There it was, only two oaks away. The treehouse was built lower to the ground than most, and it blended in with its home oak in a way that made it difficult to spot if you weren"t looking right at it. The whole thing was a madcap jumble, as though the builder had simply added rooms as he went along. A short staircase came straight down to the ground at a precarious angle.
Between the chickens and the rusting tools and the accidental garden, the scene reminded him uncomfortably of his own family"s cluttered yard, except instead of being covered with abstract sculptures, it looked like the inside of a workshop that had been hit by a tornado.
He looked up through the branches of this healthy, giant oak, taking note of its subtle distinctions, adding it to a small gap in his map of which he had been unaware until now.
He could see that smoke was puffing from the chimney. Oliver jogged toward the staircase, a few chickens clucking angrily and scattering out of his way, then went up and rapped on the front door.
He heard what sounded like the sc.r.a.ping of a chair and fast-moving steps. Oliver waited for his knock to be answered.
And waited.
And waited some more. He knocked again.
No answer.
Oliver was beginning to get the distinct impression that there wouldn"t be one. His great-uncle obviously didn"t want to be bothered, but of course he did not realize that the person knocking was a member of his family. And not one of the weird ones, but one who had a normal and healthy interest in kites. Oliver knocked again, harder, and waited.
And waited.
Yes, his great-uncle"s desire for privacy was understandable, but at the same time, the Festival would begin in three days, and Oliver had no time to waste. Pounding on the door any longer would simply be rude, however. Maybe he could wave at him through a window. Once Great-uncle Gilbert saw the family resemblance, he would surely welcome Oliver.
There was a balcony that ran around the first floor of the treehouse, with a number of windows in view. Oliver circled it, peering in. The first room was a kitchen. But the second a Oliver sucked in his breath.
At least a dozen pristine kites were hanging from the ceiling; they looked as if they had never been flown. Any one of them could have taken the Festival prize for craftsmanship. Oliver had never seen such intricate designs and clever construction. The kites were not only beautiful, composed of delicate hand-painted silks, but they possessed advanced aeronautic features that showed they were intended to be operated only by the most skilled fliers. Scattered on several workbenches were another dozen kites in various stages of completion, and each looked as promising as the finished ones. Along the walls were sliding racks stuffed with more kites. Oliver longed to see them. They were all masterpieces, with one exception.
On the centermost workbench lay a flat, diamond-shaped kite, the type usually given as a first kite, to be flown only on nearly windless days. Oliver thought it wouldn"t be a very nice kite to get, even as a first kite. Its silk was a lovely crimson, but otherwise the kite was artless and unimaginative. The only interesting feature was its long tail, which had been haphazardly decorated with odd-shaped bits of cloth. The tail was coiled up next to the kite and was so long that it spilled down to the floor.
Suddenly one of the kite racks moved.
Startled, Oliver watched as it slid smoothly aside, revealing a dark, hidden room. Then, from another part of the workshop, an old man stepped into view.
Oliver ducked his head until his chin b.u.mped the windowsill.
The old man, who had to be his great-uncle Gilbert, was squat and plump and dressed in a shabby purple robe. To Oliver"s surprise, his great-uncle went immediately to the center workbench, s.n.a.t.c.hed the crimson kite, and disappeared into the dark room that had just opened in the wall.
Oliver ducked lower as Great-uncle Gilbert emerged, no longer holding the kite. The old man hurried out of view. A few seconds later, the kite rack slid smoothly back into place.
Now Oliver was angry. He felt a bit guilty for spying on his great-uncle (he admitted that it had turned into spying), but then again, he would not have had to spy if Great-uncle Gilbert had simply answered the door like a normal person.
Oliver stalked back to the front door and gave it a resounding kick. The door shuddered in its frame. He waited a few seconds, then gave it another. And another. Determined not to tire, he reared back for an especially powerful kick.
Without warning, the door opened. Oliver, in mid-kick, fell backward. His great-uncle reached out and grabbed him just as he was about to tumble down the stairs.
"Hey!" Oliver yelled, swatting.
Great-uncle Gilbert released him, and Oliver looked the old man straight in the eye. He was only slightly taller than Oliver, and he was indeed very old, and very plump, and had a head full of wild gray hair.
He also had piercing brown eyes, and they were glaring right at Oliver. He reached out and gave Oliver a shove.
"So it"s you again!" he growled. "I thought so. I told you never to come back. Go away!"
3.
The front door slammed in Oliver"s face, shaking the entire treehouse.
Oliver was too stunned to move. This was not exactly the joyous reunion of long-lost relations he had expected. For the first time in his life, his father might have been right about something. Great-uncle Gilbert was indeed a crackpot. The condition must run in the family.
Crackpot or not, the man knew a thing or two about kites. Oliver began to pound on the door to the beat of I-need-a-kite, I-need-a-kite.
After a minute the door flew open. In that minute, Great-uncle Gilbert had somehow managed to change into a pair of dirty blue overalls and a straw hat. He looked like someone who was trying to disguise himself as a farmer and doing a poor job of it. In one hand he clutched an elaborately carved walking stick and in the other an ornate clock. His face wore a regal scowl.
"I am going to feed the chickens," he announced royally. "Kindly remove yourself back to wherever it is you came from."
Great-uncle Gilbert strode forward, and Oliver, panting from all of the door kicking and pounding, dodged out of the way. His great-uncle sailed down the steps and Oliver followed, wondering if the chickens ate from a clock.
"What did you mean, *It"s you again"?" he demanded, catching his great-uncle at the bottom of the steps. "We"ve never met. I"m your grandnephew, Oliver!"
"So you are," replied Great-uncle Gilbert. "You can"t fool me! Our visits are over. I trusted you with my secrets, and you betrayed me. Sorry you lost your kite charma"buy another!" They were halfway across the yard now. Chickens were scattering in all directions. Great-uncle Gilbert dropped the clock and took several sniffs, then turned in circles, c.o.c.king his head. "There"s that smell again."
Oliver opened his mouth, intending to continue his argument. He had never been here before! And how did his great-uncle know about his kite charm? But then he smelled it, too. It was faint, at the very edge of his senses. Something that smelled wrong, or felt wrong, or both. Something full of decay.
The smell drew him toward an oak standing around one corner of the treehouse. Oliver had never seen this tree before, and into his map it went. The scent grew stronger. Behind him he could hear Great-uncle Gilbert sniffing and muttering.
"It"s this oak," said Oliver.
He placed his hands on the trunk. The bark had an oddly soft feeling, as though the oak were somehow unhealthy. In the collective memory of Windblowne, the giant oaks were eternal. They were by far the largest, strongest trees anywhere in the world. None of them had ever shown the slightest sign of illness. Legend held that the oaks had been here, and would be here, as long as the mountain stood and the winds blew. So to look up the trunk of this oak and see its branches drooping, and its leaves showing a sick brown, left Oliver feeling a little sick as well. This oak must be the source of the dead leaves.
He heard crunching as Great-uncle Gilbert came up behind him. Oliver turned to meet the man"s narrowed eyes.
"You are not who I thought you were, are you?" whispered Great-uncle Gilbert.
"What?" said Oliver. "Ia""
"You"re you, not him!" said Great-uncle Gilbert, louder. "You look just alike! But of course, you would, wouldn"t you?" He suddenly dropped his walking stick and shot forward, seizing Oliver"s hands in his own. Oliver struggled to escape, but for such a plump old man, his great-uncle was shockingly strong.
Oliver"s great-uncle"s hands were not only strong, they were tremendously gnarled and callused, with scars from hundreds of tiny cuts. They were the hands of a master kitesmith after a lifetime of practicing his art.
Great-uncle Gilbert gripped Oliver"s hands tightly, squeezing his knuckles, rubbing his fingers, examining his hands in every last detail.
At last his great-uncle released Oliver. He bent and picked up his walking stick. "So you"re Oliver, from this mountain? I mean this one." He thumped the ground with the stick, his gaze focused on the far distance.
"Yes, that"s right, Great-uncle Gilbert," said Oliver, adopting the rea.s.suring tones of a nurse. "I"m Oliver, your grandnephew, from Windblowne." The man is mad through and through, he thought.
"Well," said his great-uncle. "That is very interesting." He began to walk back to his treehouse, with Oliver following.
"I thought you needed to feed the chickens," said Oliver, looking at the abandoned clock.
"No, the chickens fend for themselves," Great-uncle Gilbert said grandly. "A clock is not a bucket of feed, my boy. I just wanted to get rid of you."
Great-uncle Gilbert mounted the stairs and proceeded through his front door. Oliver looked back at the sick oak worriedly. That would have to be another mystery to investigate, after the Festival. Oliver entered the treehouse, filled with determination.
"Great-uncle Gilbert," he began dramatically, "I have come to ask for youra""
The word help never escaped his lips as he stared stupidly at his great-uncle"s living room.
The kite workshop, astonishing as it was, had nothing on this. His great-uncle appeared to be preparing for some sort of siege, or battle, or both. The right wall was bristling with fighting kites of all sizes, slick and fast and covered with razor hooks and edges. The back wall was stacked with water barrels and bundles of food. The left wall was covered with vast stretches of paper sketched all over with drawings of the treehouse and a lot of symbols and arrows that seemed to indicate elaborate plans for defense and counterattack against an aerial a.s.sault. And the room was rather dark, because the windows on the front wall were completely nailed over with heavy boards. Fortunately, a couple of oil lamps were burning. Oliver spotted barrels of surplus oil stacked in an open closet.
Great-uncle Gilbert was moving between windows, pounding in some more nails. "Ask for my what, my boy? Speak quickly, lad! I"m a touch busy at the moment." He gave one of the panels a resounding thump with his fist.
"Er a," said Oliver feebly, trying to recover his impressive argument. "The Festival, and, uh a my kite a"
"Kites, is it?" said Great-uncle Gilbert thoughtfully. "Afraid I can"t help you there. You must leave at once. It"s far too dangerous for you here right now. Come back in, oh, a year or two. Or three. Yes, three would do nicely. Matters ought to be cleared up by then."
The blockade seemed complete. Great-uncle Gilbert nodded with satisfaction, then swept into the kitchen. Oliver followed.
They proceeded into the workshop, and Oliver"s puzzlement increased. He could see that there was something completely out of place among the marvelous kites, something completely unexpected, not to mention completely boring. There was an entire shelf filled with his father"s books.
Oliver could not have been more shocked if his great-uncle had suddenly sprouted wings and flown away. An entire shelf of those books! Just looking at it made Oliver feel tired. "Why do you have all of those?" Oliver asked suspiciously, pointing.
"Eh?" said Great-uncle Gilbert, sitting at a workbench. "Why wouldn"t I? Fascinating stuff, those histories! Studying those old legends helped get me into this mess." He seemed rather gleeful about it.
Oliver shook his head. If he needed more evidence of his great-uncle"s madness, here it was. "Those books are the most boring things in Windblowne," he explained.
"Yes, boring, so true," his great-uncle said. "In fact, they are so boring that you should rush off before it gets any more boring around here. Run home and hide under the bed is my advice, until everything blows over."
"Until what blows over?" demanded Oliver.
"I could tell you, my boy," replied Great-uncle Gilbert, "but you"d never believe me. None of "em would! This town is full of people with limited imaginations."
Oliver shrugged. If Great-uncle Gilbert wanted to punish himself with tedious reading material, then Oliver couldn"t stop him. He gazed around the workshop. Losing his own kiting gear last night had seemed like a setback, but Oliver could see that his great-uncle had the finest collection of kitesmithing supplies in Windblowne. There were barrels full of bamboo stalks cut to various sizes. Bolts of tightly woven silk were rolled up along the benches. And the spectacular kites that hung from the high ceiling would supply models of perfection that Oliver could follow as he built his new kite right here. Oliver was becoming positively giddy. Certainly Great-uncle Gilbert would come around once he understood how important Oliver"s problems were.
"Great-uncle Gilbert," he said again, "I need a kite."
"No doubt!" Great-uncle Gilbert exclaimed. "You want to fly one of my kites in that farce of a Festival, don"t you?" He shook his fist in the general direction of the crest. "Well, I know the rules! Most of them were written just to thwart me!"
"And the rules say you have to make your own kite," Oliver broke in. "I know."
Great-uncle Gilbert"s snort expressed his contempt for anyone who would stoop to such a thing. "Well, the judges would know that any kites as amazing as mine could never have been made by you."
Whether this was true or nota"and Oliver had to admit that it wasa"he was still more than a little hurt. "No," Oliver said desperately, his voice tight, "I have no intention of cheating. I only wanted you to teach me enough for me to make my own kite."
Great-uncle Gilbert seemed taken by surprise. "Er, sorry there, my boy," he said in gentle tones. "I didn"t mean you"d cheat. It"s just that I can tell a kitesmith. It"s all in the hands. I"ve examined yours, and you don"t have it in you." He scratched his chin thoughtfully. "Your talents," he said finally, "lie elsewhere."
"That"s ridiculous," said Oliver. "You can"t say that just from feeling someone"s hands!" He felt tears coming and shook them away angrily.
Great-uncle Gilbert grimaced. "You think I"m a madman, don"t you?" he growled. "Well, you"re right. I am. My mind is filled with twists and turns and contradictions. But I do know one thing, and that"s kites. Here, look at this one!" He s.n.a.t.c.hed a kite from a nearby bench and thrust it at Oliver.
Oliver turned it around in his hands. The kite was made of slick black silk and a confusing tangle of oaken spars. Oaken spars! No one used oak for kite spars; it was far too heavy. Anyway, the thing hardly looked like a kite at all. Some of the spars came together in sharp points, and there were torn bits of colorful fabric clinging to them, and a few splinters.
"That," said Great-uncle Gilbert, "is one of my proudest creations. It is a kite that eats other kites. Swoops right down on them and chomps them to bits. The fools banned it from compet.i.tion! Be careful now," he said abruptly.
With a start, Oliver realized that he had somehow gotten his hand caught inside the kite. He pulled, but his hand was stuck fast.
"I can"t get it out," said Oliver.
"You"d better," said Great-uncle Gilbert.
There was a sudden sharp pain in his hand, and Oliver yelped. He yanked hard, his hand burst free, and some of the spars snapped shut. He hurled the kite-eater away. It flew gracefully across the room, and Great-uncle Gilbert s.n.a.t.c.hed it out of the air. "Good kite," he said approvingly, and placed it gently back on the workbench.
Oliver, stunned, said nothing, but rubbed his aching hand.
"You think that"s something?" Great-uncle Gilbert snickered. "I don"t even keep my best kite in here. I keep it hidden with my most valuable possessions, where they won"t find it!"
Oliver wondered if he meant the plain crimson kite. If so, then it wasn"t quite as amazing as his great-uncle claimed. He decided to humor the old man. "Where who can"t find it, Great-uncle Gilbert?"
"Them," said his great-uncle significantly. "Now shouldn"t you be on your way?"
"I"m not leaving until you agree to help me with a Festival kite," said Oliver.
"Now, now, my boy," said Great-uncle Gilbert. He took another fighting kite from a rack and fiddled with its spars. "You need to forget about the Festival. I have! Other matters of far greater importance, far greater danger, have presented themselves, and I will be very busy in days to come. You should occupy yourself with something else as well." He leaned toward Oliver, his voice falling to a whispered warning. "Something far, far away from the crest!"
This was too much for Oliver. First it was his parents, who were barely aware the Festival existed and certainly weren"t going to do anything to help Oliver prepare for it. Now his great-uncle, who had once been a Festival champion and who owned the most splendid workshop and kites in all of Windblowne and thus in all the world, wasn"t going to help him either. Oliver had opened his mouth to tell Great-uncle Gilbert exactly what he thought of his entire, useless family when he was interrupted by a thumping noise coming from behind the kite racks.
Great-uncle Gilbert spun about, ran to the racks, and threw his back against them. "Shhh!" he hissed over his shoulder. "Not now!"
Oliver gaped. "Who do you have in there?" he said accusingly.
"What are you talking about?" cried Great-uncle Gilbert. "I don"t hear any thumping! Don"t be preposterous!"
He turned his head to one side. "Stop that! Stop that right now!" he hissed again. "I"ll let you out in a minute. I was just getting rid of him!" The steady thump thump thump continued without pause.
"No, you weren"t!" snapped Oliver.
"Yes, I was!" shouted Great-uncle Gilbert, and Oliver found himself propelled out of the workshop, his great-uncle"s hands gripping his shoulders. He was pushed through the living room and out the front door. Oliver staggered as his great-uncle released him at the top of the steps. He turned. Great-uncle Gilbert was blocking the doorway, breathing heavily. The steady thumping could still be heard behind him.
"Well," his great-uncle said quickly, "that was a lovely visit, thank you. We shouldn"t do it again anytime soon. And you must avoid the crest at all costs. That"s how he came through, and it would be a dangerous thing indeed for you to run into him. Regards to your parents." And with that, he slammed the door. Oliver heard running footsteps fading away.
Oliver sagged against the door. His final hopes had rested in someone who turned out to be a complete lunatic. Lunacy must run in the family. His mother was headed that way too, and Oliver supposed he would be next.
He turned wearily and plodded down the steps. Now what? Oliver looked at the abandoned clock, ticking remorselessly away in the cluttered yard.