We stepped through the door into a workshop that was cluttered with tools and machine parts. The strong smell of grease and oil burned my nose hairs while the cheerfully wheezy sound of calliope music filled the room.

“Convenient how the Library sends us to out-of-the-way places,” I said. “This must be where the maintenance guys work.”

“Looks like it,” Theo replied. “I don’t know what we’d do if we stepped out into a crowd.”

“Hey, who are you?” someone yelled.

Oops.

We spun to see a little kid sitting in the corner behind a workbench, loaded down with carnival snacks. He had cotton candy, a box of popcorn, a couple of hot dogs, and a bag of peanuts. I wasn’t sure if I should be jealous or disgusted.

“How’d you get in here?” the kid asked accusingly. “Only park workers are allowed.”

I couldn’t tell whether the kid was angry, or scared, or worried that he’d been busted for loading up on junk food.

“Yeah, well, what about you, chief?” I asked. “It’s not like you work here. What are you? Seven years old?”

“I’m nine,” the kid shot back, insulted. “My parents run a snack stand, so, yeah, I work here.”

This kid might have been little, but he didn’t back down.

“How do you know we don’t work here?” I said, figuring it was better to stay on the offense with this tough guy.

“Doubt it,” the kid said. “Unless you’re a couple of clowns.”

“Clowns?” Theo asked, surprised. “Why would you say that?”

I knew the answer. Theo had on a bright blue shirt with a bow tie and suspenders. It was his usual prep look. I wore jeans, but with a bright green hoodie. This was definitely not standard 1937 wear. The little kid had on a pair of baggy dark woolen pants, a grease-stained white shirt, and a cloth cap with a small brim that made him look like one of those kids you see in movies, selling newspapers on street corners.

In 1937, we were the freaks. I hadn’t even thought about how we’d stand out like, well, a couple of clowns.

“You’re absolutely right we don’t work here,” Theo said. “Not yet, anyway. We thought we’d try out to be clowns. That’s why we chose this attire. You know, to look like them.”

Good old Theo. Always thinking. Even while dimension-hopping.

The kid laughed and took a big bite out of his hot dog. “Yeah, well, sorry. You don’t look nothing like ’em,” he said with a full mouth. “Those clowns are tough. If they think you’re making fun of ’em, they’ll kick you right outta here. They don’t like it when people don’t show ’em respect.”

“You mean some people actually show them respect?” I asked.

“Absolutely!” Theo jumped in, stopping me from saying anything else stupid. “We love clowns.”

“No, you don’t,” the kid said. “Nobody loves clowns.”

The kid was young, but he was smart. I liked him. He reminded me of…me.

“Exactly,” I said quickly. “But still, we’re gonna try, so we’ll get moving.”

I started for the only other door in the workshop, figuring it was the way out.

“Take some clothes from that box,” the kid said. “The mechanics pinch stuff from the lost and found and take it home to their families. They won’t miss nothing.”

Theo and I exchanged shrugs and went for the box. We dug through and found a couple of dark sweaters and caps like the one the kid was wearing. We each took a sweater and put it on over our clothes.

“Thanks, chief,” I said. “What’s your name?”

“Derby,” he said while jamming pink cotton candy into his mouth.

“I’m Marcus. This is Theo.”

“Don’t see too many coloreds here at Playland,” Derby said.

“What!” Theo exclaimed, stunned.

“Hey, don’t get all twitchy,” Derby said. “Don’t make no difference to me. Just being observant.”

Theo gave me a look that was somewhere between anger and confusion.

“Remember where we are,” I said to Theo. “Or when we are. It’s something people say in 1937.”

Theo nodded. He understood but wasn’t any happier about it.

We each put on a cap and looked one another over.

“Not bad,” I said. “We’ll fit right in.”

“Want me to take you to the clown tent?” Derby asked.

“Yeah,” I replied. “But first we want to see the Oracle Baz.”

Derby let out a quick laugh.

“You and everybody else,” he said. “Half the people come to Playland just to see him. They’re hoping he’ll say they’re gonna strike it rich or marry a millionaire. They don’t like it too much when he tells them they’re headed for trouble. And he does tell ’em. Baz doesn’t hold nothing back.”

“Can you introduce us?” Theo asked.

Derby looked us both up and down. “What’s in it for me?” he asked.

Theo and I gave each other questioning looks but came up empty.

“We don’t have anything to give,” Theo said. “Except for the sincere gratitude of two fellows who are in desperate need of assistance.”

Derby glared at Theo through squinted eyes, as if trying to figure out what planet he had just dropped in from, and not just because he was “colored.”

“You talk funny,” he said.

“Yeah, he does,” I added with a laugh. “Makes me crazy.”

Derby jammed the rest of his hot dog into his mouth, swallowing it nearly whole.

Theo grimaced as if the sight made him want to gag.

“I like you two,” Derby said. “I’ll take you to Baz.”

“Excellent!” I exclaimed.

As Derby crumpled up the wrappers from his food, Theo reached up for the pull chain that controlled the overhead light.

“Whoa! Leave it!” Derby yelled.

His sudden loud reaction made Theo and me freeze up.

“I was just turning off the light,” Theo said tentatively.

Derby hurried for the door. “I don’t like the dark is all,” he said, calm again. “Wait’ll I’m outside.”

“Whatever you say,” Theo replied.

When Derby opened the door and walked out, we were hit with the full-throttle sound of calliope music from the carousel.

“That was strange,” Theo said.

“Leave the light on,” I said. “Don’t want to freak the kid out.”

Theo let go of the pull chain, and the two of us hurried after Derby.

When we left the small workshop and entered the vast round room that held the carousel, things turned strangely familiar. I felt as if I had just been there because, well, I’d just been there. The carousel was the exact same one I’d ridden dozens of times. It gave me hope that moving around this Playland in 1937 wasn’t going to be a totally alien experience.

Wrong.

We stepped out of the carousel building into a totally alien experience.

It was Playland, but it wasn’t. I recognized some of the classic rides that were still around in our time, but that’s where any similarity ended. The weirdest thing to see was the people. The men wore suits and ties, like they were going to work in an office or something. Many wore hats too. The kind you’d see in old-time gangster movies. All the women wore dresses. Most had on high heels. Even the little girls wore dresses. It was odd to see how they got all fancy just to go to an amusement park. At least the boys wore pants and buttoned shirts. None had on hats or ties.

And Derby was right—there weren’t many black people. Actually, I didn’t see any at all. There were no Hispanics or Asians either. Weird.

The park itself looked different, but not in a strange way. I guess some amusement parks are just timeless. We walked past familiar booths with games, and concessions selling snacks. The prices were incredible, though. Six cents for a cola and ten cents for an ice-cream cone. I could get used to that. Maybe there really was such a thing as “the good old days.”

“It’s hot,” Theo said. “So incongruous.”

I wasn’t sure what he meant at first, mostly because it took a while for me to figure out what incongruous meant, but it finally dawned on me that it was November. The bookmark had sent us to the part of the story right after the park opened, in May. So we had traveled across time, space, and a couple of seasons.

As we moved through the crowded midway, we passed many rides I recognized. The Tornado roller coaster and the Derby Racers were the exact same, but some of the other rides were long gone by our time.

“Check it out,” I said, pointing to the biggest building on the midway. It was made to look like an imposing medieval castle. The words Magic Castle stood out boldly above the front doors in foot-high letters. “Scene of the crime,” I said. “Or it will be, anyway.”

“We’ve really gone back in time,” Theo said, awestruck.

“No,” I said. “We’ve gone into the time of the book.”

We stood there, taking in the spectacle, trying to get our heads around the fact that we were actually seeing things the way they had been in 1937.

Theo and I made eye contact, and we both smiled. We were thinking the same thing.

“This is freakin’ awesome,” I said.

“Hey, you two want to shake a leg?” Derby yelled.

That snapped us back into the moment. We weren’t there to sight-see, so we jogged to catch up to the kid.

“Gotta warn you,” Derby said. “Baz might not want to talk to you. He’s not very…I don’t know the right word—”

“Accommodating?” Theo asked.

“Friendly,” Derby replied. “Not many people like the guy. You might say he’s got a couple enemies.”

“We don’t want to be pals,” I said. “We just need a small favor.”

“You’re dreaming!” Derby said with a laugh.

“Why don’t people like him?” Theo asked.

“Beats me,” Derby said. “I never hear anybody say anything nice about him. He likes me okay, though. I do chores for him, like cleaning up his stage and bringing food to his apartment. He lives over the Magic Castle. Did you know that?”

“We did,” Theo said.

I wanted to add, Not for long. But that wouldn’t have been cool.

The kid led us off the midway to the far end of the park, headed toward the Long Island Sound. It was much quieter there, since we were away from the crowds and the noisy rides.

“That’s where he does his show,” Derby said, pointing to a big orange-and-white-striped circus tent sitting under a huge oak tree. “You came at a good time. He doesn’t go on for an hour. He likes to be alone before a show. Says it helps him clear his mind so he can consort with the spirits or something dumb like that.”

The silence was suddenly broken by a horrified scream that came from inside the tent.

The three of us froze.

“Guess he’s not alone after all,” I said.

“Is that normal?” Theo asked.

“The screamin’?” Derby said nervously. “Uh…no.”

“Help!” came another terrified scream.

I took off running for the tent, afraid that one of Baz’s enemies might be getting to him before the Magic Castle fire did.

It was looking as though we were too late.