The Secret Stealer

by Jess Webster

  Very inconsiderately, Walter I passed away prior to Angeline’s 18th , leaving the fortune under the control of Walter II for a time. Walter II, having not one appealing quality in either character or physique, hated his younger sister for her charm, ease and friendliness, and took every opportunity to wreak his subtle vengeance on his naïve younger sibling. The 13 months between their father’s demise and Angeline’s 18th birthday were all that he required to destroy her life.

  During the celebrations of Angeline’s 17th birthday, Walter II slipped no small amount of alcohol into each of her drinks. Never having tasted alcohol before, she mistakenly supposed that the enhanced happiness she felt was the result of being in love with the boy currently wooing her. Her logic dulled and her inhibitions thoroughly removed, a certain act of foolishness followed. It became clear to both herself and her brother, in the several months that followed, that this act had not gone without consequence.

  Gently guided by her lascivious brother, Angeline accompanied him and his wife on an ‘extended vacation’, with the promise that when they returned, he and his wife would pretend that the child was their own, in order to prevent any stain upon her good name. They would hide all the paperwork in a safe in the wine cellar of their house, so that none would be the wiser. They would all live together in the big house and she could raise the baby as she saw fit. Angeline agreed to this seemingly kind plan, unaware that her elder brother intended to forge papers of his own, detailing that Angeline was not in actuality the mother of this child, but rather that Yvette Winchester was. And so when they returned from their ‘vacation’, Angeline had no claim whatsoever upon this child, beyond that of a young aunt, who is pledged to love and spoil the infant at every given opportunity.

  Alas, like a merry ray of light that breaks through a swaying curtain to illuminate a dank, dark room, Angeline Winchester was not long for this world. Her vicious elder brother contemplated killing her, but nature took care of what he only wished he had the gall to do.

  Although Angeline possessed a metabolism that allowed her to eat as much as she liked whilst still maintaining the figure of a model, a lifetime of indulging her appetites meant that her insides were not looking quite so good as her outsides. One afternoon, several months after the child had been born, as Yvette, Walter II, Angeline and her infant child relaxed at Larkwind, a certain thrombus dislodged from an artery wall within the outwardly lovely Angeline and decided to take a merry embolic stroll through her vascular system until at last it reached a nice little nook, and there it stayed. This situation, though pleasant enough if one is an embolus, is not at all pleasant for the body that houses it.

  And so it passed that Angeline Winchester suffered a major stroke. Upon her regaining consciousness it became evident that she could understand people, though her written and spoken word had turned to utter gibberish.

  With enough money almost anything is possible, and with Angeline in such a condition her elder brother gained complete control of the family fortune. Several days into her recovery period, whilst she held her baby in relative contentment, her brother, having been informed in sombre tones by doctors that her disability would be permanent, came to her, passed the child to his wife and said the following to his little sister:

  “I know that you will not like what I am about to say to you, and I know that you can understand me. It is not your fault that our father liked you better than me, but he is dead, and so you must be the one to suffer. Someone must pay for the indignity of my being forced to live, dependent, upon a younger sibling.

  “I have organized for you to be taken to an institution where all your basic needs will be catered for. My wife and I will take the child as our own, as promised, and to our friends – and indeed to the entire world – you will have died of this stroke. From now on you will be Mary Thomas, and you will have no connection with our family. And we will keep all the documents pertaining to these transactions, all the bribes I have had to carry out in order to make this dream a reality, as promised, within a safe in the wine cellar of the house (which is mine, now that you are ‘dead’, and you have no children to pass it on to) so that my wife and I may occasionally flick through them, recall these times and marvel at our cleverness. This scheme is so perfect, and you are so helpless…” he trailed off with a sigh, and gave his wife a smile. Yvette Winchester returned that smile with a vapid sort of adoration, whilst Angeline sat upon her bed, numb with shock.

  Walter continued: “And when we decide to have a child of our own, this little one of yours will be cast aside, left to fend for himself, as I was by our father. He will be miserable and alone, and it will be entirely your fault. Consider this, as you live out your life in that… institution.”

  It was the cry of her child that woke her from her daze. The little one’s heart-rending wail grew louder and louder with each passing second, perhaps knowing inwardly that it did not like this woman, this upstart pretender that was holding it. The four-month-old struggled in the arms of its aunt and managed to turn enough to hold his arms out towards his true mother as he screamed.

  Suddenly recollecting her thoughts, Angeline held her hands out and tried to yell, “You evil woman, give my baby back this instant!”

  Sadly, what came out was incomprehensible to those around her, and expressed nothing of the demand that screamed deafeningly within her mind.

  Her brother spoke again: “Now we say good-bye, little sister. Soon come the men in white to take you to your…” (here he grinned at his wife) “…new situation.”

  With pain that brought on tears, Angeline hastily withdrew the cannula from her arm and attempted to pursue her brother and sister-in-law down the hall. But she did not even make it out of her room, for the men in white were already there. Screaming, and weeping for the utter helplessness of her circumstances, Angeline Winchester was thus taken.

  With these thoughts in mind James suddenly realised that he had, once again, lost track of the time. Anger had made him forget where he was. Mentally kicking himself for this lapse in concentration, he scanned the seas above South America for the eastward-bending crescent of islands, beside which, all on its lonesome, should be the small island of Barbados.

  Luckily it was a perfectly clear day above the Atlantic and James was able to locate it quite quickly. He began his descent, at all times keeping his eyes on the western coast, looking for a relatively thinly populated coastline, where the trees to the east looked (from above) a little like veins. Spotting these, he carefully continued downwards, until at last, seeing a tiny blue speck a little inland (the hotel pool), James rapidly sped toward the ground.

  Now, that was all well and good – flying at an unbelievable speed across the Pacific, and finding Barbados and the Sandpiper Hotel. But here came the hard part (as he had no room number to start from): how was he to find Blythe and Domenic within such a large resort?

  Having explained away Andrew Harrison VI’s symptoms to the best of her ability, Esther Mason-Smith, along with Lilith Palmer, now accompanied the boy’s gurney into the emergency section at the Children’s Hospital at Westmead.

  “Do you think we came to the right hospital?” Esther asked Lilith.

  The little girl looked up at her with an expression bordering on shock.

  “What?” Esther said.

  “You’re asking me?”

  “Yeah…?”

  “Sorry!” Lilith shook her head in amazement. “It’s just that I’m not used to grown-ups actually believing me when I say strange things. And yeah, this looks like the right place.”

  “Good.” Esther nodded. They were then directed to the waiting room, and Esther murmured, “We’ll probably be here for a couple of hours, Lil – can I call you Lily? I can’t seem to say your name properly.”

  “A lily is a kind of flower, isn’t it?” Lilith asked.

  Esther gave a small smile and nod.

  “Okay. You can call me Lily. And I’m sorry, Miss Mason-Smith, but we’ll be here all night. They w
on’t move him up to the ward till morning.”

  “Ugh.” Esther groaned and attempted (unsuccessfully) to make herself more comfortable on the waiting room chair.

  Lilith leaned in closer to Esther and whispered, “He did drink a lot of…” (a nurse walked by) “…that stuff.” With a malicious giggle, she added, “He thought it was water. Ha!”

  Esther chuckled, then caught herself. “Now Lily, I know it looks like I don’t like Andrew Harrison, but don’t let that influence your–”

  “He’s a big meanie and he’s got this weird, disgusting crush on me…” (Lilith shuddered) “…and I’d hate him whether you did or not. I’d just like you better for it.”

  “He’s pretty awful, isn’t he?” Esther whispered.

  “Uh-huh!” Lilith nodded emphatically. She secretively added, “I don’t even call him Andrew, I call him Ew-Boy.”

  Esther laughed. “Well, don’t worry; gastric lavage isn’t the most pleasant thing in the world. They’ll be sticking a tube down Ew-Boy’s nose or throat to wash out his stomach.”

  Lilith Palmer grinned, and rubbed her hands together with malicious glee. Esther chuckled to herself as well, and as another nurse walked past both females instantly donned looks of polite concern.

  “Do you think they’ll say yes?” Lilith asked quietly.

  “You mean – your potential new parents? You’re not getting any… ‘feelings’ about it?”

  “It’s hard to–” Lilith appeared to struggle for the right words to explain her gift. “No. I can’t control them. They just happen. Or they don’t.”

  “Well, hopefully this will make you feel better about it. Turns out she’s my twin sister and I know at least three very good reasons why they might say yes.”

  “What are they?” Lilith eagerly asked.

  Esther held up three fingers and pushed them down as she explained. “One: she and Domenic owe James big-time. Two: Blythe is quite used to getting her own way. And three: well, let’s just say the third reason means she’d probably end up adopting someday anyway.”

  Esther spoke no more, and Lilith Palmer did not reply, but looked forward and knit her fingers together on her lap, letting her legs swing beneath her. Both were slightly anxious, yet unremarkably spared no thought whatsoever for the one who was currently terrorising the emergency staff and forcefully resisting treatment. Instead they thought of the determined little lad on his mission to Barbados – though nothing could touch him, and, if anything, he was a greater threat to the world at large than it was to him.

  James figured he had three options.

  First: he could zip about through all the rooms in the hotel and search Blythe and Domenic out. The problem with this was that he might accidentally see people in the middle of changing or showering or… something. Again, for a Secret Stealer, James Winchester IV was awful funny about privacy.

  His second option was to pick a spot (such as the lobby or the pool) and simply wait for them to turn up.

  Option three: he could just get really, really lucky.

  In the end it turned out to be a mixture of options two and three. No sooner had he claimed a vantage point in the upper corner of the lobby than Blythe and Domenic entered through its front doors, holding hands and beaming. The first thing James noticed was that Mr Mancini looked very odd indeed. He was not wearing his coat with tails, or his shiny shoes, but a loose Hawaiian shirt, board-shorts and sandals. James shook his head, thinking to himself that the tuxedo had looked much better. The second thing he noticed was the simple golden wedding bands both wore. He smiled, and felt truly happy for them.

  James followed the two at a reasonable distance, figuring it best to let them return to their room before speaking to them, lest they be viewed as lunatics by the other hotel guests. This plan turned out to be ever-so-slightly flawed, for as soon as they closed the door they started kissing. And not peck-on-the-lips kissing – no! – epic-love-story kissing.

  James screamed – he couldn’t help it – and covered his eyes.

  “AH!” Blythe screamed too, released Domenic and whirled around.

  “Whooa-aaa-a–” Domenic cried out in surprise and fell to the floor, aided by an accidental push from Blythe as she turned. “What’s wrong?” he demanded from the floor.

  “It’s James,” Blythe said.

  “Look, we’ve been over this–” Domenic started.

  “No, no – it’s James. He’s here.”

  “Oh!” Domenic began to smile as he struggled to pick himself up. “Hi, James,” he said and waved both hands vaguely in the direction that Blythe was looking. He murmured to Blythe, “Well, it’s good he came in now, and not in five or ten minutes.”

  “Shh!” Blythe glared at Domenic, blushed and lightly back-handed his chest.

  Domenic just grinned and laughed.

  James wondered vaguely what they were arguing about, but he was here with a purpose, so he did not waste time by asking for explanations. He turned to Blythe. “Do you have a pen and some paper?”

  Blythe retrieved said items from a nearby desk. Suddenly she looked puzzled. “Wait. What are these for? You can’t touch them.”

  “It’s for Mr Mancini, so he can hear what I’m saying. Trust me, it’ll save a lot of time. Make the pen write down what you hear.” Seeing Blythe’s quizzical expression, James explained, “It doesn’t involve me at all, so it doesn’t break any of the rules of the Secret Stealer curse. Or something like that. It was Miss Mason-Smith’s idea.”

  Blythe looked impressed. “Clever. Who’s Miss Mason-Smith?”

  “That’s your sister, dear,” Domenic said.

  “Oh, yes. I’d forgotten.” Blythe frowned, apparently unhappy that she had accidentally complimented her sister’s intelligence.

  “Can you do it?” James asked.

  “Of course I can. Just give me a minute to figure it out…” Blythe looked towards the roof and appeared for several moments to be calculating something. A few moments later she whispered something to the pen and handed it and the notepad to Domenic, saying with a frown, “I think that’ll do it. Say something, James.”

  “Miss Mason-Smith and I got your postcard, and I’ve decided on what I want you to help me with,” James said.

  Domenic held the notepad before him whilst the pen quickly scribbled down James’ words. “Well that was quick!” Domenic nodded. “Decisive. I like that.”

  James said, “I want you to adopt a girl from my class at school.”

  “I’m not sure this is translating to the page quite right,” Domenic said, and looked at Blythe. “Maybe it’s getting mixed up between your hearing and your brain and the pen. You have a strange brain, after all.”

  Blythe gazed back at him, remaining silent.

  Domenic said, with a chuckle, “Oh.”

  “You stole my deepest secret, tricked me into being cursed and invisible, took the Deceiver along with you and left me all alone. You kind of owe me,” James said matter-of-factly. Then he added, with an impish grin, “And you did say ‘anything’, in big capital letters.”

  “I knew that ‘anything’ would come back to bite us,” Domenic muttered.

  Blythe, James noticed then, looked rather pale. “James, would you please excuse us for a moment? I need to speak with my husband alone.”

  James nodded and vanished through the nearest wall. Then he re-entered the room from behind the bar in the corner – within earshot, but out of sight. He had eavesdropped on them before, he reasoned, it wouldn’t hurt too much to do it again.

  “‘Anything’, you said.” Domenic chuckled quietly.

  Blythe seemed to ignore this, and said eventually, “Aside from the… contract, there is another reason. It’s something I… haven’t told you.”

  There was a moment’s silence. “What is it?”

  There was another silence, even longer than before. “I… well… the truth is, Dom, there are some things that even Esther can’t fix.” Her voice became a little unsteady. “Est
her and I, we… we can’t have children. I’m sorry, Dom, I know you always wanted a little boy to dress up in tuxedoes and top hats, and take photos of and play with, but I just… can’t. I can’t give you that.”

  Silence again. He asked quietly, “Can you see secrets, too?”

  “No, you silly man!” Blythe laughed. “You don’t have to be a Secret Stealer to be able to figure things out.”

  “But I always pretended to hate kids! I mean, I actually really like that little James kid. After all, he’d look great in a tux.”

  A teary laugh from Blythe followed. “I’m sorry, Dom. I wasn’t sure how, or when, to tell you.”

  “You want to say yes to him, don’t you?” Domenic murmured.

  “Well, James is right, isn’t he? What if there’s another dry spell and he can’t find another Potential for 200 years, like you? He’s only a boy, Domenic, and he may just have to watch everyone he knows and loves die, like you had to.”

  “I didn’t love anyone, I was a silly fool.”

  “Well, James isn’t a silly fool, and he obviously loves my sister, at least. And when you think of what we may be putting him through, just so that we can be together, we do owe him. We owe him everything, Domenic.”

  “If that’s how you feel, then let’s do it. She’s in his class, right? That makes her about nine years old. We’ve skipped the messy nappy part; it can’t be all that hard, right?”

  “Who knows?” Blythe said resignedly. “And I’m sure it could be just as entertaining to dress up a little girl as a little boy.”

  Goodness gracious, thought James, the precious Lilith Palmer was not a doll.

  “You can come back in now, James!” Blythe called out.

  James carefully re-entered through the doorway.