The Emerald Atlas Read Online Free PDF Page B

mystery. They were barely inside the front door when she’d scuttled up, scolding them for being late.
    “Took our time getting here, didn’t we? Perhaps the young ladies and gentleman were expecting a carriage with four prancing horses, is that it? Chocolates and cake to eat on the ride?” She wore an old red sweater with holes in the elbows and men’s work shoes with no socks. Her gray hair was covered by a knitted cap. Without waiting for them to speak, she’d grabbed Kate’s and Emma’s bags.
    “I’ve made dinner. I doubt it will be up to the gourmet standards of the King and Queens of France, but it will have to do. Chop off my head if you don’t like it; I’m past caring. This way, Your Highnesses.”
    They ate at a wooden table in the kitchen. Miss Sallow shuffled around, banging pots and pans and muttering about various character flaws the children shared with the French royal family. But even so, Miss Sallow served them the best meal they’d had in years. Roast chicken, potatoes, a very small amount of green beans, warm rice pudding. If the price for eating like this was being called the King and Queens of France, then Kate, Michael, and Emma were happy to pay it.
    When they had eaten all they possibly could, Miss Sallow yelled, “Abraham!” and a few moments later, the old man limped into the kitchen.
    “So they’ve had their dinner, then,” he said, looking at the clean plates and the glazed, sated expressions on the children’s faces.
    “Oh, you’re a sharp one, Abraham,” the old woman said. “Nothing gets by you now, does it?”
    “I was just making an observation, Miss Sallow.”
    “And thank the heavens for that, for where would the rest of us be without the benefit of your keen insights? Now, do you think you could show Their Royal Highnesses to their chamber or do you have more enlightening observations you need to impart?”
    “This way, young ’uns,” Abraham said.
    He led them up four different staircases and along dark, crooked corridors. The light in his gas lamp wobbled as he limped. Emma leaned heavily on Kate, and Michael, already half asleep, walked into two different tables, one lamp, and a stuffed bear. Once in their bedroom, Abraham built up a fire large enough to burn through the night.
    “Now you listen to me,” he warned, “and don’t be wandering about these halls at night. They’ll twist you about so you can’t find your own nose and you have to cry for Miss Sallow to come get you, and then, young ’uns, you’ll have wished you’d stayed lost.”
    He started out, then paused and came back.
    “I almost forgot. I brought you this.”
    He took an old black-and-white photograph out of his pocket and handed it to Kate. It showed a wide lake and, in the distance, the chimney-peaked roofs of houses rising above the trees. She passed it to Michael, who, without opening his eyes, slid it between the pages of his notebook.
    “I took that near fifteen years ago. Remember the gorge we drove along? Used to be there was a dam on it; plugged up the river and made a lake stretching from the big house here to the village.”
    “A dam?” Michael yawned. “Why’d the town need a dam?”
    “Boring,” Emma mumbled, and rolled toward the window.
    Abraham went on, undeterred: “Why, so’s to build a canal to the lower valley. Cambridge Falls made its bones in mining, pulling ore out a’ them mountains. That’s all done with now, but time was, this was a different place—a decent place. Men had work. Folks were neighborly. There was trees covering the hillsides. Children—” He stopped himself.
    “What about the children?” Kate asked.
    And suddenly, despite her fatigue, it occurred to her that while passing through the village, they had not seen a single child.
    Abraham waved his hand as if brushing the question aside. “Nothing. It’s late and me old brain’s muddled. That photo’s just to know your new home wasn’t always the benighted and bedeviled place