The Mystic Travelogues (Volume 1) Read online

  “This is absolutely wonderful,” she exclaimed. Then, after pausing and seeing the smile on Tug’s face, added, “maybe you should stay in this room. It would be such a cheerful place to spend the summer.”

  “No thanks,” he said, really meaning it. “I think I like the blue bedroom if that’s all right. It seemed so quiet in there. Almost like how it felt being in my old bedroom.”

  “Well, maybe we can try sleeping in a different room each night. I bet each one has its own ghost.”

  Tug smiled, shrugging off the thought. “I think I’ll like staying in the blue room,” he replied, stepping back into the cool place, somehow more still than the rest.

  Uncle Oscar appeared on the landing with a bag in each hand. “I had my suspicions you would wind up in these two rooms. But it is such a pleasant endeavor to make up your own mind on things, am I right?”

  Jodie smiled at this new uncle, but Tug saw that Uncle Oscar was looking at him, not Jodie. Tug nodded, realizing it had been longer than he could remember since he decided something for himself.

  After they put their bags away, Tug and Jodie ate sandwiches with their uncle before going out to explore the rest of the farm. Despite the tiring journey they had just completed, they were energized with each new discovery. It soon became an afternoon of climbing. They climbed over and under and above and into all sorts of tractors and trees and barns— so much they could not keep track of everything there was to notice. When the sun slipped behind the mountains, it began to get surprisingly cool for such a warm summer day. Uncle Oscar even had a fire going in the wood stove when they came inside for their supper.

  When Jodie and Tug had sat still long enough to eat and relax in the warmth of the fire, sleep began to pull at their eyelids. After teeth were cleaned and faces were washed, Tug and Jodie said their goodnights to their uncle and each other before going to bed. Tug opened his closet to pull pajamas out of his bag and paused when he noticed a stuffed, furry paw sticking out from behind his suitcase. He grabbed onto it and carefully pulled out the unmistakable shape of a large stuffed bear. He was certain he would have noticed it had it been there when he put his bag away. Perhaps his uncle put it in there for him, not realizing Tug was far too old a boy to play with teddy bears. Still, Tug smiled at it, taken by the intelligent look a lifeless toy could have. Tug guessed he must have been a very old bear, maybe even belonging to his uncle when he was a boy; the fur felt like a soft and unfamiliar sort of wool, and rather than being squishy, as most stuffed animals were, this one felt a little stiff, as if it were filled with a tougher sort of material.

  Tug turned the bear’s legs into a sitting position and set him down on the shelf next to his bag. When he did, the toy made a rumbly sort of moan, and Tug giggled, discovering some sort of growling mechanism that let out noise when you rocked the bear backwards or forwards. After several growls were elicited, Tug left the bear in the closet and pulled on his pajamas. The bed was bigger than any he had slept in before. Tug found the extra space uncomfortable somehow after sleeping on a little mattress on the floor for so many months.

  Although the farm was far outside of town, the moon and stars seemed to cast off a brighter light than the nighttime Tug knew from living on cul-de-sacs with street lights all around. Even with the curtains closed, light penetrated the room and cast long shadows against the sloping angles in the ceiling. After lying in the quiet for a long while, Tug quickly jumped out of bed and went to the closet, grabbing the bear and telling himself it would take up some of the extra space in the bed. He found it surprisingly comfortable to lean against; it fit snugly against his chest and under his chin. He thought back on how much he had done that day, but before he could recount many of the details, he was fast asleep.

  IN THE MORNING, Tug was stirred out of a heavy sleep by what sounded like a branch hitting the window. When at last he opened his eyes, he was surprised to see a large black bird with white feathers at its breast perched outside on the sill next to his bed. Tug wouldn’t let himself believe it was the same crow he had noticed at Jodie’s house, or before that at his old house with his parents. But the bird seemed to look right at Tug, cocking its head from side to side with sudden tics. When Tug made no movement in response the bird started tapping at the windowpane with its beak.

  Tug was sure this is what his uncle must have meant by the interrupting crow. He hoped this was not how he was going to be woken every morning. But Tug found it too curious an event to be annoyed by the bird. Instead, he stared at it until a knock on his bedroom door caused the crow to take flight.

  “Come in,” he answered, watching the bird disappear into the stand of maple trees across the yard.

  Jodie came into the room, already dressed. “I thought maybe you were asleep, but then I heard you banging away in here. What were you doing, anyway?” Tug paused, unsure how to relay the strange tale of the visiting bird, and before he could respond Jodie spotted the bear lying next to Tug. “Hey, I didn’t know you had a teddy bear.” She didn’t sound like she was trying to chide him but Tug felt his face get hot.

  “I don’t,” he said, forgetting all about the bird. “I think Uncle Oscar left it here for me. It must have been his from a long time ago.”

  “He left it in the bed for you?” Jodie asked.

  “Well, sometimes I like to hold onto a pillow or something when I sleep.” Tug changed the subject and began to tell her about the crow that woke him tapping at the window. Jodie listened with wide eyes. Tug didn’t tell her he had seen crows before, maybe this same crow, watching him.

  “Maybe he saw something shiny that he wanted. I’ve heard some birds can be terrible thieves,” she said.

  “And you think he was just here for some window-shopping?”

  “Well, he must have wanted something.”

  At breakfast, Jodie asked Uncle Oscar about the crow. Their uncle seemed all too familiar with the occurrence but offered no explanation.

  “Unsolicited huckster!” he exclaimed. “Never stopping to consider we’re not interested.”

  Tug looked at Jodie but she just shrugged back at him. And just as Tug bit into his toast, Jodie brought up the discomforting subject of the stuffed bear.

  “I saw your old teddy this morning in Tug’s room,” she said. “He’s a wonderful old bear.”

  Uncle Oscar raised his bushy eyebrows, looking astonished by the discovery.

  “Leopold?” he asked, as if the thing might have introduced itself to the children.

  “Is that his name?” Jodie asked, smiling. “He looks like a Leopold.”

  Tug swallowed hard on his toast, scratching his throat on the way down. “I just sort of found it in the bedroom closet,” he said. “I’ll be sure to put it back after breakfast.”

  “In the closet, you say?” Uncle Oscar still seemed to have trouble understanding the simple matter. After considering it a moment, he said, “I can’t imagine he would want to be in a closet. Best that you situate him somewhere with a little more scope for the mind.”

  “Then it’s all right for us to take him out?” Jodie asked.

  “All right for whom?” Uncle Oscar asked, and then continued before either one could respond. “Of course, I don’t question you can look after the bear. I’m sure you’ll quite entertain each other.”

  And starting that day, Leopold was present for every adventure Tug and Jodie embarked upon. That afternoon, when Jodie suggested that Leopold be the unfortunate victim of a kidnapping in a spirited game of cops and robbers, Tug shrugged his shoulders as if he was just willing to play along. Secretly he thought it was an ingenious idea. Still, he didn’t want to admit that playing with stuffed bears was ever a good idea for a boy of his age.

  The next day when rain kept them indoors, Tug thought playing hide-and-seek would be thrilling in the old farmhouse. But when it was Jodie’s turn to hide, she had the idea to take Leopold and conceal him before finding a spot for herself. Since Leopold was smaller and could fit in better spots, th
e seeker would get extra points for finding him.

  Some nights, Jodie and Tug told scary stories in front of the fire, taking turns holding Leopold on their laps. Jodie said it gave the storyteller a real audience to have more than one listener. Tug furtively clutched the bear tighter than he needed to, glad to have something to keep his nerves steady while being escorted into Jodie’s vivid imagination.

  Before long, Jodie didn’t even have to suggest making Leopold a part of their games. If they were going out to explore the woods it was expected that Leopold would ride along inside Tug’s knapsack. And when they sat at the kitchen table for a meal, Leopold had his own seat atop a couple of the sofa pillows. Uncle Oscar would look at Leopold as much as Jodie and Tug when he was speaking to them.

  Despite their shared custody, Leopold always went to Tug’s room at the end of the day. Jodie once commented that it was Leopold’s room before it was Tug’s. Tug wondered if she sensed how comforting Leopold was for him— when confusing dreams troubled Tug’s sleep, he would reach out and find Leopold in the darkness, drawing him near and dozing off again.

  And soon enough, a transformation occurred. Most would insist that it happened to the children, but those who know better understand that it really happened to Leopold. As it is with most transformations, it took place so gradually that neither Tug nor Jodie could have said exactly when it happened. At first, Leopold’s growler mechanism would sound at peculiar times, often without the customary movement that is usually needed to excite a stuffed animal’s growler.

  On one of these occasions, the children were sitting under a tree in the garden, Leopold sitting between them. As she was accustomed to do, Jodie was suggesting what wild beasts might roam in the surrounding forest. The first time Leopold let out a little whimper, Tug asked Jodie if she had heard it, unsure of himself and what he thought he heard.

  “Maybe all this talk of beastly brutes is scaring him.” And then she turned to address their small companion. “After all, you are a bear, Leopold. You might show a little more courage.”

  And this time his growler mechanism sounded with an unmistakable rattle. Jodie and Tug thought this was far more humorous than strange, and laughed for a long while. After that, Leopold would growl whenever the situation called for it. And though his eyes would glint with a knowing depth, not a single hair in his fur would move to suggest anything other than a quirky sounding.

  One morning, Tug woke to find Leopold sitting upright, his head turned towards the window as if he were greeting the morning sun. But Tug chuckled and did not stop to wonder what brought the bear to be situated such. Surely, while Tug was moving about in his sleep Leopold was displaced from under the bed sheets and repositioned in that manner by chance. No sooner had Tug had this thought than he noticed the crow had returned to his windowsill, head cocking left and right. The bird was too peculiar in its own right for Tug to equate its being there with Leopold’s unusual behavior that morning. And when the bird was getting no reaction from Tug, it cawed loudly in annoyance and flew off into the maple grove.

  Before Tug could recount the incident at breakfast, Uncle Oscar asked a very odd question.

  “I don’t suppose any of you can navigate underground with a hand lens?”

  Jodie looked at Tug and he shrugged back at her.

  “I don’t want to make any assumptions,” Uncle Oscar added, “but we do know how poor a bear’s eyesight is in the dark. Perhaps either of you children have some experience to offer?”

  “Underground? You mean, like in a basement?” Tug asked.

  “Good heavens, no. If one gets lost in a basement there’s no hope for him at all, compass glass or not. No, I am referring to that natural and expansive universe of grottos that lies beneath.”

  Tug and Jodie looked puzzled and Uncle Oscar let out his breath in exasperation.

  “Caverns!” He exclaimed. “Those labyrinthine warrens that wind through the earth below its surface.”

  “Are there caves here on the farm?” Jodie asked, already beyond excitement.

  “My girl, they are everywhere. The trick is finding entry and, more often than that, finding exit.”

  “So is there an underground entrance around here?” Tug asked, desperate for a clearer understanding of what his uncle was getting at.

  “Underwater would be more to the point. I’m sorry to say one has to take a little swim if they should wish to enter here.”

  “Where do you do that?” Jodie asked. Tug only knew of the stream that meandered through the farm, and that was not deep enough to swim in. And they were quite a distance off from the lake.

  Uncle Oscar paused as if to consider how to respond to Jodie’s question, even though it was the only question that could have been expected.

  “It occurs to me that one should not encourage children to play in caverns. Several poor souls never find their way out, you know. So it would not be fitting for me to even point out the entrance to a group of young adventurers such as you three. Like Bluebeard’s forbidden room, the temptation would prove too much and you could not be blamed for an overriding curiosity.”

  “Uncle Oscar,” Jodie protested, “how can you tell us about such a thing and leave out where it is?”

  “My girl, I am not telling, I am asking. And if neither of you possess subterranean navigational abilities I suspect I am right not to tell you.”

  Tug saw his frustration mirrored in Jodie’s face, and although Leopold had no other expression to give, he let out a deep and rumbley growl.

  “Well,” Uncle Oscar added, “I suppose the bear makes a good point. It does happen from time to time that one finds himself compelled to go below the surface and I would not want you ill-prepared if it is in my power to prevent it.”

  Uncle Oscar stood-up and went to one of the tall cupboards across the kitchen. He pulled down a large, Oriental-looking jar with a wide opening. After setting it down on the counter he reached inside, his arm disappearing up to his elbow, and he spent several moments feeling his way around with gentle movements, as if he were searching for a key in a box of nails. At last he pulled out a bundle of velvety black fabric that looked as if it would have filled the jar. He set it down on the table between Tug and Jodie without unwrapping its contents.

  Jodie reached over and lifted away folds of black cloth, revealing what looked to be a magnifying glass. Its glass lens was encased in a brassy ring, and there was a worn handle that looked as though it might have been part of an animal’s antler.

  “It’s very old, to be sure, but I’m certain it works as well for it,” Uncle Oscar explained.

  “It looks just like an ordinary magnifying glass,” Jodi said, unable to keep the disappointed tone out of her voice.

  “Not just any ordinary magnifying glass,” Oscar corrected. “This lens can tell you more details about the direction you’re facing, like what the Sun is apt to illuminate in the northeast and important thoughts you may have facing south. Sort of a looking glass with thoughtful reminders. The important thing to remember is your gem tables…”

  Uncle Oscar stopped at the confused look exchanged between Tug and Jodie. “Haven’t you children learned your gemstone fundamentals?” Both children shook their heads and Oscar murmured something about their neglected education.

  “In the library here, you’ll find a very helpful guide to gemstone identification and their meanings. If you can remember those, and you are wary of Nome trickery, you can use this lens as a compass and stay on course.”

  “Gnomes? Like the little men that decorate gardens?” Jodie asked, less interested in the magnifying glass now.

  “No. Those are ‘G’ Gnomes, not to be confused with matters of genetics. Those Gnomes are a distant and kinder cousin to the ones I’m speaking of. No, these Nomes are the sort that live underground, mining gemstones and guarding them against trespassers. You may have heard them referred to as goblins or, incorrectly, dwarfs. They know all sorts of tricks to throw off your compass readings and keep y
ou hopelessly lost.”

  “Why would they do that?” Tug asked.

  “So that you don’t find your way out again and tell anyone else about what you’ve found. You see, these Nomes have unimaginable fortunes of gems and precious stones. If anyone comes close to their kingdom they will try every trick they know to keep you from getting back to the surface and returning with reinforcements to mine their riches.”

  “That sounds absolutely cruel,” said Jodie, “being lost in a cold, dark cave forever.”

  “Nomes are anything but kind,” Uncle Oscar agreed. “But it’s best you understand the perils of that underground kingdom. Especially around here; you see, the Green Mountains are very old, some of the oldest mountains in existence. That means more time to make diamonds and rubies and, in particular, emeralds. It’s the real namesake of these hills, you know.”

  “I thought gemstones came mostly from Africa and Asia,” Tug suggested, trying not to sound contrary.

  “Oh, yes, those little gems left for us humans. The real good stuff never leaves the Nome Kingdom. And they’ll try to make sure you never leave, either, if you are unfortunate enough to wander into their caverns unknowingly.”

  “You said we might need to, though,” Tug said. “Why would we ever need to do something like that?”

  “Sometimes it’s the safest way from here to there.”