Thomas shrugged. “So?”
“They’re laughing at us, Thomas,” Sam said. He was shaking. He was angry, too—so angry he could break something for real this time, deliberately. “They think we’re freaks.”
“So what?” Thomas finally looked at him. “Who cares what they think? It won’t change anything. It won’t change us.”
Sam opened his mouth to respond but he was startled by a shriek. Pippa’s face was the vivid red of a ripe tomato, and she was glaring at Max.
“I don’t believe you,” she spat out. “You didn’t.”
Max had her arms crossed tightly. “I don’t know what—” she started to say, but Pippa lunged for her, and even as Thomas shouted, and Sam moved forward to separate them, Pippa had plunged her hands deep in the pocket of Max’s jacket. A second later, she was holding a battered woman’s wallet.
“You stole this,” she said, practically spitting the words, as though they were full of poison.
“I didn’t steal it,” Max said. She licked her lips nervously. “I found it.”
“Yeah, on the floor—when it fell out of that woman’s pocketbook,” Pippa said.
Max shrugged. “Finders, keepers.”
“You’re going to march right back inside and give it back to her,” Pippa said, waving the wallet threateningly in Max’s face.
Max swatted at her. “Get your hands out of my breathing space.”
“Don’t touch me,” Pippa said, swatting back.
“You ain’t my mother.”
“Aren’t! Aren’t! You aren’t my mother!”
“Well, you ain’t, either.”
Pippa made a low growling noise in her throat. Max’s fists were balled at her side. Both girls moved at once, lightning quick.
“Pippa,” Thomas cried out, at the same time that Sam said, “Max, don’t.”
Max had a fistful of Pippa’s hair in her hand, and Pippa was twisting the skin on Max’s cheek. Both girls were shouting, and Sam was shouting, too, though he hardly knew what he was saying. Thomas flung his arm around Pippa. He dragged her backward even as she struggled against him, clawing at his arm and demanding to be released. Sam hooked two fingers in the back of Max’s shirt collar and rooted her in place.
“Let me go!” she shouted. “I’ll poke her eyes out with toothpicks! I’ll nail her noggin to the ground!”
“Max, please,” Sam said. People were beginning to stare at them again. Down the street, a shoeshine boy had paused in his work, brush raised, mouth open. His client had lowered his newspaper to watch. On the opposite side of the street, a beat cop had paused and was peering in their direction, hand raised to his hat to shield his eyes from the glare.
“Look, everyone calm down, okay?” Sam kept his voice as quiet and steady as possible. He prayed for the cop to move on. The last thing they needed was more trouble.
“She started it,” Pippa said. She was panting. “Let go of me,” she said, wrenching away from Thomas.
Max snorted. “I didn’t start nothing, you started it—”
“All right, all right,” Sam jumped in, before things could get any worse. The cop finally moved on, casting one last glance in their direction. Some of the tightness loosened in Sam’s chest. “Let’s just head back to the museum, okay? We can talk everything out once we’re—”
But Sam’s voice was drowned out by a sudden commotion from down the block. A freckle-faced boy wearing a newsboy cap and carrying a stack of papers was shouting at the top of his lungs.
“Extra! Extra! Read all about it!” he hollered as people crowded him, snatching up newspapers, dropping coins in his hand. “The shrunken head strikes again! Reporter Bill Evans falls victim to the curse!”
“Bill Evans?” Pippa exclaimed. The girls’ fight was all but forgotten, even though Pippa’s scalp still ached and there was a vivid red bruise on Max’s cheek where Pippa had pinched it. “Dead?”
Thomas, who had purchased a paper, glanced up for a moment. “No. He could have died, though.”
“I wish he had,” Max said.
“Listen to this,” Thomas said, returning to his paper. “‘Bill Evans, star reporter and the man responsible for breaking the case of the curse, was returning to his home on Ludlow Street last evening when he was nearly killed by an out-of-control driver. He was rushed to Mercy General Hospital . . .’”
“First that old woman at the museum, Mrs. Weathersby,” Pippa said, ticking them off on her fingers. “Then Anderson. Then Potts. And now Evans.” She shook her head.
“Maybe there really is a curse,” Sam ventured.
“There’s no curse,” Thomas said, folding up the newspaper. “Let’s go.”
“Where to?” Sam said.
“Back to the museum,” he said. “We need to talk to Dumfrey.”
“But first . . .” Pippa slapped the wallet into Max’s hand. Max, grumbling, disappeared into the theater and reemerged a minute later, hands shoved in her pockets.
“Happy now?” she mumbled.
“Delighted,” Pippa said.
In two hours, the museum had undergone a remarkable transformation. The steps were swept clean of cigarette stubs and debris, and Andrew was busy washing the windows, sleeves rolled up to show off his scaly forearms. A vast crowd was still assembled in the street, including Miss Groenovelt, who was carrying one of her cats in her arms and had another two perched on her shoulders. Pippa even spotted two old men she was sure were the Sadowski brothers, a pair of legendary hermits she had never seen outside their apartment.
The children circled around the block and sneaked into the museum through the alley door. As soon as they entered the kitchen, Danny gave an outraged shout and pinned them against the wall with the handle of a mop.
“Oh no, you don’t,” he said, waving a finger at them threateningly. “Not after I just cleaned the floors. Your shoes are black as a pirate’s teeth.”
“My shoes are not dirty,” Pippa said haughtily.
“Sorry, Danny,” Thomas said, ducking under the broom handle and starting for the stairs. “Official business.”
They left Danny spluttering and waving his mop.
The lobby floor was scrubbed clean of footprints and smudge marks. The advertising banner, which had begun to droop sadly to the floor—Pinheads! Bearded Ladies! Alligator Men! Dwarves! NOVEL AND ASTOUNDING EXHIBITIONS! MORE THAN ONE THOUSAND CURIOSITIES!—was now hoisted high and proud over the ticket desk. Miss Fitch bustled in and out of the various exhibit halls, directing the other performers.
“The polish goes on clockwise, Betty! Otherwise it’s sure to look spotty. Quinn, where did Danny get to with that mop? Who moved Napoléon Bonaparte’s riding boots? They go to the left of Pocahontas’s moccasins. Hugo. Hugo!”
Hugo emerged, red-faced, from the Odditorium. “Yes, Miss Fitch?”
“Fetch me my sewing basket, please. Marie Antoinette’s dress has developed an awful tear. I’ll have to patch it.”
“Have you seen Mr. Dumfrey, Miss Fitch?” Pippa asked.
“Holed up in his office,” she said, without turning from the historical figures portion of the Hall of Wax. “Of course he would be, and leave us to do all the work. . . .” Suddenly, she spun around and scowled. “Where have you been? I’ve been looking for you for hours.”
“Quick,” Sam whispered, “before she puts us to work.”
“There’s so much to be done.” Miss Fitch was counting tasks on her fingers. “The toilets need cleaning and the beds must be stripped and—”
“Thanks, Miss F.!” Max said loudly. They darted up the spiral stairs, ignoring Miss Fitch’s cries of protest.
“Mr. Dumfrey—” Pippa burst through Mr. Dumfrey’s office door first and then stopped abruptly, so that first Thomas, then Max, and finally Sam collided with her. She stumbled forward several feet. Max let out a sharp cry. “Watch it, you big oaf!” she said. “You nearly snapped my back in two.” They saw Mr. Dumfrey standing by the window, partially concealed by a toweri
ng stack of ancient Cambodian burial urns.
“Pippa!” When Mr. Dumfrey spun around, his face was very white and there was a look in his eyes she had never seen before—as though he’d been staring at a ghost. “You scared me, children.”
The radio was playing very loudly. “Rattigan was last sighted on the morning of April twenty-fourth,” said the announcer, “wearing a felt hat pulled low and the rags of a beggar. . . .” Mr. Dumfrey switched it off with a trembling hand, and the resulting silence was even louder.
“Well,” he said, coughing. “Well. Back so soon, are we? Didn’t fancy a movie?”
No one bothered trying to explain what had happened. Instead, Thomas tossed the newspaper down on Mr. Dumfrey’s desk. “Did you hear?” he said. “Bill Evans nearly got killed last night. They’re saying it’s the curse again.”
Mr. Dumfrey barely glanced at the headline. “Oh, yes, yes,” he said, with a dismissive wave of one hand. “I heard it on the radio. Unfortunate. Terrible. Poor man. We should really send a card.” And he turned back to the window and lapsed into silence.
“Are—are you okay, Mr. Dumfrey?” Pippa ventured. She had never in all her life known him to ignore the possibility of press, whether good or bad. And Bill Evans’s near death was, she had no doubt, a great opportunity for a ton of bad press.
Mr. Dumfrey jumped. He cracked his head on the edge of one of his shelves, and an avalanche of papers began to sift down around him. “What? Me? Oh—I’m fine.” A brass paperweight, supposedly from the desk of Abraham Lincoln, conked him on the head, and he winced. “I’m absolutely fine. Wonderful, in fact.”
“O-o-o-kay,” Thomas said, drawing out the syllables. He cleared his throat. “Listen, Mr. Dumfrey, we were thinking of going down to the hospital to drop in on Bill Evans.”
“We were?” Max said. Thomas shot her a warning look.
Pippa jumped in, “We can bring him a card.”
Mr. Dumfrey, who was trying to shuffle his papers into a pile, straightened up. “Oh,” he said, jogging the stack of papers once in his arms. “Oh.” He moved woodenly toward the desk, set the papers down with a thump, and patted his tie. “Oh,” he said, a third time.
“You’re sure you’re okay?” Pippa said again.
Mr. Dumfrey whipped off his glasses and began furiously polishing them with a corner of his scarlet robe. “I’m absolutely fine, Pippa. It’s just . . . I don’t think you should be out and about today. It’ll be dark soon.”
Pippa exchanged a bewildered look with the others. “It’s only three o’clock,” she pointed out.
“Is it?” Dumfrey slipped the glasses back on his nose upside down and then corrected their arrangement. “Well. Time flies, doesn’t it? Or perhaps it doesn’t. No matter. Miss Fitch needs you here. And the streets are full of criminals.”
“You just sent us to the movies,” Thomas said.
“Did I? Well, well.” He managed a weak smile. “I suppose I’m just upset, you know, about everything that’s happened. We’re having a memorial for Potts tomorrow, at the museum, at noon on the dot. I expect you all to be wearing your best funeral faces. Miss Fitch can make you something appropriately bleak to wear.” He sighed. “Poor Potts . . . he wasn’t the brightest of the lot, or the nicest, either, or the best looking . . .”
“I think you might want to work on your speech,” Thomas said.
Dumfrey jerked in his chair, as though he’d been electrocuted. He peered closely at Thomas. “My speech? Of course . . . my speech.” He reached suddenly for a pen, once again dislodging the papers from the corner of his desk. “Excellent suggestion, my dear boy. I’ll write a speech that’ll have the hardest-hearted scoundrel weeping in the aisles. I’ll write a speech that’ll knock the socks off a nun!”
“What about Evans?” Pippa prompted.
“Oh! Evans.” Mr. Dumfrey waved a hand. “Yes, yes. Go and see Evans, if you’d like. Give him my best.” He licked the tip of his pen and paused, his hand hovering over a blank piece of paper. “Now let me see . . . Potts, Potts. What on earth will I say about Potts?”
They left him bent over his paper, frantically scribbling, and Pippa felt better, satisfied that everything was back to normal.
It didn’t take them long to find Evans once they arrived at Mercy General. A bored receptionist, her face concealed behind a copy of the Daily Screamer, directed them upstairs without even glancing in their direction. They took a rickety elevator to the third floor and could hear him even before the doors had opened fully.
“So then I said to him . . . that may be a bear, but it’s the prettiest bear this dog has ever seen!”
A chorus of female laughter, like the twittering of birds, followed this pronouncement.
Thomas gestured the group forward. This floor was surprisingly empty. There were no nurses bustling in and out of rooms, pushing patients in wheelchairs, and calling to one another. Just several empty hallways branching out from an equally empty waiting room, where a radio was buzzing forlornly in the corner.
As soon as they traced the sound of Evans’s voice, it was easy to see why. All the nurses—at least two dozen of them—were crammed into Evans’s room. Every available surface of the room was occupied either by a woman or a flower arrangement, so the air smelled as thick as a perfume factory.
“You are too much!” one of the nurses was saying, as Thomas, Pippa, Max, and Sam gathered awkwardly in the doorway. Pippa coughed and two dozen heads swiveled in their direction.
“Pippa!” Evans cried, sitting up a little further in bed. He was wearing a short-sleeved undershirt and had his left arm in a large cast. There was a faint bruise on his left cheek.
“Thomas! Mackenzie! Sam! I don’t believe it. You brought the whole gang. How wonderful.”
“Awwww.” A nurse with black hair and a powder-white face was smiling in a particularly stupid way. “You didn’t tell us you had children, Bill. Shame on you.”
“He isn’t—” Pippa and Max started to say.
“We’re not—” Thomas and Sam said at the same time.
But their protests were drowned out by Evans’s booming laugh.
“I wish!” he said. “Sorry to say, darling, these extraordinary children are no relations of mine. But come in, come in. Not you, Sam—you might break something. I’m kidding!” He roared with laughter.
“Hey.” Another nurse, this one with a wide, childish face and a wad of gum in her mouth, squinted at them. “Don’t I know you kids from somewhere?”
“We were hoping to talk to you alone,” Pippa said loudly, with an emphasis on the word alone, before Evans could cause a scene and introduce them as the freaks from Dumfrey’s museum.
“Of course, of course. Anything for you.” Mr. Evans turned apologetically to the crowd of nurses. “You heard the little lady. Mind giving us some breathing room, sweethearts?”
The nurses shuffled one by one out of the room, giggling and whispering, waving to Evans and promising to return soon. One or two of them shot Pippa a dirty look.
“Well, now,” Evans said, as soon as they were alone. “What can I do you for?”
“We, um, just came by to see how you were feeling,” Pippa said. It was embarrassing to see a grown man in nothing but an undershirt, tucked up in bed like a small child, and she had difficulty meeting Mr. Evans’s eyes. Instead, she focused on a strange blurry birthmark she could see on his right forearm.
Mr. Evans caught her staring. “You’ve found my dirty little secret,” he said, winking. Pippa, looking more closely, realized it wasn’t a birthmark at all but an old tattoo, faded and green with age, of a large flat-nosed fish. “Got this when I was in the navy. Sailor first-class. USS Saratoga.” He turned his arm so that the tattoo was concealed. “Good thing we sea dogs are made of tough salt. I’m telling you, my number almost came up yesterday.”
“What happened?” Thomas asked. He pulled himself onto a countertop, between two large arrangements of pink and white carnations.
Evans touched a finger to his nose. “Aha. There’s the rub. I knew you kids would come looking for the real story.”
Pippa opened her mouth to protest, but Evans cut her off.
“It’s all right,” he said, settling back against his pillows. “I’d do the same thing myself. Never could resist a good story. You know what they used to call me back in Atlanta? The Bloodhound.” Evans chuckled and then immediately began to cough. He thumped his chest with a fist.
“Are you sure you’re all right?” Sam said. He was still lurking in the doorway. Max, on the other hand, had her back to Mr. Evans. She was circling the room, smelling flowers, opening cabinets, and probably, Pippa thought, looking for something she could steal.
“I’m fine, I’m fine. Just a little banged up. I got lucky. When that car clipped me, I rolled over the hood and everything went dark as dungeons. I woke up here. If it had been going any faster . . . If I’d fallen differently . . .”
“The papers said you were walking home,” Thomas said. “Is that true?”
Evans snorted. “True enough. Nearly made it, too. I was half a block away on Hester. I could have spit on my own front stoop. That’s when it happened.”
“Do you remember anything about the car?” Thomas asked.
Evans grinned at him. “Good question, Tommy. You’d make a crack reporter in no time. You aren’t looking for a job, by any chance? I could use an assistant, now that I’m head honcho at the Daily Screamer. No? Well, your loss.” The smile suddenly faded from his face, and his expression turned grim. “Sorry to say, I didn’t notice squat about the car, except that it was headed directly for me.”
Thomas lapsed into silence. There seemed nothing left to say. They were at a dead end.
Max spun around to face Mr. Evans. She had located a box of chocolates some visitor had brought for Evans and had stuffed two at once into her mouth. “Whaf abuf the drivumpf?” Everyone stared at her blankly, and she rolled her eyes and swallowed. “What about the driver?” she repeated. “You said you were on the windshield, didn’t ya? So you must of got a look at his face.”
Pippa couldn’t help but be a little impressed. The feeling quickly passed, however, as Max popped three more chocolates into her mouth.