Seven-Day Magic (2 page)

One of the ideas Barnaby had was that Susan and John should get acquainted with the public library. Up till then John hardly read anything at all, outside of school. And Susan mostly read about Sue Barton, student nurse.

But books were Barnaby's life blood, maybe because he was an author himself. He had a book of his own in his mind, and some of it down on paper, but he would never talk about it or tell the others what it was.

Except that he had told a little of it to Abbie, for she was a poet, or hoped to be, and would understand.

Most of the time when Barnaby wasn't having ideas or thinking about his own book, he was reading other people's. He read one a day, at
least
, and was anxious that his friends should do the same. It was Barnaby who had decided that Saturday was library day.

Each Saturday morning, as soon as breakfast was over, the five children would ride along with Barnaby's mother on her way to the office (and with Barnaby's father, too, if he were catching the train for an early rehearsal) and get off at the library corner.

Later, after an hour or two of rummaging and browsing (and a lot of advice from Barnaby), they would come down the library steps and walk along the village street that turned into the curving country road home, reading as they went. And Barnaby had made a game of that, too. Each one got to read part of his most interesting-looking book out loud, and then the others were free to criticize.

This particular June morning started out no differently from the others. As the five children wandered along Cherry Street, Barnaby opened his top book hopefully and began chapter one. But after only a paragraph or two he leafed over to the back, glanced at the last pages, and shut the cover with a disgusted bang.

"I thought so," he said. "Of all the gyps! It calls itself
The Magic Door
, but there's not a speck of real magic in it anywhere! It's just about this boy that learns to get along with these other people by being friendly and stuff. And the magic door's just the door of good fellowship or something. Man, do I despise a book like that!"

And the others could not have agreed with him more. Usually the five children could spot a book like that a mile off, though. It wasn't very often that they got fooled.

So then, of course, Fredericka had to read about Ozma's birthday party from the end of
The Road to Oz,
the way she almost always did. The others never minded listening to this once again. It took them back to their own happy, carefree, innocent childhood.

When she had finished, Barnaby looked around at the others. "Anybody else?"

Ordinarily Susan would have been the last to answer. She wasn't a quick reader out loud and was afraid of disgracing herself in Barnaby's hearing by stumbling over long words. But today she looked at the little old shabby-looking book on the top of her pile, and something made her change her mind.

"I've got this book here," she said.

"What is it?" said Barnaby. "Who's it by?"

"I don't know," said Susan. "It doesn't seem to say. I just kind of think it might be interesting." And she opened the worn red cover and began to read.

These are the words that Susan read:

"'The best kind of book,' said Barnaby, 'is a magic book.'

'Naturally,' said John.

'The best kind of magic book,' said Barnaby, leaning back against the edge of the long, low library table and surveying the crowded bookshelves, only seeming somehow to look beyond them and beyond everything else, too, the way he so often did, 'is when it's about ordinary people like us, and then something happens and it's magic.'

'Like when you find a nickel, except it isn't a nickel—it's a half-magic talisman,' said Susan.

'Or you're playing in the front yard and somebody asks is this the road to Butterfield,' said Abbie.

'Only it isn't at all—it's the road to Oz!' shrilled Fredericka, jigging up and down excitedly..."

***

Susan's voice trailed off. She looked at the others.

"It can't be," said Barnaby.

"It is," said Susan. "It's about
us
! All of us, and every single thing we said!"

"Let's see."

Barnaby reached for the book, rather greedily Susan thought, and yet what of it? This was no time to be worrying about manners, and Barnaby could read the fastest. He was reading fast now, flipping over the pages one after the other.

"You're right," he muttered as he read. "We're all in it."

"How could we be?" said John. "How'd we get there without our knowing it?"

"I don't know," said Barnaby, "but we're there all right. It tells about us, and our parents, and your Grannie, even. And a lot more about me being stubborn and unpopular and you sticking up for me," he went on, his face getting rather red.

"What does it say about
me?
" said Fredericka.

"It says you're fierce-tempered," said Barnaby.

"Well, I am," said Fredericka.

There was a silence. Everybody stopped walking and just stood there.

"What's happening?" said Abbie. "Do you suppose we're magic, suddenly?"

"Either we are," said John, "or that book is."

"Maybe it isn't a book at all," said Fredericka in eerie tones.

"I don't like it," said Abbie. "It's creepy. Let's take it back and tell the library we don't want it."

"Or bury it with a stake through its heart," said Barnaby.

But nobody laughed.

"Do you suppose," said Susan, "we're not really real at all but just characters in this book somebody wrote?"

This was a sobering thought.

"I don't
want
to be not real," said Fredericka, all of a sudden not seeming fierce-tempered at all but just little and scared.

There was another silence. Everybody looked at Barnaby. Barnaby thought a minute. Then he shook his head.

"No," he said, "it can't be that. Because when the book tells about me and Abbie and Fredericka, it says we've just moved here. But I remember being me long before that."

"Maybe that part of you was in
another
book," said Susan. She didn't mean to say it, but it just slipped out.

Barnaby was undaunted. "All right," he said. "Suppose we
are
book characters? It never bothered us before, before we thought about it. It doesn't have to bother us now. Characters have all kinds of interesting things happen to them. And here's a whole bookful of adventures and we're just at the beginning!

"What happens next?" said Fredericka, standing on tiptoe and trying to see over Barnaby's shoulder (only she was too little to reach).

"What happens at the
end
!?" said Abbie. "That's what rm worrying about!"

"How far did you get?" said Susan. "Did the Susan in the book find an old book in the library, too, and start reading out loud from it?"

"That's where I stopped," said Barnaby. "'Susan opened the worn red cover and began to read,' it says."

"Just think," John said dreamily. "If we find a book about people like us and the people
in
the book find a book about people like
them,
and the people in
that
book find a book about people like..."

"Don't!" cried Susan. "It's like those awful arithmetic problems that go on and on." She turned back to Barnaby. "
Then
what does the book say. Is it taking down everything we're saying now, like a stenographer?"

"No," said Barnaby. "It doesn't say
anything
then. The page ends there."

"Turn over," said Fredericka.

"Look in the back," said Abbie.

Barnaby tried. "I can't," he told them. "It's stuck or something. The whole rest of the book's shut solid tight."

"I suppose that's as much as they want us to know," said Abbie darkly. "And now I suppose the awful thing happens."

"What awful thing?" said Fredericka.

"I don't know. Some awful thing. It stands to reason."

"Not necessarily," said Barnaby. And then even he broke off and caught his breath and looked around warily.

But what happened was nothing at all. Except that the sun went on shining and the sky went on being blue and some cars drove by and an oriole sang and a woman came out of a house and began beating a carpet.

After a few minutes of this usualness everyone found himself breathing more regularly again. The five children found themselves walking along again, too, and waiting for Barnaby to begin having more ideas. And pretty soon he did.

"Of course," he said. "I'm beginning to see it all. Don't you remember? We said we wanted a special magic book of our own."

"About five children just like us," said Abbie. "
You
said that part." And she pointed an accusing finger at Fredericka.

"No matter who said what," said Barnaby, "it looks as if we got it, somehow. But
something
had to make the wish come true. And what else but the book itself could have done that?" He turned to Susan. "Where'd you find it in the first place?"

"On the bottom shelf of the fairy-tale section," she said, remembering.

Barnaby nodded excitedly. "It all adds up. Think of it sitting there all those years, with the magic from all those other books dripping down onto it! It's prob'ly
soaked
with magic powers by now. It's prob'ly been sitting there waiting for somebody to come along and make a wish in front of it. And we came and wanted a magic story; so that's what it turned into. Prob'ly if we'd wanted pirates, it'd have turned into a book about a pirate ship with us on board. But we asked for magic; so that's what we got."

"What kind of wish is that?" said Fredericka. "What good is a book about us? We
know
about us."

"We don't know what's coming next," said Barnaby. "All we've had is the beginning. What else did we wish for? Think back."

"I said the people in the book would be walking home from somewhere and the magic would start suddenly before they knew it," said Susan.

"Well?" said Barnaby. "
That
part came true. And then / said they'd have to tame the magic and learn its rules and thwart it and make the most of it. So I guess it's up to us to do that from now on."

Barnaby was certainly having ideas today. In fact, he was having them so fast the others could hardly keep up with him. But they were exciting ideas, all the same.

"You mean," said Susan, "there's a whole book still going to happen to us?"

"That's what I think," said Barnaby.

"But if it's all there in the book," said John, "why not use the magic and wish the book open? So we can read the next chapter and know what to expect?"

"I don't think it works like that," said Barnaby. "I think that'd be against the rules. Anyway, maybe there
isn't
any next chapter, yet. I think if we could pry open the rest of the pages, they'd prob'ly be blank. I think it's prob'ly up to us to make more wishes and have them come true, so as to fill the pages up!"

"Sort of make up the book as we go along?" said Abbie.

"You mean it's ours to
use?
" said Susan. "Like a wishing ring, sort of?"

"Only mixed up with those things they have in offices," said Fredericka. "Those things you talk into."

"Dictaphones," said John.

"Whatever they're called," said Fredericka.

"That's the idea," said Barnaby. "More or less."

Everyone thought about this.

"That book," said John, "had better be handled with care from now on."

"Don't anybody dare even
think
about wishing," said Susan, "till we've talked it out and decided what kind of adventure we want."

"
You
ought to do the deciding," said Barnaby. "You're the one who found the book in the first place."

That was typical of Barnaby. He might be grabby, but he was fair. Susan's hand went out toward the book. Then she pulled it back and shook her head. Barnaby was the one with ideas. Let him go on having them.

"No, you go first. You'll do it better."

"No,
you
ought to be the one."

"No, honestly, I'd rather."

"Oh, for heaven's sake," said Fredericka. "If everybody else is too polite around here, let
me
!" And she laid hold of the book.

"Stop her, somebody!" cried Abbie. But it was too late. Fredericka was already talking, gabbling her words without stopping to breathe for fear someone would interrupt her, the way youngest children in families soon learn to do.

"I wish we'd have a magic adventure, with wizards and witches and magic things in it, and I wish it'd start right now, this minute, so we'll know for certain it's really our wish coming true and not just a coincidence!"

"That's done it," said Barnaby, when Fredericka finally stopped just before utter breath failed.

But it didn't seem to have. Nothing happened.

"Maybe the book didn't hear her," said Abbie.

"Maybe I'm supposed to kiss it or something," said Fredericka.

"Maybe we're supposed to keep on walking," said Barnaby. "The minute isn't up yet."

They kept on walking. Round a bend in the road they came on a house they had always specially noticed in the past. It was a perfectly ordinary-looking house in a perfectly ordinary-looking garden, but it had an interesting sign by the driveway.