The Robber Girl

by Franny Billingsley

  Mrs. del Salto did not have loose hair. None of the women in Betsy Elton’s store had had loose hair. It made the Sapphire women look different.

  “But the knife is quiet,” said Nilsson. “Now I use the knife.”

  “Now you do not use the knife.” Flora reached for the hat—the hat that was no longer Doubtful Mittie’s hat—turned it round, and looked inside. Then she whispered to one of the pretty girls, who hung it from a hook on the wall.

  “You may use your knife,” said Flora, “when you follow my rules.”

  Flora didn’t raise her voice, but the men quieted. So did the other noises: the clunk of billiard balls, the slap of cards. Even the piano music trailed off the edge of the table and into silence. It was quiet enough that you could hear the double doors whoosh shut.

  “This,” said Flora, “is Gentleman Jack’s hat. I will give each of you a chance to win it. Each of you will stand there . . .”

  One of the girls drew an invisible line on the floor with the toe of her slipper.

  “And throw your knife here.” Flora touched the hatband, beside the scarlet feather.

  “Whoever can throw his knife right there,” said Flora, “throw it so that it sticks, will get the hat for his own.

  “We’ll take bets, gentlemen,” said Flora. “You can bet on anyone willing to throw.” She reached for me, drew me in front of her. “You can even bet on this girl.”

  “Gentleman Jack’s little girl?” said Nilsson.

  “Would you be willing to play?” Flora asked me.

  I said I guessed I’d be willing.

  “Fun at last!” said the dagger.

  It got louder now, with the men calling out bets and the girls floating around in their airy dresses, taking money, handing out scraps of paper. One of them had a bump in her stomach. I knew about the bump. It was where she was going to have a baby.

  The first man stepped up to the invisible line. He reached for his knife, tossed it from hand to hand, quick and hard. Now to his right hand, now to his left.

  “Amateur!” said the dagger.

  “Show-off,” I said. A true knife professional stayed still as cold steel.

  His knife went wide of the mark. There came laughter, sharp as knives.

  “Nothing’s sharp as knives,” said the dagger. “Except knives.”

  Next up was a man with a chain across his boiled shirt. Four nuggets hung from the chain.

  “Gold!” said the dagger.

  “Gold!” I said.

  “But not enough for Grandmother,” said the dagger.

  “Not enough to get her empire,” I said.

  The gold-nugget man was very fancy, but fanciness doesn’t help you throw a knife. There came more laughter when he missed, and the Sapphire was back to its old noisy self. The piano music tilted into my ear.

  Another man threw a knife with a curved blade.

  “You can’t throw a curved blade!” said the dagger.

  “You can throw it,” I said. “But you’ll miss.”

  Why did they want the hat, anyway? It would kill them to wear it. It had killed Doubtful Mittie.

  “Too bad he wasn’t more doubtful about the hat,” said the dagger.

  Now came Nilsson’s turn. “I hit the hat,” said Nilsson, “then I keep the hat, yes?”

  “Not a chance,” said the dagger, because Nilsson held his knife too hard. You should hold a knife lightly between your thumb and forefinger. That was the only way it could fly true.

  “It’s not a bad knife,” said the dagger.

  “It deserves a better owner,” I said.

  Nilsson was making little jabbing motions. “As though that will help anything,” I said. His hand swiveled on his wrist. You needed a solid wrist to throw a knife.

  After all his jabbing and jabbering, Nilsson finally threw the knife. It fell short of the wall. There rose the usual laughter, and Lord John brought him something in a glass. “You probably need this just about now.”

  I stepped away. I didn’t want to smell the bitter sharpness.

  Nilsson nodded. He had a big bland face, with knobbly bits like a potato. “I did want me that pretty hat.”

  Now another man, holding his knife with his thumb and three fingers.

  “I guess you can hold it like that,” said the dagger.

  “If you don’t care where it goes,” I said.

  “Funny thing about you, Nilsson,” said the gold-nugget man, laughing. “You can carve a thing of beauty with that knife but not be able to throw it for nothing.” It was good laughter, though. I knew what bad laughter sounded like, when things could turn ugly in a second.

  Flora came up behind me. She smelled of lilacs, even though there were no flowers now, not with the snow about to fall. “You get yourself that hat,” she said.

  “That little gal of yours, Flora,” said a voice. “She got herself a name?”

  But I wasn’t Flora’s little girl. I was Gentleman Jack’s, and soon I would be Grandmother’s, too.

  “What’s your name, sweetheart?” said Flora.

  “Robber Girl,” I said. “Gentleman Jack says you can call me Robber Girl.”

  There was no laughter at that, not at something Gentleman Jack had said. Everyone knew Gentleman Jack didn’t take kindly to laughter.

  Mostly, though, the Gentlemen called me Girl.

  I slipped the dagger from its sheath. It would be all right to take it out here. These people would let me keep it. I felt the familiar weight of it. I knew just how it balanced. I knew just how it flew.

  Lord John examined it. “Clean, sharp, and dry,” he said.

  I made my ears stop working so I couldn’t hear the men stomp and swear. That was one trick to throwing the dagger. You built a wall between yourself and the rest of the world. You didn’t think about the egg-man grabbing your wrist. You didn’t think about the egg-man talking about sticky fingers. You didn’t think about how you had to hate Betsy Elton, and probably Mrs. del Salto, too.

  The rest of the world vanished. It was just you and the dagger. When you were throwing the dagger, you couldn’t remember anything anyone had said, like Betsy saying thank the stars I hadn’t burnt the del Saltos in their sleep.

  The only thing I heard was the piano music skittering into a corner, then curling up to sleep. The piano player was going to watch me throw the dagger. I heard the absence of piano music. That was all.

  I held the dagger by the handle. It warmed to my touch. It lay in the cradle of my thumb and first finger. Now everything was straight, everything was orderly.

  I raised the dagger. The blade faced the back wall. That was the best way to throw it. That way it would somersault through the air.

  I flicked my hand forward.

  The dagger flew.

  It didn’t make much of a thunk, but that was all right. A six-inch blade doesn’t thunk, but it sticks. If it has a sharp tip, it sticks. It took the men a moment to notice that the dagger had truly struck and that it had struck true. Then they were shouting that Flora was a sly fox to have bet money on me. That they wished they’d bet money on me.

  I realized Flora must have talked about me with Gentleman Jack. That was why she’d bet on me; she knew I could throw a knife. Gentleman Jack must have talked about me when I wasn’t there—what a strange thought.

  Nilsson had reached the wall before I did. He was already examining the hat, and the dagger, and guessing how far the dagger stuck into the wall.

  “Deep enough, I guess,” he said gloomily.

  “I have the sharpest tip,” said the dagger.

  I pulled the dagger from the wood. The hat fell, Nilsson caught it. Yes, the dagger had a sharp tip, but the wall was made of indigo, which is soft. It’s easy to throw deep into indigo. I wouldn’t say that now, though, not with the dagger so happy and proud.

  “Nilsson,” said the bartender, “you ain’t going to get that pretty feather, now, are you?”

  “I give the little lady the hat, yes?” said Nilss
on.

  “Yes!” said a sea of voices.

  “Water is a sea,” said the dagger. “Not voices.”

  Now, for the fourth time since I’d come to Blue Roses, came the reeling, pealing bells. I glanced to the window. It had gotten dark without my noticing. But of course, we’d left late because of all the tray-fixing.

  Everyone stopped and listened. The bells played the tune once through, then started again. Was it possible that I remembered the tune? Not from the three times I’d heard it already, but from long ago?

  “Not possible!” said the dagger.

  But now the piano joined the bells and everyone turned to face the same direction. They sang the words the Judge had muttered last night. I knew the tune, and now I heard the words.

  “The bird sang like a star,

  Exalting near and far

  The brightest Sister Seven.

  With grateful joy we raise

  Our voices in her praise:

  A melody to heaven.”

  “You don’t know the tune,” said the dagger. “You don’t know the words.”

  But I knew some of the words, like Sisters Seven, and Grateful Joy, and Melody to Heaven. They rang a soft silver bell, which meant I’d known them in the Before Time.

  “Yes,” said the dagger. “But that’s betrayal.”

  Five minutes later, it was over and everything went on as before. Nilsson knelt on the floor in front of me. His knobbled potato face floated in the air. “Fair and square,” he said, and set the hat in my hands.

  With Nilsson kneeling and me standing, we were about the same height. I leaned forward. “You carve things from wood?”

  Nilsson nodded. “Best woodworker in these parts.”

  “If you carve me something,” I said, “I’ll give you the hat.”

  “You will?” said Nilsson. “Little Robber Girl, you will!”

  “I need a dog,” I said. “A dog carved of wood.”

  “How big will he be, this dog?” said Nilsson.

  “It needs to fit into a dollhouse,” I said. “A dollhouse is one-twelfth the size of a regular house.” I measured a space between my thumb and index finger. Then I made it a little bigger. It had to be a big dog, big enough for the baby to grab onto its collar and pull himself up. Big enough to support the baby when he was learning to walk.

  “But it shouldn’t be made of indigo,” I said. “Indigo is too soft.” I needed a dog that wouldn’t break. I needed a dog with a good, strong heart. “And he should have joints, because he’ll need to run after the ball.”

  “I make him of oak,” said Nilsson. “White oak is stronger than red. Its pores are smaller, so it rots slow. I make him of white oak.”

  Lord John took the hat from me. “I’ll play middleman. Nilsson, when you give me the dog, I’ll give you the hat.”

  “But don’t wear the hat,” I said. Nilsson wasn’t from the Territories; you could tell by the way he spoke. He’d had to cross a Line to get here. He might not know he shouldn’t wear a dead man’s hat.

  “The snow is coming.” Nilsson lumbered to his feet. “I bring the dog after the snow.”

  One of the double doors swung open. There was something about the way it opened that made everyone look up. It was the Judge, who would never slam through a door. Already, I knew this about him. He would open it quietly and deliberately, and he would close it the same way.

  The Judge waited just inside the door. I walked toward him. The floor was sticky. I knew the floor at the cottage would never be sticky. The floor at the cottage was smooth and pale. The planks fit together with hardly a seam. The planks in the Sapphire were rough and widely spaced. The burnt end of a cigar lay in one of the spaces.

  The Judge and I left the Sapphire together. The air turned our breath into clouds; the peanut man’s song made a cloud in the air, and his coals made steam, and it smelled like butter and ash. All up and down the street, flames leapt from great metal bowls attached to the columns that held up the roof that hung over the sidewalk.

  “Do you want to go home?” said the Judge.

  “No!” said the dagger.

  “Yes,” I said.

  “TELL THE JUDGE YOU’LL TESTIFY,” said the dagger.

  But he’d have to speak to me first. Three breaths and a swallow had already passed. Anyway, I couldn’t tell the Judge until I told Gentleman Jack. Gentleman Jack might hear I was going to testify and think I really meant to do it. I couldn’t bear that.

  I had time to notice Main Street now. A few stunted indigo trees grew here and there along the boardwalk. We crossed a big square with buildings on four sides, and then we were on the fancier part of Main Street. We must have crossed the Line. I looked behind me, once, and saw the star steps climbing to the Shrine, and the Shrine shining above all of Blue Roses. You could always see the Shrine and the Shrine could always see you.

  And then a thought came to me that the direction everyone faced when the bells rang was the direction of the Shrine. That made sense: the words worshipped the Blue Rose and the Shrine worshipped the Blue Rose.

  The Judge said nothing. Not about me and the candy. Not about me and the hammer. Not about me and the egg-man and how I’d cracked his elbow.

  The Judge waited to speak, and the snow waited, too. It waited for us to return to the cottage. Return. That was another good word, like Grandmother. It meant we had left the cottage and now we were going back. You have to leave before you can return.

  I was glad the Judge didn’t speak. Then I couldn’t, either. That was restful. What would be unrestful would be explaining that Betsy had given me the candy but her father thought I’d stolen it. How I’d had to crack-crack-crack the flower in order to grab the hammer.

  I’d been thinking about saving Gentleman Jack from jail. I would always save Gentleman Jack. But I’d never save Betsy. I’d only un-save her.

  “That’s when I’ll taste her blood!” said the dagger.

  We turned up the path that led to the cottage. The higher we went, the more the steps misbehaved, stumbling here, crumbling there, changing their mind about whether to go up or down.

  “If steps go up,” said the dagger, “they also go down.”

  “Look at the stars,” said the Judge. “The Seven Sisters are very bright tonight.”

  I’d only ever heard about the Seven Sisters from the song the Rosati had sung along with the bells. The Judge said they were seven stars, all nestled together, and that he could show them to me. In order to find them, first you had to find the Orion constellation. The Judge said a Constellation is a group of stars that makes a pattern people can easily recognize. I said I knew that already. The Judge pointed out the Orion constellation, which is one of the most recognizable, so it was easy to find. Then you look at the three stars that are in Orion’s belt. They’re also pretty easy to find. You follow the line they make—which is Up—to another star, with a reddish color, and you keep your eyes going in the same Up direction and hop your eyes over to the Sisters.

  They were the brightest stars, which meant they were easy to count. They made a blue cluster in the sky. “Not seven,” I said. “Just six.”

  “Yes,” said the Judge. “The Seventh Sister is the Blue Rose, who has come from the heavens to help us here on earth. If ever you see the seventh star, you’ll know the Blue Rose has returned to the heavens to visit her star sisters. It’s the time you’re most likely to discover whether she granted the boon you craved.”

  “Does she come back to earth?” I said. “After she visits her sisters?”

  “Always,” said the Judge.

  We rounded a curve, and there was the cottage. In the parlor window shone a candle. The flame reflected itself in the glass. The cottage was lighting our way. It was different from returning to the hideout.

  “Of course it’s different,” said the dagger. “You can’t see a hideout—that’s the whole point!”

  The cottage was expecting us. The cottage knew about snow, which was why it had a long s
lanting roof that would make the snow slide to the ground. It was waiting for us to go inside, and then the snow would fall.

  “A cottage doesn’t wait!” said the dagger.

  It was too dark to see the color of the cottage, but I remembered it. I remembered the trim, which was like a blue ribbon holding the walls together. I remembered the walls were the color of a dream.

  “That’s not a color,” said the dagger, but the dagger was wrong. It had also been wrong in the General Store when it said people didn’t think up colors. When it said that colors just were.

  “A little faster, please,” said the Judge. “Mrs. del Salto will be worried.”

  Now I could speak. “What color is the cottage?”

  “We call it buttercream,” said the Judge.

  Buttercream. That was not a word in my foreign-coin pocket, but I knew what it meant. Buttercream was soft and glimmering. Buttercream was the color of cream mixed with sunshine.

  The Judge wiped his feet on the outdoor carpet with the sunflower. I wiped my feet on the sunflower. It would be quiet inside; it would be even quieter when it snowed. Sunshine is loud. Snow is soft.

  When you return to a place, you know what’s going to happen. You know the Judge will take the key from his pocket. You know the key will fit into the keyhole, that the door will swing open, that there will be a shining indigo floor.

  So much floor, just for a key.

  “Mrs. del Salto will be waiting,” said the Judge.

  You know the Judge will open the drawer of the little table. But this is the first time you notice the inside. You notice it’s lined with soft green material. That’s so the keys can be comfortable, the Judge’s key and Mrs. del Salto’s key, lying side by side.

  It was a long time ago since I’d first come into the cottage. It was a long time ago I’d been surprised they’d built a whole room just for some keys. Now I wasn’t surprised.

  “Keys don’t have rooms,” said the dagger. “People have rooms.”

  But I went ahead and thought it anyway. What if the keys had come before the room? What if the keys had come first, and then the drawer to hold the keys, and then the table to hold the drawer, and then the room to hold the table, and then the house to hold the room?