Greenglass House (20 page)

“You know,” Sirin pointed out, “if Georgie's right and Clem didn't steal these three things, that really only leaves Dr. Gowervine. And we know he snuck into Clem's room.”

“Yeah, I thought of that,” Negret admitted. “But Clem said nothing was touched, which makes it seem like he went in for some other reason than to steal things.”

“Like what?”

“No idea,” he admitted. “And the truth is, I really can't even think of anything else to write down about him. I feel like I know less about him than any of the others.”

“What's he a doctor of?”

“Don't know.”

“He's out on the porch a lot.”

“Well, he smokes a pipe. I guess we do know that.”

“Yeah, but I meant whatever his excuse is, he's out on the porch by himself a lot,” Sirin said patiently. “We should probably look into that.” She turned to a fresh page. “Mrs. Hereward.”

Here they had a bit more information. They wrote down what they could remember about the old lady's story the night before, and what she'd told them that morning.

“Her ancestors were nautical folks. Maybe she has a connection to the chart.” Negret picked up the bag and looked at the embroidery, then at the little lantern on the misshapen gate. “And the gate has to be a clue,” he mumbled. “It keeps popping up everywhere.”

Sirin turned the bag to the house on the opposite side, then turned it back. “I can't tell if the gate is supposed to be on the grounds of the house or if it's a whole separate picture.”

“Yeah, it's hard to tell.” Then he spotted something he hadn't before, on the house side. There was a design stitched onto the door: an arrangement of small straight lines that looked like symbols.

Negret shoved the bag at Sirin and took the blackjack's keys from his pocket. He examined the hammered disc on the leather key ring. On one side was the engraved crown with its specks of blue enamel. On the other side were the four Chinese characters. They matched the embroidered symbols on the door perfectly.

“What does it
mean?
” he howled at the ceiling. “This is so frustrating!”

“Mrs. Hereward might know what the symbols are,” Sirin said, patting his shoulder. “We'll just ask her, once we give the bag back. Come on, stay focused.” She took the key ring from him and copied the symbols onto Mrs. Hereward's page in the notebook. “Who do we have next?”

Negret sighed. “Clem. Clemence O. Candler. Fast and silent and joked that she was a cat burglar. Also, she implied that Georgie was a thief too.” He snapped his fingers, remembering something else Clem had said. “I was thinking so hard about the perfume, I almost didn't notice! When she gave Georgie her sweater, she said
What's a cardigan between moonlighters.
And I read in that Odd Trails book about the Moonlighter's Knack, which is a—”

“An exploit. A blackjack skill that lets you steal almost anything,” Sirin finished, nodding thoughtfully.

“Exactly!”

“Well, it could just mean they're both Odd Trails nerds,” she pointed out.

Negret shook his head. “But she also admitted she'd have a reason to steal the notebook, which Georgie knew already.”

“But even Georgie didn't think she was the one who did it.”

“Well,” he said, “Georgie told
Clem
she didn't think she did it. Maybe that was just—whatchacallit—misdirection?” Misdirection was, according to
Blackjacks of the Roads,
another key skill.

“Like maybe she was just giving Clem a chance to bring it back and pretend she wasn't the one who took it?” Sirin nodded thoughtfully. “Maybe. But didn't you kind of believe Clem when she told us that she didn't steal it?”

Negret
had
believed Clem, but he didn't know if that really meant anything. “Maybe she's just as good at lying as she is at sneaking around. I don't know if we can let her off the hook that easily.”

“Fair enough. What else do we know about her?”

Not much else, it seemed. They decided to make a list of the remaining clues and questions they had, and came up with:

 

Nautical chart found outside, painted on paper with gate watermark

Map stolen with decoy left in its place (paper with gate watermark)

Piece of matching paper found in Emporium (Lucksmith Paper Merchants)

Gate is also on windows

Gate is also on Mrs. H's bag

Chinese characters on Mrs. H's bag match characters on Negret's keys

Who dropped the chart?

Is the person who took the chart the same person who stole the other missing objects?

Is Dr. Gowervine a thief, or was he in Clem's room for another reason?

 

They stared at the list, flipped back through their notes, discussed and argued, and came up with nothing new. But they both agreed that they needed to ask Mrs. Hereward about the symbols on the door—as soon as they could get the stolen things back to their owners without bringing any suspicion on themselves.

That much, at least, Negret was pretty sure he could manage. His idea about where to hide the bag and the watch before he'd found the notebook adapted beautifully into a plan for how to return them all.

He went into the second-floor study, where Mrs. Pine had been wrapping presents before all the guests had descended upon the house. He swiped two rolls of wrapping paper, a tape dispenser, a pair of scissors, and three identical boxes, and brought them back to his room.

“Excellent idea,” Sirin said admiringly as the two of them placed the recovered items in the boxes, padding them with extra paper so they wouldn't slide around too much, then wrapped and labeled each one with an unobtrusive
w, n,
or
b
on an underside corner where the paper was particularly busy with drummers drumming. Then, since it just made sense to keep going, they switched to the second roll of paper and wrapped the presents Milo had hidden away under his bed for his parents.

He was knotting the bow on the last gift when someone knocked on his door. He shoved the spiral pad under the nearest present and called, “Come in!”

Mrs. Pine peeked in and smiled when she saw the pile of messily wrapped presents. “Lost track of time again?”

Milo and Meddy exchanged guilty smiles. “Yeah,” Milo admitted.

Meddy looked at the clock on the bedside table. “Did we miss lunch?”

Mrs. Pine waved a hand. “I thought I'd try to keep you from going hungry today. Mrs. Caraway made macaroni and cheese and ham sandwiches, and we set some aside. Come on down before it gets cold.”

“Be right there, Mom.”

He waited until the door had shut behind Mrs. Pine, then packed the boxes he'd wrapped into his rucksack. “You coming?”

Meddy shook her head and took the notepad out again. “I want to think. Do you mind if I stay here where it's quiet and keep looking over our clues?”

That wasn't an easy question to answer. Did he mind leaving her in his room alone? Or at least—because yes, he definitely minded; this was
his
space—did he mind enough to actually say no?

She waited patiently while he considered. “I can go somewhere else, if you like.”

In the end, it was thinking about the game that helped him make up his mind. They were partners in this adventure. If he couldn't trust her, he was all on his own.

“No, you can stay here,” Milo said eventually. “But would you try and keep from moving anything? My stuff is right where I like it.”

She nodded. “I promise.”

“Okay, then.” Milo opened the door and stepped into the hallway and took a deep breath. This was hard, but not as hard as he'd expected. “See you later.”

 

eight

It stopped snowing and started raining again, and the rain immediately froze on every surface. By nightfall the sky had been swept clear of gray for the first time in days, and the moonlight glinted on a world that looked as if it had been coated with a layer of silvery glass. Then the winds started, and the glazed world began to groan and creak and even occasionally to crack, sending noises like gunshots echoing through the night.

Inside Greenglass House, everyone was looking considerably more nervous than he or she had looked the day before. It wasn't just the thefts, either. Milo knew his parents were worried about losing power when candlesticks began to appear, decorating spots where they didn't usually live. The house did have its own generator, and there was plenty of firewood, but the generator didn't start up automatically, which meant that if the electricity went out, there would be at least a short period of time without lights. The candles looked right at home among the Christmas trimmings, so the guests probably didn't even notice them, but to Milo, they stood out like sore thumbs.

So did the three packages under the tree with the secret marks identifying them as the stolen-and-recovered items. They were now buried under the pile of gifts Mr. Pine had added later that afternoon, but to Milo it was as if they had flashing signal lights on them screaming STOLEN THINGS! OPEN US!

Another meal, another buffet that scattered the guests all over. Once again, Meddy sent Milo to observe the living room. This time he took his plate to the loveseat. Sitting against the arm, he could peer over the back and watch. As a bonus, he could hear just about everything in the dining room, too.

Dinner was another awkward meal full of sullen looks and uncomfortable silences. Only Mrs. Hereward broached the subject of the thefts. “You've searched all of our rooms, to absolutely no avail,” she burst out from the dining room as everyone was finishing up. The words erupted from her as if she'd been struggling to hold them in the whole time. She stalked into the living room and waved her fork back and forth between Dr. Gowervine and Clem. “What about theirs?”

Dr. Gowervine started sputtering indignantly. “You cannot possibly suggest that—”

“One of you did!”
Mrs. Hereward's voice twisted up toward screech territory. “You're the only ones who weren't robbed! It has to be one of you!”

Clem finished chewing, set her fork down on the coffee table, folded her hands, and looked with maddening calm at the old lady. “You don't know what you're talking about. If you did, if you knew even the first thing about it, you'd know
that
doesn't mean anything.”

Meddy dropped onto the loveseat and peered over the back with Milo. “What do you think she means?”

Milo shrugged, more interested in hearing Mrs. Hereward's response than in discussing Clem's.

“Maybe she's saying we're suspects too,” Meddy grumbled. “That it might have been one of us, who belong to the house.”

That was possible, of course, but Milo didn't think that was what she meant. It seemed to him that Clem could be implying that the thief might be
one of the three who'd been robbed.

Now, that was an interesting idea. What if the thief was just pretending to have been robbed, to keep anyone from suspecting him? Or
her.
Clem was looking intently at Mrs. Hereward, as if she was pretty sure the old lady was behind everything.

“O—kay.” Mrs. Pine hurried in and clapped her palms together. “How about coffee?”

Mrs. Hereward ignored her.
“Young lady,”
she said to Clem, “I'm sure you're not suggesting—”

“I'm not suggesting anything. I'm just saying you don't know what you're talking about, and by the way, I don't like being accused of funny business any more than you do.” Clem folded her napkin, picked up her plate, and got to her feet. “Can I help with the coffee, Mrs. P?”

Mrs. Hereward opened her mouth, but Clem cut her off.

“You can search my room anytime,” she said over her shoulder. “Search it now, if it'll make you happy.”

Mrs. Pine held up her hands. “How about everyone calm down?”

“I'm perfectly calm, now that Miss Candler has offered to do the right thing.” Mrs. Hereward didn't entirely sound calm, and her face had gone florid again. She turned to Dr. Gowervine, who had gotten up too and was passing by on his way to the kitchen with his own dishes. “What about you, Doctor?”

“This is ridiculous,” he muttered.

Now the old lady discovered she was about to be alone in the living room and stalked after him. “Is that a yes, or a no?”

“How about everyone
calm down,
” Mr. Pine repeated loudly from the kitchen. Everybody was either there or in the dining room now. Milo leaned farther out over the back of the loveseat so he could see.