Spyhole Secrets

by Zilpha Keatley Snyder

  The thing was, Mom and Ellen had been in art shows together before, and what usually happened was that lots of people bought Ellen’s huge blurry landscapes and hardly anyone bought Mom’s small, neat still lifes and portraits.

  The talk about paintings was still going on when the Volvo turned onto Green Street. Ellen pulled over to the curb and said, “Okay, Hallie. Out you go. The Goldbergs are counting on you for lunch. Emma says Marty’s so excited she can’t see straight.”

  So then came knocking on the Goldbergs’ front door and lots of kisses from Marty and her parents, not to mention Beowolf, their humongous Russian wolfhound. Lunch was okay because Marty and her parents only talked about things that were happening in Bloomfield, like the new mall and the computer classrooms at Hill Creek Middle School. But then her parents went back to work and Marty took Hallie out to the porch swing for a private talk. Just the way she always used to do, Marty tucked her long legs up under her, rubbed her nose with the back of her hand, and grinned her sideways grin before she began to talk.

  At first it felt okay. Hallie was glad to be sitting on the Goldbergs’ porch swing again, talking to Marty. At first, but not for very long, because things were not the same and it was no use trying to pretend they were. And it soon became obvious that Marty was pretending much too hard. So the anger had begun to churn around deep down in the pit of Hallie’s stomach even before Marty started to run down Hill Creek Middle School.

  “Oh, school? It’s okay, I guess,” Marty said. “An awful lot of homework, though. Lots more than we ever had at Lincoln. And some of the teachers are really old-fashioned and strict.” She shrugged and sighed and, watching Hallie out of the corners of her eyes, went on, “I guess you’re really lucky to be going to school in Irvington.”

  That was a lie and they both knew it. Marty had always been a good student and, just the other day, on the phone, her mother had told Hallie’s mom how much she liked Hill Creek.

  Hallie was getting the picture. The things Marty was saying were just a bunch of lies that were supposed to make Hallie feel better about having to leave Bloomfield. As if Marty thought she was too much of a mental case to deal with the truth.

  And it got worse when Marty started talking about Irvington Middle School. Saying things like “I’ve heard that sixth graders at Irvington can sign up for drama classes, and there’s a skiing field trip in February. You’re going to go, aren’t you? I wish Hill Creek had a ski trip. And drama classes. I’d really like that.” That last part, at least, was the truth. Marty had always wanted to be an actress.

  Hallie shrugged and said she guessed she would go on the ski trip. She’d made up her mind not to gripe about Irvington to Marty, even if she had to tell some humongous lies about all the new friends she was making and stuff like that. But by then she was so fed up with Marty’s treating her like some kind of a basket case, she suddenly decided she was through with pretending. “It’s the pits,” she said. “I hate it.”

  That did it. Right away Marty stopped even trying to act normal. Untucking her legs, she sat up straight and began to talk the way she had at the funeral, as if Hallie were some kind of pitiful psycho who might start bouncing off the walls if anybody said the wrong thing to her.

  For the next few minutes Marty went on and on, sounding exactly like the counselor Hallie had been taken to see right after the accident. Hallie listened in amazement to the same Marty who used to make up private languages so nobody else could understand what she and Hallie were talking about. And crazy stuff like having a secret hand signal that meant that the next thing you said was going to mean just the opposite. That same Marty went on and on in some kind of school counselor-speak. “I know how that must make you feel. But just you wait. My mom says she had to go to a lot of different schools when she was growing up, and she says all you have to do is hang in there for a little while and …”

  But by then Hallie had all she could take of Marty the psychologist, so she just tuned her out and started thinking about something else. Like why she’d ever imagined she might be able to tell Marty about her secret spyhole and what she’d been seeing through it. As soon as she possibly could she started pretending that she was expected back at Ellen’s right away.

  It was a long way from the Goldbergs’ house to Ellen’s, particularly if you took a detour down Hillview Street as far as number 309. By the time she got to Ellen’s, a couple of hours had passed, and Ellen and Mom had been worrying about her.

  “Why on earth did you do such a thing?” Ellen roared as she pounced on Hallie like an angry pit bull. “Worrying your poor mother like that. You know I’d have come to pick you up if you’d called me.” She was holding on to Hallie’s shoulders as if she were about to shake the living daylights out of her, and for a second Hallie really wished she would. Wished Ellen would shake her really hard so she could yell back at her and throw herself on the ground and have a real screaming tantrum. But Ellen didn’t do any actual shaking, so all Hallie could say was “Yeah, I know. It turned out to be a dumb idea.”

  Actually, it had been a whole lot dumber than Ellen knew, or could even imagine. Maybe it had been pretty stupid not to think about Mom and Ellen wondering where she was and worrying about her. But it was even dumber to walk all that way to 309 Hillview Street just to stand there outside the fence staring at the house where she used to live, and at a couple of little kids playing on the jungle gym Dad built for her. And dumbest of all, for some reason, was staring at one of Zeus’s beat-up old tennis balls that was still lying under the hedge right where he’d probably left it the day his new owners came to get him.

  Mom said Hallie never should have gone to Bloomfield that Saturday, because the way she’d been acting ever since was “absolutely impossible.” Hallie supposed she was right. She was right about one part of it, at least: the part about how it had been a mistake for Hallie to go back. But as for “acting impossible,” she could see nothing different about the way she’d been acting.

  “What do you mean, impossible?” she asked icily. “How could I possibly do something that’s impossible?”

  Her mother sighed angrily. “That’s what I mean. Impossibly touchy and quarrelsome and sarcastic.” She turned her face away and motioned over her shoulder for Hallie to go away. So Hallie did.

  In her room, Hallie sat on her bed and tried not to think about what Mom had said and whether it was really true. After a while she began to think that maybe she had been touchy lately, and maybe she was sorry about it, but there was no way she was going to be able to say so. What she did instead was to go out and ask Mom if there was anything she needed at the store, which in a way was a kind of apology, if only because of the way she said it.

  All she actually said was “Hey, Mom. I really need to go to the library. You know, to work on my essay for social studies. I could stop at the store on the way home if there’s anything we need.” Her smile felt almost real as she went on, “Didn’t you say we were out of milk?”

  Looking surprised, Mom opened her mouth to say something, but Hallie hurried on. “So would it be okay if I did some shopping?”

  Mom definitely looked pleased. Surprised at first, but then mostly pleased. “Why, yes. That would be a big help,” she said. “We are out of milk, and the bread is almost gone too.”

  So that was how it happened that maybe half an hour later Hallie was sitting at a big library table in the East branch of the Irvington Public Library, reading up on the Sinai Peninsula in a junior edition encyclopedia. It wasn’t too interesting, just kids’ stuff, but when she tried to bring an adult encyclopedia into the children’s room the librarian told her she couldn’t. Hallie didn’t see why not and she said so.

  “Oh yeah?” she’d said. “They always let me in Bloomfield. In the Bloomfield library I got to read any encyclopedia I wanted to.”

  So then the librarian, whose name was Mrs. Myers, said that must have been nice, but rules were rules, and that here in East Irvington the adult encyclopedias we
re for adults to use. Hallie thought of a sarcastic remark she might have made, but instead she only shrugged and turned away.

  It didn’t take long to make notes on the material in the junior edition. Hallie was almost finished when a squeaky voice said, “Excuse me. Could I ask you something?”

  For just a second she didn’t know where the voice was coming from. Not from the old man at the end of the table, which only left whoever it might be almost out of sight behind the big stack of books directly across from where she was sitting.

  “Yeah?” she said more or less in the direction of the book pile. “What did you say?”

  The top of a head appeared then, brown hair and big dark eyes. “I said, could I ask you something?”

  “Yeah?” Hallie said. “Like what?”

  More face appeared over the wall of books. A small, toothy mouth and then a pointed chin. “Like, could I see that S encyclopedia when you’re through with it?”

  She remembered then that she had noticed the kid as she sat down, but just barely. Mostly what she’d noticed was the big pile of books in front of him. A kind of book barricade that had almost hidden him until he sat up straighter and stretched his neck a little.

  When she did get a better look at him she was surprised, because he looked so young, for one thing. Probably not more than eight or nine years old. Not nearly old enough for the kinds of books he was reading—or at least hiding behind. Hallie couldn’t see any of the titles, but there seemed to be several junior edition encyclopedias plus a lot of the kind of big old dusty volumes you had to ask the reference librarian for. So when the kid’s funny face poked up from behind his book barricade and asked for her S volume, Hallie couldn’t help grinning.

  “Sure,” she said, “when I get through with it.” She looked his stack of books up and down before she asked, “You in a big hurry? Looks to me like you’ve got enough there to keep you busy for a while.”

  The kid glanced at the books before he nodded and said, “Well, I’ve already read most of these. At least the parts I’m interested in.”

  “Oh yeah?” Hallie teased with a grin. “Let’s see. What parts are you interested in?” She turned her encyclopedia and studied the letter S. “Oh, I get it. Like S for sex? You looking for sexy stuff?”

  The kid looked at her for a while before he shook his head. Not angrily like she’d expected, and not embarrassed either. Just a kind of curious stare before he said, “Is that what you’re reading about?”

  “Who, me?” Hallie put on an offended expression. “For your information, I happen to be reading about the Sinai Peninsula. S-I-N-A-I, with a capital S. Get it?”

  “Oh.” He nodded thoughtfully. “The Sinai Peninsula. Is the Sinai Peninsula interesting to read about?”

  “Yeah, sure. Real interesting. So how about you? If you’re not reading about sexy stuff, what are you reading about?”

  Looking around at all the books, he nodded and said, “Psychiatry mostly. So far I’ve mostly been reading about psychiatry.”

  Hallie let him see she was having a hard time keeping herself from laughing out loud. “Psychiatry doesn’t start with an S.” She giggled.

  “I know.” He held up a P encyclopedia. “I’ve finished with psychiatry for now. Next I want to read about shamanism.”

  “Shamanism?”

  He nodded, pointing at her S encyclopedia. “That’s why—”

  “Shhh!” The man at the other end of the table was staring angrily. “Will you kids shut up!” Hallie made her return stare say maybe she would and maybe she wouldn’t.

  But when she turned back to her fellow perpetrator, he’d disappeared behind his books again. Only the top of his head was showing behind the barricade, the top of a small round head covered with a furry crop of thick brown hair. Hallie stared in amazed recognition. But then, before sneaking suspicion could translate itself into for-sure-and-certain, the boy was on his feet and walking away. The smallish eight-or nine-year-old boy was moving quickly, with a lively, bouncy walk, toward the library door.

  “Hey, wait!” Hallie called after him, and then, glancing back at the fiercely frowning old man, she cupped her hands around her mouth and whispered it again. “Hey, wait for me!” But he didn’t, so after hurriedly gathering up her books, Hallie ran after him.

  Outside on the front steps, she stopped to look up and down the street. Up and down, but mostly up, toward Warwick Avenue and the Warwick Towers apartment building. And sure enough, there he was, bouncing along quickly, almost at the corner of Abbot Street. She followed at a run, down Larsen Street, the short block on Abbot, and then onto Warwick Avenue. She was close to catching up, only a few yards behind, when he disappeared into the lobby of the Warwick Towers apartment building.

  So she’d been right. The small, fuzzy brown head that had appeared from behind a stack of books in the East branch library was almost certainly the same head that had emerged from behind the love seat in the spyhole apartment. And if that was true, what about the monster in the horrible mask? There was something about the lively, limber way the little monster had bobbed around the room that made her think there might be a connection there too. And if there was—that meant that one of the people who lived in the spyhole apartment was a boy who went around wearing a mask and who hid behind the furniture in order to spy on a bunch of angry adults. And who also read big old books about psychiatry and—what was it he wanted the S encyclopedia for?— oh yes, shamanism.

  Shamanism. The word sounded vaguely familiar. On her way back down Larsen Street to the grocery store, Hallie tried to remember what it meant, without much success. So when she passed the library she popped back in again and found out.

  Shaman, the dictionary said: a priest-doctor who uses magic to cure the sick, to divine the hidden, and to control events that affect the welfare of others.

  So that was what it was with the mask—the weird little creature she’d seen struggling with Rapunzel had been a witch doctor? Or maybe Rapunzel’s little brother pretending he was one? Yeah, that probably was it. The kid had been pretending to be a shaman, maybe putting some kind of witch-doctor spell on Rapunzel, and she hadn’t exactly appreciated it. Picturing what the scene must have been like if she’d caught him doing it, Hallie was surprised to find herself chuckling.

  Back in the apartment, Hallie took the milk and bread to the kitchen, and when her mother asked she said yes, she’d gotten the information she needed at the library. “Yeah. I found out some interesting stuff,” she said. She couldn’t help smiling a little as she added, “Really interesting.”

  The essay on the Sinai Peninsula went pretty well, except that now and then the writing was interrupted by some questions that weren’t answered in the textbook or in the encyclopedia. Questions like why would a kid want to dress up like a witch doctor? And what had been going on right before Rapunzel dragged him into the living room? Had she been telling his father on him, and if so, what did his father do to him? And what did he find out when he hid behind the love seat and spied on the three angry adults?

  There was a lot she didn’t know and wanted very much to learn. But going to the spyhole was out, at least for the time being. Not while her mother was at home. And later, after her mother had finally gone to sleep, the spyhole rooms would undoubtedly be dark and deserted.

  So she’d have to wait to find out more. She would wait until Monday, a school day, when there would be that hour and a half before her mom got home. Of course, Monday was also the beginning of another exciting week at good old Irvington Middle School. It didn’t seem possible that she was looking forward to it, but in a way she was. Or at least to the other things that might happen on Monday.

  Monday morning finally came, and Hallie got a B-minus on her essay on the Sinai Peninsula, which was an improvement, even though it would have been one of her lousier grades back in Bloomfield. And what was more, she managed to get through the day without attracting the attention of any of her terrorist-in-training classmates. She might
actually have felt like celebrating except that her mind was on something else most of the time—or maybe someone else. Someone she started trying to locate as soon as school was out.

  Her plan, which she’d been working on all day, was to head for the corner of Warwick and Bruce Street, where anyone coming from the elementary school and heading toward Warwick Avenue was likely to cross. As soon as her last class was dismissed she started for Bruce Street at a run, but she must have been too late, because the fuzzy-headed kid never showed up. Maybe he’d skipped school that day. Or maybe he went to another school, like St. Paul’s at the other end of town.

  Anyway, since he didn’t show up, she finally decided to forget it, at least for the time being. But just in case, she went on waiting at the corner for at least another fifteen minutes before she headed home. Home to the cell block and, even though it was late, to the attic spyhole.

  She hurried across the attic. The far corners of the long, empty space were oozing ominous shadows, but with her mother due home in less than an hour there just wasn’t time to worry about ghosts. And once she was seated on the old trunk, leaning forward to the blue-glass spyhole, she forgot about ghosts and dry, dusty heat and everything else.

  However, the living room of the little witch doctor’s apartment was disappointingly empty. And it stayed that way until her time was up and she had to run downstairs to wait for her mother.

  The next day at school started out pretty much as usual, but during lunch hour Hallie sat with Erin and another new girl named Jolene. The first time Jolene talked with Hallie alone, she brought up the subject of Hallie’s father. They had been on their way to science class when Jolene said she thought it was really the pits about Hallie’s father and the big freeway pileup.