The Wonderling

by Mira Bartók

  In the dream, he was looking up at the stars. Someone was holding him, rocking him to sleep. He knew that whoever it was was about to sing the music box’s song.

  But Arthur never got to hear the song, or see the face of the singer, for a loud crash downstairs wrenched him from his dream. He heard the sound of glass breaking, then fervent whispering. He pushed the Songcatcher bell up and off his head. Three creatures were talking, and their voices were frighteningly familiar.

  “You lot start in the front of the house. I’ll check the back,” said one. Another said, “Right, Wire,” and a third added, “We got this.”

  Wire, Mug, and Orlick? What in the world were they doing there?

  The fur on Arthur’s neck stood up. He dashed inside the Songcatcher closet and looked frantically for a place to hide. But there were only narrow shelves of boxes, and the drawers in the cabinet were much too small to hide in. He ran back out, opened the closet on the right, and slipped inside. It was dark and cluttered, perfect for hiding. Inside the closet, hanging on a hook next to the door, was a key. He locked himself in and crawled under a pile of blankets in the corner.

  He lay very, very still.

  Wire, Mug, and Orlick were downstairs, turning things over, throwing things about, and making a huge racket. Every once in a while, Wire would hiss at the other two to “Hurry up and find it, you stupid twits!”

  Arthur could hear every single horrible word.

  When they finished demolishing the rooms on the first floor, they moved on to the second. They rummaged through closets, yanking out dresser drawers, throwing the contents on the floor and stomping on them. They were clearly looking for something but destroying things along the way just for fun. Arthur could hear them saying things like “Look under the bed, you clodpole” and “I already checked there, ding-dong.”

  Wire, Mug, and Orlick started up the stairs to the third floor.

  They were in the music room now, knocking all the instruments to the ground, breaking things left and right. Arthur heard the stack of miniature pianos tumble to the floor and shatter. They bashed the violin against the wall, kicked the harp down the stairs, and smashed the hurdy-gurdy to bits.

  Then they were in the Songcatcher room.

  “Well, look what we have here,” said Wire in that cool, cruel voice of his.

  “Must be it,” said Orlick. “She said a big brass bell whatsit. But fer my money, don’t look like much to me.”

  Arthur could hear Wire smacking Orlick on the side of his head. “Idiot. What you think doesn’t matter, does it? Let’s just find the plans and get out of here.”

  Arthur shook beneath the pile of blankets. Why? He said over and over in his head. He choked back tears. The Songcatcher! What if they destroy it? What if they destroy me?

  All at once Wire was outside Arthur’s closet, jiggling the handle. “Must be in here if the door’s locked,” said Wire. “I’ll get it open. I’ll kick it open if I have to.” Arthur lay very still. It was stifling under the blankets, and he could barely breathe. The door shook violently as Wire tried to kick it in. But salvation came from Orlick, who called out from the other closet, “I found it! It’s in here, mate! Plain as day!”

  “Give it to Wire, you moron,” said Mug. Arthur could hear them grunting and pulling something. It sounded like they were playing tug-of-war.

  “I know! No need to be nasty like.”

  “Yer the one who’s nasty. Take fer instance yesterday, when —”

  “Will you two shut it?” said Wire. “Now, hand those plans over, or I shall demonstrate how nasty I can be.”

  All three were in the other closet now, examining something. “Yes,” said Wire. “This must be it. She said it was a long scroll tied with a blue ribbon. These must be the plans. This is good. This is very good. She’ll be quite pleased. Now you can have one more minute of fun, then let’s get out of here. Sneezeweed said he’d wait for us in the cellar. We’ll have to go back the way we came, through the drainpipe again.”

  “Them tunnels down below give me the willies,” said Mug. “An’ I almost got stuck in that pipe. Me bum’s still sore, if you really want to know.”

  “I really don’t care to know about your bum right now,” said Wire.

  “Well, I don’t like bein’ Sneezy’s slave.”

  “Me neither,” said Orlick.

  “Just remember — you are working for her, not him. And just keep thinking about all that extra cheese,” said Wire. “And all those special privileges she promised.”

  Before they left, Mug and Orlick knocked as many cylinder boxes off the shelves as they could, then stomped on the cylinders rolling around on the floor. They yanked some of the catalog drawers open and tossed bunches and bunches of cards up in the air, laughing demonically.

  “That’s enough, now,” said Wire coolly. “Go pick that thing up and let’s get out of here. And don’t drop it!”

  Arthur waited until he was sure they were gone, then crept out from under the pile of blankets.

  He was about to run out of the closet when a thin beam of light from a small round window fell on a picture hanging on the wall. There, in a gilded frame, was the same hand-colored engraving Arthur had first seen in the infirmary — two happy girls beneath an apple tree, the very same apple tree right outside the house. It c-can’t be, he said to himself. I don’t understand. He dragged a box over to the window and reached up to open the curtains, letting the light pour in.

  The engraving wasn’t the only picture hanging in the dusty closet. There were rows and rows of photographs, all of Miss Carbunkle or her twin sister, whose name, as he discovered on a label, was Phoebe Nightingale.

  Arthur knew he should hurry up and go, but he just couldn’t. He had to find out more.

  There the twins were, together at age six, in matching pinafores and bonnets on matching ponies. And at age seven, at the zoo with their governess. Age ten, waving from the bow of a great ship. And at twelve, the girls at a picnic, dressed all in white, playing croquet. As Miss Carbunkle grew a little older, Arthur could tell her apart more easily in the photos, for while her sister’s face became lovelier and more open and kind, Miss Carbunkle’s grew sour and stern. And then, after age eighteen, there were no more pictures of the two together, just photographs of Phoebe Nightingale from the past thirty years. In one, she was standing in front of a music hall — the very same music hall Arthur had seen on his first day in the City! The marquee above read: The Golden Voice of Phoebe Nightingale: One Night Only! In others, she was waving from a hot-air balloon above the City; or on a concert hall stage, singing, her eyes closed, her hands clasped at her chest; or dressed in finery and jewels in her parlor, a fluffy white dog in her lap. There were photographs of Miss Phoebe in sailboats with friends, and on horseback, or playing the piano, or making a toast at a dinner party at her home.

  On the dusty shelves, Arthur found remnants of Miss Phoebe’s past: bundles of cards and letters, stacks of daguerreotypes, various kinds of ephemera from her family and her life on the stage.

  Arthur was absolutely bewildered. How was it that of all the houses Quintus could have chosen for him, he had ended up in this one? And who was Phoebe Nightingale? And what exactly had happened when she and Miss Carbunkle turned eighteen?

  It seemed impolite to look through all these personal things, but he couldn’t help it. He picked up a bundle of old letters tied with a pink ribbon. He had started reading the first one — a letter from Phoebe’s father to her — when he thought he heard sounds coming from the house next door. He had to get out of there now.

  Before he ran downstairs, he glanced at the table where the Songcatcher had sat. All that remained was the clock.

  ARTHUR RUSHED out the back door so fast that he didn’t shut it tight. He ran all the way to Wildered Manor and didn’t stop once except to pay the Stinkbottom toll.

  He hoped against hope that the neighbor hadn’t seen him come or go. But she had. She had observed his coming and going t
hrough her spyglass. She noted the open door, banging in the breeze. She noted the way he had fled from the place. She wrote her detailed observations on a piece of paper, then gathered her skirts and went out to investigate. She peeked inside the door and saw the rampant destruction. Then she found Arthur’s feather duster lying in the middle of the foyer. “Aha!” she said. “Caught you in the act! I knew it, I knew it!”

  She immediately sent one of her servants to fetch the police, who alerted the D.O.G.C., since the culprit appeared to be a groundling, not a human. The authorities were there within minutes.

  “I knew that groundling was dodgy the moment I saw him,” she said to the D.O.G.C. officer when he arrived. “He had that look, if you know what I mean.”

  “Oh, yes, madam,” said the officer. “I know exactly what you mean.”

  He said that he suspected that the devious groundling was responsible for a string of robberies in the area.

  “Oh, my!” said the woman. “I shudder to think what he could have done to me! Not to mention what he could have done to poor, defenseless Baby!”

  “Did he appear to be dangerous, madam?” asked the officer.

  “What a question! I was afraid for my life.” She proceeded to offer a description of Arthur, with several embellishments, of course. And within no time at all, posters of him were plastered all over the City.

  In the posters, he looked rabid, his teeth bared as though he were about to bite someone’s nose off. His ear looked larger too, and his eyes looked crazy. Around the artist’s rendering it said:

  When Arthur arrived at Wildered Manor, no one was home except for Quintus, who knew something was up the moment he saw him.

  Arthur frantically explained what had happened. He told Quintus everything. This time Quintus listened intently when Arthur told him about the Songcatcher. When Arthur told him about how Wire and his friends had destroyed every musical instrument in the place, Quintus winced. But when he tried to ask Quintus how he had happened to send him to Miss Carbunkle’s sister’s house, Quintus brushed it aside, saying, “World’s full of funny coincidentalisms, lad. Don’t pay it no mind.”

  “What if someone saw me?” asked Arthur. “What if they think I did it?”

  “’Course they’ll think you done it. But that ain’t all,” said Quintus gravely.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Listen an’ listen good. Me an’ Floop an’ a couple t’others, we gots an unnerstandin’ — a business arrangement, you might say. It’s all fine an’ dandy. But there’s a line me an’ the mates can’t cross. Never. But the problem is, Spike — you crossed it.”

  “I c-crossed it? I don’t understand, Quintus.”

  “Where’s your duster, Spike?”

  Arthur searched inside his rucksack. It was empty.

  “As I feared. You crossed the line. ’Twasn’t me who left yer duster. An’ that’ll lead ’em all the way here. Don’t think Floop won’t give ya up if D.O.G.C. breathes down his neck.” Quintus took hold of Arthur’s arm and looked him in the eye. “Listen, Spike — I can’t lose this house, you unnerstand? I can’t be harborin’ a criminal. If I do, they’ll take away the house an’ I’ll end up like Goblin too.”

  “But I’m not a criminal!” said Arthur.

  “I know you ain’t, but D.O.G.C. will think you are, sure as I’m standin’ here. What I mean to say is — you gots to go. I’m sorry, but that’s the way it is. An’ you gots to go right now.”

  “B-but where can I go?” Arthur stared at the floor, trying desperately to think where he could run to. Trinket! “I — I have a friend by the sea,” he said. “I’ll — I’ll leave the City. I’ll go back the way I came. I’ll —”

  “They’ll be lookin’ fer ya all over Lumentown and beyond! Floop told me just last week D.O.G.C.’s been lookin’ fer some groundlink whose been breakin’ into houses. Now they’ll think it’s you, Spike. Only one place for you now, I’m afraid.” He put his hand on Arthur’s shoulder.

  Arthur looked up at Quintus. He knew the answer before Quintus even said it.

  “Below,” said Quintus. “Far, far below. Now, hurry!”

  Quintus told him about a secret entrance to the City below the City, a passageway through the sewers on the other side of the river. “Can’t go over the bridge, mind. Gots to ferry across. An’ the ferry only runs after dark.”

  “But, Quintus, I —”

  “Ya gots to hide somewhere till nightfall, hear me? Then look for the ferry. You’ll know the boat when you see it.”

  “Can’t I just hide here? Please.” His voice cracked.

  Quintus shook his head solemnly. He handed Arthur a coin. “Gonna need somethink to get across, m’ boy. Put this an’ that other one I gave ya someplace safe.”

  “Thank you, Quintus,” said Arthur with tears in his eyes. “P-please say good-bye to the others for me, okay? Especially Squee.”

  He quickly threw together a bundle of things. He rolled up the suit of clothes Quintus had given him (“You can keep ’em, Spike, as a remembrance like, an’ keep the rucksack too”), and he put on the clothes he had come with. He tucked his blanket scrap and gold key into his shirt pocket, along with the coins Quintus had given him.

  When he was ready, he stood inside the door to Wildered Manor, clutching his red hat. He didn’t know what to say to his mentor, his betrayer, his friend. All he could manage was “I — I still need to find 17 Tintagel Road. . . . Can you — ?”

  Quintus gripped him by the shoulders and said, “No time for that now. Now, run! Run like the devil! Run!”

  REMEMBER WHEN YOU FOUND ME?” asked Mardox. It was early morning, and the manticore was reclining on a cushion next to Miss Carbunkle in her observatory as she gazed out through her telescope at the courtyard below. Ever since the two groundlings had escaped, she had become more vigilant in her surveillance activities.

  Her first act in reestablishing order was to abolish recess. She wondered, though, if she would miss it. Recess had been the one time in her dreadfully boring, regimented week when she could relax her rules long enough to let her hair down — or would have, if she had hair. She allowed her mind to wander and thus had come up with her best inventions — inventions she still had no money to build.

  Now, in place of recess, she and Sneezeweed took turns running her newly instituted Groundling Obedience Retraining Program (otherwise referred to as G.O.R.P.). The orphans were forced to sit in the classroom for two straight hours and repeat, over and over: I will not sing, I will not play. I’ll toil in silence night and day.◆

  ◆ Without intending to, however, Miss Carbunkle had written a poem. One could even say — if it had been set to music — that the headmistress had unwittingly written a song.

  “Mistress?” said Mardox.

  “Sorry, my pet. I was thinking of something else. Yes, of course I remember. How could I forget?” She put down her telescope and pulled the creature onto her lap.

  “Tell me the story again,” begged the manticore. “Please?”

  “But you know how it brings back bad memories, my sweet.”

  “Well, Mistress . . . if you don’t want to . . .” He gazed up at her, his droopy eyes glistening and moist.

  “Oh, Mardox. Of course I’ll tell you the story.” She fondly petted his rubbery snout. “It’s the only bright moment from that wretched time.” Her face clouded up, and she bit her thin, pale lip.

  “Calm yourself, my mistress. Think of the moment we became one. Think of that!”

  “You are right, as usual. But first, perhaps I should see what that incompetent assistant of mine is up to.”

  “Let the others do the work now, Mistress,” said Mardox. “Then you and I can focus on more important matters, like the machine, and your sister, and our plan. After you tell me the story, of course.” He laughed, or rather, he made a peculiar noise that was a cross between a hiss, a chortle, and a snarl.

  “Once again, my pet, you are correct. I am done with doing servants’
work! Let the Rat and the others earn their keep. And let that nitwit Sneezeweed do his job for once!”

  After Trinket and Arthur’s escape, the first thing Miss Carbunkle did was replace the dogs Sneezeweed had lost with another pair of mastiffs, equally drooly and dim. She thought of hiring guards from the City, but then Wire had offered up a most brilliant, not to mention inexpensive, solution. Why not use the meanest bullies at the Home to keep the others in line? Give them a little of this and that — some cheese, extra soup and bread, a new set of clothes, and, most important, an ounce of power — and they would gladly do her bidding. It was astonishing how little it took to gain their loyalty.

  She placed Wire in charge of them all. That Rat was proving to be quite useful, all things considered.

  Miss Carbunkle gazed out her panoptic window at the sky. It was heavy with clouds, but for once there was no rain. Soon she would travel to her second appointment with the man with the white gloves. This time they were to meet not in the castle high on the hill but in that dreadful place called Gloomintown. But no matter. She would go to the ends of the earth if it meant securing funds for her project. She hoped she would be successful in pleading her case this time around.

  “Don’t think of that,” said Mardox, reading her mind. “Tell me the story instead.”

  “Sorry, my pet. Ah, yes, the story.”

  Mardox nuzzled his snout in Miss Carbunkle’s cold white hand and purred.

  The headmistress took a deep breath and began.

  “It was after my father’s funeral, and I went walking in the graveyard. I was sad, but more angry than sad, for a great injustice had been done to me.”