by P. J. Night
“And you dumbly said no, but I came to your rescue?” interrupted Hailey. “Yes. It all happened. And now that you’re up, can we have breakfast?”
To Cora it felt as though Wednesday would never get there. But Wednesday had no choice. No matter how slowly Monday and Tuesday crawled along, it still had to follow. And no matter how extra slowly the school day dragged on Wednesday, it still had to end. Cora wasn’t sure whether she was more excited or more nervous about spending the afternoon with Evan. Both made the pit of her stomach feel exactly the same.
“Come to the car-pool area with me,” she begged Hailey when school let out.
“Why?” asked her friend. “Evan won’t want me tagging along.”
“Just keep me company in case he’s late, okay? I mean, what if he stands me up? What if he was just kidding around on Saturday?”
“Cora, relax. He’s gonna be there.”
And sure enough, Evan was already waiting for her when they arrived. “Time for me to melt out of sight,” murmured Hailey. She gave Evan a cheerful wave. “Hi! And good-bye,” she called. She took a few deliberate steps backward. Then, still looking at Evan and Cora, she slowly walked sideways until she had vanished behind some shrubbery.
“What was that all about?” asked Evan.
Cora giggled. “I think that’s what Hailey calls ‘melting out of sight.’ You know, discreetly leaving us alone.”
“So that’s what being discreet looks like,” said Evan. “Funny, I always though it meant trying not to attract attention.” He gestured toward three sixth graders who were openly staring at Hailey’s progress behind the bushes.
“So how do you like visiting your old school?” Cora asked as they headed for the sidewalk.
“Huh?” Evan asked, looking puzzled. “Oh, I actually didn’t go to this middle school. We just moved here over the summer.”
“From where?”
“Oh, all over the place. My dad’s in the army. He gets moved a lot.”
“Well, where did you go?” persisted Cora.
“It was a very small middle school in a very small town in Pennsylvania.”
“How small? I mean, how small was the school?”
“It’s not like I have an exact count. About forty kids per grade, I guess.”
“Wow, that is small. Compared to here, was it more fun or less?”
Evan turned to smile at her. “It’s definitely more fun here,” he said. “The girls are much nicer. Now let me fill you in on the sculpture garden.
“I’ve been volunteering there for a couple of months. The place is run by two sisters who are my bosses. There’s Eunice—she’s older, I think, but it’s kind of hard to tell. And then the other one is Stesha. Their last name is Metaxas, so you can probably figure out how the garden got its name. The museum is on the first floor of their house, along with their office. The museum’s got mostly small stuff—coins, jewelry, things like that. The garden is the main attraction.”
“Metaxas sounds like a Greek last name,” said Cora. “I’m Greek and my grandparents were from Greece, so I notice stuff like that.”
“You’re right! The sisters moved here from Greece too, but I don’t know when, exactly. Someone in their family made a pile of money and left it to them. Eunice and Stesha used the money to start the Metaxas Sculpture Garden. And there’s enough money left over to keep it going pretty much forever.”
“It didn’t look as if anyone was there when my dad drove us past the garden a few days ago,” said Cora.
“Yeah, it doesn’t bring in much of a crowd. There’s enough money that the sisters don’t really care about getting people in. But with this new statue they’re unveiling, they may get more visitors than usual.”
Cora and Evan had reached a busy corner now. As they waited for the light to change, Cora asked, “What’s the new statue of? Or who’s it supposed to be—or however you’re supposed to ask that?”
“It’s going to be Andromeda, actually,” said Evan.
“Oh! Is that why you thought of her the other night at my house?”
“I guess so.” Evan sounded distracted. “When’s this light going to change? Oh, there it goes. Finally.” He strode across the street so briskly that Cora had to hurry to keep up.
When they’d crossed the street, she said, “I’ve reread the myth a couple of times—we’re definitely going to do our English project on it. But one thing I don’t get: Why would Andromeda want to marry someone who had turned her boyfriend to stone?”
Evan turned to look at her in amazement. “Andromeda’s boyfriend didn’t do a thing to help her! He ran away when he saw the monster,” he said, sounding almost angry. “What a coward.”
“Isn’t that a little extreme?” said Cora. “If I saw a sea monster, I don’t think I’d stick around either.”
Evan sighed. “You’re right. I’m sorry.”
In Cora’s opinion, Evan had nothing to be sorry about. Maybe he was like Cora and got really into whatever he was reading. Sometimes Cora got so involved in a book that it started to seem more alive than the real world. Sometimes she even—
“Uh, Cora? We’re here.”
Cora laughed and ran back to Evan. “Oh! I didn’t even notice—I was thinking about something.”
They had reached the dark-red Victorian house. As they headed down the walkway, Evan said, “Let’s skip the museum today.” He lowered his voice. “It’s not that interesting.”
“Are the sisters in there now?”
“Probably,” said Evan, “but they won’t mind my bringing a guest. In fact, they’ll probably be glad to see fresh blood. . . . Just kidding,” he added with a wink, seeing Cora’s startled glance. “I mean, they’ll be glad to have a young visitor for a change. But you can meet them another time. Let me show you the sculpture garden.”
An elaborate, dark wrought-iron gate marked the entrance. Evan swung it open with a flourish. “After you, mademoiselle!”
Cora knew that her imagination sometimes went into overdrive. She also knew that first impressions weren’t always right. Still, she was positive that when she walked through the gate, the air became a little colder. And it wasn’t only the cold that made her shiver. The garden’s whole atmosphere seemed somehow wrong. The shade under the trees looked darker, and the grass seemed gray—as if all the color had been drained from the world. The labyrinth in the middle of the lawn loomed up like a fortress. And the sculptures . . .
Her father had mentioned a rumor about the sculpture garden being built over an old graveyard. Was that why the statues suddenly looked like tombstones to Cora?
Oh, stop, she told herself. The statues look like statues. But not the kind of statue you felt like lingering in front of.
“The sculptures are all so . . . anguished-looking,” she said to Evan. “Everyone is either sad or scared!”
Evan laughed. “That’s what the sisters go for. They like what they call ‘powerful emotions caught in stone.’”
“‘Caught’ in stone? Trapped is more like it!” Cora was studying the statue of a man who was stretching out his hands as if he were begging for mercy. “This poor guy! What’s his problem? And the woman over there—she looks as if she’s trying to pull a blanket over her head. Isn’t there even one statue of a cute little girl carrying a basket of flowers?”
“The garden can get to you after a while,” Evan agreed. “But there are some cool animals. Look at that gigantic wild boar. And the peacock is cool.”
The stone peacock was more than cool—it was amazing. Its tail had been carved with incredible attention to detail, and each feather looked as weightless as the real thing.
“How could the sculptor make a stone bird look so light?” marveled Cora. “You’d think it could fly away if it wanted to.”
“I know what you mean. Look up at that tree.” Evan pointed to the branch of a nearby tree where a stone eagle had been perched. The bird looked so ready to pounce that Cora flinched at the first sight of it.
“Oh, absolutely. We’re all about education. That one over there—isn’t that Artemis?”
“Yup. And there’s her bow and arrow. The myths say she would point at a leaf on a tree and then shoot an arrow right through the center of it. She was amazing.”
Cora pointed. “And there’s Ares, looking cranky.”
As they passed Ares, Evan continued talking about the statues as if they were old friends. “He always had his shield with him,” Evan said. “Of course, wars did usually start wherever he went. I guess that’s what happens when you’re the god of war.”
“This must be Aphrodite.” Cora gestured toward the statue of a beautiful young woman standing in a seashell.
“Yup. And Hephaestus!” Evan clapped a familiar hand onto the shoulder of the statue they were passing just then. “Hey, buddy! How’re you doing?”
Cora laughed. “Do you like talking to statues?” she said teasingly.
“Just the ones I know,” he answered. He pointed to a winding pebble path. “That’s where we’re headed.”
At the end of the path, rearing up in front of them, was a huge centaur.
Cora shivered. “That guy is massive. Look at those shoulders. They must be—” She broke off as she caught sight of another statue. “Ewww. Is that a harpy?”
“Yup,” said Evan. “Bird body, woman’s head. Not as impressive as the centaur, somehow.”
He was right. The harpy’s low-slung, stocky body had the shape of a clumsy duck, and its human head looked as if it had been screwed onto the duck’s shoulders. Still, the statue managed to be shockingly realistic. The woman’s mouth was open in an angry scream that even showed a couple of missing teeth.
“You’d think that the artist worked from life except for the fact that there’s no such thing as a harpy,” said Cora. “And I’m glad there isn’t. This thing is horrible. Hey, what happened over there?” She had just noticed a spot about twenty feet away where an empty pedestal stood. Without waiting for Evan’s answer, Cora walked over to look.
Attached to the pedestal was a bronze plaque. PERSEUS, it read.
Cora turned to Evan, who had just caught up to her. “Where’d he go?”
“I’m not sure,” said Evan. “Maybe they took the statue away for cleaning.”
“Wouldn’t it make more sense to clean it here?”
Evan shrugged. For some reason he looked very uncomfortable.
“Maybe he flew off to look for Andromeda,” Cora joked.
It wasn’t the quip of the century, she realized. Still, there was no reason for Evan to whip around and ask, “What do you mean?” He shot a quick glance over his shoulder, but of course no one was there. “It probably just needed repairing. Hey, would you like to go in the labyrinth?” He gestured toward the far end of the garden at what had once been a severely clipped boxwood hedge about ten feet tall. Now the boxwood looked shaggy and overgrown, as if no one had tended to it for a long time.
“Will we be able to find our way out?”
“Oh yeah. I’ve walked that labyrinth so many times that I know the path by heart. Think of this as your personal guided tour.”
The entrance to the boxwood maze was the only part that didn’t confuse Cora. The minute she and Evan stepped into the labyrinth, they were faced with what looked like a solid wall of hedging.
“Aren’t you supposed to start with a path?” she asked.
Evan grinned. “Oh, there’s a path. You just have to find it.”
“All I see is this hedge!”
“I didn’t say it was easy,” Evan teased her. Taking her hand, he led her toward the left end of the hedge.
He’s holding my hand. He’s actually holding my hand!
Cora lost her breath for a second, so flabbergasted that she stopped watching where she was going. She stumbled on a stray root and would have fallen if Evan hadn’t steadied her.
“Easy there,” he said.
Instantly Cora felt blood rush to her face. What if Evan was only holding her hand so she wouldn’t trip? She’d better not get too excited.
The slightest sliver of a door had been cut through the boxwood ahead of them. It was so narrow that she and Evan had to scrape through sideways. How did he know which way to turn? In some places the hedge walls were so overgrown that she and Evan were practically crashing through the bushes rather than following a path. And Evan led her around so many corners that it seemed as though they were walking in circles instead of making any progress. But after just a few minutes they reached the cool, quiet center of the maze . . . where a huge stone Minotaur was sitting on a rocky throne as if he had been waiting for them all this time.
“Whoa,” said Cora. “He is way too realistic.” She shivered. “But it’s cool to have a real Minotaur at the center of a labyrinth. A statue of one, anyway.”
“So you know the Minotaur, too!” Evan sounded pleased.
Cora laughed. “A guy with the body of a man and the head of a bull? Trapped in the middle of a labyrinth in the dungeon of a king’s castle? Once you’ve heard about the Minotaur, you don’t forget him.”
“I don’t know if I’d call a man-eating monster a ‘guy,’” Evan objected as he led Cora through a shortcut that got them out of the labyrinth quickly. “But I’m glad you know who he is. You must’ve really been studying since Saturday. Anyway, enough education. Want to play hide-and-seek?”
Cora stared at him. “Just the two of us?”
“What’s wrong with that?”
“Nothing, I guess,” Cora said after a second. She was surprised that he’d suggested a game that seemed so babyish, but Cora felt a rush of butterflies in her stomach at the thought of Evan finding her. . . .
“Okay—you hide. I’ll seek. I’ll count to fifty.”
“Not fifty! A hundred!” Cora objected. “You know this place way better than I do.”
“A hundred, then. But one thing: We have to be careful. Eunice and Stesha are working in their offices. They wouldn’t like us crashing around all these priceless statues.”
“They’re made of stone! How could we hurt them?”
“Some of them are fragile,” Evan told her. “Some are hollow, for one thing. And the sisters would be mad if we even scratched them.”
“Okay. I promise not to crash around,” said Cora solemnly.
“Here we go, then.” Evan turned his back to lean against a tree and cover his eyes. “One, two—can you hear me okay?”
“Yes.”
“Okay. One, two, three . . .”
Cora stole off as quickly and quietly as she could. If she stayed off the worn paths and on the grass, Evan wouldn’t be able to hear which way she was going. Quickly she surveyed the sculpture garden. The challenge in a place like this was that since there were no walls, you could be hunted from all sides.
Going back into the labyrinth would be too obvious and too hard for her on her own. What about that woman with the umbrella? She was wearing a long, billowing skirt that would be good to hide behind. But that would also be an obvious spot. Some of the trees looked climbable, but they’d rustle while she was going up—and the sisters definitely wouldn’t like it if she broke a branch.
You’re overthinking again, Cora scolded herself. This is a game, not a contest. You don’t have to strategize—just pick a fun place to hide. . . .
Like the statue of the girl over there, the one staring up. She looked to be about Cora’s age and was pretty much her same size. She wasn’t mounted on a pedestal. What if Cora stood behind her, in the same position? Evan might not notice her at first, and at least it would be a creative way to hide.
Cora dashed over to the stone girl and positioned her arms and legs in exactly the same way as the statue. Then she settled herself to wait.
“Ready or not, here
I come!” she heard Evan call. Cora smiled to herself. She was ready!
A couple of silent minutes passed. Cora couldn’t hear footsteps. The stone was making her cold. She hoped this wouldn’t take much longer. . . .
Cora jumped a little as she heard a low sound nearby. Carefully she steadied herself back into her hiding pose. But now she was listening tensely. What was that sound?
A hissing, swishing noise, broken by brief pauses. Almost like words. But who could be speaking out here? And wasn’t there more than one voice? Cora tried to listen even more closely. The sounds seemed to be all around her now, hovering just out of range. They were definitely coming from more than one place.
Ghostly voices in the wind, Cora found herself thinking. She shivered and pressed herself harder against the back of the statue.
Cora felt the movement before she saw it. The stone shook the tiniest bit and then shifted position slightly.
This time Cora jumped back, looking wildly around. Her dad had mentioned a fault line. Was this the beginning of an earthquake?
But nothing else happened. The ground was still; the statue was still. Cora glanced around the garden. Everything she could see was motionless.
Yet something felt different. Or was it that something looked different?
Cora looked at the statue of the girl again. It was fixed in the same position except for one thing. When she had first spotted it, its head had been staring up.
Now the statue was staring down and back, as if trying to see what was behind it. It was looking at Cora.
A few times, in nightmares, Cora had woken herself up by screaming. The sound had been embarrassing—more like a strangled squeal than a full-blooded shriek. But now, when someone suddenly grabbed her from behind, Cora had no trouble screaming full out.
“It’s me! It’s me!” came Evan’s voice. “I was just tagging you.”
Cora could feel her whole body relax a little, but she was still shaking as struggled to get to her feet. “You scared me,” she said.
