The House on Parchment Street - Patricia A. McKillip, ebook, CALIBRE SFF 1970s, Temp 2
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House on Parchment Street, The � McKillip, Patricia A.I.CAROL CHRISTOPHER PUFFED HER CHEEKS, SIGHED, and sat down on her suitcases in the middle of Parchment Street. The street was old and worn; it ended abruptly, running into a broad empty field in front of her. On one side of the street was a graveyard. On the other side was a high stone wall with a closed gate. Old trees arched over the wall; their leaves whispered softly against the stones. The long windblown grass in the graveyard played the iron railing like a harp.The warm summer wind swooped unexpectedly across the field, opened the gate, and set it creaking aimlessly a moment. A massive square house sat firm and ancient beyond the wall, stone-grey beneath a beard of ivy. Carol caught a glimpse of it before the gate slammed shut again. The street was empty, the field was empty, and the only sound on ParchmentStreet was the wind, agile as a cat, leaping over the old stone wall.Carol stood up to get at the back pocket of her jeans and pulled out a letter. She sat down and smoothed it flat on her knee, her eyes flickering over it until she found the part she wanted: "� There is no ordinary street address; the House is well known in Middleton, being something of a historical monument. There are no other houses on the street anyway, except for Emily Raison's house, which is cheerful and modest and on the graveyard side� ." She looked up. A small white house with a sharply pointed roof faced the graveyard, half-hidden in apple trees. Her head turned slowly toward the closed gate and the grey house hidden behind it. She sighed again, softly, and folded the letter.Six boys floated out of the graveyard on their bicycles. They skidded to a halt at the sight of her, colliding gently with each other. For a moment they were quiet with surprise. She stared back at them, motionless on her suitcases. And then, as though someone had pulled a string that set them in order, they flowed into a neat circle around her, spokes winking under the sun."Coo, look at that hair.""Carrots.""No, it's more like fire. I wonder what she combs it with. Should think a rake.""Look at those dirty jeans.""And bare feet. I wonder if she's an orphan. I say, are you an orphan?"Carol stood up slowly. Her hands clenched, the letter crumpled between her fingers. Faces spun around her, curious, distant, mocking."She must be an orphan�she's nothing but skin and bones.""She can't talk, either.""Of course she can't. You won't let her get a word in. Shut up, the lot of you, and let her talk."The street was silent again but for the ceaseless click-click of bicycle wheels. Carol's mouth clamped tight. She bent and picked up her suitcases."She doesn't want to talk."She took a step forward. The circle melted forward with her. Somebody snickered."Matchstick. That's what she is: a walking match-stick, lit."Carol took a firmer grip on her suitcases. She swung them in front of her, and in three long quick steps broke the circle, leaving one bicycle wobbling perilously. Another, jolted by a suitcase, smacked against the curb and fell."Ouch!"She whirled, her face flaming. "Well, it's your own fault! I am not an orphan, and I'm sick of being told I'm skinny, and I hope your spokes are bent, and as soon as I can write a note to my aunt, I'm going home, and I'm not ever coming back to this country! Ever!"There was a little silence. "Coo. She's American." The boy beneath the bicycle pulled himself free and sat up, rubbing an elbow. He was big, fair-haired, with a slow even voice that bore no malice."Are you Bruce's cousin from California? Wait�" His hand went out as she turned. "What's your name?"She stepped across his bicycle wheel and kicked the gate open with her foot. She heard his voice, slightly plaintive, before she kicked it closed again. "He told me her name�I've forgotten�" There was a fishpond in front of the house. Great orange fish nibbling on the leaves of golden water lilies made startled dives at her approach. The house, solid and square, had two rows of long windows and two dormer windows jutting out from its high roof. Two great chimneys rose cold, motionless against the sky. The stone wall stretched far toward the field, then angled to encompass a vast sweep of side yard.Carol set her suitcases on the porch and pounded on the door. She waited a moment, flicking her long hair out of her eyes, and she noticed then how quietly the stones rose upward before her, and how the thin curtains breathed in and out of soundless rooms. She shifted impatiently on the steps, the anger quivering in her. She lifted her fists to pound again.There was a muffled voice shouting from the other side. "Why can't you go round to the back? I can't� open�"The door creaked again, moving a fraction of an inch. The voice belonged to a boy. Carol set her shoulder against the door and shoved.It sprang open in a chorus of noises: a wild garbled cry; the deep curly sound of a loosened spring; the rapid beat of a clock bell counting hours. Carol caught her balance, clinging to the doorknob. For a second, she did not move. Then she peered around the door in time to see her dark-haired cousin disentangling himself from a grandfather clock."Of all the stupid things to do�Will you shut up?" He pounded on the grandfather clock. It whined to a silence; the sound hummed a moment, golden, dying in the air. Bruce was silent, blinking in the dim hall. He reached up, massaging his shoulder. "What are you doing here?""Don't worry. I'm not staying long." "Are you Carol?" His eyes, narrowed a little against the light, moved slowly over her. He dropped his hand, leaving behind a shadow of grease on his shirt. He moved, looking behind her." Where's my parents?" "How should I know?"His eyes came back to her. "What are you angry about? It's me who should be angry, having people push me into clocks when I have to get my bicycle fixed.""I didn't mean to push you into a clock. I don't see why you have a front door if you don't want people coming through it.""Every house has a front door. I can't help it if this one is three hundred years old and has trouble opening. I'd rather live in a modem house with a doorbell anyway." He stopped abruptly. His mouth pulled downward at the corners, then twitched tight. "What �How did you get here? Mum and Dad went to pick you up at the airport in London."Carol was silent. She swallowed suddenly and sat down again on a suitcase. "Oh, no." Her hands rose slowly, covering her mouth."Didn't your mother tell you?""I think so, but � there were so many people, and it was so much fun being by myself, doing things for myself � I just forgot. I took a bus to the station in London and then I took a train to Welling-borough and then a bus to here. Then I asked where Parchment Street was and I walked here, only I thought I was lost because I couldn't remember that there were supposed to be graves. And then� ." Color washed into her face; her hands closed beneath her chin into fists."And then what?"She stood up. "And then I decided to go back home. I have a round-trip ticket and I'm going. At home they don't tease me. Much."Bruce's mouth opened slightly. It curved, after a moment, into a soft, noiseless "Oh� ." He drew a breath. "They just aren't used to people who are� different. This is a little town.""Do they do that to everybody who looks different?" He nodded, his eyes steady, aloof on her face. "Mm. And most of the time, I'm there to help. Only I wasn't, today, because I've been fixing a flat."In the silence, the clock started ticking again, after a soft inner click, as though some piece had fallen into place. Carol picked up her suitcases. "Well." Her voice shook on the word; she paused to steady it. "Tell Aunt Catherine I'm sorry she had to go to London for noth-"It's just what Dad would call facts. About me. He's a historian. After all, we don't have to like each other. You came over for a month to get cultured. To see how people in a different country live. You might as well stay for that, now you're here. You would just upset everyone if you went back home.""Everybody here has upset me.""People naturally upset each other. Perhaps in California, people all go barefoot with their hair in their faces, but not in Middleton. People don't � people don't like strange things." He bent down, reaching for her suitcases, and for a moment she could not see his face. Her voice came unfamiliar, distinct and needle-sharp."You surprised me, too. I thought you would at least be nice."His face, pink and white in the summer sunlight, flushed to the color of an even sunburn. For a moment his eyes lost their aloofness, flicked uncertainly to herface. Then his dark brows melted together into a scowl. He took the suitcases from her and turned to the staircase. "I used to be," he said. "Your bedroom is upstairs. I'll show you, and then I have to fix my bicycle. You can look around by yourself." The stairs, red-carpeted, creaked under their feet. "That's my room, round the corner. Yours is on the main landing." They turned a corner and went up a few more steps. He nudged a door open with his foot. "Bathroom's next door."The room was small and sunlit, with a dark ancient wardrobe twice as big as the bed. There was a full-length mirror in the door of it; she saw herself suddenly in it, tall as Bruce, her hair vivid, tangled from the wind, her worn jeans doubled-patched at the knees. She turned away and went to look out the window.It faced Parchment Street. Across the rows of gravestones half-hidden in the trees, she saw a great grey church, its spire drifting in the moving clouds. As she opened the window, bells played a familiar four-tone melody, then tolled the hour."Four o'clock. Does it bother you, living across the street from a graveyard?"He did not answer. She turned and found him standing behind her, his hands in his p...
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