“Crutchley?” I said, remembering the car that had followed us. What had happened since then had blotted it out of my mind. “I think Crutchley was following me and—following me home today,” I said. “The same way they were threatening Henry the other night. It was kind of scary. What do you want to talk to them about?”
She came inside and slammed the door, then turned back to me. “Don’t just stand there! Can’t you see how much I’m carrying?”
She wasn’t going to tell me about Crutchley; she wasn’t concerned about the threat to me. And she was behaving as though everything were normal. It was clear: She hadn’t noticed what had happened this afternoon.
After I had helped Aunt Ruth, Linda called with a message for Jeff. After calling him, I closed myself in my room, thinking hard. As far as I could tell, everybody else was unaware of what had happened to time today. Nobody but Henry and me had noticed anything at all.
I could understand why I was aware of the slowdown and immune to its effects: I was part of the process that had caused it, part of the “three-in-one.” My connection to the clock had kept me outside the slowdown I helped it create. But why hadn’t Henry been trapped in the slowdown like the rest of the world?
I was baffled, sitting tensely on my bed, the closet door firmly closed.
I was also worried about Crutchley. Why had Aunt Ruth suddenly decided to talk to them herself, in private, instead of using me to avoid them?
Had they promised her something she didn’t want me to know about?
CHAPTERN TEN
I couldn’t concentrate on anything in school the next morning. Everything gnawed at me like Pandora’s unleashed evils. Part of me felt horribly guilty for betraying Uncle Marco by telling Henry about the boxes. How could I ever make up for it? Uncle Marco would probably never forgive me.
But another part of me kept my eyes on the clock, counting the minutes until lunch, when I could talk to Henry. How could I not have told him? He was the only other person who had shared that terrifying, unbelievable experience with me. He was my passport to sanity—if it weren’t for him, I would have to be crazy. We had to discuss it, compare notes—and try to understand why it had happened to Henry, too, and not just me.
I spotted him just as I was entering the cafeteria. He was coming in through the opposite doorway, tall and thin in black jeans and a faded blue sweat shirt. Across the large room, our eyes locked. We hurried toward each other, ignoring the kids moving back and forth between us, not moving our eyes from each other’s faces.
When we reached each other, we clasped our hands together, not thinking about the other kids.
“Are you hungry?” Henry asked me.
I shook my head.
“Then let’s get out of here.”
We passed Linda and Jeff waiting in the lunch line. “Where are you two going?” Linda wanted to know, sounding like she was accusing us of something.
Henry didn’t let me answer. “We have an errand. Can’t cover for you today. See you later,” he said quickly, not stopping. He pulled me forward before they could ask any more questions—and before I had a chance to give in and do what they wanted me to do. This was a purposeful side to Henry that I hadn’t been aware of before. “Yesterday, at school and at band and on the way home,” he said as we made our way out of the noisy cafeteria, “everything was slow, right?”
I nodded.
“But it didn’t seem huge, impossible,” he went on. “It was more kind of like the feeling you have when you’re sick, with a fever or something, kind of dizzy, out of it. Is that the way you felt?”
“Yes,” I said, nodding again.
The auditorium was across the hall from the cafeteria. It was often locked, but Henry dropped my hand and tried the door anyway. Today it opened.
We peered inside. There were some folding chairs on the stage, but the place seemed to be empty for the moment Henry ushered me into the high-ceilinged, dimly lit space, down the sloping aisle to the middle. We slid into the first two seats in a row.
He was still talking. “But then, after I got home, then it got ...” He lifted his hands, unable to express the enormity of it. “Like, everything just stopped.”
I thought of something. “What about that car that was following us? Did it keep after you all the way home?”
“No.” He looked worried. “It stopped and waited in front of your house. Didn’t you notice?”
“No. A lot of other things were going on.”
“Another one was waiting in front of my house when I got home. I pointed it out to my mother before she left. Maybe I shouldn’t have.”
“Why not?”
“They might be thinking of selling.”
“Funny,” I said. “Aunt Ruth wanted to talk to Crutchley herself yesterday. She usually avoids them. Maybe she’s giving in, too.”
He sighed. “But that’s not what we’re talking about now. Lucky thing Mom left before it started!” He shook his head, his eyes wide.
“What do you mean?”
“When my folks got home, they hadn’t noticed anything—just like everybody else. So if they’d been at home when everything stopped except you and me, how do you think I would have looked to them?”
This had not occurred to me. “I guess ... it would have looked to them like you were a blur, flashing around like lightning. Wow.”
“You were alone, too, right? Or else you’d be in some kind of trouble.”
“Yeah, I was alone—sort of. I mean, at least there were no other people there. It was a good thing.” I paused. “It’s funny, but for some reason I don’t want anybody else to know.” I coughed nervously. “I mean, two people, so we know we’re not going crazy. That’s enough.”
He took my hand again and squeezed it. My first impulse was to pull it away. But the way he was suddenly smiling now was so infectious that I didn’t take my hand away; I squeezed back. We just sat there grinning at each other, like we were the only two people in the world. In a way, we were. And even though I was scared about everything that was happening, I still couldn’t help feeling good about Henry at that moment—real good.
He looked away, releasing my hand, and cleared his throat. “But time is normal now, as far as I can tell,” he said. “The bell won’t wait. What were you telling me on the phone yesterday, about the boxes doing it?” He seemed reluctant to ask. Maybe he was afraid to risk breaking the good feeling between us by finding out I was crazy after all.
I felt guilty about Uncle Marco, but what choice did I have? Henry was the only person I could turn to. And so I told him everything that had happened yesterday afternoon—and how time had ground to a stop just after the delivery I made.
Henry stared at me, looking pale in the dim auditorium light. “This is for real, Annie?” he finally said.
“How could I make up something that crazy?” I asked him. “Anyway, is it any more unbelievable than what you saw with your own eyes?”
He thought for a moment. “No, I guess not. Gee, that’s a lot for you to be dealing with,” he said with concern. “I’ve got to see the boxes. Then we can both share all of it.”
“Okay, Henry.” I didn’t feel so guilty about Uncle Marco now. I just felt lucky that Henry really was such a nice guy. “I think it’s good that we’re in this together, but I have to say, I don’t understand why. I mean, why is it happening to you and not just me? You got any ideas?”
The bell rang. Henry got up. “No. But I’ll think about it. We can talk more after school.”
I couldn’t avoid Linda, who sat next to me in English. “So what was that all about?” she said as we were sitting down. “Skipping lunch? With Henry?” I had told her before that I didn’t like Henry the way he liked me.
I didn’t know what to say.
Then I thought of a subject I knew Linda wouldn’t want to hear about—I was beginning to understand her, finally. “It’s a problem I’m having about something Uncle Marco left me. I didn’t think you’d be interested.
But Henry was. If only you knew how much I miss Uncle Marco! Want me to tell you—”
Miss Rothschild started to talk and Linda turned away. I could see her mentally rolling her eyes. I smiled to myself.
“Nobody following us today,” Henry said after we’d gone a few blocks from school. “What does that mean?”
“Did your parents say anything to you about Crutchley?” I asked him. “Aunt Ruth kept her phone call a secret from me.”
“They didn’t. But they’re hiding something. I can tell.”
I nodded unhappily as we walked through the stone gate to our neighborhood. What would happen if Aunt Ruth sold the house to Crutchley and they tore it down? I loved the house. And without it, would Uncle Marco ever come back? What would happen to the boxes, which were more powerful than anyone would believe? The clock would do something terrible to the world if they tried to wreck the house; I could feel it.
I looked around at the big bare trees and the frozen lawns, the imposing brick and stone houses. It was beautiful here in a way that could never be replaced. The world already had more than enough malls.
“Aunt Ruth came home early yesterday,” I told Henry as I let him inside the house. It was just after three now. “She usually doesn’t come back until five-thirty, but who knows what she’s going to do anymore? She’s checking on me. So we better hurry.”
Still, Henry stopped briefly to look around. “Great house,” he murmured. “I love the stairway and the stained glass window.”
I took him down to the basement first. Halfway down the steps he jolted, then stopped. “Huh?” he said in the darkness, sounding scared.
“You’re not going crazy,” I said. “I told you, you can only understand them inside your head. ESP. Come on.”
At the bottom I reached up automatically and pulled on the light. Henry looked shaky, confused. “They’re over here in the root cellar,” I said.
As we approached, the sonar and alien voices filled my head. But I had no awareness of any sensations from Henry’s mind. Henry? I projected. Hey, Henry? It’s Annie. This is the real me.
There was no response. It seemed that the ESP worked only between humans and the creatures, but not between humans. I have to admit I was a little disappointed—naturally I was curious to know what Henry was thinking.
But I had been curious about the boxes, too, and look what had happened. It might be better not to know exactly what was going on inside another person’s head.
“Be sure to bow just like I do when you see them,” I whispered to Henry. “They don’t like it if you don’t greet them right.”
I hadn’t been down here since the beginning of the slowdown yesterday. Even before entering the root cellar I could sense that something was very different in there. “Wait. Don’t come in yet,” I whispered to Henry. I squeezed through the left-hand side of the doorway—the rest of it seemed to be blocked—and reached up and turned on the light.
I gasped and put my hand over my mouth. Henry slipped inside tentatively and stood beside me, gaping.
The structure almost filled the room, floor to ceiling; there were only a few feet of space for Henry and me to stand in.
The grid of yesterday must have merely been scaffolding. The building now revealed was far more complex. It was entirely glittering black—the creatures could not perceive color, after all. But clearly their sonar made them aware of the shape of things. Sharp conical spires spiked around the steeply sloped roof, and beneath these were colonnaded hallways, small and simple at the top—for the lower classes, I imagined—and growing more spacious and ornate as rampways, first narrow, then wider, descended toward the bottom. The two lower stories were elaborately carved with statues of monstrous creatures, not like anything on earth—many-limbed, with fangs and claws. The statues looked nothing like the creatures who had built this palace in my basement. In the middle of the structure a large arched opening rose from the floor to the third level, which seemed to go all the way through to the wall behind it.
Henry looked at me, then back to the structure, his mouth open. “They started this ... when?” he breathed.
“The first time I saw it was yesterday. And then it was nothing but ... a scaffold. All this happened during the slowdown yesterday. I haven’t been down here since then. The slowdown speeded up construction like crazy. According to a normal clock, they built this palace in an hour.”
“Is this a dream, or what?” Henry murmured.
“You know it’s real. Do you believe me now? About how these creatures, and me, and mainly the clock in my closet upstairs, all three together, were what made the slowdown?”
He nodded wordlessly.
I hadn’t greeted any of the creatures yet because so far they were paying no attention to us at all. Some of them were crowded around a very tall and peculiar object on the floor just in front of the building. Two slightly inclining posts, three stories high, were joined by a carved crossbeam at the top. Attached to the crossbeam by long cables was something like a boat. Four of the small, blotched creatures—the lowest class—rode in the boat, pumping their bodies backward and forward to make it swing as high as possible in a tremendous arc.
They were imaginative, I had to give them that.
The crowd on the ground, those with the best view, were sleek and plump, waving their front legs, and in my head I could hear the equivalent of cheers and boos. Others watched from the colonnades of the building; the higher they were, and therefore the worse the view, the smaller and sicklier they looked.
The riders in the boat were working very hard. The boat swung higher now, more than 180 degrees. And then, at the top of its arc, two of the creatures tumbled out, smashing down onto the floor. They wriggled and spasmed as the swing slowed. Some other small ones carried the wounded ones away. Meanwhile, the sleek ones on the ground rubbed their front legs together with each other. I felt no wave of alarm or regret this time, only excitement and suspense.
“It almost seems like they were betting on the outcome or something,” Henry said, still whispering. “Like this swing thing is all a game to them.”
“Yeah ...” I said. “And to think how sorry I felt about the ones who were sacrificed yesterday.” I shook my head. “They’re obviously intelligent. And yet—”
Greetings, one of the sleek ones on the floor addressed me, bowing.
I nudged Henry and thought Greetings and bowed back. Henry imitated me.
An unpleasantly startled reaction popped inside my head. There is another foreigner here. Why are there two of you? Only the nervous system is allowed! No one else in this world is to know! This is very dangerous! You have disobeyed. When the Lord knows this, you will be punished. Severely punished. This is not—
Oddly, I wasn’t scared—not of this thing, anyway. What could these creatures do to me? And what could the clock find out if I didn’t tell it? I was the only means of communication between them, after all.
For the first time, I felt an electric tingle of power. Quiet, obedient Annie, everybody else’s messenger, had made the world stop. Now I was the nervous system, in charge of the messages. It was incredibly exciting. I could tell the clock whatever I wanted; I could control everything. I didn’t have to just obey these things.
I was also annoyed at their attitude. But isn’t this my house you’re in? I interrupted it. And how have I disobeyed? Nobody ever told me not to do this.
The creature was twisting its front legs together like a person wringing her hands. And we don’t understand why we are aware of communication from the other foreigner. You, nervous system, are the only foreigner we are supposed to be able to understand. Something is wrong. Something is very, very wrong.
You didn’t think I knew that already? But I don’t really think it’s me who’s in the wrong. I think maybe it might be you who’s—
You must tell the Lord right away, it commanded me. And you must also tell it what our home is like now, in all details. Study it hard, and remember. The Lord will be
very eager to see how much we accomplished during the slowdown. The Lord will be very happy about the swing ritual and the two more who are sacrificed to the Lord’s goodness. Go! Now! And take the other foreigner with you, away from here, up to the mercy of the Lord. Tell the Lord about the terrible transgression you have committed.
“Huh?” Henry said, turning to me, looking very uncomfortable.
“You heard all that?”
“I sure did. They seem to have something against me.” He wiped his forehead. “Annie, this is weird.”
“Yeah. And wait’ll you see ...” I turned back to the creature. Who said you could boss me around like that? If you want me to help you, I expect you to be polite about it.
For a moment, it couldn’t seem to think of a response. Then it bowed to me, more deeply than ever.
Okay. That’s better. We’ll go now. And even though you were rude, I still have to tell you how beautiful your home is. It’s not just a home; it’s a palace. I will picture it for the Lord. I will picture the two who died in your ... ritual. And I’m sure the Lord will understand that I must have help. I can’t be the nervous system all alone. It’s too much.
I turned back to Henry. He could hear what they were thinking at me, but not what I was thinking at them. “I told it I would do what it said, but that I need you—I can’t do it on my own. Come on, let’s get out of here. I want to show you the clock upstairs; they call it the Lord. It’s what slowed down time yesterday so they could build this so fast. Don’t forget to bow.”
We both bowed to the creature, which returned the gesture again—perfunctorily this time, it seemed to me—and then we squeezed out of the root cellar.
There was a creak on the basement stairway—or was it a footstep? “Did you hear that?” I said to Henry, alarmed.
He shrugged. “Sure. A creak. Our house always creaks. Doesn’t yours?”
“I guess so,” I said. But the sound bothered me. Had I locked the front door? I might have forgotten, preoccupied with letting Henry inside.
In the front hall I checked the door. It opened. “I forgot to lock the door,” I said. “What if somebody sneaked in?” I turned the lock and pushed and pulled on the door to make sure.
The Boxes Page 6
