Angel of the Battlefield (5 page)

Felix stepped out carefully, trying to remember the layout of the house. The Kitchen was technically in the Basement, and he had to figure out how to get upstairs to The Treasure Chest.
The Treasure Chest.
Even thinking of it made him shudder. He remembered how nervous the Woman in Pink got when they looked inside that room. In his opinion, anything hidden behind a secret stairway had a good reason to stay hidden. Maybe he could convince Maisie to explore a different room. Like the Ballroom, with its panels imported from France—or was it Italy? Felix couldn't keep all the boring facts straight—and its chandelier made of Venetian glass—or was it Waterford crystal? The Woman in Pink had thrown around both of those things like they actually meant something to two twelve-year-olds.

Or they could slide down the banister of the Grand Staircase, the way their mother had told them Great-Aunt Maisie had done. He thought again of that picture of her as a little girl. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't believe that the old woman he knew had ever been that girl.
What would she do if she were here right now?
he wondered. If that other Great-Aunt Maisie, the young one, could take his hand and slide down the banister with him? Or run from bedroom to bedroom and jump on all the beds?
That would be fun,
Felix thought, imagining the clouds of dust that would fly out of those untouched bedspreads. If he could meet that little girl, that long ago Maisie, he might feel differently about the poor old one stuck in that assisted living place. Wouldn't it be something if The Treasure Chest could do something like that?

From behind him, the dumbwaiter interrupted his thoughts by making a strange and frightening noise like it was moving. Felix held his breath. Why had he listened to Maisie? He knew better. Yes, there was definitely something in there, and it was definitely moving. Felix tried to run, but he felt like one of those marble statues that dotted the lawn.

The door of the dumbwaiter flew open, and Felix screamed a loud and strangled scream.

The Letter

“It's just me,” Maisie said, unfolding herself and climbing out of the dumbwaiter. “I called it back up and jumped in.”

Felix still couldn't find his voice, even as he watched his sister walk toward him, shaking her head in disgust.

“I got bored waiting up there,” she said.

Apparently, she wasn't bored anymore. Her eyes shone in a way that Felix knew meant trouble.

“Want to go and slide down the banister?” he finally managed to say. He imitated sliding with his hand, swooshing it through the air.

Maisie laughed. “No way. We're going straight to The Treasure Chest. Something exciting goes on in there, and we're going to find out what it is.”

Felix thought of that hidden stairway and the red velvet ropes that hung in the room's doorway. Ropes were meant to keep people out.

“Maybe we couldn't go in because it's dangerous,” Felix said, racing to catch up to his sister who was already heading for the Kitchen stairs.

“Loose floorboards!” he called to her back. “Crumbling ceilings! That kind of thing.”

Of course, she ignored him and ran up the stairs that led to the Dining Room.

Felix had no choice. He ran up them, too. But when he reached the Dining Room, Maisie had already disappeared. The table set with its fancy china and silver looked creepy in the darkness. Quickly, Felix scurried out of there and into the Grand Ballroom, which was even creepier still. Earlier today, the marble had been all shiny and pretty, and the giant chandelier had sparkled. But now, as he walked across the floor, his footsteps echoed eerily, and the room had a distinct chill that made him think of ghosts.

“Hello?” Felix called. His voice echoed in the high-ceilinged, empty hallway. “Maisie?”

Felix took tentative steps toward the Grand Staircase.

“Maisie?”

There was silence. And then her voice, far off and small. “Come on, slowpoke! I'm almost there.”

Felix walked cautiously through the dark, passing room after room. The Ladies' Drawing Room, the Cigar Room, the Gentlemen's Waiting Room—each distorted and shadowy in the moonlight. His knees were trembling so much that they knocked into each other as he climbed the Grand Staircase. He paused at Great-Aunt Maisie's picture hanging there and, in that instant, Felix could have sworn her eyes actually twinkled. He could have sworn the girl in the picture actually
smiled
at him. A shiver ran straight up his arms.

He blinked. Twice. No, he decided, the picture was just a picture. Relieved, he practically ran the rest of the way up the stairs. At the top, in the hallway, the wall gaped open, revealing the secret stairway that led up to The Treasure Chest. What if his sister had gone up there and something terrible had happened to her? He tried to remember what the Woman in Pink had told them. Strange noises? Transparent women floating around?

“Are you okay?” Felix called from the bottom of the stairs.

When she didn't answer him, he took a deep breath and slowly climbed the narrow stairway. Maisie had unclipped the red velvet rope, and Felix saw her standing inside The Treasure Chest, her face full of wonder.

“Look at all this stuff,” she said.

Felix took another deep breath and stepped over the threshold, half expecting an alarm to go off.

But instead the room was hushed as if it were holding its breath. The walls were a blue that made Felix think of the ocean, and the lighter blue ceiling had puffy white clouds painted on it. That combination gave him the feeling that he was at sea or floating. Despite only a bit of moonlight coming in through the Tiffany glass window, The Treasure Chest seemed to be bathed in a soft amber light. Felix glanced around but couldn't find the source of the light. A massive desk, smack in the middle, dominated. Bookshelves lined each wall. In one corner stood a large globe on a pedestal. There were tables here and there, but every surface of them and the desk was covered with stuff: clocks, stones, small boxes, feathers, papers, buttons, hats, seashells, animal pelts, rings, china cups, quill pens, a compass, paper of all kinds—parchment, papyrus, lined notebook, typing, wallpaper, sandpaper—chunks of jade and amethyst.

“She said he was a collector,” Felix said.

“But why would he want something like this?” Maisie said, picking up a feather.

“Maybe we shouldn't touch anything,” Felix said.

To his relief, she put it down.

But then she picked up something else, a faded scroll from the desk. Carefully, she unrolled it. The paper was old and stiff and about twice the size of a sheet of computer paper.

“What is it?” Felix said.

“A list of some kind,” Maisie said, frowning.

“Like a shopping list?”

When Maisie didn't answer him, Felix decided to look for himself. He reached over and tried to snatch the paper from his sister's hand before she could resist. But when he grabbed onto it, Maisie yanked it back. Their eyes met across the desk, their hands clutching the paper.

The room filled with the deafening sounds of gunfire. The air smelled of sulfur and smoke. Felix tried to let go of the paper, but he couldn't.
It was as if his hand was superglued to it. They were each aware of being lifted ever so slightly off the ground. Maisie's toes barely reached the carpet.

From outside the stained-glass window came the sound of their mother's car on the long driveway, Great-Aunt Maisie's old blue 1967 Mustang that was in desperate need of a new muffler.

Startled, Maisie let go of the paper. As soon as she did, the air smelled like it usually did, all musty and mothbally. She and Felix were both jolted back down onto the carpet.

“Were we just . . . um . . . in the air?” Felix said.

“Sort of.” Maisie gulped.

“Like . . . about to fly or something?” Felix asked. His heart beat so hard and so loud that he thought he might be having a heart attack. People
could
actually get scared to death, couldn't they?

“I don't know,” Maisie said. Her eyes darted around the room as if she might find an explanation. Her heart was beating hard and loud, too, but she wasn't afraid. Instead, Maisie was more excited than she'd ever been in her whole life.

“We started to
fly
!” she said, the idea slowly sinking in.

“Maisie,” Felix said evenly, “that is not a good thing.”

“You're right,” Maisie said. “It's a great thing. An amazing thing.”

Felix studied the paper he was still holding. “It's a list of names,” he said.

“Thousands of them.”

Maisie peered over his shoulder at the fancy, old-fashioned writing. One brief paragraph at the start and then all of those names. Despite the dimness of the room, Maisie could just make out some of the names:
Benjamin Thacher. Henry Morse. James Ellis . . .
they seemed to be in categories of some kind.

“Oh! I get it!” she said. “They're arranged by states,” Maisie said, pointing. “See?”

Massachusetts. New York. Connecticut . . . The Mustang's car door slammed shut, and the sound of their mother's footsteps on the circular drive echoed in the still night.

Felix dropped the paper back onto the desk. “Let's get out of here,” he said.

But Maisie picked the scroll up again and started to read the names to herself, her lips moving slightly as she did.
John Dunlop . . . Jacob Hart . . .
“Put it down!” Felix said. “We have only a few minutes to get into our beds and pretend to be asleep!”

He was halfway down the stairs before he realized that his sister had not followed him. Felix ran back to find Maisie still standing exactly in the same spot, still reading the list of names.

“Put it down!” Felix yelled again. “Mom'll be in the house any second.”

He could practically hear their mother struggling with the key. Luckily for them, the key was tricky and had to be put in the lock just so, with the door held just right, for it to work. That would slow her down at least.

“Come on!” he said.

Carefully, Maisie began to roll the paper and tuck it under her arm.

“You can't take it with you,” Felix said.

“Why not? No one's going to notice it's missing.”

“Look,” he said, starting to panic, “something happened to us just now. Something weird. What if it has to do with that piece of paper? You really want to take it into your room?”

Maisie hesitated. “I don't think it's the paper. I think it's something in this room. That's why we're supposed to stay out.” This was the most exciting thing that had ever happened to her, and she just had to figure out what it meant. And how to do it again.

“But we're not allowed in lots of rooms,” Felix reminded her, afraid of what she might be thinking.

“That's because there's something disintegrating inside. Like fragile rugs or rickety furniture. Everything in here is pretty solid. Something else makes them keep everyone out.”

“We can come back tomorrow when Mom goes to work,” Felix said desperately. “But if we get caught in here now, we'll never get to the bottom of it. They'll probably padlock everything shut.”

Maisie sighed. “Fine,” she said. She hated how logical Felix could be. “I just hope Mom doesn't see us pop out of the dumbwaiter.”

“There's no time for that. We have to get over to the servants' stairs. Fast.”

Felix ran out, but Maisie stayed put. Something had caught her eye. She took the shard from her pocket and walked over to the Ming vase standing on its pedestal. Carefully, she fit it into the empty place where her shard belonged. But if her piece was back in its proper place, why was there still a hole in the vase, on the opposite side? Maisie put her finger in that hole. Did Felix also have a shard? Or did someone else?

“Maisie,” Felix hissed from the doorway. “Come on!”

“I'm coming, I'm coming,” she said. She popped her piece out and slipped it back into her pocket.

They ran out of The Treasure Chest and down the stairs, stopping only to pull the wall back into place before racing down the Grand Staircase and past all of the empty rooms with strange shadows falling across their walls. Maisie reached the door—the one in the Dining Room that led to the back stairs. She tugged as hard as she could, but it didn't budge.

“Locked!” she called over her shoulder.

Felix reached the door, panting.

“We are so dead,” he said.

He thought back to their tour with the Woman in Pink. She'd used a single key to open the door. He remembered thinking that it was a little strange that the key wasn't on a ring or something. So where had that key come from?

“I think the docent keeps the key hidden here,” he said, running his hand along the wall. He needed a light, a key, a miracle.

“Found it!” Maisie said. “Under the rug, just like on TV.”

She unlocked the door, careful to put the key back where she'd found it. But when she turned the handle, the door didn't budge.

“Push!” Felix said. He placed his own bony shoulder next to his sister's, and the two of them pushed as hard as they could.

The door flew open, sending them stumbling onto the staircase landing on the first floor. Just one flight below, they could hear the sound of their mother's sensible heels moving closer and, clear as anything, they recognized the song she was humming: ABBA's “Mamma Mia.”

Maisie and Felix made it into the kitchen seconds before their mother opened the door and walked in.

“Mamma mia!” she belted, finishing the song with a flourish.

Then she saw them standing in front of her. They tried to make their breathing sound even and measured. They tried to appear innocent.

Their mother looked at them, surprised.

“You two are still awake?” she said.

“Scary old house, Mom,” Maisie said. “We got frightened.”

Felix nodded enthusiastically.

Their mother studied their faces, one at a time, looking from Maisie to Felix and then back again.

“Of course you did,” she said finally. “What was I thinking going out tonight? This place can seem pretty creepy.”

She opened her arms and pulled the twins in for a hug. Their mother gave great hugs.

“Now bed, please,” she said. “It's late.”

Felix had to count all the way to forty-nine before his heart finally slowed. But Maisie didn't even try to calm herself. Tomorrow morning, as soon as their mother left for work, they would go back into The Treasure Chest.

In the hallway between their rooms, Maisie and Felix paused.

“I'm never going back in there again,” Felix said. “Ever.”

Disappointment filled Maisie. “What? Of course you are.” Then she added, “
We
are.”

Felix shook his head. “No way. You've talked me into crazy things before, but this time I'm not letting you.”

“We started to fly!” she said as if he'd forgotten.