The Magician's Tower (11 page)

Oona's mother had let go of the idea, but Oona had always harbored a sense of guilt that she hadn't fulfilled her mother's wishes. And then of course there was the thought that if she had attended the academy, instead of accepting the apprenticeship and learning magic, then her mother and her sister might still be alive. She remembered what Madame Romania from Romania had hinted at, that Oona might be innocent of the tragedy after all. But there was only one way to know for sure, which made discovering the punchbowl's location imperative.

As Oona and Madame Iree ascended the stairs, they came upon several younger girls being mentored by older girls on the proper way to walk up and down a flight of stairs. The younger girls had broomsticks tied to their backs to keep them straight. Oona thought it almost comical as she listened to one of the older girls giving precise instructions on how high to lift the hem of the skirt without the fear of being scandalized, or tripping on one's own dress.

The young lady giving the lesson—a tall schoolgirl with fiery red hair and a mouth that reminded Oona of a lizard—glanced Oona over from head to foot, and then snickered. She pointed at Oona's feet, as if making fun of the way she was walking. Oona looked away as the girls all began to giggle, choosing to ignore them. Oona's mother had taught her to walk properly—
without the need of broomsticks, thank you very much
—and in that moment she decided that she was all the better for never having attended such a ridiculous school.

Isadora's room was the first at the top of the stairs. To Oona's astonishment, Madame Iree didn't bother to knock, but flung the door open and glided gracefully in as if it were her own private suite.

“Isadora, dear,” said Madame Iree, “you have guests.”

“Mother!” Isadora shouted, clearly surprised.

Oona stepped into the room, catching a whiff of some mighty strong perfume. Isadora, who was sitting on her bed, quickly shoved something beneath her pillow. Madame Iree seemed not to have noticed.

“You know Miss Crate, Isadora?” she said, extending her hand. “She says she has something of yours.”

Oona's gaze darted around the room, looking for any sign of the punchbowl. Madame Romania from Romania had said it was precisely thirteen inches in diameter and made of finely etched crystal. Oona saw nothing of the
sort, not on the dressing table, nor the bedside table, nor the dresser.

A double wardrobe stood open, revealing countless dresses packed so tightly that Oona was quite certain not one more single dress, let alone a thirteen-inch punchbowl, could fit inside. Below the dresses, at the bottom of the cabinet, she could see Isadora's shoes lined up in perfectly even rows—again no sign of the missing bowl.

Oona was curious, however, as to what Isadora was hiding beneath her pillow.

Isadora glanced at Oona, managing to look both surprised and smug at the same time. “You have something of mine?” she asked. “Whatever could it be?”

Oona reached into her pocket and brought out the ring. She held it between her thumb and forefinger.

Isadora's eyebrows came together, a puzzled look on her face. It was not the reaction Oona was expecting. To her surprise, it was Madame Iree who reacted.

“Oh, my dear, where did you find it?” she asked. “I've been wondering what happened to my ring since the party last night.”

“It's yours?” asked both Oona and Isadora at the same time.

Madame Iree's face went red. She opened her mouth, as if to explain, but then her lips suddenly clamped shut, and she held out her hand. “Thank you for returning my
ring, Miss Crate. It no doubt slipped from my finger when the architect knocked me over and spilled his soup on my dress. Highly embarrassing.”

Oona's eyebrows rose. “No doubt,” she said, doing her best to conceal her disbelief. The ring had of course been found beneath the caravan, nowhere near the site of the soup-spilling incident, and Oona had a feeling that Madame Iree was not telling the whole story. Regardless, she placed the ring in the dressmaker's open palm.

Madame Iree turned abruptly to her daughter and asked: “Isadora, what have you got hidden beneath your pillow?”

Oona wondered briefly if Madame Iree's sudden interest in what Isadora was concealing was simply a convenient way to divert attention away from herself and the ring. If that was the case, then it was a good ploy. Oona's heart leapt. Could it be this easy? Was Isadora's theft about to be revealed?

Isadora's eyes shifted nervously, glancing from Oona to Madame Iree.

“N-n-nothing,” Isadora stuttered.

“Come, come, Isadora. I saw you shift something beneath your pillow when I came in,” her mother insisted.

Isadora's eyes narrowed. “
Barged
in would be more appropriate. Have you ever heard of knocking, Mother?”

Madame Iree ignored the sarcasm. “What are you hiding, Isadora? Show me this instant.”

Isadora licked her lips, and then pulled a letter from beneath the pillow. “It is a … a … a poem. From my BOYFRIEND!”

“Oh,” said Madame Iree. “Is that all? Why were you hiding it?”

“Because,” Isadora said indignantly. “It is a private matter, and … we're not supposed to have letters from boys in our rooms. Academy rules. Anyway, Roderick doesn't … um … well, he does not wish for others to know he is a poet. He's afraid they will think him unmanly.”

“That's ridiculous,” said Madame Iree, and Oona had to agree. For a boy so concerned with being chivalrous, she thought it silly for Roderick to worry about what others thought of his poetry. Madame Iree wandered to the dressing table, where she picked up the blue ribbon Isadora had won earlier that day. “Have you figured out your clue yet, Miss Crate?”

The question took Oona by surprise, and she couldn't help but feel a hint of challenge in it. Perhaps even a taunt.

Like mother like daughter
, Oona thought before saying: “I … um … am working on it.”

Madame Iree nodded confidently and glanced at Isadora. The two of them grinned at each other, as if they held a great secret.

“And you, Isadora?” Oona found herself asking, and hating herself for giving in to the trap. “How are you doing with the clue?”

Isadora sank back into her pillow and waggled her eyebrows. “Figured it out hours ago. Really, I'm surprised you haven't gotten it yet.” She feigned a yawn, and then snapped her fingers. “Easy as one … two … three.”

Madame Iree clapped her hands together. “That's my girl. Smart as a whip.”

Oona knew that if Deacon had been there, he would have been helpless to correct Madame Iree, explaining that the saying was actually “
quick
as a whip.” She suddenly wished for his company.

It was only moments later that she had reason to wish for his company a second time, though this time for protection rather than grammatical advice.

“Look at the hem of that dress!” said a sharp, foreboding voice from behind Oona.

She turned to find Headmistress Duvet looming in the doorway. Her glass eye gave the impression that it was looking sideways at her good eye: the good eye that presently leered menacingly at Oona's feet.

Oona looked down for the first time that evening and could see where the hem of her dress had been burned in the ape house challenge, and it became painfully obvious what the girls on the stairs had been laughing at. She had
been so preoccupied with losing to Isadora—not to mention the mystery of the missing punchbowl—that she'd neglected to change her dress. Oona's white, stocking-clad ankles showed beneath the dark burned fabric, and the dress appeared several inches shorter than when she had first put it on that morning.

“Oh,” she said, examining her ankle. “That's … um … well … that's—”

“Highly improper!” said Headmistress Duvet, her good eye all at once gleaming even brighter than her glass one, and it wasn't until it was too late that Oona noticed the cane from the entryway in the woman's hand. The headmistress raised it up, the word
IMPROPER
printed on the paddle as large as a newspaper headline, and Oona closed her eyes in anticipation of impact.

S
he actually swatted you?” Deacon perched himself atop the mirror, sounding aghast.

Oona eased herself onto the chair in front of her dressing table, a bag of never-melting ice beneath her aching bum.

“She did indeed,” she said, “and I can't believe you let me go out dressed like that. Either of you.”

Samuligan stood attentively near the door, his crescent grin just visible beneath the shadow of his cowboy hat. “I thought it rather becoming. Though, admittedly, ahead of its time. Just wait, three months from now, all the girls will be burning the hems of their skirts, and the dress shops of Dark Street will reek of smoke from the Glass Gates all the way to New York City.”

“Very funny,” Oona said, looking herself over in the mirror. “A real trendsetter.”

She took in the reflection of her room, which she decided would never have passed the inspection of Headmistress Duvet's severe scrutiny. Glass vials and laboratory beakers lay messily across the dressing table, along with various untidy piles of paper.

She pulled the ribbon containing the contest clue from her pocket, and mimicked Isadora's smug tone. “Easy as one, two, three!” She tossed the ribbon to the table. “So now it seems that Madame Iree is the most likely suspect for the punchbowl thief.”

“How so?” Deacon asked.

“Well, as I told you on the ride home, it was not Isadora's ring that you found beneath the caravan's trapdoor after all. It was her mother's.”

“But you said Madame Iree claims to have lost the ring when she and the architect fell to the ground during the soup-spilling incident at the party,” Deacon reasoned.

“And what then?” Oona asked. “The ring just got up and walked beneath the caravan on its own?”

“Perhaps it's an enchanted ring,” Samuligan suggested.

“That is always a possibility,” Oona admitted. “But that still gives no explanation as to why it fell from her hand in front of the stage, and then ended up beneath the
caravan. Unless, of course, she is lying. It could be that she ran into the architect on purpose.”

“Why would she do that?” Deacon asked.

“Well, consider this possibility,” Oona said. “Madame Iree crawls beneath the caravan in order to sneak inside and steal the punchbowl. The ring slips from her finger, and she gets mud all over her dress. After stealing the punchbowl, she then returns to the party and collides with the architect. The soup spills on her dress, and the two of them fall to the ground. Madame Iree uses this as an excuse to return home to change her sullied dress. She then uses the punchbowl to give Isadora the answers to the clues.”

“But where does she hide the punchbowl?” Deacon asked. “Before she leaves the party, how dose she smuggle it out of the park without anyone seeing?”

“Good question,” Oona said. “Perhaps … she has it beneath her dress?”

Samuligan threw back his head and howled with laughter, causing Oona's mirror to crack down the middle. Deacon leapt from the mirror, shrieking in surprise before settling on the bedpost.

“Samuligan!” Oona said. “Look what you've done.”

The faerie servant cleared his throat. “Forgive me,” he said, and then spit onto his finger. The saliva blobbed at the end of his long, bony fingertip, which he used to run down the crack in the mirror. When he was done, the crack
had disappeared and the glass appeared as good as new.

“Well, you just saved yourself seven years bad luck,” Oona said.

“Only seven?” Samuligan said. “That's nothing. I once had a cousin in Faerie who had a three-hundred-year stretch of bad luck.”

Oona smiled. It wasn't often that Samuligan spoke of his life before Pendulum House. It intrigued her. However, she did not wish to get sidetracked.

“Well,” she said, “what do you think of my theory of Madame Iree?”

“Rather dreary,” said Samuligan.

Deacon fluttered his wings irritably. “Don't you think you should put your full concentration into figuring out that clue?” He pointed his beak at the ribbon on the table. “Or are you already forgetting what happened earlier today when you dillydallied?”

Oona sighed, shifting in her seat. Her backside suddenly stung from where Headmistress Duvet's paddle had smacked home. She picked up the ribbon. “Deacon is right. Let's get to the bottom of this, right now.”