by Ellen Potter
“You’re very pale,” Audrey said to Fiona.
“I haven’t been well for some time,” Fiona admitted.
“A little sun would do you good,” Audrey told her. “And perhaps an occasional walk. To bring some blood to your cheeks.”
“I do enjoy a leisurely walk,” Fiona agreed.
“A brisk walk,” Audrey admonished.
Ms. Babbish cleared her throat and gave a quick nod to Clara. Apparently, she had made up her mind. “I would like her to be my live-in chef,” she said to Clara. “Yes, I would like that immensely. ”
Clara grinned at Audrey, waiting to see her reaction. But to her surprise, Audrey was not smiling at all. In fact, her brow was cinched in a deep frown.
“Thank you. That’s very kind. But I’m afraid that would be impossible,” Audrey demurred.
“I don’t see why.” Fiona’s voice grew a little peevish. “I have everything you could want—a well-appointed kitchen, ten extra bedrooms—you can take your pick. I would pay you a generous salary, of course. ”
“It’s not that,” Audrey said. “It’s ... I have a view in my room that I am very attached to—”
“But there are other views to look at,” Ms. Babbish said simply.
Audrey looked at Clara for a moment. Then she nodded.
“Yes. Yes, I suppose there are.”
CHAPTER TWENTY
One week later, Clara and Annabelle were spending the entire day in Clara’s apartment, going from room to room, because Annabelle was determined to see them all. Consequently, they took a hot-air balloon ride (just to the ceiling, but still ...); slammed into each other with bumper cars; bobbed in the ocean waves; visited the life-size gingerbread house, where they chewed the armrests off a Gummi sofa and licked all the chocolate doorknobs; sledded down a snowy hill, at the bottom of which they pelted each other with snowballs; ate wads of cotton candy at the state fair; and rode the roller coaster (Clara screamed so loud that Annabelle had to plug her ears). Finally, when they went skating on a frozen pond, Annabelle broke out into hoarse, loud laughter.
“What’s so funny?” Clara stopped skating and put her hands on her hips. They were both wearing the Skating-on-a-Frozen-Pond-Room costume, which was a powder-blue parka and a yellow knitted hat topped with a giant pom-pom.
“You keep whistling,” Annabelle cried.
“I do not.”
“Yes, you do. Every time you go around a corner, you whistle. Go ahead. Start skating and see for yourself.”
So Clara started skating again and found that it was true: every time she turned a corner, she flung her arms out to the side and started whistling. Then she remembered that Dr. Piff had told her she used to whistle while she skated.
“I think it helps me keep my balance,” she said.
“You are a strange duck, Clara.”
They went to every last room, until they had reached the absolute end of the hallway. Then, for old times’ sake, they scaled the climbing tree, racing each other to the top.
The girls perched on the tree’s highest limbs and looked down over the city. The day was bright and warm, but with an occasional breeze that whipped their hair and cooled their necks. Uptown the streets were set in a strict and regular grid, like a checkerboard. But downtown the streets squeezed together into a chaotic tangle as the island of Manhattan grew narrower and narrower, like a spidery maze of streams, with cars and people flowing this way and that, as though they were each propelled by their own currents.
“I canceled my membership in the American Association of Burglars, Crooks, and Ne’er-Do-Wells,” Annabelle said out of the blue.
“Are you really going to quit burgling then?”
“Well, my dad says it’s not the burgling that I love. He says I’m addicted to danger. ”
Clara glanced over at her and noted that Annabelle was sitting on the slenderest branch possible and swinging her legs back and forth nonchalantly.
“He might be right,” Clara said.
“Yeah, he might be. He promised to sign me up for rock-climbing classes on the weekends. And I figure I’ll take another stab at school. I guess it won’t kill me. I’m going back to the Huxley Academy. And if I hate it ... well, let’s just say I’m not throwing away my Spyfocals anytime soon.” She turned suddenly to look at Clara and said, “Hey, whatever happened with that envelope I stole for you?”
It was then that Clara finally told Annabelle the entire strange tale of Audrey Aster, from her first encounter with Ms. Blurt all the way to Fiona Babbish. Annabelle listened without saying a single word, and Clara began to wonder if Annabelle thought she was simply making it all up.
“So,” Annabelle said when Clara was finished, “it was old Ms. Blurt who ratted me out and gave my address to you, huh? Well, she never liked me much anyway. In her art class I liked to draw all my faces with giant nostrils—it drove her mad!”
“You believe me then?” Clara asked.
“Heck, Joan of Arc comes to our house every Tuesday! Why wouldn’t I believe you?”
“But another strange thing happened just last night,” Clara said. “Fiona Babbish came into Pish Posh again. I hadn’t seen her since Audrey went to work for her. She came in alone, as usual, sat down, and ordered some soup. So I went up to her table and asked how Audrey was doing.
“‘She’s gone,’ Fiona said.
“‘Do you mean she quit?’ I asked. But Fiona shook her head. She said that Audrey had left one day without a word. But that her glasses and her sketch pad were still in her room. She said it was as though Audrey had simply vanished off the face of the earth.”
“Cripes, that’s weird,” Annabelle said. “Was Fiona angry? ”
Clara shook her head. “Not at all. In fact, she seemed kind of cheerful. Plus, she looked a whole lot healthier. She had color in her face, and her shoulders weren’t all scrunched up. You know what I think?”
Annabelle shook her head.
“I think the splinter’s been reattached,” Clara said.
A gusty breeze made the leaves riffle, and one of the bigger ones detached from the tree and sailed down, past the terraces, and finally landed on top of a bus, where it was whisked away.
“Hey, you know what we should do?” Annabelle said. “We should go down to the Huxley Academy and let old Ms. Blurt know what happened. Besides, I want to tell her that I’ll be back in her art class this year. That’ll send her over the edge! Serves her right for ratting on me. ”
On their way to the Huxley Academy, they cut through Washington Square Park. It was teeming with people—jugglers. musicians, skateboarders, dog walkers. By the fountain a man with purple hair and pierced eyebrows was swallowing a flaming torch.
The little artist who had once offered to sketch Clara’s portrait was at his usual spot under the ancient elm tree—the Hanging Tree—and when he saw her, he patted the chair beside him energetically and called, “Sit, young lady. I will sketch your portrait. Only ten dollars. Sit.”
Annabelle hooked her arm through Clara’s and whispered, “Ignore him.”
“Wait,” Clara said. She stopped and stared up at the tree for a moment, spotting the thickest limb, the one Frank Ploy had been hanged from. It was hard to imagine that the tree once had such a gruesome history. Now it simply gave shade to the little artist and whoever sat for their portrait, its splendid canopy of leaves nudged by the breeze, high above their heads.
The artist smiled at her encouragingly and patted the chair again. After a moment’s hesitation, Clara pulled away from Annabelle.
“Sure, why not,” she said, and she took a seat.
“Don’t let him charge you a penny more than it’s worth,” Annabelle warned. “I’ll be right over there if you need me, watching the fire-eater.”
“Okay, but don’t get any ideas,” Clara called after her.
The little artist sharpened his pencil with a penknife in quick, expert strokes, and then flipped his sketchbook to a fresh page.
“No
w,” he said, pencil poised above the sketch pad, “how do you want to look? Shall I make you look glamorous? Sophisticated? Shall I make you look like a movie star?” He swept his hand toward his sketches of movie stars.
“No,” said Clara. She removed her sunglasses, folded them up, and put them on her lap. “Just make me look like a kid, please.”
While the little artist’s pencil whooshed across his sketch pad, Clara sat perfectly still beneath the shade of the Hanging Tree—no fidgeting, no hair twisting, no smiling. But she did tap her feet twice on the ground, and then once more for Dr. Piff, just to let him know she was thinking of him.