Secret of Light (16 page)

“Hey!” The worker driving the Cat jumped out and walked over to Darrell and Conrad. “Were you just in the lighthouse?”

“No —” Darrell began, but Conrad shouted over her voice.

“She was too.” He grabbed her roughly by the arm. “I was just watching you guys work and I saw someone walking around upstairs in the lighthouse. I went to check it out and she and her stupid dog were inside.”

“There's no need for that,” said the worker, and brushed Conrad's hand off Darrell's arm. He turned to Darrell, his tone serious. “If you were inside the lighthouse, then you were trespassing. Where do you live?”

“In Vancouver,” Darrell answered. “But I go to Eagle Glen School.” She turned her back on Conrad. “I was just taking my dog for a walk,” she said to the worker. “I saw all the construction stuff, but I didn't see any ‘No Trespassing' signs.”

“Ha! What about the ‘Private Property' sign on the lighthouse?” Conrad sneered. “Missed that while you were climbing under the chain, I guess?”

“There's no call for that, either.” The worker frowned at Conrad. “I think you both need to come with me.” They walked along the sand in silence for a few moments until the worker hailed one of the men with equipment.

“Frank! Can you take these kids up to the school? They shouldn't be anywhere near here while all this work is going on.” The other worker nodded and walked over.

Darrell looked up and her mouth dropped open. “Uncle Frank!”

“In trouble again, eh?” Frank grinned with the smile that was so much like her own and gave her a hug. He turned to the workman who had brought them from the lighthouse. “I'll take 'em up, Joe. Thanks.”

The other worker shrugged and returned to his job.

Frank put out his hand. “Frank Del'Amico. I'm Darrell's uncle, as you might have guessed.”

Conrad looked at the hand, scowling. “Yeah, well, your niece is in big trouble. She was hanging around the lighthouse, and that's trespassing.”

“Oh yeah?” Frank withdrew his hand and raised his eyebrows at Darrell. He looked back at Conrad. “And what were you doing down there — picking flowers?”

Conrad stuck his hands in his pockets. “I was just out for a walk, minding my own business. I saw somebody messing around in the lighthouse, so I went to check it out. It's not me in trouble, it's her.”

“Well, buddy,” said Frank, slapping Conrad a little too firmly on the back. “You did a good job. The criminal's been caught and you can head off on your — walk.” He grinned and winked at Darrell as Conrad stalked off. “Just make sure you stay off this end of the beach!” he called and turned to his niece. “Nice friends you've got at this school.”

Darrell hugged her uncle again. “He's no friend of mine. What are you doing here? Are you working on this job?”

“Yeah, my construction company got the bid to build the new light standard.” He slung his arm over her shoulder as they walked toward the path. “I was happy to come down here and have a chance to say hello. So I get here, and what do I find? My favourite niece getting herself into trouble.” He grinned and tilted his helmet back on his head. His hair was the same shade of brown as Darrell's, though curlier.

“I'm your
only
niece,” she muttered. “But what do you mean construction of the light? I thought they were knocking it down?”

“Oh, they're demolishing the old thing all right,” Frank said, puffing a little as he hiked the winding path in his heavy boots. “They're going to replace it with a light
on a tower — kind of like a light standard, but a lot higher. Doesn't need as much maintenance. Just gotta change the bulb once in a while.” He paused and leaned heavily on a branch of the old arbutus in the garden while he wiped the perspiration off his brow. “They'll take the old one down as soon as the new one is up and running.”

“That makes sense, I guess,” said Darrell, and yawned hugely.

“Well, honey, I have to get back to work now. You look like you could use a nap, anyway. What's the matter? Your mom drop you off here at the crack of dawn or something?”

Darrell nodded and remembered the secret in her back pocket. “Yeah, we were here pretty early,” she agreed. “Maybe I'll go have a little rest.”

“Great idea. I'm staying in some little hotel up the highway while I'm on this site, so maybe I can take you out for dinner one night this week.”

“Oh — yeah.”
I don't have time!
Everything in her rebelled at the thought, but she managed a smile. “I'd — uh — like that a lot.”

“Geez, you
must
be tired, kid. Don't think I've ever heard you less enthusiastic about an invitation to eat.”

Darrell swallowed another yawn and squeezed her uncle's hand. “G'night, Uncle Frank — I mean, goodbye.”

He shook his head and waved. “See you soon, kiddo.”

The next morning, Darrell pulled herself up in her bed and slowly donned her prosthesis, looking carefully at it for what seemed the first time. The top was custom fitted to support her knee and was the latest in lightweight comfort. The foot had a dynamic response and could be adjusted so that she could walk or run with comparative ease. Darrell ran her fingers over the material and thought of the heavy grain of the carved wooden leg she'd worn in Florence.

She reached into the drawer by her bed, pulled out Leonardo's notebook, and slipped it into her backpack. Her leg and the notebook. Something new and something old. And nothing that she understood.

The first bell rang out and she hurried to the door, neatly avoiding conversation with the red-headed spectre that was rising out of Kate's bed.

Darrell turned the slim volume over in her hands. The pages smelled old and strange. After seeing Uncle Frank, she had dropped into her bed and slept until Lily arrived and shook her awake that afternoon. Kate had come in soon after, and the three of them had gone down to meet Brodie and Paris in the dining hall. Darrell had felt muddle-headed and still tired from her long, strange day. She said little, ate her dinner, and returned to her room. The crush of students in the halls between classes had meant she couldn't find a moment of private time, and Kate and Lily's discussion of the upcoming Renaissance fair went on late into the night. She decided to skip the twenty-minute tutorial period after breakfast to sneak up to a quiet carrel in the library.

Darrell had slipped the notebook into a plastic bag for protection, and now, at her desk in the library, she unwrapped it carefully. She set it gently on the table beside a larger book pulled from the library shelves. Inside the front cover, the first page was blank, except for a name written backwards:

The pages beneath her fingers reminded Darrell a little of her own notebooks: filled with jottings, scrawls, and a multitude of sketches in various stages of completion. The strange mirror writing ran throughout the book. When Darrell slipped her pocket mirror out of her
pack, her fears were confirmed. At Eagle Glen, at least, her ability to read Italian script was limited to Leonardo's name on the front page.
This won't be a problem
.
There are tons of translation services on the Internet. I may not get all of it, but I'll be able to find out the general ideas
.

With shaking fingers she flipped the pages and looked at the final sketch. It was a complicated machine with many gears, levers, and what appeared to be a sort of helicopter wing on the top.

“This has to be it,” she muttered aloud. “Now I just need to find out how it works.”

She dragged her attention to the larger library book and pored through the index, determined to find what she was looking for. Absorbed in the words from the library book, she clutched Leonardo's notebook tightly in her lap and hardly noticed her hands were trembling.

Night fell earlier as the term wore on, and it was particularly black outside the study room windows as Darrell sat at a table, absorbed in her research. She had ignored Kate's puzzled frown when Darrell had declined to sit together and pulled her chair into a quiet corner away from the other students. Delaney lay curled on the floor to one side and twitched in his sleep. He was dreaming:

waves crashing wind blowing fur
free free free free free
run fast splash paws move run run

small speck small shape small blur far far far
good girl good girl run
wet wet splash sand toes gritty good gritty

Watching the dog sleep, Darrell saw his eyes darting under their lids and smiled as his feet twitched and pedalled.
Chasing rabbits
. She turned back to her work.

But Delaney was not chasing rabbits.

bright hot sand sun run wind run run
scent girl light girl good girl good
dark light grey silver
snuffle leg warm hands gentle girl good
***YELP*** pain pain bite scratch rend hurt hurt
snap bite no no no not girl not girl
snap snarl pain no no bite snap pain
not girl
blood smell pain rocks bite stick bite pain
boy boy hurt pain boy bad pain rocks sticks
sore back teeth sore pain blood stick smell boy
teeth hurt snap whimper...

“Delaney!” Darrell rubbed her hand along the dog's back and his agitated pedalling slowed.

no pain girl girl blood gone
girl there girl pat pat pat no pain
gone bad gone boy gone long gone
girl here good dog girl good dog del aaa nee

“It's only a dream, boy.”

He didn't have bad dreams very often, but this one must have been a nightmare, as for a moment he had whimpered and cowered under the touch of her hand. Now he looked up, tail thumping, paw on her foot.

“Hey, keep your dog quiet! We're trying to get some work done over here.”

Darrell looked up to see Conrad glaring at her from his table near the door. He was sitting with Paris, and they had a few books open on their table. Darrell could see illustrations of medieval and renaissance instruments.

Paris spoke up. “He's okay, Conrad. It's not bothering anyone.”

“Well it's bugging me, so keep him quiet or I'll throw him outside.”

Darrell scowled back at Conrad and refused to answer. She reached down and tousled Delaney's furry head before turning back to her work. The dog curled up in a ball once again, this time pushed up tightly against her foot. For another moment, one eye stayed open and he gave a final brief thump with his tail on the floor. Darrell lifted her pen, and his eye slowly closed as he slept soundly once more against the safety of her body.

“Find anything?”

Darrell jumped. “You startled me!”

“Sorry.” Kate sat down at the table and reached to pat Delaney as he slept. “So what have you got so far?”

“Uh...” Darrell felt her face go red and she closed her book. “Not much actually.”

“Darrell! This is a group project!” Kate's voice dropped to a whisper. “I mean, you're doing Renaissance clothing. How hard can that be? Just write a list of all the
clothes you can remember with a short description so the kids in the design class have something to go on when they start sewing the costumes.”

Darrell nodded. “Yeah — yeah. I'll work on it as soon as I can.”

“I've got a great idea for a game already,” said Kate. “I found a site on the Internet that shows how bobbing for apples was common in the Renaissance, so I'm going to set it up as one of the stations.” Kate looked at Darrell's notebook, closed on the table. “What
are
you working on, if it's not the clothing?”

“It's nothing. I'm — I'm just finishing my math.” Darrell bit her lip to stop from snapping.

“Darrell, we had time in class to finish that. Come and sit over at our table. This is supposed to be a group project, remember?”

“No!” Darrell's temper exploded and suddenly the room was quiet as all heads turned to look at her. “I've got to get this stuff done, okay? I promised you I'd finish the group project stuff later and I will, but
not right now
!”

Kate raised her eyebrows and backed away. “Geez, Darrell, sorry I asked.” She walked back to her seat. “She's too busy for us right now,” she said sarcastically, but Darrell caught the worried glance passing between Kate and Brodie.

I don't care.
She opened her notes again.
I know there's an answer. I'll just have to keep looking.

Two-thirty in the morning is a terrible time. Especially when it was five hours away from an exam you hadn't begun to study for yet
and
you still had an assignment to finish first. The December sky was black, low clouds obscuring stars and moon. The air in the room felt heavy and cold. Darrell glanced from the darkness outside her window to the clock on her end table and felt something akin to despair.