The Penderwicks at Last

by Jeanne Birdsall

  “Lydia, are you certain you want to go with Batty?” she asked. “Your dad and I won’t be there for another week and a half.”

  “We’ve discussed this, Mom.” Lydia put her suitcase into the trunk of the car.

  “But remember dance camp, and how homesick and miserable you were.”

  Two summers earlier, Lydia had gone to a sleepover dance camp—this was before she’d realized how desperately she loathed being told what to do. The head counselor, suffering from a thwarted dream of being a Rockette, compensated by trying to teach the campers to dance in a straight line and do high kicks with utmost precision, everyone exactly the same. On the third day, Lydia had stopped kicking and gone home.

  “That wasn’t homesickness,” she said. “That was the Rockettes.”

  “There won’t be any Rockettes at Arundel,” said Batty. “Lyds will be fine, won’t you?”

  “I will. Don’t worry, Mom.”

  “And, Batty, you’ll be fine, too?” asked their father.

  “Sure, she will,” said Jane. “Wesley is adorable, that is, easily adored, but Batty has successfully resisted heartbreak.”

  “Don’t make me sound cold and unfeeling,” said Batty. “I was a mess for a few days.”

  Those few days had been a week ago. Wesley had made up his mind, for real this time, to drop out of school and head west. He’d offered to wait until after Rosalind’s wedding, but Batty had told him no. If she had to lose him—and Hitch—she wanted it to be abruptly and completely, not a painful drawn-out process. She said good-bye to them, hid in her bedroom for forty-eight hours, then came out singing. True, at first it was mostly sad songs, but Batty seemed to be past that now, and at breakfast had been singing about sunshine, lollipops, and rainbows.

  While Lydia was glad that Batty had survived the loss of her love, she herself was harboring a secret regret, that she hadn’t said good-bye to Wesley and Hitch. Mostly, Hitch. It didn’t feel right to be cut off from them forever, without one last kiss on the nose. Hitch’s, that is. Lydia had no desire to kiss Wesley’s nose.

  “But you’ve gotten over him, Batty,” said Jane. “That’s the point. Remember how pathetically long it took me to get over Patrick, the guy who wanted me to— Never mind.”

  Her father groaned.

  “It’s all right, Martin,” said Iantha. “I know the story, and it’s not that bad.”

  “I don’t know the story,” said Lydia.

  “When you’re older,” said Jane.

  Batty was shoving dogs into the backseat of the car. Not that they needed much encouragement. A car plus Batty meant adventure to them, too. Sonata looked wide awake—for now—and Feldspar enthusiastically shook his latest conquest, an old feather duster he’d rescued from the trash.

  “Remember that the car vibrates if you push it past fifty-five miles an hour,” said Jane. “And, Batty, speak nicely to it—that helps.”

  “I’m no good at talking to cars. Jane, are you sure I shouldn’t just take the van? You can drive your own car and say whatever you want to it.”

  “No, no, I need the van tomorrow to carry all my stuff—”

  “Books,” said Lydia. Jane never went anywhere without lots of books.

  “And food,” said Iantha.

  “And Ben and his camera equipment, and my sewing machine.” Jane was making Rosalind’s wedding gown and the four bridesmaid dresses, one for each sister. All were still in progress—thus the sewing machine.

  “I’ll talk to your car, Jane.” Lydia had ridden with Jane often enough to know what the car liked to hear.

  “I love you, sweet Lyds,” said her mom, hugging her. “If you get homesick, I’ll come get you.”

  “I won’t get homesick. Sorry, Asimov.”

  The cat had grumpily ended up in the middle of the hug, and while he was too polite to scratch or bite, the noise he made was explicit. Lydia let go and patted him to make up for the discomfort. Now came her father with another hug, but no cat, so it was easier.

  “Infans mea,” he said.

  “Daddy, I know what that means.” It meant “my baby,” and he wasn’t supposed to say it anymore.

  “Can’t help it,” he said.

  The two sisters got into the car, buckled up, and waved good-bye. They were off to Arundel.

  * * *

  —

  The trip took longer than it should have. Jane’s car seemed to know it didn’t have Jane behind the wheel and acted accordingly, snorting and rattling. At a rest stop, it went so far as to pretend to be dead. Lydia tried to talk like Jane, praising the car for its strength of character, et cetera, but it wasn’t fooled. Finally, out of desperation, Batty resorted to singing about cars that liked to move, hoping this one would be inspired to imitate them. She led off with “Greased Lightnin’,” from the musical Grease—and it worked. Jane’s car started up again, enthusiastically and without rattling. Now, afraid to stop singing, Batty kept going with every car song she could think of while Lydia danced in her seat and chimed in whenever she knew the lyrics. They were on the last song in Batty’s repertoire—Tracy Chapman’s “Fast Car”—when they spotted the stone pillars that marked the entrance to Arundel.

  “Thank goodness. If the car stops now, we can walk the rest of the way,” said Batty.

  Lydia barely listened, too intent on soaking up the scene. The stone pillars were just as her sisters had described—NUMBER ELEVEN was carved into one, and ARUNDEL into the other. With a little shock, Lydia realized that up until now she hadn’t completely believed in Arundel.

  “It’s an actual place,” she said.

  “Seems to be.”

  Batty turned the car off the road, through the pillars, and onto the lane that led to the mansion. But before they could go any farther, the glove compartment started playing Beethoven’s Eroica Symphony. Feldspar, who by now should have been used to Batty’s ringtone, leapt from the backseat to attack it with his feather duster, defending Batty and Lydia against the tiny people playing instruments in the glove compartment. Batty stopped the car and shoved Feldspar back to where he belonged, while Lydia retrieved the phone and handed it over.

  “It’s Iantha,” Batty told her. “Hi…Yes, Lydia and I are fine. We just arrived….Lydia, are you homesick yet?”

  “Good grief. Tell her I’m not going to get homesick.”

  Lydia leaned out the window to better survey this storied world, that both was and wasn’t the Arundel her sisters had described. The lane was the same, including the double rows of poplars marching alongside. And the mansion was invisible from here—Lydia had expected that. But the broad velvet lawns had disappeared, taken over by waving meadows of tall grasses and wildflowers, white, purple, yellow. Like Sleeping Beauty’s castle, she thought, except with grass and flowers instead of vines and brambles, so nothing like Sleeping Beauty, for goodness’ sake, get a grip on yourself, Lydia.

  She’d imagined herself dancing across those green lawns, waltzing, as befit the elegant setting. But for these meadows, she’d need a less formal dance, one closer to nature. Flitting and floating, tossed by the breezes, along the mown paths. Yes, that would be just right.

  Here was something else that hadn’t changed from the first Penderwick visit—even at the very beginning of the lane, Arundel felt private, removed. Jane had said that the stone pillars were a magical boundary that kept out the real world. The other sisters had scoffed, but now that Lydia was here, she understood what Jane had meant. Looking back through the pillars, all she saw was in shadow. If cars had driven past, she hadn’t seen or heard them. The only sounds were coming from the meadows: the industrious tap-tap-tap of a nearby woodpecker, the rise and fall of a cicada’s song, and, farther off, a trilling, ecstatic burble from a bird Lydia couldn’t identify. High above, a hawk was gliding on the wind. She waved hello—I’ve arrived, Hawk, and alre
ady I love it here.

  After Batty told Iantha good-bye, Lydia pulled back into the car, in time to see her sister trying desperately not to sneeze, which made sense, as Feldspar was now vigorously shaking his feather duster in her face.

  “Stop, Feldspar, please.” Batty gave up the battle with her itchy nose and sneezed lustily. “Iantha called to say that a box arrived from Wesley after we left. I told her to open it—he sent me a mobile he made.”

  “The one you showed me pictures of? With tiny Hitches dangling from wires?”

  “Yes. And a note that said he wanted me to have it so I wouldn’t forget Hitch.”

  “No one could ever forget Hitch.” Lydia certainly wouldn’t.

  “I know. I miss him, too.” Batty sneezed again. “Lyds, I swear I’ll never again fall for a man who believes his destiny is in Oregon.”

  Lydia hadn’t heard the destiny part of Wesley’s story before and wasn’t sure what it meant to have a destiny as opposed to simply having a future. “Do you know what your destiny is?”

  Batty shook her head. “All I know is that it isn’t with Wesley.”

  When Lydia was six years old, she’d believed she was someone’s future, if not his absolute destiny. Her cousin Enam—twin of Marty and son of favorite relative Aunt Claire and almost as favorite relative Uncle Turron—had vowed to marry her when they grew up. Lydia had considered it a binding promise and was proud to be the only Wildwood Elementary first grader engaged to be married. Over time, though, Enam seemed to have forgotten his pledge, and Lydia’s hopes had gradually faded away. Then, last year at a family gathering, Lydia had discovered that Enam was not only playing the double bass, he was also hanging around a girl named Imani who looked like a young Beyoncé. Since double basses are among the coolest instruments in the world, and Beyoncé one of the most beautiful women, Lydia decided that Enam was out of her league. She wasn’t awfully upset, but was also comforted when Aunt Claire told her that boys—even her own sons—can be dopes when it comes to love, and then took Lydia out for ice cream and a movie. Life had seemed much better afterward.

  “I wonder if I’ll ever have a destiny,” she said.

  “If destiny is an actual thing, you already do.” Batty sneezed and pushed away Feldspar and his feather duster. “Let’s keep going before Jane’s car decides to die again.”

  The meadows went on and on, giving up none of their wildness, until they’d come to an abrupt end, and here was the beginning of civilization—the slender remains of the formerly vast green lawn. One more turn of the lane, and statues appeared, and fountains, and then the mansion, Arundel Hall. Lydia saw the massive pile of gray stone, bathing in the bright morning sun, the glistening windows—so many windows!—and the deep blue shadows cast by the turrets, towers, and terraces. All this she’d expected from the stories.

  But she hadn’t expected this air of loneliness. Did homes mourn when their people left? Even when the people were mostly mean Mrs. Tifton? And if it did miss Mrs. Tifton, how would it feel about the Penderwicks taking over? Lydia shivered—she wasn’t sure she wanted to sleep in a building that might have feelings.

  Batty had again stopped the car, and was drinking in Arundel Hall just as avidly as Lydia.

  “Does it look familiar?” Lydia asked. “Do you remember anything now?”

  Batty shook her head. “I thought I might, but no, and it’s hard to separate actual memories from the stories. Like, do I remember Mrs. Tifton being mean to poor old Hound? I think I do, but maybe not. Just like I think I remember Rosalind cutting gum out of my hair before Jeffrey’s birthday party, but maybe I just remember being told about it.”

  Lydia had seen a photo of her sisters ready to go to that party. They were wearing dresses that had been secretly made for them by Mrs. Tifton’s housekeeper, Churchie, whom they’d all adored. Skye looked restless and Jane excited, Rosalind was fussing with Batty’s hair, Batty was trying to get Rosalind to stop fussing with her hair, and Hound was on guard, as always, in case a monster appeared out of nowhere to snatch up Batty. The best part, Lydia had always thought, was Batty’s goofy butterfly wings. According to the old stories, she’d worn them everywhere that summer, taking them off only for baths and bed, and sometimes not even for bed.

  “How did you get gum in your hair, anyway? I never heard that part.”

  “Who knows? I can’t remember!” Batty started the car again. “Let’s go pick up the mansion key.”

  CHURCHIE, THE BELOVED HOUSEKEEPER, was long gone from Arundel. She’d moved to Hawaii to be near her grandchildren. But there was a person from the old stories still living on the estate—Cagney. Back then, he’d been a young gardener working for Mrs. Tifton. Now he worked for Jeffrey, overseeing the abandoned estate, keeping it from decaying into ruin. And he was the one who had the key to the mansion.

  Here’s what Lydia knew about the young Cagney: he’d worn a Red Sox baseball cap, lived in the carriage house behind Arundel Hall, dreamt of becoming a history teacher, and had pet rabbits named Yaz and Carla. These rabbits had been involved in one particular Penderwick mishap. Batty had let Yaz escape the carriage house, and he would surely have been lost forever in the gardens if faithful Hound hadn’t found and rescued him. But Cagney had forgiven Batty, which Rosalind always said was typical of how nice he was.

  In the last few months, Lydia had learned a few things about Cagney in the present. He had a last name, Pelletier—her sisters had always just called him Cagney. His dream of becoming a history teacher had come true. He now lived in the cottage where the Penderwicks had stayed, along with his wife, Natalie, an art teacher whom Jane had talked with on the phone and liked already. And—this was the most interesting part for Lydia—there were two Pelletier children, Jack and Alice, both near in age to Lydia. Lydia would just miss meeting Jack—he’d left this very morning to visit his cousins in Canada. But Alice was going to be here, and Lydia hoped they would become friends. As long as Alice isn’t another Deborah, she thought, and thus instantly dislikeable. Lydia knew that the possibility of her finding another person to loathe so soon after Deborah was small. After all, almost nine years had elapsed between Quesadilla Oliver and Deborah, but still, she considered it wise to be cautious.

  On the drive to the cottage, stories, memories, imaginings, and reality continued to play tag through Lydia’s mind. The Greek pavilion was larger than she’d thought it would be, and the sunken garden wasn’t as full of flowers as she’d pictured— Wait, were those tomato plants? And corn? Cagney and his family had obviously been making changes to the estate. The meadows, and now tomatoes and corn. Good changes, Lydia thought. She approved.

  The tall hedge that surrounded the cottage grounds looked just as it was supposed to. And now here was the cottage. Lydia recognized its porch and climbing roses, but not its color. What had once been a buttery yellow was now a soft blue-gray.

  “What about here?” she asked Batty. “Does this feel familiar?”

  “Nope. I wonder if I was really here the last time. Maybe I was switched out with a different Batty at some point.”

  “Or maybe the trauma of almost killing Yaz erased your memories,” said Lydia.

  “More likely, the trauma of Mrs. Tifton, who apparently thought I was deranged.”

  Lydia noticed someone who hadn’t been there a moment ago, a girl peering out the front door. That had to be Alice. She was too far away to be judged by Deborah standards—Lydia’s instant dislikes seemed to happen closer up—and then the girl who was probably Alice disappeared altogether, melting back into the shadows. This didn’t bode well for friendship, thought Lydia.

  Here came a man who was definitely Cagney, wearing a Red Sox cap so worn and faded it could have been the same one from fifteen years ago. He’d appeared from behind the cottage, and with him came five red chickens, pecking madly at the insects stirred by his passage. No one had told Lydia about
the chickens—she thought them an even better surprise than the meadows, tomatoes, and corn, and wondered if she could befriend them even if Alice didn’t work out.

  Unfortunately, Feldspar and Sonata were also interested in the chickens, loudly proclaiming their enthusiasm—five feather dusters, alive and clucking!

  Batty panicked. The last thing she wanted was another disaster with Cagney’s animals. “Get out, Lyds, now!”

  As Lydia leapt from the car, Batty put it into reverse to flee Cagney and his flock and didn’t stop until the dogs had settled down. This put her a hundred or so yards away from where she’d started, far enough to make Lydia feel a bit shy, here alone with Cagney and his chickens. But he seemed unperturbed by Batty’s precipitous retreat, and the chickens were too busy to bother with Lydia—four of them because they were insect hunting, and the fifth because she was determined to climb onto Cagney’s foot. He kept gently shaking her off, only to have her try again.

  “It’s Lydia, right?” he asked. “I’m Cagney. Welcome to Arundel.”

  “Thank you.” Lydia thought she should explain about Batty driving away backward. “My sister was worried our dogs would upset your chickens.”

  “That was probably best.” Cagney again dislodged the chicken, and again she climbed back on. “They’re easy to upset, not being heavy on brainpower.”

  Lydia crouched down to get a better view. “Do they have names?”

  “Hatshepsut is on my foot. Then Cleopatra I, Nefertiti, Cleopatra VII—I was teaching ancient Egypt when we first got them—and this one my daughter named Batgirl. I wonder where Alice is. She should be out here saying hello.”

  Lydia didn’t think it her job to tell Cagney that Alice had already seen Lydia and found her wanting, but anyway, he’d turned away and started to whistle. This seemed peculiar—her sisters had told her nothing about Cagney and whistling—and it became more so when she realized he was whistling the same two notes, the second lower than the first, over and over again. This was the call of a black-capped chickadee. She knew that because Ben had once considered making a film about a dying (of course) black-capped chickadee, and had tried to get Lydia to whistle like one. She’d never learned how, and was impressed with Cagney’s skill, though she wished she knew why he was doing it.