Chicory Up: The Pixie Chronicles (17 page)

“Anyone home?” he called from the front parlor. Then he sneezed. Didn’t anyone dust this place?

“Back here,” Dusty said, appearing in the doorway to the back of the house. She wore normal slacks and a blazer today instead of pioneer costume. A telltale smudge across her nose and cheek proved she hadn’t given up her basement haunting completely. Her glasses tipped close to the end of her nose. She pushed them back into place before he could get a good look at her eyes, a sure indicator of her mood and health.

The glasses allowed her to hide almost as much as the basement.

Dick took care to step up the extra half inch at the doorway. The original log cabin had multiple additions up, down, side to side, and back; each at a slightly different level and style of construction. He wouldn’t refer to the hodgepodge as architecture.

“What’s up, Dick?” Chase asked from his semipermanent position at the end of the long worktable in the employee lounge.

Dick grabbed a cup of coffee from the carafe Dusty kept filled. He noted that she had tea: hot, black, and sweet. “No coffee, Sis?” He took the chair beside Chase.

“Only at home.” She flashed a grin at him while she deliberately closed a fat file folder.

“If you don’t like coffee, you don’t have to drink it on my account,” Chase said. He covered both of her hands with one of his own.

“It bugs Mom.”

“Enough said.” Dick saluted her with his cup and took a long swig. “Shakespeare wouldn’t have drunk coffee, so neither Mom nor Dusty can.”

“Shakespeare wouldn’t have drunk tea, would he?
Seems to me everyone drank ale or small beer,” Chase mused.

“Since when has a detail bothered my mother? Tea is very British.” Dick imitated a posh English accent. “Therefore, it will substitute very nicely in her obsessive-compulsive brain.”

“So what brings you to my lair on a cold October morn when sensible tourists and school groups stay home? There will be bunches of kids after school helping with the maze, or scouting it.” Dusty shifted the file onto the chair beside her. Out of sight, out of mind?

Dick’s curiosity spiked. If she’d left the thing alone, he wouldn’t have noticed it.

“I’ve just come from the courthouse where I found out that Thistle and I can’t get a marriage license anywhere in the country without ID.”

“And Thistle has none. Technically, she doesn’t exist,” Chase finished the thought for him.

“Another of Peter Pan’s lost children,” Dick muttered. He and Chase had played Peter Pan in The Ten Acre Wood when they were six, taking turns with the Captain Hook role. Thistle made an admirable Tinker Bell substitute, keeping her own name because Tink was really a Faery—the enemy of Pixies.

“I gave Mom the spiel about Thistle being raised in a cult,” Dusty said. “Can you use that to get around it?”

“No. They’d still want some kind of documentation that she was born in this country. It’s worse than an illegal immigrant. At least they have birth records in their home country.”

“As a duly sworn officer of the court, I can’t help you,” Chase said. At the same time he pulled his little notebook out of his shirt pocket, tore out a blank page, and began writing something in his slanted but neat all caps printing. He’d always had neat handwriting, even in third grade, because it was easier to keep track of details.

“Now there’s a guy in Portland supplying fake IDs to migrant workers; he’s so good the INS has been trying to shut him down for ten years.” Chase finished writing and
just tapped his pencil on the paper a moment. “If I knew how to find him, I’d have him behind bars.”

“What makes this guy so good?”

“Don’t know. The last border official I talked to suspected he also supplies papers to the Russian Mafia. Me, I just think he’s a talented computer hacker with a huge database of infant deaths. See, he orders copies of the birth certificate when an infant dies. Then when someone needs official papers, he’s got matches from all over the country of age, gender, and ethnicity.”

“What about social security numbers?” Dick asked, suddenly very interested in the piece of paper Chase was folding into neat quarters.

Dusty kept her eyes on the paper, like she didn’t know what her fiancé had written. Dick was willing to bet she did.

“Most cases, anyone under twenty has a number issued at birth. But if the baby dies, sometimes the paperwork doesn’t get completed. Those are the ones our ID guru wants.”

“How do you explain to Social Security an adult who doesn’t have a number?”

“The usual. Parents were missionaries or diplomats, and the kid was raised overseas. Now the parents have died in the latest insurrection or Ebola outbreak. Paperwork is a mess; kid can’t find any records but the birth certificate. Your cult story also works. No modern conveniences, brainwashing, and no records for the evil IRS or ATF officials to audit.”

“Living overseas would explain any accent,” Dick mused. Ideas stumbled around his mind refusing to coalesce.

“Right on.” Chase made a mock pistol of his fingers and pretended to shoot. With his other hand he slid the paper beneath Dick’s fingers. Then he gulped his last swallow of coffee and pushed his chair away from the table. “Gotta get back to work. See you tonight, Dusty?”

“Yes. I’ll meet you about six. We can have dinner and then go visit Mabel.”

“Is Mabel better?” Dick asked. He itched to look at the paper. A warning headshake from Chase made him put it into his inner suit jacket pocket.

“She’s out of intensive care,” Dusty said.

“Give her my best. I’ve got to run, too. You, baby sister, can get back to your potsherds and restoring antique underwear, or whatever it is you do when you don’t have any tours.”

“Paperwork and bookkeeping. Endless piles of paperwork and bookkeeping,” she grunted. “I may clean and classify two Russian pots just to relax before my appointment with the dressmaker at five.”

“Do that.” Dick exited in Chase’s wake. His hand reached for the folded paper before he’d cleared the parlor.

“Wait to read that until I am no longer in sight or hearing. I need deniability, so you might burn it as well.” Chase hastened out the door and around the corner toward the broad cement steps that led down the cliff to downtown.

Dick waited until he was inside his car, the doors closed and locked, the engine idling, and the radio blasting before succumbing to the temptation of the paper.

He expected a name and number in Portland.

He never dreamed he’d read the few words Chase had written.

Phelma Jo helps teenagers hide from abusive parents and foster care.

“W
ELL IT’S ABOUT TIME ONE OF YOU showed up in my garden,” Juliet said on a huff. She planted her hands on her hips and stared unblinking at Chicory.

“Um… you know about us?” He backed off, finding her big blue eyes beneath her reddish-blonde curls a bit too much to take in all at once. He’d heard people in town comparing her to a Queen Elizabeth I, in coloring and temperament. She certainly carried authority in that gaze.

“Of course I know about Pixies. I’ve been friends with Mabel Gardiner and Pamela Shiregrove for too long not to suspect something strange kept their gardens more spectacular than everyone else’s. More spectacular than
mine
. It just took a little investigation to find you.” Juliet held her palm flat beneath Chicory in invitation.

Cautiously he dropped his feet onto her hand, keeping his wings ready to flit off again at the first sign of danger.

“What is your name, young man?” Juliet asked. She didn’t move, didn’t threaten in any way.

Chicory relaxed a little. He reached up to doff his blue blossom hat to her as he bowed and realized he had none. He completed the bow anyway. “Chicory, ma’am. At your service.”

“Chicory, heah. That’s a mighty pretty flower I haven’t been able to grow. It prefers ditches to my garden.”

“That’s because you haven’t dug deep enough for the roots. I can help you get most anything to bloom bigger and better. Me and my tribe that is. If you let us stay.”

“That’s a nice offer, but I already grow award-winning flowers.”

“Not as many awards as Mabel or Pamela Shiregrove. And not for your roses. Only for your gillyflowers.” Oh, Chicory knew all about the rivalry among these women. His years of spying for Mabel had taught him a lot.

Juliet stiffened and started to close her fingers into a fist. Her eyes focused elsewhere and a frown deepened the lines on either side of her mouth. Chicory rose up to the level of her nose.

Instantly, she opened her fingers. “I can see some advantages. What else can you give me in return for access to
my
garden?”

“We actually need a bit more than that.” Chicory put on his most winsome smile, the one that always convinced Mabel to give him an extra drop or two of honey.

“What is that, young man?”

“Shelter. Winter is coming fast and we won’t survive long exposed to the weather.”

“What kind of shelter?”

“Someplace warm and dry that marauding cats can’t get into.”

“There’s a big basement…”

“Excuse me, ma’am, but basements are underground. That will kill us all within a day.”

“How about the attic? There are vents up there so you can come and go as you need without bothering me to open a door or window for you.”

“That would be perfect, ma’am.”

“My name is Juliet. You may use it.”

Chicory bowed again, remembering only at the last minute that he didn’t have a cap to doff.

“However, you are asking a lot from me. I store a lot of valuable antiques up there. I can’t have you and your people wiping your muddy boots on them. And shelter inside a home makes you renters of a kind.”

“Um… you know that Mabel always knew everything about everyone and how to find them in an instant.”

“Ye—es.”

“How do you think she did that?”

Juliet raised her eyebrows while her eyes flitted right and left. “You. You and your people?”

Chicory bowed again, willing to take full credit for the work of an entire tribe, plus the half-wild ones who lived beyond the iron fence.

“Well, then. Come in and bring your… er… friends.”

“Tribe, Juliet. They are my tribe. More than a family. The best friends a Pixie can have, other than special humans.” He gave her a wink, secretly inviting her into his tribe.

“I’ll make tea and we’ll discuss this.”

“With honey?” Chicory asked hopefully.

“Only a drop. I’ve heard that Pixies get drunk on honey.”

“Does Thistle Down get drunk on honey now that she’s human?” Chicory clamped his hand over his mouth, afraid more secrets would spill forth.

“Thistle, hmmm. That would explain a lot.” Juliet tapped her foot. “Thistle was a Pixie and is now human.”

Chicory nodded his head reluctantly, unable to lie but not quite up to speaking more truth.

“I wonder what the Bard would do with that scenario.” She smiled hugely. “Well, come in. Come in all of you. We have things to discuss over tea. But no honey. I need you sober so you can scout out some people for me.”

“Who would that be?” Chicory waved to Daisy who peered between the loose slats, eavesdropping shamelessly.

His tribe emerged in a flock to swoop happily toward the shelter Juliet offered.

“I need to know what my daughter is up to and why she’s running away from her wedding.”

Dusty walked softly down the cardiac care corridor of Mercy Hospital alone. Dick had begged off, something about another car accident. If they went to dinner, it would be after visiting hours at the hospital were over.

She buried her nose in the simple bouquet of carnations and baby’s breath. She didn’t like the scent of fear that overlaid the pervasive odor of disinfectant.

Sharp reminders of the weeks and months she’d spent in
the hospital as a child. Endless nights spent alone with humming equipment and nurses just out of reach, her family gone home.

She remembered pain, fatigue to the point of nausea, and fear that kept her immobile. She remembered loneliness. In a way, that had hurt more than all the other stuff, the knowledge that no matter how much she loved her family, and they loved her, they could not endure her cancer for her. She had to do it alone.