The Rathbones by Janice Clark Read Free Book Online

had happened on the walk. But what I saw when I looked at Mordecai’s blackboard was not the map or the whales or Mama but the face of my lost brother, his features mapped in chalk like stars in a black sky.
    It had been nearly ten years. Why should this not be the year that Papa finally returned, in the wake of the whales? Why else would I have heard the singing voice that night, as living as mine, calling out to me across the water, from a ship not on the other side of the world but just a few leagues away?
    Mordecai picked up his chalk and drew an
X
on the Stark Archipelago. “And perhaps, just perhaps, when we find the whales we will find your papa!”
    He had read my mind.
    We would go to find the whales, and Papa too. And with him my brother. I felt a flood of joy.
    Mordecai’s grin faded.
    “We must leave now, before it’s too light.”
    He did not say before the intruder might come back, but he didn’t need to.
    “I’m ready,” I heard myself say. “I … what will I need? I don’t …”
    Mordecai cleared his throat.
    “I have anticipated somewhat and have taken the liberty …” He nodded toward a shadowy corner. A row of mismatched suitcases and sailors’ ditty bags huddled there. “I have packed your clothing and gloves and boots and”—he flushed, on his white skin a faint pink—“various necessities. I need only collect a few more items.”
    Mordecai picked up two large leather satchels and began bustling around the attic, opening and closing cabinets, rummaging through bins. Into one bag he slid a stack of books, bundles of papers, a box full of writing instruments. He set the bags down to dash a few notes into a small journal, copying off the blackboard, tossed it into one of the bags, and picked them up again. Continuing quickly around the room, he picked up his favorite treasures, adding some to the bags, setting others back down.
    There was a rap at the door. I jumped and put a hand over my mouth; Mordecai dropped an armillary sphere, shattering the outer planets. My crow’s head appeared around the edge of the door and he croaked loudly, flapping his wings.
    I hunched a valise under one arm, picked up two more bags, and headed for the door. I stood looking back at Mordecai, waiting.
    He tossed a sextant and a roll of charts into one satchel, hung the ditty bags around his neck, and picked up both satchels again, looking longingly at three suitcases that remained with no one to carry them. He hurried toward the door and, before reaching it, stopped abruptly, then took a step backward. His gaze traveled slowly around the attic. His eyes lost their manic gleam.
    I wondered how long it had been since he had walked out of Rathbone House. Maybe he never had.
    Mordecai took a deep breath. He set the satchels down, picked up a broken telescope from his table and with it shattered the glass case over the eye of the giant squid. He popped the eye in his breast pocket, picked up the satchels again, and together we hurried out the attic door.
    We moved as quickly as we could along the twists and turns, tryingto be quiet, our cases bumping on the corners in the narrow halls. As we neared the hallway where I had last seen the man in blue, I slowed down, afraid to turn the corner and find him lying there in the middle of the hall, gigantic, blood crusting on his face where my crow had gouged it. I imagined trying to squeeze past, my skin tingling, not sure if the man were dead or alive. Hearing his giant’s breath. Seeing his great chest heave, his eyes snap open—
    “Mercy!” cried Mordecai.
    I blinked. The hallway was open and bright. The first rays of the sun were washing in from the white rooms.
    Mordecai took my hand and pulled me along—my crow flew out from the last room and clutched my shoulder, cawing—around the last corner, down all the stairs, and out the front door, into the light and the fresh salt air and toward the harbor.
    And that is how our odyssey began.



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