The Dollhouse Romance Page 5

  There’s no getting back to sleep now. The clock says 2:14. I check my email again to see if Mamá’s written anything. Nothing? Strange. She always writes the first moment she has Internet access. At 2:18, I re-sketch an old cottage design. Still wide awake by 2:41.

  Ignoring the whispers is getting harder.

  Ignoring Arthur’s tune is downright impossible.

  I’m drawn back to the dollhouse, a moth to a light bulb. I hate how dread fills me as I enter the empty study and approach the giant dollhouse. What’s wrong with me?

  Fine. I’m going to just stand here under the shimmering dome until it doesn’t freak me out anymore. See? What’s so scary about a tiny nursery with itsy, bitsy hand-stitched teddy bears? Or a teensy train set, or a wooden puppet stage the size of a postage stamp?

  An old-fashioned kitchen banishes my fear. It has a butlery for washing and storing china, and a walk-in pantry for the food. The kitchen part itself seems like it’s been renovated from its original state. On one side, an electric icebox and oven are plugged into the tiny outlet in the wall. On the other side, a cast-iron cooking stove fills a giant hearth. Soot clings to my finger when I start probing – a real fire has burned here.

  Teensy stoneware containers make me grin. Flour, sugar, salt, tea, coffee… I expect to find them empty, but to my surprise, they’re filled with real ingredients. At least, they smell real. Tiny metal measuring cups and spoons dangle on the wall over shelves of wooden mixing bowls.

  If I had butter or milk, I’d be able to bake my favorite kind of bread. But the icebox is empty except for six cakes of antique Fleischmann’s Yeast. I wonder if they’re real. Not like I’d cook with century-old ingredients! Still, the idea of baking something on the tiny electric stove seems like fun.

  I haven’t looked at the dolls yet. In fact, I’ve been avoiding them, especially Arthur. It almost seems like I should ask permission from someone before using their dollhouse. With a sigh, I force myself to peek into the study, where I left them. Their wooden faces are still blank, but now I sense hope.

  “I’m going to bake some bread,” I tell them, feeling stupid for talking out loud as if they could hear me. “Don’t laugh. I haven’t played with dolls in years, so I probably won’t do it right. Come on, now. Everyone into the kitchen. You can all watch.”

  I place everyone around the table, where I set the ingredients and equipment. Arthur has to stand because his leg won’t bend, but I balance him against the counter as best I can. Then I fill a tiny tea kettle with water from the sink, and place it on a range coil the size of a button. When I turn the dial to medium-high, the coil glows red. “That’s cute,” I say, touching the coil – but I hiss in pain and jerk my finger back. This isn’t a toy that lights up for pretend. This is hot, for real. Soon, the tea kettle whistles.

  I cannot believe I’m playing, but I have to admit it’s a ton of fun to measure out doll-sized portions of sugar, water and yeast into the mixing bowl. When the yeast begins to froth, however, my play takes on an element of reality. Frothing yeast? After so long? Impossible. But it smells exactly as it should. I add in the salt, oil, and flour and start kneading it into a ball with my fingertips.

  The soft dough reacts just the way it should, even growing puffy when I let it rest.

  “I really should let it rise for another hour,” I tell my new dolls, “but this is just an experiment.”

  I shove the loaf pans into the oven. Then there’s nothing to do except wait until the bread bakes. To pass the time, I sweep up my little flour mess with a miniature broom. I sing, too, careful to keep my voice low because there’s a hallway on the other side of the room, and because I really hate how my own voice sounds. Love to sing, can’t stay on tune.

  Soon enough, the smell of fresh bread fills the dollhouse.

  I can’t believe it worked! When I take the loaves out of the oven, they look and smell like real bread. They’re a perfect golden brown. “If only there were butter or honey,” I say, placing them on a tiny towel to cool down. “Oh, well. Who wants some?”

  Green sparkles flash.

  “Definitely me,” says Alex.

  “I’m so hungry,” says Laurie.

  Startled, I find myself inside the kitchen, the same size as the dolls! They’re just as alive as I am.

  This isn’t imagination. This is real. Unless I’m really going crazy.

  With a gasp, I take a step backward and bump into a mountain of muscle. I whirl around and look up into Arthur’s mangled face. His claw-like fingers catch my shoulders as he plunges forward. “You,” he croaks, his hazel eyes furious.

  He’s built like a quarterback. I can’t support his weight. Terrified, I buckle under him as he slips to the floor, unconscious.

  I manage to bite back my scream this time as I try to roll him off me. “What’s happening? Who are you?”

  His brothers rush over to pull me out from under him. The Musketeer pulls me to my feet in one easy tug.

  “Easy, dear,” says Rosemary. “We’ve been expecting you.”

  CHAPTER SEVEN:

  DOLL PEOPLE

  “Henry, Nathaniel, take David upstairs. Change him out of those duds,” orders the father. Then he frowns at me. “And you, miss, shouldn’t be here. You need to leave now. Before it’s too late.”

  The two young men gently haul Arthur-David out of the kitchen.

  “Oh, George, don’t snap so. You’ll give the child hysterics,” Rosemary chides.

  I flinch when she takes my hand. None of the rumors mention dolls that come to life. This seems so much worse than murder.

  “Don’t be afraid, dear. We shan’t hurt you. Come, sit and I’ll explain everything.”

  I allow myself to be led into the parlor, where I sink into a plush couch, wary.

  Rosemary sits opposite me with easy grace, crossing her ankles in a dainty maneuver. “Before we begin, thank you for taking us out of that drawer. This is much better, even if it doesn’t last. I’m Eleanor Whitman, by the way, and that’s my husband George. Shall I start, or did you have questions?”

  I can barely squeak out the word. “Magic?”

  “Not exactly. Where’s Phoebe?”

  “Who’s Phoebe?”

  “The great-granddaughter of Artemis.”

  “The Greek goddess?”

  She nods.

  I scoff. “Sorry, never met anyone like that.”

  “You’re not Artemic, yourself?”

  “I don’t know what that is. I’m just a regular teenager.”

  “You’ve no powers of your own?” She sounds alarmed. “How did you discover us?”

  “I know, I know. I shouldn’t have been snooping. I couldn’t help myself – I found this dollhouse, and…”

  “It was too beautiful to ignore. Yes. It caught our attention, too.” She leans forward. “So Phoebe’s not coming to play?”

  My words drop to a whisper: “Nobody knows I’m here.”

  George and Eleanor exchange a troubled glance.

  “Well,” she says, her smile a bit too bright, “I’ll just go fix some tea, then.”

  George remains standing beside his chair as if he doesn’t deserve to sit and be comfortable. He stares out the open front of the dollhouse into the study beyond, where rows of dollhouses squat in the moonlight. “Those were real homes. People lived in those until she stole them.”

  “Real? How?”

  “Phoebe shrinks things.”

  His voice is too flat, too quiet. As if he’s distanced himself from his own words. “Her parents meant well, but Phoebe was always a little different. They could never make her understand her powers could hurt. We were human once, like you.”

  “And now?”

  “Now we live here until she changes her mind.”

  The oldest son, the one who wears the top hat and gloves like Laurie, joins us. He drops me an old-fashioned nod of acknowledgment. “Nathaniel’s sitting with him,” he tells his father in a low voice. “The pain’s as strong
as ever.”

  “Thank you, Henry.”

  Henry – not Laurie - bows to me. “Pleased to meet you.”

  I’d shake his hand, but I don’t think that was the custom in 1891. Then again, I never know how to greet people. In Paraguay, we’re pretty affectionate. We give kisses on the cheek, and we make it a point to greet everyone in the room by name. Here in the States, a handshake holds friends at arms’ length, and one “Hey” is good enough for a roomful of people. I’ve traveled enough to know it’s best to do whatever people do in their own homes, so I attempt an awkward curtsey in response to Henry’s gallant bow. “Pleased to meet you, too. Is your brother okay? Did I hurt him?”

  “You didn’t do it. Phoebe’s puppy chewed him up,” Henry tells me in a hushed voice. “First month we were here. Nathaniel and David and I were still testing the perimeter by throwing ourselves out and taking turns hauling each other back inside. It was almost a game – we’d see who could jump the farthest, or who could hold the best position when we turned into wooden dolls. Nearly didn’t get him out of Tiger’s mouth, though.”

  His words explain why David has so many scars. But why was he so angry with me? The fury in his eyes has burned its way into my memory, and his single word, “You,” sounded like an accusation. What did I do wrong? “I’m sorry,” I murmur.

  George’s grip on the back of his chair has turned his knuckles white. “That child didn’t deserve a puppy.”

  “Now, dear,” Eleanor says, returning from the kitchen with a full tea service, “you know the Ambassador was trying to teach her to respect life and develop empathy.”

  He scoffs. “By spoiling her with yet another birthday present? She needed a good spanking, not a party.”

  Eleanor pours some tea into a gilded porcelain mug. “The party was an alibi,” she tells me. “Artemics don’t age the way humans do. Phoebe had looked six years old for several years by then, so…”

  “Wait – six? Blonde hair, blue eyes, pink ribbons?” I ask.

  Their jaws drop. “You have met her!”

  “No, just saw a reflection of her in my mirror.”

  George reaches for his pipe and a match. “Henry, didn’t Alexis make a mirror so she could keep an eye on her sister?”

  Henry nods. “Yes, sir. She linked it to her ring.”

  I yelp like I’ve just been stung by a bee and then tear off the white gauze that hides my new ring. “This one?”

  George shies away from me. Henry looks upset. Eleanor, however, breaks into another smile. “That’s precisely the one, dear,” she says. “How ever did you find it?”

  “It was tied to a pillow. It jumped onto my finger, and now it won’t come off. I think it… changed me… somehow, because now I can see pink and green sparkles everywhere.”

  Henry’s voice is tight. “Pink was Alexis’ color. Green was Phoebe’s.”

  Eleanor reaches out to squeeze his hand in comfort. “We miss the girls, don’t we?”

  “Not Phoebe,” George replies. “If I ever get my hands on that little witch…” He turns to me. “You shouldn’t have come.”

  My cheeks begin to grow warm. “I’m sorry,” I repeat. “I didn’t mean to intrude.”

  “It’s not her fault,” Eleanor says. “She didn’t know.”

  George strikes the match and touches it to his pipe.

  I love the smell of his smoke. It reminds me of my father’s father, whom I only met once, the day my father packed up his truck and drove away. I was ten. Grandpa stood at Mamá’s side there on the grass and tried to keep my father from leaving. I don’t remember everything that happened, mostly loud shouting and threats and begging, but Grandpa pulled me close as my father drove off. We’ll make it right, he said. He puffed his pipe then the way George puffs now – quick and agitated.

  “You shouldn’t have come,” George repeats. “Now you’re as trapped as the rest of us.”

  Trapped?

  Eleanor plops two sugar cubes into my tea. “Now, George. The poor thing doesn’t know what she’s gotten herself into.” When I don’t take a cookie, she seems to understand. “Everything is as fresh as the last time we were awake.”

  I sip the tea. “What does that mean?”

  “We sleep between playtimes. The last time Phoebe played with us was 1945, just after the war ended.”

  “So you’re dolls?”

  “No, we’re kidnapped.”

  I blink.

  Before I can open my mouth to ask more questions, Eleanor holds up a finger. “It might be easier if I just start at the beginning. Let’s see. Mr. Akakios commissioned a mansion back in 1882, but it wasn’t completed until 1891.”

  My brain reels. She can’t mean the Ambassador. She must mean his father or grandfather. But I hold my tongue.

  “He could have hired Richard Morris Hunt, one of the leading architects of the time, but he loved my husband’s designs better.” She beams at George. “Mr. Hunt used the big mansion’s scraps to build a dollhouse mansion for Phoebe.”

  “Used my scraps,” George mutters. “Had the audacity to change my design, though.”

  “When we finished here in 1891, we were going to move to Minneapolis,” she continues. “But Phoebe had cottoned to us. Couldn’t stand the thought of us leaving. So she wove a spell around her favorite new dollhouse and kidnapped us.” She waits for her words to sink in.

  I’m a little slow. I stare at her, trying to grasp what she’s not telling me. “She shrank you small enough to fit here and used magic to keep you in?”

  “She shrinks everything,” George says. “Look around you. These aren’t toys. They’ve been miniaturized. That’s why the oven bakes bread.”

  “Am I stuck, too?” I dash to the nearest window and look out into the empty study, which now seems as large as a football field. It’s true. I’m the size of a doll. My breath starts to come in pants. How do I get back to normal? “Guys? Am I stuck?”

  They all study their teacups.

  I try to keep my voice calm, but it’s rising in pitch. “What happens if you try to escape?”

  Nobody answers. Then, reluctantly, George replies. “A soon as you breach the sphere’s perimeter, you get turned into a little wooden doll.”

  “It happened to Alexis,” Eleanor adds in a whisper, “and she was Artemic. You see? Nothing gets past Phoebe’s spell, not even her own sister.”

  So it’s true – Alexis was murdered, after all. By turning into a wooden doll.

  So much for solving mysteries.

  They grow so quiet I can hear my fireplace crackling from the other room. I’m out of my league here. Wooden dolls. A magical perimeter barrier. Pinching my own arm doesn’t wake me from this nightmare. I slump against the window.

  “Henry, go make up Phoebe’s room for our new guest,” George says. “I’m sorry. We didn’t catch your name.”

  “Zenia Segovia.”

  “We’ll do our best to make you comfortable, Miss Zenia. For as long as we can.”

  Henry doesn’t move. He’s staring at my ring. “It’s a vaccination,” he mumbles. “Alexis said it was like a vaccination against Phoebe’s powers.” His wild eyes meet mine. “You might not be stuck here at all. Try. Try to get out.”

  Eleanor’s hand flies to her heart. “Henry!”

  “If it doesn’t work, we can haul her back in,” he presses. “No harm done. But if she can get past the perimeter…”

  They all stare at me, desperate and hopeful.

  “I don’t even know how I got in here,” I admit. “How do I leave?”

  “This house is powered by imagination,” says Eleanor. “Do you remember what you were doing just before you came here?”

  “Baking bread.”

  “But you were also talking to us, pretending. You got so caught up in the play you forgot we weren’t real. Imagination got you in. It may be enough to get you out.”

  I close my eyes and try to imagine myself free.

  Nothing happens.

&nbs
p; “Picture yourself big, the way you were before,” she whispers in my ear.

  So I focus on standing beside the dollhouse. Still nothing.

  “Probably lost its power when Alexis went away.” George turns away, disgusted.

  “Try again, dear,” says Eleanor. “You were quite clever enough to get in.”

  “Use your imagination,” Henry suggests. “Think big.”

  I am using my imagination, but for the wrong purpose. What if I get stuck here forever? Does anyone else know how to open the secret passageway – will Amelia even suspect where I went? Even if someone figures it out, will it be before we all starve to death? I can only bake a few more loaves of bread before we run out of supplies.

  David’s angry hazel eyes flash in my memory again, peering down at me from his towering height as he crumples toward me in slow motion. My stomach roils as I play that moment again and again. Am I reading his reaction right? Why does he hate me so much?

  Poof – green sparkles flicker around me as I find myself right next to David.

  “She can’t stay,” he’s telling the Musketeer. “Get rid of her. Before it’s too late.”

  My cheeks burn. He’s talking about me.

  Both brothers freeze when I appear in the bedroom. Nathaniel’s standing near a dresser with one drawer pulled out, holding a rumpled ball of clothes. David balances on his good leg over his leather belt and broadsword, which lay in a puddle by his feet next to his royal doublet and blouse. Both boys are so tall, their heads nearly scrape the low bedroom ceiling.

  I can’t tear my eyes away from David’s chest. Thick, knotted scars meander all the way from his neck down to his stomach. It’s a wonder that dog didn’t kill him.

  David’s the first to regain his composure. He flings an afghan around his shoulders and turns his face away from mine. My blush spreads to my earlobes, which begin to pulse in shame as I realize I’ve popped into his bedroom while he’s trying to change into pajamas. “Sorry. So, so sorry.” I cover my eyes with my hand and turn toward the window.

  His brother’s slow smile of bemusement eases some of my confusion and embarrassment. “The lady got lost, did she?” He tosses a nightshirt at David and then crosses over to me in quick strides. “Don’t worry. You’ll get better. Think big.”