by Chad Morris
Abby took in the man’s speech, analyzing as he went. “That’s terrible,” she said. “How could he think slaves are better off not knowing how to read?”
“I don’t know,” Derick said, pausing the scene. “But Douglass didn’t see education that way. Reading changed his life. Frederick believed that keeping him from learning was how they kept him a slave. He thought if he could learn to read, then he would be free—free to learn and experience other things outside of slavery. Mr. Auld made him even more determined.”
“But how would he learn?” Abby asked, gesturing toward the image of young Frederick. “It doesn’t look like Mrs. Auld was able to teach him anymore.”
“He grabbed sections of newspapers to read. He tricked people into spelling words for him. He was resourceful. It took years, but he learned.”
The whole thing felt like something Grandpa would want them to think about—one of his preachy lessons. “‘Freedom in books,’” Abby said. “I think it fits.”
“And there’s an armoire,” Derick said, pointing to a large hickory cabinet behind Mrs. Auld. He walked over to it in the paused scene. Grandpa said that they should check the top of an armoire. “Come on over, and I’ll give you a boost. Check the top.”
Derick lifted Abby up the best he could. She stood on his clasped hands, and steadied herself by grabbing the back of his head. It was awkward; he wouldn’t be able to hold her for long. On top of the ghost of an armoire was nothing but a piece of paper.
Something was written on the paper—a sentence or two. After reading only the first few words, Abby gasped; the note was in her grandfather’s handwriting.
How?
“It’s a message from Grandpa,” Abby blurted out and quickly read it aloud. “Remember the first clue. And remember how you used to play Jonathan Code and Kimberly Spy.”
“What?” Derick asked.
“Put me down,” Abby instructed, tapping Derick on the shoulder. He lowered her, and Abby stepped to the ground. “Grandpa wrote it. It’s definitely his handwriting, but somehow it’s on the armoire.”
“But how?”
“I don’t know,” Abby said.
Derick reached for the armoire, but his hand passed right through it. Same with the table and the painting on the wall. “This doesn’t make any sense.”
“I know,” Abby agreed. “Plus, I wasn’t expecting him to refer to our old games.” Growing up, she and Derick used to try to sneak past Grandpa without him noticing. They planted old smart phones to record conversations, and left each other secret messages that they had to piece together. She once cut up a bunch of letters from a newspaper, and Derick had to put them in the right order—back when one newspaper was actually printed on paper to try to bring back the old days. “Our spy names were terrible.”
“Kimberly Spy is a terrible name,” Derick agreed, “but Jonathan Code is ... I was going to say awesome, but it’s really just as bad.”
“Alright, Jonathan Code,” Abby said. “Get to work on this one.”
“Let’s see,” Derick said. “He told us to remember the first clue—‘In books we often begin a journey to find freedom.’ But then the second part of the clue has to do with the two of us pretending to be spies. What do they have to do with each other?”
“I don’t know,” Abby admitted. “Do you think there’s some sort of code we’re supposed to put together from this scene with Frederick Douglass?”
“I don’t know,” Derick said. “It couldn’t hurt to check.”
The twins spent the next twenty minutes scanning the scene again and again. Of course, they started with the armoire. Then they reread the note countless times and looked for any clues in the note, but they couldn’t find anything. They looked through the rest of the armoire, which held several vases and decorative cups, but nothing to give them any hints. They watched the scene three more times just to be sure. Abby typed notes about everything they thought might be some sort of a message—the words Frederick Douglass repeated, the headlines on the one-page paper near the chair in the living room, even the names of Frederick and the Aulds. As they left, they were filled with information, but felt no closer to solving the clue.
“I don’t get it,” Abby said, sitting down and putting her head in her hands.
Derick looked at his watch. “We’ve already missed dinner, and we’ve only got a few minutes to get back to our dorms before curfew. We can use the Bridges there, but we’ll have to split up.”
Abby nodded.
“Let’s see what we can do on our own tonight, then meet right here an hour before breakfast,” Derick said.
The two walked along the pathway. Abby thought about their insane day. Her parents and her grandfather were missing, and she’d learned that there was some sort of great secret she needed to find. She wanted to collapse and cry.
“Sleep on it,” Derick said, and turned toward the boys’ dorm.
Abby stopped cold, only now realizing that she still had nowhere to sleep.
15
Roommate
Abby walked back to her dorm, figuring she’d have to sleep in the linen closet. At least that way, no one would yell at her. She had a lot to think about. But when she came up the elevator chute, there was a crowd of girls in the hall.
“There she is,” a girl whispered as Abby approached.
“I’m not changing rooms for her,” another added.
“Alright, alright,” a voice at the front of the room said. “We need to resolve a certain problem before you can go to bed.” Abby had heard the voice before—articulate and confident—but couldn’t quite place it. “Is Abby Cragbridge here?”
Couldn’t the day just end? Couldn’t she just sleep with the linens and disappear? Abby raised her hand and started passing through the crowd of girls. She was only halfway through when she recognized the voice—Ms. Entrese.
“Hello, dear,” Ms. Entrese said. She turned to the crowd of girls. “I don’t think there is a more tactful way to say this. I believe everyone is aware that Abby was kicked out of her dorm room last night. Jacqueline refused to sleep in the same room with her when she discovered that Abby was admitted to this institution largely on the reputation of her grandfather.”
The words stung. It hurt for Jacqueline to kick her out because she’d gotten accepted because of her grandfather, but to hear a teacher state it just as matter-of-factly as she would facts for an upcoming test, cut deep. If Abby hadn’t had much bigger things on her mind, she might have broken down.
“I’ve arranged,” Ms. Entrese continued, “for someone to take Abby’s place in Jacqueline’s room, but what we need to discuss is whether anyone of you would voluntarily take Abby into your room.”
Abby went from depressed to embarrassed. She couldn’t have felt more awkward. Was she on auction? The only thing worse than Ms. Entrese’s words was the silence that followed. No one moved. Abby looked at the girls, but they all avoided her gaze—except for Jacqueline, who looked her in the eyes, beaming.
“I will,” a voice came from the back, breaking the silence. “Sorry, I would have spoken up earlier, but I was in the bathroom. You know you just can’t wait about some things. And, by the way, I don’t know about you girls, but Jacqueline pulled me aside and tried to convince me not to room with Abby. Though she was really friendly and even kind of persuasive, I mean, she offered me a new wardrobe, and she’s got some really cute stuff—especially this pink V- neck that kind of gathers on the sides. But despite the cuteness, I just don’t feel good about that. Don’t you think that’s low?”
Abby didn’t need to see her face. She knew who it was.
“I like Abby,” Carol continued. “I think she’s fun to talk to. Well, maybe I do most of the talking. That’s what my mom tells me all the time, but my mom talks a lot too. I mean I probably get it from her, but anyway, Abby is great. Plus her twin brother is hot. I mean like lava-burning-into-gas-in-the-center-of-the-sun hot. So you know, this might lead to a friendship or somethin
g more. You know, good friendships. Good networking.”
Relief swept over Abby. Someone had stood up for her. And she’d finally have a place to sleep.
Then again, the way Carol talked, maybe Abby wouldn’t get much sleep. Abby didn’t care, though she couldn’t help but wonder if Carol’s former roommate was relieved.
“Alright, alright,” Ms. Entrese said. “Bless you for taking in this poor thing. We may have to shift around a few more room assignments to make this happen, but we’ll get it done. You’ll only have an extra half hour to get your things moved, then into bed.”
• • •
“So, what happened?” Carol asked, helping Abby carry one of her suitcases. “I’ve been worried about you all day. I haven’t been this worried since I lost my rings at a party, and the boy who was throwing it—Garrett Shaw—I think he was kind of into me, and I had to go back over to his house to look for them, but I was worried he thought I left them there on purpose just to have an excuse to see him again. And he’s nice, but you know ... I wasn’t interested. So anyway, what did you find out?”
It felt wonderful for Abby to have someone ask about her, to wonder about her. The whole day felt like a huge load Abby had carried by herself ever since she’d said goodnight to Derick, but somehow the burden seemed a little lighter. But how should she answer Carol’s question? Carol didn’t know about the clue or the note, but she knew about the locket.
“Oh, I had to check up on my grandpa,” Abby said, purposely being vague.
“Next time, let me know, because I’d love to meet him. I’m not becoming your friend just so I can meet him—that would be extremely shallow, like when this girl named Stephanie was really nice to me, until I brought her on set for Halvishem’s Eve. Turned out, she just wanted to get in front of the director. After she met him and got an audition for another web series he was doing, she never talked to me again. At least, when I tried talking to her again, she said I talk too much, and that I was annoying, which isn’t the first time I’ve heard it. And I don’t think it’s entirely true—at least not all the time. Anyway, that’s not why I’m friends with you.”
“Okay,” Abby said, as she bent down to pull her last case into their room. It was three times as heavy as the others.
“Let me help,” Carol said and grabbed the handle. She grunted with her first pull. “What the Valhalla is in this thing, rocks?” She struggled to pull the last case into the room.
“Books,” Abby said.
“Really?” Carol asked. “Like real books? You do know that you can read billions of them just by using your rings, right?”
“Yeah,” Abby said, “It’s just that my grandpa ...” Abby didn’t finish her thought. Something suddenly made sense. “Remember the first clue,” she whispered to herself. “‘In books we often begin a journey to find freedom.’”
“What the heck? Are you like woozy in the brain?” Carol asked. “Because there was this one time that I met this insane—”
“No,” Abby interrupted. “I have to figure out something, and I think it has to do with the books my grandfather gave me.” Abby blinked away a few tears. She was surprised she had any left.
“Okay,” Carol said. “Just don’t go crazy on me, or I’m going to seriously reconsider being roommates. I mean, crazy people are okay, even entertaining, in their little crazy-
people hospitals, and sometimes on public transportation, but I don’t want to room with one.”
“I’m not crazy,” Abby said. “My grandpa trusted me to figure something out, and I think it has to do with the books he gave me. It’s the only way I can think of that he could possibly control where we’d look for clues.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Carol said.
The first clue was about a book that he gave Derick, so maybe the rest of it is in actual books too, ones Grandpa gave them. Books—plural—lead to freedom. It would make sense. If Grandpa knew he was going to give them clues, he could put them in books he knew they would have. And that way, he would know that if someone intercepted his messages, they wouldn’t be able to figure out the entire thing. Abby opened her case and found her copy of To Kill a Mockingbird. She handed it to Carol. “Would you mind looking through this for ... anything unusual?”
“Okay.” Carol grabbed the book. “You realize that this is strange. I thought you were going to prove that you weren’t crazy.”
Abby didn’t say anything, so Carol leafed through the pages.
“Boo Radley is a weird name,” Carol said, pointing at a page. “But I kind of like it. Maybe I should name one of my kids Boo Radley.” Carol looked up from the book. “Ichabod Crane is also a fun name to say. Oh, and ...”
Abby pulled out a copy of a biography on George Washington. “I’ll take this one.”
“Do you have any idea what I might be looking for?” Carol asked.
“I’m not sure ...” Abby said. She looked at the words carefully. “If Grandpa really wanted us to catch something, he’d have to give us a hint. These books are filled with information.”
Both of them thumbed through the pages for several minutes.
“Huh. That’s strange,” Carol said. “The a in this sentence is circled.” She pointed to a specific spot on the page. “Is that what I’m supposed to find?”
“Maybe,” Abby said, “but what kind of a clue is a circled a?”
“It doesn’t tell us much, does it?” Carol said. “The whole sentence says, ‘Most people are when you really see them.’ And the a in are is circled. It’s on the very last page. I think someone is saying that most people are really nice, even though they misunderstand and do really hurtful things.”
“Sounds like something Grandpa would like,” Abby said. “Look through again; see if there are any other circled letters.”
A minute later, Abby cried out, “Found one!” She pointed to a page. “Check this out!” she said, and pointed to an l with a box drawn around it. “But that one has a box, not a circle,” Carol said. “What does it mean?”
Abby didn’t answer, but she began unloading her books. For the next hour, the two of them leafed through them all, looking for any letter that had been marked. Some had boxes, some circles, some were underlined, and some had been double underlined. They made a chart of each of the letters and how they were highlighted.
Had these markings always been there? They must have been. Abby hadn’t read all of these books, but had she just glossed over the markings in the others? They did seem familiar. Maybe she had seen them, but had been lost enough in the story she hadn’t really noticed them.
“Is it a scrambled message?” Carol asked.
“Just like Derick and I used to play. That was what he meant by ‘Jonathan Code and Kimberly Spy,’” Abby said. “The way Grandpa marked the letters could mean that they’re separate words. But then, what would D, E, R, and C spell?”
“Cerd. Ercd. Recd,” Carol tried.
“Those aren’t words,” Abby said. “Maybe Red C.”
“But that’s two words. Why would they be circled like that?”
Abby thought about it. “And the boxed ones don’t spell anything either. Lah? Ahl? Hal?
“Hal? Who do we know named Hal? It doesn’t exactly sound mysterious. There was a guy named Hal back home who owned the QuickPit. They had really good slushies! Oh, I’m really hungry all of a sudden.”
The two logged onto their rings and looked for anyone with any connection to Grandpa named Hal. They couldn’t find anyone who had a close relationship. There were a couple of bloggers posting pictures and talking about Grandpa’s work, but that was it.
“Even if we find a connection,” Abby said, “the other letters don’t make any sense. The double underlined column has only one letter.”
Carol proposed that maybe the way Grandpa marked them in the books didn’t matter, and that the message was just one long, scrambled phrase, but they couldn’t unscramble it, nor could any of the net applications they acc
essed.
Finally, both girls fell asleep on the floor, surrounded by open books.
16
The Debate
Derick sat in the Bridge in his dorm. He stared at the armoire behind the young Frederick Douglass. No way was he going to sleep. He couldn’t forget about the paper in his grandfather’s handwriting they’d found on top of the armoire. How was it possible? There seemed to be absolutely no explanation for it.
He paced the room, stealing occasional glances at the wardrobe. Could there be some sort of connection between watching something in the Bridge and the past itself?
Derick changed screens with his rings. He searched for the words Oscar Cragbridge and time. Immediately several articles and videos appeared about the Bridge, explaining how it merely portrayed images from the past, but did not actually go into the past. Another article made a big deal about how the plans weren’t public and how no other scientist had been able to replicate the Bridge. Derick looked at the bottom corner of his view—over 200,000 search results. He could imagine that most of the entries were more of the same. The Bridge had always been big news.
He knew it seemed crazy, but after a day like the one he’d had, anything was worth trying. He added a word so his search read Oscar Cragbridge time travel. He glanced through the first hundred results—more of the same. He moved the screen to show the last results. On the last page, he found a reference to a university newspaper from nearly thirty-five years ago. He scanned the summary.
Back then, some people had theorized that time travel could really be possible. The university had held debates, and among those who spoke was Oscar Cragbridge.
Derick looked at the year and did the math. His grandfather must have still been a professor then. Derick read the synopsis. The writer quoted Grandpa only once: “We shouldn’t waste our time trying to change the past,” Grandpa was quoted as saying. “But learn from it and move ahead.”
