From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler

  (Even in this very elegant house of mine, that bathroom is especially grand. All the walls are black marble except for one that is mirrored entirely. The faucets are gold, and the spigot is shaped like a dragon’s head. The tub looks like a black marble swimming pool sunken into the floor; there are two steps down to the bottom.)

  There was nothing she wanted more than to take a bath in that tub. She examined her eyes a little longer and then spoke to her image in the mirror, “You’ll never have a better chance, Lady Claudia. Go ahead. Do it.” So she did. She opened the taps and began undressing as the tub was filling up.

  Meanwhile, Jamie had done his customary job of washing up. That is, he had washed the palms but not backs of his hands, his mouth but not the eyes of his face. He emerged from the bathroom long before Claudia and growing impatient, began wandering through rooms until he found Hortense and asked her the whereabouts of his sister. He followed directions to Claudia’s bathroom where he heard the water still running. It takes a lot of water to fill that tub.

  “Suicide!” he thought. “She’s going to drown herself because we’re caught.” He tried the door; it was locked.

  “Claudia,” he yelled, “is anything the matter?”

  “No,” she answered. “I’ll be right there.”

  “What’s taking you so long?”

  “I’m taking a bath,” she called.

  “Oh, boloney,” Jamie answered. He walked away to find me. I was waiting in the dining room. I’m accustomed to eating on time, and I was hungry.

  “That nutty sister of mine is taking a bath. Don’t mind her. She even takes baths when she comes in from swimming. She even made us take baths while we were hiding at the Metropolitan Museum. I think we should start without her.”

  I smiled, “I think, James, that you already have.”

  I rang for Parks, and he appeared with the salad and began serving.

  “How did Claudia manage to take a bath in the museum?” I asked casually.

  “In the fountain. It was cold, but I didn’t mind when we found … Uh oh. Uuuuh. Ooooh. I did it. I told. I did it.” He rested his elbow on the table and his chin on his hand. He slowly shook his head. “Sometimes I stink at keeping secrets. Don’t tell Claudia I told. Please.”

  “I’m curious to know how you managed.” I was curious, and you know that I can be absolutely charming when I want information.

  “Let Claude tell you all that. She did the planning. I managed the money. She’s big on ideas, but she’s also big on spending money. I managed fine until today. Now we’re broke. Not one cent left to get back to Greenwich.”

  “You can walk or hitchhike.”

  “Try telling that to Claude.”

  “Or you can turn yourselves in. The police will take you back, or your parents will come and get you.”

  “Maybe that will appeal to Claudia, but I doubt it. Even though she sure doesn’t approve of making herself walk.”

  “Perhaps we can work out a deal. You give me some details, and I’ll give you a ride back.”

  Jamie shook his head. “You’ll have to work that out with Claude. The only kind of deal I can make concerns money, and we don’t have any more of that.”

  “You are poor, indeed, if that’s the only kind of a deal you can make.”

  Jamie brightened. “Would you like a game of cards?”

  “Which game?” I asked.

  “War.”

  “I assume you cheat.”

  “Yeah.” he sighed.

  “I may decide to play after lunch anyway.”

  “Can we start eating now?” Jamie asked.

  “You don’t worry about manners too much do you?”

  “Oh,” he replied, “I don’t worry about them too much when I’m this hungry.”

  “You’re honest about some things.”

  Jamie shrugged his shoulders. “You might say that I’m honest about everything except cards. For some reason I’m helpless about cheating at cards.”

  “Let’s eat,” I said. I was anxious, for I do enjoy a good game of cards, and Jamie promised to provide just that.

  Claudia appeared as we were finishing our soup. I saw that she was annoyed that we had not waited for her. She was all bound up in concern for good manners, and she wanted very much to let us know that she was annoyed and why. She acted cool. I pretended I didn’t notice. Jamie didn’t pretend; he simply did not notice.

  “I’ll skip the soup,” Claudia announced.

  “It’s good,” Jamie said. “Sure you don’t want to try it?”

  “No, thank you,” Claudia said. Still cool.

  I summoned Parks; he appeared bearing a silver casserole.

  “What’s that?” Jamie asked.

  “Nouilles et fromage en casserole,” Parks answered.

  Claudia showed interest. “I’ll have some, please. Sounds like something special.”

  Parks served. Claudia looked down at her plate, looked up at me and moaned, “Why, it’s nothing but macaroni and cheese.”

  “You see,” I laughed, “under the fancy trappings, I’m just a plain lady.”

  Claudia laughed then. We all did, and we began enjoying our lunch. I asked Claudia what she would like to do while Jamie and I played cards. She said that she would like to just watch us and think.

  “Think about what?”

  “About how we’re going to get back home.”

  “Call up your family,” I suggested. “They’ll come for you.”

  “Oh, it’s so hard to explain over the phone. It will cause so much commotion.”

  I was astounded. “You still don’t think you’ve caused any commotion so far?”

  “I haven’t really thought about it very hard. I’ve been so busy worrying about Michelangelo and avoiding getting caught. If only you’d tell me if the statue was done by Michelangelo. Then I would feel that I could go home again.”

  “Why would that make a difference?” I asked.

  “It would because … because …”

  “Because you found that running away from home didn’t make a real difference? You were still the same Greenwich Claudia, planning and washing and keeping things in order?”

  “I guess that’s right,” Claudia said quietly.

  “Then why did you run away?”

  Claudia’s words came slowly; she was forming thoughts into the shape of words for the first time in a long time. “I got the idea because I was mad at my parents. That was getting the idea. Then I started planning it. I thought that I had to think of everything, and I thought of an awful lot. Didn’t I, Jamie?” She looked over at her brother, and he nodded. “I enjoyed the planning. Without anyone knowing that I was doing it. I am very good at planning.”

  “And the more plans you made, the more it became like living at home away from home,” I interrupted.

  “That’s true,” she said. “But we did enjoy living away from home in a mild kind of way.”

  (Notice that Claudia is still being very careful not to reveal to me where she and Jamie stayed. I wasn’t ready to push yet. I felt I had to help the child. Don’t laugh as you read this, Saxonberg; I do have some charity in me.)

  “What part of living away from home did you like the best?”

  Jamie answered first. “Not having a schedule.”

  Claudia became impatient. “But, Jamie, we did have a schedule. Sort of. The best that I could manage under the circumstances. That wasn’t the most fun part of running away.”

  “What was the most fun part for you, Claudia?”

  “First, it was hiding. Not being discovered. And after hiding became easy, there was Angel. Somehow, Angel became more important than running away.”

  “How did Angel become involved with your running away?” I purred.

  “I won’t tell you,” Claudia answered.

  I put on my surprised look and asked, “Why not?”

  “Because if I tell you how Angel got involved, it will be telling you too much else.”


  “Like telling me where you’ve been all week?”

  “Maybe,” she answered coolly.

  “Why don’t you want to tell me that?”

  “I told you before; that’s our secret.”

  “Oho! You don’t want to lose your bargaining weapon,” I crowed. “Is that why you’re not telling me where you stayed?”

  “That’s part of the reason,” she said. “The other part is—I think the other part is—that if I tell, then I know for sure that my adventure is over. And I don’t want it to be over until I’m sure I’ve had enough.”

  “The adventure is over. Everything gets over, and nothing is ever enough. Except the part you carry with you. It’s the same as going on a vacation. Some people spend all their time on a vacation taking pictures so that when they get home they can show their friends evidence that they had a good time. They don’t pause to let the vacation enter inside of them and take that home.”

  “Well, I don’t really want to tell you where we’ve been.”

  “I know,” I answered.

  Claudia looked at me. “Do you know I don’t want to tell you, or do you know where we’ve been? Which do you mean?”

  “Both,” I told her quietly. I resumed eating nouilles et fromage en casserole.

  Claudia looked over at Jamie. Jamie had slipped down in his seat and had thrown his napkin over his face. Claudia jumped up from her seat, grabbed the napkin off Jamie’s face. Jamie quickly threw his forearms where the napkin had been.

  “It slipped, Claude; it slipped out.” Jamie’s voice was muted since his forearms were protecting his mouth.

  “Jamie! Jamie! That was all I had. All we had. The only thing we had left.”

  “I just forgot, Claude. It’s been so long since I’ve had a conversation with anyone but you.”

  “You shouldn’t have told her. You heard me say to her that that was our secret. Twice. Now everything is lost. How can I get her to tell? You had to go and blab it all. Blabbermouth!”

  Jamie looked at me for sympathy. “She does get emotional.”

  “Claudia,” I said, “be seated.”

  She obeyed. I continued. “All is not lost. I’m going to make a bargain with you. Both of you. First of all, stop referring to me as her. I am Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler. Then if you give me all the details of your running away, if you tell me everything—everything—I’ll give you a ride home. I’ll have Sheldon, my chauffeur, drive you home.”

  Claudia nodded “no.”

  “A Rolls Royce, Claudia. And a chauffeur. That’s a very fine offer,” I teased.

  Jamie said, “How about it, Claude? It beats walking.”

  Claudia squinted her eyes and crossed her arms over her chest. “It’s not enough. I want to know about Angel.”

  I was glad that I wasn’t dealing with a stupid child. I admired her spirit; but more, I wanted to help her see the value of her adventure. She still saw it as buying her something: appreciation first, information now. Nevertheless, Claudia was tiptoeing into the grown-up world. And I decided to give her a little shove. “Claudia. James. Both of you. Come with me.”

  We walked single file through several rooms to my office. For a minute I thought I was leader in a game of follow-the-leader.

  Jamie caught up with me and said, “For an old lady you sure can walk fast.”

  Claudia then caught up with Jamie and kicked him.

  We arrived at my office, and I motioned for them to sit down.

  “Do you see those filing cabinets along that wall?” I asked pointing to the south wall. “Those are my secrets. In one of them is the secret of Michelangelo’s Angel. I’ll share that secret with you as the rest of my bargain. But now my information is more important than yours. So you must have a handicap. The handicap is that you must find the secret file yourselves, and you have one hour to do it in.” I turned to leave, then remembered, “And I don’t want my files messed up or placed out of order. They’re in a special order that makes sense only to me. If you move things around, I won’t be able to find anything. And our whole arrangement will be off.”

  Jamie spoke, “You sure know how to nervous a guy.”

  I laughed and left the room. I tiptoed into the large closet I have next to my office. From there I watched and listened to all they did.

  Jamie got up immediately and began opening file drawers. Claudia shouted, “STOP!” He did.

  “What’s the matter with you, Claude? We have only one hour.”

  “Five minutes of planning are worth fifteen minutes of just looking. Quick, give me the pencil and note pad from that table.” Jamie ran to get them. Claudia immediately began making a list. “Here’s what we’ll look up. I’ll take the odd numbers; you take the even.”

  “I want odd.”

  “For goodness’ sake, Jamie, take odds then.” Here’s the list Claudia wrote:

  1. Michelangelo

  2. Buonarroti

  3. Angel

  4. Parke Bernet Galleries

  5. Metropolitan Museum of Art

  6. Italian Renaissance

  7. Auctions

  8. Sculptor

  9. Marble

  10. Florence, Italy

  11. Rome, Italy

  Jamie looked over the list. “I changed my mind. I’ll take evens. There’s one less.”

  “Talk about wasting time!” Claudia screamed. “Take evens then, but get to it.”

  They began to work very rapidly. Claudia once or twice cautioned Jamie not to make a mess. They had exhausted the list, odds as well as evens. There were folders on most of the categories they looked up, but upon examining them, they found not one hint of Angel. Claudia was feeling depressed. She looked at the clock. Six minutes to go.

  “Think, Jamie, think. What else can we look up?”

  Jamie squinted his eyes, a sign that he was thinking hard. “Look him up under …”

  “What kind of language is that? Look him up under …”

  “Oh, boloney, Claude. Why do you always pick on my gra …”

  “Boloney, boloney! That’s it, Jamie. She bought Angel in Bologna, Italy. The paper said so. Look up Bologna.” Both ran back to the files and pulled out a file folder fat with papers and documents. It was labeled: BOLOGNA, ITALY. They knew even before opening it that it was the right one. I knew, too. They had found the file that held the secret.

  Claudia was no longer in a hurry; she sauntered over to a table, carefully laid down the file, smoothed her skirt under her, and sat in a chair. Jamie was jumping up and down, “Hurry up, Claude. The hour is almost over.”

  Claudia was not to be hurried. She carefully opened the folder, almost afraid of what she would find. The evidence was sealed between two sheets of glass. The evidence was a very special, very old piece of paper. On one side was written a poem, a sonnet. Since it was written in Italian, neither Claudia nor Jamie could read it. But they could see that the handwriting was angular and beautiful, in itself almost a work of art. And there was a signature: Michelangelo. The other side of the paper needed no translation. For there, in the midst of sketches of hands and torsos was a sketch of someone they knew: Angel. There were the first lines of a thought that was to become a museum mystery 470 years later. There on that piece of old paper was the idea just as it had come from Michelangelo’s head to his hand, and he had jotted it down.

  Claudia looked at the sketch until its image became blurred. She was crying. At first she said nothing. She simply sat on the chair with tears slowly streaming down her face, hugging the glass frame and shaking her head back and forth. When at last she found her voice, it was a hushed voice, the voice she used for church. “Just think, Jamie, Michelangelo himself touched this. Over four hundred years ago.”

  Jamie was looking through the rest of the folder. “The glass,” he said. “I’ll bet he didn’t touch the glass. Are his fingerprints on it?” He didn’t wait for an answer before asking something else. “What do you suppose the rest of these papers are?”

  “Th
ey are my research on Angel,” I answered as I emerged from my hiding place in the closet. “He did it in Rome, you know. I just file it under B for Bologna to make it hard.”

  Both children looked up at me startled. Just as they had lost all their feelings of urgency, they had also lost all thoughts of me. Finding a secret can make everything else unimportant, you know.

  Claudia said nothing and nothing and nothing. She continued clutching the drawing to her chest and rocking it back and forth. She appeared to be in a trance. Jamie and I stared at her until she felt our eyes focused on her like four laser beams. She looked up at us then and smiled.

  “Michelangelo did sculpture the statue, didn’t he, Mrs. Frankweiler?”

  “Of course. I’ve known for a long time that he did. Ever since I got that sketch.”

  “How did you get the sketch?” Jamie asked.

  “I got it after the war….”

  “Which war?” Jamie interrupted.

  “World War II. Which war did you think I meant? The American Revolution?”

  “Are you that old?” Jamie asked.

  “I’m not even going to answer that.”

  Claudia said, “Hush, Jamie. Let her tell us.” But she couldn’t hush either. She rushed in with an explanation, “I’ll bet you helped some rich Italian nobleman or some descendant of Michelangelo’s to escape, and he gave you the sketch out of his undying gratitude.”

  “That’s one explanation. But not the correct one. There was a rich Italian nobleman involved. That part is right.”

  “Did he sell it to you?” Jamie asked.

  Claudia rushed in again with another explanation, “He had this beautiful daughter and she needed this operation very badly and you …”

  Jamie interrupted. “Hush, Claudia.” Then he asked me, “Why did he give it to you?”

  “Because he was a very, very bad poker player, and I am a very good one.”

  “You won it at cards?” I could see admiration grow in Jamie’s eyes.