Gatekeepers (19 page)

“Longer,” David said. “Xander, something must have hap-pened to her.”

“Give her a chance, Dae. She'll be back any minute, wait and see. And with Mom.” Now he did stop. His face was alive with excitement. He really believed Toria would find Mom and bring her home.

Xander's belief infected David. He allowed himself to
feel
it, to feel that Mom really was on her way. He could almost smell her, that hint of flowers that seemed natural to her. He imagined throwing his arms around her, squeezing her. He would never let her go.

As worried as he was, he smiled back at Xander.

Somewhere in the house, a door slammed.

“Dad!” David said. He jumped off the bench. Both boys ran into the hall and stopped on the landing. “Dad!” David yelled again. “Jesse!”

No reply.

They turned big eyes on each other. “You think,” David said, “maybe it's those big guys again, the ones from the other world?”

Xander shook his head. “They'd come from one of the rooms up here. Besides, Jesse said Phemus couldn't come back so soon.”

They returned to the antechamber, and David took up his spot on the bench. He swallowed hard and glanced nervously at the open door. Xander walked to the portal door, tried the handle—locked, of course.

Another bang. David jumped.

Xander gave David a puzzled look and went into the hall. “Dad?” he called. He walked away from the antechamber.

David went to the doorway and peered out.

Xander was standing halfway to the landing, listening. “Probably just the house trying to spook us,” he said.

“It's working,” David said.

“Could be just the wind,” Xander said. “ I'll go check.” But he didn't move, just stood there, as if expecting David to say, “Nah, never mind.”

Instead, David said, “Okay.”

Xander smiled. He walked to the landing, then tromped down the stairs.

David watched for a few seconds, then he scanned the hallway. All the other doors were closed, as they were supposed to be. He glanced over his shoulder at the portal door Toria had used.

Twenty, twenty-five minutes she'd been gone. That was too long.

He had an idea. Xander would never let him do it, but hey, he was downstairs. Dad would call it
impulsive
—doing something simply because the chance presented itself. It was unplanned, stupid.

Not stupid this time
, David thought.
Not when it's been almost a half hour.

He slipped into the antechamber, plucked a canteen and the gray kepi off their hooks, and picked up a sword from the bench. He opened the portal door—unlocked now that he held the items—and stepped through.

David ran through the woods toward the meadow of dry grass and the Union army camp on the other side. He could not see much activity among the tents: one or two people walking along the center aisle. Most of the soldiers must be at the front lines. He wished he'd had time to research the Civil War, especially the Union side and its encampments and battle policies, before plunging into it again. But they'd hardly had time to grab a few hours' sleep, let alone do homework.

At the edge of the woods, he dropped the sword into the grass. As he tucked the kepi into his waistband, he looked around for landmarks that would help him find the sword again.

That tree
, he thought.
Split, as though by lightning.

He hoped the pull of the kepi and canteen, and the items Toria had brought, would be enough to guide them to the portal home.

He bolted for the tents. Before he reached them, he heard a scream coming from the front of the camp.
Toria.

He angled that direction through the field. He reached the back of the first tent and stopped.

Toria was crying. Men were laughing.

David's guts felt twisted. He looked around the edge of the tent. Toria was walking slowly away from two soldiers. She was limping, trying to avoid putting weight on her injured ankle. She wore the blue kepi and jacket, and she was heading south, toward the hill over which David knew the battle raged. And she was carrying a rifle!

The gun was longer than she was tall. She had not brought it over with her. The Harper's Ferry rifle David had used on his first venture to this world was still in the antechamber when he left. She kept glancing back over her shoulder.

The two soldiers followed twenty paces behind, laughing and pointing their rifles at her. Both weapons were fitted with long bayonets.

One soldier yelled at her, “Skedaddle, sweetie! Get out there and fight! Else we'll have to shoot you ourselves.” He laughed, stopped, and jabbed the bayonet at her, though she was way out of striking distance.

“Everyone fights!” the soldier said. “Even country gals like you. No excuses!” He turned to his compatriot, a big grin on his face.

The other man yelled, “We don't wanna see you coming back 'less it's on a stretcher. You go all the way! Kill you some graybacks, then we'll think about letting you into camp.”

The first soldier spotted David running toward him. “Hey, what's this?” he said, and swung the rifle around.

David didn't slow down. He swung his arm cast at the bayonet, knocking it aside. He jumped and shoved his palms into the soldier's chest. The man backpedaled and fell.

“David!” Toria ran to him. She tossed the rifle away and threw her arms around his neck.

“Woo-woo!” the standing soldier said. “Young love!”

“She's my
sister
,” David said. “What do you think you're doing? She's a little girl.”

The downed man regained his feet. He picked up his rifle but held it vertically, casually. David thought his fury had startled the meanness out of the man, at least for the moment.

The soldier said, “Well, then, we have
two
greenhorns to send to the front, don't we?”

“We're friends with General Grant,” David said. “Where is he? General Grant! General Grant!”

“Whoa, young master,” the second solder said. “The general is in battle. Young lady, why didn't you say you knew the general?”

“Both of you!” David said. “I'm reporting both of you!” He grabbed Toria's hand and led her past the men into the camp.

He looked back. The soldiers were standing together, whis-pering. One of them scratched his head.

“You didn't find her?” David said.

“No,” Toria said. “I saw Bob. He was drawn on the tent, like Xander said. And the message Mom left. I looked into a tent, and those two saw me. They started pushing me around, and one of them said I should be fighting.”

“They're idiots,” David said. Then he yelled, “Mom! Mom!”

“I thought we were supposed to be secret?”

“Who cares now? Let's find her and get out of here. I've had enough of this place. Mom!”

Toria took up the call: “Mom!”

The soldiers they'd left were heading for them. Something had them suspicious—maybe it was nothing more than what Jesse had said, that he and Toria weren't supposed to be there, and they sensed it.

David yelled again. “Mrs. King! Gertrude King!”

The soldiers were closing in.

“Ignore them,” David told Toria. They continued toward the rear of the camp. With her limp, Toria's gait was more of a skip than a walk.

“Mom!” Toria yelled.

“Mrs. King!”

“You two!” the soldier behind them said. “You stop right there.”

David turned to face them.

The one he'd knocked down said, “Doesn't sound like you're looking for General Grant. I don't think you're friends with the man. In fact, I don't think you even know him.” He stepped closer, the bayonet five feet from David's chest. “Sammy, I think we got us some spies. Oooo, those gray-backs are getting tricky, sending kids.”

The other soldier said, “You know what we do with spies?”

“Shoot on sight,” the first man said.

“David?” Toria whispered.

An older woman, wearing a blood-covered smock, ran out from a nearby tent. She stopped between David and the bayonet. She faced the soldiers, put her fists on her hips, and said, “What do you think you're doing?”

“Well, ma'am . . .”

“These are
children
!” She pointed toward the front of the camp. “Go, both of you, before I have you thrown into the stockades!”

The two soldiers looked at each other, then back at the woman. Their shoulders slumped. They turned and walked away like five-year-olds heading for time-out.

As she watched them depart, she pulled off the soiled smock, crumpled it, and dropped it on the ground. Then she spun around.

David said, “Thank y—”

She darted toward them, grabbing the material over their chests with her fists. She brought her nose to within an inch of Toria's, then did the same to David. Her eyes were huge, bright and blue.

Through gritted teeth, she said, “Did you say
King
?”

CHAPTER

forty -two

W
EDNESDAY, 4:25 P.M.

Whatever had made the noises that drew him away, Xander hadn't found it. But when he returned to the Civil War ante-chamber, David was gone. One look at the hooks, with their missing items, told him that David had gone over.

I'll never figure that kid out
, he thought.

He swirled his hands lightly against the grain of the por-tal door. He willed it to open, to admit back to their rightful time and place his brother and sister.

He could not believe what David had done. That . . . that . . .
punk
! And
he
had called Xander stupid! Xander had merely wanted to find Mom, and sending Toria seemed like the best way to do it. How much more stupid was it to go into a world where the people had chased you out with guns—twice?

When David returned, he was going to punch him, punch him hard.

No, he wasn't going to do that.

It was a brave thing to do, going over for Toria like that. What was with that kid? He would stand behind Xander if a shadow crept up the wall. But then he'd plunge into World War II and the Civil War, where you had to be afraid of a lot more than shadows. When the stakes were high, the out-come crucial, he manned up—because that's when bravery mattered.

Xander's mind kept casting images of all the things that could happen to his brother over there—unpretty things that would make a movie R-rated for “graphic violence.”

Stop! He'll be fine.

He sat on the bench, put his hands on his knees, then stood again. He walked to the portal door, then into the hall.

Where was Dad?

Xander and David had shared a room their entire lives. They'd shared vacations and friends and baths. But over the past few years they hadn't spent much time hanging out.

David had his soccer and video games. Xander's interests were becoming more adult—or at least more older-teen: a girlfriend, making movies, driving.

But as they had faced a mutual enemy—the move itself, and then the house—Xander realized that David had been growing and maturing too. He had sharp ideas and a witty sense of humor, and generally gave as good as he got. His brother was someone he truly
liked
, not just loved.

So maybe, when he next saw David, he would give the kid a bone-crushing bear hug.
Then
he would punch him. Hard.

Toria, he would hug and spare the punch. He had to keep believing what he had told David: The people over there would see nothing more than a cute little girl. No threat. No one to throw in jail or shoot at. Her going over was much safer than David's.

He lowered his head into his hands.

The portal door burst open. Sunlight blinded Xander. Shadows cut through the radiance and slapped down on the antechamber floor, followed by tumbling, grunting, air rushing out of lungs. Sand and leaves blew in on smoky currents. The door slammed shut.

Toria sprang up at him and threw her arms around his neck. “Oh, Xander,” she said. “It was awful! If David hadn't come, I would have . . . I . . .” She began to weep.

Xander squeezed her. Peering over her shoulder, he saw David lifting himself off the floor.

Then Xander's heart leaped. There was another person on the floor behind David. A woman. She had her hand pressed to her forehead; her hair hung over her face.

He shifted Toria to the bench beside him. When he turned back, the woman flipped her hair away from her face and looked at him.

His hope popped like a balloon. This was worse than not getting anything for Christmas, worse than not passing your driver's test, worse than being rejected by a girl you'd liked all year and finally summoned the courage to ask out.

It wasn't Mom.

The woman was old, a lot older than Mom. She was breathing heavily through her mouth, which had formed into a curious smile. But she had kind, vibrant eyes that somehow looked familiar.

Xander looked from the woman to David and back to the woman. Finally he said, “Who are you?”

“Are you Xander?” she said, pushing a strand of hair off her face.

Hesitantly, he nodded.

“Well,” she said, trying to catch her breath. “From what these two told me . . .”

A realization struck Xander like a hammer between the eyes. He knew where he'd seen her before . . .

“. . . mostly while running from soldiers . . .” she continued.

Xander gaped at her. If not her, then her features. The shape of her eyes. The top lip thin, the bottom one fuller. He saw them every day, staring back at him from the mirror.

“ . . . I guess I'm your grandmother.”

Xander blinked. His mouth formed words, but nothing came out. He shot his eyes to his brother, who had rocked back to sit on his heels.

David smiled, nodded.

“But . . .” Xander said. “How?”

“Bob,” she said. “That silly cartoon face—Henry, your grandfather, made up when
he
was a kid. You put it on the tent, right?”