The Dragon of Lonely Island (2 page)

“Jade?” wondered Zachary.

Mother gazed slowly around the room and then tilted her head back to look up at the high carved ceiling. She took a deep breath. “My goodness, children,” she said. “I never expected anything quite like this.”

Mr. Jones poked a cheerful face in the door. “You folks make yourselves at home,” he said. “I’ll just go let Mrs. Jones know you’re here.”

“Mr. Jones!” Zachary called. “Who did the telescope belong to?”

“Now, that, I’ve heard tell, was the captain’s own,” said Mr. Jones, when Zachary showed it to him. “The captain what built this house a hundred years and more ago.”

“Was he a pirate?” Zachary asked hopefully.

Mr. Jones laughed and shook his head. “No more than anyone else in those days,” he said, and then, as Zachary’s face fell, he added, “but it was a wild life all the same. His ship was called the
Dancing Susan.
That’s her on the weathervane up on top of the house.”

“Did you
know
the captain?” asked Sarah Emily.

“Of course he didn’t,” Hannah hissed. “Don’t be
stupid.
”

But Mr. Jones just shook his head and chuckled. “He was well before my time, little lady,” he said.

Zachary reluctantly turned away from the telescope. “How do you get to the tower?” he asked.

Mr. Jones looked surprised. “The tower? Nobody’s been up there in years. It’s kept locked.”

“Let’s explore!” said Sarah Emily, hopping from one foot to the other in excitement. But Mother shook her head at her. “Slow down,” she said. “We need to settle in first and then have some supper.”

At that moment, the door at the end of the hall flew open and a short plump woman in a calico apron appeared. Her hair was pinned on top of her head in a bun, and there was flour on the end of her nose.

“You must be Mrs. Davis!” she cried, bustling toward them. “And Hannah and Zachary and Sarah Emily! I’m so glad to see you! We’ve been looking forward to this for weeks! You come along with me and leave Tobias to bring your suitcases up. There’s a pot of tea just hot, and fresh lemonade, and raisin cookies just out of the oven.”

She wiped her hands on her apron and hustled the children and their mother toward the heavenly smelling kitchen. Zachary, bringing up the rear, tapped Sarah Emily on the shoulder.

“‘Not accustomed to children,’” he quoted. “‘Be on your best behavior.’”

Sarah Emily giggled. “Even Aunt Mehitabel can’t know
everything
,” she said.

The children’s bedrooms were on the second floor of the house, all next to each other in a row, with Zachary at the front of the house, Sarah Emily, who was afraid of the dark, in the middle, and Hannah, who was the oldest and bravest, next to the back staircase. On their first morning at Aunt Mehitabel’s house, Sarah Emily woke early. Beside her head, sunbeams danced and flickered across the blue stripes of the wallpaper, and faintly through walls and windows came the rhythmic whoosh and splash of the sea. Sarah Emily stretched out her arms and legs luxuriously in the big four-poster bed. It was a beautiful day and the first real day of vacation. There were a thousand things to do and places to explore. Sarah Emily sprang out of bed, landing on the blue rag rug, and ran next door in her bare feet to wake Zachary.

She paused outside Zachary’s door. At home, Zachary hardly ever let anyone come into his room. He had a sign posted on his door that said NO TRESPASSERS! KEEP OUT!

“I don’t like people coming in all the time and fooling around with my things,” Zachary said. “I like to be private.”

Sarah Emily hesitated for a moment. Then, cautiously, she knocked. “Zachary! Can I come in?”

The door opened. Zachary was awake, already dressed in a T-shirt, blue jeans, and sneakers. Behind him, his bed was made, the quilt pulled smooth, and his pajamas neatly folded on his pillow. Zachary liked everything kept in its proper place. He stepped out into the hall and closed the door firmly behind him. “Is anybody else up?”

“I don’t think so,” Sarah Emily said. “It’s awfully early.”

“Then go get dressed,” Zachary said. “Let’s see what else is in this house. This place is enormous. It must have about a zillion rooms.”

“Don’t go without me,” Sarah Emily said. “I’ll be really quick.”

When she emerged from her room for the second time, in jeans, sandals, and her favorite pink shirt, Zachary was prowling restlessly up and down the hall.

“This floor is all bedrooms,” he whispered. “There’s another big one across the hall next to Mother’s and a little one beyond that.”

At the very end of the hall a narrow wooden staircase led up and down.

“Where does this go?” asked Sarah Emily. She peered nervously into the shadowy stairwell. “It’s spooky in there.”

“There’s a light,” said Zachary reassuringly. He switched it on. “If you go down,” he said, “you come out in the kitchen. Mrs. Jones told us so last night. If you go up, I’ll bet you get to the attic. Let’s go see.”

The children tiptoed up the narrow stairs, with Zachary in the lead. The stairs creaked protestingly under their feet.

“Look how dusty these stairs are,” Zachary whispered over his shoulder. “Nobody has been up here in ages.”

At the top the stairs made an abrupt left-hand turn. The children found themselves facing two closed doors.

“Which one first?” asked Zachary. He deepened his voice in imitation of a magician the children had once seen at a stage show. “Anything could be behind the mysterious doors. A forgotten treasure map. The long-lost family jewels.”

Sarah Emily giggled. “A magic carpet, all rolled up in a corner. A crystal ball.”

“Or a skeleton,” Zachary said. “Or ghosts!”

Sarah Emily shivered. “Don’t, Zachary. You’re scaring me.”

Zachary closed his eyes and pointed dramatically. “I pick . . . the door on the left!”

Sarah Emily tugged nervously at his sleeve. “Maybe we should wait for Hannah.”

“We can show her everything later,” Zachary said. “Aren’t you curious? Let’s just take a quick look.” He turned the wooden doorknob and pulled open the door. “Come on, S. E. Not a ghost in sight.”

Before them was a long dim room, stacked floor to ceiling with odds and ends. There was a torn green velvet sofa with feet shaped like crocodile claws, stacks of crumbling magazines tied up with twine, old leather trunks, a wire dressmaker’s dummy, and an aged upright piano with three missing keys.

“Look at all this stuff,” said Sarah Emily, awed.

“This is
great,
” said Zachary enthusiastically. “Look up there — I think that’s a
sword.
We’ll have to come back. Let’s go see what’s behind the other door. Maybe this place has
two
attics. It’s big enough.”

But the other door was locked. Zachary rattled the doorknob and shoved the wooden panels —“Maybe it’s just stuck,” said Sarah Emily hopefully — but the door refused to budge.

“It’s locked,” said Zachary finally. “We can’t get in.”

“Maybe the Joneses have the key,” suggested Sarah Emily. “We could ask.”

Zachary’s eyes suddenly opened wide. “Wait a minute,” he said. “Don’t move, S. E. I’ll be right back.” He turned and raced down the stairs. In less than a minute, he was back, clutching something in his hand. He grinned triumphantly at Sarah Emily as he opened his fingers. There in his outstretched hand lay Aunt Mehitabel’s little iron key, with its curiously curlicued handle and attached paper tag. “We
have
a key,” he said.

Sarah Emily’s eyes widened too. “Do you suppose . . .,” she began.

Zachary nodded. “This must be the Tower Room.”

The key fit. It slid precisely into the lock and turned with a sharp click. Zachary tried the knob once more and this time the door, released, opened. In front of them was an iron ladder leading up to a trap door in the boards of the floor overhead.

“It
is
the Tower Room,” breathed Sarah Emily.

“Come on,” said Zachary. “I’ll go first. Let’s climb.”

Rung by rung, they mounted the iron ladder. Zachary pushed on the trap door —“It’s heavy,” he panted — and slowly thrust it open. It tilted back on its hinges and the children scrambled out onto the floor. They got to their feet and slowly looked around. “Wow!” Zachary said.

The children stood in a small octagonal room, completely circled by round windows that looked like portholes. They could see the entire island from the windows of the tower. To the north, at the far end of the island, a rocky hill rose up, topped with windblown trees.

“I’ll bet that’s Drake’s Hill,” Zachary said.

Sarah Emily turned away from the window.

“This was a kid’s room once,” she said. “A playroom. Look — the toys are still here.”

“Maybe it was Aunt Mehitabel’s,” Zachary said, “when she was little.”

On shelves along one wall, beneath the round windows, were rows of books and old-fashioned toys: a wooden doll with glossy painted hair, a jar of colored marbles, a folded checkerboard, a small blue china tea set with a chipped teapot. There was a collection of shells and chunks of coral. Two immense pink conch shells, too large for the shelves, were set on the floor below. There was a brass gong on a stand, with a little red wooden hammer hanging on a hook at its side. Sarah Emily gently unhooked the hammer and tapped the gong. It gave off a mellow bell-like chime.

“Look at this,” said Zachary from the other side of the room. “Wouldn’t you love to have a desk like this?” The desk closed with a wooden flap, fastened with a small metal hook. Opened, the flap folded down to form a flat writing surface. The back of the desk was lined with rows and rows of little cubbyholes —“They’re called pigeonholes,” Zachary said — filled with papers, packets, boxes, and jars. There was a neat row of bottles of colored inks.

“I didn’t know ink came in so many different colors,” said Sarah Emily. She began reading the labels on the little bottles one by one. “Lilac. Magenta. Emerald Green. Topaz. Aquamarine. Gold.”

Zachary was busily opening and closing the desk drawers.

“Nothing special here,” he said. “Just paper and envelopes and stuff. Let me try the big drawer at the bottom.”

The drawer smoothly slid open.

“It’s on little wheels,” Zachary said.

“What’s in it?” asked Sarah Emily.

The drawer was empty, except for a wooden box. Zachary lifted out the box and set it on the desktop. It was about the size of an ordinary shoebox, but much heavier, made out of dark polished wood. The top of the box was inlaid with a pattern of interlocking squares and rectangles, made of pieces of wood in different colors, from pale gold to chocolate brown to ebony. Sarah Emily ran her fingers slowly from piece to piece, tracing the patterns. “It’s beautiful,” she said. “How do you open it?”

The box had no visible handle or latch, and it was sealed tightly shut. The children poked, prodded, and wiggled the box, turned it sideways and upside down, and — Zachary was frustrated — even shook it. But nothing happened. There seemed to be no way of opening it. Then, as they stared at each other, undecided about what to do next, they heard a faint voice calling their names from far below.

“Zachary! Sarah Emily! Where are you? It’s time for breakfast!”

“That’s Mother,” said Sarah Emily. “We’d better go.”

Zachary set the box back in the bottom desk drawer. “We’ll figure it out,” he said. “We’ll come back later.”

“Zachary!” Mother called again. “Sarah Emily!”

Hastily the children climbed through the trap door and scrambled down the iron ladder. Zachary closed the door to the Tower Room, locked it, and carefully put the key back in his pocket.

“I’m starving,” said Sarah Emily. “It feels like we’ve been up there for hours.”

“We’re right here!”Zachary shouted.“We’re coming!”

They hurried down the stairs toward the tempting smell of frying bacon.

The children sat on the veranda steps eating homemade doughnuts sprinkled with powdered sugar, made just that morning by Mrs. Jones.

“This is the most wonderful place on earth,” said Sarah Emily blissfully, licking her fingers.

They sat for a few minutes in stuffed silence. Bumblebees buzzed happily in the red rosebushes along the garden fence, and on the shore the waves rolled in and out, crashing against the rocks. From somewhere inside the house came the sound of Mrs. Jones singing “Amazing Grace” slightly off-key. Sarah Emily shaded her eyes with her hand and peered northward. There, small in the distance, the rocky hill topped with windblown trees was silhouetted against the sky.