Gold Dust Letters

by Janet Taylor Lisle

  She peered anxiously at Angela. Rather too anxiously, Angela thought, with a jab of fear.

  “Will Dad be here?” she asked her mother.

  “I don’t believe he will,” Mrs. Harrall replied in such a cold and final tone that Angela knew not to ask any more about it.

  So everything was arranged, and Poco and Georgina began to feel little streaks of excitement about being in Angela’s house. Pilaria had not left anything on the mantelpiece all week. She had not answered Angela’s letter. Did this mean that perhaps she would appear when they were there?

  “Personally, I have my doubts about this whole thing,” Georgina told Poco in the hall before school on Friday morning. “But I’m bringing my mother’s camera just in case something happens.”

  “Angela won’t like that,” Poco warned. “She’ll say you shouldn’t take pictures of magic beings.”

  “Angela can’t control everything,” Georgina said. “Besides, I’m going to hide the camera. She won’t know I have it. Unless you tell her.” Georgina shot a suspicious glance at Poco. “And if you do, I promise that I will never, ever, in my entire life, speak to you again.”

  “George! Why would I tell? You don’t have to be so snappish,” Poco said. “You are worse than a pack of llamas.”

  “Of what?”

  “Llamas,” Poco repeated. “Haven’t you ever talked to one? They refuse to trust anyone and are always snapping at people because they think they’re being tricked. Of course, when llamas snap, it isn’t with words but with big, sharp teeth, so it’s best to keep out of their way.”

  Georgina was completely infuriated by this remark, but she bit her lip and kept back the cutting reply that sprang to mind. What else could she do? One word and she would have looked more like a nasty llama than ever.

  Chapter Five

  A GOLDEN AUTUMN SUN WAS shining down full and strong as the three friends walked together along the sidewalk to Angela’s house that afternoon. All signs of the bad weather had disappeared, and with it had gone Angela’s gloomy mood. She was as happy and chirpy as a spring robin, already beginning to play the role of hostess before her home had even come into view.

  “We have three kinds of soda—orange, Coke, and root beer,” she announced, prancing in front of the others. “And popcorn if anyone wants it. Which no one probably will because we also have”—she paused for dramatic effect—“ice-cream sandwiches!”

  “Mmm.”

  “Yum.”

  Poco and Georgina seemed quieter than usual. They tramped heavily along. Both were carrying stuffed knapsacks on their backs. Georgina’s, in particular, looked about ready to burst, Angela noticed.

  “What on earth have you got in there, George!” she cried out. Luckily, she did not really expect an answer. A minute later she was describing the things they might do that afternoon: leaf raking in the backyard, video games in the den, Ping-Pong on the third floor. The Harralls’ house was bigger than the Lamberts’ or the Rusks’, thanks to Mr. Harralls business success. It had many beautiful rooms and soft couches and velvety rugs. Angela even had a small TV by her bed.

  Today, however, these delights seemed not to interest Angela’s friends as much as they had in the past.

  No sooner was Georgina in the house than she went to the mantelpiece in the living room and stared at it. She walked down the hall where Angela had seen the fairy’s light and noticed that the den, the kitchen, and the dining room opened off it. Beyond this cluster of rooms, farther to the back, were a family room and Mr. Harralls dark, leathery office. The second floor could be reached by a back stairway that came up from the family room, as well as by the front stairway, Georgina noted.

  “Can I look at Pilaria’s letters again?” she asked Angela. “Does gold dust still fly out whenever you unroll them?”

  “Not as much,” Angela had to admit. “I’ve opened them so many times.”

  Poco was in deep conference with Juliette by now, though few words were actually being exchanged. They lay on their stomachs on the dining-room carpet, almost nose to nose, staring at each other. Every once in a while Poco would say, “Ve-r-r-y interesting.” And Juliette would twitch her tail.

  This was the sort of thing that drove Georgina absolutely wild, so Angela took her outside into the backyard. The leaves were just beginning to fall. There weren’t really enough to make a decent leaf pile yet.

  “How does it feel to have real magic come into your house?” Georgina asked, looking around the yard with hard, practical eyes.

  “It feels … okay,” Angela replied in a guarded tone. “It feels like I have a new friend.”

  “Why is it we’ve never seen or heard about fairies coming into people’s houses before?” Georgina asked. “Except in fairy tales, which don’t count. We should have heard more about it if such things really happened.”

  “Not necessarily,” Angela said. “In real life, real magic happens only once in a while. Afterward, we forget we saw it, or people tell us we’re crazy so we don’t believe what we saw anymore. Then we’re surprised all over again when it happens another time.”

  “Angela, you made that up just this minute, didn’t you!” Georgina said in disgust. “You’ve never had that idea ever before in your life.”

  “That’s right,” Angela said, with an odd little smile. “I never did think anything like that before. I think it’s true, though. Maybe I’m beginning to come under Pilaria’s spell.”

  “Oh, come on! Now Pilaria is making spells?”

  “No, it’s not like that,” Angela replied. “But lately I’ve had the strangest feeling that she’s near me. She’s around the house, just out of sight. I talk to her sometimes, in my room, in case she’s there. And you know, it sometimes seems that she is listening. I think she is interested in me.”

  “Good grief! You sound as nutty as Poco!” Georgina exclaimed. She turned and marched off toward a distant clump of trees in the yard, hoping that Angela wouldn’t follow, which she did not. The whole situation was so infuriating.

  “Angela’s letters are being written by somebody who lives close to Angela,” Georgina muttered to herself as she walked. But by whom? She couldn’t think. Angela’s mother didn’t know anything about the letters. Anyone could see that from the way she acted. Angela’s brother, Martin, had no interest in his sister. He was six years older and played a lot of sports. Angela’s father was never home and hardly spoke to her when he was. He always looked upset whenever Angela was around. Could Juliette have been right when she said it was “an outside job”?

  “Wait a minute!” Georgina said out loud in the middle of the clump of trees. “I do not believe that Angela’s fat old cat can talk!”

  Nevertheless, and against her better judgment, she found herself walking back across the yard toward the house. Perhaps by now, Poco had picked up some other bit of information from Juliette. It was a ridiculous idea, utterly impossible and out of the question, but Georgina could think of nowhere else to turn.

  “Juliette is upset,” Poco reported, when Georgina found her upstairs. She was unrolling her sleeping bag in Angela’s room, unpacking her overnight bag and settling in. Poco was not really an overnight sort of person. She felt nervous about being away from home, even with friends, and liked to arrange things around herself in a special, familiar way.

  “Why is Juliette upset?” asked Georgina, who could have slept on a battleship as long as she was in charge of it.

  “Because she doesn’t feel happy.”

  Georgina frowned. “I know that. But why?”

  “She says the air currents in this house are blocked.”

  “And what does she mean by that?”

  “How should I know?” Poco began to look upset herself. She opened her overnight bag and removed a sweatshirt without looking at Georgina.

  “Well, does it have anything to do with the letters?” Georgina demanded.

  “I don’t know!”

  “Why not?”

  Poco glared
at her. Georgina was acting like a chief of police, asking a lot of impossible questions and then getting angry when she didn’t like the answers.

  “Look, George. I’m just telling you what Juliette said, okay? I can’t read her mind!”

  “This is ridiculous!” Georgina fumed. “We are getting nowhere. That’s what happens when you try to talk to a cat!”

  “That is a completely unfair thing to say!” shouted Poco, who almost never shouted.

  “But it’s true!”

  “People like you will never understand!” Poco yelled.

  “And people like you will never find out anything about anything that’s important!” Georgina shrieked back.

  “Ssh!” hissed Angela, coming suddenly into the room. “What is the matter with you? My mother is wondering what’s going on.”

  Poco and Georgina glowered at each other and turned their backs.

  “I guess we’re all a little nervous,” Angela said. “Let’s pull ourselves together. It might be important for tonight. Look what I’ve done: written Pilaria another letter.”

  Both friends turned around at this and noticed the piece of paper she held in her hand.

  “Listen,” said Angela, and she sat down on her bed and read the following, out loud:

  “TO PILARIA, of the Kingdom of the Faeries, Eighth Tribe, Fourth Earth, Under the Sun-Star Aravan, May It Shine on Your Land Forever and Ever:

  Hi! Did you get my last letter? I was hoping you’d write back. If you want to, that is. I have some questions.

  1. Where do you live?

  2. How old are you?

  3. Will you live forever?

  4. Do you still grant wishes like in the old days?

  You don’t have to answer if you don’t want to. I know how busy you must be.

  Respecfully yours,

  ANGELA HARRALL”

  “Oh, Angela, that is very good,” Poco said when she had finished. “Are you going to leave it on the mantelpiece?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you think Pilaria might answer tonight?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t want to say ‘Please answer tonight.’ You can’t tell someone like that what to do,” Angela said, glancing at Georgina. “I tried to hint to Pilaria that I wanted to hear from her soon. So, who knows? She might come.”

  Georgina nodded and leaned forward. “You spelled ‘respectfully’ wrong,” she said, pointing. “There’s a t after the c.”

  They all leaned over the letter while Angela took out her pen and put in the t.

  “I think we should set up a night-watch system,” Georgina said then. “It won’t do any good if Pilaria comes and we’re all asleep.”

  Angela looked as if she was about to protest against any unnatural systems, but Georgina added, quickly, “It won’t be to spy. We don’t want to hurt her. In a way it will be so we can protect her and be her friend. We could do that a lot better if we knew what sort of being she is.”

  Angela still appeared doubtful, so Poco said, “I’ve been thinking that maybe Pilaria wants us to see her. She controls her invisibleness, right? If she didn’t want to be seen, why would she be going around the house in a great beam of light?”

  “Hmmm,” Angela said.

  “From what she said in her letter, she’s mostly kept herself invisible before,” Poco went on. “For years and years. I think Pilaria wants to come into our world, now. I think she’s interested in Angela and wants Angela to see her.”

  This was a wonderful and amazing thought, and Angela had to agree that it might be true.

  Not more than fifteen minutes later, a night-watch plan had been arranged.

  Angela was to take the first watch, which would start shortly after Mrs. Harrall went to bed that night. The best place to watch from was the top of the front stairs. It provided a good view of the downstairs hall, and of the doorway leading to the living room. Also, the person on watch would be able to fetch the others quickly if Pilaria appeared.

  At 1:00 A.M., Georgina would take over and be on duty until 4:00 A.M. Poco would take the last watch.

  “I get up early, anyway,” she said. “It’s the best time to talk to birds. They’re the kind of people who like to hop out of bed and get things done before breakfast.”

  “Oh, really,” muttered Georgina, but without much force. The idea that they might, this very night, catch sight of Pilaria—whatever she might be—was beginning to seem awesome even to her. Indeed, all three friends were unusually quiet during dinner with Angela’s mother that evening.

  “I hope I am not as boring as you are making me feel!” poor Mrs. Harrall said during dessert. “I’ve tried every subject I can think of, but no one seems interested in a word I say. I suppose you must have something on your minds.”

  “Oh, we do,” Angela replied gratefully.

  “It isn’t you,” Poco said.

  “Dinner was great,” Georgina added.

  Then, because Mrs. Harrall looked a little sad and tired, the friends helped her with the dishes and joked around to cheer her up.

  “You have the nicest mother,” Poco whispered to Angela later, as they were going to watch television in the family room. “I feel so sorry about your dad.”

  Angela made no answer to this, however, and very soon the group was wrapped up again in their exciting plan for the night.

  Chapter Six

  UP UNTIL ABOUT MIDNIGHT, the friends were full of energy and could not even think of going to bed. This was supposed to be Angela’s watch, but they were all so eager to see Pilaria that everyone crowded together at the top of the stairs, whispering frantically.

  Mrs. Harrall poked her head out of her door once and asked them, please, not to stay up too late. Afterward, from her room, came the soft strains of a classical music station. A little later, her light went off.

  “That’s it. Now we don’t have to worry about her for the rest of the night. She’s a heavy sleeper,” Angela told the group when she came back from checking.

  Even so, they were careful to keep their voices quiet. The night seemed to require it. They turned off the light in the hall. Gradually, they grew less fidgety and began to stop whispering. The silence of the Harralls’ big house swam in around them, and each friend leaned back and thought her own thoughts. But everyone kept an eye on the downstairs hall, where the shadows seemed sometimes to creep forward, and sometimes to shrink back. It was hard to tell what was real and what their minds were inventing.

  A short while after midnight, Poco yawned and said she was going to bed. Georgina declared that she would stay up with Angela until the beginning of her own watch. When one o’clock came, Angela decided to stay up with Georgina for a while. But very soon, a heavy drowsiness settled over her, and she went, reluctantly, to join Poco in the bedroom.

  By one-thirty, Georgina was the only person on the stairs. She sat huddled in a blanket on the top step. The air in the house had turned chilly. Outside, the noise of a lone car passing in the street came through the front windows. Georgina rubbed her eyes. Darkness had spread over the floors and up the walls like a black flood. Below, in the hall, certain shadows seemed to press forward again. She began to feel that something was watching her. A strange squeak echoed up the stairs. Georgina’s heart jumped. She leaned forward and peered into the blackness.

  But time went by and nothing happened. She sat back on the step again. Her eyes kept wanting to close. She put her head against the wall and shut them for just a moment. The last time she remembered looking at her watch, it was 2:05.

  “Psst! Georgina!”

  She woke with a jolt and saw that Angela was crouched beside her. “Look down in the hall,” Angela said.

  A faint light was coming from the living room.

  “Pilaria’s here. I’m going to get Poco,” Angela whispered. She disappeared, and Georgina felt a sudden rush of fear at being left alone with the unknown thing below.

  Poco and Angela came back almost immediately, though.

>   “Incredible!” Poco gasped when she saw the light coming from the living room.

  It made a dim rectangle on the hall rug, too weak for a lamp or even a flashlight. The outline of the door frame was barely visible. From time to time, the light wavered and grew dimmer. Then it brightened again. Fluttered. Thin rustling sounds made their way up the stairs to the groups straining ears. There was no question that something was there in that room.

  “I’m going down,” Georgina breathed.

  “No!” Angela shook her head.

  “I want to see what it is!”

  “No!”

  “Angela! Someone has to look.”

  “Let’s just wait,” Angela whispered. “I’m afraid we’ll scare her and she’ll never come back.”

  “Don’t you want us to see Pilaria?” Georgina asked angrily. “It always seems as if you’re trying to keep us from getting too close.”

  “No, of course not!”

  “Well, it seems that way.”

  “Pilaria wrote to me. I’m the one who should see her!” Angela said.

  “You go down and look then,” Georgina hissed in exasperation. “Someone has got to do it. We must see what she looks like.”

  “All right!”

  Angela stood up slowly. She was wearing a summer nightgown with short sleeves. As she stepped past Poco, their bare arms brushed.

  “Angela, you’re cold as ice!”

  “I’m all right.”

  “Don’t go if you feel too scared,” Poco whispered. “We don’t have to look.”

  “Yes, we do!” Georgina exclaimed.

  “It’s all right,” Angela said. “I’ll go down slowly so Pilaria doesn’t hear me. You two stay here.”

  While her friends watched, Angela began to creep down the stairs. At first she held on to the banister to keep her balance. But it was loose around its poles and creaked. She let go and reached for the wall on the other side. With her palm pressed against it, she descended one step, then another. The thick carpet on the stairway muffled her tread. Below her, the glow in the living room began to flutter again, and Poco and Georgina saw shadows dancing on the rug just inside the doorway.