Sparrow Road (2 page)

I wasn’t going to talk to any artists. The second I saw daylight I was calling Grandpa Mac. Collect. Just the way he taught me.

“Of course,” Mama agreed. “We won’t disturb the artists. We’ll have enough to keep us busy, as you know.”

“Let us hope,” Viktor said.

“As for the rules,” Mama added quickly, “we completely understand.”

“I don’t,” I said again. “I don’t understand at all.”

Our cottage was a tiny Snow White house where a gardener used to sleep. Inside it smelled like dust balls and old clothes;—abandoned, like no one had lived in it for years. There was a sunken couch, a painted wooden rocker, and a little purple table just for two.

“Well, it’s cute,” Mama said when Viktor left.

“Cute?” The walls were butter yellow, the white lace curtains grayed. “Maybe in a rundown dollhouse kind of way.” I rolled my eyes at Mama. I didn’t care about the cottage. “No TV? Silence until supper? All those stupid rules you didn’t tell me?”

“I was going to,” Mama said. “Just not on our first day.” She wiped her palm across the dusty table. “Don’t worry, Raine, we’ll make it our own place.”

The only place I wanted was Milwaukee. I lugged my suitcase up the narrow staircase to the tiny slanted bedroom where Viktor told us we would sleep. Heat pressed down from the ceiling; a hint of breeze blew through the open window.

“How is it?” Mama asked, but I didn’t answer.

It was daisy wallpaper peeled away in patches, two sagging beds, a broken mirror nailed to the wall. I flopped down on the musty mattress, hugged a flimsy pillow to my chest. At home, Beauty would be purring on my bed. Grandpa Mac would be watching some old western on TV.

“Love you to the moon and back,” I whispered to Grandpa Mac. It’s what I always said before I went to bed. A single tear trickled down my cheek.
Love you to the stars,
he said to me.
Good night, sweet girl. I’ll see you in my dreams.

 

The strange thing is, I slept. Long and deep, the way I sometimes did with fevers. When I woke up the next morning the spicy smell of coffee filled the cottage and Mama’s bed was made.

“Mama?” I called. She never made her bed.

“Down here, sleepyhead,” Mama almost sang. “Come see, Raine. I’ve been cleaning up our cottage. And everything looks better with the sun.”

Downstairs, Mama sat at the little purple table—her long red curls still wet from washing, her denim overalls rolled up to her knees. The smell of dust had already disappeared. Warm white light poured through the open windows. “Getting ready for our week.” Mama patted a stack of yellowed cookbooks. “I found these in the cupboard. The birds wouldn’t let me sleep.”

I slumped down in the chair and wiped the sleep out of my eyes. “I need a phone,” I said. “This morning.”

“There’s no phone, Raine. I’m sorry.” But sorry wasn’t in her voice.

“No phone?” I looked around the cottage. “No phones at Sparrow Road?”

Mama shook her head. “The artists come to Sparrow Road to get away.”

“Right. No talking. No TV.” I dropped my head into my hands. Six days a week of silence, now I couldn’t even find a phone. “But what about emergencies? A fire? Someone could get hurt.” I was two when Grandpa Mac taught me how to phone for help.

“In an emergency,” Mama said, “I’m sure a call can be arranged.”

“Okay,” I said. “It’s an emergency today.”

Mama stared into my eyes. “This isn’t an emergency. It’s change. I know that you’re unhappy, but we’ll get used to it. We will.”

“But why?”

Mama turned the pages of her cookbook like an answer would be there. “I told you, Raine, I came to do a job.”

“You had a job at Christos.”

“Another job,” Mama said. “A job that wasn’t in Milwaukee. And I’ll have my Christos job when we go home.” She slapped the cookbook shut. “Raine,” she sighed, “not everything’s a mystery.” It’s what she always said when she was tired of my questions or when she held a secret she wasn’t going to tell.

“I know,” I said. “Not everything. But this?” Our move to Sparrow Road was a mystery to me.

“But hey!” Suddenly she jumped up and an unexpected smile lit up her worried face. “If you’re looking for a mystery, I’ve got a real one you can solve.” She grabbed my wrist and pulled me toward the counter. “Look!” she cried. “Like Easter!”

Underneath a drape of emerald velvet was a lilac wicker basket filled with water-colored eggs, a jelly jar of flowers, warm banana bread, and two small tangerines. On a torn scrap of paper WELCOME had been glued in golden glitter. “I found it here this morning, at our door.”

“Weird,” I said. “Viktor didn’t make this.”

“No,” Mama said. “I don’t think so either.” I heard a hint of wonder in her voice. Like maybe something was a mystery to her. “And this?” Mama handed me a linen napkin, white, with the towered house embroidered in the center and my initials
R.O.
stitched into the corner. “There’s a second one for me,” Mama said.

“So someone knows our names,” I said. “Someone besides Viktor.”

“Yes,” Mama said. “Someone who must be happy that we’re here.”

Mama was right. Sparrow Road looked different in the sunlight. Outside, miles of rolling hills formed a patchwork quilt of green, wildflowers swayed graceful in the meadow, and the sky seemed to stretch forever in a perfect, deep blue sea. It was a pretty place I might have loved with Grandpa Mac and Mama. A vacation place without Viktor and his rules, and all the silent days I had ahead.

When Viktor came to take us on the tour, I let Mama walk beside him. I was happiest a few steps back, away from Viktor’s stony quiet, his icy eyes, his sunken face covered in white whiskers. Plus there was something I was watching—the friendly way they talked, the way Mama seemed too sweet, too comfortable with a man as cold as Viktor. Too at home, like she and Viktor knew each other before he met us at the train.

He led us down a steep path to a lake. “Sorrow Lake,” he wheezed when we’d made it to the shore. “But here, I need a rest.” He sat down in the shade while Mama and I left him for the dock.

“Sorrow Lake?” I said to Mama, when I was sure Viktor was too far away to eavesdrop. “Isn’t that a strange name? And how can Viktor own a lake? No one owns Lake Michigan.”

Mama shook her head. “So many questions, Raine.”

“Did you know Viktor before he got us at the train?”

“Know him?” Mama closed her eyes, tilted her face up toward the sun. “Viktor hired me. It’s how I got the job.”

“But did you know him in Milwaukee? Or some time before now?”

Mama opened up one eye and gave me a mean squint.

“You just seem to know him, like he might be your friend.”

“Viktor is my boss.” Too many questions got on Mama’s nerves. “I’m here to work for him.”

I slipped off my flip-flops and dipped my toes into the lake. A school of minnows skittered near the surface. “So can we swim after the tour?” I wanted something happy up ahead, something besides Viktor’s boring tour and Mama planning out her menu for the week.

“We’ll see.” A flush of red washed over Mama’s face. Already, her pale Irish skin burned a little pink. I didn’t have Mama’s coloring or beauty. I was dark-eyed, dark-skinned, with straight black hair, and skinny, where Mama was all curves. “This afternoon,” Mama said, “I need to go with Viktor into Comfort.”

“Comfort?”

“It’s a town not far away. It’s where I’ll buy the groceries.”

“You? You mean you’re going without me?”

Mama kept her eyes closed. “Viktor’s truck,” she said. “There isn’t really room for three.”

“There were three of us last night.” We were crowded knee to knee, but we still fit.

“Another time. Today you’ll have to stay here by yourself.”

“Alone? At Sparrow Road? Mama, there’s nothing here for miles except for hills!”

“The artists,” Mama said, although we hadn’t seen them. “Surely one of them would be near if some emergency occurred.” Sparrow Road had cast some kind of crazy spell on Mama. At home Mama worried when I walked six blocks to the library. Mama always acted like I’d be snatched off of some street. Grandpa Mac did, too. Now she was going to leave me in the country by myself?

“I want to go with you. There’s room for me in Viktor’s truck.”

“No.” Mama stood, then offered me a hand. “I’m afraid today I’ll need to go with Viktor.”

 

By the time we finally made it to the main house, I was too mad at Mama to listen to Viktor’s dull descriptions. Instead I kept my eyes out for an artist, someone who’d be nearby at least while Mama was in town.

“Well, it certainly is spotless,” Mama said the minute we stepped inside the house. I could tell she was relieved.

It was almost spooky clean, like a house where no one lived. The dark woodwork was all polished, floors and ceiling beams and benches. Crystal chandeliers sparkled in the sun. It smelled like Holy Trinity, our church back in Milwaukee—hot candle wax and lemon polish, a trace of sweet perfume. A wide, grand wooden staircase curved up from the front room.

Viktor cleared his throat. “The artists keep it tidy.” He raised his lanky arm and pointed down a hallway. “Our poet, Lillian Hobbs, has the room off of the library.”

“A poet?” Mama said, surprised. “How nice. Raine writes.”

“I wrote,” I said. “In fourth grade.” Back when my teacher, Sister Cyril, told me to put my imagination to good use. But I didn’t want Mama to tell my past to Viktor. Not a word.

“Our other summer artists—Josie, Eleanor, Diego—all reside upstairs. And each one has a shed where they create. Although Lillian and Eleanor often work here in their rooms.” He’d already pointed out the little sheds as we’d walked across the meadow. Two in the tall grass. Two tucked back in the woods. “Of course the artists’ sheds, their rooms, all those spaces are totally off-limits. Always. Like the silence until supper; that rule must be honored. The artists came for quiet. They must be left alone.”

Viktor made it sound like every rule was for me, like there was no place for a kid at Sparrow Road.

“We understand,” Mama said. I could tell she wanted to get Viktor off the rules.

“And here”—Viktor led us to a gleaming tiled kitchen where copper pots hung from silver hooks—“is where you shall prepare the evening meals. As you wished.”

“You
wished
to make the meals?” I asked Mama, but Mama just ignored me.

“Every day but Sunday,” Viktor said. “On Sundays you are free.”

The smell of peanut butter and warm toast lingered in the kitchen. Maple syrup that reminded me of home. Earlier, an artist must have eaten breakfast. I wondered where they were this morning, what they looked like, if one of them would be here when Mama went to town. Close enough to help if something happened?

And which one left that basket at our door?