The Painted Ponies of Partequineus and The Summer of the Kittens (2 page)

“Give her the front one,” Mrs. Baxter said. “You should take the one in back for yourself.” She leaned forward, staring directly into Vanessa's eyes, so close that the girl backed up a little in alarm. The old woman's voice dropped to barely above a whisper. “The room at the back of the house was mine when I was your age, child, so I know what I'm talking about. It's best if you don't go in there at all. Not ever.” She took a long, deep breath and straightened her shoulders.

“Well!” she said, a little too loudly and cheerfully, “I must be going now. I hope you'll be very happy here.” She pulled open the door, stepped through it, and was gone in an instant.

“What was
that
all about?” Vanessa asked.

“I have no idea,” her mother said, “and I'm not going to worry about it. Let's go exploring, shall we? The moving van should be here in about an hour, and we have to decide where to put all of our things.”

TWO

 

Less than five minutes later, the truck from the moving company pulled into the driveway.

“Oh, dear!” Vanessa's Mom said. “They've come too early. We haven't had a chance to think about where everything should go.”

Three men climbed out of the van and began bringing in a few pieces of furniture that had come from the old apartment. They put boxes of dishes in the kitchen, and moved the television set into the living room. They carried suitcases full of clothes up the stairs and left them in the hall. Next came cartons of books and pictures for the walls and all the other things that people need in order to live.

When at last their belongings were safely inside the house and the truck was gone, Vanessa and her mother unpacked the boxes in the kitchen. They put the dishes in the cabinets and the knives and forks and spoons in one of the drawers. They arranged the canisters of flour and sugar and tea and coffee on the counter. Vanessa organized the refrigerator, and her Mom stacked cans of soup and vegetables and boxes of cereal and cookies in the spacious pantry. When they were finished, they decided to go upstairs and unpack their clothes.

There were two bedrooms on the upper level, one at the front of the house and one at the back, with a bathroom in between. Vanessa thought the bathroom was as big as their whole apartment had been - well, almost. It had an old-fashioned claw-foot bathtub along with a modern shower, and not one, but two basins, one for each of them.

There was a big double bed in the front bedroom, and a tall chest of drawers. An antique dressing table stood opposite two side-by-side windows that faced east. It had a huge mirror that reached almost to the ceiling. The closet was wide and deep, with plenty of room for lots of clothes, and there was even a big brick fireplace in the corner. Vanessa had never seen a fireplace in a bedroom before.

THREE

 

August faded away into September. Because their house was just a few blocks away from their old apartment, Vanessa still attended the same school, with all of her friends. She especially liked her new homeroom teacher, Mr. Carson, who taught English and had a huge library of books that all of the students could borrow, any time they liked.

School started on the Wednesday after Labour Day. By Friday, Vanessa already had half a dozen homework assignments to complete over the weekend. She arrived home a little after three and let herself into the house with her own key. Her mother wouldn't be home from work until shortly after four, so she decided to get a head start on her math.

She poured herself a glass of orange juice from the refrigerator, drank it quickly, and took an apple with her up to her room. She sat at her desk and opened her math book. She had a whole page of word problems to complete (“If an airplane leaves New York and travels west for two hours at a speed of 650 kilometres an hour…”), and, with the headphones of her iPod plugged into her ears, she started to work.

At ten minutes to four she finished the page and decided to stretch out on the bed for a while. She watched the wind blowing through the leaves of the big oak tree nearest her windows, and she began to feel drowsy. Still listening to the music, she let her eyes fall closed, and was almost asleep when she heard a voice softly calling her name.

“Vanessssaaah.”

The whispery voice seemed to blend in with the music in her ears, and she stirred restlessly.

“Vanessssaaah!” the voice came more urgently.

She jolted awake and her eyes flew open. She screamed. Her room had vanished. Her desk, the windows, the sunlight outside - everything was gone. All around her, the world was bathed in a swirling purple mist. She pulled the headphones from her ears and jumped off the bed. There was no floor beneath her feet, just a soft, cottony vapour of purple that hid her toes and wove in and out between her knees. She screamed again.

“Don't be afraid, Vanessa,” the voice whispered.

“Who are you?” she said aloud. “
Where
are you?”

“Right in front of you. Come and see. It's safe. And it's beautiful over here.”

“Over where?” Vanessa was frightened and confused. “What happened to my room?”

“Your room is right where it's always been,” the voice said. “But you aren't in it any more. You're in the gateway to Partequineus.”

“What's Partequineus?”

“Let me show you. Take three steps forward and reach out. I'll take your hand.”

“No!” Vanessa cried out. She backed away, one step, two, then three, and tripped over her chair. She lost her balance and sat down hard on the floor, and the purple mist rose up in a miniature tornado, spinning crazily near the ceiling. Like a genie diving back into a bottle, it plunged into the fireplace and vanished up the flue.

Vanessa looked around wildly, at her bed, her desk, her bookcase filled with her beloved books, and her closet, which was standing open where she could see all of her clothes hanging up in neat rows. Nothing had changed.

“Wow!” she murmured. “That was some scary dream.”

“Vanessa!”

She jumped at the sound of her name, startled, then realized it was only her mother, just getting home from work. She stood up from the floor and smoothed her skirt down, and went out of the room and down the stairs. Vanessa's Mom was in the kitchen, putting some groceries in the pantry.

“Have a good day at school?” she asked her daughter.

“It was okay.” Vanessa walked over to the counter. She took a carton of eggs and a pound of butter out of the bag and put them in the refrigerator.

“Mom?” she said, then hesitated.

“What is it, dear?”

“I was just thinking. You know the old lady who sold us this house?”

“Grace Baxter? Of course. What about her?”

“Well…” Vanessa wasn't sure if she should say anything more. It
had
been a dream, hadn't it?

“Is something bothering you, sweetheart?” her mother said.

“I was just thinking about what she told us. You know, about how you should take the back bedroom and give me the one in front.”

“I thought you loved your room.”

“I
do
,” Vanessa said. And suddenly she felt very foolish. She was sure it had only been a dream, a silly dream. And Mrs. Baxter was silly, and
she
was silly, too, for even thinking that there was anything to worry about. It was just an old woman's crazy idea. It didn't mean a thing.

“I was only wondering if you really like your room, that's all,” she said to her mother. “Or if maybe you would have chosen the back one if I hadn't said something first.”

“That's very nice of you, dear,” Vanessa's Mom said, “but my room suits me perfectly.”

“Oh.” Vanessa paused. “Okay. Well, that's good, then.”

“Are you sure nothing's bothering you?”

“Nope, I'm fine,” Vanessa said. “What are we having for dinner?”

FOUR

 

For the next few days Vanessa felt vaguely uncomfortable whenever she was alone in her bedroom. She was uneasy when it came time to go to bed, and when she woke up in the morning, she half expected to find herself inside the strange purple cloud. But everything seemed to be completely normal.

By Tuesday she had almost completely forgotten about her dream, and about the mysterious voice that had called to her in her sleep. On Wednesday her friend Bethany invited her to help celebrate her birthday on the weekend. It was to be Vanessa's favourite kind of party. They were going to take a trail ride up into the hills. Like many of her friends, Vanessa was an excellent rider, and was even taking show jumping lessons. Someday she hoped to have her own horse.

On Friday, Mr. Carson announced a new project for his English class students. Everyone was to pick out a book from his special library, and read just the first three chapters over the weekend. Only three chapters, no more. Then on Monday he would explain what the second part of the assignment was.

Vanessa was eager to begin the book she had chosen. She hurried home through a cool September rain and went directly to her room, not even stopping for a glass of juice or a cookie. She opened the book, a really hard one that Mr. Carson had been reluctant to let her borrow. It was called
The Abandoned
, written many years ago by a man named Paul Gallico. It was about a boy who dreamed he was a cat and had all kinds of amazing adventures. In spite of the theme, Mr. Carson told her, it wasn't really a children's book, but she wanted to try it anyway.

Time flew by as she buried herself in the wonderful story. She loved it. It was the kind of fantasy that she wished she could experience - a chance to go somewhere exciting, and even become someone different.

She was well into the third chapter when she began to feel sleepy, and looked up in surprise to see that it was almost four o'clock. She leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes to rest them for a minute or two, and when she opened them again, her room had vanished into a shimmering purple haze.

Vanessa didn't scream this time. “Nuts,” she said aloud. “Same stupid dream again.” She stood up and started to push her chair back, but she couldn't find it. The chair was gone. She reached forward and groped for the edge of her desk, and her fingers touched nothing but air. She took a step forward but couldn't feel the floor under her feet.

“This is ridiculous,” she said. “I have to wake myself up.” She took another step forward, then a third, and suddenly the world exploded in a rainbow of dazzling light.

At first she thought she had fallen through the window into the back yard, but then she realized that everything was somehow different from home. The trees weren't
her
trees, the yard wasn't
her
yard. She was standing in a lovely meadow, where the grass was too green, the sky too blue, and flowers the size of dinner plates grew on every bush. On her left, a blood-red sun shone down upon a magnificent mountain range that seemed to climb halfway to the sky.

To the right, brilliant blue-green water filled a vast ocean all the way to the horizon. The surf rolled onto a bright pink beach, and graceful white seabirds whirled and soared and dived for fish in the foam-crested waves.

Straight ahead, beyond the meadow, a desert of bright yellow sand stretched away for miles, and beyond that lay a lush green forest. Vanessa had never seen so many vivid colours. She stood still in awe, amazed that so much splendour could exist anywhere in the world.

Then she felt as if someone were watching her, and she turned around. She gasped in surprise.