Read Online Spellbound: The Books of Elsewhere by Jacqueline West - Free Book Online Page B

was a bit stiff, as though it had been stored in a refrigerator until it set. She reminded Olive of someone. But it was her brother who caught Olive’s eyes and held them. He was a little boy with a round, pale face. A little boy with tufty, whitish hair. A little boy who, for once, wasn’t wearing a long white nightshirt.
    “Hey, that’s you!” she exclaimed.
    Morton didn’t answer.
    “Is that your family?”
    Morton nodded.
    “Wow,” Olive breathed. They were both quiet for a minute, studying the faces caught in fading shades of gray. “It must have been taken not too long before—I mean, you look almost exactly the same. Except in different clothes.”
    Morton just stared at the picture.
    Olive edged around him, trying to get a look at his face. “Do you know what happened to them, Morton? To the rest of your family?”
    Morton shook his head, not meeting Olive’s eyes.
    “What about their names? Do you remember their names?”
    “Mama and Papa,” Morton whispered.
    “I mean their real names,” Olive pushed. “What other people called them. If you can remember, maybe—maybe I can find out what happened.” Morton’s frown twisted and wriggled as he thought. One by one, unhappy lines appeared in his face, pulling his eyebrows into a frown, tugging his mouth downward, wrinkling up the corners of his eyes. The lines deepened until his whole face seemed to crumple, like a plant withering in fast motion. He hung his head.

     
    “I want to go home,” he said into his sternum.
    “I know you do,” said Olive. “That’s why I need to find this book. If I find the book, and we find out what happened to your family, then we can—”
    “No,” said Morton, still speaking directly to his chest. “I just mean, back to my house.”
    “Oh,” said Olive. “Okay.” She backed away, trying not to show her disappointment.
    “Can I take this with me?” Morton held up the photograph, although he kept staring directly at the carpet.
    “Sure,” said Olive. “Of course. Maybe—maybe it will help you remember.”
    It was a quieter, slower group that trailed back down the hallway to the painting of Linden Street.
    “Do you want to look with me again tomorrow?” whispered Olive as Morton took hold of Harvey’s tail. Morton shrugged and didn’t meet her eyes.
    Olive watched the two of them disappear through the picture frame. Then she slumped into her bedroom and climbed between the covers. Her dreams that night were full of books that fluttered toward her, like big friendly birds, before slipping through her fingers and soaring away.

8
     
    O LIVE WOKE LATE the next morning with the urge to dive back into Elsewhere burning inside her.
    Something else was burning too. She could smell it. For a moment, as she lay in the foggy place between sleeping and waking, Olive was certain that the house itself was burning—that it had lulled her into a deep sleep and left her to smother in the smoke. She sat up in bed, glancing around at her bedroom walls. But there was no fire. There wasn’t even any smoke. There was only an unpleasant burning smell . . . and it seemed to be coming from downstairs.
    Olive followed her nose down to the kitchen, where Mr. and Mrs. Dunwoody were clanking and clattering through the drawers and cupboards. Four pots were boiling away on the crusty burners of the old black stove, creating the burning smell and making the kitchen even hotter and stickier than it would have been otherwise.
    “Aren’t you two going to your office this morning?” Olive asked grumpily, through a mouthful of toast. If her parents were around, the cats tended to hide, which meant all her plans for exploration would be squashed.
    “Not today,” said Mr. Dunwoody, who was testing the burners on the old stove to see which boiled water the fastest, carefully measuring the amount and starting temperature of the water. “Would you like to help me double-check the cooling rate of these pots?”
    “Or you could be