Read Online 100 Cupboards by N. D. Wilson - Free Book Online Page A

all.
    Henry tried not to shiver. This wasn’t make-believe. He really had found these doors, and he didn’t know what was inside them. He suddenly wondered why something hidden inside a secret cupboard would have to be pleasant.
    Henrietta flipped on her flashlight and handed it to him.
    â€œTake it,” she said. “Look in the door. You found it.”
    Henry took it. He knelt on his bed, put the flashlight beside his right eye, and, swallowing hard, he looked.
    â€œI think I can see something.” He shifted his head. “It looks like an envelope.” He handed the flashlight to Henrietta and knee-waddled out of her way. She bent and looked.
    â€œIt looks skinnier than an envelope,” she said. “Maybe a postcard.”
    Henry leaned his hand against the wall and bent over to look.
    â€œMove your head a bit,” he said. She did, and he looked again, bracing himself against the cupboard wall. He was holding on to something metal. It slid, and he fell over onto Henrietta. She screamed. They both fell off the bed. Above them, a cupboard door banged against the wall.
    Henry lay still, all of his senses straining. The flashlight was off. His eyes hurt, they were open so wide. He could make out Henrietta on the floor by the light from the door. He could smell something big and feel a cold wind on his skin. He could hear rustling, and Henrietta holding back tears. He could taste fear in the back of his throat, constricted to the point of pain.
    Henry had never thought of himself as brave. He never had been. What he did next wasn’t a terrific act of bravery, but it did take effort. With every inch of his skin crawling at the touch of cold, moving air, he sat up, found his way to the head of his bed, and turned on his light. The cupboard door just above the post office box was open and swinging gently back and forth, lightly tapping the wall, then almost closing.
    He looked at Henrietta. She looked back at him, her face white and eyes wide.
    â€œAre you okay?” he whispered.
    â€œWhat is it doing?” she asked.
    Henry reached up and held his hand in front of the moving door. “There’s air coming through it.”
    They both held still for a moment, listening.
    â€œCan you hear that?” she asked. “What is it?”
    â€œIt sounds like trees blowing around,” Henry said.
    â€œShould we look inside?” Henrietta asked. Henry climbed onto his bed. A cool wind pushed around his face and through his hair as it came out of the cupboard. Henry held the door still.
    Henrietta climbed up beside him.
    â€œThere’s something inside. On the bottom,” Henry said. He stretched out his hand. He could barely see what he was reaching for. It was simply a shape. His hand felt something and closed. It was a string. He pulled the string out of the cupboard. Dangling below his fingers was a small key.
    The wind blowing out of the cupboard suddenly became a gust. Henry’s bedroom doors blew open, and dust shuffled and rolled across the floor toward the attic window. The noise of the trees roared like a waterfall. The two of them could hear boughs bending and creaking. Then they smelled it, sudden and fresh. Somewhere on the other side of the cupboard, rain had begun to fall.
    â€œShut it quick,” Henrietta said. “Mom and Dad will hear it. They’ll
feel
it.”
    Henry pushed the door closed on the wind. Then he slid the metal latch, and the room was quiet.
    â€œHow did you get it unlocked?” Henrietta asked.
    â€œI don’t think it
was
locked,” Henry said. “It must have just been stuck. I leaned on it to look through the glass, and it came open.”
    Henrietta’s hair was coming loose in the front. She brushed it back and put her eyebrows up. “It’s magic,” she said. “We can’t pretend it’s not. It’s a magic cupboard. They’re probably all magic.”
    Henry shifted on the bed