Fortune's Magic Farm (16 page)

Walnut showed Isabelle to a room, tucked away at the end of a crooked hall. It was about the same size as the room on the fourth floor of Mama Lu’s Boarding House, except that streaming sunlight illuminated its far wall, making it seem much bigger. “This will be your room.”

“My room?” Those words sounded so strange. “Just mine?”

“Certainly,” Walnut replied, tapping his dirt-stained fingers together. “It belongs to you.”

Isabelle thought that maybe she had ferns growing in her ears. “An entire room belongs to me?”

“Of course. And everything in it belongs to you, too.” Everything included a small bed covered in a bright quilt made from cotton gardening gloves, a stand of dusty shelves that waited to be filled, a cluster of candles, and a box of matches on a bedside table. Except for the rain slicker and boots she had purchased with her factory wages, nothing had ever belonged to Isabelle. Her clothes were hand-me-downs, on loan until she outgrew them.

The marmot crawled under a pillow. “I guess you’ve got a roommate,” Walnut said.

Suddenly, Isabelle panicked. Could this be too good to be true? “How much is the rent?” Her great-uncle probably didn’t realize that she didn’t have any money. The few pennies
she had saved and had hidden beneath her mattress now belonged to Mama Lu.

“Forgive me, my dear.” Walnut poked his finger in his ear. A few bits of dirt tumbled out. “Did you ask about the
rent
?”

“Yes. How much is it?”

He frowned. “You don’t pay rent. You’re family. However, you will be expected to do your fair share of chores. And there are lots of chores to do around here. Too many, in fact, ever since your grandfather fired all the farmhands. The whole place is falling apart.”

“Well, I’m a real good worker,” Isabelle said proudly. “I can work for eight hours without taking a break.”

“Why would anyone work eight hours without taking a break? Breaks are mandatory around here, as are naps, daydreams, and occasional episodes of goofing off.” He opened the closet. A few pairs of pants and some shirts hung on wooden pegs. “There are some old clothes of Sage’s in here, worn before his last growth spurt. They belong to you now. I’m afraid we don’t have any girl clothes. My brother got rid of all your mother’s belongings after… Well, not to worry about that right now.” Walnut looked away.

Isabelle didn’t need to be a rocket scientist—or any kind of scientist—to deduce the following: that the subject of her mother was a delicate one, perhaps an unpleasant subject. Had something horrible happened to her? And to her father? Though Walnut tried to avoid the answers, Isabelle
was determined to know. She needed to know. She’d ask again, when the moment seemed right.

“There’s a bathroom in here, just for you.” Walnut opened a blue door.

Isabelle nearly tripped over her own feet as she rushed into the brightly painted bathroom. “Just for me?” No waiting in line behind the Limewigs and Wormbottoms in the cold hallway, wondering if they’d left any paper. No stumbling down two flights of stairs in the dark.

Walnut pointed to a sink shaped like a flower. “There’s a towel over there, and some soap.”

Would the wonders never cease? Not a ball of smooshed-together bits and pieces from Mama Lu’s old soaps, but an entire bar of brand new soap, just for her.

“Why don’t you change out of that kelp suit and clean up. Then you can explore the farm.” Walnut gave Isabelle a big hug. “You have no idea, my dear. No idea how much you are needed. I thought that all was lost but here you are. You’ve made an old man very happy.” His eyes misted. “I’m so glad that Sage found you.” He hugged her again, then closed the bedroom door on his way out.

“I’m glad he found me, too,” Isabelle whispered. Then she spun around, twirling like a seed in the wind. Her very own bedroom, her very own bathroom—rent-free!

Isabelle’s little bathroom contained a shower that worked by pumping a handle. She peeled off the kelp suit and sighed as warm water cascaded over her new skin. The
shower’s basin turned gray as the final remnants of Runny Cove washed away.
My old self,
she thought, as gray swirled down the drain.

She dried herself with the fluffy towel. Not a dishrag like the ones at Mama Lu’s, but a towel that reached from her nose to her toes. She dressed in a pair of tan cotton pants that fit well, a white cotton shirt, and a pair of soft boots. She found a comb and ran it through her new, thick hair. Gwen wouldn’t even recognize her.

Poor Gwen. She’d be working in the Handle Room, attaching handles to the new colorful umbrellas. And Leonard would be working in the Testing Room, dumping buckets of water onto each umbrella to make certain it worked. Didn’t they each deserve a warm shower, a fluffy towel, and a brand-new bar of soap?

I don’t want to feel sad,
Isabelle thought.
I can’t help them right now but I will help them. Right now I just want to feel happy.
So she pushed the sad thoughts from her mind and looked out her bedroom window.

A grassy yard dotted with daisies stretched between her room and the red barn. Someone had parked the caravan next to the barn. Chickens made their way across the yard, clucking and pecking, and a pair of milk goats rested in the sun.

Fortune’s Farm is the happiest place on earth,
Isabelle thought. Her head filled with music and, right then and there, she made up a song. The chickens picked up the song’s rhythm as they scratched the dirt.

The Fortune’s Farm Song

I never thought that life could feel

warm and dry and bright.

I never knew that things could smell

sweet and clean and light.

But now I know and it’s clear to me

that Fortune’s Farm is the place to be.

Sunshine shining down,

songbirds flying round,

seedlings in the ground,

magic to be found,

here on Fortune’s Farm.

I always hoped one day I’d find

a place to call my own.

I always prayed for a sign

to tell me where to go.

But now I’m here and it’s clear to me

that Fortune’s Farm is the place to be.

“Come on, Rocky,” Isabelle said, opening the door. “Let’s go explore.”

The marmot crawled out from under the pillow and followed Isabelle down the crooked hall. They passed a door with a large “W” painted on it. Then they came to a door with a large “N” painted on it. Isabelle didn’t mean
to eavesdrop, but the voices behind the second door thundered.

“I don’t believe you,” said a man.

“You must believe me.” That voice sounded like Walnut’s. “We have a future now. We have hope.”

“Why do you persist with this futile fantasy? We have no future. There’s nothing more to be said.” Sadness hung in the unknown voice. “The end has come. Now leave me in peace.”

“But Nesbitt…”

“Enough!” he hollered. “I just want to be left alone. Go away.”

Isabelle thought she might be reprimanded for listening and the last thing she wanted, on her first day in her new home, was to get into trouble. She hurried down the hall but as she did the unknown voice said, “The end has come.”

“But Nesbitt…”

“THE END HAS COME!”

T
o whom did that angry voice belong?
Great-Uncle Walnut had called him Nesbitt. Surely he couldn’t be Isabelle’s grandfather, for she had imagined him to be kind, gentle, and good-natured. And finding a lost granddaughter would make for happiness and rejoicing, not yelling about things coming to an end. What had he meant by that, anyway?

While wondering about these latest mysteries, Isabelle stood in the Fortunes’ kitchen, which was everything a kitchen should be—warm, colorful, and filled with tempting scents. A wood-fed stove sat in the corner. Pots and pans hung from the beamed ceiling. Sun streamed in through open windows. Nothing in the room reminded her of Mama Lu’s kitchen, which was damp and sticky, riddled with piles of salt, and filled with constant demands about wanting to hear something
interesting.
Since leaving Runny Cove, Isabelle had encountered enough
interesting
to make Mama Lu’s head explode!

The Fortunes’ kitchen also happened to be a complete mess, which didn’t bother Isabelle one bit. Plates sat stacked in the sink and a family of mice ran along a little trail they had made across the dirt-covered floor. Red-breasted and black-crested birds flew in through the windows, helping themselves to overturned bags of corn meal and hazelnuts. Bees flew in and out of a doorless icebox that sat unplugged
and empty, except for a mud-packed hive that dripped with golden syrup.

While the marmot dug a hole in a potted plant, Isabelle peered into some drawers. The first was filled with fat green worms. The second contained polka-dotted melons. One squirted at her; the stinky fluid just missed her shirt. She went to open another drawer but its contents growled fiercely. Best not to look in there.

A door slammed. Walnut emerged from the hallway, his face scarlet, swinging his arms and breathing hard as if he had just climbed to the fourth floor.

“Hello,” Isabelle said, ducking as a songbird flew by. “I’m all clean and ready to explore.”

But Walnut didn’t bother to look up. “Stubborn old fool,” he mumbled, stomping right past Isabelle and out the front door.

“Great-Uncle Walnut?” she called. “Come on, Rocky. Let’s see where he’s going.” Isabelle pulled the marmot from her new hole.

Outside the thatched roof cottage, Isabelle looked for her great-uncle. She called his name but only a goat answered, bleating as it ambled toward the field. Rocky wiggled free and started digging another hole.

Where had Walnut gone? She looked around one side of the cottage. The barn sat quiet, its double doors closed. “Great-Uncle Walnut?” She ran to the other side, a wilder side with a forest and looming mountains, hoping for a trace of checkered coat and white hair. Still no sign of him.
She sighed. She’d have to explore on her own, but she had plenty of experience doing just that. Maybe she’d find some interesting things to put on those dusty shelves.

A tall post stood near the forest’s edge, covered in arrow-shaped signs.
THIS WAY TO THE LAKE SHAPED LIKE A HALF ROUND OF CHEESE. THIS WAY TO THE SWAMP THAT MAKES RUDE NOISES. THIS WAY TO THE CAVE THAT SWALLOWS THINGS THEN SPITS THEM BACK OUT.
She pushed aside some tall blades of grass to read the last sign.
THIS WAY TO THE TENDER AND FARMHAND CEMETERY.
The arrow pointed down an overgrown path, its stepping stones barely visible. She had only visited Runny Cove’s cemetery one time, a sad and eerie place of cracked headstones and prickly thornbushes. Maybe she’d find some answers about the rest of her family in Tenders’ Cemetery. It was worth a try.

“Rocky,” she called, hoping the marmot would join her. A cemetery would surely be less creepy with a furry friend by her side. But Rocky didn’t appear, so Isabelle took a deep breath and set off down the trail.

A solitary dark cloud hung gloomily over the cemetery. Many of the headstones stood as tall as Isabelle. She wandered around, peeling back ivy vines to read the engravings. Dozens of Fortunes had been buried there, some of whom Walnut had mentioned and others, like Caesar Ragweeder Fortune, Pollenminder Veritas Fortune, and Sunflowery Millicent Fortune. Etched beneath each name was the cause of death:
DIED MOST UNEXPECTEDLY FROM A FALL OFF A LADDER. DIED MOST PEACEFULLY WHILE NAPPING AT A
PICNIC. DIED MOST REGRETTABLY IN A DRUNKEN DUEL.
Only one tombstone did not list cause of death and its single name read:
DAFFODILLY.

In a separate part of the cemetery she found a clump of headstones that bore only single names like Bob, Poke, Curly, and Gus, followed by the statement,
A LOYAL FARMHAND TO HIS DYING DAY.
These also mentioned cause of death, though in one-word form only:
EATEN, SQUEEZED, SPONTANEOUSLY COMBUSTED, LOST.
No doubt about it—farmhanding was a dangerous occupation.

Isabelle searched and searched but no headstone read:
MOTHER TO ISABELLE
or
FATHER TO ISABELLE,
or
PARENTS OF THE CHILD WHO WAS LEFT ON A DOORSTEP.
Walnut hadn’t said that her parents had died. He said she
no longer
had a mother and father. That could mean something else besides death, couldn’t it? Maybe. Hopefully.

A whistle rang through the cemetery. Isabelle, who was becoming something of a
Marmoticus Terriblus
expert, knew that marmots chirp when discussing things and whistle when they feel threatened. She ran back up the trail to the thatched-roof cottage. Maybe that goat was getting too close to Rocky’s new hole. Another whistle sounded from somewhere in the field. “Rocky?” She stood on tiptoe and strained her green eyes, searching for a furry brown head. At the center of the field, something orange rose out of the grass, hovered in the air, then sank back down. Rocky whistled again.

Isabelle hurried across a red bridge. Not too far ahead,
another orange object floated above the grass, hovered, then disappeared. Heading that way, she crossed a green bridge and came to a pond. “Rocky,” she cried out, relieved to find the marmot sitting at the water’s edge. “What’s the matter? I was worried.”