Winterhouse

by Ben Guterson

  The man ran his index finger and thumb over his mustache and said, “Very sorry. I thought you looked like someone, is all. Apologies for disturbing you.” He nodded, smiled thinly, and then glanced away. Suddenly, the woman beside him looked up and stared at Elizabeth with eyes that were even blacker and colder than the man’s. After a few seconds she whispered something into the man’s ear before returning her gaze to Elizabeth. This was such a strange and unexpected thing—as though she had a secret to share with the man just at that moment—Elizabeth found herself feeling uneasy. Even more so because the woman continued to glare at her without looking away or blinking. She seemed to be one of those people who, if you happen to catch them looking at you, will keep staring right back just to make you feel uncomfortable. But why had she whispered to the man?

  Elizabeth wanted to look away from the woman. Her eyes were so penetrating, though, and her gaze was so uncanny, Elizabeth couldn’t move. The woman’s eyes bored into hers. A long few seconds passed, and then a few more, and the tension was so great Elizabeth almost felt as though her glasses might snap. It was impossible to look away.

  CHAPTER 3

  THE HOTEL—AT LAST!

  LOST

  HOST

  HOSE

  HOPE

  “Next stop—Ragnar!” called the bus driver loudly, and the spell broke. Elizabeth looked away as the woman dropped her head back onto the man’s shoulder. Elizabeth took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and thought, She can’t scare me. This was something she had been telling herself for a few months now—whenever Aunt Purdy threatened to punish her—though she couldn’t say just why she had started doing it. She only knew it made her feel better.

  Elizabeth opened her eyes and tried to resume her reading. She couldn’t stop thinking about the man and woman behind her, though, so she set her book down and found herself thinking, again, about how strange it was that her aunt and uncle had sent her away for Christmas. They had no other family members who lived near them, it was true, and so they never shared holidays or, really, anything with anyone—even on Thanksgiving or Easter, it was always just the three of them. Elizabeth was never even allowed to go to the homes of the girls she knew at school, though this was as much because Aunt Purdy forbade it as it was because Elizabeth never got invited. It was hard to make good friends at the small school in Drere when everyone knew you lived with your weird aunt and uncle in the poorest house in town—and that you seemed to prefer sitting in the library during lunchtime most days to playing outside or eating with the rest of the kids. Once she heard a boy in her class tell the others he thought Elizabeth’s only friends were her books. She didn’t try to be odd on purpose, and she definitely wasn’t disagreeable—it just seemed easier, most of the time, to stick to herself. And, besides, she loved to read.

  These thoughts were tiring, and her journey on the bus was already exhausting enough. Before she knew it, Elizabeth had fallen into a deep sleep.

  * * *

  Just after nine o’clock that evening she awoke, and she might have kept sleeping even deeper into the night had she not been roused by a nightmare. In her dream she had been walking between two long bookcases in a dark library when she heard a voice—an eerie voice—calling to her. She began to walk quickly and then started to run, but the bookcases seemed endless, and she felt trapped. Just when she saw a doorway up ahead, a figure stepped out of the shadows and brought Elizabeth to a halt. A woman—somewhat resembling the woman in black at the back of the bus, but older and taller and with eyes even more menacing—was in front of her. Elizabeth tried to turn around but found she was fixed in place and couldn’t move. The woman began to speak softly, and as she uttered Elizabeth’s name, she reached out a hand …

  Elizabeth gasped as she opened her eyes, taking a deep breath to reassure herself that she’d only been having a bad dream. And then she exhaled and shook her head to clear away the memory of the strange woman.

  Aside from herself and a few scattered riders, the only other people on the bus were the peculiar man and woman behind her, and they were asleep. Elizabeth realized she had slept so soundly until her nightmare that she hadn’t even heard the bus make its stops to let the other riders off. She sat in the dark and allowed the dream to drift away as the bus chugged onward; very slowly the unease she had felt began to subside.

  Absentmindedly, Elizabeth reached up and pulled her necklace out from under her sweater. It was the only thing of her mother’s she owned in the entire world, a thin circular pendant of indigo-colored marble rimmed in silver and etched with the word “Faith,” with the outline of a skeleton key beneath it. She often felt that she would sooner surrender every one of the thirty-seven books she owned and spend every night counting the pennies in Uncle Burlap’s coin collection—something he’d made her do every Friday night at 7:30 until she was ten, even though the total always came to $21.73—than lose this pendant. Sometimes she worried the dim memories of her parents might fade and then disappear completely.

  She held the pendant in her fist and pressed it to her heart. Without meaning to, she thought once again of the family that had been sitting across the aisle from her earlier in the day. And then she said to herself, “Even though I know the next three weeks are going to be boring—I hope something good happens to me at Winterhouse. Please.” She wanted to add more, something connected to the memory of the family on the bus, but she couldn’t figure out what it was she wanted to say, so she held her eyes closed for a long time and sat in silence. The bus plodded onward; the snow fell harder. She tucked the pendant back under her sweater, as always.

  Just then the road leveled out and Elizabeth became aware of some charge in the air. She pushed up her glasses and looked ahead, but she could see nothing aside from the driving snow and black sky in the headlights of the bus. She put a hand to the spot where her necklace lay under her sweater and felt a flutter move through her and down into her stomach.

  The bus began to slow, and a haze of bright lights came into view from tall lampposts, like something Elizabeth had seen in pictures of the queen’s castle in England. “Last stop!” the bus driver called. “Winterhouse!”

  A brick wall appeared, and then a huge iron gate stood open. There, before her, lit up as brightly as midday, rose the colossal hotel—a fortress of golden-colored brick, leaping ramparts, crystalline windows, and high turrets, all adorned with a blaze of lights, waving flags, and what seemed like a thousand silver banners each with a “W” in clear, shining white. Balconies stood out here and there, and arched verandas and overlooks decorated with Chinese lanterns; tinseled, glistening trees lined the hotel’s frontage like stage lights. Elizabeth had never imagined a building could be both so large and so beautiful.

  The bus pulled into the circular driveway, and within moments Elizabeth was clambering off and gaping at the gleaming walls of Winterhouse. Behind it she could make out, in the reflected light from Winterhouse itself, the smooth ice- and snow-coated surface of a vast lake with the lines of a ski lift to one side; and on its far side a crest of mountains rising into the distance like a sky full of boat sails, ghostly gray against the starry darkness. Music, something that sounded to Elizabeth like what a person might hear in a church on some pleasant holiday, radiated off the walls of Winterhouse. The frigid air numbed her face, especially after the cozy warmth of the long bus ride, but she hardly noticed how cold it was.

  The man and woman in black stepped off the bus. Now that she could see the woman clearly, Elizabeth guessed she was the same age as the man; she had very white skin that seemed even whiter when set against her jet-black hair. The woman looked to the man and said, quietly—but not so quietly that Elizabeth couldn’t hear—“It begins.”

  Very peculiar people, Elizabeth thought.

  “We’ll unload your luggage for you!” the bus driver announced to the small crowd of passengers milling about. He had opened the large compartment under the bus that held everyone’s belongings, and Elizabeth couldn’t help
noticing that in among the bags and cases was a large plywood crate, something wide and long enough to hold maybe a trombone or two or three, or perhaps a few sets of skis.

  “That is my collection of books!” the man in black said sternly, pointing out the crate to the bus driver. “Be careful with it!”

  “It looks like a coffin,” someone in the crowd said wryly, and the others began to laugh—but not the man and woman in black. Elizabeth studied the crate and then realized the woman was staring at her once more.

  “Looks like you’ve made it to Winterhouse,” the woman said, almost whispering.

  It was odd enough that the woman would say anything to her, but what was even more odd was what she said next: “Are you glad to be here, Elizabeth Somers?”

  CHAPTER 4

  PUZZLES IN THE MAIN LOBBY

  LAIN

  LAID

  LAND

  BAND

  BIND

  FIND

  “How did you know my name?” Elizabeth said, stunned.

  The woman in black tilted her head and pointed to the bookmark that was sticking out of Elizabeth’s book: Her name was written on it.

  Elizabeth thought there was something very odd about saying a person’s name like that if you didn’t even know her. Right at that moment, though, two bellhops in red suits came bounding from the ivory-and-glass doors and called out “Welcome to Winterhouse!” in unison. Elizabeth realized all she wanted to do was get away from the man and woman in black.

  She can’t scare me, she told herself once more.

  * * *

  The lobby of Winterhouse astonished Elizabeth almost as much as her first view of the hotel itself. It was so enormous and so well-ordered—with its paneled walls, sprawling chandeliers, diamond-puzzle of a rug, and curtained windows overlooking the silver lake—that Elizabeth halted in place and simply stared all around.

  This is definitely not what I expected, she thought. She made a mental note to add this moment to her “Times When I Was Super-Surprised” list, right after her most recent entry: “Uncle Burlap wouldn’t unclog the toilet after Aunt Purdy ordered him to do it.”

  “Please, young madam,” the bellhop beside her said. “This way and we’ll get you all settled and comfortable.” He arched his neck to look behind her. “Just you?” he said.

  Elizabeth hoisted her backpack higher up onto her shoulders. She had been considering for the last twenty-four hours just what, exactly, she would say when someone might want to know what she was doing at the Winterhouse Hotel, and now that the moment was here, she could think of nothing better to do than explain herself as simply as possible. “I came on my own.”

  The lobby looked so inviting, and the bellhop seemed so friendly, and Elizabeth herself was so curious about what might happen next, that she didn’t know what more to say. She glanced around. Archways rose to her left and right, offering views along avenues of distant hallways; a staircase with a silver handrail rose twenty yards ahead, with a bronze bust set in the recess on the landing; six elk heads hovered above the vast lobby from their mountings on the expanse of high wall; and a wonderful aroma of something sweet—like sugar and fire-smoke and candles all rolled together—lingered in the air. The man and woman in black were explaining something to a bellhop at a desk just far enough away from Elizabeth that she couldn’t hear their voices; they seemed to be upset. The large crate was on the floor beside them.

  “On your own, you say?” said the bellhop to Elizabeth, his red suit crisp and his small pillbox of a hat perched smartly on his head. He was perhaps fifty years old and had the kind of face that needed a good shave daily—but he had a natural smile. He leaned in and stared at her as if he’d spotted a butterfly on her nose. “Well, that is wonderful news for us! We are very glad to welcome all of our guests!”

  Elizabeth was distracted, though, and was peering at a far corner of the lobby. Two elderly men in suits were standing beside a long table examining something intently, as though they were focused on a complicated game or studying a document. They were concentrating so deeply, they seemed unaware that Elizabeth or anyone else was there.

  “What are those men doing?” Elizabeth said to the bellhop.

  He gazed at the men as though scanning for a ship on the horizon. “Oh, those two,” he said. “That would be Mr. Wellington and Mr. Rajput.” He cleared his throat. “They are working on a puzzle.” He leaned down and whispered: “It consists of thirty-five thousand pieces, and they’ve been working at it—on and off—for two years. There’s a big blue sky in the picture, and I think they are lucky to find five pieces a day that fit correctly.” He stood up straight once more and curled his lips as if to say, Isn’t that something else?

  “That’s the biggest puzzle I’ve ever heard of.” Elizabeth was eager to take a look at it herself.

  “I’ve never seen one bigger.”

  Elizabeth felt a word welling up inside her. “You could even say it’s gargantuan.”

  The bellhop examined her over his glasses. “Just curious, miss,” he said. “How old are you?”

  “Eleven.”

  He kept studying her. “We are overjoyed to have you here at Winterhouse,” he said softly, and then he put his hands together in a quick gesture before whipping a sheet of paper from his breast pocket and examining it. “And you would be Miss…” he said, scanning the sheet, his voice trailing away. “Let’s see, you are…”

  “Elizabeth Somers,” she said.

  “Somers … Somers,” the bellhop said, squinting at the paper. “Ah, very good.” He paused, leaning toward her. “I see it right here. Yes, Elizabeth Somers, party of one, traveling on her own. Yes, all right.” He looked up. “We have you right here. Incoming. Room 213.” He looked behind her again. “Your bags?”

  She gave a tug on the strap of the pack on her shoulders. “This is it,” she said, but just then she was distracted by the man and woman in black. The man had raised his voice to the other bellhop; Elizabeth thought she heard him say the word “books” and then the word “crate.”

  She pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose. “The thing is,” Elizabeth said to the bellhop before her, “to tell you the truth, I’m not even sure I’m supposed to be here.”

  The bellhop held out his paper. “Your name is on this list,” he said, and smiled. “So you must be in the right place.”

  Elizabeth frowned. “Does it say on there who paid?”

  He studied the paper. “It just says ‘Paid in full.’ You’re all set with a room and meals through January the fifth.” He looked up at her. “But you don’t know who arranged this for you?”

  Elizabeth shook her head and thought back to the week before when, from behind her closed door, she had overheard her aunt and uncle talking. Although she couldn’t make out much of the conversation, she did hear Uncle Burlap say a few sentences: “Well, whoever they are, if they are going to pay to send her to some silly hotel and give us money to take a vacation, why are we even talking about it? When’s the last time five thousand dollars fell into our laps? Five thousand dollars! Who cares if we don’t know why? Or who.” Aunt Purdy had shushed him, and Elizabeth had heard nothing more. It was a mystery she couldn’t figure out then, and certainly couldn’t now. Who would have given her aunt and uncle money? Or asked them to send her to Winterhouse? She had been turning these thoughts over in her mind for days.

  The bellhop put the paper back into his pocket. “No matter, Miss Somers. Everything is in order. By the way, my name is Jackson,” he said, and he nodded down at the brass nameplate on the chest of his thick red jacket.

  The man in black had raised his voice again. “We arranged for a two-bedroom unit, and we insist on it!” he said so loudly it echoed across the entire lobby. “I need room for my books!” Elizabeth stared. The two men working on the puzzle looked up. Jackson stood watching the couple, too, and seemed to have forgotten about Elizabeth. The woman in black, as if she’d heard something or smelled smoke, glared at Eliz
abeth for a moment before returning her attention to the bellhop she and the man in black were berating.

  “Perhaps some slight confusion has arisen,” Jackson said to Elizabeth.

  “Is everything all right?” she said. The woman’s gaze had startled her once again. The crate, too, seemed such an odd thing for transporting books. And it really did resemble a coffin, Elizabeth thought.

  “All fine,” Jackson said. And then he turned and looked as the front door of the lobby swung open. “And what good luck we have! Mr. Norbridge Falls is here!”

  CHAPTER 5

  AN INTRODUCTION—AND A GOOD FIT

  BIT

  BIG

  BOG

  BOX

  A tall man in a heavy wool blazer, a crisp white shirt, and a black tie that looked like a large bow was striding toward them and grinning. He was old, maybe seventy-five, Elizabeth thought, and even though he had white hair and was slim, he seemed full of life, as though he’d been a mountain climber and was not only still strong but had some force inside him that he’d soaked up over a lifetime out of doors. His face was ruddy, and he had a thin mustache and a trim beard—not one of those bushy ones that look untamed and dirty, but one so neat and white it made him look dashing.

  He stopped before Elizabeth and held out his hand. “A very good evening to you!” he said. His eyes were dark and powerful. “I am Norbridge Falls. And I believe you are Elizabeth Somers.” He nodded to Jackson.

  Elizabeth shook his hand; his grip was strong and steady. “How did you know my name?” she said. “I mean—good evening to you, too, sir.”

  He spread his arms wide. “Winterhouse is mine,” he said, with complete assurance, as though informing her he had a beard on his face. “And I’m supposed to know these things. Please call me Norbridge, as well.” He laughed—pleasantly, not in the way Elizabeth was accustomed to hearing her aunt or uncle laugh, as though always trying to let her know how much smarter they felt themselves to be—and then he stroked his beard. “Besides, I looked over a list of people who were supposed to arrive today. Elizabeth Somers was the only eleven-year-old girl scheduled to come by herself, and she was the only eleven-year-old girl slated to arrive on the late bus—and right now you’re the only eleven-year-old girl standing here in front of me at ten o’clock at night. So you must be the one and only Elizabeth Somers!” His eyes danced, as though he’d just solved a riddle and was glad to share the answer with her.