"Who Could That Be at This Hour?" (All the Wrong Questions) (9 page)

“That was quite a stunt,” she said. “Where did you learn to fall into a tree like that?”

“I’ve had an unusual education,” I said.

“Did they teach you how to get down?”

“The best way is to wait for someone with a ladder.”

“Someone?” she repeated. “Who, exactly?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t know her name.”

“Hello,” she said, “I’m Ellington Feint,” and I sat up to get a better look at her. It was not so
dark that I couldn’t see her strange, curved eyebrows, each one coiled over like a question mark. Green eyes she had, and hair so black it made the night look pale. She had long fingers, with nails just as black, and they poked out of a black shirt with long, smooth sleeves. And right before she started climbing down the ladder, I saw her smile, shadowy in the moonlight. It was a smile that might have meant anything. She was a little older than me, or maybe just a little taller. I followed her down.

When I reached the ground, Ellington Feint looked me over and then brushed a few leaves from my collar before offering her hand. The statue felt solid against my chest, and my hands were a little raw from the hawser. I could not see Theodora above me. It was possible she did not even know I was no longer behind her. “You haven’t told me your name,” Ellington said.

I shook her hand and told her.

“Lemony Snicket,” she repeated. “Well, follow
me, Mr. Snicket. I live in that white cottage you passed over. You can rest there from your flight.”

She led the way through the trees to the cottage I had seen from the road and from the hawser. Curiously, it looked even smaller now that we were close up, with a few windows here and there and a creaky-looking door and a white brick chimney puffing gray smoke into the night. A small arch over the door read HANDKERCHIEF HEIGHTS in faded letters. “They say a washerwoman used to live here,” Ellington said when she saw me looking at the sign. “She used to hang handkerchiefs out to dry in the backyard, and that gave the cottage its name.”

“Who lives here now?” I asked.

“Just me,” she said, and opened the door. The cottage was no more than one small room, and most of that room appeared to be a fireplace with a colorful fire lighting every corner. The crackles of the fire mixed with music in the room, music I’d never heard and liked very
much. There was a small cot in the far corner, with some rumpled blankets and pillows, and a large striped suitcase open on the floor, with all sorts of clothing tossed all sorts of ways. I spotted a long, fancy evening gown, some heavy hiking boots, an apron that a chef might wear, a red wig, a long, zippered green tube that might have been a purse, and two small hats I’d seen on the heads of Frenchmen in old photographs, both dirty, both worn, and both the color of a raspberry. In the opposite corner were a small sink and a short wooden table, completely bare, with one stool tucked under it. Sitting on a windowsill was a dented pair of binoculars, and on the floor in the center of the room was a small box with a crank on its side and a funnel on top. It took me a moment to realize that it was an old-fashioned record player, with the music I had never heard before winding out of the funnel. The music sounded interesting and complicated, and I wanted to ask the name of the tune. There
were no books in the room as far as I could see. I should have known better.

“Have a seat,” Ellington said to me, gesturing to the stool. “I’ll make us some coffee. That should be restorative.”

“
Coffee
?” I said, my voice louder and higher than I had planned. “I don’t drink coffee.”

“What do you drink?”

“Water,” I said. “Tea. Milk sometimes. Orange juice in the morning. Root beer if I can find it.”

“But not coffee?”

“People our age don’t usually drink coffee,” I said.

“Nor do they usually drop into trees,” Ellington said. “I guess we’ve both had unusual educations.”

I pulled out the stool and sat down, and Ellington busied herself at the sink with a metal coffeepot, rinsing it out and then filling it with water before adding several scoops of ground
coffee from a paper bag stenciled with the shadow of a black cat. “Black Cat Coffee,” she told me. “Corner of Caravan and Parfait. It’s one of the last businesses left in Stain’d-by-the-Sea, and one of the only reasons I venture into town at all.” She sighed. “Mostly I stay right here.”

“And what do you do here?” I asked.

She gave me a small smile. “You first,” she said. “Why are you flying through the air in the middle of the night?”

I reached into my vest and put down the Bombinating Beast on the table, a little too hard so it made a loud
thunk
. Ellington glanced at it briefly and then reached for a pair of creaky iron tongs, used for moving burning logs around in a fireplace. She used the tongs to pick up the coffeepot and then held it over the flames before looking back at me.

“What is that?” she asked. “Some kind of toy?”

I took a long, close look at the statue for the
first time. The Bombinating Beast still looked like a sea horse, if a sea horse could be a nasty, frightening animal. The eyes of the statue were actually small holes, as was the mouth, with its lips drawn back and the tiny, sharp teeth making thin lines over the hole. The entire statue was hollow, I realized, and for a moment I wondered if it had been carved to fit over a candle, so that the fire might shine through the eyes and mouth to create an eerie effect. I turned it over to look at the base of the statue, which had a strange slit cut into the wood. There was a small, thick piece of paper pasted over the slit like a patch. The paper patch felt curious to the touch, like the paper wrappings on cookies in the bakery. I shook the statue to see if there was anything inside, but it did not make a sound. “I don’t know what it is,” I said finally. “I’ve been told it’s worth a lot of money.”

“And someone’s going to give you this money,”
she asked me, “in return for your stealing it?”

“Something like that,” I said, remembering my promises.

“Then why did you drop into a tree?”

“Something was going wrong,” I said.

“What was going wrong?”

“You’d know better than I would,” I said. “You were watching me the whole time.”

The coffeepot began to gurgle, and Ellington removed it from the fireplace and set it down, bubbling, on the table before fetching two cups and two saucers from a rack next to the sink. She poured two cups of coffee and let them steam in front of us for a moment on the table. The steam lingered in the air along with the odd, jumpy music. It was dark out the window, but I knew had it been daytime that we would have had a wide view of the Clusterous Forest. Ellington grabbed a pillow from the cot and knelt on the floor before replying.

“How did you know I was watching?” she asked quietly.

“I saw something glinting at me from the window of the cottage,” I said, “right where those binoculars are sitting. You were watching me and my associate on the hawser. Why?”

“I’ve been watching this area for days,” she said, and took a sip of her coffee. I left mine alone. It wasn’t that I thought she had slipped laudanum into it. It was simply that I didn’t like coffee. I didn’t even like the way it smelled, dark and earthy like soil, but Ellington smiled a little as she sipped.

“What are you looking for?” I asked, and pointed to the Bombinating Beast. “This?”

She put down her coffee and smirked at the statue. The statue frowned back in reply. “I’m looking for something much more important than some silly statue,” she said. “I’m looking for my father.”

“What happened to him?”

She stood up. “Somebody took him—some terrible man. My father and I lived together in Killdeer Fields, a town farther up the road a ways.”

“I’ve heard of it.”

“It’s a nice enough place,” Ellington said, “although something was going on that was bothering my father, I could tell. And then one day I came home from school and he wasn’t there. He wasn’t there by dinnertime, and he wasn’t there by bedtime, and in the morning a man called with a fearsome voice. He introduced himself as Hangfire and told me I’d never see my father again. That was six months ago. I’ve been looking the whole time, and I’m beginning to believe that what Hangfire told me was the truth.” She walked to the cot and reached under it to show me an enormous, messy pile of notebooks, newspapers, envelopes, and parcels. “This is what I do,” she said. “I’ve been following any lead I can find. I’ve interviewed dozens of people. I’ve checked on hundreds of rumors. I’ve written
letters and telegrams, made phone calls, and knocked on doors. I’ve sent countless packages to people he knew, most of whom left Killdeer Fields after the flood. I send photographs of my father, copies of articles he’s written, anything that might help people tell me where he is. A while ago I heard that Hangfire was hiding out here in Stain’d-by-the-Sea.”

“He chose a good location. With so many abandoned buildings, this town is full of hiding places.”

“Yes, I know. I’ve been living in this cottage ever since, hoping for a glimpse of him. If I find Hangfire, I know I’ll find my father.”

“But this Hangfire person wouldn’t just give him back to you.”

“No.”

“So what will you do then?”

“Anything and everything,” she told me, and it made me shiver a bit. She’d thought about her
answer. She hadn’t just said it, the way most people said most things.

“Why would Hangfire kidnap your father?” I asked her.

“That’s the most mysterious part of all,” Ellington said, and poured herself more coffee. “My father never hurt anyone. He’s a kind, quiet man.” Two tears rolled out of her eyes, and she brushed them away with her smooth black sleeve. “And he’s a wonderful father. I’ve got to find him, Mr. Snicket. Will you help me?”

I had fallen out of one mystery and into another, and perhaps that was why I made another promise, this one as foolish and wrong as all the others. “I’ll help you,” I said. “I promise. But not tonight. Right now I have to leave. Thanks for the coffee.”

“You didn’t drink any.”

“I told you I don’t drink coffee,” I said. “But come find me tomorrow and we can work
together. I’m staying at the Lost Arms with my associate, S. Theodora Markson.”

“What’s the
S
stand for?” she asked, but then there was a knock at the door. The clock above the fireplace told me it was close to two in the morning. Ellington looked at me and asked the question that is printed on the cover of this book. It was the wrong question, both when she asked it and later, when I asked it myself. The right question in this case was “What was happening while I was answering the door?” but when the hinges stopped creaking, I was thinking only of the Officers Mitchum, who were standing there with matching stern eyes.

“Aren’t you that Snicket lad?” Harvey Mitchum barked at me while Mimi Mitchum barked, “What are you doing here?”

I replied “yes” to the first question and “visiting a friend” to the second.

“What sort of young man visits friends in
the middle of the night?” asked the male officer suspiciously, sniffing the air and frowning.

“What sort of hanky-panky are you up to?” asked his wife.

I replied “a friendly one” and “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” but I could tell these were the wrong answers.

“We need to talk to you, Snicket,” Harvey Mitchum said. “There have been reports of a burglary. Somebody stole a very valuable statue in the shape of a mythical beast. Do you know anything about that?”

“I’ve always been interested in mythology,” I said.

“That’s not what I mean!” he snapped. “Your chaperone was hanging on the hawser and refused to tell us why.”

“It’s still too early to make assumptions,” Mimi Mitchum said, “but it wouldn’t be surprising if she’s as big a criminal as you are, Snicket.”

“I’d say she’s a bigger criminal,” her husband said.

“No, he is.”

“She is.”

“We can settle this later,” Harvey Mitchum said with an annoyed look. “Right now we’re going to search the premises for this valuable statue.”

“Don’t you need a warrant for that?” I asked.

“This isn’t the Clusterous Forest,” the female Officer Mitchum said, gesturing behind her back. “This is Stain’d-by-the-Sea, and we are the law here. Step aside, Snicket.”

I stepped aside, but not before looking behind me and seeing with relief that the Bombinating Beast was not in plain sight on the table. Instead, Ellington Feint was in plain sight, holding her envelopes and parcels in an awkward pile in her arms.

“Good evening, Officers,” she said.

“It’s not
good evening
,” Harvey Mitchum said sternly, “it’s
bad behavior
. You should follow the example of my boy, Stewie. He knows better than to stay up late. That’s why he’s sleeping in the car right now.”

“It keeps him calm,” said Mimi.

“And alert,” said Harvey.

“And good looking,” added his mother.

“That’s true,” the male officer said. “Stew Mitchum is as cute as a button.”

I tried to think of buttons I’d seen that liked to torture small animals, but I couldn’t.

“Mr. Snicket,” Ellington said quickly, “will you help me with these parcels?”

I took a step toward her. “Of course, Ms. Feint.”

She smiled at the Mitchums. “Mr. Snicket and I were just about to take a walk to the mailbox to deliver these things.”

“Wait until our search is over,” Harvey
Mitchum said, “and we’ll drive you there ourselves.”

“Young people shouldn’t be out at this hour,” Mimi Mitchum said. “The Bombinating Beast might get you.”

“That’s a myth,” I said.

“Ignore the bell and you’ll find out,” the male Mitchum said, and brushed past me to peer around the cottage. Ellington hefted a parcel into my hands that was about the size of a milk bottle. It was wrapped in newspaper, and I saw she’d hurriedly put a few stamps on it and scrawled an address:

S. THEODORA MARKSON

THE LOST ARMS

STAIN’D-BY-THE-SEA

The officers began rifling through Ellington’s things, and she and I stood at the doorstep of the
cottage. “Why didn’t you address the package to me?” I whispered to her.