The Explorers’ Gate

by Chris Grabenstein

  “The map on your grandfather’s wall!”

  “Really? Huh. I never noticed. See the wee people use the drainpipes under Central Park as a subway system but, instead of electric trains, they use canal boats like people do in Amsterdam. I volunteered to come rescue you. They mapped out a route through pipes wide enough for me to swim through. Polar bears, sea lions, or snow monkeys?”

  “What?”

  “Just need to know which exit pipe we should take. Sea lions would be best. The glass wall around their tank is the easiest to climb. But if you want to see the polar bears while we’re here, that’s cool.”

  I was smiling again. “No. Let’s get out as quickly as we can. The sea lions’ tank is fine.”

  “Okay. You might want to hold your breath.”

  “Do we have to swim under water?”

  “No. But, have you ever smelled sea lion poop? Woo! Very fishy.”

  Chapter 20

  When we climbed out of the sea lions’ swimming pool in the zoo’s central courtyard, several kids were gawking at us.

  Because it was the middle of the day. The zoo was full of families.

  So Garrett did something extremely clever. He pulled out a quarter and said, “Aw, this is a Nebraska. We need Tennessee! Let’s go check out the coins in some of the other fountains.”

  Yes, Garrett (who wasn’t the dumb jock I had first thought him to be) was pretending that we had just jumped into the sea lion tank to retrieve a collectible quarter someone had tossed into it. This being New York City, nobody thought that was strange. Our crowd just shrugged and went back to popping peanuts and licking ice-cream cones.

  “Well done,” I whispered.

  “Thanks. Come on. We need to take the long way around to the exit so the concrete eagles don’t see us.”

  Apparently, the stern birds, which looked like overgrown flagpole ornaments guarding the zoo, were on Loki’s side.

  “Loki promised them he’d banish all children from the zoo when he becomes king,” Garrett explained.

  “What?”

  “The eagles have ‘issues’ with sticky fingers.”

  “But can Loki even do that? Banish children from the zoo?”

  “Sure. With the help of his human friends, the ones who want to make Central Park scary again, like it was back when Loki’s grandfather was king. That way, they can take it over and make money. I heard this one guy wants to tear down the zoo and put in a Rainforest Cafe.”

  I remembered the TV news story about David Drake wanting to build a luxury hotel in the heart of the park.

  “Privatizing a public space …”

  “Huh?” said Garrett.

  “Nothing. Let’s get out of here before the eagles see us.”

  We crept out of the zoo, passing under the triple archway of the Delacorte Musical Clock, an awesome bronze sculpture that comes to life every thirty minutes—during the day. Jolly music plays while a bear with a tambourine, a hippo with a violin, a goat with panpipes, a kangaroo tooting a horn, an elephant holding a concertina, and a penguin banging a drum glide around the base of the clock. On the hour, two monkeys up top bang a bell with mallets.

  We took the asphalt pathway north, past the boat pond (where Stuart Little used to yacht), and alongside Cedar Hill until we neared the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

  “So,” I asked, “where’s Willem now?”

  “Up at his castle at the far end of the Reservoir. The north gatehouse.”

  The Reservoir (officially the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis Reservoir) used to be a major part of New York City’s water supply system. Now the 106-acre basin between 86th and 96th Streets is better known for its jogging path and bird-watching possibilities.

  “Hey, Garrett?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Do your parents know you swim through sewers?”

  Garrett laughed. “Yep. They’re the ones who taught me.”

  “Well, where are they? How come you live with your grandfather?”

  “It’s just for the spring. My parents are over in Europe. New Amsterdam wasn’t the only Dutch colony. There are kabouter problems everywhere.”

  “So, they’re like ambassadors?”

  “Yeah. Comes with being a Vanderdonk.”

  “So your ancient ancestors were the ones who brought the first kabouters over on the boat?”

  “That’s right. The Vanderdonks and the Von Draakens. Here we go.”

  We headed for the jogging trail and approached a fortress-like building with boarded-up windows.

  “What’s going on over there?” I asked, pointing to the tennis courts just north of the gatehouse. A man was peering through a small telescope on a tripod at another man holding a fluorescent orange stick.

  “Surveyors,” said Garrett. “That’s where Mr. Drake wants to build his Royal Court Hotel.”

  “That is such a ridiculous idea.”

  “I know. But, well, if people get frightened enough, they might let him do it. A luxury hotel would have tons of security guards. Come on. We better see Willem. He’s worried about you.”

  We approached the massive front doors to the kabouter castle—two towering iron panels edged with rivets the size of baseballs. Signs advised us to keep out. Go away. Not to trespass.

  When no one was watching, Garrett rapped his knuckles against a panel.

  A door creaked open and we stepped into darkness. Garrett shoved the door shut with a manly grunt. A match flared.

  It was Willem, lighting the wick to an oil lamp. “Welcome, Nikki! I trust you are uninjured?”

  “I’m fine. But, well …”

  “Yes?” Willem asked eagerly.

  “You might’ve told me you were a prince! Garrett said you were his brother.”

  “He is!” said Garrett. “And you, Nikki, are my sister.”

  Oh. He had meant it that way. Like in church.

  “So,” I asked Willem, “you’re not in the fourth grade, are you?”

  He smiled. “Not for several years.”

  “Exactly how old are you?”

  “Ninety-five.”

  “How come you don’t have a beard like all the other kabouters?”

  “He didn’t want to scare you,” said Garrett. “So he shaved it off.”

  “But you look like you’re nine years old!”

  “Good skin,” said Willem. “No wrinkles. Comes from staying out of the sun, living down here in the dark.”

  “Hey—how come I could see you that first night, before I put on my red cap?”

  Willem’s eyes twinkled. “It’s one of the perks of being a prince.”

  “So they can talk to humans and junk,” added Garrett.

  A squat kabouter in gray sweats with a whistle hanging from a lanyard around his neck waddled into the room. “Yo, Prince Willy? Yooze comin’ downstairs to practice or what?”

  “I’m sorry, Coach Krunk. I needed to make certain Miss Van Wyck was unharmed after her early morning adventures.”

  “You dah one Loki’s schmeboygahs shanghaied?”

  “Um, yes, sir.”

  “Can yooze imagine da agita I’m gonna get if dat skootch Loki becomes king?” He put a fist to his stomach and burped. “Yooze ready to roll, Willy?”

  “In a minute.”

  “Hey, I’m just axin’ is all.” The coach waddled away.

  I raised my hand.

  “Yes?” asked Willem.

  “How come all the kabouters, except you and Loki, have Brooklyn accents? You know—‘dese, dem, dose.’”

  “It is a holdover from our original Dutch language which substitutes a D for most TH sounds.”

  I shot my hand up again.

  “Yes?”

  “One more question.”

  “Ask as many as you like.”

  “Okay. That picture Grandpa Vanderdonk showed me. My parents’ wedding?”

  “Yes?”

  “Was it photoshopped?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Did you guys us
e some kind of trick to put my mom and dad into a picture with King Kroll so I’d join your team?”

  “No. The picture was real. Your mother was our dear, dear friend.”

  “You promise?”

  Willem raised his right hand. “I swear on my late father’s noble name. Besides, I could not tell a lie to my goddaughter.”

  I must’ve done a quadruple take. “Huh?”

  Willem reached into a pocket and showed me another photograph: Willem, his blue eyes twinkling above a long Santa Claus beard as he cradled a newborn infant in his arms.

  “That’s you?” I asked.

  “Yes, Nikki. And the baby? That’s you.”

  Chapter 21

  The three of us headed downstairs to a dining hall with a glass ceiling that let in soft, wavering light filtered through the deep water of the Reservoir above.

  We had a Dutch lunch, of course, feasting on bean-and-sausage stew; braised red cabbage; crisp chicken rubbed with spices; roasted turnips, celery root, and parsnips; fresh pears and apples; and “traditional Dutch apple pie.” For dessert, we had cheeses. Wheels and wheels of cheeses.

  Garrett and I were both starving and gobbled down everything. Willem nibbled on a mouse-sized wedge of gouda the way some people chew the ends of their hair. Well, people like me. When I’m nervous.

  “I’m not very hungry,” Willem said, putting down his cheese.

  “I sure am!” said Garrett. At least, I think he did. His mouth was full of parsnips, chicken, and pears.

  “How well did you know my mother?” I asked Willem.

  “Very. She was an extremely kind, extraordinarily wise woman. A true friend to all kabouters. She called you the crowning achievement of her long and illustrious life.”

  “Do you know my dad?”

  He shook his head. “We never had the pleasure of meeting. Although I know your mother loved him from the instant she first set eyes on him.”

  Coach Krunk, the stubby kabouter in the gray sweats, came over to our table. He was the only kabouter with a bristly flat-top hairdo under his red cap, which he wore rolled up tight on the sides like a dockworker. He looked like a gym teacher.

  “Yo, Willy? We ever gonna practice here or what?”

  “Of course.” Willem dabbed a napkin at his lips. “Will you excuse me, Nikki?”

  “Sure.”

  “What time do you wanna head down to the bowling green?” asked Garrett. Again, I think that’s what he said. This time he had half an apple pie in his mouth and was shoveling in a slab of cheddar cheese.

  “The ninepin competition commences promptly, and appropriately, at nine p.m. We should leave at sunset: a little before eight.”

  Garrett nodded. “Good. I need a nap.” Then he stretched and yawned, so I got to see how good the apple pie looked when mixed with bright orange cheese.

  While Garrett napped and Willem trained, I found the kabouter library and read up on ninepin, made famous in the story of Rip Van Winkle, who heard rumbling, like thunder, coming from a ravine in the Catskill Mountains and saw “bearded men of odd appearance” playing the bowling game.

  There were illustrations of the Rip Van Winkle kabouters, captioned as “Our Catskill Kin,” in a dusty leather-bound book I found in the library stacks: Ninepin for Neophytes and Ninnies.

  I had the thick book spread out on an oak reading table that had the most incredible carvings scrolled along its edges and chipmunk-head gargoyles at every corner. The table’s legs were sculpted to look like slender reindeer legs.

  These kabouters definitely knew how to work with wood.

  I slowly flipped forward a few crinkly parchment pages to read about extreme ninepin—a thunder-boomer version of the game that’s played with solid wooden balls the size of minivans. This is how Willem and Loki would play in the first round of the Crown Quest competition.

  Now, even though Central Park has a “bowling green,” it’s not long or wide enough for extreme ninepin. For that, you would need a Catskill Mountains ravine or the vast expanse of Central Park’s Sheep Meadow: a grassy, green field that can hold thirty thousand sunbathing New Yorkers on a hot summer day.

  In the extreme version of the game, the nine pins are nine feet tall—three times taller than Willem and Loki. The red king pin (or kegel), placed in the center of the diamond, would be even taller.

  If you knocked down all nine pins, you got nine points. If, somehow, you were able to knock over the eight outside pins without toppling the king pin in the center, you got twelve.

  “Excuse me,” said a petite woman with yellow, yarny pigtails as she came up to my library table. “Are you Miss Van Wyck?”

  She looked to be about twenty years old (which meant she was probably over one hundred) and wore a bright blue jumper with the initials KHC embroidered across the front.

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “I’m Kristinka Huffen Clunken from the Kabouter History Commission. I am told that you will be one of the children participating in the coming Crown Quest?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Marvelous. If you have a moment, I’d like to show you our short orientation video. Is now a good time?”

  “Um, okay.”

  “Kindly follow me.”

  I closed up the ninepin manual and followed the toddling commissioner through sliding panel doors and into an ornately decorated room.

  “Welcome to the Hall of the Kabouter Kings,” said Kristinka, spreading out her arms in true tour-guide fashion.

  I studied the amazing oil portraits adorning the mahogany walls.

  “That, of course, is King Kroll the First, right after his coronation in New Amsterdam in 1642. You’ll hear more about him in the video. Next to Kroll is Lorki the First, who took over the throne after Kroll’s death and the Crown Quest of 1687.” She slowly circled the room, pointing out each portrait as we passed. “King Kintersinter, 1704; Koolidge, 1736; Lindenschlatt, Kirkleus, and Ludmilka, which takes us to 1869 and the Mass Exodus to the Central Park …”

  “Who are those two?” I asked, pointing at a framed black-and-white photograph on the far side of the room, directly below the final portrait: a painting of Willem’s father, King Kroll the Second.

  “Ah, yes,” said Kristinka. “That is Gustaaf Vanderdonk, age thirteen, and Greet Zeldenthuis, age twelve.”

  “Is Gustaaf related to Garrett Vanderdonk?”

  “Oh, yes. Gustaaf is his father; Greet Zeldenthuis is his mother. Of course she changed her name from Zeldenthuis to Vanderdonk when they married. Then again, wouldn’t you?”

  “Probably,” I said with a smile. “When was that picture taken?”

  “When Gustaaf and Greet were the two children on Kroll the Second’s Crown Quest team in 1980.”

  Wow, I thought. Garrett’s parents had done the same thing he and I were about to do.

  “Of course, getting married after your victory isn’t a requirement,” said Kristinka. “But, soon after their Crown Quest triumph, Gustaaf and Greet fell in love. Perhaps you and Garrett, hmm?”

  I frowned. Hey, I liked Garrett but I wasn’t too keen on the whole “getting married” concept. People say they’ll be together forever, but then one of them goes ahead and dies. Ask my dad. He’ll tell you about it.

  “I apologize for the quality of the video you are about to view,” said Kristinka as she pushed some big, chunky buttons in a box. “We haven’t updated the Crown Quest tutorial since 1980. But don’t worry, it covers all the pertinent points.”

  Kristinka exhaled with a great gust and, with that single breath, blew out all eighty candles circling the grand chandelier suspended from the ceiling.

  The far wall quickly filled with a flickering white light and what appeared to be dust specks and hair on a projector lens.

  A sweeping second hand moved in a circle around giant numbers: 5 … 4 … 3 …

  I heard a Bloop! and my history lesson began.

  Chapter 22

  Have you ever seen those goofy Schoolho
use Rock! videos from the 1970s and ’80s on YouTube?

  If so, you have a pretty good idea of what the movie I was watching looked like.

  “Welcome to the Kabouter Crown Quest!” boomed a cheery voice over a trumpet fanfare as a grainy image of a seven-pointed crown turned on a velvet-covered lazy Susan. “A grand and noble tradition. If you are watching this video: Congratulations! You have been chosen to represent the Dutch descendants of New York City who have benefitted from the presence of kabouters in their midst.”

  Then the wall was filled with black-and-white images of old and new New York.

  “Working behind the scenes, through the ages, kabouters have helped the farmers, artists, merchants, doctors, and bankers of New Amsterdam, and then New York, in their daily endeavors.”

  Next came images of grimy kabouter faces straight out of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs: dozens of “wee people” toting pickaxes and shovels over their shoulders.

  “And let’s never forget, the hardworking kabouters who helped build the New York City subway system we all ride on today. Yes, where would New York City be without its kindly kabouters? Well, one thing’s certain, New York wouldn’t be the Big Apple without all these little helpers!”

  More bouncy music played while the video showed panoramas of the Manhattan skyline, ending with an overhead shot of Central Park sparkling in the middle of the island.

  “And now the time has once again come for these hidden but hardworking New Yorkers to choose a new king to rule over their home, Central Park! But, wait, you say, how did this Crown Quest even get started? Well, children, that’s a very good question. For the answer, let’s journey back in time to the early 1620s, when the first Dutch settlements in the New World were teetering on the brink of destruction!”

  The music became very History Channel as the visual changed to a map with throbbing blue and orange dots.

  “Fort Orange, near what is now Albany, and New Amsterdam, here at the mouth of the Hudson River, were about to be abandoned. You see, back home in the Netherlands, these Dutch settlers had relied on kabouters to help them toil in their fields and shops. In the New World, they were on their own. But in 1641, two wise young merchants in Amsterdam named Adrian Vanderdonk and Daveed Van Draaken realized that, for the new colony to thrive, they should import willing and courageous kabouters!