Greenglass House (36 page)

“A necessary unpleasantness,” Mr. Vinge said carelessly, leaning back in his chair. “I'll finish when they come back.”

“I think we've heard enough,” Dr. Gowervine grumbled, striding toward the porch. “I know I have. Doc Holystone was no gunrunner, no weapons-monger. I know not everyone agrees about whether he's the hero I think he was, but—”

“Sit down, Dr. Gowervine.” Mr. Vinge's face was neutral, but his words—that hadn't been a request. It had been an order. “Sit down,” he repeated when the old man looked at him in surprise. Mr. Vinge stood, reached into his pocket, and took out a folded rectangle of leather. He flipped it open to reveal a bronze-colored badge and tossed it on the dining table between two serving dishes. “Sit. Please. In fact, everyone please take a seat.”

“What is that?” Mrs. Hereward demanded, squinting at the badge.

“Deputy customs ID,” Georgie said coldly. She looked up at Mr. Vinge. “Is that thing real?”

“I found a customs agency paper hidden under the carpet earlier today,” Milo said quietly, glaring at him. “Right after Dad let us out of the room you locked us in, Mr. Vinge.”

“Yes, yes, you're better at hide-and-seek than I am,” the customs agent retorted. “I'm sure we're all very proud of you.”

The side door opened and Mr. Pine stalked across to the dining table. “What's this about?” he demanded. “Do you have a concern you'd like to discuss privately?”

“Not privately,” Mr. Vinge replied. “Sit down, Mr. Pine.”

“I'm fine,” Milo's father snapped. “Let's go have a word, you and I.”

Mr. Vinge put a finger on the badge in its leather folder and spun it to face Mr. Pine. “I said, have a seat, sir. I need a few words with everyone. That includes you and your wife and Fenster out there.”

The door opened again, and Mrs. Pine stood uncertainly in the doorway. Milo thought he knew what was going on. His father had come in to get Mr. Vinge out of the way before they let Fenster back in. They weren't going to let the two of them be together in the same room anymore if they could help it.

Unfortunately, it seemed Mr. Vinge had other ideas. He ignored the looks passing between Mr. and Mrs. Pine, strode into the living room, and called to Fenster, who was pacing furiously on the porch. “Fenster! Set something straight for me.”

Fenster pushed past Milo's mother into the room. “You bet I will, you flipping liar.”

“When you said Mrs. Pine got your ghost story wrong, what did you mean?”

The smuggler stopped in his tracks and frowned. “What's that matter to you?”

Mr. Vinge shrugged. “You say I'm a liar. I say, if I'm mistaken, help me correct my errors. What did Mrs. Pine get wrong about your ghost story? Was it, perhaps, the part where she said you recognized Doc Holystone because you'd seen Wanted posters with his image on them? Isn't it true that you recognized him because you sailed with him? Because you were part of his crew? Isn't that the part she got wrong?”

The smuggler's hands balled up into fists.

“Fenster,” Mrs. Pine whispered, putting a hand on his arm.

He shook her off. He stared at Mr. Vinge for a moment, red-faced. Then the tension went out of him and he actually grinned. “No, sir,” he said, tucking his hands into his pockets. “No, sir, that's not the part she got wrong. She said I saw Doc Holystone's son, when everybody knows Doc Holystone had a daughter. Addie, she was called.” He elbowed Mrs. Pine gently. “Which it was a fairly silly mistake to make.” Still smiling, he looked at Mr. Vinge with a defiant glitter in his eyes. “And that's all Nora got wrong, bless her.”

Mr. Vinge forced a smile in return. “Well. Thank you for clearing that up. Now perhaps you'll clear up something else for me. You, or perhaps our intrepid hosts. Certainly one of you must know the answer. I'm finished with these games.”

There was a long moment when nobody moved, and then Mrs. Pine stepped forward and crossed her arms. “Please explain yourself, Mr. Vinge. Explain why you're ordering my guests and my family around, and while you're at it, please also explain why you stole from my guests and why you locked my son in a room. Actually,” she snapped, “don't bother. Please just pack up your things and go. You'll have to figure out how to contend with the weather on your own.”

Mr. Vinge chuckled. “No, no, Mrs. Pine. At the moment I represent the law in this house, so I believe the orders are mine to give. Here's all the explanation I feel you require: Doc Holystone's final cargo is here in the house somewhere, and I think either you or your husband or Fenster knows what it is and where. Obviously, Holystone's legacy is alive and well here, or your son wouldn't be running about with one of those watermarked maps. Especially not one that just happens to have an albatross on it. Not exactly the kind of thing that turns up just anywhere, is it?”

Georgie gasped. “No, no,” she protested. “
I
brought that map!
I
gave it to Milo!”

“The cargo is here!”
Mr. Vinge roared. “And I don't intend to leave without it. I've waited nearly forty years to be able to close the book on Doc Holystone. I'll leave when I have that cargo. Not before.”

“Milo,” Meddy whispered, “get ready to run.”

“What?”

“You heard me,” she hissed back. “When I say so, run for the stairs. Not outside; you can't hide outside or you'll freeze. Run for the stairs. Run fast. Run for the Emporium.”

Milo opened his mouth to demand to know what the heck she was talking about, but Mrs. Pine spoke first in a voice that shook with fury. “Mr. Vinge, you are
not
the law, and you will have to leave.”

“I'll throw you out myself,” Brandon growled, stalking forward.

Then two things happened. Mr. Vinge pulled a gun from his vest and leveled it at Brandon, and two strange men burst through the front door into the house.

“Run!” Meddy yelled. Milo launched himself off the bench and sprinted for the stairs.
Zephyr's Passage,
he thought wildly to himself.
Your feet carry you as swiftly and invisibly as the wind.

“Stop,” Mr. Vinge snarled. “Get that kid back here!”

The two strangers leaped after Milo and Meddy, but before they had even crossed the room, Clem was on the move. In a series of motions that looked like something out of a kung fu movie, she took three steps that carried her from the bench to the corner of the bar that divided the dining room from the kitchen, and then she pivoted and took a flying leap straight into the nearer of the two strangers in pursuit of Milo. Down he went, with Clem on top of him.

Owen had none of Clem's acrobatics, but he was only a few steps behind her. The second stranger was just about to grab Clem when Owen tackled him. Milo and Meddy reached the stairs, and then they were on the first landing.

There was an explosive boom from below. Milo stumbled. “Was that—”

Meddy grabbed him by the collar and threw him forward. “Keep going!”

He obeyed and sprinted up until the green glass knob of the door to the Emporium was turning in his palm. He fell over the threshold and sprawled across the dusty floor. Meddy slammed the door shut behind them. The first overhead bulb sputtered to life.

That was when Milo realized he'd just run away and left his parents in the living room with a man holding a gun. “That was a
gunshot,
what we heard, wasn't it?” He yanked off the rucksack and burst into tears.

Meddy crouched on the floor next to him and patted his shoulder. “Pull it together, Milo,” she said in a comforting tone that didn't match her words. “Your mom and dad would want you to get out of the way of that gun.”

“I . . . I
left
them there,” Milo sputtered. “I just
left
them! What if he . . . what if he . . .”

“Vinge doesn't want to hurt your mom and dad.” Meddy sighed. “I should've recognized him,” she added bitterly. “I should've known.”

Milo wiped his eyes. “Known what?”

“That he was from Deacon and Morvengarde. He just looks like an agent.”

Milo wasn't sure what she meant by that, but the evasive tone of her voice made him stop and think. “You said you should have
recognized
him,” he said slowly, getting to his feet. “Why would you have recognized him?”

“I meant recognized him as an—”

“Plus, you were acting really weird when he was talking,” Milo continued, looking closely at her. “Something's up. Something you're not telling me. Why would you have recognized him?”

Meddy folded her arms and considered him for a long moment. “What I'm going to tell you is going to sound crazy, but I need you to believe me, okay?” He shrugged and waited. At last, Meddy sighed. “He was talking about himself. He's the agent in the story,” she said. “It happened here at the house. He's way older now; that's why I didn't recognize him, but that's the guy.” She pointed a finger viciously at the attic door, as if Mr. Vinge were standing on the other side. “He's the guy who captured Doc Holystone, and he's the guy responsible for his death, too.”

I've waited nearly forty years to be able to close the book on Doc Holystone,
Mr. Vinge had said. It certainly sounded like Meddy might be right. Still . . . “How could you know for sure?” Milo demanded, eyes wide. “How could you
possibly
know?”

She swallowed, and all the poise and anger drained from her. She swallowed again, and Milo realized she was about to cry.

“Because I saw it,” she whispered. “I saw
him,
with Doc Holystone. I was there.”

“That's not possible,” Milo said, confused. “That was forty years ago, Meddy.”

She smiled weakly. “Wrong on both counts, Milo. First of all, it was thirty-four years ago. Secondly, my name's not Meddy. Not even when I'm not Sirin.”

Milo opened his mouth, then closed it again. “Meddy. Short for Madeleine or something.”

“
Mrs. Caraway's
daughter is called Meddy,” she replied deliberately. “If you told her you've been playing with her daughter for the last few days, she'd think you were off your rocker. Meddy Caraway isn't here. She never was. But I introduced myself to you at about the same time as the Caraways arrived, and you assumed I was Meddy, and I just never corrected you.” She scratched her head. “I kept thinking you were going to say something to someone that would make me have to explain things to you, but you never really did.”

And it all came together. As Milo stared in shock, a series of recollections flashed through his memory.

It's like the attic and the basement—half the stuff in here is from before your mom's and my time.

ROLE-PLAYING GAME STUFF—AW.

She said I saw Doc Holystone's son, when everybody knows Doc Holystone had a daughter. Addie, she was called.

ADDIE WE HARDLY KNEW YE.

“You're . . . Addie Whitcher,” Milo said slowly.

She smiled hesitantly. “I never really liked Addie, actually. I'm sort of partial to Meddy, now that I've gotten used to it.”

“And Doc Holystone . . . was your father?”

She nodded, looking steadily at him.

Milo nodded back numbly. “And you saw Mr. Vinge capture him thirty-some years ago?”

“Thirty-four years ago, almost exactly.” She smiled crookedly, then put her hands in her pockets and looked down at her feet. For the first time, Meddy—Addie?—seemed very, very young.

His head was spinning. The math didn't work. “But you're not old enough. You're my age.”

“I
was
your age,” she said deliberately. “Thirty-four years ago.”

RIP AW.

In his mother's story, Doc Holystone's child had been a ghost. And Fenster had said apart from that child being a girl, the rest was true.

“You're a ghost?” Milo murmured, not daring to believe his own words.

“Thirty-four years ago,” she repeated softly, rubbing the toe of one shoe against the heel of the other. “I'll never forget that day, you see, because it was the same day I died.”

 

thirteen

They stared at each other. Milo couldn't decide whether to laugh or consider believing it. The latter was guaranteed to lead to him freaking out. Meddy looked as though she knew he probably wouldn't believe her story but was holding on to a tiny shred of hope that maybe, just maybe, he might surprise her.

“Can you prove it?” Milo asked.

She sighed. “If you need me to.” And without further warning, she flickered like a lightbulb about to die. She was there, and then she was not, and then there she was again, and then she was gone.

Milo stood alone in the attic. He turned in a circle with his blood rushing, heart thudding in his chest. “M-meddy? I mean, Addie?”