The Sixty-Eight Rooms (9 page)

“I was sorry to hear about Helen’s professor,” Lydia offered. “Please give her my condolences, Dan.”

“Thank you, Lydia. I will. And thank you for helping out,” Ruthie’s dad said. She could tell he was about to open his mouth again and say something more specific about the weekend.

“Jack!” Ruthie nearly shouted at him, even though he was right next to her. The two adults looked at her,
surprised. “Did we do all the math? It’s due tomorrow, remember?” Ruthie was putting on a performance of a girl in a panic. “Dad, we have to go now! And I still have an hour’s worth of reading tonight.
I am so stressed!
”

“Yeah, that’s right!” Jack said, playing along. “Ms. Biddle really piled it on tonight.”

“I’ll say! C’mon, Dad,” she said, pulling him onto the waiting elevator. Jack hopped in and closed the door fast.

As they rode down, Ruthie looked at Jack, wondering what he was thinking. They both knew Jack’s mom had more important worries on her mind tonight and wouldn’t give another thought to what Ruthie’s dad had just said. But it had been a close call.

Ruthie felt overwhelmed. Her panic act had not been difficult to call up—although it had nothing at all to do with homework. Between the frustration of the key not working and the possibility of Jack having to move, she didn’t know how or what to feel. Walking home with her dad made her feel a little better. She reached for his hand to hold. He gave her hand a squeeze.

“Something wrong?” he asked.

She couldn’t tell him everything, of course. She couldn’t tell him about how she might never get to do the one thing she wanted to do most. She ached to talk to him about the magic key and the disappointment she was feeling right now. She was even beginning to wonder if she had imagined the whole thing. If it hadn’t been for Jack being her witness, she’d think she was going crazy. But
she could tell her dad about Mr. Murphy and what she’d heard and how worried she was about Jack and Lydia.

“That explains why Lydia seemed so preoccupied just now. I could tell something was bothering her,” he said when she’d finished.

“It just doesn’t seem fair that Jack might have to move. Where would they go?” Then she added, “Can we do anything for them, Dad?”

“That would be a shame if they had to give up their loft. It’s tricky to give help to people who aren’t asking for it, and Lydia hasn’t asked us.” Her dad was quiet for a few paces. “But maybe there is something we can do for them. I’ll give it some thought.” That was something her father said often—“I’ll give it some thought”—and it always made her feel better.

S
ATURDAY FINALLY ARRIVED AND RUTHIE
got up early with Claire. She sat with her sister while she ate breakfast, and wished her good luck on the SAT. Their parents called to make sure the girls were okay, that Claire was up and ready, and to cheer her on. Claire was cranky and a little nervous, even though she was a really good student. As Ruthie cleared their breakfast dishes she reminded Claire that Jack was coming over to get her this afternoon and that she would be spending the night at his house.

“So I’ll probably be gone by the time you get home. Call my cell phone if you need me, okay? Jack’s mom is using the phone a lot these days, so you might not be able to reach me if you call his house.” She hoped she sounded calm but responsible even though she was feeling the opposite of both.

“Sure—although I can’t imagine what I’d need to call
you for. I’m going to watch movies and veg out tonight and not think about tests anymore!” She said this while she zipped up her coat and headed to the door. “So I’ll see you tomorrow sometime, okay?”

“Okay. Good luck!” Ruthie said.

“Thanks,” Claire answered, and closed the door behind her.

Now, what to do with the rest of the morning? She had thought the week went by slowly but today was pure torture. She went through her list of what to take with her, checking and rechecking, packing everything into the pockets of her oversized sweatshirt jacket and her coat and making sure she didn’t overlook anything she might need. Her house keys, cell phone, bus pass and five dollars were in an outside zippered pocket. She and Jack had only briefly discussed what they would bring for snacks: trail mix, Goldfish crackers, chips. She debated whether or not to bring in a drink box or two. Ruthie worried about what would happen if they got caught carrying liquids into the museum, but all these snacks might make them thirsty. She decided on one juice box to share. She looked at herself in the mirror a few times with her coat pockets stuffed to see if it looked obvious.
No
, she thought,
no one will notice
.

She spent some time on the computer, put the breakfast dishes in the dishwasher and made her bed. It was still only midmorning. She sat down on the couch with the Thorne Rooms catalogue and spent an hour or so trying
to decide how she was going to use her time in the quiet overnight hours. The worst part of the waiting was the fact that she was still worried that the key might no longer work. If the magic failed, her disappointment would be made worse by the fact that she and Jack would have to spend the whole night stuck in that dismal corridor with the otherworldly lights from the rooms glowing down on them. She tried hard to put those thoughts out of her mind and focus on how awesome the adventure was going to be.

As she sat there, her stomach in knots, the doorbell rang. Ruthie almost jumped out of her skin. She popped off the couch, ran to the door and pushed the button on the intercom. The voice of an elderly woman came through the speaker. It belonged to Mrs. Minerva McVittie, an antiques dealer her father was friends with. Ruthie buzzed her in and waited for her at the door.

“Hello, dear. Are you home alone?” Mrs. McVittie seemed to be about a hundred years old and had shrunk so much with age that she was the same height as Ruthie. She took her hat off as she crossed into the apartment, showing fine wisps of silver hair. She owned an antiques shop, but old and rare books were her specialty. She had been finding interesting books for Ruthie’s father for as long as Ruthie could remember. Sometimes she would show up at their apartment with a special one and she and Ruthie’s dad would pore over it like little kids at Christmas.

“Yes, but just for a little while. Mom and Dad are in St.
Louis for the weekend and Claire is taking the SAT today,” she answered.

“Those tests! When I was a girl, people used to actually talk to each other to find out what they knew!” Mrs. McVittie often spoke about what it had been like when she was a girl. Ruthie thought maybe all old people did. “Did you have lunch?” Mrs. McVittie continued. “I’ll make you some soup.” Without waiting for an answer, she laid her coat on a chair and went to the kitchen. She acted like she was Ruthie’s grandmother sometimes.

“Did my parents tell you to check on me?” Ruthie asked, worried that it might ruin her plans.

“No, no. I thought your father was here—I brought a book for him.” She pointed to her coat. “In the pocket.” She was busy opening a can of soup and finding the right pot. Ruthie lifted the coat to find a small leather-bound book in the pocket. “Over one hundred years old,” Mrs. McVittie called from the kitchen. “A real find. It’s in French—I’ll help your father read it.” Mrs. McVittie spoke French and about five other languages.

“Where did you get it?”

“From an estate sale. I bought a few books and other antiques—some silver, a few old oil paintings. You should come to the shop and see them. I’d love a visit from you.”

Ruthie hadn’t been in the shop for months but she always liked going there with her father. Mrs. McVittie let Ruthie touch the treasures in her shop; she knew Ruthie wouldn’t break anything.

“Here, now eat your soup.” Mrs. McVittie set a steaming bowl in front of Ruthie.

“Aren’t you going to have any?”

“No, I just had brunch. What will you do today, young lady?”

Ruthie was nervous about discussing her plans. The less said the better. “In a little while I’m going over to my friend’s house—maybe we’ll go to the museum—and then I’ll spend the night there.”

Mrs. McVittie spied the Thorne Rooms catalogue on the couch. “This is new.” She seemed to have a mental inventory of every book Ruthie’s family owned.

“Oh, I borrowed that from a friend,” Ruthie said between spoonfuls of soup. “I saw the Thorne Rooms last week on a school field trip. I love them!”

“Mmm.” Mrs. McVittie was thumbing through the book. “They are quite convincing, aren’t they? I remember the first time I saw them—it was 1932. They were exhibited at the Chicago Historical Society before they went to the Art Institute. I was only eight years old then.” She looked at several pages quite intensely, taking her time. “They are magic.” Mrs. McVittie looked at her as she spoke. Ruthie tried to hide the jolt she felt in her soup-filled stomach.

“What do you mean?” She was almost afraid to ask. Could it be that Mrs. McVittie knew something about the rooms and the key?

“I mean that everyone who looks at them believes, at
least for a moment, in the fantasy they represent. Don’t you think so?”

“Oh.” Ruthie’s heart sank. “Yes, I guess so.” Mrs. McVittie’s statement made Ruthie think she had been imagining everything that had happened with the key. She focused on her soup.

Mrs. McVittie seemed to sense Ruthie’s disappointment and after a moment added, “Maybe
fantasy
is the wrong word. It’s the same feeling I get when I come across a rare old book. I believe I’m having a conversation with the person who made the book and the people who owned the book. It’s magic and it’s real—at least to me. Of course, you have to be open to these feelings for the magic to work, and not everyone is.” She put the book down and walked over to her hat and coat. “I’d better be getting along now.” With some difficulty, she slid her old arms into her coat and put on her hat. “I’ll leave this book for your father. Tell him I’ll talk to him next week.”

“Okay, Mrs. McVittie. And thanks for the soup.”

“Don’t be a stranger—come visit my shop! And make sure you lock this door behind me.”

“I will.” Ruthie was left alone again, thinking about what Mrs. McVittie had said about magic and feelings and believing. A week ago those words wouldn’t have been very important to her, but now she couldn’t stop wondering what they really meant. Could it be that she hadn’t been able to shrink at Jack’s house because, for some reason, at that moment she hadn’t believed?

As planned, Jack picked Ruthie up at her apartment a little before two o’clock. Ruthie wanted to be out the door before Claire returned home, so they hurried. Because they arrived at the museum ahead of schedule they decided to go to the gift shop to kill time. Around four-fifteen they went downstairs; that gave them enough time to first use the restroom—they realized it would be a long night with perhaps no chance for that—and then to sneak into the corridor and wait until the museum closed at five.

The exhibition was pretty crowded. Ruthie and Jack tried to look casual as they rounded the corner to the alcove. Not one but two guards stood in their way, talking. They walked right past the guards and around another corner.

“That’s not good, two guards,” Jack said. “We’ll wait five minutes and walk by again.”

They checked their watches. They didn’t talk. Exactly five minutes passed and they walked by again. Same problem.

“What if they start making people leave the museum and the guards are still there, Jack?” Ruthie was beginning to feel panicked. If she had to wait more than one hour to try the key again—let alone endure a wait of who knew how long till the next time they had a perfect weekend—she wouldn’t be able to stand it. “It’s almost four-thirty!”

“We’ll figure something out. I’m not passing up this chance! We’d better keep walking around, though.” They
heard the first announcement that the museum was about to close. Ruthie looked anxiously at Jack.

They passed by the same spot about four times; each time, the two guards were still deep in conversation. They overheard them talking about sports, and Ruthie knew those discussions could go on for hours. The crowds were thinning. It was less than ten minutes until the museum closed.