Larque on the Wing by Nancy Springer Read Free Book Online Page B

creature in a crisp crinolined skirt that stood out from her slender body like a butterfly’s wings. The white blouse shone with starch. This dainty beauty had quiet porcelain hands, silky blond hair, a petal-skinned, utterly symmetrical face on which no particular expression lived. No pout. No pain. No dreaming, no yearning, no defiance.
    â€œNo!” Larque exclaimed.
    Mother and girl-child turned on her the same serene stare. “What’s wrong, dear?” Florrie asked.
    â€œThat’s not me.”
    â€œWhat do you mean, honey child? Of course it is. I’m looking straight at you.”
    â€œIt’s not! I’m not like that. Don’t you have photos or something? I can show you—oh, never mind.” Probably this witch could blink at photos and change them too. Much upset—or she would not have been talking to her mother this way—Larque bolted up, hurried over, and grabbed the butterfly-Sky by her little ladylike hand. This did not work, of course. The apparition had less substance than dandelion fluff.
    â€œCome on,” Larque told her.
    â€œWhy?” But there was no invigorating brattiness in the word. Sky turned to her eyes tame as a dove’s. The child was requesting information, nothing more.
    â€œSo we can get you back!” Larque cried with more vehemence than lucidity. “C’mon.” Fleeing, she headed out the door, and Sky—if it was still Sky—followed her meekly.
    The dog, a simple-minded beagle-poodle cross named Harold, snarled hysterically at Sky when Larque brought her into the house, though he had not even barked at her before. His claws clattered on the kitchen floor in his frenzy. He crouched and lost control of his bladder.
    â€œSenile,” Larque scolded him as she cleaned up. The dog was only three years old, but what could one expect of a curly-haired, pinto-spotted, rat-tailed boogie? “Don’t mind him, Sky,” she told the child. “He’s brainless. Lost what little gray matter he ever had banging his head against the front door, trying to terrorize the mailman.” She smiled, but her heart was clenched like a fist in her chest.
    She took the girl up to her studio. As she set up her spare easel, she saw that Sky was trembling. Afraid of punishment, maybe. Understandably so. Larque was the woman who had slapped her.
    â€œDon’t be scared,” she told her.
    â€œI’m sorry about what I did. I didn’t mean to.” Gracefully, tenderly, without contorting her face, the little girl started to cry.
    â€œTrashing this place, you mean? I’m not worried about that.”
    â€œYou’re not?”
    â€œNo. Here, would you like to paint something? You can use up some of this oil paint you got out.”
    Wet-faced, fawn-eyed, the youngster obeyed. Using the flat side of the brush like a rubber stamp, she started doing careful, orderly flowers in lemon yellow. Then she mixed some other colors, using plenty of white to mute them into pastels. Crimson became pink. Violet turned into lilac, ultramarine into powder blue. Her tears had dried. She made more tidy flat flowers, and some lettuce green leaves.
    â€œThere, that’s pretty,” she said when she was done.
    â€œUh-huh,” muttered Larque.
    The pseudo-Sky pointed at the stormy oil the real Sky had done two days before. “That one’s ugly,” she said.
    â€œNo, it’s not. I kind of like—” Glancing at the painting in question, Larque failed to explain what she liked about this passionate sheet-cake impasto, because her jaw had dropped and she was staring. She stepped closer—it didn’t help. Purple cloud and brassy sunlight remained, but the black-hat cowboy and the white-hat cowboy were gone.
    Sky hadn’t done it. Sky didn’t know how it had happened. It was no trouble to get this new, improved Sky to talk and answer questions, though the answers were no more solid than