Carter and the Curious Maze

by Philippa Dowding

  When did this happen?

  Arthur poked him. Someone was staring at them.

  The boy from the maze stood near the adults, but he was watching Carter and Arthur closely. Carter had been so engrossed in watching the Natives and the traders, he’d almost forgotten about the boy. He raised his hand and the boy crept over, ducking down to their hiding spot.

  “Car-tair,” he said quietly. Not a question, just a hello.

  “It’s you! You saved me from the maze, and your father saved us from the bear! Thank you! Do you think you could save me one last time? I need to find Mr. Green? The old guy, SNIP, SNIP … you know? SNIP, SNIP?”

  The boy frowned, but Carter tried again. “Look, I’m exhausted and I have to get this little guy home. I want to go home, too. Believe it or not, I’ve been in three different time periods today, I’ve seen a LOT of weird stuff. You don’t seem too surprised to see me, though, so maybe this has happened before? Maybe you see people from the maze all the time? It’s been an interesting afternoon, but right now I just want to go home!” On the word “home,” Carter’s voice wobbled, just a bit.

  Yes, he wanted to go home. Was that too much to ask? He’d almost forgotten what home was like, he’d seen so much in the past few hours.

  The boy looked over his shoulder at his father, who was deep in conversation with one of the traders. The boy looked back at Carter, then nodded. He looked over at his father one more time then ducked and crept past his parent’s careful eye toward the forest.

  Carter and Arthur followed. They snuck past a wooden house filled with sacks and boxes, then past a sheep pen, then past a small garden and something that definitely smelled like an outhouse. They crept outside the fort gates, then past a tiny patch of wooden crosses.

  A cemetery. Definitely the oldest cemetery in the city!

  Then they were at the very edge of the dark green forest. The boy pointed into the deep woods and said, “SNIP, SNIP.”

  Carter gulped. The sun was low in the sky, barely piercing the treetops. The sounds of the fort were already far away, and the last thing Carter wanted to do was enter the dark green forest just as night fell.

  But there could be no mistaking the Native boy. He pointed into the deep woods again and repeated those two words that Carter had come to dread: “SNIP, SNIP.”

  Carter took a deep breath and nodded. “Okay, I get it, Mr. Green is in there. Thanks, but I really don’t want to do this.”

  The boy put his hand on Carter’s shoulder and said softly, “Car-tair.” His smile made Carter brave. He could do it — he could take Arthur into the dark, terrifying woods and look for Mr. Green.

  Plus Sydney was out there, too, in some future time, calling his name. And Arthur’s mom.

  The boy raised his hand in a final farewell then disappeared back to the fort.

  “See you,” Carter said quietly to his retreating back. “If you’re ever in my time, I’ll show you your city, although it’s changed a little.”

  And hopefully you’ll be braver than me.

  Chapter 15

  Sundown

  It was so dark that Carter almost couldn’t see Arthur’s face. The trees grew closer and closer together, and the late afternoon sun barely filtered down to the forest floor.

  They crept along, working their way deeper into the gloom.

  Suddenly Carter heard the sound of running water ahead. He shhh’d Arthur, and the two boys snuck over fallen logs and through the tightly growing tree trunks toward the sound.

  SNIP!

  SNIP!

  Carter stopped.

  Mr. Green stood beside a tiny, bubbling fountain. The water came up out of the ground and ran into a little stream that grew into a pool, and then meandered into the woods. Mr. Green stooped and took a drink.

  “Hello, Carter,” he said without looking up. “You’ve finally found me. It took you long enough, much longer than most children. You must have dawdled.”

  Dawdled?

  “You! You’re crazy! What have you done to us? We want to go home!”

  Suddenly Carter wasn’t scared. The whole afternoon flashed before him, the Wild Man of Borneo, the terrifying battlefield, the scary bear, and the constant feeling of being lost and weirdly out of place. No, he wasn’t scared — all he felt was mad.

  It felt good to be mad.

  “You have no right to steal kids and send them back through time in your stupid maze! I don’t even care how you did it … or why … but it’s time to stop this! We’re lost, we’re tired, Arthur is scared … we almost got blown up by a huge gunpowder explosion during a BATTLE and … then a bear tried to eat us! If it wasn’t for that Native boy …”

  “Ah, yes, him,” the old man said. He snapped upright, and Carter was SURE he heard a cracking, like a twig. Mr. Green stared at Carter with his brown wooden eyes. Carter’s own eyes were getting used to the gloom, and he suddenly noticed a girl standing perfectly still behind a tree, looking at him.

  It was Creepy Leaf Girl. Finally, the last person from the maze! Carter gulped. The girl didn’t have leaves growing out of her ears this time, thankfully. She just looked old-fashioned and normal. She smiled at Carter behind Mr. Green’s back.

  Mr. Green didn’t stop talking.

  “Ah yes, the Native boy. The magic of the maze is very old indeed, but his people have lived in this spot long before the maze arrived, so it holds no power over him. He was the first child to walk through the maze in this place, the first child to find his way out. He can come and go as he pleases and show others the way to me. It’s annoying. Most children I choose for the maze have to work hard to find the exit, unless he’s around.”

  “What do you mean, ‘choose?’ Why did you choose us?” Carter pulled Arthur closer.

  “You, Carter? You were an interesting case. You were the boy who found everything dull, remember? You said, and I quote, ‘Nothing interesting has ever happened around here in the history of the world.’ I wonder if you think that now? And as for Arthur … well … you needed a sidekick, didn’t you?” Mr. Green stooped to take another drink from the fountain. Behind him, Creepy Leaf Girl looked hard at something, again and again. She kept looking at whatever it was and then looking back at Carter. He followed her eyes.

  Mr. Green’s red-handled garden shears lay against a tree. It was only the second time that Carter had ever seen them out of the old man’s hands or out of his smock pocket.

  The old man talked and took sips from the bubbling fountain.

  “How did you like the bear? Or the grand magazine? Or the freak show? All quite interesting, don’t you think? Or did you find them boring, too?” On and on he went, drinking from the fountain and talking.

  Creepy Leaf Girl was still telling Carter something with her eyes. She kept darting looks at the garden shears against the tree. She wanted him to do something with them.

  But what?

  The old man was speaking. “Did you like how only other children and animals can see you in the maze? That’s always been a nice touch, I think, don’t you? Very disturbing not to know who can see you … and who can’t. What do you think of time travel, Carter?” Mr. Green peered at Carter and blinked his wooden eyes. He didn’t bother hiding his creepy thumb, and no doubt about it this time: leaves slowly sprouted and spiralled around his hand like an emerald green serpent.

  “What? What do you want with us? I just want to go home. We all just want to go home.” Carter held on to Arthur. Creepy Leaf Girl pointed at the shears now, and then at the fountain of water behind Mr. Green. She was trying to get Carter to do something.

  Mr. Green wasn’t watching her. He had his eyes very keenly on Carter. His horrible, unblinking wooden eyes.

  “Hmmm. Yes, no doubt you do want to go home. But there’s a price. No one leaves the curious maze without paying. It’s quite a simple price, though. All you h
ave to do is answer these questions truthfully, and I’ll let you go: Are you scared now? Was this afternoon boring? Or was the curious maze the most interesting ride at the fair?”

  Carter frowned. Scared? No kidding! Boring? Hardly! Interesting? Yes!

  But there was a stubborn place in Carter that suddenly dug in its heels. He and Arthur had been through so much. Why did Mr. Green get to say when they go home? What gave him the right to scare them? So Carter said, “You have no right to do this to us. Now send us home!” He hoped he sounded brave, but in the deep forest with creepy Mr. Green standing there … he probably didn’t.

  Mr. Green stood in a stray shaft of sunlight that filtered down through the trees. It was almost sundown, and soon the forest would be pitch black. The fountain burbled at Mr. Green’s feet. Behind him, Creepy Leaf Girl gestured wildly at the garden shears.

  The old man drew in close to Carter, and there was no doubt about it now: his eyes WERE made of wood. He blinked, and they clicked like marbles. Carter drew back in horror.

  The old man laughed, or rather, creaked and moaned.

  “You will wander the curious maze forever, like Clarissa here, until you answer me!”

  Clarissa?

  The old man closed his eyes and threw his head back to take another drink from the fountain. Leaves sprouted from his hair, his eyebrows, his ears, his hands ….

  Now, Carter!

  Carter lunged forward and grabbed the garden shears.

  He tossed them through the air and they flipped end over end over end. With a fantastic leap, Clarissa caught them.

  Then she plunged the garden shears deep into the fountain.

  SPLOOSH! The water bubbled, burned and rose, higher and higher.

  “No! NO!” the old man screamed. He threw his arms deep into the pool, frantically grasping for the shears hidden in the dark water. Clarissa ran up, pushed with all her might … and Mr. Green toppled and fell into the fountain.

  One. Two. Three. Four seconds, and still no Mr. Green. The water bubbled, fumed, and roiled, rising angrily. Five seconds, six … seven, eight … the water rose higher and Carter held his breath.

  …nine, ten, eleven, twelve …

  … then a figure burst out of the pool. A twig man stepped stiffly out of the water, leafy arms held out.

  The boys backed up in horror. The twig man took a few more stiff steps toward them, and then suddenly his leafy right arm jerked toward the sky. Then his left arm followed. The look of surprise froze on the twig man’s face as it turned to tree bark. His feet grew into long roots that dove into the earth. With a huge CRACK, his arms grew and grew, and his chest thickened and lengthened as the tree trunk stretched toward the stars. His knees turned into tree limbs, his shoulders into huge boughs, his hair into leafy branches and twigs.

  The figure crashed upward through the other trees, snapping, creaking, and breaking through everything in its path.

  Right before their eyes, Mr. Green turned into an enormous and ancient tree.

  Before he disappeared completely, the old man’s voice carried on the wind: and here is the end of the curious maze!

  Chapter 16

  Here Is the End

  The forest fell silent, the fountain was gone, and the huge tree that was once Mr. Green stood shoulder-to-shoulder with the other trees.

  Carter, Clarissa, and Arthur looked at each other.

  What just happened?

  Clarissa spoke first. “Thank you, Carter. You saved us. I’ve been waiting for someone to toss me the old man’s garden shears for ages!”

  “What do you mean, ‘waiting for someone?’ Who? Who have you been waiting for?”

  “You don’t think you’re the only person to get caught in the curious maze, do you? Mr. Green has chosen many bored children for the maze over the years. But most of them just tell Mr. Green what he wants to hear. That they were scared. That the maze is interesting. That there’s nothing dull about it. And then they return to their own time like nothing happened.”

  “Well, why are you still here?”

  Clarissa shrugged. “I don’t get scared that easily, I guess. I just couldn’t lie and tell him I was scared. So I’ve been stuck in this maze for a long time. But as you just saw, there is more than one way out of a maze.”

  “There are two ways?”

  Clarissa pointed at the old man’s red-handled garden shears, lying on the forest floor where the fountain was a moment before. “The garden shears were the key to the magic of the maze. One way out of the maze was to tell Mr. Green you’re scared. The other way out was to hide his magic garden shears, even for a moment. But I could never get close to them, the old man guarded them so well. You must have noticed that. I knew the maze would end if I could hide them in the fountain even for a second, but I didn’t know he’d turn into a tree if he got pushed in. That was a stroke of luck.”

  The children all looked at the tree that was once Mr. Green and quickly looked away.

  “Well … why haven’t I seen the maze before? I come to the fair every year.”

  Clarissa put her head on one side and smiled a little. “You ask a lot of questions. The maze is an ancient and magical creation. It never stays in one place for long. Or one time.”

  Carter was going to ask what she meant, but something was happening to Clarissa. She was shimmering and slowly, slowly, she faded away. For a second, he saw her standing in front of the curious maze on a sunny summer day … and a man and woman called her name. Her parents? She ran over to them, and then the image vanished. The last thing Carter saw was the smile on her face.

  Then the little hand he held let go. Arthur was fading, too! Slowly the little boy shimmered and faded, just like Clarissa. As he vanished, he locked eyes with Carter and raised his pudgy hand in goodbye.

  Then Carter heard a woman’s voice say, “There you are, Arthur! You’ve lost your cap!”

  And a little voice answered, “Mummy!”

  “See you, Arthur!” Carter whispered to the dark, empty forest.

  At that moment the sun vanished, and Carter was left completely alone. The forest fell into blackness.

  His heart started to pound, and his mouth went dry. He walked over to the garden shears and picked them up. They were warm and heavy, and he could almost feel the old man’s hand upon them, which instantly made him want to put them down. He leaned them against the bottom of the tree that was Mr. Green.

  “Mr. Green! If you can hear me … now it’s my turn! I want to go home, too!” he called.

  The forest grew darker … and small rustlings began to fill the air. He tried to stay calm.

  THINK, CARTER!

  What was he supposed to do? He thought about entering the maze (how long ago that seemed!), about meeting Arthur, Clarissa, and the wounded soldier, how the Native boy saved him, about his sister calling him again and again. He thought about all of it. He’d seen what scary was, he knew now that the haunted house was for kids. But there was nothing wrong with that, since little kids need haunted houses to get them ready for bigger, scarier things. There were still plenty of strange surprises out there to amaze and delight a person. More than he could possibly imagine.

  “Mr. Green?” he called quietly.

  A single leaf fluttered down from the tree that was once Mr. Green. It landed gently at Carter’s feet. He stooped and picked it up.

  “Mr. Green? If you’re listening, the curious maze was definitely the most interesting thing that’s ever happened to me.” It suddenly struck him that despite the terror, the fear, the strangeness of it all, it had been the most exciting day of his life.

  Another leaf fluttered down and landed at his feet. He cleared his throat and raised his voice a little.

  “But Clarissa, Arthur, and I got to the end of the maze, you said so yourself. You also said we could leave when we got to the end, unless yo
u intend to cheat. They’ve both gone back to their own time. And now I’d just really like to go home, too.” A few more leaves fluttered down at his feet.

  “I don’t think what you did was right, but the truth is … I was scared. I still am. But I was more than just that. I’ve had to be brave, and smart, and curious, too. And I couldn’t give up, even though I really wanted to. The maze was the best ride at the fair, the best ride I could imagine. Ever.”

  It was true, all of it.

  Then with a tiny click, a door opened at the bottom of the tree that was Mr. Green. A warm light shone from behind the door, the kind of light that made Carter think of sunshine and a summer day.

  He walked across the dark forest, stepped through the door …

  … and stood at the opening of a very familiar, leafy pathway.

  Carter was back at the beginning of his strange afternoon. Just like that, he had found his way out of the curious maze.

  Chapter 17

  That Which Is Most Curious

  Carter stood at the entrance to the curious maze in the exact spot where he stood earlier that day, before the whole crazy afternoon began. The sun was a little lower in the sky, maybe, but apart from that, nothing had changed from the moment he entered the maze.

  Moments before? Hours before? A lifetime ago?

  Huge roller coasters whizzed over his head, their giant wheels squealing. People shrieked as they whipped by, children ate ice cream (in cones!), cars drove past, airplanes zoomed overhead. Carter wanted to hug everyone he saw, wanted to spin in circles laughing, but he didn’t.

  I’m back!

  “CARTER! CARTER!” a voice called. It was Sydney! She waved. “Over here!”

  He ran to his sister. Then for the first time since he was seven years old, he gave her a huge hug. He could honestly say that he’d never been so happy to see her, or her amazingly weird red squid hat.

  “What? What the heck’s wrong with you? Are you okay?” she asked, surprised. Carter was glad that she hugged him back, though, just a little.