CHAPTER 12

Some Sort of Bizarre Cutting Implement

Lookin’ fer somethin’, ladies?” inquired a voice behind us, followed by a whooshing sound and the sudden feeling that a fast-moving snake had just coiled itself around my left wrist. My arm jerked back and I was spun around to face Chester. A bullwhip stretched between us. He was holding the whip’s more useful end.

“You shouldn’t go pokin’ round other people’s property,” Chester informed us, sounding so much like Killbreath it occurred to me they might be related. “’Specially,” he added, leaning forward to peer deep into my bonnet, “if you, yerselves, might be other people’s property! How’d you all escape? What was all that tarnal commotion with the wagon? Where’s my brother, an’ Bert, an’ Zack?”

“The slide horn is our property,” said Frankie, standing straight and tall, “and we, ourselves, belong to no one. Take your filthy whip off my friend!”

Chester flicked the whip’s handle, and a wave undulated down its length, undoing the coil around my wrist. He raised the whip over his head and snarled at Frankie, “Miss Smart Mouth, is it? Maybe you’d like my filthy whip down the side of yer pretty little face!”

Chester cracked the whip in a motion that looked like it would slash Frankie from head to toe. But the whip’s end cut through the overhead branches of the chestnut tree and snagged on something. Chester said “Tarnal!” again, and yanked hard on the handle. Instead of the whip coming free, it jerked higher into the branches, pulling Chester off his feet. He went up about a yard and let go, hitting the dirt and dropping into a crouch, staring wide-eyed at the whip’s dangling handle.

“What in tarnation?” Chester sputtered.

The handle dropped a foot, Chester sprang to seize it, and a hairy arm with an enormous hand reached down from the tree, caught Chester by the collar, and dragged him into the branches. Chester started to cry out, but his voice faltered and turned to a mumble.

Leaves fluttered down.

“Mr. Ganto?” Frankie inquired.

“You have not been a good girl,” the tree rumbled in response.

“No,” Frankie agreed. “I haven’t. Could you ask that man you’re holding what became of the slide horn?”

Through the branches I could just make out Mr. Ganto perched comfortably, one-handedly holding Chester above a twelve-foot drop. Twigs stuck out of Chester’s mouth, making it look like he was eating a hedgehog. Mr. Ganto plucked the twigs out, pulling a spiny cluster of horse chestnuts with them.

“S-s-sold it ta B-B-Brinley,” Chester managed to stammer.

“Brinley?” asked Ganto.

“W-w-white house, g-g-green shut-shut-shut—”

“Shutters?” Ganto suggested.

Chester nodded and pointed vaguely up the hill.

“Thank you,” rumbled Ganto, reinserting the chestnuts like he was putting a cork in a bottle.

“What did you do with the others?” Frankie asked the Gigantopithecus.

“Left them. Other side of river. Told them not to come back. I will bring this one to them.”

“You’re going to swim across the river again?” I asked, dumbfounded.

“Trash should be kept together,” said Ganto, shaking Chester as if he were a dust rag. “If we let this one run loose, he will cause more trouble. Better he should join the others. I will signal when I return. Please do not leave without me.”

The branches of the tree shook, raining down more leaves, as Ganto swung himself and his captive into an adjoining tree and disappeared into the forest.

“Nothing in the fossil record suggests Gigantopithecus could talk,” said Tom.

“What?” asked Frankie, picking up the trombone case and handing it to me. “You want a jawbone with a comic-book speech balloon coming out of it? They could talk. It’s singing you don’t want them doing.”

We trudged back up the hill to the road where we had first encountered the hay wagon. Houses were spaced out unevenly on either side, and after a few minutes we found the one we had seen with the sign advertising music lessons. The house was white with green shutters.

“This must be the Brinley place,” I said. “Should we peek in a window or go up to the door and knock?”

“I think you two are going to hide in some bushes while I go get the Shagbolt back,” Frankie said. “You don’t look entirely convincing in those dresses.”

“No,” I said. “Whatever we do, we’re doing it together.”

“Why don’t we see what the I-Ching thinks?” asked Tom, pulling the book out of the pocket of his apron. He dug deeper and found his precious quarter.

“The I-Ching doesn’t think,” I said irritably. “It’s not a person.”

“It’s talking to us,” he replied, jiggling the book in my face. “I shouldn’t be the only one listening. This is important!”

I looked to Frankie for support. I could tell she wanted Tom and me to stay out of sight, while she took the risks, but she gnawed on her lip for a moment, then shrugged. “My mother is a crystal-gazer. Who am I to judge?”

“Good!” said Tom, squatting and picking up a stick. “I want us all to concentrate while I flip. Ask yourselves, what is our current situation, and what is the best way out of it?”

He flipped the quarter six times and used the stick to draw a hexagram in the dirt.

“‘Number three,’” Tom read, and I looked over his shoulder to reassure myself he wasn’t making stuff up.

HEXAGRAM 3

DIFFICULTY.

A CHALLENGE TO BE OVERCOME. PROBLEMS AT THE BEGINNING.

WHAT IS THE POINT OF BEING AHEAD OF YOUR TIME IF SOMEBODY ELSE IS SO FAR BEHIND THEIRS, YOU CANCEL EACH OTHER OUT?

“We already know we’re having difficulty,” I said disgustedly. “We don’t need a hexagram to tell us that!”

“Is there a Morse code message?” Frankie asked.

Tom nodded vigorously. He ticked off the parts of the hexagram with his stick. “There’s two dots, a dash, and a dot—that’s an F—followed by two dots, which is I, followed by three dots—S—and then a final dash, which is T. The message is fist!”

“You decoded that without looking at your paper,” I said. I knew I wouldn’t be able to do it as quickly, even if I had memorized the code.

It was a clue, and I missed it.

He pulled the code paper from his book and offered it to me. “You can check it if you want, but I’m sure I’m right.”

I ignored the paper.

“What’s fist supposed to mean?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Tom responded. “We were trying to decide whether to look in a window or knock on the door. Which do you do with your fist?” He clenched his hand and mimed rapping.

“Maybe it’s telling us to break a window,” I countered.

“Door it is,” said Frankie. “And the two of you might as well come. Just remember, making a fist, in this century, wouldn’t be ladylike.”

“Did I ever thank you for helping me save Dwina?” I asked as we filed through the gate and up the porch steps.

“No, you didn’t. Not that you have to. It was the only thing to do. But—you’re welcome.”

We got to the door and she raised her hand to knock, but before she could, I reached across her and pulled a cord hanging from the doorframe. A bell jangled inside the house.

“Maybe this isn’t what fist meant,” I said. A little smugly.

The door was opened by a short, chubby man in a plaid vest and a pumpkin-orange tie. He was wearing stemless eyeglasses that clung to his nose with a metal clip. One arm cradled the Time Trombone against his shoulder, the way a soldier might carry a rifle.

“Yes?”

“Hello,” said Frankie. “My name is Shofranka Camlo, and these are my adopted sisters, Rose and Thomasina. We were robbed earlier today of a valuable family heirloom, and we have reason to believe it may be in your possession.”

“Why on earth would you think that?” sputtered the man.

“You’re holding it in your hand.”

The man frowned and took a step back. He held out the trombone and stared at it as though he had never seen it before.

“The slide horn? I just bought it from a man who swore it had been in his family for generations. Said he had to give it up because it was chapping his lips. Surely I haven’t paid good money for stolen merchandise!”

“We have the case that was custom-made to fit it,” I said, holding open the lid so he could see the shape indented in velvet perfectly matched the horn he was holding. His frown deepened.

“May we come in?” asked Frankie.

“What? Oh, yes, of course; I’ve quite forgotten my manners. I am Colonel Josiah Brinley, late of the Fourth Ohio Volunteer Infantry. Served under Taylor in Mexico. Come in here to the music room; we’ll see if we can’t clear this up.”

We followed him into a room with a small keyboard instrument at one end and, at the other, a fireplace with a bugle hanging off a cord from its mantel. Sheet music and a deck of playing cards covered a table in the room’s center. A bookcase crowded with books stood by the door.

“I had seen the man once before—we had played cards together in town not two days past—he seemed honest enough. Said he needed the money quickly, to pay off a gambling debt, which I thought proved him honorable.” Colonel Brinley tapped the deck of cards with a pudgy finger. “We couldn’t agree on a price, so it was decided I would cut the cards and whatever card turned up, I would pay its value in dollars for the horn. It was a good risk; my highest offer had been eight.”

“What card did you draw?” asked Thomasina.

“The ace of clubs.”

“You only paid a dollar for the trombone?” I squawked.

“Fourteen dollars, actually,” said the colonel, with a grimace. “Aces were high. It was more than I wished to pay, but what could I do? A gambling debt is a debt of honor.”

“Who shuffled the cards?” asked Frankie.

“He did.”

Frankie nodded, as if this explained everything.

Thomasina leaned in close to the bookcase to examine something, and the protruding edge of his bonnet swept a small blue vase from its shelf. He caught it, tossed it from one hand to the other, and put it back on a different shelf.

“Can we have our trombone back?” I asked, holding the case out to the colonel, in the hope that he might chuckle jovially and slip the horn into it.

“I’m afraid not. Stolen it may be, but then again, it may not be. I’ve paid for it; it’s mine. If you children would care to fetch your parents, I’m willing to discuss it with them. On the other hand, I’d be very interested in buying the case from you.”

I slammed the lid. “It’s not for sale!” I snapped.

Frankie burst into tears. “We were having a picnic,” she whimpered convincingly, like she was terribly upset, “and our father forbade us from bringing the slide horn, but it is so lovely to have music, and Thomasina was playing it ever so delicately, and this man galloped by on his horse, and snatched it out of my poor Tommy’s hands, and I am sure it will mean a spanking in the woodshed for each of us if we do not get it back!”

“You’re not from around here,” the colonel said coldly. “My wife teaches melodeon to some of the children of Freedom Falls, and I’ve never seen you among their number. You’re itinerants, passing through, possibly even Gypsies—”

Frankie’s head popped up, instantly dry-eyed—

“—so I doubt there’s any woodshed involved. You’re trying to play on my sympathy, but it’s not an instrument easily strummed! I think it’s time the three of you were on your way. I will be keeping the trombone!”

I thought furiously, trying to come up with a way to get the Shagbolt back. I could see from the way the colonel was clutching it that he half expected us to try to snatch it from him, so making a grab for it wouldn’t work.

I glanced around, searching for inspiration. My eyes roved from the playing cards to a picture on the wall of puppies playing poker. My dentist had a similar picture in his waiting room—the dogs were much older, of course—and immediately I knew I had to gamble.

“Do you really want the trombone case?” I asked the colonel.

“Would you be willing to sell it?”

“No, but I’d be willing to wager for it.”

The colonel looked at me shrewdly. “Women do not wager. Nor do children.”

“But maybe Gypsy children do,” said Frankie, with a touch of ice in her voice.

“What kind of wager?” asked the colonel.

“Would you honor it, even if you lost? Even if we are children?” I demanded.

“Are you implying I am not a gentleman?”

“Is that a yes?”

“Of course it’s a yes!” the colonel exploded. “I honor all my debts! What kind of wager do you propose? It is not seemly for children to play cards with adults, outside of the nursery!”

“No card games,” I said hastily. “Are you familiar with rock-paper-scissors?”

“Some sort of bizarre cutting implement?”

“No. It’s a way of settling disagreements,” I explained. “We stand facing each other. Each of us makes a fist. We shake our fists three times at each other.”

“Sounds pointless.”

“I’m not done. On the third shake, you do one of three things with your fist. If you spread out all your fingers, that’s called paper. If you stick out only two fingers, it’s called scissors. No fingers out, it’s rock. If you’ve got scissors and your opponent has paper, scissors cut paper—you win. If you’ve got rock and he has scissors, rock breaks scissors—you win. If you’ve got rock and he has paper—”

“Rock rips paper—I win!”

“No. Paper covers rock—you lose.”

“Makes no sense.”

“That’s the way it’s always been, ever since the game was invented, back in—?”

I turned to Thomasina, thinking he might know when rock-paper-scissors had been invented. He surprised me by looking up at the colonel and asking, “What’s today’s date?”

“August twelfth.”

“Eighteen fifty-two?”

“Of course!”

Thomasina turned to me and answered my question. “August 12, 1852.”

I was stunned. “You think… I just… invented rock-paper-scissors?”

He shrugged, as if to say it was entirely possible.

“I like it,” said the colonel. “It’s a way of settling a dispute without recourse to cards or dice. What is your proposition?”

“We do rock-paper-scissors once, winner take all. If you win, we give you the trombone case. If we win, you give us the trombone.”

The colonel stroked his chin thoughtfully.

“You appeal to the sporting man in me! Let us perform the contest! Do we stand in a special way?”

“Yes!” I didn’t want to disappoint him. “Plant your feet well apart, with the rear foot at a ninety-degree angle to the front.” I gave him the same instructions Frankie had given us for staying upright during time travel. I put the trombone case down near the bookcase and faced him in the same way. He placed the trombone on the table.

“What if we both make the same gesture?”

“It’s a tie and we go again. Are you ready? You do the count!”

He nodded nervously and licked his lips. We both hunkered forward.

“One!”

We threw down our fists.

“Two!”

Again.

“Three!”

He threw out two fingers. I kept my fist.

“Rock breaks scissors! I win!” I crowed.

The colonel’s hands both became rocks and they quivered briefly at his sides. Then he unclenched them, shook himself, and forced a thin smile. “Bested fair and square,” he admitted.

I picked up the case and held it open before him. He squared his shoulders and placed the trombone with great longing into its velvet bed. Before he let go he said, “It’s a fine and unusual instrument. Do you have any idea where and when it was made?”

“Prague,” said Frankie, gently easing his hands off the horn so I could close the lid. “Late sixteenth century.”

“That old? It seems so modern.”

“Its maker was extraordinary,” Frankie assured him, snapping the latches and taking the case by its handle.

“Excuse me,” said Thomasina, adjusting his apron and keeping his voice soft and girlish. “But I see you have a copy of Uncle Tom’s Cabin.” He pointed to the bookcase. The blue vase marked the spot. “Have you read it?”

“It belongs to my wife, actually,” replied the colonel, and I had to admire his effort to be polite. I could tell he was seething. “I, myself, do not read fiction. Waste of time.”

“Is she still reading it?” Frankie asked excitedly. “I see there’s a gap where volume two should be.”

“These personal questions border on the impertinent. But, yes, Mrs. Brinley is still reading it. She’s over to Ethel Mordred’s house at this very moment”—he waved at the window toward the house across the way—“with a number of the other village ladies, discussing it. They call it a book club, but it’s really just a reason to drink lemonade and gabble. I miss the old quilting bees. At least those produced a quilt. No good will ever come of women reading fiction—you mark my words! They should confine themselves to cookbooks and almanacs.”

“Oh, I quite agree,” Frankie said, giving him the least sincere smile I had ever seen in my life. “Well, we really must be going!”

Frankie swept out into the hall, and Thomasina and I quickly followed. The colonel was a few steps behind, but we waited for him to open the door for us.

“If you ever reconsider, and wish to sell the horn—”

“We’ll keep you in mind,” Frankie assured him, and a few moments later we were off his porch and through his gate.

Frankie gave me an odd look, like she was seeing me in a new light, and said, “That was very good.”

“Thanks,” I said, feeling a funny warmth in my chest. I figured the dress was too tight.

“What made you choose rock?” Tom asked.

“You did,” I said.

“Me?”

“Well, it was really the hexagram you came up with. What was it called?”

“Difficulty.”

“Right. And the Morse code that went with it was obviously telling us how to get out of difficulty.”

“How?”

“By making a fist!”