Hunting Midnight Read Online Free PDF

Olive Tree Sisters. They were then halfway into their sixth decade. If asked, however, I would have sworn that they must have been over seventy, since their gray hair and puckered faces indicated to my youthful eyes a withering decrepitude.
    Luna and Graça were renowned throughout the city for the lifelike beauty of the wax fruit they molded. Their likenesses were so precise, in fact, it was rumored that our mad-as-a-hatter Queen Maria, while on a visit to Porto before my birth, had taken an ill-advised bite of one of their sunset-colored peaches. As I have it on good authority that the Queen’s brown teeth were as precarious in her mouth as tortoiseshell buttons on a ragseller’s waistcoat, this must have meant a shattering end to several.
    Standing outside the Olive Tree Sisters’ home, I tapped the lion’s-head knocker against their door. I had not considered the ungodly time – no more than half an hour past sunrise. And even worse, I’d disobeyed my parents by sneaking out, as I was forbidden from leaving our home while they were both asleep. But I was optimistic that I could complete my mission without their finding out – an indication of just how far afield Daniel’s friendship had already led me.
    Luna peered down from an upstairs window, her head crowned by a scarlet nightcap with a woolen ball tassel. Considering me a figment of the early-morning mist, her gray-green eyes blinked. “John? Is that you, lad?”
    I confirmed it was and she shouted, “Codfish cakes! What are you doing here at this hour? What’s wrong?”
    I started to explain, but my excitement left me tongue-tied.
    “I’m coming down, John. Don’t move or I’ll flatten you!” she said, pointing a stern finger at me.
    I was too much of an imp to heed her request and after only a few seconds knocked again, far harder. Placing my ear to the door, I heard her say, “That wee son of a bitch knows nothing of the pains in this old body.”
    I wasn’t offended; Luna was renowned for speaking like a stevedore. She opened the door, frowning. “You are a most impatient little devil!” she declared.
    “I’m sorry, Senhora Luna, but … but I need your help.”
    Luna’s wiry gray hair was clipped short and she was wearing several slender gold necklaces and earrings of filigree six-pointed stars, which made her look, I thought, beautiful.
    “John,” she said in a grave whisper, “is something wrong – is your mama or papa ill?” She was convinced that only tragedy could have brought me here so early.
    “I need paints,” I replied.
    She turned and looked behind her, as though I might have been addressing someone else.
    “You woke me at this hour for paints? Are you mad, child?” she shrieked.
    “I promised Daniel I’d get paints.”
    “Who in God’s name is Daniel?”
    Before I had time to answer, she breathed in stiffly and muttered, “Oh, never mind, lad.” Grabbing my arm, she dragged me into their sitting room like a hooked fish. Though tiny, she was powerful, with the great knobby hands of a peasant. I had once seen her crush a walnut between her palms – afterward , she told me that all artists need strong fingers in order to strangle their doubts.
    She waddled to the base of the stairs, her feet splayed like a duck. With no warning, she gave a deafening screech for her sister. “Graçinha! Move those bones, Sister. Someone left another surprise on our doorstep.”
    “You’re cleaning it this time, Little Sister,” Graça called down.
    “Too late – it’s in the house. We’ve a sorry spectacle here right on the rug.” She grinned at her prank.
    “What in God’s sweet name are you talking about, Little Sister?”
    After a moment, Graça appeared at the top of their stairs, her bony feet wedged into clogs. She was the taller of the two by nearly two inches, though she usually described herself as “a full hand closer to God” to irritate Luna. She smiled more easily than her younger sister, and now, having