Hannah & the Spindle Whorl (5 page)
Read Hannah & the Spindle Whorl Online
Authors: Carol Anne Shaw
An Afternoon Downtown
WE STAY FOR ANOTHER
half an hour, and I leave the whorl with Mr. Sullivan at the museum. It’s an important find, and I wouldn’t feel right keeping it all to myself. Discovering it was exciting enough. And what’s just as exciting is that Mr. Sullivan and some other museum people want me to take them to the cave on Tuesday so they can do their own exploring. I ask if Max and I can come and hang out with them, and Mr. Sullivan insists that we be a part of the whole adventure. I can’t wait. What makes it even better is that Max and I get to miss a whole day of school when we go.
We leave the museum and Dad suggests that Max and I grab a bite from Market Square and then hang out in Chinatown while he goes to meet with Ian.
“I’ll only be fifteen minutes or so,” he assures us. But I know that he’ll be at least an hour. The only person who talks more than Dad is Ian, his editor. I remind him of this, so we agree to meet in one hour by the stone lions at the entrance to Chinatown, on Fisgard Street.
Max and I head to Market Square, following the smells that drift over from Howie’s Bagels. His bagels aren’t as good as Nell’s but, because we’re starving, we order three: one each and one to split between us. We sit out on the top stair in the courtyard and watch a couple of little kids chasing a bunch of pigeons around in circles. There’s a tall woman playing a familiar song on a twelve-stringed guitar outside the bookstore. She has a puppy tied to the railing beside her, and his ears flop over when he cocks his head to one side. It’s like he’s really listening to every word of the Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young song she’s singing: “Teach Your Children” — one of my dad’s favourite songs.
“Do you think there’s more stuff in that cave?” Max asks suddenly.
“Well, I don’t think there’s that much room in there. I wonder why the whorl was in there anyway. It seems like kind of a weird place for it to be, you know?”
“Maybe there’s a skeleton in there as well,” Max says eagerly.
“Oh gross, Miller.”
“Why? That’d be way cool.”
“I was crawling around in there, that’s why! I can think of better things to find in the dark than some old skull.”
“You just don’t have any sense of adventure,” he kids.
“You’re definitely twisted,” I kid back.
We finish our bagels and cross the road to Fisgard Street, the start of Victoria’s Chinatown. We both want to go into the famous never-ending store — a narrow shop full of twists and turns and strange and interesting angles. But not before we check out the grocery store with the pigs hanging in the front window.
“Now that’s gross!” Max says to me.
At least we agree on one thing.
We spend about half an hour in the never-ending store. I buy a hinged wooden snake … I never get tired of them, even though I’m twelve. Max buys a deep blue silk wallet, the one with the peacock embroidered on the front. It’s for his mom, for her birthday.
There are so many cool things in this place — you can easily spend two hours looking around and still not see everything. But we only have twenty minutes left so it isn’t long before we’re walking back up Fisgard Street to the concrete lions where we’re supposed to meet Dad. Of course, he isn’t there yet, but I’m surprised we only have to wait ten minutes before we see him loping up the street. From this distance, I notice that his jeans are too short. Flood pants. He’s also mostly looking up at the sky. My dad’s like that. Most people look straight ahead, or at the ground when they walk, but Dad looks up all the time. He says you miss a lot if you always have your eyes fixed on every step. Well, he might see more stuff than the rest of us, but he also has more accidents. One time he walked straight into a telephone pole and had a black eye for two weeks.
“Hi, Dad!” I call to him. “How was Ian?”
Dad doesn’t say anything, just grumbles under his breath, muttering something about integrity and not selling out. I’m not quite sure what happened at Ian’s office, but I’m pretty sure that Dad thinks Ian is wrong and he’s right.
“You guys finished in Chinatown? Spend all your allowance, kiddo?” he asks me.
“Wait till Christmas and see,” I tease him.
Dad wants to stroll up Fort Street and snoop in some old bookstores along Antique Row. His favourite bookstore is the one that smells like old cigars and wilting geraniums. Max is cool with that, especially when I tell him the owner’s name is Arthur McNish and he’s about two hundred years old. He usually offers me one of the partially unwrapped caramels he carries in his pocket. I’m pretty sure they’ve been in his pocket for at least twenty years because they’re kind of sticky and covered with lint. I always take one, but I never eat it.
He never remembers my name, either. He calls me “Hilary” or “Helen,” or some other “H” name. I used to correct him every time, but he always forgets, so now I don’t bother. I figure that’s okay. Anyone who has lived for two hundred years should be allowed to forget stuff like somebody’s name. He sure knows his authors though. He’s read almost every book ever written on the planet, and always has a copy of some strange unknown title that Dad is hankering after.
Dad tells me that Mr. McNish used to teach English at a fancy university, and that he’s got millions of dollars and two castles in northern Scotland, but he chooses to live in a seedy apartment over a drycleaner. I think that’s pretty cool. He’s also worn the same black Oxford shoes for eleven years. I bet he keeps all his money hidden in old cookie tins or under his mattress. I know this because I heard him say once how he hated bankers. He called them crooks. Dad says Mr. McNish has been writing a book about the history of his family, Clan McNish, for most of his life. It must be a pretty big book. Or a pretty big family.
While he and Dad talk about Scottish clans, Max and I explore the back of the store. No one can see us there so first we draw stupid faces in the dust on the shelves next to the fishbowl. In the history section, I find a book about Coast Salish culture. There’s a picture on the front cover of a woman weaving a basket. Her hair is long and black and she’s wearing a cape that looks like it’s woven from the same grass as the basket she’s weaving. I open the cover and a small spider runs out across my hand and disappears between two leather-bound books about railways. The book isn’t in very good shape but it only costs three dollars. I check in my wallet and decide that it might be a good buy for my school report. Maybe it will even have something about spindle whorls too.
I hand Mr. McNish my money, and he puts my book in a brown paper bag with a grease stain on the front of it.
“There you are, Holly,” he says, handing me the bag and my change. I smile and Dad winks at me. Max isn’t even listening. He’s got his face stuck in a book about graveyards and haunted houses.
“Thanks, Mr. McNish,” I say, scratching the fat cat sleeping by the cash register. The cat opens one eye and mews faintly. I’m pretty sure it must be nearly as old as Mr. McNish.
After Dad buys three books, we head out onto Fort Street and back in the direction of the Jeep. I have to yank on Dad’s arm halfway down the street to keep him from walking into a garbage can. He’s too busy looking up at the crows watching us from the roof of the hobby store. Typical.
On the way home, Dad and Max talk about engines and houseboats, and the best way to eat crab. When Max says to my dad that he loves crabbing, Dad tells him he can catch a lot of them right off the Cow Bay docks. I let them do all the talking. I’m too busy thinking about Tuesday, when we’re meeting Mr. Sullivan at the cave site, and wondering how I’m going to get through tomorrow and Monday. It’s going to be the longest two days of my life.
Monday, June 15, 2010
Dear Diary:
Okay, now this is kinda creepy. More weird dreams about the woods again. Three nights in a row – with the drumming and the staring out to the ocean and stuff, only this time it was like I was watching someone else. Not me, but this strange girl, about the same age as me. On Saturday night, I dreamed I was kind of hiding in the trees, and I see this girl scurrying along through the underbrush. She keeps stopping to look through the trees, out to the sea and … it’s like she’s worried. She has something in her hands, but I can’t tell what it is. And this big black raven, the same one as before, is flying above her head, just ahead of her. Is she following it, or is it following her?
I call out to her, to see if she’s okay, but she can’t hear or see me. It’s like I’m invisible. I sort of follow her as she heads for this clearing beyond the trees. I feel like I know these woods, but somehow they’re different. Darker, quieter, more still. Then, just before she gets to the clearing, I wake up. And, it’s the same as last time: I can remember every single detail, like the sound of the quiet – if that makes any sense. So who is this girl? I can still see her face, and her black hair – the way it hangs down her back.
Then last night, after spending the day with Dad, scraping old paint off the deck, I had another one. This one was sharper and clearer than any dream I’ve had before. It’s almost as though this dream picked up where the other one left off. It goes like this: I follow the girl into the clearing. I recognize it immediately, the shape of the beach and the stretch of mudflats where the tide has gone out. It’s Cowichan Bay. But there’s a village there. A Native village. Right near the beach. There aren’t any boats in the marina. There’s no marina. But I know that’s where I am. I follow the girl to one of the village houses. It’s made of planks. There are two poles outside the door, painted with dull red and black paint.
The girl goes inside, and over to a woman who is lying under some blankets at one end of the house. I can see that the woman is ill. There are beads of sweat on her forehead and she’s talking very quietly to the girl, in some language I’ve never heard before. The girl keeps twisting this beautiful turquoise and silver shell which shimmers like a rainbow on a cord around her neck.
A fire burns in the corner in a shallow pit on the dirt floor, and I see another girl, maybe a year or two older than me. She has a bowl of something beside her. Another older woman sits to one side of the sick woman. Her eyes are closed and it’s like she’s chanting to herself. She makes these strange gestures with her hands, and she picks up a cedar bough and sweeps at the air over and around the sick woman. And even though they don’t know I’m in the room, watching, I don’t move. I don’t make a sound. I barely breathe. But I feel so sad inside, because somehow I know that the sick woman is the girl’s mother. And I know that she is dying.
Adrenaline
I MANAGE TO GET
through Monday, which is pretty boring, except for when Sabrina Webber gets into trouble for writing something mean on Gemma Taylor’s locker, and has to go see the principal. When she comes back into the classroom, she isn’t smiling, but Gemma sure is. Other than that, it’s pretty uneventful.
During last period, Mrs. Elford gives up trying to teach us about conjunctions and pronouns. Instead, we watch a
DVD
about the endangered marmots of Vancouver Island. She tries hard all day to keep everyone in line, but most of us are just too excited. Summer holidays are almost here.
“Dad,” I say, just before I climb up the stairs to the loft on Monday evening.
“Mmmm?” he half answers. He’s got a pencil stuck over his ear and there’s an open bag of sour cream and onion potato chips on the paperwork in front of him.
“Do you think we’ll find anything else in that cave tomorrow?”
“I dunno, Han.” He swivels around in his chair. “Maybe some gold bars and bullion?”
“Daaadd! It’s a Native site, not a sunken pirate ship.”
“Well, you and Max just be careful. What if the cave belongs to Bigfoot or some other old cranky thing?”
“Bigfoot?” I sneer. “You mean the Sasquatch? Come on, Dad. You and Max are both obsessed with Sasquatches!”
Dad just raises his eyebrow at me and keeps quiet.
“Uh, Dad? Hello? You know that Bigfoot isn’t real, riigghht?” It would be just like my dad to be a huge believer. He lives in a fantasy world most of the time anyway.
“Don’t be so sure, Han,” he says, hiding the grin on his face. “There are a lot of people who say they’ve seen one.”
“Sure,” I say, adding, “just like all the people who say they’ve been abducted by aliens!”
That makes him smile. “Just when did you get to be so skeptical, Hannah Banana?”
“Whatever. I just hope we find some more cool stuff tomorrow, not a stinky old Sasquatch guy.”
“Well, unless you get yourself off to bed, you’re not going to find out, are you?” he says in his father-knows-best kind of voice. I blow him a kiss and climb the stairs, trying not to trip over Chuck as he weaves in and out of my ankles, mewing for more wet food.
I curl up under my comforter and look up at the sky. It’s clear and the moon is big — almost full. The stars blink over the top of the mountains and I can see a satellite moving steadily across the sky above Mount Prevost. I wonder what kind of pictures it’s sending back to earth tonight. Maybe there are some of me and Chuck wrapped up in my quilt, or maybe a couple of Dad scratching his head, chewing his pencil and making notes that no one else can read in the margins of his typed pages. A moment later, I hear Chuck purring and the clacketty-clack of Dad’s fingers on the keyboard. The last thing I remember before falling asleep is listening to the music coming from the Baxters’ place two boats down.
Tuesday turns out to be bright and sunny. The birds are singing really loud this morning — a sound I look forward to all winter. Chuck is already up, sitting on the windowsill looking hopefully at the little wren perched on the stovepipe of Ben’s boat.
Dad is nowhere to be seen, but while I’m getting my cereal, I hear his feet coming along the dock outside. He has a newspaper under his arm and his sweater is on backwards with the tag sticking up under his chin — my father the fashion statement.
“Today’s the day!” I tell him excitedly.
“Right … right … the museum thing,” he says, beginning to unfold the newspaper. “Make sure you take the camera, Han … you may find some other stuff, right?”
“Good idea.” Once again, I imagine the newspaper headline: Local Girl Discovers Important Archaeological Site. Only now, I’ll also get credit for the photography. Sweet!
I’m too excited to finish my cereal, so I give it to Chuck. I stuff some things into my backpack and hurry out.
“Knock ’em dead, kiddo,” Dad calls after me.
Outside, the air is still and the docks are sort of slippery from the dew. I jog down the planks and up the ramp, two steps at a time. I don’t even stop in at the bakery to say hi to Nell. Max and I meet on the trail almost as soon as I cut into the forest.
“Where have you been?” he demands, looking impatient.
“What … it isn’t even nine-thirty!”
“Well, I’ve been up and down the trail for, like, hours already! Geez … I never thought you would sleep in on a day like today.”
“Chill out, Miller!” I tell him. “The team has to drive up from Victoria. Anyway, they said ten o’clock. We still have a whole half an hour.”
“Whatever,” he shrugs. “So … anyway … show me the site. We can go in first, and look around and stuff. I brought my flashlight.” He waves a slim black Maglite under my nose.
“No, we can’t. I promised my dad I wouldn’t go in the cave again until he or some other adult knows how to find it. And remember, Mr. Sullivan said to wait for the crew just in case we wreck something important trying to get in.”
“Oh yeah,” Max shrugs. “Well, show me where it is, anyway. I couldn’t find it.”
We walk quickly down the trail and talk nonstop about the possible finds inside the small dark space. It takes me a minute or two to remember just where to stop, and I have to backtrack to find the huge clump of salal.
“Here it is,” I tell Max. “Look, you have to get down on your hands and knees, and …” I begin to scramble through — but then I stop, suddenly.
“What are you doing?” Max stops short before he bumps into me.
I don’t say anything. I just look straight ahead on the ground, and then I turn slightly and look up into the bushes above me. It’s spooky. Something feels funny … not quite right.
“Earth to Hannah! Whassup?” Max asks, sounding impatient again.
“Shhhhh, just a sec,” I stall. I stare up past the salal into the giant cedar that looms before me. The breeze has picked up a bit and it moves the huge limbs of the tree, back and forth. They make a soft whispering sound. I hold my breath. I think I hear someone. I think I hear a girl’s voice … a girl’s voice calling someone, but I can’t be sure, and then the feeling goes away — probably because Max is pushing on the back of my foot.
“Anderson! What’s with you? Get going!”
“Uh … er … did you hear something a second ago?” I ask him. “Did you hear a girl’s voice?”
“What? Are you nuts?”
“Okay. Never mind. Here. You have to get through this small space right here, and kind of tunnel behind this yew tree, and … are you with me?”
“Yeah, yeah, I’m right behind you.”
“Okay, then, check it out.” We brush off our hands and knees and stand staring at the wall of ivy before us. I point to the dark opening at one end.
“Whoa!
COOL
!” Max cries, walking toward it, craning his head down low so he can check out the entrance.
“Don’t start messing around in there, Max. You might wreck something,” I warn him, before looking over my shoulder and up at the cedars again.
“Oh yeah? Like a creepy skeleton of some old spirit dude? You’re not freaked out, are you Hannah?” he teases.
“No! But you are definitely obsessed with creepy things and dead stuff.”
“Nah — you’re just chicken. I can tell,” he says. “I can see it in your eyes.” He looks like he’s enjoying himself.
“Besides,” he continues, “what’s so creepy about dead stuff? Everybody’s curious. Why do you think cars slow down at accidents? ’Cause it’s a total gore fest! Everyone wants to get a good look!”
It feels like someone has just taken a sledgehammer to my chest. I can’t breathe … Max’s words … The car … they said it was a write-off. I remember the exact moment when the police officer came; how he struggled to find the right words to tell Dad and me what happened; how I couldn’t believe that Mom was never coming home again. For a second I can see her face right in front of me. I can smell her … the lemon-scented fragrance she wore every single day. I feel like I’m going to fall over. Instead, I yell at my friend.
“Max! You stupid jerk!”
And then I’m shimmying through the underbrush to get out to the trail. I can’t get there fast enough. In a flash I’m up and running. I don’t know why, but I keep going. I run as fast as I can and I don’t stop until I get to the clearing at the end of the trail, near the bakery.
I hear Max running up behind me. “Hannah! What’s your problem? I don’t get you.”
I can tell he’s mad. He must think I’ve really lost it. I just stand there, breathing hard, staring out at the ocean, unable to look at him.
“What’s wrong with you?” He steps in front of my face and breaks my gaze, forcing me to look him in the eyes.
What’s wrong with me is that I suddenly hate Max. I don’t care about the stupid spindle whorl. Or the archaeology team. I don’t care about the cave or my school project. I don’t care about anything.
I miss my mom.
I miss my mom, so much!