فصل 34

CHAPTER 34

IT’S HERE

FOR THE THIRD TIME, Neville pressed the doorbell button of the Darling house. As before, he heard the chimes echo inside. And as before, nobody came to the door.

“Odd,” he said. He turned to John and Michael, who stood behind him on the doorstep. “Your father said he’d be here.”

“What about Mum?” said John.

“Yes,” agreed Michael. “Where’s Mum?”

Neville frowned. He had forgotten that neither John nor Michael knew that their mother was missing.

“Your mother is, er, abroad,” he said.

“What’s abroad?” said Michael.

“Abroad is France, you ninny,” said John.

“I’m not a ninny!” said Michael.

“Are too.”

“Am not!”

The two boys continued arguing, which for once was fine with Neville, as it distracted them from the question of where their mother was. What bothered Neville was the absence of their father. George had been very insistent that Neville return his sons to London immediately. Why wasn’t he here?

After several more futile stabs at the doorbell, Neville put the boys back into the taxicab, whose driver had been ordered to wait. Neville gave him an address on Kensington Park Gardens.

“Where are we going now?” asked John.

“We’re going to your grandfather Aster’s house,” said Neville.

“Will Father be there?” said John.

“I don’t know,” said Neville. “We’ll see. If all else fails, you can wait there until your father picks you up.”

In ten minutes he was ringing the door of the Aster mansion. It was opened by Mrs. Bumbrake, whose face lit up at the sight of her visitors.

“Why, Mr. Plonk-Fenster, this is a surprise!” she said. “And John and Michael! What brings you here at this hour?”

“We’re looking for George,” said Neville. “He’s not at his house.”

“George is our dad,” explained Michael. “But we don’t call him George, ’cause we call him Dad.”

“She knows that, you ninny,” said John.

“I’m NOT a—”

“All right, you two,” snapped Neville, who had been listening to basically this same argument for several hours. “You boys go play somewhere while I talk to Mrs. Bumbrake.”

“There’s tin soldiers in Lord Aster’s study,” said Mrs. Bumbrake.

The boys, delighted, scampered off. Mrs. Bumbrake turned a worried face to Neville. “George isn’t home?”

“No,” said Neville. “I don’t understand it—he told me to bring the boys home immediately. He’s quite upset with me about Wendy going missing.”

“I don’t blame him,” said Mrs. Bumbrake, with a stern look. “How could you? Putting a girl on a flying machine!”

“I didn’t put her on it!” protested Neville. “She jumped aboard and flew off before I could stop her. But you should have seen how it flew! I had no idea it could …” He stopped, seeing Mrs. Bumbrake’s disapproving look. “In any event,” he went on, “I had hoped to find George here.”

“He’s not here,” she said. “I expected him—he’s been coming by regularly to see Lord Aster—but he didn’t come today.”

“Where could he be?” said Neville.

“I don’t know,” said Mrs. Bumbrake. “But I’m worried. With Molly missing, and now George …”

“Now, wait,” said Neville. “You don’t know George is missing.”

“That’s just it,” said Mrs. Bumbrake. “I don’t know anything. So many strange things are happening”

“What strange things?” said Neville.

“I’ll make some tea,” said Mrs. Bumbrake. Tea was Mrs. Bumbrake’s solution to everything.

In a few minutes they were sitting in the parlor over a pair of steaming cups. Mrs. Bumbrake told Neville about Wendy’s visit, during which she apparently had told Lord Aster something that made him very upset.

“Upset about what?” said Neville.

Mrs. Bumbrake considered her answer. Finally she said, “Do you know about the Starcatchers?”

Neville frowned. “A little,” he said. “A secret society fighting evil. Magic and hocus-pocus. Very unscientific. Leonard approached me about joining years ago, but I declined. Said I was too busy. To be honest, I thought it was silly.”

“It’s not silly,” said Mrs. Bumbrake. “It’s real.”

“What do you mean?”

“The evil,” said Mrs. Bumbrake. “It’s real. I’ve seen it, and Lord Aster has been fighting it his whole life. He thought he’d won, but now it’s come back. It’s here, in London. I think that’s why Molly’s missing, and George as well. And Lord Aster…he’s …”

Mrs. Bumbrake buried her face in her hands, stifling a sob.

“What about Lord Aster?” Neville asked softly.

Mrs. Bumbrake looked up. “He’s…dying,” she said.

“Oh dear,” said Neville. “Is there anything—”

“Dr. Sable said at this point it’s no use taking him to the hospital. He doesn’t want to go anyway.”

“How much time?”

“Days. Maybe hours.” Mrs. Bumbrake sobbed again. “I fear he’s going to die without ever seeing his family again. And the worst of it is, he keeps calling for Molly…actually, sometimes Molly, sometimes Wendy. Whichever it is, he wants to tell her something. He seems obsessed with it.”

“Tell her what?”

“I honestly don’t know. He’s delirious, and he’s very weak, so his words are unclear. But he keeps saying something about a sword.”

“A sword? Does he own a sword? Perhaps something he wants to bequeath to his heirs?”

“Not that I know of. And there’s one other thing.”

“What?”

“Something about a meteorite.”

“A meteorite? Are you quite certain?”

“Yes. He’s said it quite clearly several times.”

“What about a meteorite?”

“I don’t know. As I say, he’s delirious. He just keeps repeating Molly’s name, or sometimes Wendy’s, then something about a sword, and a meteorite. When I ask him what he means, he becomes agitated, and then I lose him.”

“Odd,” said Neville.

“Whatever it is,” said Mrs. Bumbrake, “I think it’s connected with the Starcatchers.”

“But you can’t possibly—”

“Yes, I can. I know what I know. It has to do with the Starcatchers I tell you, and Wendy’s visit, and Molly’s disappearance, and now George’s. The evil is back, Mr. Plonk-Fenster. It’s here.” She glanced toward the parlor window, then added, “It’s around this very house.”

“What’s around this house?” said Neville.

“I think we’re being watched,” she said. “I’ve seen men outside.”

“It’s London. There are lots of—”

“No, these men are watching us. Bobbies, some of them. Watching at all hours.”

Neville nodded, but he was unconvinced. He was about to say something when John burst into the parlor, followed by Michael, who had his hand over his face.

“Michael put a soldier in his nose,” announced John.

“Only his head,” protested Michael.

“More like his whole body,” said John. “And it’s stuck.”

“Is not!” said Michael.

“Then pull it out if it’s not stuck,” said John.

“I don’t want to pull it out,” said Michael.

Neville and Mrs. Bumbrake exchanged a look. He lowered his voice and said, “We can discuss this later. For now, the question is, what do we do with the boys, until we find Geo—until matters are straightened out?”

“The boys will stay here,” said Mrs. Bumbrake firmly. “And so will you.”

“But I had planned to—”

“Mr. Plonk-Fenster,” said Mrs. Bumbrake, “surely you do not intend to leave me in this house with these two children and Lord Aster in his current condition.”

Neville blinked. “Of course not,” he said.

“Good,” said Mrs. Bumbrake. “Now let me see about the soldier in Michael’s nose.” She rose from the table and headed toward the boys. Neville also rose. He went to the window, parted the curtains, and peered out into the London night. The fog had crept in as usual, obscuring most of the street. The lone illumination came from a gas streetlight, casting a ghostly pale cone of light down to the sidewalk.

In the cone, facing the Aster house, was a bobby.