The Stone Child (8 page)

“Right,” Eddie whispered.

“The group of people from this article touched the water, too, when they were searching the bottom of the lake,” said Harris, closing the book and putting it back on the shelf. “Maybe that’s why the dogs chased after them?”

“Maybe,” said Eddie. “But I have a different question.”

“What do you mean?”

“How does a pack of dogs live underneath a lake?” he said, swiveling toward Harris. “Unless the Olmstead Curse is real?”

Harris blinked at him.

“There has to be some connection between what happened to us in the woods and everything else you told me today,” Eddie continued. “The symbol carved into the statue is the same as on the front page of the book my parents found at the antiques fair. The dogs appeared in the lake, just the way Nathaniel Olmstead wrote about them in
The Rumor of the Haunted Nunnery
. And what about the legend of the ghost in the woods—the Woman from the graffiti? Maybe she’s …”

“What? She’s real too?” Harris said into his hands.

Despite what he’d seen in the woods, Eddie felt foolish for thinking something so crazy. He bit at the inside of his mouth and tried not to blush. “It’s just a thought.”

“If we could read the stupid code, we could sort out what the connection might actually be,” said Harris, lifting his face from his hands.

“Totally,” said Eddie. “We’re on the verge of something really big. But there is something else. …”

“What’s that?”

“The curse … Remember how you said some people in Gatesweed think that the monsters in Nathaniel Olmstead’s books are real?”

Harris nodded skeptically.

“Those people don’t seem so crazy anymore, do they?” Eddie continued. He thought about the scaredy cop and the tow truck driver, Sam. And Mrs. Singh, the librarian. “Maybe they know something we don’t.”

Before Harris could answer, there was a knock at the door. The boys jumped as Frances opened the door a crack.

“Dinner’s ready,” she said. “Hope you’re hungry.”

Before Eddie got on his bike to ride home, Harris asked him to see
The Enigmatic Manuscript
one more time. Eddie hesitated for only a second before pulling the book out of his bag. After everything they’d gone through today, he felt it belonged to Harris as much as it belonged to him now. He watched as Harris flipped through it, scanning the strange writing.

“What is it?” asked Eddie. “Do you see something?”

“I’m not sure,” said Harris, looking up. “Do you mind if I keep this tonight?”

Eddie looked into Harris’s eyes, and what he saw there, he knew he could trust. This is what came with friendship. “Okay,” Eddie said. “That’s cool.”

“I’ll give it back to you tomorrow,” said Harris. “I promise.”

Eddie refrained from telling Harris to
be careful
with it, as he got on his bike and waved goodbye.

Harris returned the book to Eddie during lunch the next day, just like he said he would.

The day after that, Eddie brought the code-breaker book to school. One small section had caught his eye. It mentioned the history of secret decoder rings—a toy popularized in the 1930s that allowed kids to send encrypted messages to each other. The ring consisted of two alphabets lined up next to each other on two attached discs. To create the secret code, you simply rotated the discs, offsetting the two alphabets, so that the letters no longer matched up. The letter
A
offset by three would become the letter
C
. To solve the message, you simply had to know the offset number.

“Something like this could be the answer to the code in
The Enigmatic Manuscript,”
Eddie said.

“Yeah, but that’s assuming the code we’re trying to
solve is a simple letter puzzle,” said Harris, “that this book only needs to be translated, then
bam
, we’re done. Mystery solved.”

“What do you mean?” said Eddie. “What else would the code be?”

“Well … anything, really,” said Harris. “When was the last time you read an entire book that had only three-letter words?”

Eddie blinked, frustrated. “Don’t you think we should at least try?”

“I guess so.” Harris shrugged, unconvinced. “If this decoder-ring thing is the answer, and that’s a big
if
, how are we supposed to know what offset number Nathaniel used?”

Eddie shook his head. “We could go through the whole alphabet,” he said, “offsetting each letter.”

“A through Z?” said Harris. “That’s going to be a ton of work.”

Together, they spent a week of lunches trying to figure the code out. In the evenings, sometimes, Harris would come home with Eddie, and they would work on their project in his bedroom. Eddie’s mother was constantly writing in her notebook at the kitchen table, and his father was always out in the barn, sorting through his antiques, so the house’s quiet was suitable for the boys’ concentration. They finally made it through the entire alphabet, offsetting the letters one by one.
Unfortunately, it didn’t work. The only pattern they could discern was the arrangement of letters into groups of three. Still, they wondered how, or why, anyone would write an entire book using only three-letter words?

Near the end of September, as the leaves finally changed color, and the north wind brought colder, drier air to Gatesweed, Eddie began to feel more at ease in his new school, especially the one day his English teacher introduced his class to Gothic literature. Mr. Weir had asked the class to give a report on a spooky book of their choice. Even though English was his favorite subject, Eddie was still nervous to talk in front of his class. He had prepared the night before by rereading
Whispers in the Gingerwich House
, a book with which he was quite familiar.

His report went well. Eddie only stammered a couple times. No one laughed, so he made it through his speech, then sat down quickly.

After two more reports, someone near Eddie raised her hand.

“Why do we like being scared?” said a voice quietly. Eddie turned around—it belonged to Maggie Ringer, the girl whom Eddie had run into the first day of school. She looked as pale and weird as ever. Her hair was especially stringy, as if she hadn’t washed it in days.

“Excuse me?” said Mr. Weir.

“In these stories, the authors are always trying to scare us,” said Maggie. “Why?”

Mr. Weir pushed up his glasses and smiled. “Eddie? Can you think of an answer?”

Silence. Then slowly, Eddie nodded. Before he could stop himself, he answered, “So we know what we’re up against.” All the students looked at Eddie like he was crazy. But he was certain he was right, so he confidently continued. “Nathaniel Olmstead once wrote that most of his stories came from his nightmares,” he said, looking at his desk. “He said that we have bad dreams because our brain is trying to protect us.” A boy coughed nearby. Eddie wondered if he was making fun of him. “If—if we can figure out a way to beat the imaginary monsters …” People started to snicker. Eddie spoke quickly, “Then the real monsters don’t seem so scary.”

The classroom became very quiet.

“That’s why we like reading scary stories,” Eddie finished quietly. He folded his hands and stared at the blackboard. “At least, that’s what
I
think.”

Maggie leaned toward him and said, “So basically, you’re saying that monsters are real?”

He made it to the woods before he heard the splashing. …

“That’s not what I meant,” Eddie started to say, but the bell interrupted him and Mr. Weir dismissed the class.

Harris was late meeting Eddie after the last bell to go home. Eddie sat on the stoop outside the cafeteria, looking at his copy of
Whispers in the Gingerwich House
. After rereading the
book the night before, he had a strange feeling that there was something inside it to which he should pay closer attention, but he couldn’t figure out what it was. He was scanning the beginning of chapter seven, when Viola finds the mirror hidden behind the secret panel in the living room wall, when a shadow crossed his path.

Eddie glanced up and saw Maggie in front of him. Her purple tattered sweater and skinny black jeans looked especially harsh in the slanted autumnal light.

“Can I help you?” asked Eddie, sticking his finger between the pages of his book to keep his place.

She crossed her arms and bit her lip. She wouldn’t look at him. Quietly, she said, “I wanted to apologize.”

“For what?”

“The scary-story stuff.” She tilted her head and shrugged before continuing. “For some reason, every autumn, the teachers bring up the whole Gatesweed ghost and goblin thing. Just wait. Listen to people talking in the hallway and the locker room. I bet you’ll hear someone mention the Olmstead estate and how it’s creepy and dangerous and we should stay away in case we get cursed and go crazy.
I
live up there.
I’m
not crazy.” She paused. “I’m just so sick of everyone talking about it. Obviously, you’re not.”

Eddie didn’t know what to say.

She added, “The class wasn’t whispering about you. They were laughing at me. … That’s what usually happens. I just
thought you should know. I’m the class freak, if you haven’t heard.”

“I don’t think you’re a freak,” said Eddie quickly.

She stared at the book he held in his lap for a few seconds, then said, “So … tell me. Are you an Olmsteady?”

Eddie blinked.

“I’ve seen you carrying his books around,” she said.

“You have?” Eddie asked. Had she been watching him? “What’s an Olmsteady?”

“Do you really need a definition?” she asked.

Eddie cleared his throat. “Uh … no, I guess not.” He had heard the term before but hadn’t really thought about what it meant.
Olmsteady: one who reads Olmstead
.

“Are you obsessed or something?” She kicked at the stoop with her black boot.

“I wouldn’t say obsessed. I just like to read,” said Eddie. “Don’t you?”

“No. I hate it. But
television
is totally cool.” Eddie didn’t know what to say. Then Maggie smiled at him. “I’m kidding. I do read. Books about biology and science and cool stuff like that,” she said, clearing her throat. “I think those books are terrible, by the way.” She pointed at the book in his lap. “Nathaniel Olmstead’s.”

“Oh,” said Eddie, a little bit hurt. “That’s too bad. I really love them. They’re exciting. Good versus evil. Battling it out. I like being scared. The books make me happy.”

“I like science,” she said. “There is no good and no evil. There’s fact versus fiction. And it doesn’t matter who wins. The truth is the truth. … Epic tales of good and evil are so unnecessary, you know? Those kinds of battles are fought every single day, right here.” Maggie slowly extended her index finger and pointed it at Eddie’s forehead, like a gun. “Kapow.”

Eddie laughed and quickly moved out of her line of fire.

“I’m Maggie, by the way.”

“I know,” said Eddie. “I mean … I’m Eddie. Nice to meet you.”

Maggie smiled. “See you around, Eddie,” she said, blowing on her trigger finger as she slinked away. Eddie realized he was staring when he felt someone breathing in his ear.

“She’s way too mature for someone like you, dude.” It was Harris. “I’ve seen your pits in gym class. They’re totally bald.”

“So are yours,” said Eddie. He knew his face was bright red.

Smacking Eddie in the arm, Harris said, “You totally have a crush on her.”

“No, I don’t. I just …”

“She’s a real witch,” Harris whispered. “Be careful. She probably put a spell on you. You might fall in love with her and have little witch babies.” Then he started kissing his own hand in a really gross way. Eddie blushed, but Harris looked so ridiculous, he couldn’t stop himself from laughing.

Eventually, Harris stopped kissing himself and said, “Mrs. Dunkleman is such a dummy. She made me stay late because I said her skirt looked like a sheep.”

“Why’d you say that?”

“Because it did,” said Harris, heading toward the bike rack. “Come on, it gets dark early in Gatesweed at this time of year. Let’s go to my house. If we can’t crack the code today, then at least I’m totally going to kick your butt playing The Wraith Wars on my computer.”

Eddie took his finger from
Whispers in the Gingerwich House
and dog-eared the page where he’d stopped reading. The chapter title caught his eye. Chapter Eleven: “The Place Where Stories Are Told.” Why did that look so familiar?

When Eddie didn’t follow him, Harris called over his shoulder, “Oh, come on … don’t be a sore loser before we’ve even started playing the game!”

Eddie waved him quiet. He stared at the book. He didn’t want to lose his thought.

“What’s wrong?” said Harris.

Finally, Eddie blinked and looked at Harris again. “Have you heard this before?” he said, then read from the page, “‘The Place Where Stories Are Told.’”

Harris stood next to the bike rack. He squinted and looked confused. “Well … yeah. ‘The Place Where Stories Are Told’ … It’s the phrase that’s carved into the stone near the roof of the library. In the middle of town.”

Eddie thought about his English class and how Maggie accused him of believing in monsters.
So basically, you’re saying that monsters are real?
she’d asked him. Slowly, he began to nod. “Are these words carved into the library because Nathaniel Olmstead wrote them? Or did Nathaniel Olmstead write them because he saw them carved into the stone?”

“I don’t know,” said Harris. “What do you mean?” He stood over his bike, undoing the chain lock, looking at Eddie as if he were nuts.

“I just have a hunch about something,” said Eddie. “My English class today has me thinking about these books again. The statue in the clearing, the symbol on the book, the lake in the woods, the dogs from the
Haunted Nunnery …
If they were real, if Nathaniel Olmstead had seen them with his own eyes, then maybe it stands to reason that other parts of his books are real. And not
just
the places that inspired him.”

“Are you saying …?” Harris started, then added, “What are you saying?”

“In order to solve
The Enigmatic Manuscript
‘s code language, we need the key. Right?” said Eddie, picking up his own bike lock and swirling the numbers on his combination pad. “The answer might be in Nathaniel’s stories.”