The Carnival of Lost Souls : A Handcuff Kid Novel (7 page)

Jack dropped the card. It had to be a joke the professor was playing on him, probably trying to teach him a lesson not to pry into other people’s trunks. He picked the card up again, but this time a new line magically appeared:

He jerked his hand, and the card fell to the floor. Quickly, Jack grabbed the card and reburied it. This was definitely a trick, perhaps another gift, or more likely a trap to catch him snooping. He was so busted. For the first time since his arrival, Jack was afraid. He shut the box and fastened the lock.

In an effort to keep his mind off the card, Jack ate a thick slab of meat loaf for dinner and practiced with his cuffs. The metal bracelets called to him, and he could always count on them and their logic—a skill he could master and control. He twisted his hands behind his back like he had a thousand times before and closed the steel around his wrists.

As far as picking went, Jack was partial to the shim. He visualized the inner workings of the lock before inserting the slim metal tool. That’s how doctors do it in the emergency room when they’re trying to get a guy’s windpipe open and slide tubes in so the guy can breathe. The doctors imagine the trachea with its soft pink walls and visualize the tube going in. The esophagus runs straight. Sword-swallowers really did swallow the sword. Jack visualized the lock mechanism in his mind’s eye. He saw the ratchet—the toothed wheel inside the lock—the simple way it worked like a turnstile in a subway. He followed the shim going in and rounding the small metal corners of the lock, wedging its way in; overriding the
catch, he pulled.
Click
. He didn’t need to see it now to know that the lock had released.

Too antsy to stay cooped up, Jack had the sudden urge to go outside and run to clear his head. He didn’t lock the door to the house. Jogging along, he was almost invisible in his black T-shirt and navy sweatpants, slipping in between parked cars and telephone poles, trading places with the dark. He made a game of it, trying to stay in the shadows, dodging a sudden flood of headlights. Throwing himself on the ground, he crawled on his belly till the car coasted by. He ran through the playground and through the small tangle of woods.

He felt alone, but alert, cautious. This was how animals must feel. People always liked to make it seem like animals had families, moms and dads and babies. But it wasn’t true. Sure, they technically did, but most animals were left to survive on their own pretty early. Once, he saw a nest of baby rabbits that the mother had already left—and they barely had their eyes opened. If those baby rabbits could survive, so could he. They don’t wait for their mothers to say good-bye to them. Jack kept running, like an animal in his leafy and tangled kingdom. He was a star in his own deep dark sky. His destiny was bigger and brighter than this journey of survival.

The card irked him—the strange invitation seemed so real, somehow feeling alive as it had trembled in his
hands. The words had moved. Was the invitation really from the mysterious magician Mussini? But the carnival was so long ago—when the professor was young. There was no way that Mussini was still around. The professor probably had a normal explanation for everything. Mildred would have never placed him with a dangerous guy. Weird was one thing, but not dangerous.

Still, Jack needed answers, and he would have to face the professor sooner or later if he wanted to get them.

An entire week went by. Jack was still as jumpy as a baby rabbit. He waited day after day for the professor to confront him for snooping in his office. Surely he had left some incriminating evidence behind—some dirt on the floor or on his clothes. But so far, the professor said nothing about his office, the trunk, or the card. Jack’s deception was exhausting. His head ached. Regret spread through him more and more each day. Why did he break his word? Why did he have to screw everything up?

Saturday morning, Jack sat cross-legged on the living room floor, shoveling heaping spoonfuls of cereal into his mouth. The horrific moans of a violin oozed out from under the professor’s office door, as on every Saturday morning the professor listened to classical music. Jack turned up the television, hoping that the high-pitched mania of his cartoons would drown out the screech
of strangled cats the professor called masterpieces. Suddenly, the music stopped, and Jack jumped to turn the television down.

Jack slurped up the chocolaty milk-soup of his cereal while his eyes followed the professor walking around the room, circling him. The professor stared at him; the look of suspicion caused dread and guilt to roll around in Jack’s stomach.

“When were you going to tell me?” The professor began gathering up pages of newspaper from the coffee table.

“Tell you what?” Jack asked, resting his cereal bowl on the floor. He tried not to panic; the less he said, the better. The professor didn’t seem
that
angry; maybe he would let him off easy for sneaking into his office.

The professor glanced down his nose at Jack. “That’s not a very good answer. Try again.”

“I was never going to tell you,” Jack said, hoping his blunt yet honest answer would at least gain a few points. He could still feel the cold earth slip between his fingers when he opened the trunk, and he could still see his name printed clearly on the card.
He
was the guest of the magician Mussini. He had opened the trunk when he knew he shouldn’t. He broke his word to the professor and Mildred by sneaking into the office. And now he just sat there, pathetically waiting for his punishment. A lump formed in his throat.

“Never! But if you
never
told me, then we couldn’t go.” The professor stood in front of the television, focusing Jack’s attention.

Go where? What was he thinking? Jack stared at the professor.

“I’m not sure I want to go.” Jack wiped his mouth off on his pajama sleeve; his chin still ached from the fight in the park. If the kids were right, then Jack and the professor were off to the psych ward, which might not be so bad as far as punishments go, compared to where they
might
be headed.

“Well, as your legal guardian, I am insisting that you attend.” Swiftly the professor wedged the newspapers under his arm and rummaged into his pocket. He pulled out a piece of paper and dropped the creased leaflet onto the carpet in front of Jack. “Concheta found this stuffed in the pocket of your jeans when she was doing the laundry.”

Jack snatched up the yellow slip. It was the carnival flyer he found in the park! A wave of relief washed over him, and he jumped to his feet. He had forgotten all about it.

“All you had to do was ask.” The professor smiled. “As you know, I love carnivals and was thrilled when Concheta showed it to me. I think you’ll find we have many things in common.”

“That’s a relief,” Jack said. “Um, I mean, I’d love to go.”

“Tonight is the last night to attend.” Jack grinned and the professor walked out of the room.

If the professor didn’t know that Jack snuck into the office, then Jack wanted to keep it that way.

The professor decided to get some fresh air and walk to the carnival. They waited until after dinner when the sun was almost down to trudge through the woods and then maneuver a patch of tall, weed-choked grass. Concheta’s long jean skirt kept getting snagged on the prickly weeds, and she cursed the grass in Spanish while simultaneously using Jack’s head to keep her balance. Finally, they reached the gritty parking lot that had been transformed into a neon wonderland.

Before Jack could race into the crowd, Concheta yanked the hood of his sweatshirt, and he stumbled backward.

“Don’t get lost,” she said, handing him a fistful of crumpled dollar bills. “Now, go buy a candy apple and
one for me, too.” She smiled mischievously and pushed him toward a crowded alleyway of vendors selling loads of sticky sweets and fried food.

Jack darted into the crowd. The carnival was alive—a maze of rides and booths and games whirling and spinning all around him. Rides rose up out of the crowds like metal dinosaurs, roaring shrill music and blinking with millions of tiny lightbulbs. This place was better than he expected.

After devouring his candy apple, Jack and the professor attacked the arcade and the game alley, then jumped on a string of jarring thrill rides that spun their heads around and around in the fun chaos of the Tilt-A-Whirl and the Zipper. Concheta mostly watched, but she did take a few turns on the merry-go-round, sitting sidesaddle on a glittery pink horse. Jack looked, but he never saw any of the strange sideshow acts the professor had told him about. When he asked about them, the professor just stared off into space.

“Oh, those attractions are long gone.” The professor put his hand on Jack’s shoulder and directed him toward the center of the fair and an enormous glowing Ferris wheel. “Time for the last ride of the night.”

Concheta planted herself a few yards away and waved them on. The professor and Jack didn’t have to wait long; the crowds were thinning, as the night was growing late. Once locked inside the tiny swinging metal box, Jack
jumped at the opportunity to talk to the professor alone. “I figured it out.”

“Hm,” the professor mused. “What’s that?”

“What that magician, the Amazing Mussini, wanted from you. Your most valuable possession. It wasn’t that hard, really.” Jack figured the professor would respect him more if he solved the problem of what he sold to Mussini, and maybe even forgive him for opening the trunk in his office.

“Really?” The professor rested his arm on the back of the cart and twisted his body under the metal safety bar, turning his attention to Jack. “I’ve been anxious to hear what you think.”

Jack took a deep breath. “I figured you’re a smart guy, Professor, from all the books you’ve read and all the places you’ve been. You were probably a smart kid, too. You know a lot about everything, especially stuff that no one else bothers to study, like magic tricks and escapology. I think Mussini wanted a kid like you around, to help him create more tricks for his act.” Jack eased back in his seat, not realizing that he had been tensed up against the safety bar.

The ride lurched, the box swung, and they were lifted high into the liquidy darkness. They both grasped on to the metal bar that rested across their laps. A rush of air blew over him, and Jack glowed with the excitement of soaring, as if he and the professor were escaping into the
starry black sky as the simple magic of the ride carried them upward.

“That’s a very good answer. But I’m afraid it isn’t entirely correct.”

“Then what did Mussini want, if it wasn’t money?” Jack asked.

The professor’s eyes anxiously darted over the crowd. “Mussini is a trader, and he travels between the lands of the living and the dead. He wanted my services, for sure, but that meant I would have to go with him.”

“How does Mussini travel between the world of the living and the dead? That would be a cool magic trick.”

“It’s complicated.” The professor twisted up his mouth. “Mussini is a powerful magician. He trades in
lives
. He wanted my soul.” He spit out the words as if they tasted awful. “You don’t understand the position that put me in.”