Chameleon (The Ripple Series)

by Cidney Swanson

  “Whoa,” said Will, from the next room.

  I crossed to join him.

  “I just felt your breeze in here,” Will said. “Where’s it coming from?” He was walking from window to window, holding his hand out searching for the source of the cold air. “That was like—” he lowered his voice and I drew closer. “That was like touching you when you’re invisible.”

  “Told you it was drafty,” I said. “If I were rich enough to build a place like this, I’d insulate a lot better.”

  Will agreed and strolled into another room, connected to the first one.

  “Hey, Sam, check this out.”

  I followed his voice.

  “Oh!” I sighed.

  The ante–room was tiny, perfect, paneled in ancient dark oak and covered with paintings of all sizes. But the real beauty was the open window and what you could see through it. Graceful arches stood sentry over water flowing lazily beneath the massive structure. All the pictures of the château showed this famous section of building.

  “It’s like a fairytale.” My voice came out in a sigh.

  Will watched me nervously as I gazed at the water. “Careful, Sam. Don’t go blissing out.”

  I steadied my gaze on the grey–green flow of river. Hidden from his eyes, my mouth formed a smirk, and I decided to tease Will. I watched the water, then felt my flesh dissolve.

  “Sam!” Will moaned. “You disappeared. Quick, come back. No more looking at the river. Our group could be here any minute.”

  He twisted to look over his shoulder for oncoming hordes. But I had listened carefully before vanishing, and I knew no one was coming yet. I walked towards Will and gave him an enormous icy embrace. Then, because I found the temptation irresistible, I brushed my lips along the back of his neck. Ignoring the winged creatures flapping in my stomach, I turned towards the ancient wall. At this point I felt a tickle of curiosity. What would it feel like, smell like, to pass through a wall this ancient and into the corridor?

  Will called my name again. I made sure no one else was approaching and entered the wall. The wall measured perhaps eighteen inches thick. Inside I sensed cold stone and furniture polish and wood that had once been tree. Behind me, Will groaned, so I shivered back through the wall oh–so–slowly and then rippled solid.

  Will sighed in relief.

  I grinned and didn’t say anything.

  He frowned. “Tell me you didn’t do that on purpose.”

  I grinned bigger.

  “That was irresponsible,” he said, glaring.

  “This, from the guy who likes to break into evil laboratories for fun?” I asked.

  “Hmmph,” he grunted. “Let’s go check out the other rooms.” We returned to the central hall.

  I picked a room on the opposite side and Will followed me.

  “Brr! How could anyone stay warm enough to sleep here?” I asked, walking towards an ancient carved bed.

  I snapped a quick picture of Will framed by the doorway, freezing in pixels a furrow deepening along his forehead.

  “What’s with the frown?” I asked. “You mad at me? Will, I checked to make sure no one was around. I’m not stupid.”

  “No, no—not that.”

  We heard our fellow–students thumping up the marble staircase.

  “Later,” he said.

  Madame Evans arrived in the hall, describing a love affair between a French king and the woman to whom he had presented this château.

  “Nice gift,” Will said, as he gravitated towards the sound of a history lesson he might miss. In Las Abs, I smiled indulgently at his obsession. Here in France, history crooked her finger at Will around every corner.

  As Madame left, Will whispered into my ear. “A minute ago, I felt that chill you were talking about. Do you think the cold spots are, well, moving around a lot?”

  I shivered from the warmth of his breath on my neck and ear—so close, so intimate.

  “You mean, someone like us? Here?” I asked.

  Will nodded, curt. He mouthed two words: a rippler.

  I shook my head. “We’re getting as paranoid as your sister.”

  I circled the room once more, my fingers trailing wide to detect any change of temperature, but I felt nothing. Madame Evans led us through two additional rooms on the second floor before herding us up one level. I heard Gwyn’s laughter echoing through the high–ceilinged stairwell. I tried not to miss her friendship.

  “Maybe it’s ghosts,” whispered Will. “Madame, s’il vous plaît?” He was addressing our French teacher.

  She turned. “Oui?”

  “Sont–ils des histories des fantômes du château?”

  “Mais non,” she replied. “Ce château, c’est un château des dames, et de l’amour, pas des fantômes.”

  “A ‘castle of women and of love,’” I said to Will.

  He looked disappointed. “Guess we have to rule out ghosts.”

  We continued with Madame and our classmates until we’d seen the entire castle. Mickie joined us as we explored the kitchens below ground.

  “Where’ve you been, Mick?” Will asked.

  “The kitchen gardens,” she said enthusiastically. “Back by the entrance to the grounds. I had a very cool composting lesson. Using hand gestures. God, I wish I’d taken French. That was some gorgeous dirt.”

  Will and I gagged back laughter, Will turning his into a evil–sounding cough.

  “We’re heading to the formal garden with the fountain in the middle,” I said. “I think that’s where they take the pictures looking back upriver at the castle.”

  Mickie joined us and we set off across a graveled walk. The ground stone dusted my black boots in pale powder. We had just descended a set of stairs into the garden when I heard Will’s sudden intake of breath.

  “What?” I asked.

  “Did you feel that?”

  “What?” I asked.

  “That wash of cold,” he whispered.

  “No,” Mickie and I said together.

  “I’d swear someone like us just passed through me. Like an icy blast”

  “A friendly blast? Or, you know …” I broke off.

  Will rolled his eyes at me. “Friendly? How am I supposed to tell?”

  “Keep your voice down,” said Mickie. “How sure are you, Will?”

  “What I felt was just like when Sam walked through me a minute ago,” he replied.

  Not hard to guess how Mickie was going to view my behavior.

  She groaned, cursed, and pressed her thumb and forefinger to her eyes. “Please tell me you were alone.”

  “Of course,” I said, flushing.

  “Oh, great, now someone’s staring at us,” Mickie said, eyeing a gentleman who did seem to be looking at us with curiosity. “Get your picture and we’re moving on,” she whispered.

  I took some quick snapshots, matching the view of the castle I’d seen on guidebooks and postcards.

  Will and his sister marched back to the stairs. I followed, but twisted to capture one last shot of the formal garden. I nearly bumped into staring–man, walking just behind me.

  “Je suis désolé, Mademoiselle,” he apologized.

  “De rien.” I told him it was nothing and dashed to Mickie and Will. My heart pounded and I tried to convince myself it was a coincidence that someone would choose to stare at us. We were six–thousand miles from UC Merced and this guy looked genteel French, not übermensch–y.

  Leaving the staring man behind, we retraced our way to the entrance, beside the knobby–bald trees and winter–dead vegetable gardens. As we approached the grand avenue, a path joined ours from the side, and the same gentleman strolled towards us, gazing at us as if to memorize each of our faces. Or discover our weaknesses.

  This time, Will stepped out to confront him, placing himself between us and the stranger. “Que voulez–vous, Monsieur?”

  “Will asked him what he wants,” I whispered to Mickie.

  The grey–haired man smiled and replied in cri
sp English. “A great many things, young man, none of which pose any threat to you or your … companions.” He inclined his head to Mickie and myself, a polite, antiquated gesture.

  Mickie bristled. “Our conversation is private, if you don’t mind.”

  “Certainly,” he said, a hint of a smile pulling at one side of his mouth. “I beg your pardon.” He looked intently in several directions and then nodding once again, he began walking down the avenue of silent trees and disappeared into thin air.

  “Holy shit!” Mickie whispered.

  Chapter Nine

  SIR WALTER DE ROCHEFORT

  “Monsieur de Rochefort?” Will called softly after him.

  “No, Will!” Mickie looked in exasperation at her brother. “We don’t know who that was.”

  “He looked friendly, alright? Who else could he be?” asked Will.

  As if in response, a spot before one of the great mottled trunks shimmered and resolved itself into the old man.

  “Bonjour, Mesdemoiselles, Monsieur. Allow me to present myself. I am called Waldhart Jean–Baptiste de Rochefort, and I am entirely at your service.” He made a seriously old–fashioned bow before crunching along the drive toward us.

  “You speak English really good,” Will said.

  “I speak English very well,” corrected the grey–haired gentleman. He then pulled himself up to his full height somewhere just below my own five–foot–seven and drew in a breath through his nose, so exaggeratedly that his nostrils almost pinched shut. “We French invented English, as a means of communicating to the miserable peasants inhabiting that forsaken island known as Greater Bretagne.”

  His hauteur suggested we might belong to the miserable peasant contingency.

  “Ten–sixty–six,” said Will.

  The old gentleman tilted his head to one side and down, an understated nod.

  I looked at Will, lost.

  “The French conquered England in 1066,” Will murmured in explanation. “The English language came into being as the conquerors and the defeated figured out how to talk to each other.”

  The Frenchman regarded Will with something like approval. “You evidently share the Conqueror’s name, Guillaume.”

  “No, I was named after a river in Oregon,” Will said.

  “You know my brother’s name?” Mickie asked. “Pfeffer kept that secret.”

  “There’s a Guillaume River in Oregon?” I asked.

  “Willamette River,” Will replied.

  “So that’s your real name, Willamette?” I asked.

  “My real name is Will,” he replied tersely.

  “How do you know my brother’s name?” Mickie repeated, an edge to her voice.

  The ghostly Frenchman, ignoring Mickie’s question, continued dismissively, “Of course, you are Americans, with your own bastardization of the island dialect.”

  “I flew six thousand miles to meet you and now you’re telling me you have a problem with Americans?” Mickie asked, eyes narrowing.

  “Of course not. The French love Americans. We gave your country to you two times over as a gesture of our goodwill. First was the Marquis de Lafayette, and later our own Napoleon sold half your nation to you for pennies. Without France there would be no America.”

  “Napoleon wasn’t French,” Will muttered.

  The old man regarded Will. “Napoleon was la France,” he said, as if he’d thrown down a glove and now waited for Will to retrieve it. The exchange left me puzzled, but Will nodded as if conceding the point.

  “But we gave you Paris in 1944, so we’re even,” said Will.

  “Touché,” whispered the gentleman, a hint of a smile as he gazed at Will.

  The old man fixed Mickie with an imperious gaze. “As for my knowing the name of your brother, chère Mademoiselle Mackenzie, I took care that I should know both his name and his identity before revealing myself.”

  Here he turned from Mickie to gaze upon me.

  “Bonjour Mademoiselle,” he said.

  “Bonjour, Sir Walter,” I said politely. Then I blushed and stammered. “I mean Monsieur de Rocheforte.”

  “Non, non,” he said. “You have not misspoken. But how did you know of my knighthood?”

  “Knighthood?” asked Mickie.

  “We didn’t know at all,” said Will. “I, uh, started referring to you as ‘Sir Walter’ back home. I got everyone else in the habit. Sorry.”

  “As a speaker of English, it is most fit you would adjust my name from Waldhart to Walter.” A smile twitched along his mouth. “And you are welcome to continue to address me by my title as Sir Walter.” The small smile grew to a larger one.

  He turned back to study me. “This is a cousin perhaps?” he asked Will and Mickie. “Not, I think, your sister.”

  “Samantha is our friend,” Will said. Lowering his voice he whispered, “She’s the one we wrote you about.”

  Sir Walter’s mouth curved upwards. “Mademoiselle Samanthe, Waldhart Jean–Baptiste de Rochefort, à vôtre service.”

  My face heated, from trying not to laugh at his old–fashioned manners.

  “Okay, listen. So, how do we know you are who you say you are?” Mickie asked.

  Sir Walter shrugged—a gesture the French should totally trademark—and answered. “You cannot, of course. You can only accept that before you is the man with whom you have corresponded, or you can choose not to accept. Allow me, however, to point out that if I wished to do you harm, that could have been accomplished several hours ago. I also know which one of you I would keep hold of as a hostage should I wish to force your brother and friend to remain in solid form.”

  “You watched us upstairs, inside the castle, when we were alone,” I said.

  He looked puzzled. “I did, indeed, watch you and your friends, Mademoiselle, but only whilst you were out of doors.”

  “You placed yourself in my path while you were invisible,” said Will.

  “Your reactions helped me to be sure of your identities,” Sir Walter said. “I never form an acquaintance without reassuring myself that there has been no trap lain for me by a clever enemy.”

  “Dude.” Will smiled. “You’re going to get along great with my sister.”

  Mickie frowned, uncertain whether to trust him.

  “But Mademoiselle Samanthe, what is this you say of being watched indoors?”

  “We noticed—Will and I noticed—an icy presence in the castle.”

  Sir Walter’s brows drew together ever so slightly. “I should have made a more thorough search.” His heavy lids closed and he seemed to disappear inside himself. Then he opened his eyes again. “You appear to have captured the interest of a person with whom I am well acquainted. Him, I have found relatively harmless, all things considered. He fears me greatly.” The French gentleman smiled and drew himself tall. “You are to consider yourselves under my protection. Whether you can see me or not, I shall guard your well–being.”

  “That’s very kind of you to offer to protect us,” said Mickie. You could see it on her face: she was stuck halfway between impressed that the French gentleman had bad–guy radar and worried he wouldn’t be able to offer much assistance.

  “Not at all,” said Sir Walter, bowing. “Pfeffer would have expected it.”

  “How do you ‘see’ an invisible person’s identity?” asked Will.

  The Frenchman shrugged. “Assuming I have already encountered the person, it is simple enough for me to recognize the signature of their thoughts, while they are invisible.”

  “Simple for you,” murmured Will, his admiration evident.

  “Okay,” said Mickie. “So that brings me to my next problem. Assuming you’re Sir Walter, I need to know why we should trust you. For starters, why did Professor Pfeffer trust you?”

  Sir Walter made a small sort of laugh. “You might turn that question on its head and ask why I trusted him. However, to answer your question, he trusted me from the moment I saved his life.” He smiled as if he would say no more on that subj
ect. “I believe there is an hour before you depart with your group?”

  We nodded.

  “It would be well if we conversed in privacy, yes?” Gesturing with a sweep of his hand, Sir Walter led us off the main roadway, to the side path we’d seen him upon minutes ago.

  We arrived at a small arrangement of iron chairs and a table and sat.

  “On the occasion of our last visit together, Doctor Pfeffer confided to me his discovery of yourself and your brother. He spoke of you in terms of highest praise.” His smile turned downwards as if he were now remembering something unpleasant. “We agreed that should he find himself in danger, he would leave important documents in your keeping and that I should contact you in this event. He spoke of his plan to obtain a record of Helmann’s experiments upon children during the Second World War. I attempted to dissuade him, to point out the danger of drawing attention to himself by such a theft, but he would not listen.”

  “He was stubborn,” said Mickie.

  “Look who’s talking,” mumbled Will.

  “A strong will is a great asset,” said Sir Walter, his mouth pulling into half a smile. “Especially for one without other genetic gifts. Mademoiselle, I understand you do not share your brother’s abilities?”

  Mickie shook her head. “I can’t ripple.”

  “You are not a ‘chameleon’?” Sir Walter asked. “That is the word I use. Quite aside from the chameleon’s ability to disappear, the creature was for centuries thought to live by consuming only air.” He laughed softly to himself. “What is your word again? Ree–pill?”

  “Ripple. It’s like when you disturb a pool of water, you know, the ripples that flow out. That’s what it looks like when Will disappears,” Mickie replied.

  “Of course. A good word. Especially as there is no verb–form of ‘chameleon.’ Trust my young friend Pfeffer to find a better word in the language of his new home,” said Sir Walter.

  “It’s my word,” snapped Mickie. “Pfeffer referred to Will’s ability as ‘the phenomenon’ before I told him my word.”

  Will guffawed at his sister’s prickliness.

  Sir Walter spoke gently. “He would have been only too quick to credit you, my dear, were he here with us now.”