Suitcase of Stars

by Pierdomenico Baccalario

  This time I went right up to the red house. “I bet it was built from the wood of Captain Reginald’s red ship,” I said to myself, eyeing it with renewed curiosity.

  The front door was wide open. “Aiby!” I called without thinking. “Stay here,” I said to Patches. He sat on his hind legs.

  “Aiby Lily?” I called. “I have another letter for you!”

  No one answered. I noticed that the window beside the door looked more like a shop’s window than a house’s. Its wooden shutters were open. Inside, several shelves were crammed full of antique objects that looked like toys.

  I tried to enter the house, but stopped. Well, I didn’t stop — it felt like I was physically unable to step inside. As I stood in the doorway, I saw Aiby reading a large book and leaning against a curved counter. There was a huge flame-red rug beneath her feet. A wrought iron chandelier with dripping candles was suspended above her head. Behind her were dozens of shelves crammed with the most unusual collection of objects you could ever imagine.

  I couldn’t really distinguish anything specific because it seemed like I was looking through a shifting mist. Shapes were fuzzy, colors were muted, and the shadows were dense.

  “Aiby?” I called, still standing in the doorway.

  She looked at me and it felt like magic. Her eyes seemed to pierce the blanket of mist that muddled my vision. The expression on her face was anxious.

  I smiled awkwardly, and then mumbled something. I don’t remember what I said or what happened afterward. As soon as the strange mist faded, I found myself walking by her side along the path in the woods. Patches was trotting a few paces in front of us as I guided Jules’s bike over the stones on the ground.

  Aiby was talking to me. I had the sensation of hearing everything but not understanding anything. I felt like a chunk of my life had vanished — first I had been talking to Aiby in the red house, and then the two of us were walking through the woods. How did we get here? I wondered.

  At the time, I could never have understood because I didn’t even know that Professional Memory Removal Dust existed. Aiby had dusted me with a magical powder to make me forget what I had seen. According to her, she’d done it for my own good, but I had my doubts.

  Either way, all I felt was a vague sense of lost time. I stopped abruptly in the middle of the forest path. “Isn’t this a little weird?” I asked.

  Aiby did a half-pirouette to face me. “What’s weird?” she asked.

  I pointed to the woods around us. “Just look around!” I said. “There are bushes, saplings, and grass! Yesterday there was nothing here but charred tree trunks.”

  She looked at me like I was talking about a flying rhinoceros, or something equally unlikely and strange.

  I kneeled down to snap a twig off to make sure it was real. “See? They’re real!”

  “Of course they’re real,” Aiby said. “Don’t you like them?”

  “That’s not the point!” I said.

  “Then what is the point?” she asked.

  “Come on, Aiby,” I said. “Trees like this can’t grow overnight.”

  “Well, it did rain last night,” she said.

  “It rains all the time!” I cried. “We’re in Scotland!”

  She crossed her long arms behind her back. I noticed she was wearing her usual mishmash of patterned clothing. Seeing her in the woods right then made her look like some kind of fairy creature.

  Aiby rolled her eyes. “Dad planted them,” she said. “He’s really good at growing things.”

  “Growing trees overnight?” I said. “Yeah, right.”

  “They’re for the official opening,” she said, ignoring my sarcasm. “It didn’t seem right for our first visitors to see this landscape of burned tree trunks.”

  I let out an exasperated sigh. “Aiby, what in the world are you even talking about?!”

  “The opening of our store, Finley,” she said. “Why else do you think the Lily family moved back to Applecross?”

  “I had been wondering that,” I said. “I even asked around in the village, but no one seemed to know anything about it.”

  “Really?” she asked.

  Aiby was calm as could be, but I could feel the tension in me rising. Every response she’d given me seemed careful and prepared.

  “Yes, I did,” I said.

  “And what did you discover, detective?” she asked.

  “You’re acting weird,” I said.

  “Think what you like,” she said with a smile. “But I didn’t spend the night searching for information on your family and their sheep farm.”

  “How did you know we have a sheep farm?” I asked.

  Aiby picked a curl of wool from my clothes and lifted it up to my face.

  “Oh,” I muttered. “I guess everyone has a sheep farm in this area, anyway.” I concentrated on pushing the bike. “I don’t want you to think that I’m sticking my nose into your business or anything like that, but let’s just say that I’ve noticed some strange things happening in the last few days.”

  Aiby shrugged. I didn’t know what I wanted to say next, so I changed the subject. “What’s the Enchanted Emporium?”

  We had reached the sign that indicated the beginning of the path. “And while you’re at it,” I added, “can you explain to me why this arrow keeps changing positions?”

  Aiby smiled at me. “Finley, are you sure you want to know?” she asked.

  I was about to answer when I remembered her warning from the previous day. “No one can know everything,” I said.

  She nodded. “You were paying attention!” she said coyly. “I’ll answer one of your two questions. Which one will it be?”

  “The Enchanted Emporium,” I said immediately.

  “The store has always been our family’s primary business,” Aiby said proudly. “When it’s our turn to run the shop, we open it for business.”

  “Your turn?” I asked. “What do you mean?”

  “There are other families who share the business,” Aiby explained.

  “What is the business?” I asked.

  “Selling, buying, and repairing rare items,” she said.

  “What kind of rare items?”

  “Oh, I suppose things like the messages in bottles that you sometimes find on the beach,” she said, smiling.

  I narrowed my eyes at Aiby. I couldn’t tell if she was trying to hint that she knew I’d found the bottle yesterday, or if she just brought it up because we’d talked about messages in bottles before.

  I slumped my shoulders. “Listen, Aiby,” I said. “I’m really confused.”

  “What is there to be confused about?” she asked.

  I was about to say that her answer bothered me, but just then Patches began to run around our legs and bark. Someone was coming.

  “There he is,” Aiby said, using her hand to shade her eyes. “My father’s finally home. Let’s hope he’s found who he was looking for in the village, otherwise we won’t be able to open the shop on time.”

  That was when I recognized her father: he was the blond man with the self-propelling pants I’d followed to the cemetery the night before!

  Later that day, I was feeling flustered, so I went into town to try to clear my head.

  “Finley, could you come here a moment?” Mr. Everett said. As usual, he was sitting on a wicker stool just outside the entrance to his shop and smoking his long pipe.

  Mr. Everett’s shop, The Curious Traveler, sold souvenirs and inexpensive gift items. From his stool, Mr. Everett was able to keep an eye on almost everything that happened in the main square of the village. Before retiring to Applecross, he had been a well-known professor at an important university. For this reason, some people in Applecross called him “The Professor.” Mr. Everett didn’t seem to mind.

  I approached his shop. “Yes, Mr. Everett?” I asked.

  “Can I have a word with you?” he asked. He glanced around quickly, then added in a whisper, “In private.”

  “Sure,” I
said.

  He put his hands on his knees and raised himself up. He smoothed out the wrinkles in his blue business suit. “Please step inside,” he said.

  As I entered, the scent of lavender filled my nose. The shop was clean and organized, just like its owner. There were books, figurines, Scottish flags, scarves decorated with the colors of local rugby teams, wooden troll statues, and little elves holding twinkling glass gems in their hands.

  Mr. Everett leaned across the pale wooden counter and looked me right in the eyes. “I’ve heard from the reverend that you’ve met the Lily family,” he said.

  Mr. Everett was usually direct, but it still caught me off guard. “Sort of,” I mumbled. “Actually, I only asked the reverend if he knew anything about them.”

  “So why were you asking about them?” he asked.

  I shrugged. Patches was scratching against the door outside the shop. “No particular reason,” I answered.

  Mr. Everett nodded thoughtfully. “Anyway, you were right,” he said. “The Lily family has in fact returned to Applecross. Do you know why they’ve come back?”

  I hesitated, uncertain how much information — if any — I should share with Mr. Everett. “They own a little shop,” I said. “Down by the shore. It’s called the Enchanted Emporium.”

  The Professor nervously traced his fingers along the wooden counter. I wondered if he was afraid that the opening of the new store would take away some of his business. “I must admit, I’m a little worried,” he said. “I ran into Mr. Lily the other day when he came into the shop. He seemed pretty strange to me. I don’t know why a man like him would want to open a shop in Applecross.”

  It’s pretty strange for a former college professor to retire to Applecross to open a souvenir shop, too, I thought. But on the other hand, Mr. Everett was right — Mr. Lily was the strangest man I’d ever met.

  “Have you spoken to him?” Mr. Everett asked. “Mr. Lily, I mean?”

  I nodded. “We met briefly,” I said.

  “What about the girl?” he asked.

  “We talked a little,” I said. “She seems nice enough.”

  “I see,” Mr. Everett said. He hesitated for a moment, then added, “Did they say if they were looking for someone in the village?”

  “Looking for someone?” I repeated. It was true that Aiby had talked about needing someone for the official opening, but I didn’t know more than that.

  A loud crash came from the shop’s storage room. Mr. Everett spun with surprising speed. “Excuse me for one moment,” he said. Then he disappeared into the storeroom. After a few moments of silence, I heard him rummaging around.

  While I was alone in the shop, I took the opportunity to look around. I noticed a list of names by the cash register. The first name on the list was Askell. The second name was circled in red marker: Lily.

  When Mr. Everett returned, I managed to turn my head around in time so that he wouldn’t think I’d been looking at the list. “Pesky stray cats,” he grumbled. “You only need to leave the door open a crack and they somehow manage to squeeze inside.”

  I had no reason to be suspicious of Mr. Everett. He was nice enough, and he certainly cared about Applecross. I figured he was probably just concerned about the future of his shop, so I decided to help him out without giving too much information away.

  “Now I think about it,” I said, “they did talk to me about some kind of grand opening in a week or so.”

  “I heard that as well,” The Professor replied, nodding over at the McStay Inn on the other side of the square. “Rufus McStay told me yesterday. There’s a foreign man staying at his inn for the Enchanted Emporium’s opening. In fact, Rufus asked me to go over and help interpret for his guest since the man refuses to come out of his room and only speaks Dutch.”

  “Maybe he’s a friend of the Lily family,” I said.

  “In all likelihood, yes,” Mr. Everett said. “Anyway, if you see the Lily family again, just be careful.”

  That sounded like a warning. “Mr. Everett, what do you really think about the Lily family?” I asked.

  The old professor shook his head slowly. “Nothing,” he said. “Their ancestors left a positive impression on the village, but that was over two hundred years ago. Time tends to change things.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “Don’t mind me, Finley,” he said, flashing a smile. “I’m just being old and foolish.”

  I could tell that Mr. Everett wouldn’t give me more information, so I turned to leave.

  “Be careful, okay?” Mr. Everett repeated.

  “I will,” I said, wondering what he wasn’t telling me.

  As I opened the door, I nearly ran into Meb McCameron, the village dressmaker. She was holding a dark suit in her hands.

  “Hi there, Finley,” she said with her usual smile. She turned to face Mr. Everett. “I’ve brought you your suit for the funeral.”

  Funeral? I thought, as the door closed behind me. Who died?

  * * *

  Mr. Everett’s final warning of “Be careful” kept repeating in my head as I pedaled along my mail route. It was my last day delivering mail since Jules would be returning to work the following day. Halfway through my route, I decided to take a break and visit the ruined castle.

  “Listen, Patches,” I whispered. “How about the two of us go nose around the old Lily castle for a while?”

  Patches howled softly. He didn’t seem too happy about the idea of exploring a haunted castle, but I knew how to persuade him: I gave him one of his favorite treats. As he chewed, I slipped him into my mailbag and continued biking. I could feel him squirming the whole way.

  It was such a clear day that I could see old lady Cumai on the other side of the bay. She was silhouetted against the calm sea, walking from the door of the flour mill to the cliff’s edge.

  The wind kept blowing my hair in my eyes and scattering my thoughts as I rode. Pedaling was twice as hard as normal since the gusts of wind were strong enough to knock me off balance. I stopped for a rest, turning to look at the ruined castle up ahead. It looked like a rotten tooth poking out of the greenery.

  Until I’d met Aiby, I only knew the castle as a setting for silly ghost stories. In the evenings, you could sometimes see car headlights moving around in the ruins. People often visited there at night if they wanted to feel the thrill of exploring a haunted house. Doug had told me not to go down there if I saw car headlights, but he’d never told me why. I only knew it was a place I never wanted to visit.

  But things were different now. It felt as though those ruined walls were calling my name, as if the answers to the many questions I had about Aiby and her family could be found inside.

  Earlier that day, when Aiby had introduced me to her father, we didn’t really speak much. He didn’t even shake my hand — he just waved at me and smiled briefly. I noticed he had the stubble-covered face of a man who was too busy to shave regularly. Or too lazy. But what really caught my eye was a strange-looking key that hung around his neck. On its stem was the engraving of a scarab beetle — just like the ones from ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics. It made me feel uneasy.

  I pedaled a little faster. To reach the ruins, you had to cross over the small bridge that passed over Calghorn Dinn. Then you followed a dirt road that had mostly eroded over the years. There were countless potholes to avoid along the way, but eventually it would take you to the rear of the castle.

  After I crossed the bridge, I had to pull off to the side of the road to let two cars pass me. It was unusual to see a single car on these roads, let alone two. The second car tapped the horn at me. I couldn’t see who it was, but I lifted my hand and waved anyway.

  Moving ahead, I noticed that the two cars were heading toward the Dogberry farm. There was something going on up there — the dogs were barking like mad, and there were three additional cars parked nearby.

  I noticed the undertaker’s car was already there. A broken-down car was next to the undertaker’s.
“Looks like bad news, Patches,” I murmured. I jumped off the bike and observed the group of people on the farm. Moments later, I heard Reverend Prospero’s booming voice.

  That’s what Meb was talking about with Mr. Everett, I realized. Mr. Dogberry must have died. “Poor man,” I said. I hid the bike in some undergrowth by the side of the rode, and then I let Patches out from my bag.

  It was sad news, but the two of us continued on our way toward the castle, anyway. People dying in Applecross wasn’t all that unusual, after all. Doug claimed that dead people had gray skin, but I didn’t know if that was true, because I’d never seen a dead person. In fact, I’d only seen a casket once, and it was closed.

  Insects swarmed me as I passed through the woods. Branches whipped my face as I walked. Between one mosquito bite and the next, I wondered if I should have said a prayer for Mr. Dogberry. But if so, which one? I ran through a few in my head, but none of them seemed quite right. After all, I didn’t even know how he had died.

  Yet.

  “Heel, Patches,” I whispered from the bushes. When I’d previously come to the ruins with Doug, we’d arrived by tractor from the front. Now that I was approaching the castle from the woods, it appeared larger and more imposing.

  Patches and I approached the remains of an exterior wall. The large archway was nearly covered with countless tangles of creeping ivy. Inside the wall, wild grass was growing where the wood flooring used to be. It was a gray, gloomy, and empty space with a wooden roof that was falling to pieces. Above the archway, a wrought iron talon creaked softly in the wind. Once upon a time it had probably held a coat of arms or maybe a sign of some kind. I was more than a little creeped out by the moaning sound it made when the wind hit it. It reminded me of the sounds a really sick person makes.

  I noticed that the insects from the woods were keeping away from ruins. “No insects or spider webs nearby,” I said to myself. “That’s weird.”

  Patches wagged his tail, which helped me gather some courage. I pushed the curtain of creeping ivy aside and passed through the archway. “Let’s go, Patches.”