“Now for the hard part,” Ida said. “We have to steal the key to the front door off Stairway Ruth. It should be easier, now that there are three of us.” She smiled at Josephine, who smiled uneasily back, knowing that she had been given very little choice in the matter.
Ida whispered her plan to them twice, to make sure that everyone knew what he or she had to do.
ELEVEN
Stairway Ruth was in a grand mood. She marched happily through her evening patrol, twirling her lashing stick. This new child was an incredible stroke of good luck. She and Maggie had been worried for some time about what they would do once they ran out of orphans. They had no idea if the Master would allow the Institute to survive if they had no children to give him.
And tomorrow they were handing over Ida. The beauty of it! Ida was the most troublesome little brat Ruth had ever known and she was happy to get rid of her. Fargus was tolerable because he made no noise. But he had become Ida’s little lackey, which Ruth detested.
And now fortune had smiled upon them, and this other strange girl had appeared, which would buy them another two months at least to find more children. Ruth felt she had been given a wonderful reprieve.
She strolled through the doorway into the library and her foot caught on something. Before she knew it, she was flying face-first into the floor. As soon as she landed, she heard a voice cry out, “Get her!” It was Ida, that little demon! Ruth lifted her head and reached out for her lashing stick, but instead she saw Fargus crouching there, already holding it.
“Don’t mess with me, children!” she screeched. “I’ll boil your eyeballs!” Ida suddenly leaped out of nowhere, landing on Ruth’s back and pinning her down. Ruth reached with her sinewy arms and tried to grab her.
And then something dreadful occurred.
It was something out of Stairway Ruth’s worst nightmares.
The child began to tickle her.
It started directly below the ribs. Ruth summoned all of her courage and strength and vowed not to give in. But it was no use. A great guffaw escaped from her lips, followed by a cackle, and then, worst of all, a giggle. She was completely incapacitated. And, at the same time, furious. There was nothing she hated more than laughter, and her own was the most detestable of all.
“Hurry!” Ida yelled. “Get the keys. Now!”
Josephine emerged from her hiding place, bent down next to Ruth, and began to search for the keys.
“In her right side pocket! Quickly!”
“I’ll . . . get . . . you . . . Ida . . .” Ruth panted between fits of laughter.
Josephine’s fingers were shaking, but she finally managed to get her hand inside the pocket and extract a large ring of keys. “Got ’em!” she cried.
“Put. Those. Down,” a voice commanded from behind her. Josephine turned and saw Kitchen Maggie, looking like an angry bull about to charge. Josephine did the first thing that came to mind and dove into Maggie’s blubbery middle. Maggie was thrown off balance and seemed to fall backward in slow motion.
She landed on her ample backside with a booming thud, crying out as Josephine’s tumbling frame knocked the wind out of her.
Josephine lay there, shocked and sprawled on top of the mammoth woman.
“Josephine, quit lying around! Let’s go!” Ida cried, grabbing their food sack and scampering toward the front hall. “Come on!”
Josephine struggled to extricate herself from Kitchen Maggie, but it was like trying to climb out of an oversize marshmallow. She felt she’d never reach the edge. Finally she managed to pull herself up onto her feet and start running. Fargus ran beside Josephine, but without warning he stopped, turned around, and returned to the two defeated women. Both Kitchen Maggie and Stairway Ruth were struggling to catch their breath and stand up.
Josephine cried out, “Come on, Fargus! What are you doing?”
Fargus held Ruth’s lashing stick, and a crazy look came over him. He approached Ruth from behind, took careful aim and hit her once, hard across the rump. “Aaaaarrr,” she screeched, in pain and fury.
He then leaped toward Maggie, still supine on the floor. Her eyes were bulging in alarm as she simpered, “Now, now, Fargus. I always treated you well. Remember that day I let you have extra porridge?”
Fargus raised the stick once again, whipped it through the air, and let it land on the bottom of Maggie’s bare feet. “Aaaaghh,” she screamed.
Fargus gleefully ran to catch up with Josephine and Ida, and the three of them sprinted through the hallway.
Arriving at the foyer, Josephine stared at the towering set of doors before her. She guessed they were three times as tall as she was. They had been built to keep children inside and, more important, to keep the Brothers out.
Ida placed an iron key in one of the massive doors and turned it with both hands. Josephine heard three loud clicks and the door groaned open a crack. Ida grinned with satisfaction but then the alarm began to ring. CLANG! CLANG! CLANG!
They heard a mechanical groan and looked up to see a latticed gate lined with metal spikes begin dropping from the ceiling, about to separate Josephine and Fargus from the open door.
“Hurry! NOW!” Ida ordered, and was halfway out the door when Josephine was overcome with doubt. Perhaps if she left this place, she’d never make it home, never see her father or her books again?
“Wait!” she cried.
Ida froze. “What?”
“Are you sure this is the only option?” Josephine looked at Fargus and could see that he was feeling uncertain as well.
Ida pointed at the descending gate. “It’s a little late to change your mind, don’t you think?”
They could hear Maggie and Ruth yelling from the library. “Ida! Fargus!”
Ida gritted her teeth. “Either come with me and have a chance of survival, or go to the Master and have none. Which is it going to be?”
Josephine knew that once they were through this door, there was no turning back.
“We have to go, now!” Ida commanded. “Come on!” She disappeared out the door.
Josephine knew she had no choice. She looked at Fargus, who seemed to be hypnotized by the falling gate, which was already at eye level, and grabbed his sleeve. She pulled him under the gate and shoved him through the crack in the doorway. But he hit her in protest. She whirled around to find out what was wrong and saw that he had dropped the sack full of food. The gate was almost closed when Ida stuck her head back inside and hollered, “Hurry up!”
