Before Throckmorton had any more time to ponder the sad past, Annaliese and Teddy returned to the kitchen. Annaliese was bundled in a wool coat with a fur collar, fur muff, and matching fur hat. A cobweb hung from the hat’s brim like a torn veil. Captain Eugene was perched on Teddy’s shoulder.
“It’s freezing up there,” Annaliese told Mrs. Wiggins. “We came downstairs to get our sock monkeys. We’re hoping they’ll bring us good luck.”
“We passed Father on the staircase,” Teddy said. “He didn’t look too happy.”
The cook shrugged.
“Thanks for giving us the keys, Mrs. Wiggins.” Annaliese’s face brightened. “Our attic is like a giant treasure chest.”
Mrs. Wiggins picked up a dish towel and shooed them off.
Annaliese and Throckmorton trailed Teddy and Captain Eugene past Eastcliff’s ballroom on the third floor and then up the narrow stairs to the attic on the fourth floor. Bailey—a trained scent hound with weak eyes and a bad hip—soldiered loyally behind.
Anxiety about the fate of his missing cousins caused Throckmorton’s stuffing to clump.
What if moths had munched hundreds of holes in Sir Rudyard’s woolly skin?
What if a mouse had burrowed into Miss Beatrice’s body, set up housekeeping, and given birth to nine babies?
Or what if his cousins—deprived of human touch for such a long, long time—had completely lost their senses?
Throckmorton cringed, recalling Annaliese’s store-bought stuffed animals that couldn’t see, couldn’t hear, couldn’t think, and couldn’t feel.
Inside the attic’s main room, the air was dry and musty. Morning light shone dull and gray through grimy windowpanes. Shadows lurked in cluttered corners and ghostly white bed sheets covered hulking pieces of furniture.
Everything smelled lonely.
Annaliese and Teddy tucked their sock monkeys into a wicker baby buggy with rusty wheels and then plunged into the attic’s dimly lit interior. Bailey tagged along.
“Evan! We’re back!” Teddy called. “Did you find anything?”
“Nope!”
Throckmorton scanned the array of castoffs deadened by dust: antlers, arrows, and alligator purses; bowlers and beaver hats; fans, furs, and stuffed seagulls; jump ropes, jacks, and jigsaw puzzles; mustard jars and Merry Christmas mugs; a weather vane, wind chimes, and an old Victrola.
How would the children ever find the missing sock monkeys in such a muddled mess?
“I fear the worst,” Throckmorton told Captain Eugene, once Teddy and Annaliese were out of earshot.
“Aye, I do as well,” said the captain. “I haven’t seen Sir Rudyard in years—not since Evan was a tyke.”
“By the way, where were you?” Throckmorton asked. “It didn’t take Teddy very long to find you.”
“That’s because,” his cousin explained, “I was never lost.”
“You weren’t?”
“Oh, my heavens, no,” said Captain Eugene. “It’s just that, well . . . Master Teddy keeps me well hidden.” He lowered his voice. “I think he’s afraid that Evan or Judge Easterling will tease him if they discover that he’s still so fond of me.”
“They surely would,” Throckmorton agreed.
“Teddy hides me inside his marble pouch. Or I hang upside down, bat-style, in the corner behind a globe. Sometimes I nap underneath the skivvies in his dresser drawer.”
“That’s terrible,” Throckmorton commiserated.
“There are worse fates,” Captain Eugene responded matter-of-factly. “Besides, every night without fail Teddy takes off my hat, unbuttons my jacket, folds it up neatly, and tucks me inside his pillowcase. The lad’s never slept without me. I don’t know what he’ll do when . . .”
Captain Eugene’s voice cracked.
“When what?” asked Throckmorton.
“Haven’t you heard? The judge is sending Evan and Teddy to boarding school.”
A queasy, uneasy feeling spread across Throckmorton’s body. “Annaliese too?”
“Oh no,” Captain Eugene answered. “I overheard Annaliese ask Judge Easterling if she could attend as well. He told her that St. John’s Military Academy is for boys only. Miss Pine will be Annaliese’s tutor as well as her nanny.”
Throckmorton was relieved that Annaliese would remain at Eastcliff. Still, she must have found the news terribly upsetting.
Not that Evan and Teddy played with their little sister that often anymore . . . but she didn’t have any friends. And, no matter how many times she’d asked him, Judge Easterling wouldn’t let her attend the local school. It was an awfully lonely existence for a nine-year-old girl.
“What about Teddy?” Throckmorton asked. “Does he want to go?”
“Absolutely not!” Captain Eugene declared.
After a moment Throckmorton said softly, “When are they leaving?”
Captain Eugene hesitated, as if reluctant to seal the truth with his answer. “The day after Great-Grandmama’s birthday party.”
A mournful silence followed.
Throckmorton didn’t know what to say or do to comfort his grief-stricken cousin. Every sock monkey fears the day when his or her keeper heads off into a wide, wide world far beyond a sock monkey’s imagination.
Now, as Evan, Teddy, and Annaliese searched the terrain of their family’s past, their pillaging and plundering became more frantic.
Wooden crates scraped over plank flooring. Bird cages rattled. Bells rang. Hinges squeaked as the children pried open lids of steamer trunks. Pencil cases spilled. Baskets tipped. Arrowheads, seashells, pins, buttons, and lots of itty-bitty things scattered.
When a stack of shoe boxes toppled over, Evan yelled, “Timmmm-berrrr!” as if he’d sawed down a tall tree.
Moments later, Teddy burst through a clothes rack laden with garment bags. Cheeks red and teeth chattering, he declared, “I—I—I give up!”
“No, wait! I’ve got an idea,” said Annaliese, who’d been busily pairing shoes to put back into the right boxes.
“I’ve got a better one,” Teddy responded. “Let’s go downstairs.”
Annaliese stood up and slapped her thigh. “Here, Bailey!” she called.
Skeptical looks crossed her brothers’ faces.
Bailey’s eyes lit up. The gloomy dog with droopy ears waddled toward her, ready and eager to report for duty.
Swoosh!
Before Throckmorton knew what hit him, he was dangling upside down in front of the dog’s wrinkled, whiskered face.
“Look, Bailey.”
Annaliese wiggled and juggled Throckmorton’s body like some pathetic puppet. “See? Sock monkey.”
What his keeper did next was unthinkable, almost unforgivable: She rubbed Throckmorton’s bare red bottom back and forth across the dog’s cold wet nose.
The beast sniffed.
He snuffled.
He slobbered.
“Oooh, wet . . .” Throckmorton recoiled at the sheer indignity of it all.
“Go. Find. Sock. Monkey,” Annaliese ordered.
Evan scoffed. “As if that worthless bloodhound could sniff out a couple of sock monkeys . . .”
“Sherlock Holmes might disagree,” Teddy observed wryly.
Scenting an invisible trail, Bailey zigzagged away. Soon a resounding bay rang through the rafters. “Ah-rooooooo!”
Evan and Teddy exchanged looks of disbelief.
“He’s on to something!” Annaliese cried, turning Throckmorton right side up. “Let’s go!”
The hound’s bellowing came from behind a tall golden harp, partly covered with a black drape secured by a length of gold tasseled cord.
“Give me a hand,” Annaliese yelled.
Evan and Teddy inched the harp away from the wall. Punctuating the air with their grunts, they shoved Olivia’s once-beloved instrument aside.
Bailey feverishly scored the wall boards with his long, strong toenails. Evan beamed his flashlight up, down, and around the wall. Then he ran his hands over a panel of wood wider and newer looking than the others.
“It’s some kind of makeshift door,” he said.
Annaliese bounced from foot to foot. “Open it! Open it!”
Teddy crossed his fingers. “Maybe this is where the gold doubloons and crown jewels are stashed.”
The panel bore simple hinges but no handle. In the darkish light, its small keyhole—almost invisible unless you knew where to look—might have been mistaken for a knothole.
Evan pulled the cook’s ring of keys out of his coat pocket. He shifted his eyes from keyhole to keys, sizing them up.
After a few wrong guesses, voila!
A key turned, the lock clicked.
Evan poked the panel with two fingers. Creaking eerily, the door opened into a pitch-black space—the kind of space, Throckmorton feared, that was best left undisturbed.