Christmas Chiller Read online

  We strolled out, trying to look unconcerned, but we were on full alert. Again, nothing. But the feeling persisted all the way home, and I found myself glancing at the reflections in shop windows, trying to see if anyone was behind us.

  Stacey kept a sharp lookout too. Nada. Nothing.

  Finally we got on the elevator in Mr. McGill’s apartment building. We were so busy staring out through the closing doors that we didn’t notice the control panel until Stacey reached out to push the button for our floor.

  She jerked her gloved hand back with a shriek. “Oh! Oh!”

  I gasped, grabbing her arm and pulling her away as the doors hissed shut and the elevator began to rise.

  The control panel of the elevator was covered with dripping red blood. We stared in horror as the elevator went up, up, up and the blood went drip, drip, drip.

  “It can’t be,” Stacey said in a hollow voice. “Not really.”

  I swallowed hard. “You’re right. It’s probably, it’s probably …” I let my words trail off, stumped. Then I said, “Well, whatever it is, we’ll call the doorman and tell him about it when we get to your father’s apartment.”

  “Right,” Stacey said. “Good idea. And I’m going to throw these gloves away.”

  The doors opened. I half expected to see a maniac lurking in the hall.

  We didn’t. As we stepped out of the elevator, Stacey used her clean glove to yank off her red-smeared one. She dropped them into the small garbage can next to the elevator.

  We walked down the hall and turned the corner — and stopped.

  More blood.

  I gasped. Stacey clutched my arm. I clutched her arm. We stared at the red splash on the floor by Stacey’s door.

  “It’s paint,” I said at last, with a conviction I didn’t feel.

  “Yeah,” said Stacey, sounding about as convincing as I did. “Has to be.”

  We edged around it and stopped again. For some reason, the little square of white paper propped against Stacey’s door looked menacing, too white near all that gory red.

  “A note,” I said. I tried to make my voice unconcerned. “I hope the neighbors aren’t complaining that we play music too loud when your father’s not home.”

  Stacey picked up the note and read it. Her cheeks seemed to grow paler.

  “Stace? What is it?”

  “Hardly a work of art,” she said. She handed the note to me. Printed on it in big, black letters were the words: YOUR TIME IS UP.

  I had a funny feeling on my neck, that same funny feeling that I had had in the coffee bar. I whirled around, but the hall was empty.

  “What do you think it means?” asked Stacey.

  “I think it means we should get out of here. Fast.” I grabbed Stacey’s arm and dragged her toward the stairs. “And not by elevator.”

  We pounded down the stairs and burst into the lobby. Carl the doorman spun around.

  “Whoa,” he said. “Where’s the fire?”

  “No fire,” Stacey gasped. “This.” She thrust the note into his hand.

  He read it slowly. He pushed his cap back and scratched his head. “That’s not a love letter, is it?” he said at last. “Where’d you find this?”

  “Propped against our front door,” Stacey said.

  “Has anyone come to visit the McGills today?” I asked.

  Carl shook his head. “No. No one. And I’ve been on shift since you left this morning.”

  “What about deliveries?” Stacey said. “Any delivery people?”

  “Only the guy from the deli around the corner, for Apartment 6R, and he comes almost every day. He wouldn’t do something like this. I just don’t understand it.”

  Stacey said, “Someone also left red stuff all over the elevator and in our hall.”

  “It looks like blood,” I added.

  Carl blinked. “What? What?”

  He practically pushed us to one side to reach the elevator. He bent forward and sniffed the air near the red gore. “Chemical,” he said. “Paint, maybe, although it’s awfully thick for paint. I’ll have this cleaned up right away. I don’t know when it could have happened. But first I’m going to see that you girls get back to your apartment safely.”

  Carl rode back upstairs with us and escorted us into the McGill apartment. He insisted on checking every closet and cabinet and even under the beds.

  Stacey and I didn’t protest. I was pretty grateful, actually. As he left, Carl said, “You have my number downstairs. Call me if you need anything, do you hear?”

  “We will,” Stacey assured him. “Thanks, Carl.”

  We stood for a moment in the empty apartment. It was very quiet. Too quiet.

  “Let’s watch a movie,” I said loudly. “We can do that until your father comes home.”

  “Good idea,” said Stacey with the same sort of forced enthusiasm.

  We popped the old movie Fame into the VCR and sat on the sofa, facing the door. For a while, we jumped at every sound. Then the movie became interesting. (We’ve seen it a million times and it never fails us.)

  We’d just reached the scene in which the characters go on a date to see The Rocky Horror Picture Show when Stacey said, “What’s that?”

  “What’s what?” I asked.

  Stacey hit the pause button. “That noise. I heard noise. From the front door.”

  I froze. Then I heard it too. Or I thought I did.

  “Start the tape again,” I whispered. Stacey nodded. Under the cover of the movie soundtrack, we crept toward the door. Cautiously, slowly, Stacey peered through the peephole.

  “Nothing,” she breathed. “I don’t see anything.”

  I pushed in beside her and peered out. All I saw was the hallway, weirdly distorted by the peephole.

  “I’m going to call Carl,” said Stacey. “I don’t care if it is nothing.”

  Carl came up right away. When he knocked on the door, we both jumped, even though we knew it had to be him. And we both checked him out through the peephole before we opened the door.

  “You did hear something, I guess,” he said. “Someone leaving you this.” He held out his hands. In it was a medium-sized cardboard box.

  “Oh,” said Stacey. “How did it get there?”

  Carl shook his head. “I don’t know. A couple of people have come home but no deliveries have arrived.”

  “Maybe it’s from a neighbor,” said Stacey.

  “You want me to stay while you open it?” Carl asked. He grinned and winked. “Just in case?”

  Stacey managed a laugh. “I don’t think it’s a bomb or anything. Thanks again, though.”

  “No problem,” said Carl.

  We took the box back inside and put it on the coffee table. Absently, I picked up the remote and turned off Fame.

  We stared at the box.

  Then I said, “Well, nothing ventured, nothing gained.” I reached out and picked up the box. I shook it gently. It wasn’t very heavy. Nothing moved inside.

  Gingerly I pried open the top. Stacey and I peered inside.

  “It’s some kind of a box — or ornament? A Christmas tree ornament?” said Stacey.

  “Maybe,” I said.

  I lifted the brightly painted box out. It looked like a kid’s building block, only bigger. It had been carefully decorated with abstract designs in bright blobs of color, but the artwork overall was crude. I bent over to examine it more closely.

  Without warning, the top of the box popped off. A tiny creature flew out at me. Stacey and I both leaped back, screaming. I dropped the box and it tumbled to the floor.

  Then Stacey started to laugh, shakily. “Look. Look at what scared us! It’s just a jack-in-the-box.”

  It was. I bent over to pick it up. “You’re right, Stace. Boy, do I feel like a dope. I — Stacey!”

  “What? What is it?”

  I stared speechlessly at the face of the jack-in-the-box. It was a face I recognized all too well.

  Pasted over the jack’s face was a photograph
of Stacey.

  “I’m stuck! I’m stuck! Let go of my wing!” the angel cried.

  Since the angel was Jackie Rodowsky, it was no surprise that he was stuck. And it wasn’t much of a surprise that he was stuck in the choir loft, dangling both feet off the side just above the floor. Fortunately, the choir loft is only a couple of feet higher than the rest of the church.

  I hurried to him and reached up to clasp Jackie around the waist. It wasn’t his wing that was stuck but his robe. If it had been his wing, the wing would have ripped and Jackie would have plummeted to the floor in a very unangellike way.

  “Jackie,” I said as I freed him, “what are you doing in your costume?”

  “It was ready, so I tried it on,” he explained. I set him on the floor.

  “Are the wings broken?” he asked anxiously.

  “No. Take off the costume and put it back in the closet before something does happen to it, though, okay? We’re not going to wear our costumes until the dress rehearsal.”

  “I know,” said Jackie. He grinned, and I couldn’t help but grin back. The BSC members have dubbed Jackie “the Walking Disaster” because he lands in some kind of trouble wherever he goes. But with his red hair and freckles and big “I’ll-try-anything” smile, he wins everyone over. We all love him, but we do wear our oldest clothes around him because we never know what is going to happen next.

  Jackie trotted away, his big silver cardboard wings flapping gently.

  “Jackie,” I said.

  He turned.

  “What were you doing up in the choir loft?”

  “Angels are supposed to fly,” he said. “I thought I’d practice flying out of the choir loft.”

  “No! Angels do not fly out of choir lofts,” I said firmly. “Or anywhere else in this church, okay?”

  “Oh, okay.”

  A hand pulled on mine. I looked down to see Claire. Although this wasn’t the dress rehearsal for the pageant, she was holding her stuffed woolly lamb. She insisted on bringing the lamb, which she called Baba, to all the rehearsals, so “Baba can practice for the pageant, too.”

  “Will you hold Baba?” Claire asked. “I have to go to the bathroom.”

  “Doesn’t Baba have to go, too?”

  “No.”

  “Oh. Can’t you leave Baba on a pew?”

  “No! Someone might sit on her! Some of these shepherds are not very good at their jobs,” said Claire.

  Remembering the “lamb chop” incident at the earlier rehearsal (Mallory had told me about it) and seeing Claire’s lower lip poke out ominously, I said, “Okay, I’ll hold Baba.” I tucked the lamb under my arm.

  It had been a long rehearsal so far, but we were making progress. The angels were coming in on cue, Becca had remembered every single one of her lines, and the scenery was almost finished. I was beginning to feel a little excited, and I could tell that Mallory and the rest of the cast felt the same.

  Mrs. Boodle, the church choir leader and director of our pageant, stepped to the front of the church and held up her hands. “Okay, one more run-through for the Wise Men and Joseph and Mary. The rest of you can start getting ready to go home. And remember, the next rehearsal will be our dress rehearsal, so please be there and in costume!”

  I walked over to Mallory and said, “I’ll keep an eye on the kids for you while you do the run-through.”

  Mal was clutching a sheaf of pages with notes scribbled all over them. I knew it was the script. She gave me a grateful look. “Thanks,” she said.

  When Claire returned from the bathroom, she and Vanessa and I sat in the back of the church and watched as Adam, Byron, and Jordan marched up the aisle.

  “We are wise men from the east,” said Adam.

  “We have followed a certain star,” said Byron.

  “We seek a king,” said Jordan.

  “No king here, mate,” said Joseph, who was being played by eleven-year-old Ben Hobart.

  We all cracked up. Ben is from Australia and he often calls people “mate,” the way someone here in the United States might call another person “buddy.”

  Ben smiled sheepishly and pushed his glasses up his nose.

  Mallory pushed her glasses up and raised her eyebrows at Ben.

  Mrs. Boodle said, “Try that line again, would you, Ben?”

  “Righto.” He cleared his throat. “There is no king here. Just a baby.”

  After that, the rehearsal proceeded smoothly.

  Mallory joined us, with her brothers trailing behind her. “It’s looking good,” I said.

  “I think so,” said Mallory. “It really is fun, isn’t it?”

  “It is. I’m glad I let you talk me into helping out.”

  We were almost out of the church when Claire wailed, “Baba! Baba!”

  “Claire?” said Mal. “What is it?”

  “I forgot Baba!”

  “You just had her. You probably left her in a pew. We’ll go back and find her,” I said.

  We went back inside. But Baba wasn’t there.

  “Oh, dear! I fear … she’s the victim of a lambnap; it is indeed a mishap,” said Vanessa.

  If Claire hadn’t looked so horrified, I would have been impressed at Vanessa’s rhyming “lambnap” and “mishap.”

  “No, she isn’t,” said Mal. “Good grief, Vanessa!”

  “Sorry,” said Vanessa, realizing that she might have contributed to Claire’s clearly rising panic.

  Then Becca said, “There’s Baba!”

  She had fallen underneath the pew. Claire swooped down and grabbed the toy by the neck and crushed it to her chest. Her tears disappeared.

  We headed outside to look for one of the Pike-Mobiles. After Mrs. Pike had dropped everyone else off, she was going to take Mallory and me to the hospital to visit Mary Doe.

  * * *

  Mary was sitting up in bed and looking much better than the last time I’d seen her.

  “Mallory, Jessi, Mrs. Pike, hello,” she said in a soft voice.

  Mrs. Pike leaned forward and patted Mary’s hand reassuringly. “How are you doing?” she asked.

  “I’m fine. The doctors still aren’t sure exactly what caused the concussion, but they think I was knocked unconscious for a minute — not very long.”

  “Wow,” said Mallory. “I thought you had to hit your head really hard to get amnesia.”

  “Not always,” said Mary. “And it’s not always brought on by a blow to the head. Sometimes a traumatic experience can cause it.

  “But in this case, it was definitely a head injury.”

  “When will your memory come back?” I couldn’t help but ask.

  Mary shook her head. “The doctors don’t know. They said it usually returns fairly quickly.”

  Usually, I thought. But what if it didn’t?

  Surely someone must be looking for Mary. Even if she couldn’t remember who she was or where she came from, someone else would see her picture and know the answers. After all, she’d been in practically every newspaper and on the national news by now.

  “Well,” said Mrs. Pike, lifting the small suitcase she’d brought and setting it on the foot of the bed. “I thought that by now you might need a few things. And I just happened to have some old maternity clothes that I think would fit you, including nightgowns and robes.”

  Mary said, “Oh, thank you! It’ll be so much nicer than just wearing hospital clothes!”

  Mrs. Pike said mischievously, “And a lot less drafty!” They both laughed and so did Mallory and I, thinking about how hospital gowns tie in the back and are never quite big enough.

  “We thought we’d have your other clothes cleaned for you,” added Mrs. Pike.

  Mary flushed and said, “That’s so kind of you.”

  “Where are your clothes?” Mrs. Pike asked. “We’ll refill the suitcase with those. Here, Jessi, you put these things in that bottom drawer over there for Mary. Mallory, gather up the clothes we’re taking to be cleaned.”

  As we worked, Mrs. Pike a
nd Mary talked about babies. Mallory and I didn’t pay much attention to them. I’d heard it all before, after Mom had had Squirt, and of course Mal, with seven younger siblings, is very accustomed to it.

  We did learn that the doctors had told Mary they thought she was due to have her baby in about a month. “And the baby is healthy,” said Mary. “They said that my accident didn’t hurt it. I hope they’re right.”

  “I think they are,” said Mrs. Pike. “Babies are remarkably resilient, even before they are born. Why, I remember one time, when I was pregnant with the triplets —”

  “Triplets? You have triplets!” exclaimed Mary, looking startled.

  I grinned at the tone of her voice as I handed Mary’s sweater to Mal. Mallory checked the label inside the neck of the sweater and leaned toward me suddenly. “Look,” she said in a low voice.

  The label said, BABYBABY, DEL FLORES, CALIFORNIA.

  “Is that the store where the sweater was sold?” I whispered. “Or the manufacturer? If it’s the manufacturer, it could just mean that’s where the sweater was made before it was sent to stores all over the country.”

  “I know,” said Mal softly. “But still, it could be a clue.” She opened her backpack, took out a notebook, and carefully wrote the name into it.

  We checked all the other labels, too. But none were so distinct. I didn’t think that the fact that Mary had bought her jeans from The Gap was a major clue.

  When it was time to go, Mary said, “Oh, I wish you didn’t have to leave!”

  Mrs. Pike said, “Don’t worry. We’ll be back. Now, you rest.”

  “I’ll try,” she said.

  But her voice sounded forlorn. I looked over my shoulder as we walked out of the room.

  Mary had turned her head to stare out the window. Although her room was filled with flowers, she looked as if she didn’t have a friend in the world.

  I couldn’t imagine anything more awful, especially at Christmas.

  “Well,” I said, “what do you think?”

  Ethan frowned. “It’s not a very good picture of you,” he said. “And the colors don’t work, artistically speaking.”