waited, Clover took a closer look at the objects around her. She touched the fur of a dried tarantula, tapped on an empty saltshaker, pulled the lever of the printing press to watch the tremendous screw turn.
In the middle of the room was a marble stand with a scuffed cigar box sitting on it like a piece of art. Curious what kind of tobacco deserved a pedestal, Clover picked up the box and opened it.
She had only a second to see what was inside: a rag doll of the simple type that settlers called a “Prairie-Sue.” It was made of a rough hemp cloth, the color and size of an old sock. It had a yarn smile fading from plum to pale pink. Its button eyes stared in different directions with a sleepy, faraway look.
But the dreamy smile turned into a scowl as the Doll reached out and closed the lid with a snap, pinching Clover’s thumb. Clover yelped and dropped the box. It opened mid-fall, and the rag doll tumbled out, rolling twice before pulling itself to its feet. Then it stood, hardly a foot tall, and frowned furiously about the room.
“Oh no!” Mr. Agate yelled, dropping a stack of books. “Oh heavens, no!”
Clover took a few steps back, but there was nowhere to run. Her thumb was throbbing, but more distressing was the fact that the doll had picked up a crowbar.
It flung the tool with such force that the crowbar stuck in the brick wall with a thunk, narrowly missing Clover’s head. Clover screamed and scrambled to find shelter behind the press as the Doll searched for another weapon.
Mr. Agate crouched on the floor, holding the cigar box open toward the Doll. His hands were trembling, but he sang a child’s lullaby as sweetly as he could: “Susanna, don’t be sore; the rain will stop by morning. Susanna, don’t you cry; the clouds are only snoring.”
The Doll had lifted the corner of a crate between the nubs of its stuffed hands. The crate rose as if it weighed no more than a bread roll. Clover had seen draft horses tear the earth with their hooves, she’d seen oxen pull chestnut stumps out of the ground, but she had never seen strength like this.
Mr. Agate kept singing, with sweat streaming down his face. He shook the box a little to draw the Doll’s attention. “Susanna, don’t you fuss; the morning bird is singing.”
Begrudgingly, the little Doll slammed the crate down and ambled back to the cigar box. She climbed in and gave Clover one last sour look before Mr. Agate closed the lid.
He placed the box gingerly on the stand, then, thinking better of it, set a heavy book on top to keep it shut.
He looked at Clover over his spectacles and said, “Susanna will not be played with.”
Despite the scare, Clover let out a thrilled laugh. She was standing amid a genuine collection. She chewed on the end of her braid, panting with panic and awe.
“Do be careful,” Mr. Agate said. “Anomalies can be quite dangerous, as you must already know. But there are boxes to pack! I have eighteen confirmed oddities here, the largest collection in the world, plus thirty-two unconfirmed, and it all has to go.”
“Unconfirmed?”
“Suppose a man wears a particular glove and wins at cards. He wonders, ‘Did the glove make me win? It must be an oddity!’ But usually it isn’t. This, for example,” he said, twirling a green Umbrella over his head, “is said to have survived eight lightning strikes. If it’s true, I’d be happy to include it in the books as a genuine oddity, but it’s not an easy thing to test, and I don’t want to be the one to do it. So for now it remains unconfirmed. The Birdcage, on the other hand . . .” He pulled a simple brass birdcage from a high hook and handed it to Clover. “Put your head inside.”
Clover did and almost dropped to her knees with vertigo, for suddenly she was perched high above the street, looking down onto the bustle of people and carriages. Then, with stomach-lurching speed, she was flying with the gray birds around her. The noise of the street below was muffled by the soft applause of dove wings. She gasped and withdrew her head, blinking at Mr. Agate.
“I was flying!”
“The Canary was flying.”
“But I saw —”
“What the Canary saw. When you’re obliged to spend your days cowering in a basement, as I am, the Canary offers a much-needed perspective. We’ll pack the Birdcage last.” He gestured at the medical kit. “And we’ll sort through that when we’ve safely moved.”
As Clover repacked her father’s bag, she blinked at the wonderland around her. The iron stove, the washbasin, the whisk broom — any of them might have strange and beguiling power.
“A collection like this must have taken decades to assemble. Where do they all come from?”
“Where indeed?” Mr. Agate was nailing a crate shut and spoke between hammer blows. “There are different schools of thought —” Blam! “Some say oddities are artifacts of an earlier draft of creation —” Blam-blam! “Detritus from a flawed universe, you might say. Some say they’re merely random eventualities. In a field of clover, for example, there is bound to be one with four leaves, isn’t there? Likewise, if you have enough” — he looked at the hammer — “hammers, there is bound to be one that is a little different.”
“Is that hammer different?”
“No. This is just a hammer. But this —” He lifted a blue-glazed Teapot from its box and gazed at it lovingly before removing the cork from its spout. “In the end we don’t care where this Teapot came from. We are only concerned with its nature. Would you like some?” He scanned the littered room and, failing to find the teacup that dangled from his own belt, shrugged, and poured an amber stream right onto the brick floor.
“Chamomile,” Clover whispered with reverence. “It is always chamomile.” She knew the Teapot from the journals, but she’d never thought she would smell its perfume.
She stepped back and watched the dark puddle grow. A moment later, when a normal teapot would have emptied, the tea was still rushing out and showed no signs of stopping.
“Nice and hot,” Mr. Agate said.
The redolent steam warmed Clover’s cheeks, and she was overcome with the significance of the objects around her. She saw how easily this work could have coaxed Mr. Agate away from his explorations and turned him into a nearsighted archivist. The enthralling aroma insisted that this was the most important teapot in the world, the only teapot that mattered. And yet, after all, this was just wet tea, wasn’t it? Was even an ocean of chamomile really important? Was it, as her father would have said, neobkhodimyy? What was the necessary oddity? What could overshadow even these heavenly artifacts? Clover had made it all this way and still had no answer.
“I could stand here and pour tea enough to drown us.” Mr. Agate seemed as mesmerized as Clover was.
“You won’t, though,” Clover suggested, turning her attention to the eccentric scholar.
“I could fill this room, and this pot would still give and give!” Mr. Agate was in a reverie, his eyes shining as he watched the tea flowing. “That’s how . . . generous it is.”
The tea surged and filled the cracks between the bricks, pushing out toward the walls and filling the air with moist fragrance.
“I should not like to drown today, Mr. Agate,” Clover said sternly.
He blinked and finally pulled the pot upright, stopping the flow.
“The tea is perfectly safe to drink. But some don’t like chamomile.” Mr. Agate tapped the cork back into the spout and went back to packing, his feet now sloshing about in the liquid. “Philosophers say that the oddities slipped through the holes in our d
reams and tumbled into this waking world. Of course, there was your mother’s theory — that the oddities are puzzle pieces, or rungs of a ladder, so to speak, which, if arranged in the proper order, could lift us up from suffering, even from death! Rather unscientific, if you ask me. Newton, on the other hand, established that an object at rest tends to stay at rest —”
“Did you say my mother?”
The professor kicked a table hard. “You see, it takes a good deal of force to get it to move. But what if there was a table that tended not to rest? In Bangladesh, there is just such a table; it dances about the room, spinning its tablecloth —”
“But you said —”
“An oddity simply has a different tendency, a variation in the whims of nature. I am working on an addendum to Newton’s principles, you see, a law of anomalous physics for —”
“Aaron Thomas Agate!” Clover shouted.
“What is it?”
“Did you know my mother?”
Mr. Agate looked up from his packing. Dust smeared his nose, and the pair of spectacles had slid down to hang in front of his mouth. “Of course! We all knew her well. Or as well as a correspondence allowed. She was a generous mentor. I still have her letters tucked away somewhere . . .”
“Mentor to . . . How . . . When . . . ?” Clover balled her fists, dumbfounded.
Mr. Agate placed a hand kindly on her shoulder. “Clover, your mother was not just a member; Miniver founded the Society. Miniver Elkin was the first one to write to other collectors, to classify oddities, to track them, and to lay rules for their proper use and care. Before Miniver, oddities were just rumors scattered in gossip, something a drunk cousin saw. Now there are verified collections like this one, and an international host of scholars dedicated to understanding them. She brought oddities out of the shadows into the light of modern scrutiny. She is the reason I started collecting. We all tried to keep pace with her, but she was, well, she was Miniver.”