So, while CJ stayed at the computer, Patrick went down to the dumbwaiter with his mother, and Eloise, Carron, and Brid touched one side of Patrick’s closet to reveal a twenty-foot passage filled top to bottom with drawers and shelves. This was the place that used to hold the silverware, platters, and glasses for the countless guests who once frequented the ballroom. The passage led to a little staircase and Torrio’s back door. Torrio stood there to greet them. “It’s faster than going up and down the elevator,” he said. Brid couldn’t help but think how much fun she and her brothers would have with the silver room in the future.
They pushed through Torrio’s back door and into a kitchen filled with books. There were books on architecture, history, and museums, and many collections of poems. Brid wondered if there was something about this building that turned people into poetry lovers. “Sorry about the mess,” Torrio said. “I just haven’t had visitors in a long while. I spend most of my time, uh…”
“Reading?” Eloise asked, softly fingering an old edition of Robert Frost’s poetry. Brid looked around at the books stacked everywhere, the cheap black table, and the chipped gold-leaf paint on the walls. It had never occurred to her how lonely Torrio’s life must be. Her thoughts were interrupted by a soft whirring noise coming through the grille, the sound of the dumbwaiter rising toward them.
“Patrick?” shouted Brid into her walkie-talkie. “Let’s review each section of wood you need to push on, before you actually push it.”
“I know the order,” Patrick said. “I think about it all the time. Wait while I put the DigiSpy down.”
“Okay,” Brid said. “The first poem is ‘The Weary Blues’ by Langston Hughes, and he’s talking about Harlem.” She quickly unfolded her printout of the map onto the card table. Torrio and Eloise gathered to look over her shoulder.
“Number one is around Lenox Avenue. The Guastavino building is gone, but the symbol has to be…?” Eloise asked.
“The musical note,” Patrick replied. “Cool.”
“What’s cool?” Brid said.
“The wood just kind of springs in when you push that spot,” Patrick said. “And then it stays in.” Upstairs, in front of his father’s computer, CJ watched the wood piece easily notch into place.
“Okay, Patrick, now we head west on the map, on your left.”
“I know, it’s ‘Ulysses,’ that poem by the tennis boy,” Pat yelled.
“What?” Brid sounded alarmed.
Upstairs, CJ chuckled into his walkie-talkie. “Tennyson!” he said. “Not ‘tennis boy’! And the symbol is the general’s star for General Ulysses S. Grant.”
Patrick found the star and pushed it forward, once again feeling the piece latch on to something.
“Third poem!” he yelled.
“The third poem is ‘Faint Heart in a Rail Way Train,’” said Brid. “The symbol is the caduceus held by the Mercury statue at Grand Central Terminal.”
“Yeah, about the guy who wished he had gotten off the train to meet some girl. Yuck!” Patrick said.
“Actually,” interrupted Eloise, “the bigger thought is to follow your heart and take a chance every once in a while.” They waited as Pat pushed the wooden shape with a caduceus on it. “The next poem is ‘Recuerdo’ by—”
“—Edna St. Vincent Millay,” they all chorused.
Brid added, “Patrick, push the joyful girl, that’s the symbol for that poem. Remember, from the Staten Island Ferry?”
There followed a long pause. CJ watched from upstairs, seeing that Patrick’s arms couldn’t reach that far south on the map. He had the DigiSpy directly in front of the correct spot, but he just couldn’t reach it. It was too far away to his right, and too far up.
“Darnnnnn it!” came his shout.
“What’s wrong?” they heard as Anne Smithfork’s voice crackled over the walkie-talkie from the basement. She had been listening, mesmerized, the entire time.
“I can’t reach that far,” Pat said. “It’s too high up.”
“Is that behind the Williamsons’ wall?” Brid asked. “Can’t he just take the dumbwaiter up higher?”
CJ came on the walkie-talkie. “It’s too far to the side for Pat; the dumbwaiter can’t go sideways. We need to get into the Williamsons’ apartment. Pat, go down to the basement, then come up and meet us there,” he said.
Brid was already heading out of Torrio’s front door, Joe and Eloise coming behind her. She summoned the elevator, knowing exactly where they had to go.
Sonia, the maid, met them at the entrance to the Williamsons’ apartment. Brid said, “Hi, remember me? I live on the other side of this wall, and I need to get into your side.”
Sonia just stood there, looking at Brid’s shoes.
“Oh, yeah,” Brid said, and flipped them off, not bothering to untie her sneakers. To Brid’s surprise, Lily appeared from behind Sonia.
“What an absolute pleasure!” Lily said, extending her hand. “We’ve just come home for half-term holiday! We haven’t been here twenty minutes.”
Impulsively, Brid hugged her, as Lukas appeared behind her.
“Listen, long story,” Brid said, “but we have to get behind your wall. Probably one of your radiator grilles will do in that back bedroom.” The elevator dinged again as Ray arrived, bringing up CJ, Patrick, Carron, and Anne.
“Shoes off, people!” Brid demanded. Sonia looked too stunned to protest as the parade filed past her. She picked up her neat basket of booties, but shrugged when nobody took any.
In Lily’s ruffled bedroom, CJ extracted the screwdriver from his Swiss army knife and began to unscrew the grille cover. This was going to be easier than he’d expected. He slipped the cover off, and everyone took in the sight of the other eye.
“What in heaven’s name?” said Anne Smithfork.
“Holy knuckle-duster!” said Lukas.
“That’s nothing,” said Patrick. “Look at the writing around her eyes while we finish this thing up. Just remember to skip seven places.”
“What does he mean by that?” said Lily as she watched Patrick sink behind the wall, helped by CJ. They moved with the grace of people who did this every day.
“Patrick!” Anne protested.
“Don’t worry, Mom, there is a shelf for him to walk around on,” CJ said as he stuck his head in and handed Patrick his flashlight.
“Now, where were we?” Patrick asked, as if only a moment had passed.
Brid, CJ, Torrio, and Eloise all looked at each other and laughed.
CHAPTER 40
Below them, they could hear Patrick congratulating himself as he pushed the fourth symbol, the joyful girl, and a latching noise proved it was the correct choice. He yelled up to the open grille, “Isn’t the Kissing Post next?”
He added, “I can see big lips right where Ellis Island should be.”
Lukas Williamson gave a shrug. At some point in the last few minutes he had resigned himself to the fact that he and Lily would have to wait for answers to their questions.
“Got it,” Patrick yelled up. “That’s five down! What’s next?”
“It’s the trolley car, Patrick, back at the Queensboro Bridge,” Brid said. “That’s at Fifty-ninth Street on the East Side, so you have to go to the middle of the map.”
“I know; it’s where we had hot cocoa yesterday,” said Pat happily.
Eloise sat down on Lily’s pink and green tufted bedspread. She was feeling light-headed.
“So the seventh and last clue,” Brid said as she looked at the expectant faces, “relates to Ota Benga. Remember he slept at the American Museum of Natural History?” She paused. “Did we ever decide on the symbol for that one? I don’t think we did!”
“No!” said CJ. “That’s what we were doing when the storm started and we had the subway sleepover and—”
“Silly!” Patrick’s voice interrupted him. “It has to be a dinosaur; everyone knows that the Museum of Natural History is full of them.” And without even waiting for confirmation, h
e pushed the last symbol.
The final block of wood latched like the others, but this time, it freed an entire portion of the map. It fell forward, completely unhinged from the inside wall, free of the enormous wooden frame that had held it for so long. It fell like a giant piece of jigsaw puzzle turned upside down. Everyone in Lily Williamson’s bedroom heard a rumbling noise followed by a heavy thud.
“Patrick!” Anne Smithfork yelled. “Get up here.”
“Whoa!” said Patrick.
Brid and CJ jammed their heads into the open space, but neither could see anything but Patrick’s dancing flashlight beam.
“Here goes,” Pat said as he thrust something upward. CJ could just about reach the thing Pat was holding over his head, but he grasped it and gingerly pulled it through the grille opening. It was a package.
The wrapping was of the same brown paper and red-and-white bakery string that Treasure Island had been bundled in, making Brid think that both packages were probably wrapped at the same time. Attached to the string was a key that looked like the same key that activated the dumbwaiter.
“What could that be for?” Lukas asked.
“Must be another key for the dumbwaiter,” said CJ, glossing over the fact that nobody would need a dumbwaiter, had they gotten this far in the treasure hunt. He casually slipped the giant key into his pocket, and only Brid seemed to notice. All eyes were on the package.
Of course, the brown paper had a poem attached. CJ lifted it from the packaging and handed it to Eloise. She glanced at it and slowly read out loud:
“For a Child
by Fannie Stearns Davis
“Your friends shall be the Tall Wind,
The River and the Tree;
The Sun that laughs and marches,
The Swallows and the Sea.
“Your prayers shall be the murmur
Of grasses in the rain;
The song of wildwood thrushes
That makes God glad again.
“And you shall run and wander,
And you shall dream and sing
Of brave things and bright things
Beyond the swallow’s wings.
“And you shall envy no man,
Nor hurt your heart with sighs,
For I will keep you simple
That God may make you wise.”
When Eloise finished reading aloud, she looked around the room at the people surrounding her. “I’m not sure God has made me wise,” she said, “but perhaps there is still time left for me to become wise. Let’s open the package!”
CJ had just handed her the package when they all heard, “Um, a little help here?”
Patrick! They had forgotten to pull him up from behind the wall. CJ and Brid each reached down for one of Patrick’s arms and carefully pulled him back into the room. “Good work,” said CJ. Pat said nothing, but he beamed.
Eloise carefully unwrapped the brown paper packaging to reveal a framed oil painting about the size of a large notebook. It was a very accurate representation of the top two floors of 2 East 92nd Street, and the majestic roofline that adorned it, Eloise’s childhood home.
The roof showed the unmistakable limestone balustrades that seemed to stand guard. An impressive water tower stood erect at the very top, with the faint profile of a brown ladder leading upward. The water tower reflected the late autumn sun, which had turned the front of the building a golden bronze. Though unsigned, the painting was visibly a masterpiece, certainly worth a lot of money.
Eloise looked at it, searching for the details of her home, the home that was the scene of so many parties, so much life, and so much drama. “This artist must have been perched on a neighboring rooftop.” Eloise pondered. “To be able to paint the top of this building with that perspective, he had to have been on a roof.”
“Such a beautiful painting,” Anne Smithfork murmured. “Such a wonderful treasure left in the wall so very long ago.”
CHAPTER 41
That night, Anne Smithfork made chicken curry and invited everyone over for dinner. The kitchen was a mess, but the dining room looked radiant. Gold candles made the room glow. The lights were dimmed, and soft music played. CJ had to admit that their mom’s work had made their new surroundings look beautiful.
Eloise brought a belated housewarming gift: an entire set of china she had never used, dishes that had been her mother’s. Each plate was hand-painted with a set of four children holding hands and dancing in the middle. Brid noted that the word Sèvres was written on the back of each plate.
Lily Williamson seemed pleased to be in the company of such fine dishes. “These were made in the late 1700s,” she said, watching with horror as Anne Smithfork popped a plate in front of Carron.
“When?” Anne asked.
“Around Napoléon’s time,” Lukas answered.
Without any fuss, Anne moved the contents of Carron’s plate onto a purple plastic plate with a dinosaur on it, and took her Sèvres plate back to the kitchen.
“You may not wish to place that in the dishwasher,” Lily called after her.
Ray sat at the head of the very long dining table, his face scrunched up in laughter. Eloise sat erect at his side. Carron showed everyone how precisely she could use her fork and spoon, the result of coaching from Eloise.
Torrio had brought a few bottles of ginger ale that he dramatically poured into everyone’s glass. He raised his cup and toasted everyone, including Anne Smithfork, the children, Ray, and even the Williamsons for allowing access to their apartment.
As dinner wound down, Joe Torrio stood and banged his knife on the side of his ginger ale glass. He cleared his throat. “I want to share this letter that Mr. Post wrote to Mr. Torrio.”
“Right,” interrupted CJ. “So this is from Eloise’s dad to your dad?”
Mr. Torrio’s face twisted strangely. “Something like that.”
He cleared his throat.
“Dear Johnny,
“Enclosed is a small compensation for the unwavering friendship you showed through the most trying time of our lives. Money means so little in lieu of friendship, but as a token gesture, please accept this.
“When Julian was being threatened with kidnapping, there was nobody else I could turn to. You seemed to know good and bad people, but I never wavered in thinking you fell on this side of being good. Hiding Julian with your family at Knollwood all those years was brilliant, and I’m sure the only thing that kept him safe in those trying times. I know having him there as a pretend nephew was confusing, both to him and to your family, but it was the only way my son could be safe.
“I realize how difficult living with the shadow of suspicion over your family must have been, and there is no way to compensate you for that. I trust this letter will at last clear the Torrio family’s good name. I also understand your wishing to wait to make this letter public, to keep your own family safe.
“For taking such good care of Julian, and for all the tales you had to tell to protect my family,
“I am gratefully yours,
“Mr. Lyon Post”
There was a long silence at the table until Ray finally said, “I don’t get it.”
Eloise had a dazed look on her face. “Knollwood? The place my parents went on weekend outings? My brother, Julian, was there?” She seemed agitated.
“Wait,” Ray said. “Julianwasnever kidnapped?”
Mr. Torrio took over from there. “After the Lindbergh child was kidnapped, affluent families worried the same thing could happen to them. Because Mr. Post was so wealthy and so visible, he worried his son was in danger. The senior Mr. Torrio knew a lot of bad characters. He thought kidnapping threats were valid, and he came to Mr. Post to tell him that. Together they came up with a plan. They decided to pretend that Julian was kidnapped, when really the Posts sent Julian to live with the Torrio family. Both families pretended to dislike each other for the sake of Julian’s safety.”
Eloise looked up from her plate, misty-eyed. “I know my father was afraid
to leave him with his governess after the Lindbergh kidnapping, afraid to go out at night, afraid to let him go to the park. But I can’t believe he sent him away for so long.”
“That doesn’t make sense,” Brid said. “Why weren’t you at risk of being kidnapped, too?”
“Well, I’m three years older than Julian, so I wasn’t as vulnerable,” Eloise said wistfully. “But they did send me away.”
“You mean boarding school?” Lukas said.
“Yes, boarding school with a new last name. At the time, Julian was too young for boarding school.”
Patrick still didn’t understand. “So Julian wasn’t kidnapped, he was given to another family to be raised?”
“That would be the Torrio family. The family some accused of kidnapping him were actually the ones who saved his life,” said Mr. Torrio. “After his father’s death, everyone thought it was time for him to go home, be back with his own family. But by then Julian was quite fond of the Torrios and mad at his own family. I felt abandoned. I felt Eloise was the favored child, and when they wanted me back with my real family, I didn’t want to go.” Torrio was looking down at his plate. “I was so foolish,” he said, turning to Eloise. “I hope you can forgive me.”
There was a painful silence in the room. Even Carron had stopped wriggling in her high chair.
“What?” Eloise said in a soft voice, her mouth hanging open.
“It’s true. I missed so much, and I just thought it was far too late in our lives to even begin to be brother and sister again.” Joe Torrio—Julian Post—rose from his seat and went over to Eloise. He bent low and put his hand out to shake hers. “May I have the pleasure of finally getting to know my sister?” he asked with great deference.
Eloise hugged him tightly, as if she wouldn’t let him out of her sight again. “I thought you had died. I thought of you every day of my very, very old life.” Eloise was crying hard now. “How dare you shock an old woman this way,” she snorted and laughed at the same time.
The children watched as Ray blew his nose into his napkin, and Anne Smithfork rose and hugged the two Posts together.
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