Mrs. Shevvington straightened. “Arthur, dear,” she said loudly to her husband, “after this dreadful brush with death, I’m too shaken to stay longer. I simply cannot finish out the ski weekend. My nerves,” said Mrs. Shevvington, who had none, “are frayed. Girls, you must pack immediately. Go to your rooms. As soon as Christina is warm and in dry clothing, we’ll drive straight home. Tonight.”
But now I want the weekend, thought Christina. She did not have enough energy to argue a single syllable. She could hardly stand up without Blake.
Dolly said, “That’s very wise, Mrs. Shevvington. Chrissie can hardly stand up. She can sleep in the car.”
“I’d rather sleep in the room,” Christina mumbled.
Mr. Shevvington picked Christina up this time. Blake was too absorbed by Anya to notice. Dolly frowned with faint jealousy. Christina was too tired to argue.
Anya wilted against Blake. “Home?” she whispered. “Oh, please, no! I just saw him again. Not yet!”
Just as she manages to blossom again, thought Christina, they cut her back.
“Come, Anya,” said Mrs. Shevvington. “Come, Christina. Do not dillydally.”
“Anya is staying for the weekend,” said Blake. “I’ll drive her home.”
“She most certainly is not staying. I do not give permission,” said Mrs. Shevvington.
“Permission,” said Blake, “is not yours to give. I am eighteen. I can vote and die for my country. And therefore, I can decide when to drive Anya back to Schooner Inne.”
A chill that was not from snow or mountains settled all over Christina’s heart. If I go home without Blake or Anya, she thought, if I go back to Schooner Inne and only Dolly is between me and the Shevvingtons … that means there is nothing between me and the Shevvingtons.
Mrs. Shevvington stomped her foot, like Dolly having a pout. “Well, I’m not paying for that room,” she said spitefully. “Just where do you expect Anya to sleep?”
“I’ll get her a room,” Blake said.
My folder is not yet closed, thought Christina, whose eyes had closed of their own accord. And I am so close to the truth now that the Shevvingtons cannot wait much longer to be rid of me.
Blake. I need you. You have to come, too. Anya has to come, too.
But she had not spoken aloud. She was thinking it in her sleep. She had fallen asleep right on Mr. Shevvington’s shoulder. She knew it and did not know it, wanted to move but slept on.
So they were back early. She slept through the drive back to Schooner Inne, slept through being put to bed upstairs, slept till way into the next day, when Dolly woke her up. “I’ve had breakfast!” said Dolly impatiently. “Let’s go over to Jonah’s. They’re playing in the ice maze. We have to tell them everything. And I have photographs. One of the people in the ski crowd had a Polaroid, and he gave me photographs. We’ll show them to everybody.”
“Of me falling?” cried Christina, waking up immediately, thinking, Proof, proof! This is it! A photograph of the man in the red suit — proof that I was pushed, that I was not alone in that chair lift! I’m there, I have it, I won after all, I —
“No, no,” said Dolly. “Nobody had a camera out then. Photographs of us rescuing you. See this pretty one of me in Mr. Shevvington’s arms? And here’s a really nice one of me snuggling down next to your cheek to be sure you’re all right.”
Christina stared at the cracked plaster on her ceiling. Do I laugh or sob? she thought.
“What do you want for breakfast, Chrissie?” said Dolly. “I’m willing to fix you something.”
“I think I’ll just chew on my pillow for a while,” said Christina.
Everybody was startled to have Christina and Dolly join them. “But you were going away for a three-day weekend,” protested Jonah.
“Did you wear the yellow suit?” cried Mrs. Bergeron. “Did you have a wonderful time? Are you a natural at skiing? I bet you are.”
Dolly said importantly, “Christina fell off the ski lift.”
“No!” they all screamed. “She didn’t! How terrifying! Are you all right, Chrissie? What happened?”
Dolly gave her version of the fall.
Christina did not offer hers. She could just imagine what people would say. Pull yourself together, Christina; stop telling stories; behave in a socially acceptable manner; do what the Shevvingtons say.
Jonah said impatiently, “Dolly, shut up. I want to hear what Christina says. You weren’t part of it at all.”
“I was so!” said Dolly, pulling her lips together in anger. “Look at the photographs of me.”
“Nobody cares about photographs of you,” said Jonah irritably, brushing her aside. “Christina,” he said, “that is so scary.” He pulled her away from the rest, so they were standing in a corner of the house that made a sun trap, out of the wind. “Chrissie,” he whispered, “was there something more to this than — well — you know — the Shevvingtons? They wouldn’t really go that far, would they?”
The rest were screaming, yelling, pushing, and sliding in the ice mazes.
I could be skiing now, Christina thought. With Blake. Going fast, skimming over the top of the world with his hand on my waist. Wearing the lemon-yellow suit. The sun could be over Running Deer instead of this boring old backyard.
She wanted to share with Blake, not Jonah! She wanted Blake to care, not Jonah! Jonah was just another seventh-grader. Blake was man, handsome and strong and — and Anya’s.
Christina sighed. She said, “I don’t know. Let’s play.”
When it was time to go home, she could not find Dolly.
She shrugged. Dolly never stayed unless she was the center of attention. Dolly had doubtless gone on home herself.
Chapter 22
BUT DOLLY WAS NOT at Schooner Inne.
The sun set. The sky went black. The snow began. And Dolly did not come home. There were no little sixth-grade friends to phone to see if she was at their house … Dolly had no friends.
Michael, Benjamin, and Christina put on coats and boots and went to look for Dolly. They searched between Jonah’s house and Schooner Inne. The snow came down thick and heavy. Hedges turned into white snakes, parked cars became white monsters. Michael brushed snow off fire hydrants and garbage cans, as if he thought his little sister had frozen upright at the side of the road.
“When we get home,” said Michael loudly, “we’ll find her with Mrs. Shevvington in the kitchen.”
Or has Dolly already been in the kitchen with Mrs. Shevvington? thought Christina. Is she missing because the Shevvingtons decided she would be?
“Or she was home all along,” said Benjamin. “Hidden in some corner reading a book.”
They liked that idea. The island children ran back to Schooner Inne. They searched Dolly’s and Anya’s room. They went into the closets and up into the cupola. They looked in Christina’s room and under the piles of extra blankets. They went through each guest room, and then the formal rooms downstairs.
Dolly was not in Schooner Inne.
The boys and Christina stood silently in the kitchen, staring at the Shevvingtons.
Even I, thought Christina — and I know how evil they are — even I am waiting for them to be the grown-ups and fix things.
Mrs. Shevvington did not make supper. Mr. Shevvington walked between the back and front doors, opening them, looking around for Dolly. Snow whipped into miniature drifts inside each door.
“Maybe we should call our parents and let them know,” said Benj.
Mr. Shevvington said there was no point worrying them yet.
The snow came down. The temperature dropped. The wind howled.
Christina had thought Dolly was pouting because nobody had cared about her photographs and everybody put Christina first. But Dolly could only pout in front of people: Dolly needed an audience for everything she did. Where could Dolly be — by choice — without a companion or a crowd?
At nine o’clock Michael said, “Maybe we should call the police.”
Mr. Shevvington hesitated. So Michael picked up the phone and called them himself.
They came, asked their questions, and looked through the house themselves, from cupola to cellar. No Dolly. They looked in the Shevvingtons’ cars, in case she had fallen asleep in one of them. Then they said most likely Dolly had finished her hot chocolate at Jonah’s, felt sleepy, and crept into some corner right there and fallen asleep. Off drove the police to search Jonah’s house. It was such a logical, cozy explanation that for a whole half hour Christina felt good: surely Dolly was safe at Jonah’s.
But she was not.
The police came back to Schooner Inne. They wanted a good photograph of Dolly.
Outside the snow fell harder. Is she cold? thought Christina. Is she scared? Is she lonely? Is she hungry?
It’s my fault, thought Christina. I should have let her keep the spotlight. I know she can’t live without it.
Her words rang in her head. Can’t live, can’t live, can’t live.
“Had Dolly been having trouble at school?” asked the police. “Would she have run away?”
But how could Dolly run away? In a village with no bus, train, or taxi? The only place Dolly would go for refuge was Burning Fog Isle, and no boats were on the water in this weather.
“Like many island children,” said Mr. Shevvington sadly, “Dolly had a hard time in school. She was an unhappy little girl.” He managed to imply that it had been immoral of the Jayes to bring up their sons and daughter on Burning Fog Isle. He managed to imply that he and his wife, however, had been doing all they could to cure Dolly of her island upbringing.
“Dolly was not liked,” added Mr. Shevvington. “Her locker was defaced. Her notebooks torn. The sneakers she left in her gym locker were shredded. A child shunned like that, I’m afraid, might reach for a grim and final solution.”
“You’re making that up,” said Christina sharply. “That never happened. If those things had happened, Dolly would have told me.”
“She didn’t tell us much,” said Michael, fighting tears. “She mostly confided in Mrs. Shevvington. Mrs. Shevvington was really her best friend,” he told the police.
Mrs. Shevvington smiled pityingly. “It’s a sad thing when a little girl’s best friend is a strange grown-up, officer. But it is not unusual for unhappy children to seek out the most stable adult. I think you know the recent history of Anya and Christina. What examples to have set for you! Stability is not an island product.” Mrs. Shevvington shook her oatmeal face back and forth. “Poor little Dolly. Perhaps in the morning … you should … drag the pond. Christina made her go there. Poor little Dolly was always drawn back.”
“She was not!” cried Christina. “It wasn’t like that.”
They will redecorate that guest room, thought Christina. The one that was black and cream, lace and gauze, the one that was Anya. They will make it a room of Dolly. Emerald green and full of books.
Mrs. Shevvington began to cry noisily. Her crying was as ugly and solid as her face. Mr. Shevvington put an arm around her to comfort her.
The police officer said quickly, “Nobody blames you. You did your best. Anything could have happened. Going to a friend’s house without calling you. Falling through thin ice.”
Nobody would blame the Shevvingtons.
Why, the Shevvingtons would act as horrified as anybody. They would weep in front of people, saying it was their fault. People would gather around to reassure them. “It wasn’t your fault,” they would tell Mr. and Mrs. Shevvington, adding in a whisper, “Those island girls …. so unstable … so strange. In the end, Dolly was no different.”
If Christina told the police that Evil stood before them, fixing coffee, they would say Christina had gone winter mad. If Christina said, “Guess what almost happened to me skiing,” the police would say to the Shevvingtons, “You people really have all the loonies living here, don’t you?”
“Also,” said Mrs. Shevvington, “the island children, especially Dolly, are fascinated by the fact that exactly one hundred years ago, the wife of the sea captain who built this house flung herself to her death by leaping off the cupola onto the rocks. Dolly asked for the details. I thought it was historical interest, and I encouraged it.” Here Mrs. Shevvington wept a little. “But perhaps Dolly was planning to do the same. Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear,” sobbed Mrs. Shevvington.
“My sister wouldn’t do that,” said Benjamin. He was as stolid and unemotional as ever. “My sister is afraid of heights,” he said. “She was afraid of that ski weekend because she’d have to go downhill face first.” Then he said, “I’m going back out to look for my sister again.”
“But where?” cried Mrs. Shevvington. “Where haven’t you looked already?”
Benjamin shrugged. “I can’t do nothing.” He turned to the police. “She’d go to the island if she were going anywhere. Let’s check every boat in the harbor. She might have sneaked aboard a fishing vessel.”
The police thought that was logical. They said Michael and Benj could come with them for the hunt. “Me, too!” cried Christina.
“You’re too little,” said Michael. “And she’s our sister.”
Christina was alone in the mansion with the Shevvingtons.
They smiled at her.
Her skin crawled. She could feel the three colors of her hair separating and shivering. She smiled back.
Mr. Shevvington said, “I will telephone the Jayes now.”
“Now when you know they can’t come,” said Christina. “You know they’ll have to wait for dawn. Nobody can take a boat to the mainland at night during a snowstorm. So you know they’ll sit awake all night, weeping and terrified.”
Mr. Shevvington smiled.
Mrs. Shevvington smiled.
She could not sit in the room with them. Their smiles were too horrible, full of holes and yellow teeth and knowledge.
Christina went up the curling stairs to her cold little room.
She turned on the electric blanket and wrapped it around herself, mummy style. The Shevvingtons can’t hurt me tonight, she thought. It’s not reasonable, not when the whole police force will be back shortly. So I must stay calm and think. Either Dolly is hiding from the Shevvingtons … or the Shevvingtons are hiding Dolly.
Could they hide Dolly at Schooner Inne?
Christina had often wondered if the giggle who lived in the cellar came up for meals; if when she was asleep on the third floor, the giggle crept up to sit in the chair where Christina sat for supper; to drink from the glass Christina liked; to eat the leftovers Christina had wrapped in aluminum foil and put in the refrigerator.
Now she knew the giggle could ski.
But did she know where he was? Ski resort? School gym? Or back here? With Dolly?
Chapter 23
AT TWO IN THE morning the policemen brought Michael and Benjamin back with the order to get some rest. They had found no trace of Dolly.
The boys went upstairs. The Shevvingtons followed. The Shevvingtons entered their room on the second floor. Michael and Benj continued up to the third. Christina rushed out to hear the news.
“She’s got to be all right!” said Benjamin desperately. “What could have happened to her? She’s so cautious.”
Michael said, “Remember Anya this fall? How over and over she said the sea wanted one of us?”
How could they forget Anya, in her white gown, hidden by the cloud of her own hair, like an ancient prophetess, murmuring, “The sea wants one of us?”
“I’m calling Anya,” said Benj thickly, turning, pounding back down the stairs. Michael and Christina thudded after him. He dialed the ski resort, and over the phone lines, across the miles, they heard the terror of being wakened by a phone call in the middle of the night. “Dolly’s missing?” cried Anya, her voice breaking and cracking like old ice. “Not Dolly! We’re coming, Blake and I; we’ll drive as fast as we can.”
“There’s no point,” said Benj. “I just wanted to know if you had Dolly, or if she had come to y
ou or talked to you.” He hung up almost with violence, frustrated by another dead end.
They trudged back up the stairs. The endless circling stairs, like an endless circling nightmare. “Benj,” said Christina, “do you think that the Shevvingtons — ”
“Chrissie!” snapped Benjamin, “you’re as crazy as Anya these days. Dolly’s just — I don’t know — lost or something.” His voice broke. Benjamin, too, was lost.
The Shevvingtons will have captured us all, thought Christina.
She shut the door to her room. Michael and Benj’s shut, and down below, the Shevvingtons’ door closed with a snap.
Christina looked out the window into the village. In spite of the heavy snow, she could see far more lights than the night she had walked alone to break into the high school. Rotating red-and-blue lights on police cars looking for Dolly Jaye.
She isn’t out there, thought Christina.
Christina was wearing her sweatpants with the jungle parrots. Over it she added an old hooded sweatshirt. She put on two pairs of socks instead of shoes. She checked the batteries of her flashlights. She put one flashlight in the kangaroo pocket of the sweatshirt and held the other in her hand — combination weapon and light.
For two hours she sat on her bed watching the lights go on and off in the town. Mostly they went off.
It was four in the morning.
If people were going to sleep at all, they would be asleep now.
Down the stairs crept Christina in her stocking feet. Nothing creaked to give her away. She reached the bottom and looked up. No moonlight filtered through the ice-caked cupola windows. The banisters rose like bones in the darkness. Nobody’s bedroom door opened. Nobody had seen or heard her.
Through the hall, into the kitchen. She turned on no lights. In the dark she found the bolt on the cellar door. She worked it slowly, controlling the sound of her own breathing until finally, silently, she could open the cellar door. At the top of the stairs, she stood listening.