Long Lost, стр. 10
The quick footsteps of a girl and the skittering paws of a dog pattered up the staircase to the third floor. A door opened and closed.
There was a moment of quiet.
Then, following a short, shuffling sound, a voice whispered clearly into Pearl’s room.
“Pearl? Are you awake?”
Pearl, lying fully clothed in bed, turned toward it.
Hazel was speaking to her through their secret channel. Years before, Hazel had stolen a drill from Mr. Hobbes’s tool chest and bored a small hole through the wall between their rooms. On Hazel’s side, the hole was hidden by the edge of a framed picture. On Pearl’s, it was shadowed by a chest of drawers. If there was light on either side, the girls could see straight through, and they could speak clearly without anyone overhearing, even when they’d been banished to their separate rooms.
Pearl had not turned on her bedroom light. If Hazel peered through the hole, she wouldn’t see much but darkness.
“Pearl,” Hazel’s voice said again.
Pearl was still deciding on a reply when Hazel went on.
“What did you tell Mrs. Rawlins?”
Pearl sealed her lips.
“Did you tell her I made you run home by yourself? And did you tell her the Searcher had been chasing you?” Hazel’s voice was mocking, chastising, without any need for an answer. “This is why I told you to wait. Then none of this would have happened. I would have gotten us out of everything, and you wouldn’t have scared yourself with some stupid old story.”
Pearl swung her legs out of bed and stood up. The bedsprings creaked behind her.
“Pearl?” Hazel asked.
But Pearl still didn’t speak. She crossed the room to the secret channel. Planting her feet, she dragged the heavy chest of drawers in front of the hole.
“Pearl,” said Hazel’s voice. But the voice was small and muffled now. It couldn’t reach her, not well enough to push or pull.
Pearl crossed back to bed and threw herself down on top of the blankets. In a few minutes, she was asleep.
A muffled buzz came from Fiona’s backpack.
She pulled out her phone. How could it be twelve eighteen already?
About to leave the rink, her mother had texted. See you in front of the library at 12:30.
Fiona squeezed the back half of the book, feeling how many pages remained. Definitely too many to read in the next ten minutes. And she didn’t have a library card yet. She would have to leave without the book and come back to finish it tomorrow.
Or, Fiona thought, she could just take the book home. She could slide it into her backpack and smuggle it out without anyone ever knowing. When she’d finished reading it, she would bring it right back, exactly like you were supposed to do with library books—just minus the library card.
But second thoughts came swift and scary. What if she set off an alarm on the doors? What if the librarian searched her bag in front of all those staring people? What if she was never allowed inside the library again?
The thought of a library-less life clinched it. Fiona ran her fingers one last time over the book’s soft leather cover. Then, stooping down, she wedged the book onto the end of the very bottom shelf, where hopefully no one else would find it before she came back. It wasn’t like she had misshelved it, Fiona told herself. There was no alphabetizing tag on the book’s spine. There wasn’t even an author’s name on the cover.
That was a little odd, Fiona realized. But there wasn’t time to wonder about it right now.
Swinging her backpack over her shoulder, she hurried out of the mystery room and down the stairs to the circulation desk.
The librarian with the upswirled hair was bending over a stack of returns.
“Excuse me?” Fiona began.
The librarian turned. Up close, Fiona could see that her name tag read MS. MIRANDA. “Yes?”
“Is that your first name or your last name?” It wasn’t the question Fiona had planned to ask, but it slipped out first. This happened to Fiona a lot. Her curiosity tended to bump everything else—caution, politeness, other thoughts—out of the way.
“It’s my last name.” The librarian gave a little smile. Her face was friendly. Friendly-ish, at least. Up close, the swoops and curls of her hair looked even more like magic to Fiona, who had never mastered a braid that didn’t look like it had been chewed on by a grumpy cat. A small yellow shape was tucked into the curls above the librarian’s ear. When Ms. Miranda stepped toward her, Fiona saw that it was a waving Lego man.
“Can I help you with something?” Ms. Miranda asked.
“Um . . . my family just moved here.” Fiona’s phone gave an impatient buzz. “What do I need to do to get a library card?”
Ms. Miranda’s smile widened. “How old are you?”
“Eleven.”
“You’ll need a parent to come in with you. They’ll need ID and proof of your new address. Then we’ll set you up.”
“Okay.” Fiona whirled toward the doors. “Thank you!”
She bolted out into the daylight and down the walkway to the waiting car. Behind her, the heavy library doors thumped shut, sealing the thousands of books and all their stories inside.
Chapter Six
That evening, back at the creaky colonial house, the Crane family gathered around the dinner table.
“You’ll take me back to the library tomorrow, right?” Fiona speared a large piece of grilled chicken. “And you’ll bring along your ID and proof of our new address, so we can get library cards?”
“Yes, Fiona. Like I already promised.” Her mom straightened the pendant of glowing plastic aliens hanging around her neck. Fiona’s mother had a huge collection of weird accessories: furry socks, fuzzy animal necklaces, headbands with glittery cat ears and unicorn horns. She claimed she wore them to entertain her patients, but Arden and Fiona thought their mom just had ridiculous taste. It was one