Raymie Nightingale

“There is entirely too much Chopin played in this establishment,” said Isabelle.

  Raymie looked up.

  “Write that, too,” said Isabelle.

  A long silence prevailed in the room.

  “I don’t know how to spell Chopin,” said Raymie finally.

  “What do they teach you in those schools?” asked Isabelle.

  This, Raymie knew, was another impossible, unanswerable adult question. She waited.

  “He was a musician,” said Isabelle. “An entirely too gloomy one. Chopin is a proper name. Therefore, it begins with a capital C and is followed by a lowercase h.”

  And so they continued; by the end, Raymie had written a letter of complaint for Isabelle, detailing how the Golden Glen janitor played the wrong kind of music on the common-room piano. According to Isabelle, the music of Chopin was too mournful, and the janitor needed to stop playing it because the world was mournful enough on its own. The Golden Glen, in particular, was too mournful to be borne, according to Isabelle.

  It was a very long letter.

  And when Raymie was done writing it, Isabelle made Raymie push her wheelchair out of the room and down the hallway and back to the common room, where the floor was just a floor and not a glowing lake, and where there was a wooden box with the word SUGGESTIONS printed on its side in silver stick-on letters.

  “Drop it in,” said Isabelle.

  “Me?” said Raymie.

  “You wrote it, didn’t you?” said Isabelle.

  Raymie put the letter in the box.

  “There,” said Isabelle. “You wanted to do a good deed. You did a good deed.”

  Writing a letter of complaint about mournful music didn’t seem like a good deed at all. It seemed like the opposite of a good deed.

  “Take me back to my room,” said Isabelle. “I’ve had enough.”

  Raymie thought that she had had enough, too. She turned the wheelchair around and headed back to Isabelle’s room.

  “Take my hand!” shouted Alice Nebbley as they made their way down the hallway.

  “Close the door when you leave,” said Isabelle after Raymie had wheeled her into her room. “And do not return. I am not interested in people doing good deeds. Good deeds are pointless, in any case. Nothing changes. Nothing matters.”

  The sun was trying to make its way through the one small window in Isabelle’s room. Raymie stood in the doorway holding Florence close to her chest, as if the book could protect her. Which it couldn’t, of course. She knew that.

  Everything seemed bleak, impossible.

  “Archie, I’m sorry I betrayed you,” said Raymie without really meaning to say it.

  “Yes, well, poor Archie, alas Archie. And alas your betrayal of him,” said Isabelle, “whoever he is.”

  “He’s a cat,” said Raymie.

  Isabelle stared at Raymie with her bright-blue eyes. “Is that why you want to do a good deed, because you betrayed a cat?”

  “No,” said Raymie. “My father left.”

  “And?”

  “I’m working to get him back,” said Raymie.

  “With good deeds?” said Isabelle.

  “Yes,” said Raymie. Maybe it was because of Isabelle’s X-ray vision, or maybe it was because of her lack of sympathy; for some reason, Raymie told Isabelle the truth. “I’m going to win a contest and then I will be famous, and he will see my picture in the paper and he will have to come home.”

  “I see,” said Isabelle.

  Just then, the sun managed to come around the corner of Isabelle’s window and throw itself into a small square of light on the floor. It was very bright. It shimmered. It looked like the window to another universe.

  “Look,” said Raymie. She pointed at the sun patch.

  “I see,” said Isabelle. “I see.”

  “Take my hand!” shouted Alice Nebbley as Raymie walked down the hallway.

  Raymie stopped. She listened. She flexed her toes. And then she started walking again. She followed the sound of Alice’s voice.

  Raymie needed to do a good deed, plus she needed to make up for the bad deed she had just done. That meant she had to do the bravest, best deed she could think of, the deed she least wanted to do.

  She had to go into Alice Nebbley’s room and ask her if she wanted to be read to.

  It was a terrifying prospect.

  Raymie looked down at her feet. She made herself put one foot in front of the other. She concentrated on Alice’s voice.

  The voice led her to a door with the number 323 on it, and underneath the number was a white card. Alice Nebbley was written on the card in black ink. The letters of the name were shaky and uncertain, like maybe Alice Nebbley had written them herself.

  Raymie flexed her toes. She knocked.

  And when no one answered, Raymie took a deep breath, grabbed the doorknob and turned it, then stepped inside. The room was dark, but Raymie could see that someone was in the bed.

  “Mrs. Nebbley?” whispered Raymie.

  There was no answer.

  Raymie stepped farther into the room.

  “Mrs. Nebbley?” she said again, a little bit louder this time. She could hear whoever was in bed breathing in a raspy, strangled kind of way.

  “Um,” said Raymie. “I’m here to do a good deed? Would you like to hear about a bright and shining path and, um, Florence Nightingale . . . Mrs. Nebbley?”

  “Arrrrrggggghhhhhhh!” screamed Alice Nebbley.

  It was the most terrifying noise Raymie had ever heard in her life. It was a sound of pure pain, pure need. Alice Nebbley’s scream pierced something inside of Raymie. She felt her soul whoosh away into nothingness.

  “I cannnnooooottttt!” shouted Alice Nebbley. “Give meeeee.” A hand rose out of the covers. It was reaching for something. It was reaching for her — Raymie Clarke!

  Raymie jumped, and A Bright and Shining Path: The Life of Florence Nightingale leaped out of her hands and flew into the air and skittered under Alice Nebbley’s bed.

  Raymie screamed.

  Alice Nebbley screamed back. “Arrrrgggghh! I cannot, cannot, cannot bear the pain! Take my hand.” Her hand was still extended, reaching out of the covers, searching. “Please, please, take my hand.”

  Raymie Clarke turned and ran.

  Raymie stood for a long time on the sidewalk in front of the Golden Glen, flexing her toes and isolating her objectives.

  She had to get the book back. That was her one true objective right now. It was a library book. Edward Option would be very disappointed in her if she didn’t return it. She hadn’t even read it, and that would disappoint him, too. And there would be fines, overdue fines!

  What if she had to pay for the book?

  But she couldn’t go back into Alice Nebbley’s room. She truly didn’t know if she was brave enough to ever enter the Golden Glen again.

  She thought about Isabelle’s X-ray eyes.

  She thought about Alice Nebbley’s hand.

  She thought about gigantic seabirds that snatched babies from their mothers’ arms.

  And then she heard Beverly Tapinski’s voice: Fear is a big waste of time. I’m not afraid of anything.

  Beverly. Beverly Tapinski and her pocketknife.

  Beverly, who was afraid of nothing.

  Raymie knew, suddenly, what her objective was.

  She would find Beverly and ask her to help get Florence Nightingale back.

  Finding Beverly Tapinski turned out to be surprisingly easy.

  When Raymie got to baton-twirling lessons the next afternoon, Beverly was standing under the pine trees, chewing gum and staring straight ahead.

  “I thought you weren’t coming back,” said Raymie.

  Beverly said nothing.

  “I’m glad you came back.”

  Beverly turned and looked at her. There was a bruise on her face, under her left eye.

  “What happened to your face?” asked Raymie.

  “Nothing happened to my face,” said Beverly. She chewed her gum and
looked right at Raymie. Beverly’s eyes were blue. They weren’t the same blue as Isabelle’s; they were darker, deeper. But they had the same effect as Isabelle’s eyes. Raymie felt as if they could see right through her, inside of her.

  She stared back at Beverly and started trying to rearrange her soul, working to make it invisible.

  And then Louisiana Elefante showed up.

  She had on the same pink dress from the day before. But today she was wearing barrettes, six of them. The barrettes were scattered randomly throughout Louisiana’s limp blond hair. All the barrettes were identical — made of pink, shiny plastic with little white bunnies painted on them. The bunnies looked like ghost bunnies.

  “I’m not going to faint today,” said Louisiana.

  “Good news,” said Beverly. “Got yourself some bunny barrettes, huh?”

  “These are my good-luck bunnies. I forgot to wear them yesterday, and look what happened. I’m never going to remove them from my head again. What’s on your face?”

  “Nothing’s on my face,” said Beverly.

  At this point, Ida Nee came marching toward them, her white boots glowing and her baton flashing. She had on a spangled top that sparkled like fish scales. Her hair was very yellow. She looked like a mermaid in a bad mood.

  “Here we go,” said Beverly.

  “Stand at attention!” shouted Ida Nee. “Stand up straight! That is the first rule of baton twirling, to stand as if you value yourself and your place in the world.”

  Raymie tried to stand up straight.

  “Shoulders back, chin up, batons out in front of you!” said Ida Nee. “And we will begin.” She raised her baton. And then she lowered it. She looked at Beverly. “Tapinski,” she said, “are you chewing gum?”

  “No.”

  Ida Nee lunged toward Beverly. Her baton flashed brilliantly, violently, in the afternoon sun.

  And then, unbelievably, the baton landed on Beverly’s head.

  Where it kind of bounced, because of the rubber tip.

  Louisiana gasped.

  “Don’t lie to me,” said Ida Nee. “Never lie to me. Spit it out.”

  “No,” said Beverly.

  “What?” said Ida Nee.

  “No,” said Beverly again.

  “Oh, my goodness,” said Louisiana. She put her hand on Raymie’s arm. “Here I am wearing my lucky bunny barrettes, but I am still thinking that I might faint.”

  Raymie thought that she might faint, too, even though she had never fainted before and had no idea what almost fainting felt like. Louisiana held on to her arm and Raymie held on to . . . what? She didn’t know. She held on to the fact that Louisiana was holding on to her, she supposed.

  Ida Nee raised the baton to hit Beverly again.

  Louisiana took her hand off of Raymie’s arm and let out a strange noise — something between a scream and a squeak — and then she lunged forward and grabbed hold of Ida Nee’s spangled midsection.

  “Stop it!” shouted Louisiana. “You stop it!”

  “What in the world?” said Ida Nee. “Unhand me.” She tried to peel Louisiana off of her, but Louisiana held tight.

  “Don’t hit her again,” said Louisiana. “Please don’t.”

  Lake Clara glittered. The pine trees swayed. The world sighed and creaked, and Louisiana clung to Ida Nee as if she would never, ever let her go. “Don’t hit her, don’t hit her,” Louisiana chanted.

  “Don’t be stupid,” said Beverly.

  This seemed like good advice, but Raymie wasn’t sure exactly whom it was intended for.

  “Please don’t hurt her,” said Louisiana. She was crying now.

  “Get off me,” said Ida Nee, pushing at Louisiana.

  “Look,” said Beverly. “I’m spitting out the gum.”

  She spit out the gum.

  “See?” she said. “No one’s going to hurt me. It’s impossible to hurt me.” She put down her baton and held up her hands. “Come here,” she said. “It’s fine.” She pulled Louisiana off of Ida Nee. She patted Louisiana on the back. “See?” said Beverly again. “It’s all fine. I’m fine.”

  Ida Nee blinked. She looked confused. “This is nonsense,” she said. “And you know how I feel about nonsense.” She took a deep breath and marched away, back toward the house.

  And that was the end of the second baton-twirling lesson.

  The three of them were down at the dock.

  “So let me get this straight,” said Beverly. “You want me to go into some old lady’s room and take a book about Florence Nightingale out from under her bed.”

  “Yes,” said Raymie.

  “Because you’re afraid to do it.”

  “She screams,” said Raymie. “And it’s a library book. I have to get it back.”

  “I want to come, too,” said Louisiana.

  “No,” said Beverly and Raymie together.

  “But why not?” said Louisiana. “We’re the Three Rancheros! We’re bound to each other through thick and thin.”

  “The three who?” asked Raymie.

  “Rancheros,” said Louisiana.

  “It’s Musketeers,” said Beverly. “It’s the Three Musketeers.”

  “No,” said Louisiana. “That’s them. We’re us. And we’re the Rancheros. We’ll rescue each other.”

  “I don’t need to be rescued,” said Beverly.

  “I want to come with you to the Sparkling Dell,” said Louisiana.

  “It’s the Golden Glen,” said Raymie.

  “I want to help rescue the Florence Darksong book.”

  “Nightingale,” said Raymie and Beverly at the same time.

  “And when we’re done doing that, we can go to the Very Friendly Animal Center and rescue Archie.”

  “Listen,” said Beverly. “Let me tell you something. There is no Very Friendly Animal Center. That cat is long gone.”

  “He’s not long gone,” said Louisiana. “I’ll rescue him and that will be my good deed for the Little Miss Central Florida Tire 1975 contest, and my other good deed will be that I will help you get the book back. Also, I’ll stop stealing canned goods with Granny.”

  “You steal canned goods?” said Raymie.

  “Tuna fish, mostly,” said Louisiana. “It’s very high in protein.”

  “I told you,” said Beverly to Raymie. “I looked at them and I could tell that they were criminals.”

  “We’re not criminals,” said Louisiana. “We’re survivors. We’re fighters.”

  At this point, there was a long silence. The three of them stared out at Lake Clara. The water glittered and sighed.

  “There’s a lady who drowned in this lake,” said Raymie. “Her name was Clara Wingtip.”

  “So?” said Beverly.

  “She haunts it,” said Raymie. “In my father’s office, there’s a photo of the lake from the air, and you can see Clara Wingtip’s shadow under the water.”

  Beverly snorted. “I don’t believe in fairy tales.”

  “You can hear her weeping sometimes,” said Raymie. “That’s what they say.”

  “Really?” said Louisiana. She rearranged her barrettes and put her hair behind one ear and leaned in toward the lake. “Oh,” she said. “I hear it. I hear the weeping.”

  Beverly snorted.

  Raymie listened.

  She heard weeping, too.

  “So, okay,” said Beverly. “You get the book, and you get the cat. But what do I get?”

  They were all on their backs on Ida Nee’s dock, staring up at the sky.

  “Well, what do you want?” asked Louisiana.

  “I don’t want anything,” said Beverly.

  “I don’t believe you,” said Louisiana. “Everybody wants something; everybody wishes.”

  “I don’t wish. I sabotage.”

  “Oh, dear,” said Louisiana.

  Raymie said nothing.

  She looked up at the impossibly bright sky and remembered how Mrs. Borkowski had told her once that if you were in a hole that was deep en
ough and if it was daylight and you looked up at the sky from the very deep hole, you could see stars even though it was the middle of the day.

  Could that be true?

  Raymie didn’t know. Mrs. Borkowski dispensed a lot of questionable information.

  “Phhhhtttt,” said Raymie very quietly to herself.

  And then she thought about how in fairy tales people got three wishes and none of the wishes ever turned out right. If the wishes came true, they came true in terrible ways. Wishes were dangerous things. That was the idea you got from fairy tales.

  Maybe it was smart of Beverly not to wish.

  From somewhere behind them, up at Ida Nee’s house, there came a loud screeching noise, which was followed by a bang and then a thump.

  “Granny is here,” said Louisiana. She sat up.

  “Louisiana!” someone called. “Louisiana Elefante!”

  Raymie sat up, too. “Who were the Flying Elefantes?” she asked.

  “I told you,” said Louisiana. “They were my parents.”

  “But what does it mean? The flying part? What did they do?”

  “Well, my goodness,” said Louisiana. “They were trapeze artists, of course.”

  “Of course,” said Beverly.

  “They flew through the air with the greatest of ease. They were famous. They had personalized luggage.”

  “Louisiana Elefantteeeee.”

  “Granny’s anxious,” said Louisiana. “I have to go.” She stood up and smoothed down the front of her dress. Her bunny barrettes glowed in the light of the sun. Each barrette looked purposeful, alive, as if it were busy receiving messages from very far away.

  Louisiana smiled down at Raymie. It was a beautiful smile. And for a minute, Louisiana almost looked like an angel, with her pink dress and the blue sky lit up behind her and all her barrettes glowing.

  “They died,” said Louisiana.

  “What?” said Raymie.

  “My parents. They died. They aren’t the Flying Elefantes anymore. They’re not anything anymore. They’re at the bottom of the ocean. They were on a ship that sank. Maybe you heard about it?”

  “We haven’t heard about it,” said Beverly, who was still on her back on the dock, staring up at the sky. “Why would we know about a ship sinking?”