The Trouble with Secrets (6 page)

When they had finished the dishes, B followed Dawn up to her room, explaining about George.

“He’s bringing it upon himself!” B was saying. “He’s so sure he’s cursed, he’s practically useless. Thinking about the curse constantly. So of course bad things keep happening to him.”

“Expand the mind, loosen the tongue
…” Dawn was muttering to herself. “Hm? Oh. Yeah, George. He’s got it pretty bad, huh?”

“He’s totally paranoid,” B said. Nightshade leaped up onto Dawn’s bed and Dawn sat down in front of her cauldron.

“Hm. Whaddya think of this, B? A dictionary to
expand the mind, a picture of a sunset to fill the heart with truth …”

“That’s interesting. Why a sunset?” B asked.

“Well, nature is one of the truest things there is, don’t you think? Nature can’t lie.”

B stroked Nightshade’s fur. “I like that, Dawn. That’s really clever.”

Dawn looked surprised, but she smiled. “Thanks. Anyway, what would infuse the soul with courage?”

B scratched Nightshade between the ears. “Umm … I don’t know. I’m the biggest scaredy-cat there is.”

“No, you’re not. Think what you did at the Magical Rhyming Society when you found your magic! You did amazing spells in front of everyone!”

B flushed with pleasure to hear her sister’s praise. “Yeah, but you know what? I couldn’t do it until you came and stood next to me.
You
gave me courage.”

“Well, I only went up because you needed me. Otherwise I’d have been scared, too …” Dawn trailed off midsentence and stared at B. Then she
snapped her fingers. “That’s it, B. You figured it out. It’s family that gives us courage, isn’t it?” Dawn grabbed a copy of their family’s photo Christmas card that was lying on her desk and dropped it into her shiny EZ-Brew cauldron.

“And friends,” B said. She gestured to the cauldron, where the family photo was melting into potion broth. “I hope Mom has more of those pictures.”

“Now all I need is something to loosen the tongue.”

“Um, a drink of water? The principal always takes a drink before starting his ‘Welcome back to school’ speech.”

Dawn frowned. “I don’t think that’s what they mean.”

“How about a thumbtack?”

Dawn stirred her cauldron with a wooden spoon. “What are you talking about?”

“Well, if you sat on a thumbtack, you’d make some noise in a hurry.”

“You’re crazy.”

“Laughter loosens the tongue,” B said. “It gets people talking.”

Dawn froze midstir. “B, you might be a genius,” she said. “Can I raid your candy stash?”

“Since when do you ask? Go ahead,” B said, “but there’s nothing very good left.”

Dawn disappeared into B’s room and came back with the Easter basket B had had since she was tiny. She kept it supplied with candy year-round. Dawn fished through it, then held a little green-wrapped square high in the air. “Aha!” she said. “Laffy Taffy.”

She threw it into the cauldron and stirred. “Wish me luck, little sister,” she said, then closed her eyes and recited a spell.

“Wisdom of years, innocence of youth,

Distill in my cauldron the essence of truth!”

There was a soft noise like the ringing of faraway chimes, and the lumpy glop of Dawn’s ingredients transformed into a smooth sea green sauce that smelled like buttered popcorn.

Dawn and B peered over the lid at the surface of the brew.

“Please, oh please, oh please,”
Dawn whispered. “Here goes nothing.” She dipped the spoon in, then licked it clean.

“Tastes good,” Dawn said. “Go ahead, quiz me.”

“Okay,” B said. “Did you or did you not fib to Mom and Dad two years ago about the broken crystal ball?”

Dawn’s face flushed scarlet. “Yes!” She pressed her lips together. “It was a tiny white lie, okay? And I hadn’t been using it. I was just
looking
at it.”

“Right,” B said. “What else do you do with a crystal ball, go bowling?”

“No, you tell the future with it,” Dawn said. “Oh, for heaven’s sake.” Then her scowl turned into a radiant smile. “My potion worked! It made me tell the truth!”

“Not so fast,” B said. “How much of your waking time do you spend daydreaming about Lancelot Jackson?”

Dawn whapped B lightly on the hand with her wooden spoon. “You little sneak!” She tried to clamp her lips together, but they had a mind of their own.
“Sixty-six percent.” She clapped her hand over her mouth.

“The numbers don’t lie, do they?” B said, grinning. “Looks like you’ll get to go to Camp Juju. Congratulations.”

Dawn sank down into her chair, exhausted and relieved. “It really works, doesn’t it?”

“It’s spectacular.”

Spectacular. The Grand Spectacular!
Holy cats. Nothing like a little honesty mixed into a bamboozler’s performance … She snapped her fingers. That was it — the secret weapon she needed.

“Hey, Dawn, I promise not to ask you any more personal questions if you let me take some of this potion. I think I want it for Enchantress Le Fay’s Grand Spectacular tomorrow.”

Dawn cocked an eyebrow. “What’re you cooking up, little sis?”

“Nothing much. Just a fake curse antidote.”

“Be careful,” Dawn said. “With honesty, you can get more than you bargained for.”

B went to her room, picked up the phone, and dialed.

The voice on the other line sounded near death. “H’lo.”

“George?”

“This isn’t George. It’s his cursed twin,” her friend said gloomily.

“Pull-leeeze,” B said. “Listen, George, I’ve got a guaranteed way to break Enchantress Le Fay’s curse.”

George didn’t say anything. “If I promise to get rid of the curse, forever, will you do what I ask you to, even if you don’t like it?”

“Why do I have a bad feeling about this?” George moaned.

“You’ve got a bad feeling about everything lately,” B said. “Trust me. I’m your best friend. Would I do something to hurt you?”

“Not on purpose,” George said.

“Do you
promise?”

George sighed. “If it’s legal.”

“ ’Course it’s legal! And it’s easy. All you’ve got to do is come to the fair tomorrow to see the Grand Spectacular.”

The next day, B waited for George on the steps of the school. The late bus came and went, but still no George. B was just about to go in when she saw a figure running up the long driveway to the school. Tall, with a crazy shag of blond curls, running as fast as a soccer star … yep, it was George.

“What are you doing?” B called to him. “How come you weren’t on the bus?”

“Missed it,” he panted, catching up to her. “Lost homework. Spilled oatmeal. Forgot to walk Butterbrains.”

B wrinkled her nose.
“Pee-yew!
What’s that smell?”

George lifted up one of his huge sneakers. “Oh,
no
.”

There, smashed into the bottom of his soccer shoe, was a big brown clump of …

“Gross!” George wailed, scuffing his foot furiously into the grass. “I’m gonna smell like dog doo all day! I am
so
completely cursed!”

B dragged George by the backpack up the steps of the school. “Knock it off! You’re
not
cursed. It’s just another bad morning. Come on. Er” — she wrinkled her nose once more — “you might want to walk on your tippy-toes till we get this cleaned up.”

They got the shoe cleaned, but George’s day didn’t improve much. B watched as her friend walked around all day in a daze, bumping into things, calling teachers by the wrong names, and fidgeting nervously instead of listening during class. At lunchtime he announced he’d better quit the soccer team, so his curse couldn’t make them lose their chance at the league play-offs. B shadowed him all during gym class so she could tackle him in case he tried to tell Coach Lyons he was quitting.
By the end of the day, she was exhausted. Babysitting a curse, she decided, was no fun.

“Look,” B said. “This will all be over tonight. See you at the Grand Spectacular, at six o’clock.”

George looked doubtful.

“You promise you’ll come?” B demanded.

“Okay,” George said. “If I can get there in one piece.”

At five-fifteen B pulled on her jacket and stepped outside to get to the fair early. It was a perfect fall evening — a chill breeze swept the scent of leaves into the air, and a burning orange sunset painted the sky to the west. B patted her pocket containing the potion vial that Mr. Bishop had bought at the fair, now full to the cork with a dose of Dawn’s honesty potion.

She smiled to herself. Le Fay’s shenanigans would crumple as soon as Dawn’s honesty potion got inside her. The tricky part would be getting her to drink it. It wouldn’t be easy. But for George, B would find a way.

The sky had turned purple by the time B reached the park, and the fair lights flashed wildly. B hurried through the noisy Friday night crowd to the tent that became Enchantress Le Fay’s little stage once the curtain opened. A large poster, crookedly hung on the tent, announced tonight’s Grand Spectacular, but no spectators had lined up yet. B ducked under a canvas flap.

There was no one inside the tent, which doubled as “backstage.” She checked her watch. 5:40. The show started at six o’clock, and no Le Fay or Jason! Outside the tent, B knew, the crowd would start gathering soon. B ducked behind a side curtain.

Her eyes had just adjusted to the dark when footsteps on the platform behind her made B turn around. It was Enchantress Le Fay, dressed in a different black dress — still raggedy, but with sequins — holding her wig and her makeup bag. “Jimmy!” she called. “I need you to go back to my camper and get my set of shrunken heads. The rubber ones … Oh!” She stopped in her tracks; the torn strips of fabric that made up her skirt were
rustling. “You’re that girl who was with the bratty boy, and then with the teacher guy.”

“Yep,” B said. “That’s me. I, uh, go to school with Jason, your helper.”

“Really? That’s nice.” She sat down at a little table, flicked on a portable light, and started painting thick makeup on her face. “Where did he go? And what are you doing here?”

“I’m here to help,” B said. “Jason is, uh, running late.”

Le Fay swiveled around on her bench. “Figures! I don’t know why I bother with that kid. I need him here in just” — she checked her watch — “a few minutes. He’s got to help me before the show.”

“Well, since he’s not here,” B said, “why not use me? I’ve heard, I mean, I know about the tricks you use to help make your show spooky.”

Enchantress Le Fay applied her thick dark eyeliner while she talked to B. “Name one.”

B flipped the switch for the bats, and lowered the lever that made a crystal ball (glass, fake) seem to levitate. She even tested the music.

“Hm,” Le Fay said. “I guess you do know the drill. Okay, you can stay. Fasten my necklace, will you?” While B fumbled with the tiny clasp of one of her brass charms, Le Fay lined her lips with a red pencil, then smeared on a thick coat of scarlet lipstick. When she was done, she made a kissing noise at her reflection in a handheld mirror.
“Mmm-wah!”
B had to work hard not to laugh.

B checked her watch again. 5:45. Now was her moment. For her plan to work, B needed Enchantress Le Fay to lose sight of what time it was, so she wouldn’t rush to get ready for the show. B stared at the fake witch’s watch, and breathed, “S-T-O-P.” The second hand stopped spinning.

“Like my Grand Spectacular dress?” Le Fay said. “I’m adding a favorite trick of mine tonight. You can help me set it up. Open that box over in the corner and get out the witch hat inside. Then open the cage under the hat, but be careful, because Rufus the rabbit’s in there. Don’t worry, he won’t bite. Just slip him in the secret pouch in the hat. I’ll start with that trick — the audiences always love it.”

B followed the instructions, giving Rufus a quick scratch behind his ears. Sweet little bunny, too bad he had to put up with stuff like this. She tucked him carefully into the compartment inside the sequin-covered hat.

Le Fay was apparently in a talkative mood. “Man, oh, man, am I in trouble tonight,” she said, plastering her face with dark rouge. “Running late for the show! We’ll just have to skip the shrunken heads. My assistant, gone. How’s a poor gal gonna earn a buck?”

“Are you sure you’re running late?” B said. “What time is it?”

“Well, whaddya know,” Le Fay said, glancing again at her watch. “I’ve still got a little wiggle room. Here, stick a few of these glow-in-the-dark spiders into my wig.”

B arranged the spiders, then reached into her pocket and pulled out Dawn’s honesty potion. She was so close! Maybe George was on the other side of the curtain right now, waiting for the show to start. B desperately hoped so — him and half the town, too, with any good luck. But if Enchantress
Le Fay didn’t somehow drink this potion, what good would it do? If she wasn’t forced to admit the truth, how could B prove to George that the curse was bogus?

“Is your throat sore?” B asked. “I could get you a drink of water.” B didn’t wait for an answer. She headed for the exit to find a drink. In the dim light she tripped, knocking over the suitcase full of vials. Dawn’s honesty potion vial spun out of her fingers and landed in the middle of dozens of others.

And there was no way to tell them apart.

“Nice going, klutzy,” Enchantress Le Fay snarled. “Clean those up!”

“Sorry about that,” B said, trying to keep her voice calm while she scooped up potion bottles, dumped them helter-skelter in the suitcase, and desperately searched for one that looked different.

But nothing looked different. B started uncorking bottles and sniffing them. They all had that mild herbal scent that Mr. Bishop’s money potion had had. B hoped Enchantress Le Fay wouldn’t notice her sniffing each one.

No such luck.

“What are you doing with the potions?” Le Fay cried.

“Oh!” B stalled to think of something. “I, um, thought I’d label them.”

Enchantress Le Fay started pinning her blond hair off her face with bobby pins. “Nice idea,” she said. “But I don’t think there’s time for that.”

Sniff.
“Oh, I’m pretty quick.”
Sniff.
“They all sort of smell the same, don’t they?”
Sniff.

“That’s because they
are
the same.”

Sniff.
“Right.”

B checked her watch again. 5:58! Almost showtime … but where was that honesty potion?

“Listen to that crowd gathering out there,” Enchantress Le Fay bragged. “I’ll make a fortune tonight. Sounds like hundreds! Lining up fifteen minutes early, just to see me. You don’t see that kind of showbiz success every day, you know.”

“I’m sure you don’t,” B agreed. She got up and peeked her head through the curtain. George had come! She yanked her head back in before he turned and saw her. “It sure is a big crowd, Miss Le Fay.”
The bigger, the better!
She returned to the spilled potions, searching through them as quickly as she could.

But each bottle was the same. About to give up, B uncorked one more bottle and took a deep whiff.

This bottle was different. It smelled like buttered popcorn. The honesty potion! Just in time. B had breathed it in so deeply, her nostrils tickled. Come to think of it, her head felt light and fluttery for a moment.

Oh, no!

She sniffed one more time. Sure enough, the fragrance was gone.

She’d found the genuine potion among the fakes … and used up all its magic potency!

How could she trick Le Fay into telling the truth now? Come to think of it, how could she trick anyone when she, herself, was forced to only speak the truth?

Her whole plan was ruined!

Footsteps clattered up the back steps. “Sorry I’m late, Your Greatness!” Jason Jameson cried, bursting through the curtain, dressed in a ridiculous wizard’s costume — a bathrobe decorated with puffy paint stars. “My mom made me wash all the dish —
hey!” He pointed at B. “What’re you doing here, Beeswax?”

B scowled at Jason, but the honesty spell had ideas of its own. “I’m here to expose Enchantress Le Fay for the flashy fraud she really is,” she said.

For a second Jason, Le Fay, and B were frozen, no one knowing how to react.

Then Enchantress Le Fay’s throaty laugh reverberated through the tent. “I like your attitude,” she said. “ ‘Flashy fraud!’ Think you can take me down, do you? Ha! You’ve got guts, Miss Beeswax. Too bad you don’t like me. I could really use an apprentice like you.”

“Hey!” Jason said. “What about me?” Le Fay shrugged and kept fussing with her props.

B backed away, bumping into the cauldron. She wished she could hop back inside it and camouflage herself again, she was so embarrassed and disappointed. There on the other side of that curtain was George, hoping and waiting for B to break the curse. And she’d blown her chance.

Jason sneered at B. “It’ll take more than a stink-bug like you to mess up Enchantress Le Fay’s show,” he said. “She’s a
professional
witch. An
expert.”

“Listen here, sugar pie,” Enchantress Le Fay said, fastening a plastic wart to her cheek. “Not even a real witch could stop me from making a killing tonight. Stick around, you may learn something.”

Wait a minute.

A real witch. A professional. An expert.

B checked the time once more. Six o’clock.

Showtime.

It was now or never, even if Dawn’s honesty potion had gone up the wrong nose. Time to show George, and the whole town, what a so-called enchantress’s curses were worth.

Of course!
she thought.
I still have my magic. There must be something I can do.

The announcer poked his handlebar mustache through the curtain. “It’s time to roll. Got a full house tonight.”

Le Fay looked at her watch. “Eeeek!” she cried, shaking her wrist. “Lousy batteries! This says I’ve got fifteen more minutes.”

The announcer shook his head. “Six-oh-two right now.”

Jason and Le Fay began racing around like bumper cars, colliding in their haste to get ready.

“Well,” B said nonchalantly, “since there’s no way I can outwit a professional, expert witch, I guess I’ll just go out in the audience and watch the show.”

Jason and Le Fay were too frantic to answer.

“Good luck,” B said. Under her breath she added, “You’re going to need it.”