Theo’s heart pounds. Then she straightens her hat, thinks for a second.
“My boyfriend,” she says. “He’s this total dumb-ass. I’m sick of it. Sick of his lies, his stupid promises. It was his phone, actually. Well, one he got me. So he could always be in touch, know where I was and stuff.”
The man smiles. “He’s gonna be pissed.”
“I hope so.” She smiles back.
“This boyfriend…you meeting him here?”
The question catches her off guard. “No.” Then, she starts to panic. Maybe she should have said Yes, and he’s a big strong guy with a gun and a temper. She takes a step back, dangerously close to the edge of the river.
Suddenly, Pru is out of the car, coming toward them. Her hands are fluttering around, straightening her hair and billowy dress. “Mr. Marcelle? What on earth are you doing here?”
The big man turns and looks at Pru, flashing her a smile so warm it makes her cheeks pink.
Pru
“I was just about to ask you the same question,” Mr. Marcelle says. “You’re about the last person I expected to see here.”
It’s the first time Pru’s seen him out of his delivery uniform: he’s wearing faded blue jeans and a white button-down shirt that’s smudged with dirt. She’d like to wash it for him. She imagines treating the stains, letting it soak in her sink while he waits around in his undershirt. She feels her face heat up even more, so she looks down at the ground.
“Not that it isn’t a pleasure,” Mr. Marcelle adds. “Running into you like this.”
Always a gentleman, Mr. Marcelle is.
“I’m sorry, but who the hell are you?” Theodora asks, sounding all tough-girl.
“Mind your language, Theodora,” Pru scolds.
Mr. Marcelle sticks out his hand to shake Theodora’s. “Fred Marcelle, at your service.”
He gives a little bow, which Pru knows is for her benefit. Theodora is clearly a girl who doesn’t appreciate chivalry, but Pru does.
“Wait,” Theodora says, turning to Pru. “He’s the guy from your circus, right? But he’s a real person?”
Mr. Marcelle looks from the girl to Pru, bushy eyebrows raised.
Pru’s chest gets tight. She’s told Mr. Marcelle about the circus, about some of the acts, even, but has neglected to mention that he is one of the stars.
“Mr. Marcelle delivers food to the cafeteria,” Pru explains. She wishes she could say more: He’s my friend. He brings me gifts. Gifts for the circus, where he is my strongman.
“Well, I’m just making a wild guess here,” Theodora says, “but I don’t think this abandoned old mill is in need of any food deliveries. Not for the last eighty years or so.”
Mr. Marcelle chuckles. “I’m actually out here doing my second job.”
“And what’s that?” Theodora asks. Pru wishes the girl would tone it down a bit, be less rude and abrasive. Kids these days don’t know a thing about manners. That’s the problem with the world today; people just aren’t cordial enough.
“Mr. Marcelle works for his brother,” Pru explains. “He’s a private detective.” She delivers this bit of news with a certain sense of pride. She knows things about Mr. Marcelle. She knows he moonlights for his brother. And that he has cockatoos. He’s shown her pictures of the birds on his phone, beaming like a proud father. Funny little birds with crested heads. He’s always building things for them: new perches, bigger cages, swings. He’s a handyman, Mr. Marcelle. A jack-of-all-trades.
Theodora’s face twists in panic, and she glances over at the old mill. At last, Pru understands that her strongman’s mysterious, sudden appearance could mean trouble for Necco.
“That’s right,” Mr. Marcelle says, his eyes on Theodora.
“So what brings you out here?” Pru asks, trying to keep the suspicion out of her voice. Does Mr. Marcelle carry a gun? She looks for the bulge of one hidden under his white shirt, but is distracted by the way the shirt strains at the seams around his bulky strongman shoulders. She’d like to make a him a custom shirt, one that fits perfectly. She could do that. She’s a talented seamstress.
“Well,” he says, straightening his shoulders, “I’m not supposed to talk about my work. But I can tell you this much: I was following a man.”
A man! Thank goodness. It’s not Necco he’s after.
“A potentially dangerous man,” Mr. Marcelle adds. “And he led me here.”
“Dangerous?” Pru exclaims, nervous. “Here?”
Mr. Marcelle puts his great paw of a hand on her arm. “Not to worry, Pru,” he says. “He’s not here anymore. He slipped away. We’re safe.” He gives her arm a little reassuring squeeze.
Theodora hasn’t taken her eyes off the building, but now she throws Pru a desperately worried look that Pru has no trouble reading: Necco.
“A dangerous man?” Pru can’t help but repeat.
Mr. Marcelle nods. “This is all hush-hush, but he may be connected to what happened to the governor’s son. My brother has a picture of the two of them meeting last week. They’re connected in some way. The poor dead kid and this mystery man I’ve been tailing all over town.”
“But who is he?” Pru asks.
“That’s all I can say.” He holds up his hands in a what-can-I-do? gesture. “Now, you haven’t told me yet what you and the young lady are doing out here.” He looks pointedly at Theodora.
“Oh,” Pru says. “I’m afraid it’s not nearly as exciting as your story. This is my niece, Theodora. She’s staying with me for a few days. And she’s writing a paper for school on old New England mills. So I thought she’d be interested in seeing the Jensen one.”
Pru smiles, proud of her easily fabricated story. Maybe if life in the circus doesn’t work out, she can start writing novels—mysteries maybe, where things aren’t always the way they seem. A private detective series starring a man who might just resemble Mr. Marcelle. A man with custom-made shirts sewn for him by the woman who loves him.
“A paper, huh?” Mr. Marcelle smiles, but Pru can tell that he’s still skeptical. “Well, my advice is to look from the outside only. The building’s in bad shape inside. It’s not safe. And there are rats…big nasty ones.” He looks genuinely distressed.
“Oh, not to worry, Mr. Marcelle, my niece and I aren’t going anywhere where there might be rats. We’re going to stay right out here, maybe take a few pictures of the mill, then head out.”
“Well, I’ve got to get going,” Mr. Marcelle says. He reaches into his pocket, pulls out his wallet and a pen, and writes something on a business card. “This is my cell number,” he says, handing it to Pru, his fingers brushing hers. “I’m sure my guy is long gone, but you call me if you see anything strange here. And like I said, don’t go into the building, okay?”
“Of course not.”
He winks. “Good. I wouldn’t want anything to happen to you. And don’t stay too long. It’ll be dark soon. Things much worse than rats come around after dark.”
“We’ll call if we notice anything strange,” Pru says and shivers.
“Anytime, Pru,” Mr. Marcelle says, and she nods, lets herself imagine calling him just because she feels like it, just to hear his voice before she goes to sleep. He has such a lovely voice.
“Nice to meet you, Theodora. You’ve got a very special lady for an aunt,” Mr. Marcelle calls as he walks back down the driveway. “Take care now.”
“Sure,” Theodora says, just a trace of teenage sarcasm in her voice.
“How about if we take a quick walk around the building before we go?” Pru booms while Mr. Marcelle is still within earshot. “Maybe you can teach me a thing or two about mills.”
“Absolutely, Aunt Pru,” Theodora responds, equally loud, as she links arms with Pru. Then she whispers, “Two big questions, Mrs. Small: When’s the wedding with your strongman there? And where the hell is Necco?”
Necco
“Who are you?”
The man’s voice roars in her ear. He’s panting; his
breath smells sweet, pepperminty, like candy canes. Santa Claus breath. He twists her arm up higher. Ho-ho-ho. Beneath the smell of minty breath, she detects the undeniable scent of pipe tobacco. Her father’s smell.
“No one,” she says, the pain bright and all-encompassing. She is no one. She is everyone. She is the Fire Girl, but the Fire Girl is facedown on the floor about to have her right arm torn off.
“Are you the one who trashed this place? Who tore it apart?” he asks.
“No,” she tells him.
“Where are the people who live here?”
“No one lives here,” she tells him.
“You’re lying!” he snarls. “There’s a woman. One of the Devil’s Snuff group.”
Necco pauses, heart thudding. Mama. How does he know Mama?
“She’s dead.”
“What?” He relaxes the pressure on her arm but doesn’t shift his weight. She’s still trapped, and there’s no way to reach for her blade.
“She’s been dead since spring.”
“How?” His voice cracks a little.
Necco considers, not sure how much she should tell this stranger. If this was Snake Eyes, she’d probably be dead already. Whoever this is, he knows Mama. He seems shocked, upset, by her death.
He yanks up on her arm again. “How did she die?”
“She was murdered.”
“Oh my God,” he says, his voice much softer now. He loosens the pressure on her arm.
Necco lies still beneath him, breathing in the damp smell of stone, waiting to see what he might do next.
“What about the girl? Her daughter?”
Necco tenses. “I don’t know anything about a girl.”
He jerks her arm up hard. “Bullshit. Tell me what you know or I will seriously hurt you. You think this hurts now?” he asks, pulling on her arm. “This is nothing. It can get worse. Much worse.”
“Look, I can’t help you, can we just—”
“What did you do to her? Did you hurt her?” he asks, furious.
“No,” Necco pants.
“Then where is she? Where is the Fire Eater’s daughter?”
“Okay, okay, it’s me!” Necco admits. “I’m her daughter.”
Her arm is tugged tight again, a wishbone about to snap. Necco cries out.
“Bullshit! The girl I’m looking for has red hair.”
“It’s a wig. A…a disguise,” she tells him, panting through the pain.
Keeping her arm twisted, he uses his other hand to snatch off her wig, pulling at her hair where Theo and Pru had bobby-pinned it.
Then he lets go, shifts his weight from her back.
“Eva?” he says, and it’s like someone’s calling to her from a dream, a name she only half-remembers, but she hears it now the way her father used to say it. As this man is pulling her up, helping her to turn over, she thinks it might just be her daddy’s face she finds looking down at her. Daddy with cherry pipe-tobacco smell, his inventor’s hands, the fingers thick with calluses and scars.
But it’s not Daddy. He’s dead. The newspaper said so. It’s…
“Errol?”
He’s older, a man himself now, and his hair is cut short and bleached, but she recognizes his pale blue eyes, the funny cowlick in his hair, the jagged scar over his left eye.
“Oh my God, Little E!” He pulls her up, takes her in his arms, and holds her tight.
“But Mama said you were dead,” Necco says, tears coming to her eyes. She clings to him, buries her face in his shirt. It smells like campfires and roasted marshmallows and happy memories of the two of them sleeping out in a tent in the backyard. Errol used to teach her the names of the constellations, telling her that space went on forever. It felt impossible, yet thrilling.
“I guess I kinda was, in a way,” he says.
She pulls away, studies him. He’s been in the sun a lot—his skin is a warm bronze. He’s wearing a faded black tank top, black jeans worn through at the knees, and old sneakers that have seen a lot of miles. Tattoos encircle his bare arms: fish, dragons, tribal designs, and a dagger with one word in neat calligraphy: REVENGE.
“After…after what happened,” he goes on, “I just ran. I ran and didn’t stop running. I stayed as far away as I could. I knew my life depended on it.”
“Did you hear? About what happened to Daddy?”
He gives a solemn nod. “I knew the same thing would happen to me if I came back. I’d end up in the river, floating like some kind of scum. Is that…how it was with Mama, too?”
Necco nods. “They said it was suicide. And I believed it. I couldn’t understand how it was possible, what would make her do such a thing, but I didn’t think anyone would kill her. She told me people were after her, after us, but I never believed.”
“How did you figure out that it wasn’t suicide?”
“Miss Abigail told me. One of the Fire Eaters.”
He springs up on the balls of his feet. “Does she know more? Does she know how it happened? Who did it?”
“I’m not sure. I’m supposed to go see her tonight. I’ll find out all I can. Maybe…maybe you can come with me! She’d love to meet you! She and Mama were so close. Oh, Errol, Abigail is wonderful. She and the other Fire Eaters took us in, taught us how to survive out here. I’d be dead if it wasn’t for them, I’m sure of it.”
He doesn’t say anything, just looks sad and worried. It’s all too much for him, she supposes.
“How did you know about this place?” she asks. “That me and Mama stayed here?”
He looks away, then back at her. “Mama showed me.”
“What?”
“She brought me here once. Just once. It was last year, in the fall. You and she were living with the Fire Eaters when I found you. Mama hurried me off, took me here to talk.”
“But…she never told me,” Necco says, hating how hurt she sounds. Like she’s a little girl again, complaining to Errol about some imagined mistreatment from her parents.
“She thought it was safer that way. For you to keep on thinking I was dead. She said I could never make contact with you.”
“But why? I don’t understand.”
He considers her a minute. “Mama said you don’t remember anything from that day. Is that true?”
“Not much.” She reaches out and touches his hand. “Errol, tell me what really happened that day. Tell me everything you remember. Mama said there was a flood. A flood that destroyed everything, but that’s not what happened, is it?”
“A flood.” He grins, but it’s sad, and regretful. “I can see why she’d call it that. And she sure was right about one thing—everything we knew and loved was destroyed that day.”
“Tell me,” Necco begs.
Errol shakes his head. “Not here. Not now. This place isn’t safe. Whoever did this—came here and tore your place apart—they might be back. And there was a man following me earlier. I think I lost him, but I can’t be sure.” He shoots her a worried look. “The last thing in the world I want is to lead him right to you. Especially not now, when everyone in the state is looking for you.”
She stiffens. “So you know? You know what they say I did?”
“Yeah, I know. That’s why I came looking for you. I saw it in the paper. But I also know you didn’t do it.”
“I think the man who killed my friend also killed Mama. Maybe Daddy, too. Mama called him Snake Eyes. Sometimes she called him the Chicken Man. Do you know anything about him?”
Errol flinches a little. “We can’t do this now. I’m sorry, Little E, we just can’t. It’s too big.” He reaches into his back pocket and pulls out a piece of paper and pen. He tears a scrap off, scribbles on it. He hands her the paper. “Meet me tomorrow at noon here. Come alone, Eva. Don’t even tell anyone where you’re going. And wear your disguise.”
She looks down at the address and recognizes it immediately. She just saw it printed neatly in Hermes’s handwriting on the back of a photograph. “Home? You want me to go back home?”
<
br /> “Yes. Tomorrow at noon.”
“But Mama said it wasn’t there anymore. The house was destroyed.”
“Eva, the house is still there. You’ll see for yourself.” He turns away. “I’ve gotta go.”
She grabs his wrist, holds it tight. “No! I just found you. I thought you were dead!”
She’s sure if she lets him go, she’ll never see him again.
“Trust me, Eva, it’s safer if we’re apart right now. We have to be really careful. I think you’re right—it is the same man who killed Dad and Mom and your friend Matthew. And now, he’s looking for us. It’s us he’s after this time.”
“Us? Why?”
“He thinks we have something. Something of Dad’s.”
“But what? Is it that machine? The Edison invention?”
He nods again.
“But I don’t have the stupid machine. I don’t have anything of Dad’s. Why would he think we have it?”
“I’ll tell you everything tomorrow,” he promises, then turns to go. He stops, faces her again. “Little E, you can’t tell anyone you saw me, understand? You’ve gotta swear.”
She nods. Satisfied, he scurries off down the tunnel.
She thinks of going after him. Of tackling him, making him tell her everything. But she stands alone in the Winter House, listening to his footsteps fade, trying to catch her breath and still her mind, which is running in fast, swirling circles, one word at their center: Errol.
Her brother is alive.
Fred
After Fred leaves Pru and Theodora, he walks down the driveway until he knows he’s out of sight, then cuts around in a big loop, following the river back until he can see Pru’s car again. It’s tricky going along the riverbank: the slope is steep, covered in brambles and stones. More than once, he nearly loses his footing and ends up in the murky brown water. He imagines Pru and the girl hearing the splash, running over just in time to see him hauling his soaking wet self out of the filthy water. Not very suave.
After creeping slowly up the bank, he finds an old willow tree with a good view of the mill and Pru’s car. He hides, making himself comfortable as he watches Pru and the girl circle the old building. They end up back at Pru’s car. They’re arguing. He’s too far away and the water roaring over the dam is too loud, so he can’t hear exactly what they’re saying, but it sounds like they think someone has run off on them.
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