The Book Jumper

by Mechthild Gläser

  I sat up, flicked an oversized ant off my knee, and began to creep through the bushes in the direction of the voices. The vegetation was thick, but I’d only gone a few yards when, through the curtain of ferns, I spied a group of wolves. The group consisted of two adult wolves with silver-gray fur, talking quietly to each other, and a whole heap of cubs at their feet, frolicking happily with a naked human child who couldn’t have been older than two. Mowgli!

  This was the beginning of The Jungle Book! The wolf family had just found Mowgli alone in the jungle and decided to bring him up as one of their own—and I was right in the middle of it! I felt dizzy. I’d never read the book, but I knew the Disney version of the story. It had been one of my favorite films as a child. Was Bagheera the panther about to show up? Or Baloo the bear? Would he sing a song, like in the film? Would he take me to the monkeys’ lost city? Would I be able to understand the language of the animals and speak to them? Oh, man—I had really and truly jumped into a book! My thoughts tripped over one another as I crawled closer and closer to Mowgli and the wolf family. Unlike the Disney Mowgli, this Mowgli had curly hair and was not wearing red trunks.

  But just as I was about to burst from the undergrowth and greet the wolves with a friendly “Hi, how’s it going?” I suddenly felt something settle upon my back. I froze; the something was soft and warm and heavy and felt suspiciously like a paw of some kind. Slowly, very slowly, I turned around …

  … and found myself face-to-face with a predator. It was Shere Khan, the tiger. His yellow cat’s eyes blazed and all of a sudden I remembered that the main storyline in The Jungle Book was about this very tiger trying to hunt Mowgli down and eat him. Because he was afraid of men and their guns. And because he was a tiger, and in the wild tigers do have a tendency to eat humans.

  Shere Khan bared his teeth. The stink of his breath hit me square in the face. Now I understood why Alexis had insisted on me jumping into a harmless children’s book. Unfortunately, however, even those didn’t seem to be entirely risk-free. If I called for help, would the wolves be able to save me? I drew a deep breath, but before I could make a sound the tiger put a claw to his lips.

  Put a claw to his lips?

  “You must not interfere with the plot, Reader,” whispered Shere Khan. “If they see you, they will not keep the man’s cub. Then you will be lumbered with the brat, and our entire story will fall apart.”

  I stared at the tiger. He could talk. “Herghm,” I said.

  The tiger cocked his enormous head to one side. “Not so loud,” he murmured. “I just told you. Come with me.”

  The big cat moved off, and after a moment’s hesitation I followed him into the jungle thicket. What was the likelihood that Shere Khan was only luring me away from the tumbling wolf cubs so he could devour me in peace somewhere else in the forest? Was it even possible for me to die inside the story or, as a visitor from the outside world, was I invincible? Powerful bands of muscle rippled beneath the tiger’s striped coat as he prowled noiselessly onward. I, on the other hand, kept treading on snapping branches and rustling leaves, a far cry from the graceful elegance of my companion. If he really was planning to attack me, I didn’t stand a chance.

  But with every step I took, my fear dissipated a little beneath the jungle canopy. I was reassured by the thought that Shere Khan could have killed me by now if he’d wanted to, but he hadn’t. And somehow I just couldn’t imagine being eaten by someone I’d been having a conversation with a few minutes earlier.

  The tiger led me to a clearing where there was a fallen tree lying on the ground, and I sat down on it. Shere Khan lay down beside me, head on his paws. His tail whisked to and fro among the ferns.

  “I am Shere Khan,” he said.

  “Amy,” I replied. “I’m sorry. I’ve never been in a book before and I didn’t know…”

  “It’s all right,” returned the tiger. “I would say it’s the law of the jungle, but it’s the same everywhere in the book world: Readers are not allowed to intervene. Under no circumstances. You must always stay in the margins, between the lines.”

  “Kind of like—in the subplot?”

  Shere Khan nodded.

  “Okay,” I said, and a fresh wave of excitement washed over me now that I was fairly sure the tiger wasn’t going to hurt me. “What should I do, then? I’m very pleased to meet you, by the way. Do you know where I might find Baloo and Bagheera? Which way is the monkey city? Are you really so terrified of fire?”

  The tiger sighed and stood up. “You had better ask someone in the outside world. In a few pages they are going to take Mowgli to the Pack Council. Then I will have to sit in the thicket and demand that they hand him over to me,” he explained. “This is the way back to the plot and to the tree that will take you home again.” Even as he spoke the last few words he had disappeared into the tangle of the undergrowth.

  I stayed seated on my tree trunk for a moment. Should I go after Shere Khan and return to Stormsay? Or …

  As if of their own accord, my feet carried me off in the opposite direction. This trip was far too exciting to turn back now. I’d spoken to Shere Khan the tiger. The whole thing was unbelievable. Unbelievably awesome! Perhaps one of these days I really would have Momo’s tortoise Cassiopeia as my guide, I thought, as I made my way deeper and deeper into the jungle. There were so many stories I would have liked to jump into and so many characters I was desperate to meet. But coming face-to-face with a dancing Baloo in the monkey city would do for starters.

  There were no footpaths in the jungle, of course, so I clambered over tree roots and boulders and battled my way through ferns and vines until the vegetation gradually began to thin out. But the trees gave way not to a lost city or an indigenous village, as I’d expected, but to a different landscape altogether.

  All at once the air was drier and cooler. A sandy road wound its way through fields and meadows. In the distance I could see a windmill and a knight galloping toward it, lance lowered. Before me lay a crossroads with a towering signpost at its center. The Jungle Book was written in ornate, squiggly letters on one arrow, pointing in the direction I’d just come from; another pointed to Shakespeare’s tragedies. Other roads branched off to Don Quixote, Alice in Wonderland, and The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.

  Wow! It looked as though I’d reached the edge of The Jungle Book and could now decide which story I wanted to travel to next. I’d just resolved to pay a visit to the murderer with a split personality, Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde, when I spotted another arrow. It was smaller than the rest, and somebody had written a single word on it in a spidery hand as if it had been painted on in a great hurry: Margin. I’d never heard that title before. Seriously, since when had there been a book called Margin?

  The sign pointed to what could scarcely be called a road: it was more of a dirt track flanked by craggy rocks. It was littered with rubble, but hey—I had just successfully navigated a jungle thicket, after all, and I was also exceedingly curious. Without further ado I set off along the track, the strange title going round and round in my head. I made surprisingly good progress. Normally I would’ve been bound to stub my toe or fall over or trip on a loose stone. But this literary rubble seemed to be on my side.

  The rocks on either side of me loomed higher and higher until they formed a ravine, which I was now walking along the bottom of. The sand crunched under my feet and my footsteps echoed off the walls. After a while I thought I heard voices in the distance. Was I getting close to the next story? How long had I been walking? Was it only five minutes ago that I’d been talking to Shere Khan, or an hour?

  Eventually I reached a bend in the path. As I turned the corner I saw a man sitting on the ground—though it took me a while to establish that he was a man, because he was wearing silk stockings and heeled shoes and had his hair tied back in a ponytail with a velvet ribbon. He’d buried his face in his knees and flung his arms over his head in an attempt to protect himself from three old women who were flying through the air arou
nd him, hooded cloaks flapping. They were scratching at his arms with their long fingernails.

  “Hail to thee, young Werther,” screeched one.

  “Thou shalt find happiness with Lotte,” called the second.

  “Thou shalt wed her by and by,” shrieked the third.

  The man curled up into an even tighter ball and his shoulders quaked beneath his embroidered waistcoat. A sob could be heard amid the jeers of the old women flitting around Werther’s head. “Go away,” he pleaded, a choke in his voice.

  But this had no effect whatsoever on his tormentors. “Hail to thee,” repeated the first, flying closer to the man. Her voice rang out across the ravine and made the crags tremble. Here and there, showers of dust and stones cascaded down the rock face. Her victim made himself even smaller, not even attempting to fight back.

  “Hail to thee, young bridegr—” began the first.

  I was so fixated on the scene that I forgot to look where I was going, and caught my foot on one of the larger rocks. I almost fell headlong into the midst of the whimpering man and his tormentors but managed to steady myself just in time. The old women immediately fell silent and turned their watery eyes upon me. Their hair snaked out from beneath their ragged cloaks as if it had a life of its own.

  I cleared my throat, gurgled something that sounded vaguely like “Hello,” and swallowed hard. The three old women hissed menacingly, and the man sobbed. Now that their attention was turned on me I felt somehow obliged to try to help the poor wretch at the roadside. “C-can’t you see he’s upset? Just leave him alone.”

  The old women grinned.

  “Thou art brave,” rasped the second.

  “Thou art a Reader,” snarled the first.

  “Yes,” I said, squaring my shoulders. “And who are you?”

  They laughed.

  “Thou wouldst know who we are?” screeched the third. “Come, sisters, ’tis time for our potion.”

  They were still laughing as they spiraled up into the air and flew away.

  The man squinted out from between his elbows. “Thank you,” he mumbled.

  “You’re welcome. I hope I haven’t messed up the plot,” I said, remembering that I had only recently been warned by a massive tiger not to interfere with the progress of any stories. I bit my lip.

  But the man waved aside my anxieties. “No, no—this is no-man’s-land. I was on my way to the Margin when you found me. To all intents and purposes they are harmless outside of their own play. But they take pleasure, you see, in reminding me of my sorrows.”

  “Why?”

  “Oh, because I am easy prey, I suppose.” The man clambered effortfully to his feet, brushed the dust from his silk stockings, and pulled out an embroidered handkerchief. He blew his nose and gazed at me from under his long eyelashes. “Forgive me, but would you happen to be Miss Amy?”

  “Er—yes. How do you know my name?”

  “Half the fairy-tale forest is looking for you, truth be told. They say your friends in the outside world are afraid you might not have survived your jump.”

  “Oh.” I tucked my hair behind my ears. “I’d better set them straight, then.”

  * * *

  Soon afterward, when I jumped back to Stormsay from the giant jungle tree and landed in the stone circle, the first thing I saw was the anxious faces of Betsy and Glenn. Will stood apart from the others on the brow of the hill. He was strikingly pale and his hands gripped The Hound of the Baskervilles so tightly that the veins showed blue under his skin. He was staring off into the distance and didn’t even seem to register my arrival.

  But the other two came rushing over to me straightaway.

  “At last,” Glenn exclaimed. “Did you get stuck? Are you hurt?” His eyes examined me from head to toe.

  “Um, no, I—”

  “It’s too late, simple as that,” Betsy broke in. “She’s too old to start training. A Macalister might be able to do it, but a Lennox…”

  “Betsy,” admonished Glenn, but Betsy was undeterred.

  “It doesn’t do anyone any good to have her stuck at her jumping point for hours, not even able to move. How is she ever going to learn how to speak to the characters? She should just stay here till the holidays are over and then go back to Germany. You can’t force these things.”

  “Um—actually, I didn’t get stuck,” I said, picking my book up off the mat. “First of all I talked to Shere Khan the tiger. Then he had to go back to the plot, so I went on by myself and eventually I got to the end of the jungle and I found a signpost and—”

  “You left The Jungle Book?” cried Glenn.

  “Students aren’t allowed to do that.” Betsy wrinkled her nose. In her eyes was a flicker of something I’d seen before on the faces of my classmates in Germany. Jealousy. But she did her best to hide it.

  Glenn folded his arms. “Well, you do seem to be very talented. But I have to agree with Betsy in this instance: it is still far too soon, and far too dangerous, for you to explore the book world outside of your practice book.”

  Betsy nodded vigorously, and now at last Will did look over at us—and eyed me with interest.

  The monster crept out of its cave.

  Softly, softly.

  Nobody noticed it.

  3

  CHEWING GUM FOR OLIVER TWIST

  THE COTTAGE ON THE MOOR WAS SMALL. It consisted of a single room, just big enough to hold the sofa with its holey cushions and the cast-iron stove. The thatched roof reached almost to the ground; mold had set in among the stalks and let the rain in the moment it came knocking. In a storm the wind whistled through the cracked windowpanes. But in spite of all this Will liked his home.

  Of course, it wasn’t really his home—Will was after all the nephew of Reed Macalister, Laird of Stormsay, whose ancestral home was Macalister Castle in the north of the island. But the castle was scarcely less drafty than the cottage and when Betsy and her old nanny launched into one of their frequent tirades about Will’s father and what a failure he was, what a disappointment to the clan, Will vastly preferred the bubble and gurgle of his own little stove to the griping by the fire in the great hall of the castle. Not to mention the presence of the Laird, whom he went out of his way to avoid.

  Some time ago Will had transported all of his treasures from the castle to the cottage. He now kept his favorite books in a chest sandwiched between the sofa and the wall, along with the album full of photos from his past. His memories were hazy; they felt like the fading fragments of a dream. He’d been five years old when his parents had left. That was twelve years ago now.

  But today Will had no desire to recall the distant past. He just wished he could remember more of the details of the previous day. Because yesterday something had happened—possibly even something terrible.

  His gaze was riveted to something that had been daubed on the wall above the stove. The color bloomed red, far too red, against the plaster. A few drops had trickled down the wall like tears not wiped away in time. But this liquid wasn’t water. Will didn’t want to think what it was.

  It formed words on the wall, the letters turning brown at the edges.

  I HAVE AWOKEN

  It had appeared suddenly yesterday afternoon. Will had dozed off on the sofa and when he’d woken up from his nap, there it had been. Was it supposed to be a warning? A threat? Who had painted the words on the wall? Had they already been there before he’d fallen asleep? What did they mean?

  Will had run to the stone circle to fetch his best friend.

  Holmes.

  It was forbidden, but it wasn’t the first time he’d done it.

  And Holmes seemed to have a hunch. He had stared long and hard at the writing, and at last he’d murmured, “It wasn’t Moriarty.” Then he’d gone out into the storm, perhaps to organize his thoughts. Will hadn’t seen him since. He and the dog had searched for Holmes all evening before eventually giving up. They’d hoped Holmes had gone home to play his violin or experiment with anesthetics or engage i
n another of his favorite pastimes.

  But today during lessons when he’d jumped inside the book, Will had found it empty. He still couldn’t believe Holmes hadn’t returned to the book world. But the great detective did seem to have vanished into thin air.

  And now Will sat here alone, staring at the wall.

  * * *

  “Do help yourself to another, Amy,” said Lady Mairead, sliding the plate of biscuits closer to me. “They are a little old, but if you dunk them in your tea they taste almost freshly baked.”

  We both knew she was lying. The biscuits between us were massive—not dainty little cookies like the ones we had in Germany, but dry, inch-thick slabs as big as the palm of my hand. I took a second biscuit, even though the first was already lying like a stone in my stomach and weighing it down. Ever since my journey into The Jungle Book, Lady Mairead had been remarkably kind to me, and I was far too polite to spurn her biscuits. A cloud of dusty crumbs filled my mouth as I took a bite.

  My grandmother smiled contentedly and leaned back in her chair. We were having afternoon tea in the conservatory where we’d eaten breakfast. A tabby cat named Macbeth had curled up on Lady Mairead’s lap and was purring loudly. “We don’t get to the shops as often as we used to, unfortunately,” my grandmother explained, tickling Macbeth behind the ears. “But the main thing is just to get some proper food into you. Your mother’s fruit and vegetable diet doesn’t seem to agree with you.” She glanced at my wrists.

  I was about to reply that my figure was not due to my mum’s vegan cooking but to a cruel freak of nature, when I found that the dust-biscuit had cemented my tongue to the roof of my mouth and was now threatening to block my windpipe as I attempted to swallow it. I eventually managed to wash the thing down with the help of two cups of tea. Then I had a coughing fit that lasted a full minute.