Gertie Milk and the Keeper of Lost Things Read online

  On one side of Gertie was the cliff edge, while on the other, a miraculous green countryside, so lush and soft and utterly delicious that Gertie remembered how thirsty she was and felt her throat and stomach tighten against the emptiness. Far, far in the distance, jagged gray mountain peaks rose up like teeth to pierce a loose blanket of cloud.

  There was a path winding along the cliff edge and Gertie decided to follow it. She thought again of the giant birds. They must have made their nests higher up, where the sea could not wash them away. When she remembered their soft, furry heads and kind yellow eyes, Gertie felt something move inside her body, as though love is a string tied between the heart and memory.

  « • • • »

  After walking for what seemed like hours, the wind began gusting so forcefully that Gertie was afraid she might be blown off the cliff. She imagined tumbling to the bottom, bouncing off bits of jutting rock. From a distance, she’d be just a speck of brown moving very quickly in one direction, arms flailing. Breathless.

  By late afternoon, gray-bellied clouds darkened the landscape. Then the rain began. Gertie opened her mouth to quench her thirst, but it didn’t work, so she licked beads of water from blades of grass, slowly so as not to cut her tongue. Gertie knew if she didn’t find shelter soon, or at least get more water, she would be in serious trouble.

  The path led toward a cluster of trees. As Gertie got closer, she realized it was a forest, into which the path disappeared. With hunger pulling at her insides, and sore, wet feet, she felt like throwing herself on the ground and beating her fists against the stony earth. Night was coming. Gertie knew she would be alone in the darkness.

  “Going into any forest is bad enough,” she said out loud, “but to enter now? When there are probably crawly things and slimy creatures—worms that suffocate children with giant sucky ends then laugh about it in worm language?”

  If she had to enter the forest, Gertie wanted to do it with the day ahead, not behind. She reached into her pocket and wrapped her fist around the curious key. The cool metal made her feel safe. After all, it had guided her to the correct path under the mountain—the one that led outside into the cool air. This told Gertie that whatever magical force controlled the key wanted her to survive.

  When she arrived at the edge of the forest, roots broke up through the soil and twisted back down into the dark earth. The wind was gusting. It tore through the dense woods, whispering leaves, and groaning ancient branches.

  Gertie flopped down on a mossy tree root and went over her options. She took the key from her pocket in case it had anything more to tell her.

  She slipped off one of her little cloth shoes. It was worn through from walking. Gertie noticed two holes in the sole. Sad little shoe face, she thought. “Want to be my friend?” But the shoe just hung limply on the end of her finger.

  The strong wind was freezing and stung her cheeks. Gertie sank into her gown, unable to stop shivering. She hoped desperately that at any moment, something might happen. The key vibrating again. Or the appearance of a white bird with food or even a map in its beak.

  Hours passed.

  The first stars came out. Cold and hard and far away. Gertie noticed them in the puddles around her. Every night holds many small nights, she thought, then dipped her finger and wet her cracked, salty lips with the star water.

  She wondered where her real home was, and if there was food there, and a warm place to sleep, and the voices and footsteps of people who loved her.

  Soon it was pitch-black. Gertie had gathered grass and dead branches around her in order to hide.

  Then she tried to keep her eyes closed. But it was difficult. She worried closing them would attract the things she wished most to escape. She imagined the sound her body would make getting dragged by the leg of a giant spider.

  Gertie blocked these dark thoughts by trying to picture her parents. As she didn’t know what she herself looked like, this took some effort. Eventually her imagination conjured two grown-up Gertie Milks, tall and smiling—one just a bit hairier than the other.

  Maybe they had taken long boat rides together, laughing as the spray soaked their clothes. Maybe her mother used to brush her hair. Gertie imagined sitting very still, as the brush pulled gently, melting knots. Her father was probably the sort of person who laughed at anything and never got angry. And what about siblings? An older sister to show her the way and whisper secrets that only sisters could share? For a brother, Gertie conjured a boy with brown hair that flopped around on his head like a slow wave. He was a serious person, but gentle, and loyal. . . .

  She tried to keep her eyes closed for the count of fifty, then a hundred, then two hundred, all the while attempting to hold steady in her mind the flickering smiles and steady glances of her imagined family—hoping their vague faces would eventually change into ones she recognized.

  Gertie felt sure that if she could make it over the broad back of night to morning, she would have an entire day to get through the woods. What if home lay on the other side? She would know tomorrow. Sleep was the only way to get there. Gertie shut her eyes and began to count.

  Then suddenly, between forty-seven and forty-eight, a voice spoke to her in the darkness.

  “I wouldn’t sleep here if I were you.”

  Gertie jumped up in fright, not knowing which way to run.

  “Unless of course,” the voice went on, “you’d enjoy getting torn limb from limb by a creature so awful that it ripped apart the letters of its own name, so that no one would know it exists.”

  5

  Moonberries & Slug Lamps

  GERTIE SPUN AROUND FRANTICALLY, but could see only the faint glow of stars beyond. Then she screamed.

  “For goodness’ sake stop,” the voice commanded. “I’ve got very sensitive hearing!”

  “Who are you?” Gertie cried. “Don’t come any nearer!”

  “Don’t worry, I won’t! Anyway I couldn’t, even if I wanted to.”

  Moonlight lit up the cliff and in the pale glow Gertie saw someone very small on the path before her: a tiny man no more than a few inches high. He was waving his arms around.

  She crouched down. “Is that you?”

  “Yes, it’s me,” said the man, with a hint of shame in his voice. “I’m very small, miniscule in fact, which is not the best first impression, I know . . .”

  “I’ve never seen anyone so tiny,” Gertie said. “Or is it that I’m really big?”

  “No, you’re normal, as far as I can tell. The truth is, when I found out there was someone on the island, I thought I should swallow some growing spice and make myself enormous in case you were some scary intruder. But I must have gone into the wrong box under the kitchen table and ended up with shrinking spice instead. Luckily, it didn’t kick in until I was already out of the cottage looking for you. Otherwise it would have taken me weeks to get this far on these matchstick legs.”

  “But how did you know I was here? Were you expecting me?” Gertie peered closer. “Do you know who I am?”

  “Oh dear,” the little man muttered to himself, “here come the questions. It’s always the same.”

  Gertie got down even further to look the tiny person in the eye.

  “I’m sorry, it’s just that I seem to have lost my memory,” she explained. “Can you at least tell me where I am?”

  “You’re on the island of Skuldark.”

  “Can you tell me how to get home?”

  “How should I know?” the man shrugged. “You don’t even know where you’re from.”

  Gertie stared at the small figure, trying to make sense of what was happening.

  “Why are you looking at me like that?” he said. “You’re not going to step on me, are you? I’m getting a very negative vibe. . . .”

  “I’m not going to step on you,” Gertie said crossly. “I’m not that kind of person! Or at least, I
don’t think I am.”

  “Good,” said the man, “because if you squished me, you’d have to spend the night out here instead of coming back to my cottage for tea and peach cake.”

  “Back to your cottage? I don’t know who you are,” Gertie said. “You might be a cannibal.”

  “I’m vegetarian! And you don’t even know who you are—what if you’re the cannibal!”

  “Well . . .” Gertie thought out loud. “Will we have to cross the forest to get to your cottage? I was almost eaten by a worm monster on the beach. I’m worried there are more in the woods.”

  “A worm monster?”

  “Yes, a giant worm with a head of scary holes.”

  “A head of scary holes? Oh! You mean Johnny . . .”

  “Johnny? He nearly ate me!”

  “Don’t be silly, he won’t hurt you, he’s vegetarian too. Did you pet him?”

  “Er, no, I was too busy running for my life.”

  “He also likes to be tickled . . . if you’ve got a feather big enough, that is. Loves a good tickle does Johnny the Guard Worm. You met the dodos I assume? White birds? They’re curious things with yellow kitten eyes and tufts of hair on their heads like funny little hats.”

  “Yes!” Gertie said. “One of them helped me get away from the killer worm.”

  “You mean Johnny,” the man gently corrected her. “Well, that’s nice, I’m glad you met the gang. What a shame such interesting creatures don’t exist on earth anymore. Lucky I swiped a few before they became extinct.”

  Gertie’s mouth fell open. “We’re not on Earth?”

  “Not exactly, but did you know, I was making a batch of moonberry juice and I found Johnny crawling around inside a moonberry? Yes, that’s right, at a time when I was very worried about people, the wrong sort, getting onto the island. So I began to feed him regularly with that growing spice I was telling you about, and it stuck! He’s lived on the beach as a Guard Worm ever since, eating all the seaweed and kelp pods that wash in. He’s in his element down there.”

  “What sort of place is this where you can make worms grow—”

  “And shrink!” said the little man. “I’ve got herbs and spices for almost anything you can dream up, from pretty much everywhere on Earth you can imagine.”

  “So we are on Earth!”

  “Not quite! But it’s good you remember there’s a watery little rock floating in space that we live on. You’re farther along than most. Now, do you remember what a house is?”

  Gertie nodded as an image of a cozy home popped into her head. It was small but nice, with a thread of smoke over the chimney.

  “Now imagine,” said the man, “that in the house there are places you can go, such as the sitting room, the kitchen, toilets, up the stairs to the bedrooms, and the attic, et cetera.”

  “Right,” Gertie said. “Got it.”

  “Excellent, now that is Earth, the places we know about and can go easily. But where we are is one of the spaces in the house that no one ever thinks about—such as the gap between the walls, or under the floorboards, or under the stairs . . . are you imagining it?”

  “So we’re trapped in a dark cupboard in an empty house with a giant worm and birds?”

  “No, no, no!” said the little man indignantly. “There is no house, it’s just a metaphor. You’re on the earth, but, just like in the house, there are places no one ever thinks about or goes. The island of Skuldark is one of those places.”

  “But how did I get here?”

  Before he could answer, the little man’s body started to make a fizzing sound.

  “Here we go!” he cried excitedly. “HERE WE GO!” Gertie watched as he got bigger and bigger until he was normal size again.

  “Excellent” he said, now towering over Gertie by at least a foot and a half. “And just in time, as the nocturnal population of Skuldark is waking up for its nightly roam.”

  He pointed toward the wild wood. Gertie turned and saw dozens of glowing lights in the trees and bushes that hadn’t been there before. Some were red, some were yellow, some were very dark green.

  “It would be quite a beautiful display,” the man said. “If each light wasn’t the beady eye of a Fern Valley millipede.”

  “Are they friendly, like Johnny?” asked Gertie hopefully.

  “Oh no, no, no, not at all! The millipedes are actually very dangerous. They live in deep holes, but come out in the dark to hunt.”

  “Hunt what? Kelp pods?”

  “I’m afraid they’re a bit more ambitious than that.”

  “Have they been watching us this whole time?” Gertie said, edging away from the woods.

  “Probably listening too, the little sneaks. Which means we have no time to waste,” the man said, digging in his pocket. “Here, have a Slug Lamp.”

  Gertie reached out her hand for the strange, soft creature, which began to glow at her touch.

  “He likes you! But you’re holding him by the wrong end. That’s his bottom.”

  Gertie flipped the slug creature over and looked into his face. “Sorry . . .” She whispered. The creature blinked a few times, and then a beam of light shot out of its rear end.

  “Now follow me,” the man said. “And it’s best if we don’t talk. We wouldn’t want to draw attention to ourselves, not with millipedes stomping about.”

  “But,” Gertie whispered, “what about the Slug Lamps? Aren’t they noticeable?”

  “Well, it can’t be avoided!” the man huffed. “Unless you have night vision. Electricity goes a bit screwy on Skuldark when the moon is full. And we haven’t had any lightning for a while to fill the energy tanks.”

  “Where are we going again?”

  “The Keeper’s Cottage. Now let’s get moving, there really is no more time for questions. The darker it gets on Skuldark, the more things start to wake up.”

  6

  The Cottage of Lost Things

  IN HIS NORMAL FORM, the man was rather tall, and Gertie had to walk swiftly to keep up as he strode through the darkness, his Slug Lamp held aloft.

  There seemed no end to the walking, and soon Gertie’s feet were dragging. But she kept the light from her Slug Lamp on the man’s shiny black shoes, and when the moon came out, the trees and bushes cast beautiful faint shadows.

  « • • • »

  Finally, they arrived at a wooden gate. The man held it open for Gertie, then led her through what appeared to be a garden piled high with various things. It was very dark. Some of the stacks were taller than the cottage. Some were in the shape of people and large animals.

  When they came to a door, the man removed an old key and rattled it into a lock.

  “Leave your Slug Lamp out here,” he said. “Next to that moonberry bush. The slugs can’t get enough moonberries—that’s the secret to their luminosity.”

  Gertie set the creature down and watched it inch excitedly toward a low-hanging moonberry leaf.

  Inside the cottage, it was warm and bright, with walls and walls of books. There was a long wooden table with old bottles, quills, animal skulls, maps, a basket of wooden balls, and (Gertie noted with a shudder) an enormous dead spider under a glass dome. Inside a wooden briefcase hundreds of different colored beetles were pinned in size order.

  “Those insects belong to Charles Darwin,” the man said. “He had the case designed especially. Beetle-mad he was!”

  At the far end of the room was a blazing fire, with two old but comfortable chairs, and a small table in between with a teapot and an uncut loaf of peach cake.

  “I was just about to have tea, when the B.D.B.U. announced your arrival and sent me out looking.”

  Gertie stood between a shelf of leather-bound books and the briefcase of beetles, which sat open on the long table. She was starving hungry but felt too shy to say anything—even to ask if she might sit do
wn.

  “You can look at those things later,” the man told her, “Come sit in one of these comfortable chairs by the fire and have the first slice of cake. I’ll heat up some milk with honey too.”

  As Gertie ate and drank the sweet warm milk, the man dozed off with his hands stuffed into his waistcoat pockets.

  Gertie thought he had a kind face, but there was sadness in the shape of his mouth. Lines on his forehead made him look worried—even while sleeping. She wondered who he was, and where he had come from.

  When Gertie was almost finished eating, the man woke up.

  “I can’t believe it,” he said, rubbing his eyes. “Did I fall asleep?”

  Gertie nodded. “I was waiting for you to wake up so I could tell you how much I like peaches. That’s a clue, isn’t it? To who I am?”

  “It is a clue,” the man said. “You know, I don’t think I’ve even introduced myself, my name is Kolt—”

  “Like it says on my key!” Gertie mumbled with a mouthful of cake.

  “Your what?”

  Just in time she realized that her key probably belonged to this man. It had his name on it, after all. What if she had stolen it from him? Or worse, what if he wanted it back? She felt the key was hers now. It had guided her, it knew her, she was sure of it.

  “Er, oh, my knee,” she said, thinking quickly. “I banged my knee coming into the garden.”

  The man gave her a long, hard stare. “What did you say your name was?”

  “Gertie Milk. I think.”

  “You think? So you really don’t know?”

  “All I know . . .” Gertie went on slowly, “is what it says here.” She pointed to the name stitched on the outside of her gown.

  “I shouldn’t worry,” Kolt said. “As at any moment you will most likely be catapulted back to Earth, and that will be that. It’s what always happens. No one will believe it when you try to tell them where you were. You’ll come to think of our time together as a vivid dream that taught you not to get on the wrong side of worms—unless they’re slugs with bottoms that light up.”