The Jewel and the Key (10 page)

“Dad!” She sprinted down the street toward him. “Is Zack okay?”

He turned and broke into a smile, the age dropping away. “Of course. What do you think? He enjoyed it. At least he says he did. You were quick.”

Quick? She'd been gone for ages. Addie glanced at her watch: 12:30. That had to be wrong, but at least the watch was working again.

“Margie told me about your mission of mercy.” Dad tousled her hair. “That was good of you, Addie.”

Whaley came around the side of the building, carrying a dustpan and wheeling the garbage can behind him. He gave Addie a glum wave. “How's Mrs. T.'s friend?”

“Fine,” Addie said, and frowned. “Better than fine.”

Whaley looked at her curiously and began sweeping up the broken glass. The larger pieces had already been cleared away, and all that remained was this shimmering pile of broken shards.

“Owns a theater, doesn't she?” Dad asked. “I can imagine what the quake did to it.” He shook his head. “We'll have to get that glass in the door safely removed. Until then, go in the back way, or do like so.” He went over to the empty window frame, pulled some work gloves out of his big jacket pockets, and put them on. Then he braced himself against the sill, jumped up, and climbed into the bookstore.

Addie made as if to climb in after him.

“Don't touch the frame! Here.” Dad stripped off the gloves, leaned out the window, and grabbed her hand. She braced a foot against the sill and let him pull her up and over. After a moment of scrambling, she found herself standing on the cushion of the window seat, which was white with plaster dust. Dad was already heading to the back of the store.

She stepped down. The front of the store looked even worse than the rear had. It had always been so inviting here, with the wool rug on the floor, the bright Ethiopian posters Almaz's family had given them, the tinted lamps, and the brass Victrola up on the shelf. Now the shelves were broken, and hundreds of papers and books were scattered all over. The imitation Tiffany lamp was upended, a pane of its ruby-colored shade cracked. The Victrola was nowhere to be seen.

She heard the crash of glass being dumped into the can outside. A few moments later, Whaley clambered into the store as well. Addie turned to him, indicating the chaos with a sweep of her hand. “It doesn't seem fair! Nothing was broken in the Powells' neighborhood. Mrs. Powell's son didn't even believe we'd had an earthquake.”

Whaley snorted. “Theater people are so full of crap. He was just messing with you.”

“No, they're not!” Addie hesitated. “And I don't think he was messing.” She crouched down and began picking up books, testing their bindings. Even though she had denied it, maybe Whaley was right. Maybe Reg had been joking. But how could he have been? There'd been genuine concern in his eyes when he insisted there hadn't been any earthquake.

Maybe something
was
wrong with her. Considering that perfectly solid things were disappearing and reappearing ... The horrible moment when she found the angel gone flashed into her head, and a rush of dizziness overtook her.

She stuffed the memory away quickly into some hidden compartment in her mind.

“Hey!” Whaley tapped her shoulder. “Want to help out here?”

Addie shook herself and put her hands under a toppled bookcase. She raised it, and the rounded edge of a brass trumpet amplifier gleamed beneath the mess of books that had fallen from the shelves.

“Dad! I found your Victrola!” she called, righting the bookcase and bending down again to carefully uncover his treasured record player. “I think it's okay.”

“It'll be a miracle if it is.” Dad emerged from the chaos of fallen shelves, an anxious look on his face. His dark hair and beard were dusted in white plaster. “If you find the box of seventy-eights, would you check inside? I don't think I can stand to look.”

Addie's heart went out to him, thinking of all the years he had spent searching for the records at antique stores and estate sales, cleaning them, cataloging them, and playing them on the Victrola at backyard parties in the summer....

“They're all shellac, aren't they, Mike?” Whaley shoved a box he'd filled with books against the wall. “Man, I couldn't look either if I were you. Some of them must be one of a kind.” He straightened up, and a look of panic washed over his face. “Oh, my God. Nothing better have crashed down onto my guitar. I left it out of the case.”

Addie jumped to her feet. “I wonder if I put away the theater-makeup kit.”

Dad looked from one of them to the other. Then he lifted his hand, curving his thumb and pointer finger together, like a statue of the Buddha. He lifted his head in a meditative pose. “Life is suffering,” he declaimed. “Attachment to things causes suffering. To end suffering, detach yourself from antique record players and guitars.”

“Speak for yourself, Buddha.” And Whaley went running to the back of the shop. They heard him pounding up the stairs to his room.

“Release yourself from twenty-jar makeup kits and wardrobes full of vintage gowns and boots....”

“Shut up, Dad.” Addie giggled.

He closed his eyes and rubbed his forehead. “Ah, my head is clear. I feel free....” He opened his eyes, winked at Addie. “Cheer up. We're out of business for a little while, that's all.”

A moment later, Whaley thumped back down into the store. “I did put it in the case.”

“That's good,” Dad said. “Listen. I'll clear this stuff away. You guys go get some of that plywood out of the shed and hammer it across the window frames. We need something to keep the vultures out until we can get a glazier to fix us up. Oh, and Addie?”

“Yes?”

“Take off that marvelous costume of yours. It's your brawn I need, daughter dear, not your beauty.”

“Oh, right.” Addie glanced down at the antique dress. “I'll go change.”

She began to pick her way through the ruins of the store, heading for the back stairs, but came to a sudden halt. The drama shelf had toppled over. Crouching down, she began picking up the books, carefully closing them, brushing off plaster dust. Her eyes darted anxiously until she found
A History of the Theater
splayed open on the floor. Thank goodness it wasn't squashed or ripped! Some pages were bent back, but the binding hadn't broken. She hugged it to herself. Where could she put it to keep it safe? She could take it to her room, but that would be plain stealing. Her eyes traveled across the wall to the hidden closet, exposed now. Perfect. She opened the door, placed the book on the little seat that protruded from the wall, and shut the door again. She'd put the book back once things settled down.

As she stepped into the back hall, she ran into Whaley coming out of the storage closet with his hammer and a jar of nails. His bleak expression startled her.

“Whaley? Something wrong?”

But he just ignored her and went out the door into the backyard.

Concerned, Addie followed him out, then stopped short.

Mrs. Turner was reclining on their flowered garden chair, her injured foot propped up on a stool. Zack was sitting on the old picnic table, reading one of his books to her.

“Addie!” Zack leaped up and charged toward her as if he'd been fired from a cannon, hair sticking up and smudges of dirt across his cheeks. “It was so cool! The teachers helper hid in the broom cupboard. There were six of us under my table, and the table legs jumped like a frog, and one of the boys was hanging on to this girl's braids, and as soon as it stopped, she socked him—pow!”

“You're spitting on me!” Addie spluttered, holding him at arm's length, grinning.

“It was a six point eight, the radio said, but way deep down, not on the surface.” It figured that Zack would know this, Addie thought. He loved earthquakes, volcanoes—any kind of natural disaster. He always wanted to go to Mount Saint Helens when they went hiking so he could look at the lava dome. “That's why there wasn't too much damage.”

“This isn't much damage?”

“
And
we get to have a barbecue,” Zack rushed on. ‘A barbecue in April! There's still no electricity, so Mrs. Turner said I could get those iron tong things, if it's okay with Dad, and she'll make toasted cheese over the fire pit.”

Mrs. Turner was watching Addie with a sheepish look on her face. “It sounds as if I sent you on a fools errand. I'm sorry, sweetie.”

Gently, Addie pushed Zack away. “Go tell Dad about the barbecue.” Zack ran into the house. She turned to Mrs. Turner. “What do you mean, a fool's errand?”

“I mean there was no need to send you after all. Becky Powell rang a little while ago to make sure I didn't come hitching across the city to check on her, since she was fine.”

“The phones are working?”

“My cell is, now. Still no landlines.”

“Well, she said she would call you.” Addie leaned against the picnic table. “There's something funny there,” she said slowly.

“Where?” Mrs. Turner looked around, as if expecting to see a rat by the chicken coops.

“At the Powells'.” Addie hiked herself up onto the table and sat where Zack had been. The wood was slightly damp,
and for the first time since she got home, she felt the chill in the air. “For one thing, there's nothing wrong with your friend's eyes, is there?”

“Of course there is! Didn't you notice? She's recovering from cancer.”

“Cancer?” An image of a thin, withered-looking woman in a hospital bed flashed through Addie's mind. Her mom. So long ago. Addie could remember very little of her during that last illness, when she was in the hospital, but this image had always haunted her. She held it up to her image of Mrs. Powell from earlier in the day, and shook her head. “How could that be? She has so much energy.”

Back by the alley, the shed door slammed loudly. She looked over at Whaley, struggling with a sheet of plywood. ‘Addie! You helping or what?”

“In a minute!”

Whaley heaved the wood up onto his back and stalked past her.

Mrs. T. eyed Addie quizzically. “Becky had brain surgery about six months ago. It nearly destroyed the vision in her right eye. She can see fine out of the other, but it affected her spatial sense—for example, she can't always judge distance. The other eye will eventually compensate, the doctor says. But it's good to hear that she was energetic.”

The beautiful polished-agate color of Reg's mothers eyes rose in Addie's mind, and the whisper of unease she'd felt at the Powells' stirred again, stronger this time. It fit with that feeling she'd had from the moment she met Reg, that something was really off; things just weren't adding up.

She thrust the thought away. Looking around at the familiar yards, the houses, the big Douglas fir, the weathered picnic table, and the piled-up milk crates that Dad used and reused for transporting books, she found it all oddly comforting. She turned back to her neighbor. “I really liked her—Mrs. Powell. She invited me to the Jewel on Tuesday after school.”

“Tuesday?
I'm
going there on Tuesday, to help her with the inspector.”

“What inspector?”

“Building code. Becky wants to renovate the place.” Mrs. T. shook her head. “It'll be a lot more than she was bargaining for now, with this earthquake.”

Maybe Mrs. Powell had been lucky and her theater had suffered as little damage as her house, Addie thought. Though when she looked around at the roof shingles in the yard and Mrs. Turner's damaged chicken coop, it seemed unlikely. “What time are you going to be there?”

“Around two. Becky gave me a key. If you'd like, I could leave it in the mailbox for you—its by the loading dock entrance in the alley around back—so you can just let yourself in when you get there.” She paused, examining Addie. “She must have seen you were interested in theater. Did she think that old dress was a costume? Now that I look at it on you, I'm beginning to wonder.”

Addie leaped off the picnic table. “Oh, gosh, I'm sorry! Its a mess. I'll get it dry-cleaned, I promise!”

“Stop apologizing! You ran halfway across the city just because I was worried about Becky. Besides, the dress isn't mine as far as I'm concerned. Its yours. I was thinking I'd offer most of the contents of the crates to Becky for the Jewel, since it seems they came from there in the first place. But of course you can keep anything you like.”

“Really?” Delight flashed through her. This wonderful dress was hers! And maybe even—she reached into her pocket, pulled out the mirror, and handed it to Mrs. Turner. “I forgot I had this. Do you mind if I keep it, too?”

Mrs. Turner's eyes widened. “Where did this come from?”

“It was wrapped in the shawl that went with the dress. The shawl must still be up in my room. I forgot about it when I found the mirror.”

“I don't blame you. This is gorgeous!” She held the silver closer to her face and squinted. “Do you see this here?” She pointed the manicured nail of her pinkie finger at some tiny letters along the edge of the metal. “The silversmith's mark.
T-a-g
... something.”

Addie went and leaned over the edge of the lounge chair. “There's a date, too ... 19—oh, I can't tell what the other numbers are. We need a magnifying glass.” She looked up. “That's a great idea, giving the costumes to the theater. You'll need help getting them there, won't you?”

“I'm hoping your dad will offer to loan me the van.” She looked down at her bandaged ankle ruefully. “And help me pack it too.”

“Well, when I get to the theater, I'll help carry the crates inside. Actually, I'll get Whaley to help, too. How does that sound?”

“Perfect.”

The sound of banging on the front door carried into the backyard, and Addie heard Whaley yell, “Don't come that way! Can't you see the broken glass? Climb through the window.”