Part 15 (1/2)

Oona began rubbing her hands together. Here at last was something she could explain. ”Remember last night, Isadora, when you asked the inspector if it were possible for the daggers and the dresses to have been stolen by the same person?”

”Everyone looked at me like I was crazy,” Isadora replied, giving Oona a fiercely reproachful look.

Oona winced, realizing that, yes, the idea had seemed somewhat ludicrous at the time. ”Well, it turns out, you were right.” Oona pointed to the hole in the floor. ”Sanora must have tunneled her way beneath the shop and come up here, beneath the platform. Though I doubt she was alone. This is a big job. One small girl could not have done it alone. It's my guess that she had some help from her fellow witches.”

Oona scratched at her head. How the witches had known to come up in that exact spot, so that the platform would cover the hole, she didn't know. But she intended to find out.

Peering into the hole, she gulped. ”Will you go down first, Deacon? Or shall I?”

”And why would I go in there?” Deacon squawked. ”Now that we know how the thief got in, we simply need to tell the authorities.”

Oona gave Deacon an incredulous look.

”Well, all right,” he admitted, ”perhaps Inspector White will muck everything up, but it's better than you or I going in there ... alone.”

Oona turned to Isadora, but the fine young lady put up her hands. ”I'm not going down in there.”

”And besides,” Deacon said, ”if Sanora did steal the daggers, then that means she still has possession of the second one: Fay Mors Mortis. The Faerie Death. You promised your uncle that you would not go snooping around deadly criminals.”

”I know what I promised, Deacon,” Oona said. ”But if Sanora was the one who threw the dagger at Uncle Alexander, then she is the only one who knows the words to transform him back. Red Martin intends to stop the Dark Street pendulum at midnight if the Wizard does not show up to reclaim Pendulum House.” She pointed at the hole in the floor. ”Sanora Crone could stay down there in Witch Hill for months, or even longer.”

”Witch Hill?” said Deacon.

”Yes. Don't you see? There is a tunnel leading directly from this spot to the hill across the street.”

”But how did you know it would be here?” Deacon asked.

”It all came from seeing those missing cobblestones. When I dropped the inspector's candy through the pothole, I did it to ill.u.s.trate a point, which is that the witches have dug a tunnel beneath the street. That's why the cobblestones have gone missing, as well as the earth beneath them. The witches must have dug the tunnel terribly close to the surface, and the ground has begun to fall away in certain spots, like where the carriage wheels travel the most. That is why the carriages keep getting stuck.”

”Hmm,” Deacon intoned, glancing toward the filthy black dress that hung from Oona's shoulder. ”I can see why she would want to steal the dresses, since her own is so very drab, but why would she wish to imprison your uncle?”

”Maybe she meant to kill him,” Oona said. ”Maybe she didn't know which dagger she was using. I don't know. As to why she would wish to harm him at all ... that is precisely what I intend to find out.”

Moving with a swift sort of confidence that she did not entirely feel, Oona s.n.a.t.c.hed one of the fallen candles from the floor. She then dug a match from her pocket and struck it along the edge of the platform. Her face glowed as she lit the candle and took in a deep breath, as if preparing to plunge into deep waters. The lit match dropped from her fingers into the hole, winking out as it disappeared into the darkness.

”Miss Crate,” said Isadora, almost tentatively.

Oona glanced over her shoulder. Strangely enough, she thought she saw an expression of concern on Isadora's face. It seemed quite out of place there.

”Do be careful,” Isadora said. ”No one knows what those witches do down there.”

It was the concern in Isadora's voice that set Oona's nerves on edge more than anything else. She had a strange, albeit short-lived thought that perhaps Isadora wasn't quite as bad as she had judged her to be. Maybe there was a sc.r.a.p of kindness in the girl after all. But the thought died quickly away when Isadora added: ”And if you find the dresses, try not to get them dirty when you bring them back. That hole looks filthy.”

Oona did not bother to respond, but instead she lowered herself into the hole in the floor, the burning candle held in one faintly trembling hand, and began her descent into the darkness below.

Deacon hopped to her shoulder, shaking his head from side to side. ”Oh dear. Here we go.”

Oona touched bottom, the moist earth squis.h.i.+ng beneath her shoes. She stepped around the ladder, holding the candle high above her head, where the flame licked at the earthen ceiling. The tunnel stretched out before her like a long, dark throat, and she began to have second thoughts about continuing forward. Down here in the dark, things seemed much different than they had up above. They were ... well, they were darker, for one thing. And the air itself seemed denser and more threatening. She gulped audibly, considering whether or not to simply climb right back up, when something grabbed her attention.

”Look, Deacon. Do you see?” She moved closer to the sidewall of the tunnel, exposing a pile of pickaxes, chisels, and handsaws.

”Tools of the trade,” she said. ”And look how many. It appears I was right, and there is actually more than one thief involved.” She bent down, examining the ground. A set of wheel ruts cut into the floor and disappeared down the tunnel. ”Some sort of cart has pa.s.sed this way, many times.”

”Careful,” Deacon whispered. ”Even I am having trouble seeing very far.”

The two of them began to inch their way forward, the walls seeming to close in around them. It wasn't long before they came to a spot where the hooves of a horse could be heard clopping overhead.

”We must be under the street,” Oona said, and looking up, they saw several square-shaped patches of sunlight leaking down through the holes in the street. At her feet lay the missing cobblestones, and beside one of them lay the candy Oona had dropped through the hole. She picked it up and put it in her pocket.

”I tried to tell Inspector White my suspicions,” she said. ”But he wouldn't listen.”

Beyond the reach of the pulsing candlelight, she could see nothing. The hand holding the candle began to tremble as the wax dribbled down over her fingers. It was not the sting of the warm wax that caused the tremor inside of her, however, but the thought of the witches. Not only did she know nothing about them, but neither did Deacon, and he had the entire Encyclopedia Arcanna stored inside his head. They could have magic that no one knew about. Horrible spells.

Eventually, the two of them came to a spot where the tunnel split in two different directions. The wheel ruts turned left.

”What do we do now?” Deacon asked.

Oona thought for a moment. ”Let's go left,” she said, ”and we will continue left on any other forked tunnels so that if we need to make a run for it, we can easily retrace our steps.”

The tunnel curved and the ground sloped, so that it felt as if they were walking in a giant corkscrew, going down, down, down. They walked for what seemed a very long time, following two more forked tunnels, each time bearing left, until finally they came to a small, round room, where no fewer than six tunnels branched off in different directions. The floor here was smooth marble, and the walls were plastered smooth. An unlit chandelier hung down like a shadowy claw from the vaulted ceiling. It felt more like a palace entry hall than some underground cave, albeit a palace that had long gone to ruin.

A large sheet of paper hung on the wall between two of the tunnel entrances: a diagram of some sort.

”Do you know what this is, Deacon?” Oona tapped her finger on the paper. ”This is a complete plan of all of the stores in the shopping district of Dark Street ... including the dress shop and the museum bas.e.m.e.nt. Look how detailed it is. You can even see right where the showroom platform is, and the mirror. This is how they knew exactly where to dig their hole.”

”But how would they be able to acquire all of this information?” Deacon asked.

”My guess,” Oona said, ”Red Martin. This is very big, Deacon.”

”You think he and the witches are working together?” he asked.

Oona shushed him. ”Do you hear that?”

Deacon listened. ”It's coming from there.” He indicated a tunnel to their right with his wing.

”I guess we'll have to break our always-go-left rule,” Oona said, and the two of them started down the first tunnel to their right. Oona's pulse rose. The deeper they went, the more distinct the sound became. It was the sound of voices arguing.

A dim light could be made out up ahead. Oona blew out the candle. Her nerves tingled, her muscles tensing with each step. The tunnel opened just ahead, the flickering light appearing to come from a room at the end.

She slowed, stepping as lightly as possible. Once she came within a few feet of the tunnel's mouth, she could hear them clearly: two young voices, female. The first voice Oona recognized right away. It was Sanora. The second voice was one that Oona had never heard before. It sounded more mature than Sanora's girly soprano, though still young and feminine-perhaps someone Oona's own age or older. It was the second voice that spoke now, sounding exasperated.

”You are so clumsy, Sanora. You almost ruined everything.”

”I'm sorry, Katona,” Sanora replied.

”First, you pester me into returning to the dress shop so you can take the dress from the window, and regrettably, I agreed, so long as we were very careful. But then you insisted on trying it on in the showroom, and I warned you against it. But would you listen? No. You should have waited until we came back down here. Really! Whirling about in front of that mirror like that, and knocking over the mannequin ... you cracked the mirror. It will need to be replaced now, and when they remove it from the wall to do so, they will find the hole leading into the museum. Must you act so childish, Sanora? I'll admit, the dress is magnificent. And you do look stunning in it. And yet ...” The girl named Katona paused a moment before saying: ”Sanora, where is your dress?”

”I'm wearing it,” Sanora said.

”Not the one you stole. Your dress. Your work dress. The one you were wearing before you put that one on?”