“What do you mean?”
“The Berkeley alums are coming tomorrow. And Dr. Tenzo. Didn’t you know of him somehow?”
“No,” I say quickly. “I mean, I’ve heard of him from Justine’s grandpa. They work together.” All of a sudden I worry that she’ll bring up the subject of Dr. Middleford to Tenzo, and then Tenzo might mention the spirals, and then I’d have to explain everything. “But, they hate each other so I wouldn’t bring up Justine’s grandpa at all.”
Mom laughs. “Grown men who hate each other? Now that’s just silly.”
“I’m serious! They have some sort of rivalry, so just don’t mention Middleford. Please.”
Mom’s eyebrows go up and I wonder if I’ve made too much of a big deal out of this.
“Settle down honey, I won’t mention a thing,” she says as she slips the chocolate bar back in the box and hands it to me. “You keep this. Otherwise I’ll eat the whole thing.”
“Gladly,” I say.
“I’m going to take a quick bath. See you at dinner,” she says as she tucks my hair behind my ear.
I put away the clothes Mom bought and then dress Mr. Papers in his new outfit. He looks ridiculous in these normal clothes, like all the stupid preppy boys at the Academy of Cruelties. I liked him better in his old circusy outfit so I give them a good cleaning in the bathroom and set them on the window sill to dry. He deserves to look unique.
That night, I eat dinner as quickly as I can and then head back up to my room; I want to decode two more spirals before bed. After a lot of work getting them decoded, I’m a little frustrated that they seem just as confusing in English as they were in whatever weird language they were originally in:
The butterfly will emerge in three different ways
At the source, at your core, and by way of the days
Called feathered serpent when spoken of in code
Connected to all by the great white road
Remember this always, and above all other
The wise ones grasp the power of our great mother
The numbers, the stars, the cycles and days
Should all be counted, should all be praised
I print them out and write, “Make any sense to you?” on top. Then I sneak over to Uncle Li’s room and slide the paper under his door. I hear a creak as I’m walking back down the hallway and run like a gazelle back to my room; I don’t even feel my feet hitting the ground. Obviously I’m a lot more on edge than I thought if one random creak can get me this freaked out. I wonder if I’ll have permanent nerve damage from all of this.
When I get to my room, I bolt the door and literally fly into bed. I’m so jacked up on adrenaline I don’t even have to use the stairs. Drawing all the bed curtains, I enclose myself in my little velvet-tufted genie’s bottle and try to calm down.
Mom taught me to say the Fibonacci series when I can’t sleep. You start with one plus one and then you keep adding the previous number to the result. It works—believe me, nothing puts you to sleep faster than doing math in your head.
0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, 89, 144, 233, 377, 610, 987 … I’m out.
Waking up late and hungry, I pull on some clothes and make my way to breakfast. When I get downstairs, I hear voices and realize the alumni group from Berkeley must have arrived.
Slipping quietly past the dining room and into the kitchen, I see Mrs. Findlay folding apricot filling into crêpes and Mom making more coffee in the huge percolator.
“Hey, when did all these people get here?” I ask.
“Oh, they just arrived,” Mom says, rubbing her hands together over the sink to dust off the coffee grounds.
“Was Tenzo on the train with them?” I ask, trying to seem unconcerned.
“Yes, he was. He wanted to take a look around, though, so Thomas is giving him the grand tour.”
“What?” I blurt out.
“What do you mean, ‘what’ ?” Mom asks.
“Nothing. I’ll be right back.” I bolt out of the kitchen to look for Uncle Li and find him in the dining room next to a tiny woman with a long grey ponytail. As I make my way over to him, I notice that Alex is in the room dressed in a crisp white shirt and black pants. He sees me before I can sneak away and I instantly regret not paying more attention in the mirror this morning.
“Isn’t it nice to see this old place full of people, the way it was meant to be?” he asks.
“Yeah, but it’s strange to hear all this noise after it’s just been us.” I pour myself some tea. He hands me the sugar bowl. “Thanks. So will you be here all day?” I ask.
“Nae, Gran is making up picnic lunches for your parents and the guests to take with them on their tour of the countryside. But I’ll be back to serve at dinner.”
Mrs. Findlay pokes her head through the door and gives Alex the stink eye.
“Hate to get fired by my grandmum,” he whispers. “Excuse me, Caity.”
I love hearing him say my name.
I serve myself a crêpe and some potatoes and sit down next to Uncle Li. He introduces me to grey-ponytail lady, Kimberly Slaton, and tells me she is a retired astrophysicist. “Oh how cool!” I say, pretending I know exactly what that is.
“How are you this morning?” Uncle Li asks me.
“Good, good. Thanks,” I reply as I dig in to my crêpe. As nonchalantly as I can I say, “So, Tenzo is here. He wanted to see the castle so Thomas has him on a tour right this minute.”
Dr. Slaton chimes in, “Oh, we met him on our way over from the train station. He’s very serious! We couldn’t figure out what a man like that would be doing on a vacation by himself.”
“I guess everyone has a different reason for being here,” Uncle Li says. He looks at me and motions to the door with his head. He stands up and tells Dr. Slaton what a pleasure it was to talk with her as I shove the last bites of potato in my mouth. “Caity, we really should be getting started with that project,” he says to me.
Running into the kitchen, I pick up Mr. Papers before we go up to my room. I immediately change him back into his crazy circus clothes and he looks just right again.
“Okay, so what do we do about Tenzo poking around?” I ask.
He thinks for a moment and says, “We do nothing. We sit and watch.”
“Really? You don’t want to follow him? See what he knows?” I reach into my pocket for the last decoded message. “Here are two more I did last night. Something about the sky and cycles and stuff.”
Uncle Li reads it and asks, “Are these the last ones?”
“I think there are two more,” I answer. “What do you make of it?”
“Context is everything. We should decode those as soon as possible and read them all in order,” Uncle Li says.
I get up to see if I can catch sight of Tenzo and Thomas from my window. Mr. Papers jumps up on the sill and starts sniffing the air and furrowing his brow. I scan the courtyard but don’t see anyone. Then Mr. Papers starts jumping up and down, screeching and pointing, so I follow his finger. “Oh my God, they’re on top of the tower!”
Uncle Li runs over to look, and Mr. Papers is still screeching. Not wanting them to see us, I grab Mr. Papers and close the window. I feel his heart racing under my fingertips.
“Is there any way he could know what’s deep inside the tower?” Uncle Li asks.
“No, I don’t think so,” I say, trying to remember how this all came together. “All I did was fax some symbols to Justine, and she forwarded that to her grandpa. He sent it on to Tenzo, who’s some kind of specialist in ancient languages. He asked Justine’s grandpa where I sent it from. That’s how he knew I lived here.”
“Okay. Well, we’re many steps ahead of him, so let’s just relax,” Uncle Li says.
“Relax? Are you serious?”
“There is an old Chinese saying, ‘Give evil nothing to oppose and it will disappear by itself,’” he says, putting a reassuring hand on my shoulder.
Usually Uncle Li’s words of wisdom work, but toda
y they do nothing.
————
I’m fidgety and nervous and I try to think of something to do, but all I’m really interested in right now is looking at Alex, so I head back downstairs. Everything is cleared and cleaned from brunch, and Alex is nowhere in sight. Mrs. Findlay is in the kitchen, looking a little stressed. “What’s up?” I ask.
“Oh, ’tis the first big dinner I’ve done in awhile,” she says. A piece of hair has sprung from her bun and she pushes it out of her face with the back of a floured hand.
“Can I help? I can do basic stuff like chop or stir or something.”
“Ah, thanks lassie, but I’ll manage. Besides, the Laird’s daughter shouldn’t be found working for the cook.”
“Hello? Is this not the twenty-first century? We’re so past that,” I say.
She gives me a crooked smile and goes back to her work. I hand Mr. Papers a banana and he takes it back to his cubbyhole.
“How long have you lived in Brayne, Mrs. Findlay?”
“Why, my whole life. Was born in the house that I was raised in and never left,” she says as she sprinkles flour on the marble pastry slab.
“So this castle has always just been a home, nothing more?”
She punches her fist into a huge ball of bread dough. “Aye. It’s only belonged to the descendents of Fergus Mac Fireland.”
I search for the right way to ask. “Do people think it’s unusual? Like haunted or anything?”
“Haven’t you heard dear?” she says, laughing deeply. “Everything in Scotland is haunted.”
I can tell she’s preoccupied with cooking, so I stop my interrogation and ask again if there’s anything I can do to help.
“Nae, child, Alex will be back to help before too long,” she says with a wink. The whole master/servant thing bothers me, but at least I’ll get to see Alex again today. “Why don’t you just rest up for dinner?” she suggests. “These four-course meals can last hours.”
“Is this something I should dress up for?”
She looks at me like I’m an idiot. “Most certainly. Didn’t your parents talk to you about this? Your paying guests have come to a castle; they’re expecting the royal treatment.”
Seriously? Sitting through a four-course dinner with old people after what we’ve discovered seems ridiculous. But, since Alex will be there, I have a long bath and try on every outfit in my closet. I end up choosing a sleeveless ice-blue linen dress with a silver chain belt.
Mom stops by as I’m getting dressed. “You look beautiful!” she says, slipping a tube of lipstick into a purse the size of a clamshell. She’s wearing a green nubby silk dress with three-quarter sleeves and a square neckline. It looks retro, like something from a Hitchcock movie.
“Where have you been hiding that cool dress?” I ask.
“Just got it in Switzerland. You like?”
Dad pops in. “Can you believe I’ve forgotten how to tie a tie?” Mom turns around to look at him and whistles. He does look nice in a suit, a sight we rarely see.
Mom shakes her head. “I’ve never known how to tie one. I don’t think I’ve seen you in one since … well, I don’t remember.”
“Thomas gave me this one; it was my grandfather’s,” Dad says. “It’s the dress plaid for the Mac Fireland clan.”
“When’re you going to bust out the kilt?” I ask as I Google “how to tie a tie.”
“Might be awhile, don’t think I could get used to the draft …” he says.
“You want the windsor, four-in-hand, or half-windsor?” I ask.
Dad comes over. “Ah, my little genius,” he says. “I’ll take the windsor, please.”
I hold up the printed instructions so he can read and tie at the same time.
“Alright! When have the Mac Firelands ever looked so good?” he asks as Mom and I thread our arms through his.
The guests are already in the parlor having cocktails. Thomas is behind the bar, dressed in a white shirt and black vest. He has his hair slicked back and I hardly recognize him. Alex is wearing the same, and is passing out hors d’oeuvres. He looks amazing, amazing, amazing.
His whole face smiles when he sees me. I’m sure it’s because I’m the only person here within 50 years of his age. “Smoked salmon with crème fraîche, Miss Mac Fireland?” he says. Then he leans in and says, “You look stunning tonight.”
All of a sudden I’m dizzy and need to sit down. I blush and say thanks and then sink in the nearest chair. Thomas brings me a glass of fizzy water with lime, which I drink all at once. I turn to my right to set the glass on a side table and jump; Tenzo is sitting in the chair next to me.
“Good evening,” he says as he extends his hand. I reluctantly give him mine and he shakes it in that floppy way where you only grab fingers. “I’m Dr. Tenzo.”
I pull my hand away and covertly wipe it on my lap. “I’m Caity.”
“I know,” he says as his thick red lips curl into a smile.
Within seconds Uncle Li is standing by my chair. He offers his hand to Tenzo and says, “Hello, I’m Zhong-Shan Li.”
Tenzo stands up to shake. “I’m Dr. Tadashi Tenzo. Are you here with the Berkeley group?”
“No, I’m a family friend,” he says as he puts a hand on my shoulder. I like that he seems to be saying, This is my territory.
I rub it in by saying, “I’ve known Dr. Li my whole life. He’s our Feng Shui Master.”
“Oh, Doctor Li is it?” Tenzo says with a smirk. “Do Feng Shui Masters get such titles?”
“Actually I have a Doctorate in Philosophy from Columbia University.”
Tenzo seems embarrassed, “Oh, fantastic. Well done.” He looks into his empty glass, and shakes the ice. “I think I’ll freshen up my drink before dinner,” he says as he heads off to the bar.
“What a jackass!” I say.
“He is quite annoying, isn’t he?”
Dad comes over and walks me around the room by the elbow, introducing me to the guests. I feel like a poodle at a dog show—I expect Dad to pull a liver treat out of his pocket and reward me at any minute.
There’s Dr. Slaton, the grey-ponytail astrophysicist who can actually pull off wearing orange lipstick; Mr. Inada, a tall, willowy chemist with a beard that looks as soft as rabbit fur; Dr. Frasse, a gorgeous Italian-looking college professor who is as tall as my dad; and Mr. Dressel, an ex-pilot who is missing two fingers (didn’t ask). Plus Tenzo, of course.
When Mom announces dinner, Dad and I follow the others into the dining room. Thankfully, Uncle Li has saved me a seat as far from Tenzo as possible.
Each place setting has three crystal glasses of varying size, three forks on one side, two spoons and a knife on the other, and another spoon across the top. Three huge silver candelabras sit along the length of the table, and each one holds ten candles. I’m sitting near one and can actually feel the heat from all the flames. Between the candelabra are two big flower arrangements. I wonder where Mrs. Findlay is going to put all the food; there’s no room left on the table for anything.
Once we’re all seated, Alex pours the adults wine and me sparkling cider and then brings in a big tureen of soup on a wheeled cart. After we’ve all been served, Alex comes back in with rolls and puts one on each bread plate using silver paddle-like tongs.
The formality of the dinner causes an awkward silence. Mom uses me as an icebreaker and says, “Dr. Frasse, didn’t you teach Classics? Our Caity has become quite interested in Plato and the Ages of Man.”
All the old heads turn toward me and I turn as red as their wine.
Dr. Frasse’s face lights up. “Oh, that’s wonderful!” she says. “At such a young age, too. What have you been reading?”
I give Uncle Li a desperate look, and he says, “Actually, I have been tutoring her. We’re studying preliterate myths and how they all boil down to one thing: how astronomy affects man. I’m sure you all know that the rise and fall of cultures is closely tied to where we are relative to other stars and planets and the
Galactic Center.”
Dr. Frasse nods. “It’s true. All ancient myths are about cycles of time and how human development is tied to the movement of the heavens.”
“Cycles as in Light and Dark Ages?” Dr. Slaton asks.
“Precisely,” says Uncle Li. “As the Earth takes its twenty-six-thousand-year trip through the constellations of the zodiac, each sign reflects an age. Some ages are dark, some are light.”
I didn’t realize Uncle Li knew so much about this.
“So you actually believe there has been a Golden Age?” Mom asks. She seems as surprised as I am that Uncle Li knows so much about it.
“Absolutely. And we’re emerging from a Dark Age now,” he replies.
“Really?” Dad says skeptically. “With the amazing technology we’ve developed over the last hundred years I’d call this a Golden Age.”
“You know what’s driven most of that technology?” Uncle Li asks.
“Military research,” Mr. Dressel answers. “How to control and or kill more people more efficiently.”
Uncle Li nods and says, “Even the Internet was developed by the military. A civilian named Licklider wrote a paper about the concept of the Internet in August of 1962 and two months later he was snatched up by the United States Department of Defense to develop it.”
I can tell Dad is getting freaked out and he makes some comment about the conversation getting heavier than the leek soup. Mom uses distraction and says, “So, what would you all like to do tomorrow? Go walking? Fishing?”
I’m glad my parents have to show these Berkeley alums every possible thing there is to do here; having them so involved with the guests keeps their eyes and their minds off of me.
As they all discuss what they want to see and do, I whisper, “Nice save, thanks,” to Uncle Li. As I look up, I catch Tenzo watching us talk.
The door from the kitchen opens and Alex rolls in a cart with the biggest leg of lamb you’ve ever seen. He raises his eyebrows at me and I realize this must be the poor creature that Mrs. Findlay and I picked up from the farm the other day.
The Daykeeper's Grimoire Page 10
