Quest for the Secret Keeper

  The two boys gathering up the last of their things made sure to glare angrily at Ian and Carl as they left, and Ian nearly felt bad for forcing them out, but then he reminded himself that he would be there only as long as it took to sneak Wolfie off into the woods.

  The last boy out of the room closed the door with a bit more force than was necessary, and Carl raised his eyebrows at Ian as if to say, “See? All Germans are ill tempered.”

  Ian ignored him and turned to the boy reading his book. “Hello,” he said. “I’m Liam and this is Karl.”

  The boy made no response; he just held the book up higher in front of him. Carl repeated the look he’d given Ian before.

  Ian rolled his eyes and looked about for something to do. He moved to one of the beds, where the sheets had been removed by the previous occupant, and found that on the bureau between the two bare beds was fresh bedding. Not knowing what else to do, Ian got to work making his bed.

  Behind him he could feel Carl’s eyes on him, and was relieved when he saw Carl finally follow suit. As he worked, Ian couldn’t help noting that the sheets were made from a coarse wool, scratchy to his fingers, not at all the quality of sheets he had back home.

  “They do that on purpose,” said the boy behind him.

  Ian turned. “Sorry?”

  “The sheets. They’re horrid on purpose.”

  Ian froze. Wolfie had just read his thoughts, and Ian knew it. Wolfie seemed to realize he’d said the wrong thing, because he quickly added, “I could tell by the way you were handling them that you didn’t approve.”

  “Right,” Ian said, nervous that the younger boy had been rifling through his thoughts. Ian turned to face him and saw that Wolfie was blushing, but he quickly cast his eyes back to his book. Ian eyed Carl and saw that his friend was looking curiously at him. He wanted to tell Carl to guard his own thoughts very carefully, but at that moment Wolfie got up abruptly from his bed and moved to the door. “I think I’ll go out for a bit of air,” he said, and with that he was gone.

  “What was that about?” Carl asked.

  Ian placed a finger to his lips and moved to the door. Carefully cracking it open, he peered into the hallway and saw the young Van Schuft dashing down the corridor, intent on putting some distance between them.

  Ian closed the door and turned to face Carl. “He read my mind, Carl.”

  “When?”

  “When we were making our beds.”

  Carl’s eyes widened. “Does he know who we are?”

  Ian frowned. “I don’t think so. I wasn’t thinking about anything at the time but the sheets.”

  “They’re terrible,” Carl said, eyeing his bed with distaste. “Who could sleep on such awful itchy things?”

  Ian nodded. “That’s exactly what I was thinking when he read my thoughts.”

  Carl sighed and sat down on his half-made bed. “If he can read our minds that easily, Ian, then how are we going to trick him into following us into the woods?”

  Frustrated, Ian ran a hand through his hair. “I have no idea. But I believe the greater danger is in preventing him from figuring out who we are and where we’re from.”

  Carl’s eyes went wide again. “Gaw!” he said. “Ian, if he roots around in our heads and sees that we’re British, he’ll turn us both in and we’ll be shot!”

  “Exactly,” Ian said, his hands trembling a little when he realized the terrible and precarious nature of their mission.

  “What’re we to do?”

  Ian looked again at the door. “When we’re around Wolfie, we’ll have to keep our thoughts as innocent as possible. Think about what you’d like for lunch, or think about the weather, but don’t think about home, or our quest or anything that might make him suspicious.”

  Carl looked at him as if he’d just said something outlandish. “How do you propose we persuade him over to the woods and kidnap him if we can’t think about it beforehand?”

  Ian sighed. “I have no idea, Carl. Perhaps we could offer Wolfie a distraction so that he’s preoccupied and unable to rummage round in our minds while we work him close to the woods.”

  “What sort of preoccupation did you have in mind?”

  Ian shrugged. “Dunno. But I’ll think of something,” he promised.

  Carl frowned. “Yeah, all right. Let’s have a go at him now, though, all right? Being surrounded by so many swastikas is making me twitchy.”

  They searched all about the dormitory for Wolfie but couldn’t locate him anywhere. “Maybe he went back to the room?” Carl suggested when they had searched the library to no avail.

  “Worth a look,” Ian said.

  The two young men trooped back up the stairs, crested the landing, and were about to turn down the corridor leading to their room when Carl reached out and caught Ian by the arm. “Look!” he whispered, pointing below to the drive and a black sedan. Out of the car came Wolfie’s father, looking as angry as any man Ian had ever seen. They watched from above as Dieter pointed to a priest, called him over, and spoke to him with rigid shoulders, his hands held in tight fists. For his part the priest shook his head and stepped back from Van Schuft, obviously unsettled by the encounter, and then, as if he’d known his father was nearby, Wolfie emerged from a door on the other side of the courtyard.

  Dieter pointed to his son and ordered him over, and even from the upstairs landing Ian and Carl could see the fear in the boy’s face. “That doesn’t look good,” Carl said.

  Wolfie approached his father tentatively, which seemed only to make the elder Van Schuft angrier. He pointed again at Wolfie, then to the ground in front of him, and his son wisely quickened his step.

  Meanwhile, the nearby priest was edging slowly away, as if the last thing he wanted to witness was the stern lecture that was sure to follow.

  But when Wolfie arrived in front of his father, it was not a lecture that he received; it was a slap so hard that the boy went hurtling backward, landing flat on his back to stare up in surprise.

  Dieter didn’t leave him lying there for long; instead, he marched straight over to his son and lifted him roughly up, holding him by the shirt while he smacked him repeatedly.

  “Oh, that’s not right!” Carl cried, and Ian found himself growing so angry about the abuse Wolfie was suffering that he thought seriously about dashing outside to pummel Van Schuft into leaving his son alone.

  And then a small crowd of boys began to gather round, their faces horrified, and the poor priest who’d been called over by Dieter was attempting to pull him away from his son, but Dieter continued to strike his son again and again until poor Wolfie’s nose and lip were bloody.

  “Someone do something!” Carl growled, his hands gripping the banister until his knuckles were white. Just as Ian was about to bolt down the stairs to go help, however, three other priests, including the headmaster, went running outside and angrily shoved Dieter away from the poor boy.

  Van Schuft was heaving and there was a crazed look to his eyes, but he threw off the hands of the priests, cursed at his son, and stomped away. A moment later the wheels of his car were spinning out of the drive, kicking up gravel as he fled.

  While Ian and Carl watched, the courtyard below grew oddly quiet and all eyes fell on Wolfie. Two priests were now hovering over him and one of them picked him up and carried him away.

  “Where do you think they’re taking him?” Carl asked, his voice hoarse with rage.

  “To the infirmary, I believe,” Ian told him, radiating anger as well.

  “We’ll have to get word to Mr. Goodwyn,” Carl whispered.

  “Wait until the dinner bell has sounded,” Ian told him. “No one will be about then to see us sneaking off into the woods.”

  The bell for the evening meal was rung a short time later, and as Ian and Carl huddled in their rooms, they heard the sound of thunderous footsteps in the hall. Carl’s stomach rumbled, and Ian couldn’t help giving him a grin. “We’ll eat after we speak with Mr. Goodwyn.”

  “Let’
s go now, then,” Carl said.

  The pair left their room and took the stairs down to the ground floor. Making sure no latecomers to the dinner hall were about, they snuck out the door and made their way cautiously to the woods.

  They’d gone no more than a few yards beyond the tree line when they heard “Ian! Carl! Over here!”

  Ian turned to his left and spotted their headmaster, still dressed in his black uniform and peeking up moodily at the sky. “I believe it’s going to rain,” he said when they’d approached and stopped in front of him.

  “Wolfie’s been taken to the infirmary,” Ian told him, getting straight to the point just as he heard a plop, plop, plop sound and knew that the rain had already begun.

  “What’s happened?” Perry asked.

  Ian and Carl told him all about the encounter between Wolfie and his father. “Good heavens,” Perry said when they were through. “I wonder what the devil set him off.”

  Ian had a terrible thought. What if Dieter had discovered the chess box and the destroyed chess pieces? What if he’d assumed his son was the culprit? He turned to Carl and the look on his face suggested he might be thinking the same. Still, neither one of them spoke that theory out loud.

  “We’ll have to work quickly,” Perry said. “You say he’s been taken to the infirmary?”

  “We think that’s where they’ve taken him,” said Carl. “I mean, he was a bloody mess, Mr. Goodwyn.”

  Perry frowned. “Language, Carl,” he warned.

  Carl shook his head. “No, sir! I meant he was actually bleeding and looked a mess.”

  “Oh,” said Perry. “Right. Well then, you two must go to the infirmary and have a chat with the school nurse. See how badly he’s injured and report back to me here.”

  Ian and Carl nodded, then sprinted back the way they’d come.

  It took them a bit to find the infirmary, and when they finally did locate it, they discovered that Wolfie had already been released and was likely at supper. Carl and Ian hurried to the large dining hall, filled with laughing and chatty young men, but as they scoured the room with their eyes, they found no sign of the young Van Schuft.

  “He’s not here,” Ian growled.

  “Let’s have a bite to eat, then,” Carl said.

  Ian frowned. “We’ve no time for that, Carl. We’ve got to find Wolfie.”

  “Aww, it’ll just take a minute, Ian,” Carl complained. “Come on, mate, I’ve had nothing since this afternoon!”

  But Ian could feel a mounting tension inside him. “Nick a few rolls and leave the rest, Carl. We can’t stay.”

  Carl grumbled under his breath but retrieved the rolls all the same, and the pair went in search of Wolfie once again. “If I’d received such a beating from my father, I wouldn’t show up for dinner either,” Carl said as they left the dining hall.

  Ian paused and turned to his friend. “You’re right!” he said. “I wouldn’t either. I’d have gone straight back to my room.”

  Without further delay Ian and Carl ran back across the grounds to their dormitory and rushed up to their room. When Ian opened their door, however, he stopped short.

  Poor Wolfie Van Schuft sat on the floor, shoveling clothes into a linen bag, his face puffed and swollen with bruises. “Get out!” he shouted when he saw them.

  Ian was so surprised by his outburst that at first he couldn’t think of a reply.

  “I said get out!” Wolfie shouted again, glaring at Ian, and in a wink all Ian wanted to do was leave the room.

  “We should go,” he said, turning to Carl and moving to push him back from the open door.

  “Hang on, mate,” Carl said, pushing back against Ian. “We can’t leave him.”

  Suddenly, Ian returned to his own senses and saw the expression on Carl’s face change. “Oh, of course we should go!” said Carl. And instead of pushing against Ian, he took his arm and began to pull him from the doorframe.

  But Ian realized instantly what was happening and he tugged out of Carl’s grasp. Turning around, he spoke quickly and calmly. “Wolfie,” he said, “I’m terribly sorry about what happened to you, but we’d like to help.”

  Wolfie glowered at him, and Ian could actually feel the young boy enter his mind again, but Ian pushed against the sensation with all his might, holding stubbornly to his own thoughts. After a moment the sensation eased and Wolfie rubbed at his temples as if he had a terrible headache, which Ian did not doubt he had.

  “I’m leaving,” Wolfie said, turning back to his sack. “Don’t try and stop me!”

  Carl pushed his way into the room. “We wouldn’t dream of it,” he said. “I saw what your father did to you, and I wouldn’t wait around for another beating like that either.”

  The young lad paused his packing. “I didn’t do it,” he whispered, and Ian heard him sniffle.

  “Do what?” Ian asked.

  Wolfie looked up, his eyes almost pleading with Ian to believe him. “My papa accused me of taking something from our house, and I didn’t do it.”

  Ian knew for certain then what the poor boy had been accused of. “I believe you,” he said.

  Again Wolfie rubbed his temples and looked away. “I have a terrible headache,” he whispered.

  “We can help, you know,” Carl said.

  “Help what?” asked Wolfie.

  Carl pointed to the linen sack. “You to run away. We know a place where you can go. Somewhere out of this rain where no one will find you.”

  Wolfie eyed Carl, as if wondering if this was some sort of a trick. Ian hoped that the boy wouldn’t pry too far into Carl’s thoughts and discover the truth.

  “Would you like a roll?” Carl asked suddenly, offering one of the several buns he’d pinched from the dining hall.

  Wolfie’s face softened. “Thank you,” he said, taking it from Carl.

  Ian smiled. Good old Carl. “Come on,” he said, reaching for the sack Wolfie had packed. “Let’s be off before the other boys are through with dinner.”

  With no small amount of satisfaction, Ian was relieved when he saw Wolfie get up and follow them out of the room. Now, if only their luck would hold until they reached the portal, all would go as planned.

  UNWELCOME GUESTS

  Dieter Van Schuft returned to his home shaken and sickened by the brutal beating he’d given his son. With trembling fingers he pulled the small pawn out of his pocket and set it on the top of his bureau.

  He had never struck Wolfie with such unrestrained violence before, and Dieter cringed away from the chess piece on his bureau as if it were a deadly serpent. He remembered the rush of pleasure that had come from smacking his own son, and now that he was away from the influence of the Gorgonite, he found that memory disgusting.

  Dieter closed his eyes and covered his face with his hands. He’d knocked the boy senseless—of that he was certain. And for what? What?

  Magus the Black was likely never coming back to claim his precious chess set. His master had intended it for the Führer, and Dieter likely would have offered it to him as a present if it could have curried him favor. But even Dieter knew that Adolf Hitler had the seeds of madness within him, and he’d hidden the chess set for over a year without giving it to the Führer because he knew it could prove far more lethal than he’d intended.

  So he’d debated what to do with it, never really deciding. And now his son had made the decision for him. He’d effectively dismantled the set and rendered it unusable.

  After carrying the pawn in his pocket for a day and a half while he’d dealt with his superior, he had become more and more angry at his son. It had taken all his willpower, in fact, not to shout obscenities at the visiting Oberführer, which would have won him a court-martial. And the moment the Oberführer had allowed him to leave, Dieter had driven straight to the school, intent on having Wolfie give him back the precious metal and jewels.

  But the moment he’d seen his son, Dieter had lost all control. And all over a chess set that no one but he and his former mas
ter knew of. When he thought of the dismantled pieces, Dieter had to admit that he was actually grateful to his son for doing exactly that. The chess set was far too dangerous an object.

  Dieter moved unsteadily into the living room, where he rooted around in the side bar for his decanter of scotch. After pouring himself a stiff drink, he swallowed it in one gulp.

  He felt no better.

  He began pouring his second drink when the large oak tree outside his window rustled and groaned from a strong wind bending the branches. Dieter paused with the glass partway to his mouth as he looked outside and saw a most unusual sight. The rain had turned to snow.

  Setting the glass down, Dieter moved to the kitchen door and stared out into the snowy yard. He saw two figures approaching the house, both of them tall and imposing.

  He squinted through the pane and realized suddenly that he recognized one of them, and the breath caught in his throat. “Caphiera!”

  Peering harder, he was certain that the second figure was none other than her frightful sister Atroposa. Oh, no! Dieter thought.

  If they were here, was his master, Magus the Black, far behind? Dieter considered with a pounding heart what it would mean if Magus had indeed survived his encounter with his other sister, Lachestia. Dieter thought it unlikely he would live long enough to beg for his life if Magus had been rescued by these two and come in search of his loyal servant. Especially after Magus discovered what had become of his chess set.

  And what would that mean for Wolfie? The boy would be hunted down like a dog and killed if Magus suspected that Wolfie was responsible for taking the metal off the chess pieces.

  Still, Dieter didn’t see his master. Only the two sisters, who had now stepped into his yard. He noticed that Caphiera wore some sort of patch over one eye, and Dieter made sure not to look directly into the other.

  “Van Schuft!” Caphiera called.

  At first, Dieter didn’t move. He didn’t know why the sisters had come to his home, and he wasn’t at all certain that he wanted to know.

  “Come out!” Atroposa ordered, her voice mournful and horrible.