Figgs & Phantoms (12 page)

Sissie and Newt were singing a duet from the pamphlet. Stretched out and sunk in the broken springs of the couch, Mona was trying to read “Heart of Darkness” from one of her auction purchases. Mona loved to handle books, to examine and catalogue them, but reading them was difficult, particularly with the silly noises her parents were making:

Fido stood in the doorway unnoticed. He blew his nose softly.

Mona read and reread each phrase with care, weighed every word for a clue.

“ ‘He was creeping,' ” Sissie sang.

“ ‘He was crawling,' ” Newt sang.

“ ‘He was creeping, creeping,' ” sang Sissie.

“ ‘Crawling!' ” sang Newt, lunging toward Mona with clawlike hands.

Mona screamed.

“Gee, princess, I didn't mean to scare you,” Newt said sheepishly, but Mona was more frightened by a sentence she had just read:

Mona slammed the book shut. She refused to believe it had anything to do with Capri.

Fido joined in the apologizing. “Mona, I'm really sorry about this afternoon at Bargain's.”

The Newtons spun around, surprised to see a visitor.

“Fido, you're a ... ,” Mona paused. “Fido, you owe me a lot of favors.”

Fido nodded in agreement.

“‘Sing me your song, O!' ” Newt sang in a booming bass-baritone. Sissie had found another duet and was thumping out the melody on the piano, waiting for her own solo.

Heads together, Mona and Fido entered into a new conspiracy. Mona talked; Fido nodded. He promised to read the Conrad books and report on each one to her. Mona explained, with some pride, that the books were rare and expensive first editions. Fido promised to handle them with care and not take them out of the house.

Fido looked up to watch Sissie singing lustily and dancing an energetic soft-shoe.

“Go wash your hands and wipe your nose, Fido,” Mona commanded.

Fido obeyed his new mistress. When he returned, she presented him with
Lord Jim.

Fido read, and Mona thought. She had to find a way of getting
Las Hazañas Fantásticas
off that top shelf. Suddenly Newt sang his chorus with such ear-shattering enthusiasm that they both jumped.

“That's supposed to be a sad song,” Mona suggested. “Sad and quiet.”

“I like it that way, Uncle Newt,” Fido said. Mona glared at her slave, who cast his eyes down on
Lord Jim.

“I like it that way, too,” Sissie said. “I think you're doing just fine, Newt.”

“You mean it?” Newt asked. “But maybe we should find a different song for Mona.”

All was quiet while Sissie riffled through the score. Then the singing began again.

“Oh no,” Mona moaned.

“Well, you asked for a sad song,” Sissie said.

“It's sad, all right,” Fido said, tears streaming down his cheeks. He decided he would have to do his reading somewhere else.

Days passed. Days devoted to poring over secret books and skulking around Bargain Books. Mona was desperate. She expected to fail English if she wasn't first arrested for tampering with the mails or embarrassed to death during the Founders' Day parade when her parents would sing and dance down Hemlock Street before the smirking people of Pineapple.

It was more than Mona could bear. She missed Uncle Florence more deeply every day. She had to find Capri, and soon.

If only Fido could read faster, she thought. He had finished one book,
Lord Jim,
and his report consisted of one word: Jump.

Mona stared at one of the secret books opened to a colorplate of a ruby-throated hummingbird. If only she could get the copy of Pirata Supuesto's
Las Hazanas
from old man Bargain's top shelf.

That was it! A copy! She didn't need a first edition; a second printing, a later edition, a facsimile, any copy would do.

F
IDO WAS sprawled out at a table reading a later edition of
Typhoon
when Mona burst into the library and descended on the card-catalogue cabinet. She yanked out the drawers, one by one, and anxiously thumbed through the listings.

STA—SUZ .... No “Supuesto.”

LAB—LED .... No “Las Hazanas.”

HAB—HEX .... No “Hazanas.”

FAL—FRO .... No “Fantasticas.”

One more try and then she would have to ask the librarian's help and involve still another person in her dream search.

MAB—MAR. Maps. Maps, Spanish.

There was no reference to her book, but she found one promising title.

Mona jotted down the code number and with a trembling hand presented it to Miss Quigley. “Why hello, Mona. I haven't seen you in ages. You don't look well, dear,” the librarian said.

“I've been sick,” Mona replied, pale with impatience.

“I'm sorry to hear that.” Miss Quigley read the request. “No one has asked for this book in a long time. I'll have someone look for it in the stacks. You'd better sit down; it may take a while.”

Mona didn't want to sit down. Knuckles white from clutching the edge of the desk, she stood, waiting, waiting, for the map book to appear. Miss Quigley finished stamping some books and returned to chat.

“I didn't know you were interested in maps.”

Mona turned her back on the librarian with a pretense of coughing, trying to think of a convincing fib. She saw Fido, his nose running, his lips moving as he read, and spun around.

“Miss Quigley, would you, by any chance, have a book by Joseph Conrad called
Children of the Sea
?”

“Children of the Sea?
No, I don't think so.” The assistant librarian emerged from the stacks and handed the book of Spanish maps to Miss Quigley, who was still musing on Conrad titles. “I think you must mean
Mirror of the Sea.”

“No, that's a different book,” Mona replied curtly, her eyes riveted on the map book in the librarian's hand. “I want
Children of the Sea
, or
Nigger....”

Mona spit out the hateful word and with a horror of sudden awareness, recognized that Miss Quigley—Miss Quigley, who had read stories aloud to her before she could read, Miss Quigley, who had recommended books to her, had searched for books for her, had discussed books with her—that Miss Quigley was black.

Rebecca Quigley's face froze in pained shock. Mona grabbed the book of Spanish maps from her hand and fled from the library sobbing.

The Chamber of Commerce was tapping to “There's No Business Like Show Business.”

“Hi, Mona, look at me,” shuffling Flabby Benckendorf shouted.

Mona stumbled up the stairs, still sobbing, and flung herself onto her bed. She sobbed out of loneliness and fear and confusion; and for once she sobbed for someone other than herself. Unthinkingly she had hurt Miss Quigley. She could never face the librarian again. “I wish I were dead,” she moaned aloud. “I wish I were with you, Uncle Florence. I wish I were in Capri.”

Capri.

Mona sat up and fumbled for the book of facsimile maps. Drying her eyes with her sleeve, she searched the table of contents.

The Chamber of Commerce had given way to the Horticultural Society, tiptoeing through the tulips. The Horticultural Society had given way to thirty kindergarten children tap-dancing and screeching “On the Good Ship Lollipop.”

Mona lay across her bed, her chin cupped in her hand, her eyes smarting, a finger tracing and retracing every outline on the garishly colored facsimile map. She pored over each line, each speck, wishing, hoping. At last her finger came to rest on a tiny, irregularly shaped island. On it was a tree. A palm, a pink palm.