The Deceivers

by Margaret Peterson Haddix

  “Hope” wasn’t actually an odd word, but Emma had included it anyway. Because she needed it; she needed to remember that Mom would never have written the coded letter if she hadn’t had hope that the kids could figure it out.

  If Mom could hold on to hope, so could Emma.

  She sprang up, stalked over to the others, and seized Other-Natalie’s phone. She thrust the phone at the other girl.

  “Call your grandma back,” Emma demanded. “Get her to tell you everything she knows about levers and tunnels and how to get back to the other world. She wanted to get us out of here before—tell her we’ll go and never come back if she lets us take Mom and Joe and, and Natalie’s mom with us. If we’re out of time, we’ll just have to bargain. Even if it has to be with someone as mean as your grandma.”

  Other-Natalie recoiled as if the phone were a poisonous snake or a rabid dog.

  “We can’t do that,” she muttered. “Not over the phone. Phone conversations can be intercepted. Anybody could be listening. There are always spies, always—”

  “Fine,” Emma said. “Then tell her you want to meet. In your room, maybe. That’s safe, isn’t it? You can use an excuse like, ‘Hey, Grandma, come help me curl my hair for the party.’ Or was she like your mom, saying you shouldn’t go to the party? Then you can say, ‘Grandma, I threw up again. Can I have some Gatorade and toast?’”

  Gatorade and toast were what Mom gave Emma, Chess, or Finn when they were sick. It made Emma’s stomach hurt just talking about it. Or maybe it hurt because she was close to the numbered keypad by the nearest door, and the same food smells that made Finn think of spaghetti made Emma think of vomit.

  Or maybe she just missed Mom.

  Other-Natalie shoved Emma’s hand away.

  “You don’t understand!” she said, suddenly frantic. “You don’t know anything about this world. Or my family. We’re always on display. We always have to pretend and deceive. Even when we can’t be sure if anyone’s watching or not. You think my room’s safe? Look!”

  She snatched the phone back from Emma, and began swiping her finger across the screen. Grainy security camera footage came up: the same view of Other-Natalie’s bedroom closet that the kids had been able to see on the wall in the Judge’s office.

  “My own mother spies on me!” Other-Natalie complained. “I’m tapping into the footage that feeds into the security system for her office. But who knows who else can see it?”

  Beside Emma, Natalie reeled back, looking aghast.

  “Wait—I told you everything when we were in your room together,” she groaned. “I knew the Greystone kids might see your closet from your mom’s office, but . . . why didn’t you warn me someone else could hear?”

  “Well, I didn’t know what you were going to say until you said it,” Other-Natalie said ruefully. “And then . . . I just wanted to know. I was so sick of lies and pretending. And I’m pretty sure no one watches any part of my room but the area by that closet. But, Natalie, don’t you see? When I tore that poster off my wall, that changed everything. Someone’s going to see that, if they haven’t already. Why do you think I’ve been hiding out in the secret passageways ever since? I’m in as much danger as all of you now!”

  “It was just . . . a poster,” Finn whispered. “It wasn’t even a good picture of you.”

  “That poster was a symbol of the political party,” Other-Natalie said. “Of our leaders. And the government. Ripping up that poster was like saying I hate the government. Nobody does that!” She gulped. “I’ll call Grandma. She’s not always mean. Maybe I can lie enough to get her to . . .”

  She tapped the screen and put the phone to her ear. Emma was close enough that she could hear the recorded message that came in reply: “All phone circuits in this area are temporarily out of order. Please try your call later.”

  “That’s weird,” Other-Natalie muttered. Her thumbs sped across the screen, calling up one app after another. She groaned. “Texting doesn’t work either. And I can’t access the GPS trackers on Mom’s and Dad’s and Grandma’s phones, to know where they are in the house—not that that’s always accurate. . . . Oh, great. The security feed showing my closet does still work. . . .” Her voice turned completely bitter. “Because Mom can always spy, no matter what . . .”

  Emma saw the view of Other-Natalie’s closet spin across the screen again as Other-Natalie lowered the phone—as Other-Natalie gave up. But Emma also saw a flash of movement in the closet. The door was open now; it’d been shut before.

  “Wait!” Emma cried, cradling her hand under Other-Natalie’s and bringing the phone back to eye level. “Who’s that?” A tall, shadowy figure in a dark uniform—brown, maybe?—stood just inside the closet doorway. The figure turned slightly, and Emma realized it wasn’t a single person lurking in the shadows, but two. And maybe one of them was injured? Was that why the man (maybe?) in the brown uniform was carrying the woman (almost certainly) in the neon green shirt?

  Neon green shirt, Emma thought. And that woman’s hair is so long and dark and streaming down. . . . Isn’t that just like . . .

  Before Emma could say anything, Natalie began screaming behind her.

  “Mom! That’s my mom!”

  And then she took off running.

  Fifty-Five

  Natalie

  Natalie couldn’t possibly run as fast as she wanted.

  Mom Mom Mom Mom Mom pounded through her brain in time with her running feet. It was Mom she’d seen in the security footage, being carried either into or out of or just through Other-Natalie’s closet. It had to be. Mom had been wearing her neon green workout shirt when she’d gotten trapped in this world; she’d thought she was just making a quick stop on her way to the gym on an ordinary Saturday morning. She hadn’t even known the alternate world existed.

  Natalie thought about how Mom’s body drooped helplessly over the brown sleeves of whoever was carrying her.

  Was she injured or just sedated? Natalie wondered. Injured or sedated?

  Either way, the sooner Natalie could get to her, the better.

  The passageway light behind her clicked off a second before the one ahead of her clicked on, and in the instant of darkness, Natalie stumbled so badly she smashed her shoulder into the wall. Were the winding stairs ahead to the right or to the left? Why hadn’t she made herself memorize the directions even when she was blindfolded?

  “Turn here!” someone whispered behind her. And then hands shoved at her, too. Oh—Other-Natalie. Natalie saw that Chess, Emma, and Finn were running along behind her, too. Chess was even carrying all their backpacks. But she didn’t slow down for any of them.

  The light clicked back on, and the stairs were right ahead of her. Natalie sprinted toward them. At the top of the stairs, Other-Natalie whispered from behind her, “Now left! Right! Left! Left again!”

  Natalie kept running. She reached what seemed to be a blank wall ahead of her. Other-Natalie dashed out in front of her and touched something down near the floor. The wall began to slide away. Natalie didn’t even wait to see what was on the other side before she rushed forward.

  Then she tripped over a pair of Nikes. She was back in Other-Natalie’s closet. No—falling through the open closet door into the room.

  Natalie scrambled up, taking in the entire room in one glance: the pieces of the ripped-up poster scattered across the floor, a dresser drawer left hanging open, the bed’s comforter still holding a Natalie-shaped indentation on the corner.

  The room was empty.

  “Where is she?” Natalie moaned.

  She peered into the other side of the closet; she looked under the bed. She raced around the corner to the door out to the hall, but it was still locked, just the way Natalie and Other-Natalie had left it. Or maybe it was locked again, after the man carrying Natalie’s mom had run through it. . . .

  Natalie whirled back around to face Other-Natalie, who was just now stepping past the jumble of shoes.

  “We would have seen Mom and that
guy if he went through the secret passageways, right?” Natalie asked.

  “Depends on if he went through Dad’s routes or Mom’s,” Other-Natalie said.

  “Which one leads into or out of your closet?”

  “Both,” Other-Natalie began. “But—”

  Natalie raced back to the closet and grabbed the other girl’s arm.

  “Then we have to go back. We have to search all the secret passageways. And someone should search the hall, too, just in case—”

  “It won’t do any good,” Emma said. She was still several steps back, deep in the secret passageways. The fluorescent light from overhead made her face look sickly green.

  Or maybe that wasn’t from the bad lighting.

  “How do you know?” Natalie asked, still gazing around wildly, as if there were some hiding place in Other-Natalie’s room she’d missed. “They were just here! They couldn’t have gotten far!”

  “Uh, would you call the other world far?” Emma asked weakly.

  “You’re just guessing about that, right?” Chess asked. “We should still—”

  “No, sorry,” Emma said. “I’m sure.” She held up Other-Natalie’s phone even as she caught up with the other kids. “I kept watching the security footage of this room until it cut out.”

  “You could do that while running?” Finn asked, sounding awed.

  Emma shrugged. “I did bash into walls a few times.”

  “What did you see? Where’s the lever? Where’s the tunnel?” Now Natalie couldn’t ask questions fast enough.

  “The man peeked out into this room,” Emma said. “He looked at his phone. He took a step back, and then I could see that there was another lever on the wall of the closet, and a tunnel beside it. And then he carried your mom into that tunnel. The tunnel closed—I guess from the other side—and then the lever was gone. Just like how Chess and Finn and I saw the lever disappear down in the basement closet.”

  Other-Natalie began feeling around on the walls inside her closet as she murmured, “There was a tunnel here? Can’t we open it again?”

  “Not without our own lever,” Chess groaned. “The one the cleaner guy stole.”

  “But . . . but isn’t it good that someone took Ms. Morales back to the right world?” Finn asked. He sounded so hopeful it made Natalie want to cry. “The police are looking for her everywhere back there. They’ll catch the bad guy from this world, and they’ll take her home, and . . .” His face fell. “She’s probably right now wondering where we are.”

  “No,” Emma said, her voice heavy. “The police in the other world won’t find her. There isn’t time.”

  “You don’t know that,” Natalie objected. “Back in our world, there could be police swarming all over Mom’s house. Maybe the neighbors saw me making a scene in the yard this morning. Maybe . . .”

  It was funny how Natalie now hoped that someone had witnessed her fury over the sign in Mom’s front yard.

  Emma only shook her head.

  “No,” she said. “I do know. Or . . . I’m pretty sure. Because I took screenshots of the security footage. In case we couldn’t retrieve it later.”

  “That was smart,” Other-Natalie said admiringly.

  “Maybe, but . . . not good news,” Emma said, her face turning even grimmer. She held up Other-Natalie’s phone again. “I zoomed in on the view of the guy’s phone when he held it out sideways. I saw the message he got.”

  She turned Other-Natalie’s phone so the other kids could see the screen. Numbly, Natalie read the grainy, enlarged words:

  PARTY MOVED UP BY SIX HOURS. GO OUT AND COME BACK AGAIN IN THE APPROVED SPOT FOR THE PARTY. MEET THERE ASAP. BRING THE WOMAN.

  ALL PLANS ARE STILL A GO.

  Fifty-Six

  Chess

  “Something’s still going to happen at the party,” Chess moaned. “Even with the moved-up time.” He waved his arms, trying to herd the other kids together, away from the secret passageway. “It’s going to be dangerous. So . . . you all have to stay here. Where it’s safe. I’ll go down and find Ms. Morales and Mom and Joe. And . . .”

  He wanted to add, And get help from Other-Natalie’s dad. Because he couldn’t do this alone. And he couldn’t risk the other kids.

  But Other-Natalie was already shaking her head.

  “That’ll never work,” she said. “The way these parties go—especially if there’s been a threat of attack—the minute you show your face, you’d be arrested. Everybody knows everybody. And everybody would know you’re an intruder.”

  “I could pretend to be . . . a waiter,” Chess said. “One of those people who go around with food on a silver tray.”

  Even to his own ears, he sounded as young as Finn, suggesting playing dress-up.

  “It’s really brave that you want to do that,” Other-Natalie said gently. “But all the workers are screened and vetted. They have ID cards they show to get their uniforms. They have to give their fingerprints. And that’s just the start. During parties there are security cameras everywhere, and . . .”

  “But I can go down there,” Natalie said, turning to the other girl. “I can pretend to be you. That way you’ll stay safe, and so will the Greystones.”

  Chess almost wanted to laugh. Natalie was doing the same thing as him: trying to protect everyone else.

  Other-Natalie went over to her bed and began shoving the pieces of torn-up poster underneath it.

  “Maybe the guy in the closet never saw this,” she muttered. “And the door to the hall is locked, so nobody else saw it either. . . . Oh, why did I choose today for my grand gesture?”

  She was practically shaking with fear.

  That’s how bad this world is, Chess thought. If someone gets that worried about a poster . . .

  “Try calling your grandma again,” Emma suggested, holding out the phone.

  Other-Natalie took the phone, but she was only a few seconds into the call before she cut it off and dropped the phone to the bed.

  “This never happens,” she said. “I mean, I guess phone service goes down all the time for ordinary people, but not here. Not for my family or anyone like us.”

  “The bad guy got his message,” Finn said.

  Other-Natalie pressed her hands to her face.

  “What if this is the big plot against the government that everyone’s always afraid of?” she said. She darted her eyes side to side, as if seeing danger everywhere. “But I don’t know who’s on what side. That ‘threat of attack’ could mean anything. Are my parents plotting against someone? Is someone plotting against them? And, oh, both your moms could get caught in the middle. . . .”

  Emma reached over and yanked down one of the backpacks Chess had been carrying, then dumped its contents onto the floor. For a moment Chess thought she was looking for her laptop but, no, she still had that clutched under her arm. She held up a round metal disk and slipped a cordless earbud under her hair.

  “Hello?” she said into the metal disk. “Oh, good—our listening devices still work.” She turned to Other-Natalie. “Do you think you could hide these in the clothes your parents and grandma are going to wear to the party, before it starts? We can each wear one of the earpieces, and then at least we’ll know everything they hear.”

  “Just knowing stuff isn’t enough,” Chess said, and the hurt look Emma shot him made him regret opening his mouth. But her listening devices seemed just as childish as him imagining holding a silver tray.

  We just need Finn to suggest something silly, and then . . .

  Where was Finn?

  Chess turned around. Finn had wandered over by Other-Natalie’s desk. He’d plucked a red pen from an overflowing canister, and seemed to be drawing on a stack of white Post-it Notes.

  “Here,” Finn said, turning back to pass out the Post-it Notes. “Hearts for everyone.”

  Chess’s eyes blurred so badly he could barely see what Finn handed him.

  “Finn, these are great, but I messed up before,” Emma said, and her tone was t
he most patient, kind one Chess had ever heard her use. “It’s not really safe to show the heart symbol to anyone in this world. It’s not a . . . heart kind of place.”

  Chess was blinking so hard, he couldn’t tell if Emma cut her eyes over to Other-Natalie or not. He wasn’t even sure how he felt about letting Other-Natalie hear about the heart symbol.

  “I just wanted everyone to have one,” Finn said, grinning crookedly. “It made me feel better to draw them. And, remember, we’re from this world, and we’re nice. And so’s Other-Natalie. So couldn’t this be a heart kind of place if people tried a little harder?”

  Other-Natalie hugged Finn before anyone else had a chance to.

  Everything could work out, Chess thought. I’ll figure out a way to get down to Other-Natalie’s dad before anyone else has to be in danger. Maybe Emma’s listening device idea could even help. . . .

  It seemed like Finn had energized the others, too, because Other-Natalie sprang up and said, “Natalie, we should both go down to that party, and stay at opposite ends, so we’ll see and hear everything.” And Emma rushed over to close the closet door as she muttered, “Let’s make sure no one comes in and surprises us while we’re sorting out our electronics and making plans. . . .”

  But maybe Emma slammed the closet door too hard. An echoing thud seemed to come from below. Chess tilted his head to the side, listening, and then he scrambled over to the locked door out to the hallway and pressed his ear against the solid wood. Now he could hear an absolute roar of sound. But it wasn’t from the echo of a single door hitting a wall. It was from a door downstairs being opened again and again. It was from voices and laughter, occasional booming cries or shrill shouts loud enough to stand out: “Thank you for inviting . . .” “. . . so glad to be . . .”

  They’d run out of time for making plans or figuring out anything.

  The party had already begun.

  Fifty-Seven

  Natalie

  Natalie swayed a little dizzily at the top of the second-floor stairs. She and Other-Natalie had made probably the fastest change ever into party dresses and the best attempt at fancy hairstyles they could achieve in five minutes, while also working around the need for the earbuds and tiny microphones of their listening devices. But what had seemed possible in Other-Natalie’s familiar room felt head-spinningly risky out here in the open, perched above the bright lights and swirling colors of the party below.