Alexander Graham Bell: Master of Sound #7 (3 page)

“Forget about it,” Felix said on their way to school the next morning. “Only Pickworth twins can time travel.”

“Says who?” Maisie asked.

“Great-Uncle Thorne,” Felix reminded her. “That’s what he told Penelope Merriweather.”

They were walking down Bellevue Avenue, the broad, tree-lined street where Elm Medona sat among all of the other mansions from the Gilded Age. You couldn’t see any of them; they were hidden by high walls and impressive iron gates. But signs pointed to them.
Rosecliff. Marble House. The Breakers.
Whenever he passed them, Felix wondered if those
houses had rooms like The Treasure Chest, too. Or had Phinneas Pickworth been the only one with a magical room? Penelope Merriweather’s father had a sarcophagus with an honest-to-goodness mummy in it right in the entry hall. But according to Penelope, almost everyone owned a sarcophagus back then. “We had such fun at parties when the sarcophagus was finally opened,” she’d said dreamily.

“Are you listening to me?” Maisie demanded.

“Yes,” Felix lied.

“Then what did I say?”

Felix thought for a minute.

“You said you wanted to try anyway,” he said finally. “You want to bring those Ziff twins to Elm Medona, somehow get into The Treasure Chest, pick up an object, and—”

“All right, all right,” Maisie muttered.

“And I say it won’t work,” Felix said. “First of all, there’s no way to get inside—”

“There’s always a way,” Maisie said.

“Second of all, we’ll be off who knows where, and the Ziff twins will be standing there in The Treasure Chest—”

“So what? When you brought Lily Goldberg
into The Treasure Chest, she never even knew we were gone,” Maisie reminded him.

That time they’d gone all the way to China and stayed there for months. Yet, like always, when they returned it was as if no time had passed at all.

They had reached the corner of Memorial Boulevard where Jim Duncan stood waiting for them.

“If I can get in,” Maisie said to Felix, “will you at least try with me?”

Felix glanced at Jim. “I don’t know,” he said.

“Get in where?” Jim asked.

“Nowhere,” Felix answered.

Frustrated, Maisie stomped off ahead of the boys. First their father decided to get married. Then Great-Uncle Thorne decided to get married. And to throw Maisie and her family out of Elm Medona and make them move back upstairs to those dreadful servants’ quarters. It was time Maisie took control of something in her life, she decided. She would figure out a way to get back inside The Treasure Chest. And then she would convince Felix to let her bring the Ziff twins there. And then—she smiled to herself—and then how could Hadley Ziff not decide
that Maisie was the coolest person in the entire world? How could she not be her best friend after something like that?

Hadley Ziff walked into class late. When she did, Maisie did a double take. Hadley was wearing a white skirt with a black T-shirt, and Maisie was wearing a black skirt with a white T-shirt. Hadley noticed, too, and as she walked past Maisie’s desk, she gave her a thumbs-up. For the rest of the morning, as Mrs. Witherspoon talked on and on first about pre-algebra and then about their new social studies section on inventors, all Maisie could do was watch the clock, counting the minutes until lunch, when she could finally talk to Hadley Ziff.

Sometimes time seemed to slow down when Maisie waited for something important to happen. That was how it seemed to her that morning. The two hours until lunch felt more like two
hundred
hours.

At one point, Mrs. Witherspoon said, “Maisie Robbins, do you know of any inventors to add to our list?

List?
Maisie thought, looking around.

Sure enough, Mrs. Witherspoon was writing a list on the board. She stood there, a piece of chalk in one hand, staring at Maisie.

“The Wright Brothers?” Maisie said hesitantly.

Mrs. Witherspoon tapped the blackboard with her chalk hard enough to send a little puff of chalk dust into the air.

“We already
have
the Wright Brothers, Maisie,” she said. “Right here beneath Thomas Edison.”

Maisie saw that now that Mrs. Witherspoon had pointed it out.

“Um,” Maisie said, scanning the list.

Names floated in front of her. Benjamin Franklin and Henry Ford and even Steve Jobs.

“You seem to have them all covered,” Maisie said, and went back to watching the clock.

Finally, a million years later, the lunch bell rang. By then, Maisie had come up with a plan. She would be the first one at the door, and she would stand there until Hadley Ziff walked out. Then Maisie would simply fall into step beside her. They would walk together to the cafeteria, move through the food line side by side, then find a place to sit
away from Bitsy Beal and her friends. By the time lunch ended twenty-three minutes later, Maisie would have invited Hadley over on Saturday. In Maisie’s mind, they were already practically best friends.

Maisie was on her feet before the bell even finished ringing.

But Mrs. Witherspoon stopped her before she got to the door.

“Where is your mind today, Maisie?” she asked.

Maisie kept her eye on Hadley, who was slowly standing up and moving across the room.

“On inventors?” Maisie said.

“Please look at me when you speak to me,” Mrs. Witherspoon said.

Hadley was almost at the door, and Monica Shea was making a move toward her. Monica was smart and pretty and quiet, someone Hadley might actually like.

“Mrs. Witherspoon,” Maisie said as Monica reached Hadley and the two of them walked together right out the door. “I love inventors. And inventions. And I’m so excited to start this section.”

She gazed up at Mrs. Witherspoon’s baffled face.

“Well…,” Mrs. Witherspoon said.

“And also,” Maisie said desperately, “I’m so hungry that I think I might faint if I don’t eat something superquick.”

“Well…,” Mrs. Witherspoon said again.

“Thanks for understanding,” Maisie said, and she practically ran across the classroom and out the door.

“Go inventors!” she called over her shoulder for good measure.

Maisie stopped as soon as she left the room. The hallway had already emptied. Hadley Ziff was gone. And Monica Shea was nowhere in sight. Disappointed, Maisie began her slow, lonely walk toward the cafeteria, the same slow lonely walk she made every day. Sometimes Felix was waiting for her at a lunch table. But most times he had presidential duties to tend to—selling gross, chalky candy bars or raffle tickets, or taking a survey to measure the dissatisfaction of the sixth grade over lunch food or vending-machine goods or some other unimportant thing.

Maisie rounded the corner of the hallway that led to the cafeteria.

“There you are!” someone said, and of course
Maisie didn’t look up or pause because no one was ever waiting for her.

“Maisie?” the someone said.

The someone, Maisie saw, was Hadley Ziff, who stood in front of her, grinning.

“I can’t wait to hear everything you have to say about absolutely everything,” Hadley said.

She crooked her arm in Maisie’s.

“Go,” Hadley said. “I’m all ears.”

“S
ometimes,” Maisie said to Hadley Ziff, “I think my entire family is deaf. I mean, I talk and talk and talk, and either they just have blank expressions on their faces or they say
Mmmm-hmmm
in a totally fake way.”

As Maisie spoke, Hadley nodded. They were standing on the corner of Bellevue Avenue and Memorial Boulevard, right where Jim Duncan had waited for Maisie and Felix just that morning. Hadley had to go right and Maisie had to go left, but neither of them wanted to part.

“Sometimes,” Hadley said, “Rayne listens. But lately she’s all into being popular and becoming the head of this and the head of that.”

Now it was Maisie’s turn to nod.

“My brother,” Maisie said, lowering her voice, “is class president.”

“My sister,” Hadley said, also in a low voice, “was a cheerleader at our last school.”

“What is wrong with them?” Maisie said sadly.

“There are times when I’m embarrassed that we share the same DNA,” Hadley admitted.

They stood in a companionable silence. The trees had all sprung new green leaves and buds. On one block, a row of pink and white dogwoods had bloomed, and the petals looked pretty in the spring sunshine. Maisie remembered how much she used to like when the trees along Bleecker Street blossomed in the spring. Imagining it made her homesick.

“Do you miss San Francisco?” she asked Hadley.

“Kind of,” Hadley said. “We move a lot. We’ve lived in Moscow and Tel Aviv and Virginia and Panama.”

“I went to China once,” Maisie said.

“We lived in Beijing, but just for six weeks,” Hadley said.

She glanced around—nervously, Maisie thought.

“My father isn’t in the navy,” Hadley whispered.

“He’s not?”

“He’s in the CIA,” Hadley said. She giggled. “I just told you my biggest secret. We’re not allowed to tell people. For security reasons.”

“CIA?”

“Central Intelligence Agency,” Hadley explained. “It’s top secret.”

“What do people in the CIA do?” Maisie asked.

“Overthrow governments and all sorts of dramatic things,” Hadley said. “That’s why it’s such a secret.”

“Wow,” Maisie said, impressed. She used to think having a father who was a sculptor was exciting. Until now.

Felix came down the street with a girl Maisie didn’t recognize. The girl had black hair and alabaster skin, just like Hadley. But she was prettier, in the more traditional way. Her eyes were big and long-lashed. She was tall and had long legs beneath a denim skirt and blue button-down the same color as her eyes. Felix was talking, gesturing madly, and the girl couldn’t take her eyes off him, as if he was the most interesting person in the world.

“Here comes Mr. President now,” Maisie told Hadley, motioning her chin in Felix’s direction.

“With Rayne,” Hadley added.

“That’s your sister?” Maisie asked rhetorically.

“Beautiful, right?” Hadley said with a sigh.

Rayne grinned when she saw Hadley and Maisie.

“Two sets of twins!” she gushed.

Felix smiled stupidly. “How about that?”

Maisie frowned at him. Hadn’t he been complaining about another set of twins just last night?

“Well,” Rayne said to Felix, flashing hot-pink braces on her teeth, “I’ll see you Saturday.”

“What’s happening on Saturday?” Maisie asked Felix, who just stood there staring at Rayne Ziff like he was hypnotized.

“I’m coming to your house,” Rayne said. “Felix promised to help me with my report on inventors.”

Hadley looked at Maisie hopefully.

“Maybe I could come over, too?” she asked when Maisie didn’t pick up her cue.

“Sure,” Maisie said.

Hadley and Rayne turned to walk in the opposite direction, but Hadley paused long enough to lean
close to Maisie and whisper, “I told you my biggest secret, so you have to tell me yours.”

“Uh…okay,” Maisie said, wondering if she should tell her big secret.

The Ziff twins waved good-bye, and Maisie and Felix watched them until they became just a blur.