♦ ONE-LEGGED FRENCH GIRLS ♦
Adélaïde followed Miss Whitewood out through the front doors of the Button Factory. They’d spoken about many things during their tour—about France and about being tutored at home—but not about bakery trucks or ballet. They stood on the front steps beneath the factory smokestacks.
“Well,” said Miss Whitewood. “I do hope you’ll enjoy it here.”
“I think I will,” Adélaïde lied.
“I also hope you’ll come visit me during breaks if you can.”
“I would like that,” said Adélaïde.
They parted ways. Adélaïde walked north two blocks and down a narrow street called Howling Bloom, which was lined with many stores, including her father’s new café—a corner shop painted an alluring yellow that seemed to glow as if by magic. She pressed her face to the glass. Mr. Belmont was working alone inside.
Opposite the café, two flights up, Molly S. Mellings spotted Adélaïde from a window of DuttonLick’s sweetshop. She tossed a jelly bean at her and shouted, “It’s the crocodile girl!”
Adélaïde spun around. The sweetshop windows swelled with Button Factory students—some stared in awe while others laughed and made loud chomping sounds. Adélaïde stepped over the jelly bean and into the café. She pulled herself atop a barstool and slid her hands beneath her thighs. Mr. Belmont filled a cup with boiling water.
“Black tea or green?” he asked.
“Black,” she replied.
“Well?” he said, placing the cup in front of her and folding his arms. “How was it?”
Adélaïde shrugged and scooped a heap of sugar into the cup. “Fine, I suppose. But I don’t want to go back there.”
“Why not?” Mr. Belmont asked.
“I just don’t like it, is all.”
“You didn’t like anything about it?”
Adélaïde lifted the cup to just below her lip. “Miss Whitewood was nice,” she said, and after taking a sip, explained who Miss Whitewood was.
“Well,” Mr. Belmont said, turning to continue polishing an espresso machine. “If you did leave school, what would you do?”
Adélaïde shrugged again. “Let’s keep traveling. I’d rather not stay in one place for too long.”
“We can’t do that.”
Adélaïde knew they couldn’t. She spun the stool and glanced around the café. It was closed to the public, as her father was still setting everything up. Mr. Belmont was a very specific man and wanted everything just right, which meant he often did the work himself.
“Where’s Pierre and Pierre?” she asked.
Mr. Belmont shook his head. “Home remodelers at my dis-service, you mean? I couldn’t take it—all that finishing of each other’s sentences. When they started finishing mine, I told them to leave.”
Adélaïde was disappointed. She thought they were funny. Mr. Belmont bent down behind the counter and reemerged with a crate labeled “Espresso Cups.”
“I met a man this morning,” he said. “Lives just across the gardens. He has a son about your age—also attends the Willow Academy.”
Adélaïde spun back around. “Archer Helmsley,” she said.
“So you’ve met him?”
She nodded. “He’s rude and I think he owns a polar bear.”
Mr. Belmont laughed. “I did catch a glimpse of their house. It’s called Helmsley House. Peculiar place. Lots of animals. I didn’t realize who they were at first, but then I remembered reading about the grandparents. They were explorers—floated out to sea atop an iceberg.”
Adélaïde lowered her cup. Until this, she hadn’t been sure what Mrs. Murkley had been talking about. Now it made sense. Or at least as much sense as floating out to sea atop an iceberg could.
“Are they dead?” she asked.
“That’s the assumption. Don’t think anyone has seen them since it happened.”
Adélaïde finished her tea in silence.
“And perhaps he’s just shy,” said Mr. Belmont after a moment. “This Archer Helmsley. After all, not all of us can be bold French girls.”
“Or one-legged French girls,” Adélaïde mumbled.
She thanked her father and slid off the stool.
“I’ll be home soon,” Mr. Belmont said.
Adélaïde nodded and left the café. She slipped quickly beneath DuttonLick’s and clomped her way back to North Willow Street, thinking about this possibly not-so-rude Archer Helmsley whose grandparents had floated out to sea atop an iceberg. Adélaïde didn’t think such things could happen. But two years ago, she also didn’t think pigeons could send a bakery truck crashing into a lamppost.
♦ PETRIFIED GLUB ♦
Oliver finished his dinner and opened the garden door. Mr. Glub picked up his newspaper and looked at his watch.
“Shouldn’t you be going to the roof?” he asked.
“Not tonight,” said Oliver. He shut the door behind him and went to the corner of the garden. On the ground, embedded in the grass, was a moss-covered stone with the name Théo etched into it.
Théo was Oliver’s cat—his first pet. And Théo had been a good cat, most helpful with keeping the basement mice from overtaking the house (a war the Glubs had been losing of late). But when Oliver was seven, instead of eating a basement mouse, Théo scratched open a bag of cement mix and for reasons Oliver still couldn’t figure out, Théo found the mixture to his taste. Oliver found Théo an hour later and called to him, but the cat didn’t move. He tried to pick him up but he couldn’t. Théo was petrified. Oliver sighed and lay down in the grass.
Rising above his garden wall loomed the Murkley house, with lights beaming like interrogation lamps. Mrs. Murkley petrified him. He was glad he wasn’t on her list, but Archer was, and for the first time, he realized that simply being Archer’s sidekick could get him into very real and serious trouble. He wasn’t cut out for this line of work. Adélaïde was. He’d only accepted Archer’s request because he wanted a friend. Adélaïde could actually help Archer. And if she did, Oliver wanted no part of it.
A firefly dotted past and made Oliver smile. He went back inside, found an empty mason jar in the pantry, poked holes in the top with a pen, and was about to return to the garden when he decided to make a quick trip to the roof to see Archer. He climbed the ladder and peered over the edge, but Archer wasn’t there.
CHAPTER
ELEVEN
♦ INSULT TO INJURY ♦
Archer opened his eyes. He was lying on the floor in the aftermath of the wobble. He decided to stay there awhile and stared at the ceiling. He knew it was a ceiling. He’d been staring at this one for eleven years. And now more than ever, Archer wanted to smash through it and soar far beyond the clouds, far beyond the stars, and straight into the vast who knows what. But he couldn’t do that so he stayed where he was, staring up into that great white nothingness. All at once, a head sprouted from nowhere.
“Your ceiling is pretty nice,” said Oliver. “But I think mine is better.”
Archer smiled and took Oliver’s hand. But he was still spinning from the crash and only able to rise halfway.
“Are you okay?” Oliver asked, looking around at the mess.
“I’m fine,” said Archer, rubbing a bump on the back of his head.
“But what happened?”
Archer was about to explain, but before he could, a paper airplane floated in through the window and jabbed him in the back of the head. Oliver picked it up.
“What’s that?” Archer asked.
“A brochure,” said Oliver, unfolding the paper “For something called Belmont Coffee.” He turned to Archer. “What’s Belmont Coffee?”
Archer didn’t know. He stumbled to his feet to see where this plane had come from, but he was struck once more. This time it was a direct hit to his forehead.
“Does this happen every night?” asked Oliver.
Archer bent down to pick up the second plane. This one wasn’t a brochure. This was a bonjour.
“Ther
e’s your answer,” said Oliver, looking out from the balcony door and across the gardens where the crocodile girl was standing on her balcony. She smiled and waved. Archer and Oliver waved back.
“Now she’s taunting me with paper airplanes,” said Archer.
Oliver disagreed. “Bonjour means hello,” he said. “If she meant that to be a taunt, it’s not a very good one.”
“No, she’s taunting me.”
“I’m surprised she’s even talking to you,” said Oliver, finally putting his hand down. “You were rude before and there was no reason for it.”
Archer left the doorway to search for his glass eye in the rubble.
“I should have said it earlier,” Oliver continued. “And I’m surprised you don’t see it, but I think she’s the one you’re looking for—the one who can help you.”
Archer picked up his glass eye and said, “I don’t need her help.”
“Of course you do,” Oliver replied, still staring at Adélaïde. “At least, if you’re as serious about Antarctica as you were before. That girl has sailed across Egypt in a hot air balloon and survived Nile crocodiles. And she willingly took on Mrs. Murkley. Those are just the parts we know. Me? Well, I’m good at falling down stairs.” Oliver wrinkled his brow at Archer. “Why don’t you want her help?”
“Because I don’t think it’s true,” said Archer.
“You’re not acting like that,” said Oliver. “You seem jealous.” He glanced once more at Adélaïde. “But maybe it isn’t true. You should ask her if you want to know for sure.”
Archer sat down on his bed, uncertain what he believed. But Oliver was right. He’d been jealous of Adélaïde. He rubbed his arm and nodded at Oliver’s hand.
“Why are you holding that jar?” he asked.
Oliver had forgotten about his jar. “I was in the middle of something,” he said. “I can’t stay. I just wanted to tell you what I told you and don’t worry if you’d prefer her help and not mine. We both know you’ll need someone with experience.” He paused, then added, “But I still don’t think you should do it.”
Oliver returned to his garden, and Archer slipped off his bed and went to the balcony door. Adélaïde was leaning against her balcony railing watching Oliver. There was no getting around it; this girl looked nothing like a great adventurer. She was small and skinny and perhaps a little dainty, if dainty is the right word. Dainty people don’t become explorers. And if they do, they don’t make it very far. But perhaps Oliver was right about that, too. Perhaps the unlikeliness of it meant it was true. These sorts of things do happen. You’ll see someone odd and tell your friends, “She eats lizards.” But then you’ll discover she happens to be the greatest pastry chef in the city and you’ll be the one left alone to eat your lizards.
Archer rolled the glass eye from one hand to the other. It watched him as he did so and he knew what it was thinking. You don’t look like a great adventurer either. That was true. And if he was going to be one, he would need help. Maybe Adélaïde was the one to do that. He needed to know if the crocodile rumor was true, or if Adélaïde was just some scantily dressed emperor wandering the Button Factory halls.
Archer tore a page from his notebook and wrote Adélaïde a note. He folded it into a plane and sent it sailing across the gardens. It was a good throw. Adélaïde jumped to catch it and stood quietly for a moment after reading it.
Did a crocodile really eat your leg?
Adélaïde disappeared inside her bedroom where she sat a few moments more before returning to the balcony and sending another plane to Archer.
Yes
Archer bit his lip. It was all there in black and white. Three letters. One syllable. He looked from Adélaïde to the airplane and then to the glass eye. It did make sense. He sent another plane flying and left his room without awaiting a reply.
♦ GLASS EYES HEAR NO LIES ♦
Archer hurried down the stairs in perfect silence. The light was still on beneath the door to his father’s study, and his mother was next door at Mrs. Leperton’s. He creaked down the cellar stairs and reappeared with a ladder.
“It’s escaping!” shouted the ostrich. “Quick! Someone grab it! The thing with dirty hands is escaping!”
Archer maneuvered the ladder through the conservatory, past the shudderflies, and out into the garden. There was no way for him to know if his grandparents were still alive. Some days he thought so and other days he didn’t. But ever since that night on the rooftop, the night when Oliver had suggested they dig into the ice, Archer thought that their being alive was a real possibility. And if they were alive, and if they returned to Helmsley House, everything would change.
They had to return. Even if that meant he had to bring them home himself.
Archer leaned the ladder against the wall at the back of the garden and climbed to the top. On the other side, Adélaïde was standing in the grass staring up at him. He waved awkwardly and said, “Hello.”
“Hello again,” she replied.
For a moment, that was that. Archer stood atop the ladder staring down at Adélaïde, who stood in the grass looking up at him.
“I want to apologize for before,” Archer continued. “For what I said about the polar bear and the crocodile and your leg and everything.”
Adélaïde nodded. “It’s fine,” she replied.
“My polar bear isn’t real anyway,” said Archer. “None of the animals in my house are. They couldn’t chew my head off even if they wanted to.”
Adélaïde smiled.
“But your crocodile was real and I think you did better than I would have in that situation.”
“I froze,” she said.
“I think most people would their first time. The second time will be different.”
“I don’t think there will be a second time,” she replied.
Archer was afraid of this—afraid that Adélaïde would not want to go on another adventure. But he had an idea. He fumbled in his pocket and removed a box.
“Heads up,” he said, and dropped it down to her.
“What’s this?” she asked.
“Open it.”
Adélaïde opened the box and what she thought was a large marble rolled out onto her palm.
“It’s pretty,” she said.
“It’s a glass eye,” he replied.
Adélaïde quickly rolled it back into the box and discreetly wiped her hand against her dress.
“Thank you,” she said, though it sounded more like a question.
“It’s from my grandparents. They were great explorers so I thought you might like it.”
“Which of them lost an eye?”
“Neither,” said Archer. “It belonged to a ship’s captain. He only had one eye. I think I met him, but that might have been a coincidence.”
Adélaïde looked horrified.
Archer was confused. “Are you okay?” he asked.
“Why did they take his eye?!”
Archer shook his head and grinned. “No, they didn’t take it from him. He gave it to them so they would remember seeing a mountain.”
Archer explained that the captain only had one eye but still captained his ship. And while the gift wasn’t terribly subtle, Adélaïde appreciated it.
“Thank you,” she said.
After that, Archer chose his words carefully, thinking it best to begin vague and then slowly work into the specifics.
“I gave you that because there’s somewhere I want to go, but it’s far away and I was hoping you would help me because—”
“Okay,” said Adélaïde.
Archer raised an eyebrow. “What’s that?” he asked.
“I said ‘okay.’”
“Okay what?”
“Okay, I’ll help you.”
Archer didn’t understand. “But you don’t even know what I need help with,” he said.
“You want to go somewhere far away,” she replied.
“But I didn’t say where.”
“That doesn’t matte
r.”
Was it really that easy or was the crocodile girl making fun of him? He couldn’t tell.
“Are you laughing at me?” he asked.
“I’m not,” she replied.
“But a crocodile ate your leg.”
“That was two years ago.”
“And you’re still interested?”
“Very much.”
It all made perfect sense to Adélaïde. Adélaïde knew where she didn’t want to go. She didn’t want to go back to the Button Factory. It reminded her of the hospital. And beyond that, she was once a ballerina and sitting perfectly still at a desk all day was simply no good. The truth was Archer could have said he was going to the moon and Adélaïde would have wanted to come along.
“But just out of curiosity,” she said. “Where is it that you want to go?”
Just then Oliver poked his head over the garden wall. Oliver had climbed his tree with one hand because in his other was a jar aglow with fireflies. He looked annoyed.
“I don’t mean to be rude,” he said. “But would you mind keeping it down?” He nodded toward the Murkley residence. “I really don’t want her coming out here and taking another swing at me with that shovel.”
Archer pulled himself atop the garden wall to get a better look at Oliver’s jar. The neon critters were blinking and bouncing all around. Archer was very little the last time he had hunted a firefly.
“Have you ever hunted a firefly?” he asked Adélaïde.
She hadn’t.
“Can we join you?” Archer asked.
Oliver shrugged. “I think I have more jars,” he said.
♦ A TRIO ♦
It took a concerted effort getting Adélaïde and her wooden leg quietly over the garden wall, but with an extra ladder from Oliver, they managed just fine.
“Your garden looks like a jungle,” she said, taking Oliver’s hand.
“We try our best,” he replied. “There’s just no controlling it.”
Archer stood atop the wall, lifting the ladder up out of his garden. He lowered it to Adélaïde and then started down Oliver’s ladder, but paused when he heard a door open. Two gardens over, Mrs. Leperton and Mrs. Helmsley stepped outside. Archer stood frozen in plain sight, watching his mother with eyes wide. And though she didn’t notice him, he made a terrible decision. He jumped back, causing the ladder to pull away from the wall. Oliver and Adélaïde quickly took hold of the bottom, and for a moment the ladder and Archer stood straight up in the air. But the teetering weight was too much. They couldn’t hold on. Archer took one last look at them before crashing to the ground.
The Doldrums Page 11