Lair of Dreams

Page 52

Ling couldn’t stop staring at the slippers. “Tomorrow night,” she said.
The first sharp ring of Ling’s alarm clock roared across the dreamscape. Her body grew heavier, a signal that she had begun her ascent into the waking world.
“Till tomorrow, Little Warrior!” Wai-Mae called.
Tomorrow, Ling thought, and like the flapping wings of a dove, the night whitened and twitched, then blurred into a great cottony nothingness.
At the first peal of the alarm, Gaspard barked furiously.
“No! Not yet!” Henry yelled. He thrust a hand out toward Louis as if he could grab hold of him and keep his lover from disappearing. But it was no use. Henry gulped in huge lungfuls of air as he woke in his chair at his tiny table in the Bennington. The alarm clock screamed and shook on the floor where it had fallen. Henry lay in the chair, paralyzed, unable to wipe away his tears. From the other room, he could hear Theta yelling. In a minute, she’d come out and growl at him. But Henry didn’t care about any of that. He’d seen Louis. He’d talked to Louis.
But would Louis even remember their conversation? People didn’t always remember their dreams, and even if they did, even if one crawled under the skin for a little while, it didn’t linger for long. Details were forgotten. People brushed them aside, busy with their lives. But Louis didn’t have a telephone, and if Henry’s father was somehow keeping his letters and telegrams from reaching Louis, then calling for him at Celeste’s was useless.
He’d found Louis in a dream, so it was possible to do it again. All he had to do was go back in and give him a suggestion, the way he’d done with Theta when she had a nightmare. That was it! Through the dream world, he could get Louis to come to him. But that meant he’d need Ling once more. That was the key—the two of them together. Tomorrow, he’d ask Ling to help him, no matter how much it cost.
“Henry Bartholomew DuBois the Fourth!” Theta marched in, her sleep mask pushed up haphazardly on her forehead so that she resembled a drunken pirate. She slapped off the alarm clock and turned on Henry, furious. “What’s our deal, Hen?”
“Now, Theta…”
“Don’t you ‘Now, Theta’ me. What’s our deal?”
“No more than—”
“Once a week,” Theta finished.
“Theta—”
“This is two nights in a row, and after you promised me today—”
“Theta—
“If you think I’m gonna lose my beauty sleep while you—”
“Theta!” Henry croaked out her name with the last of his strength.
Theta snapped out of her temper. Worried, she fell to her knees beside Henry. “Whatsa matter, Hen? Holy smokes, you okay?”
Henry smiled with chattering teeth. “I’m s-swell. Theta, I f-found him. I f-found Louis,” Henry managed to say before he fell, utterly exhausted, into a dreamless sleep.
Adelaide Proctor fished a nitroglycerin tablet from her pillbox, placed it beneath her tongue, and waited for her angina pains to subside. It had been a nightmare that had brought on this spasm—something about an old hand-cranked music box that played a song that had been popular when Adelaide was young. The song’s beauty had stirred her longing, promising her everything she’d ever wanted if only she’d follow it deeper and deeper into dreams. Adelaide sensed it calling out to other sleepers, too, like a radio transmission from a far-off station late at night. But then the dream shifted, the song was lost, and she saw Elijah standing silently on the edge of the cornfield, his face painted in deep moon-shadow. “Addie,” he’d whispered, beckoning, and her heart began to gallop wildly, a riderless horse, until she woke with a start.
The tablet worked quickly on the tightness in her chest. Once her heartbeat slowed to a steadier rhythm, she forced herself from her bed and staggered to her own music box, atop a small oak cabinet tucked into a corner of the room. When she lifted the box’s lid, its tiny Moulin Rouge dancer figurine jerked into motion. With two fingers, Adelaide silenced the dancer’s song before it could wake her sister, Lillian. Inside lay a flannel jewelry bag housing a small iron case with the initials EJH. Adelaide opened the case and examined its contents—a lock of dark-gold hair, a tooth, a sliver of finger bone, and a tintype of a young man in a gray uniform. Seeing that everything was secure, she placed the iron case back in its bag and closed it away, locking the doors of the cabinet once more.
Next she gathered a shallow bowl, matches, a candle in its brass holder, a roll of bandaging, bundled sage, and a small crooked silver dagger. These she added to her handbag. She emptied the salt can into each pocket of her robe, grabbed the handbag, and, with the burden of salt weighing her down, shuffled down the hall to wait for the elevator.