The Sixty-Eight Rooms (24 page)

T
HE NEXT DAY COULDN’T COME
soon enough for Ruthie. She had tossed and turned all night. It was as though when she was lying on one side she could only think of the great stuff that had happened—the rooms, the magic, Sophie, finding Mr. Bell’s photos—and when she rolled over, she could only think of Jack having to move away. The question of what would happen to him and Lydia kept repeating in her brain.

Her dad was flipping pancakes and her mom was reading the paper when she walked sleepily into the kitchen.

“Happy Presidents’ Day!” her dad said.

“Thanks.” She plopped down in a chair, still as glum as last night. Her dad put a plate of pancakes in front of her but she didn’t feel like eating.

“Are you coming down with something, sweetie?” her mom asked.

“No, I’m not sick…. I’m just so worried about Jack.” All her fears spilled out of her. “And if they can’t pay the rent that means they probably can’t pay for anything!” she finished, after explaining everything. “What are they going to do? We have to help them!”

Her parents gave each other quick glances. “I think we should tell her,” her mom said.

“What? Tell me what?” She could hear the frantic tension in her own voice and it startled her.

“Well,” her dad started, “we weren’t going to tell you until it was official. You know the meeting we went to last night?” Ruthie nodded. “It was for a special committee—actually, your mother formed it—of the board of directors at Oakton. We were trying to find a way to help Lydia.”

“But Jack’s already a scholarship student,” Ruthie said.

“We decided to look into what else we could do. Last night we found a solution,” her mom said.

“What is it? Will Jack get to stay in his loft?” Ruthie could barely stand the suspense.

“You know the new wing that was built on the school last year?” her mother continued. “You know that big, long, blank wall connecting the old wing to the new? We decided that wall needs a mural—a big, expensive mural—and the board okayed the money to commission Lydia to paint it for us. The chair will call her today with the offer.”

“Will it be enough money?” Ruthie had no idea how much an artist could get paid for a job like this.

“It will certainly be enough to get them through this rough period,” her dad said. “There are some pretty generous families who all wanted to help Jack and Lydia—and make the school look nicer in the process. It works for everyone. Your mother’s a genius.”

Ruthie leapt into her mother’s lap and hugged her.

“Thanks, Mom!” Ruthie said, still hugging her tightly. She could feel the anxiety floating right out the top of her head.

When Jack arrived to pick Ruthie up she couldn’t explain to him why she was in such a good mood (her parents had told her not to say anything to him—the committee should talk to Lydia first). But they had an important mission ahead of them, so it was easy to talk about that instead. Jack had placed Caroline Bell’s old backpack and its contents inside his to protect it. They told Ruthie’s parents they were going to the library, one last lie for a good cause.

It was bitterly cold outside, so they sat in a coffee shop for a while, trying to figure out how they would present Mr. Bell with the photos. It was nice to be in the warm space. Ruthie ordered some hot chocolate with whipped cream. She knew Jack didn’t have any money in his pocket, but she kept quiet. Instead she drank half of the frothy liquid and then gave the rest to him.

At first Jack thought they should just show Mr. Bell the photos straightaway, but Ruthie had the feeling that this could be very delicate. Who could predict how he would
react to seeing the photos that he’d said he would give anything to have again? Plus, they needed to figure out what to tell him about where they found them.

Ruthie’s eyes suddenly widened. “I have an idea! C’mon, we have to go see Mrs. McVittie first.”

Jack guzzled the last of the hot chocolate and followed Ruthie out into the cold.

“What’s your idea? Why Mrs. McVittie?” Jack asked as they rushed along the sidewalk.

“I want to tell Mr. Bell that we found his album in her shop—you know, way back in that storage room. She’s got boxes in there that I bet she’s never looked at. She gets stuff from estate sales all the time and can hardly keep up with it all. We can say we found the album while we were helping her sort boxes. I bet she’ll go along with us; besides, she’s the only person we can trust because she knows about the magic already.”

Jack agreed that it was a great idea.

They found Mrs. McVittie in her shop, reading as usual. Jack smiled and pulled the album from his backpack. They both blurted out what it was and how they had found it. Mrs. McVittie remembered right away who Edmund Bell was and understood how important the work had been.

“This is thrilling, simply thrilling,” she said as they showed her the album and the exquisite photos it held.

Mrs. McVittie eagerly agreed to help them with their cover story. They would tell Mr. Bell that many years ago—they could be vague about precise details—Mrs. McVittie
had bought entire boxes from the estate sale of an eccentric old man who had died without heirs. They would say that many of the boxes had been filled with junk and that one of the boxes ended up underneath other boxes and was never opened, until Ruthie and Jack offered to help Mrs. McVittie clean out her storeroom. Simply a lucky find.

Before they left the shop to go see Mr. Bell, Ruthie asked Mrs. McVittie if she minded keeping so many secrets with them.

“At my age, you don’t expect so much fun and excitement,” she answered, grinning. “I’d have been disappointed if you hadn’t asked me!”

Jack bundled the album into his backpack while Ruthie gave Mrs. McVittie a goodbye hug. They zipped up their coats and braced themselves for both the cold and their meeting with Mr. Bell.

Pushing the buzzer at the front door of Mr. Bell’s building for the third time, they looked at each other as a realization came to them at the same time: it was Monday, so of course he was working. They headed to the museum, jumping the dirty piles of snow at every corner.

Since Ruthie had spent her money on the hot chocolate, neither one of them could pay to check the backpack and they couldn’t enter the museum with it. Besides, Ruthie wasn’t crazy about the idea of leaving the precious item in the hands of some stranger at the coat check.

“I’ll sit here in the lobby,” she said, plunking down on
one of the benches near the big glass doors. “You go find Mr. Bell and see if he can come upstairs and meet us here.”

Ruthie sat on the bench next to an old lady in a wool coat with a fur collar. It seemed like she sat there a long time, getting warmer in her down parka, with the backpack on her lap. Every time someone came into the museum she would feel the whoosh of frigid air sweep in and cool her off a bit. She usually enjoyed watching people but now she mostly just wanted to see Jack come through the crowd with Mr. Bell. Finally Jack appeared, solo.

“Where’s Mr. Bell?” Ruthie asked.

“He can’t leave his post for another fifteen minutes,” Jack answered. “He’ll come up and meet us on his break. I told him we had something really important to show him.”

“Well, let’s hang out in the gift shop, at least,” Ruthie suggested.

They stayed in the gift shop, nervously checking the time so as not to miss Mr. Bell. After only ten minutes, they went back to the bench in the lobby to watch for him.

Jack jumped up first. “Here we are, Mr. Bell,” he called, walking up to him quickly. Ruthie followed right behind.

“Hello, Ruthie,” Mr. Bell said, his eyes betraying his curiosity. “What’s all this about?”

“Hi, Mr. Bell,” Ruthie started. “We have something for you.” She looked around, realizing that this crowded lobby wasn’t the place she’d had in mind when she imagined this moment. “Is there someplace quieter we could go?”

Mr. Bell’s look of curiosity intensified. “Follow me,” he said. He walked them past the entrance guards, who smiled at him and said hello by name. They entered the area of the main grand staircases of the museum, but instead of going up or down Ruthie and Jack followed Mr. Bell through a doorway on the left, into a cavernous and nearly pitch-black space. He switched on the lights. They were in an auditorium.

“I didn’t know this room was here,” Jack said.

“It’s used for lectures,” Mr. Bell said. “Have a seat.” Ruthie and Jack sat in two aisle seats in the back. Mr. Bell stayed standing.

Ruthie started speaking as she began to unzip Jack’s backpack. “We found something and we’re pretty sure it’s yours.” She lifted Caroline Bell’s backpack out and held it so he could see it clearly.

At first, Ruthie could see no reaction on Mr. Bell’s face. She watched him closely. After a second or two his eyebrows rose slightly and his mouth opened as if to speak. Next his shoulders lifted as he inhaled more than a normal breath, and his hand went to his chest.

“Is that what I think it is?” he asked softly. Neither Jack nor Ruthie said anything. Instead, she unzipped Caroline’s backpack and tipped it so he could peer in. He reached over and started unloading it, item by item: her arithmetic book, notebook, pencil box and pink barrette, and then the photo album. He opened it and gave a gasp, tears filling his eyes almost immediately. Ruthie felt a lump in
her own throat. Jack looked at Ruthie and gave a quick smile of deep satisfaction.

“Oh, my … oh, my,” was all Mr. Bell could say. He pulled a white handkerchief out of his back pocket and wiped his eyes. Then he slowly sat down. Mr. Bell turned page after page, steadily wiping away tears. Jack and Ruthie sat quietly and waited until he was able to speak. Closing the book, he pressed it to his chest, saying, “How … Where on earth …?” He couldn’t say more but they knew what he wanted to ask.

Ruthie answered. “My family knows a woman who sells antiques—Mrs. McVittie. Jack and I were helping her clean out her storage room and this was in a box way in the back, under a bunch of other boxes. She thinks it came from an estate sale years ago but can’t really remember how long it had been there. She has piles and piles of stuff in her shop, and boxes she’s never sorted through.” Ruthie felt as though she was rambling on nervously. She wished she’d let Jack do the talking.

“We saw the backpack and thought it looked cool, kinda retro,” Jack explained, and then paused for a minute to let it all sink in, hoping Mr. Bell believed their story. “We were pretty sure it belonged to your daughter because we saw her name on the inside cover of the math book. Then we saw the album and since we’d heard your story, it just made sense.”

“I am overjoyed…. You can’t even begin to understand! And I am deeply grateful.” Mr. Bell was still wiping
tears off his cheeks. He continued to look at the old photos, lost in his memories. After a while he looked up at the two of them.

“Funny thing is, we still don’t know how it disappeared. I can’t believe it’s been in Caroline’s old backpack all this time.”

Ruthie and Jack said nothing and offered no more explanation. They would simply stick to their story.

“I guess my daughter was telling the truth all those years ago. At least partially,” Mr. Bell remembered.

“What do you mean?” Ruthie asked.

“She had a very hard time when her mom died—she was only seven years old. I took her to see a psychiatrist because she seemed to be imagining all sorts of things. After my photos disappeared, she blamed herself. She even made up a story about being able to shrink and get into the miniature rooms. She said she left the photos there.” He paused and shook his head. “Imagine that!” Mr. Bell added, “I knew she’d lost her backpack but I didn’t want to believe that she had taken the photo album without my permission. But since the backpack and the album were together, I guess that proves it. I didn’t want her to feel guilty on top of grieving over her mother.” He sighed. It was the deepest sigh Ruthie had ever heard. “The doctor said children tend to blame themselves when bad things happen….”

As Mr. Bell looked at page after page of his photos,
Ruthie glanced at Jack, unsure of what to say next. He put his finger to his lips. Ruthie nodded in agreement.

After a few more moments, Mr. Bell looked up at the two of them. “Did you take a look at these?”

“Yes,” Ruthie answered. “We thought they were beautiful!” She was relieved to be able to say something that was completely true.

“Thank you! Won’t Caroline be surprised, to say the least! I’ll call her this evening,” Mr. Bell said, and added, shaking his head, “After all these years, she’s been carrying this burden….” His voice cracked with emotion.

Ruthie thought it was amazing that a grown-up could still feel guilty about something she’d done when she was young. She thought about Mrs. McVittie searching for books all her life, trying to understand things that had happened in her childhood. Did everyone live with unanswered questions? “Little kids lose stuff all the time,” Ruthie said. “She shouldn’t feel bad anymore.”