A Bitter Magic by Roderick Townley

Author:Roderick Townley
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Random House Children's Books
Published: 2015-10-10T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twenty-Two

A rotten-egg smell greets me as we reach the roof. It gets abruptly worse when Janko opens the laboratory door and gestures me in.

Click-click-click.

“Um,” I say, “maybe this isn’t the best time?”

He takes a step toward me.

I duck in, just in time to glimpse an object whiz past my head and crash tremendously against one of the metal supports. Dirt and broken clay fly in all directions, small bits peppering my face. There’s Asa, hunched, glaring, his eyes as wild as his hair.

I quickly step out again.

But there’s Janko. He grabs my arm and practically flings me inside, slamming the door shut.

Asa looks up at the sound. He’s like someone waking from a dream. “You!” he says.

“Uncle, are you all right?”

He runs a sooty hand through his hair. “What are you doing here?”

“You told me to come!”

“Oh.” He looks around as if he’s misplaced something.

“Are you sure you’re all right?”

He doesn’t answer.

“Uncle?”

“I haven’t been sleeping well.”

That makes two of us. “Did you throw that flowerpot at me?”

“At you?” He finally focuses. “Of course not. I didn’t see you sneaking about.”

“I was not sneak—”

“Glad to hear it.” He expels a huffy sigh. “Now, what do you say; shall we get to work?” He fits a vial over a small flame. His lab coat, once white, is blotched with orange stains.

“Uncle Asa, what’s that horrible smell?”

“Sulfur. Some so-called expert said sulfur would work. I’m here to tell you it does not.”

“Can we at least keep the door open?”

“Can’t. Temperature control.” He takes a flat metal case from a shelf and unlatches it, revealing scores of stoppered test tubes with labels in Latin. He selects two and sets them on a stand.

“What do you want me to do?” I tap the glass end of my thumb nervously. I don’t want him to see it. I don’t want anyone to see it.

“Get me down that book. Third from the right? That’s it.”

It’s heavy, but I carry it with one hand, keeping the other out of sight. Le Vrai Mystère de la Rose Noire. “It’s in French.”

He riffles through it, then slaps his hand down. “Where am I supposed to find that?”

“Find what?”

“A certain black moss grows in the south of France. In winter.” He rubs his forehead. “You may have noticed we are not in the south of France. And it is not winter.”

“What do you need it for, this moss?”

No reply. He’s checking the glass vial over the flame. The liquid inside has turned brown.

“Damn!”

“What are you trying to do?”

“The impossible. Now, if you want to be useful as well as ornamental, you could hand me those calipers on the hook there.”

“You’re still trying, aren’t you, Uncle Asa?”

No answer. He wipes the back of his hand across his forehead, leaving a smear.

“But you know it can’t be done.”

Silence.

“Mother had to know that, too.”

He pours the vial of brown liquid into the sink.

“Maybe she was teasing you.” I’m determined to get a reaction. “Maybe it was a joke.”

He whirls around, his eyes murderous. “A joke?”

I flinch.

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