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December 24th
Christmas Eve
My deep sleep ended when the downstairs phone rang. My eyes opened the instant the jangling bell sounded. I felt the brief surprise of waking up in an unfamiliar house. My mind soon came out of its slumbered haze and I remembered where I was.
The morning light was faint and dim, so I knew that it was still very early. I decided it might be wise to get some more sleep. I closed my eyes, but within minutes, I heard footsteps, and a gentle knock at my door.
“Mannie?” a voice said quietly. It was Sissy, and she opened the door just a crack.
“Hullo,” I said. “I’m awake.”
“Did you sleep all right?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“I’ve just got a call from Michael. He wanted to know if we could bring you over a bit earlier than planned.”
My mind rushed into awareness. Today I would return to Very North. I had not yet fully processed the previous day’s adventure. Sleep had taken me over before I could begin to sort through the experience. I had lived through a remarkable story, in a world where gnomes and magical deer were commonplace. Then I had discovered that this world was in fact a theatrical contrivance. And that, I found, was harder to grasp than the fantasy had been. Still, true or not, Very North was a real place, and I was about to go back. I felt an intense excitement, like every Christmas morning of my life taken together.
“Yes!” I said. “I can go now!” I was already climbing out of the bed, as keen as if the house was on fire.
“I’m going to fix you a breakfast first,” she said. “And we’ll let your mother sleep a bit longer. She needs the rest. Your father will drive you over to the stage.”
“The stage?”
“Very North. It’s our stage, you know.”
“Right,” I said. “Like a stage in a theatre.”
“Only much moreso,” Sissy added. She advised me to wash and to choose comfortable clothes. Downstairs, she served hot porridge and sliced fruit. I devoured mine in less than two minutes.
“Careful, Mannie. Don’t give yourself indigestion,” said my father. “Tonight, we’ve got to get back to Clarketon. It will be very late by then.”
“I would let you stay here another night, if I could,” said Sissy. “But we’ve got the new candidates arriving soon.”
“Candidates,” I said. “I guess I was one of them after all?”
“That’s right. Yesterday, you were a candidate. We did everything we could to make it feel like an accident. You got to play the role of the unsuspecting outsider. That part always begins here, at this house. A boy and girl from Wellington will arrive tonight. They will meet Trimble and Lemuel out by the well, just like you did.”
“That’s amazing,” I said. “So, you’re an actress, then?”
“That’s right. Lettie, as well.”
“And your house is part of the show each night?”
“Three times a week, for four weeks each year. But tonight is the last round.”
“Do you live here the rest of the time?”
“No, dear. Lettie and I have perfectly modern lodgings in the city. This house belongs to Michael. It was one of his childhood homes.”
“So, when my Mum said that you were a friend of Audra’s...”
“She wasn’t making that up. It’s quite true. We were on stage together when we were much younger. Perhaps I can tell you more about it someday. But I think you two had better be on your way.”
My own happiness in this was acute, but as my father drove me back to Marbury Meats, I knew he harbored misgivings about Audra’s gift. He already thought my toy theatre an unfortunate frivolity. He must have thought the Secret Feast a scandalous distraction indeed. So neither of us spoke on the short drive. When we arrived at the concrete parking lot by the warehouse, I broke the silence by thanking him, and by assuring him that I would not let the excitement affect my studies.
“That’s what I like to hear,” he said, and he gave a curt nod and a smile. “I’ll be back tonight. You’ll have to say your goodbyes and be ready to leave the instant the show is finished.”
“All right,” I said. “Thanks again.” I left the car and saw that Michael was standing nearby, waving from a dozen yards away. My father waved back, then rolled out of the lot.
I gave the warehouse a look. It was remarkable to think that such a great lummox of a building could house something so exquisite as Very North.
“Good morning, Mannie,” Michael called out. “Thank you for coming so early. We’ve got an unexpected crisis that I think you can help us with.”
“What is it?”
“Clive Murney. He’s still here.”
“He is?”
“He refused to leave. He didn’t feel he had paid due penance for his role in Trimble’s capture.”
“Really?”
“He insisted on staying in his gilded prison cell for the night. And he seems very serious about staying out his year’s sentence.” Michael laughed.
“I’m not too surprised,” I said. “I’ve learned Clive takes things very seriously.”
Michael opened a door into the warehouse. “Before we start your orientation this morning, I thought you might pay him a visit. He still believes everything that happened last night really happened. I don’t want to spoil that impression. So, if you will tell him that you, too, have been here all night. Guide him to the Den of Friendship. There will be a surprise for him there.”
I was given a sweater and cap, similar to those the other children had worn. Michael led me into the palace halls. It was strange to see the transition. From the concrete lot, just a few steps down a grey corridor, open a door and here is this stunning other world. It reminded me of the geode rocks that Anaru kept in his room. On the outside, craggy and rough, and on the inside, filled with crystalline beauty.
Michael guided me up some stairs to the door of Cell Number Seven. He handed me a key.
“You were never locked in. If you or Clive had tried to open the door at any time, you would have succeeded. But mimic your unlocking the cell with this key.”
“All right,” I said, “So I’m acting already.” I was delighted by this carefully managed detail. How many hundreds more there must have been in that minutely crafted dreamscape.
“One other thing. When you walk Clive to the den, don’t take him through the Great Hall. The work lights are on in the snow yard, and my crew are making repairs on Grimms. Let’s prevent Clive from seeing the mundane reality behind all this.” He instructed me on an alternate route. Then he left me to my task.
I knocked on the door first, just to alert Clive that someone was here. Then I put the key into the lock and turned it. I pushed the door open, and found Clive sitting at the desk. He looked up.
“Oh, it’s you...” he said. “I thought you had gone home.”
“No, I stayed to help Kris,” I said.
“You don’t intend to hang about all year, do you?”
“No,” I replied. “I’ve got to get home soon. And you?”
“I’m staying, a year at least.”
“Father Christmas released you last night.”
“It’s a matter of personal honor,” he said, and then yawned.
“Have you slept at all?”
“I have to write it all down. That will take a year.”
He had filled a dozen pages of a hardbound journal with notes. At a glance, I could see that his normally careful handwriting had turned into a lazy scrawl, no doubt owing to lack of sleep. Clive picked up a hefty leather-bound book.
“Look at this! Martin brought it to me. It’s the manual that goes with my chemistry lab! I need all year to learn this, too.”
“So, you plan to spend your year’s sentence in here, playing with your chemistry lab?”
“Maybe I’ll invent something useful. Then I could split the profits with Father Christmas.”
I couldn’t help but laugh. “There’s only one of you, Clive Murney,” I said.
“Of course there’s only one of me. What kind of a crack is that?!”
“I’ve been ordered to bring you to the Den of Friendship.”
“What’s in the den?”
“I don’t know. They might put us to work. I bet there are floors that need scrubbing.”
“Oh. I hadn’t thought of that. Are we likely to be scrubbing every day?”
“Yes. I expect there will be lots.”
“I don’t enjoy scrubbing much,” he said. “But I don’t suppose I have a choice.”
He stood up and walked. He weaved and swerved a bit.
“My gosh, Mannie. I’m a little wobbly.”
“Well of course you are,” I said. “You haven’t slept.”
I opened the door to the hallway, and Clive stumbled out. “Here, you better lean on me,” I said. He grabbed hold of my left arm, and together we made our way around the corner to the right, and then bore left until I saw the doorway to the den.
Martin was there, in costume. “Master Candler and Master Murney,” he said, and for a moment, it was as though yesterday’s story was still going on. I could nearly hope that last night’s reveal of the truth about Very North was itself the dream.
“Good morning Martin Piper,” I said. “We’re here to report for duty.”
“Mmm.. Morning,” Clive muttered. It was clear that fatigue was overtaking him fast.
“Eyes open and face front,” said Martin. Clive made an effort to come to attention. Martin swung open the door, and there, sitting near the fireplace, was the Murney family; Cyrus and Joan hand in hand, and Annabella seated in a chair.
“Merry Christmas, Clive!” they all sang out.
Clive blinked and shook his head lightly. “What?” he said, and Annabella laughed.
“Clive, it’s us. You know, your family?”
“I know who you are,” he said sleepily. “What are you doing here?”
“He stayed up all night,” I said. Anna came to Clive’s side and held him.
“My darling, you’re about to collapse!”
“I’m all right. I’m supposed to scrub floors now.” Then he yawned. Anna tried to pick him up, something she hadn’t done in a long while.
“Oh, my heavens. I can’t carry you anymore, Clive.”
“Why ... why would you?” he said, and then he collapsed into a chair and went promptly to sleep.
Joan wedged herself into the chair and heaped Clive onto her lap. “He’ll sleep all day now.”
“He’s been through a lot,’ I said. “I don’t know if he’ll tell you about it. We’ve all been sworn to secrecy.”
Cyrus laughed. “We know all about it. We were never far away. You remember Silbersee, that menacing coach driver?”
“Couldn’t forget him.”
“That was me!”
This was astonishing news. “You?”
“Michael often arranges it that way. If you or Clive had not willingly got on board that coach, the rest of the story couldn’t have happened. In an emergency, I would have unmasked myself and told you I was in on the whole gnome conspiracy.”
“I never would have guessed,” I said.
“I was sure Clive would see through my disguise. But he never did.”
“So, he was meant to find Olivia’s letters, then?”
“Oh yes. We took a gamble that Clive would fall for this scheme more easily if he thought he was getting the better of someone. He fell for the whole business.”
“I think he took it more seriously than you might have expected. When I visited his prison cell, he was... well, I think he was heartbroken.”
Joan looked at her husband with a frown. “I worried it might be too much for him.”
“He’s come through fine,” said Cyrus. “I wanted this to build his character a bit. And he’s got the chemistry lab. That was a pretty penny, I have to say!”
Michael walked into the den. Everyone greeted him by name.
“I’m told you need a strong shoulder to hoist young Clive away,” he said. Anna laughed and warned Michael that Clive was heavier than he looked. Michael lifted the boy and propped him against his left shoulder without struggle. Clive barely seemed to notice.
I walked along with the Murneys all the way out to the concrete lot. Joan walked alongside me. “I think you were a very good friend to my son,’ she said. “I don’t mind telling you. I’m anxious as hell about that chemistry lab. Who knows what evil things Clive might do with it.”
“I think he just wants to know.”
“Know what?” Joan asked.
“Everything,” I said.
As Michael arranged Clive into the backseat of Cyrus’s car, Clive’s eyes opened briefly. “Who are you?” he said, and then he saw that he was under a New Zealand sky once again. “How did I get here?”
“You’re almost back home, son,” said Cyrus.
“Oh,” Clive muttered, and then slumped back on the car seat and resumed his long-delayed sleep.
“Say hello to Olivia,” I said as Cyrus got behind the wheel.
“When I see her. She’s keeping company with Nate Garrick right now. She’ll be home this afternoon.” He said this in such a carefree way, he couldn’t have known how sorry I would be to hear it. He revved the engine and engaged the clutch. “You’ve quite a day ahead of you. The merriest of Christmases, Mannie.”
“Thank you, Mr. Murney,” I said.
He smiled and waved as he pulled away. Anna blew me a kiss, and then the Murney family was gone. It was time for me to uncover the real secrets of Very North.