The Face in the Frost

by John Bellairs

  "I grow plants," said the monk. "And, I do things with them. Come in and let me show you around."

  The guided tour of the Green Oratory showed that the monk indeed grew plants: lime trees in tubs, frazzled cacti in barrels, jack-in-the-pulpits in pots, and Venus's-flytraps in cages. He had built flooring to divide the bell tower into rooms; they were connected by ladders, but Prospero's fear of heights extended to fear of straight-up ladders, so he went up the dumb­waiter with the luggage. When they came to the top of the belfry, there were the bells, dirty and pigeon-streaked, but they had been turned upside down and filled with dirt. Vines and creepers with purple leaves and red waxy droplet flowers dripped over their sides. The monk would not tell Prospero and Roger how he kept the steamy atmosphere of an arboretum in this cold stone building, but he did enjoy exchanging plant information with Prospero.

  Now, they were on the roof, where all sorts of night-blooming flowers opened, bells, trumpets, and puffy Chinese-lantern mouths. The roof of the tower was covered with a burgundy-colored moss that Prospero had never seen before. Roger was smiling and shaking his head while the monk walked around, fingering leaves and talking proudly of his collection. Prospero finally had to interrupt him.

  "Please. All this is lovely, but we've got to get to the village beyond this mountain. Is there any way in?"

  The monk looked unhappy. "I saw you coming down the stairs on the other side, so I guess you know about those gates. The villagers chased me out a couple of months ago when I was picking mushrooms at night. They have plants up there that you wouldn't believe. Why... oh yes. No, that's the only way up. But, why go there? It's really not a very friendly place these days."

  "I can't explain," said Prospero, thinking wearily of all the people to whom he had said "I can't explain," "but we've got to get in. Haven't you been wondering why it's still almost like summer up here in this valley? And, haven't you heard what's happening down below?"

  The monk pointed to a little white dovecote in the corner. "I've heard, all right-from them-and I hope I can ride it out. I don't know much magic except plant magic, but I can tell you that this is not a healthy place now. It's close and muggy down in that valley there at night. Come over to the edge and look down."

  Prospero and Roger saw a blue mist floating below-it was like water, and like water, it distorted shapes. Broken rocks looked wavy, and tall stalks bent sharply at the top. Long grass was rippling like weeds at the bottom of a stream.

  "It all looks as though it might blow away in a minute," said the monk "When I'm down there at night, I don't feel real at all."

  "I've seen worse than that down on the plain; said Prospero. "And, we may be able to stop all this, God knows how. Isn't there any way up? Think!"

  The monk walked around, pounding his fist in his hand. He kicked a tin watering can across the roof.

  "Way up. Way up. Say! No, that's ridiculous. Still...wait here a minute."

  He went down through the trap door, and made a lot of noise in the room below. When he came back up, he was carrying two pots, and in each one was an ordinary-looking creeper vine.

  "This," he said, "is Sensitive Anaconda."

  "It looks like Creeping Charlie to me," said Prospero, who had such a plant in his front parlor.

  The monk looked hurt. "Well, it isn't. And, it may get you over that wall. Follow me, and may I request silence?"

  Prospero and Roger followed the monk, who solemnly carried the plants, one in each hand, across the little wooden bridge that connected the tower with the mountain. On the other side was a narrow rock shelf and beyond it was a dank-smelling mushroom cave. The procession stopped at the mouth of the cave, and the monk set the plants down. He looked up at the slightly fur­rowed granite wall that rose at least a hundred feet above the shelf; it was not only perpendicular, it actually seemed to lean out a bit at the top. Now, he began to conjure, and his style was odd. He stood with his hand over his face, muttering, as if he were trying to remember the answer to a hard question. As he talked, the plants rose, swaying like charmed snakes. They dug green tendrils into the smooth rock, making cracks where they did not find them. Up they went, wriggling and twisting, until the tops of the two vines were out of sight. The monk waited, tapping his foot. Suddenly the vines tightened, vibrating like plucked strings. They had caught hold of some rocks at the top.

  Prospero looked pale. "Excuse me," he said, "but I'm not very good at climbing f get dizzy in the lower limbs of apple trees."

  "Well, lucky man that you are, you won't have to climb," said the monk. "Hold this."

  He put a pot in each man's hand. The vines, imitating the corkscrew motion that the monk now made with his finger, wrapped themselves tightly around the wizards, several times around. He gave each man his bag and staff.

  "And so farewell," he said. "Come back and tell me what this was all about."

  The vines began to wrap more and more lengths of green cable around the two somewhat alarmed men, who now started to rise, slowly and solemnly. Prospero thought for a second of what would happen if this eccentric plant grower was one of Melichus' helpers, or, God forbid, Melichus himself. But, he shrugged his shoulders as well as he could with six bands of vine around him and tightened his grip on the carpetbag. There was no way up but this, and up they went, scraping their backs on hard rock. The monk, who was waving his watering can at them, got smaller and smaller in the moonlight.

  By the time they got to the top of the mountain wall, each now had a fat green rubber tire around him. But, when they were safe on the broad rock rim, the vines loosened and slithered back down the sheer face. Like someone preparing to go on stage, Prospero stood with his back to the little Valley, squared his shoulders, brushed back his hair, and shook granite dust off his sleeves. Finally, he took a deep breath, let it out, and turned around.

  The valley below him, gray in the rising moon, was a wide hilly basin of close-cropped grass, dotted with clover. Dark wrinkled rocks stuck out of folds in the ground. Houses, squatty loaf shapes with thatched mops, ran in even rows over the one long central ridge. He counted them-one... two... hmmm... twenty. Where was the cottage he had stayed in? It must be in the shadows at the back of the valley, up under those four upright slabs of stone. Then, he turned and saw Roger.

  Roger stood listening. His arms were raised to fend off something, and he was staring in fear at the pleasant little town, as if it were about to fly at him in a hail of boards and stone. Finally, he lowered his arms, wiped his face, and turned to Prospero. His voice showed that he was breathing heavily.

  "You... you know, all the way up here I thought to myself, 'What if we are going to the wrong place? What if we are leaving the field of battle, where we ought to meet Melichus and try to beat him?' I don't think that now. There's something here, all right, and it doesn't like us. We are going to have a hard time getting out of this place."

  Prospero looked around him. "I don't feel anything. That may be a bad sign, because this fight is mainly between Melichus and me. Maybe I'm not meant to notice anything-yet."

  "Well, come on," said Roger. "Let's see what's down here. We may as well give up all hope of sneaking up to the cottage unnoticed. If they can't see two men silhouetted in moonlight on the edge of a cliff, they won't see us if we walk through the middle of their town."

  They stumbled down the long slope of loose and broken stones that led to the edge of the sweet-smelling clover field. The houses in the distance had looked dark from above, and now, they looked just as dark.

  "This is strange," said Prospero. "It's only eight o'clock at night, and even in a little farming town, there'd be one light. And look! The shutters are closed."

  "Yes. They really have a wild life up here."

  Prospero and Roger walked on, listening for some sound, some barking dog or screeching night walking cat. When they reached the little town, the houses seemed more than dark-they were empty, abandoned, and dead. Blackness lay in the cracks of the broken shutters, and in the spac
es between doors and sills. Prospero walked up to one silent cottage and rapped several times on the door. He heard nothing, but as he stood waiting, his hand passed near the keyhole. A cold draft, so cold that it stung his palm, was blowing from inside the house.

  He turned and walked back to Roger, who was looking around him with more and more apprehension.

  "Roger, this is more than very strange. Didn't that silly monk say there were people up here who threw him out?"

  "Yes, he did. But, they may not have been people."

  "Let's go on."

  A little farther ahead-nothing was very far from anything else in this tiny town-was the market place, a square plot overgrown with weedy grass and withered dandelion stems. In the middle was a fountain with a low carved curb. Fountains were common enough in market places, but this one was quite elaborate. The sides of the round basin were carved into several bas-relief panels, and in the center was the figure of a hooded man reading. Unfortunately, the fountain was not running, and the basin was full of dirt. And flowers. Very odd-looking flowers.

  Prosper sat on the smooth worn lip of the basin and tweaked a leaf with his finger.

  "These are strange flowers. You remember what the monk said, Roger. He said they had flowers up here you wouldn't-"

  Roger suddenly leaped forward, grabbed Prospero's hand, and jerked him away, so violently that the two of them fell in a heap on the ground, amid many shouts and what-the-devils, all of them from Prospero. He picked him­self up and stared at Roger, who was himself staring intently at the fountain.

  "Now, what in God's name..."

  "The flowers. You didn't see the monk's drawings, but I did."

  "The monk? The one down there with the plants? Why-oh! Oh! Good Lord, the plants in the book!"

  "Yes. And, let us now have a look at those carved panels, if we dare." Roger's voice was shaking.

  The panels, to neither man's surprise, were familiar: the Witch of Endor, the silhouetted figure in the terrible black window. What the other pictures were they never found out, for as Prospero was straightening up after looking at the first two, he saw a candle burning in a window down the street on the right.

  "Look."

  "Yes. I see it and I want to run. But, we must go to it."

  "At this point, anything else would be insane, don't you think?"

  Roger agreed, and they slowly started to walk toward the little haloed light. It was shining in the front window of a stone house that was a little larger than the two on either side of it. Its roof was of slate and the shingles looked newly laid. For whatever good it would do them, Prospero and Roger stayed close to the shadowed walls and eaves of the nearer house as they edged down the lane. Finally, they were at the corner of the large house, and they flattened themselves against the rough stuccoed wall. Prospero was the first to reach the window, and, much against his better judgment and the shouting of his instincts, he looked.

  What he saw was an old white-maned man, his back to the window. He was seated at a polished table and he was reading a book. A single candle in a pewter stand dribbled wax on the dark varnished surface. Nearby on the table lay a half loaf of bread from which a piece had been roughly torn, and there was a tin cup that might have had wine in it.

  In the few seconds that Prospero stood there looking, he felt terribly afraid. He imagined that the faint steam from his breath on the pane would catch the old mans eye. But, the reading figure did not move. Prospero edged back, and Roger squeezed past him to look. A couple of seconds later they were both on all fours, crawling back to the alley between the two houses. They whispered excitedly.

  "To think he is up here!" said Roger. "But, it does make sense, in a way. Do you think he knows we're here?"

  "No," said Prospero, crossing himself. "If you want my opinion, I think that hell could gape and not tear him away from that cursed book. He's caught, but then maybe we are too."

  "At least, we know why he stopped chasing us," said Roger. "Which way is your cottage? Do you have any idea of which way it is?"

  "North," said Prospero, pointing up the dark valley. "I think we had better go on hands and knees till we get out of this lane. And then, run like the devil for the back of the valley! Follow me."

  The two men crept along slowly, lifting their satchels and setting them down softly a few feet in front of them And, when they were in the open, behind the houses, they ran, but nothing followed them from that dark house.

  The shadows of the four monoliths rose higher over them as they ran. Roger tripped on a stone and almost fell.

  "Where is it? Maybe he's torn it down."

  "No... no, there it is! Just a little farther."

  There it was, a narrow wooden house with Gothic pointed windows and a steep roof. As they got closer, Roger could tell that this had been mainly Prospero's work, not Melichus'. The posts that held up the sagging porch roof were carved into beanstalks, and a few traces of the original yellow paint could be seen in the cracks. Knobby white wooden icicles dripped from the eaves, and the deep-paneled front door had an oval stained-glass inset. Up on the creaky porch, the two wizards set down their bags and stared a minute at the dark jeweled glass. Roger lit a match.

  "Do you suppose that key the farmer gave you fits this lock?"

  "No," said Prospero, who was rummaging in the inside pocket of his winter cloak. "I have carried the key to this door with me for years. When I'm looking for the key to the root cellar or the linen closet, I always come across the thing and wonder why I keep it."

  He pulled out a small iron ring full of different-size keys. Selecting a big one with a quatrefoiled handle, he placed it in the cherub-mouth of the lock plate. The door rattled open, Roger shut it after them and lit another match, and they saw the shadowy outline of a few small wooden chairs. An empty copper candlestick stood nearby on a dusty table, and Prospero stuck a lighted candle-his last one-in it.

  "Well, here we are," he said. "Now, if I can only remember where I put that globe."

  "If it's still here," said Roger. "Look at the floor."

  The dusty gray boards in front of them were covered with long narrow footprints. Prospero stood looking at them. He bit his lip several times until it hurt, and he started nervously clenching and unclenching his fists.

  "It was to be expected. But, he can't take it away." His voice dropped "At least, I think he can't. Come on. I remember where I put it, and I was the last one out."

  He grabbed the candlestick and led Roger to a corner cupboard at the back of the cottage's one large room. The round-topped door stood on a little waist-high sill, and its knob, a piece of blue-streaked porcelain, was startlingly cold to the touch. While Roger held the candle, Prospero opened the cupboard. Inside, he could see stacks of bowls and plates, last used-as far as he knew-by Melichus himself. On a separate shelf, over the others, was the green-glass paperweight. He was almost afraid to touch it, and he reached for it twice, pulling his hand away each time. Finally, he closed his fingers on it-it was colder than the knob had been-and he lowered it carefully. Roger saw that he was covering it with his hand.

  "Let's light more candles," said Prospero. "I don't want to look at this strange little thing in the dark."

  He set the green object on a table and, with Roger, searched about until they found a bundle of candles on the mantelpiece, tied up with some rotted string. They spent several minutes sticking them in wall sconces and dishes all around the room, then lit them all. Prospero was still not satisfied, and besides, he wanted an excuse to keep him from looking at the magic globes. So, he decided to build a fire. The logs that he and Melichus had left there so long before lay near the fireplace, soft honeycombs of mushy sawdust. He kicked one and a swarm of beetles crawled out, scurrying away to find cracks in the floor. But, another log pile lay nearby, further evidence that someone had been there recently. Roger knelt in front of the black sooty-smelling hearth, laid a small fire, and struck several matches before he could get the pile of twigs to light. Prospero wa
s pacing up and down, looking at the door.

  "The globes aren't dusty either," he said. "And, there were marks of hands scrabbling in the dust on the shelf. What do you think? I'm afraid."

  "So am I," said Roger, who was pumping the fire with a cracked old leather bellows. "So am I."

  He straightened up. The fire was crackling and throwing long jumping shadows on the opposite wall.

  "Well, that's that. Now, let's look at that thing on the table. Prospero! For heaven's sake, stop pacing!"

  "Oh, very well. I'd feel better if he'd just burst in on us. But, he's not going to. Let's see what the globes are doing."

  They pulled two chairs up to the round oak table where the glass pyramid sat sparkling between two candles, like some strange shrine. At first, the globes were empty and transparent. A few bubbles frozen inside them made specks in the green water-shadow that floated on the table. Then, slowly, the three lower spheres began to form a picture. There was the crossroads, there were the high banks, the bare trees, the leaning stone marker, and the softly falling snow. Prospero pulled the paperweight closer and stared hard at the uppermost globe. From the pinpoint bubbles, rounded images expanded till their bowed and distorted shapes filled the whole ball, and then, they burst to let new images form. All these pictures were familiar to Prospero: his bookcase, a hatrack, a bust of some Roman dignitary. Finally, after much swirling, the ball focused on a single scene: Prospero's house, seen from the front lawn. The porch was piled with leaves, the shades were drawn as Prospero had left them, and long bands of that uncanny snow lay in curving ridges around the house. With an effort, Prospero brought the house closer, till he could see the square window in the front door. It was covered with the frost-mask, two running empty eyes, and a long howling mouth. He tried to get close enough to look in the window, but the empty face filled the glass and burst. The ball was clear and green again.

  "Now," said Prospero "I'm going to speak to Melichus."

  Roger jumped up and put a hand on his arm. "No, don't! You don't know what will happen if you meet face to face."