Raymie Nightingale (16 page)

Beverly snorted. But she got out her pocketknife and went up to the door. She said, “This won’t take any time at all.”

And it didn’t.

She put the tip of the knife into the doorjamb and jiggled it, and a second later, the door to Building 10 swung wide. Darkness seemed to roll out of it like a cloud. It had been dark in Building 10 in the daylight. How dark would it be at night? There wasn’t even the light of the single swaying bulb.

“I can’t,” said Raymie.

“What do you mean?” said Louisiana.

“I’ll just wait here,” said Raymie.

Beverly shone her flashlight into the cavern.

“Shine it on that door,” said Louisiana. “I know he’s behind that door.”

“Yeah,” said Beverly. “You said so already.” She turned to Raymie. “You can wait here. It’s fine.”

“No,” said Louisiana. “All of us. All the Rancheros. Or we don’t go at all.”

“Okay,” said Raymie, because she had to go where they went. She had to protect them if she could. They had to protect her.

The three of them stepped into Building 10.

Beverly’s flashlight beam wavered in the darkness and then it held steady. It smelled terrible inside. Ammonia. Something rotten. Beverly shone the flashlight on the other door.

And then the horrible howl started.

Someone was dying! Someone had given up all hope! Someone was filled with a despair too terrible for words!

“Take my hand,” whispered Raymie.

Louisiana grabbed Raymie’s hand.

Raymie grabbed Beverly’s hand.

The flashlight beam danced wildly around the room. It shone on the ceiling, the metal desk, the filing cabinets. It illuminated, for a moment, the single unlit bulb, and Raymie, ridiculously, felt angry at the lightbulb.

Couldn’t it even try?

“Oh, my goodness, oh, no, no,” said Louisiana. Her lungs wheezed. She took a deep, raspy breath and then she shouted, “Archie, here I am!”

The howling continued.

“Can you?” said Louisiana. Her teeth were chattering. “Can you unlock the other door?”

“Sure,” said Beverly. They moved together, holding on to each other, toward the door. “You’re going to have to let go of my hand,” said Beverly to Raymie. “I need it to pick the lock.”

“Okay,” said Raymie. She held tight to Beverly’s hand.

“Look,” said Beverly, “why don’t you hold the flashlight.” Raymie dropped Beverly’s hand and took the flashlight.

“Shine it right on the doorknob, okay?” said Beverly.

Raymie shone the flashlight on the door, just as Louisiana reached forward and turned the knob.

The door wasn’t locked. It opened slowly. The sound of howling got louder.

“Archie?” said Louisiana.

Beverly took a deep breath. “Give me the flashlight,” she said. She took the flashlight from Raymie and swung it around a room filled with cages. There were small cages and large cages. The small cages were piled on top of each other, and the large cages looked like human prisons, and all of the cages were empty. There wasn’t a cat anywhere in sight.

It was a terrible room.

Raymie wished that she had never seen it, because now she would never forget it.

“Archie!” shouted Louisiana.

Beverly stepped farther into the room.

“They’re empty,” said Raymie. “No one’s here.”

“Who’s howling, then?” said Beverly.

“Oh, Archie,” whispered Louisiana. “I’m sorry.”

Beverly walked around the room, swinging the flashlight in great, swirling arcs.

And then she said, “Here. Here.”

It wasn’t Archie.

It wasn’t even a cat.

It was a dog. Or it might have been a dog at some point. He had ears so long that they were touching the ground. His body was small and stretched out. One eye was crusted over and swollen shut.

“Oh,” said Louisiana. “He’s some kind of rabbit.”

“He’s a dog,” said Beverly.

The dog wagged his tail.

Beverly put her hand through the wire of the cage. She patted the dog on the head. “Okay,” said Beverly. “Okay, it’s okay.” The dog wagged his tail some more. But when Beverly took her hand away, he stopped wagging his tail and started to howl.

The hair on Raymie’s legs stood up. Her toes flexed without her even intending to move them.

“Right,” said Beverly. “Okay.” She raised the latch on the cage and opened the door. The dog stopped howling. He stepped out toward them, wagging his tail. He looked up at the three of them out of his one good eye and wagged his tail some more.

Louisiana dropped to her knees. She wrapped him up in her arms. “I’m going to call him Bunny,” she said.

“That’s the stupidest name I’ve ever heard,” said Beverly.

“Let’s just go,” said Raymie.

Louisiana picked up the dog. Beverly shone the flashlight ahead of them, and they walked out of the terrible darkness of Building 10 and into the normal darkness of nighttime.

The moon was still up in the sky, or half of it was. It didn’t seem possible to Raymie that the moon was still shining after everything that had happened. But there it was — brilliant and very far away.

Raymie sat down on the curb. Louisiana sat down next to her. The dog smelled terrible. Raymie put out her hand and touched the top of his head. There were bumps on it.

“Archie isn’t dead,” said Louisiana.

“Would you please shut up?” said Beverly.

“He’s not dead. But he’s missing and I don’t know how to find him.”

“Fine,” said Beverly. “He’s missing. Right now, what we need to do is get out of here.”

“I don’t think I can walk anymore,” said Louisiana. “I feel too sad to walk.”

“Get in the cart, then,” said Beverly. “We’ll push you.”

“What about Bunny?” said Louisiana.

“We’ll push him, too. Duh.”

Louisiana stood up.

“Here,” said Raymie. “Give me the dog.”

Louisiana handed Bunny to Raymie, and Beverly picked Louisiana up and put her in the cart.

“It’s not very comfortable in here,” said Louisiana.

“Who said it would be comfortable?” said Beverly.

“No one,” said Louisiana. And then she said, “I feel really sad. I feel all hollow.”

“I know,” said Raymie. She handed Bunny to Louisiana. Louisiana wrapped her arms around the dog.

“I wonder where Archie is,” said Louisiana. “And I wonder what will become of us. Don’t you wonder what will become of us?”

No one answered her.

Beverly was pushing the cart, and Raymie was walking beside her.

Raymie said, “I wish we could go to the top of the Belknap right now.”

“Why?” said Beverly.

“Just to see if we could, I don’t know, see things.”

“It’s dark,” said Beverly. “You wouldn’t see much. Besides, the place is all locked up. And you need a key to use the elevator.”

“You could figure it out,” said Raymie. “You could break in and find the key.”

“I could break in anywhere,” said Beverly. “So what? There’s no point in going up there.”

“Going up where?” said Louisiana.

“To the top of the Belknap Tower,” said Raymie.

“Ooooh,” said Louisiana. “I’m afraid of heights.” She stood up in the cart and turned to face them. “I would have been a disappointment to my parents. I wouldn’t have been a very good Flying Elefante.”

“Yeah,” said Beverly. “You said so already. Sit down before you fall over.”

Louisiana sat down and gathered Bunny back into her arms.

The wonky wheel on the grocery cart stuttered and stuck as they started going uphill. Raymie and Beverly pushed together. Inside the cart, Louisiana was silent.

They were almost at the top of the hill. Raymie knew what was below them. It was Mabel Swip Memorial Hospital, and next to that was Swip Pond, where Mrs. Sylvester went to feed the swans.

Swip Pond wasn’t really a pond. Or it hadn’t started out as a pond. It had started out as a sinkhole. But now it was called Swip Pond because Mabel Swip, who owned the land, had donated the sinkhole to the city and then paid for some swans and some lamps to surround it and make it look elegant.

From the top of the hill, the pond looked like a single dark eye staring at Raymie. The lamps, five of them, formed a solemn constellation of moons around the pond. There weren’t any swans in sight.

Suddenly, Raymie was terribly, horribly lonely. She wished that she could find a pay phone and call Mrs. Sylvester and hear her say, “Clarke Family Insurance. How may we protect you?”

But even if she found a phone, Mrs. Sylvester wouldn’t be there. It was the middle of the night. Clarke Family Insurance was closed.

Raymie tried to flex her toes.

Louisiana stood up again. She was holding Bunny close to her chest. She faced forward. “Go faster,” she said.

“Are you kidding?” said Beverly. “Who do you think you are? Some kind of queen? We’re pushing as hard as we can. This grocery cart is worthless. It’s like the wheels aren’t even wheels. It’s like they’re squares or something.”

Raymie and Beverly pushed together.

One great push.

And somehow — how did this happen? Raymie didn’t know — the cart got away from them.

They didn’t let go. It wasn’t that at all. It was more like the hill grabbed the cart from them. One minute, they were pushing, and the next minute, the Tag and Bag grocery cart was out of their hands, rolling down the hill.

Louisiana, Bunny in her arms, turned and looked back at Beverly and Raymie. “Oh, my goodness,” she said. “Good-bye.”

And then the cart and Louisiana and Bunny were gone, clattering down the hill at an impossible speed, headed right for the pond that used to be a sinkhole.

“No,” said Beverly. “No.”

They started to run. But the cart was done with stuttering and balking. The cart was ready to move. Even with its wonky wheel, it was faster than they were. It was determined.

From a long way away came the sound of Louisiana’s voice, only it didn’t sound like Louisiana. It was eerie, resigned, the voice of a ghost. And what the ghost voice said was, “But I can’t swim.”

Bunny started to howl his terrible end-of-the-world howl.

Raymie ran faster. She could feel her heart and soul. Her heart was beating, and her soul was right up beside her heart. No, that wasn’t right. It was more like her soul was her whole body. She was nothing but soul.

And then, from somewhere in the darkness, Raymie heard Mrs. Borkowski’s voice. And what Mrs. Borkowski said was, “Run, run, run.”