“I promise,” said Mr. Curtain. He gave Constance a sly look. “Am I telling the truth, my dear?”
Constance gazed fearfully at him, then nodded.
Mr. Curtain made a pleased murmur. He turned back to Mr. Benedict. “Now tell me quick, and no more games! Who is this person you spoke of ? And don’t you dare ask which person! You know who I mean: the one ‘extremely close’ to you — the only one who can secure the information for me! That’s exactly what you said! Now who is this person?”
Mr. Benedict looked frankly at his brother. “You.”
“Me?” said Mr. Curtain, taken aback. His eyes narrowed, and he put his hands over his mouth, breathing into them as if they were cold. It was evident he was attempting to stay calm. “What do you mean, me? How could I possibly secure this information for myself ?”
“You could have done so at any time simply by letting us go, which was the offer I made you repeatedly,” said Mr. Benedict. “Had you released us, I would have revealed the information.”
Mr. Curtain threw his hands into the air. “But you said you didn’t know!”
“I said no such thing.”
Mr. Curtain’s wheelchair bucked forward, and with surprising agility he leaped from his seat and landed inches away from Mr. Benedict. He shook his finger in Mr. Benedict’s face. “And what if I had threatened to hurt your companion? You wouldn’t have revealed it then?”
“I most certainly would have,” said Mr. Benedict. “But it would still have been you who secured the information with your threats.”
“So you phrased it that way to prevent further questioning!” roared Mr. Curtain, finally understanding. “You knew I didn’t want to waste any more serum! You knew I wanted to save it!”
“That was my understanding, yes.” Mr. Benedict returned his brother’s furious look with a calm, inscrutable gaze.
The children watched hopefully. If Mr. Curtain was angry enough, he might fall asleep, and they could try to make an escape. Maybe . . .
But after only a moment of outraged quivering, Mr. Curtain relaxed. He smiled, nodded, and put his hands behind his back. His wheelchair came up behind him like a well-trained pet. “Good enough,” he said, taking his seat. “In the end, your treachery has worked in my favor. You must be terribly disappointed in yourself, Benedict. Now I shall have my duskwort and my Whisperer, and these children are proving useful as well. . . .” He turned his wheelchair and cast a probing glance at Constance.
“Ledroptha,” said Mr. Benedict. “Shall I show you what I discovered now, or would you prefer to wait?”
“Yes,” said Mr. Curtain, turning eagerly back to him. “Show me at once.”
“I’ll need you to turn off the lights, then.”
“What?”
“The floodlights. Turn them off. There’s a control box on the table.”
“I know where the control box is,” said Mr. Curtain. “And I have left the lights on for good reason — so that nothing you did would go unobserved.”
Mr. Benedict gave him a patient smile. “I was aware of this, of course. But if you wish to see what I’ve been hiding from you, then off they must go.”
Mr. Curtain regarded him coldly. “Before I turn them off, do I need to make clear what punishments the children will suffer if this is an attempt to trick me?”
“I don’t believe such an explanation is necessary, no. I assure you I intend to do nothing at all while the lights are out.”
Mr. Curtain backed his wheelchair to the table and picked up the control box. He examined it carefully, then — just to be safe — rolled over and handed the box to S.Q., who’d been watching the proceedings in dutiful silence and at a dutifully safe distance. “Very well, Benedict. Let us hope you haven’t needlessly endangered your young friends. S.Q., flip the switch!”
S.Q. did as he was told, and the cave was thrown into perfect darkness. But the darkness lasted only a moment, for the walls, stalagmites, and stalactites soon began to glow with luminescent streaks of green.
“What you’re seeing is a form of translucent moss,” said Mr. Benedict. “It is what makes the rock appear slimy and wet in the light. In the darkness, as you can see, it is iridescent.”
For a long time Mr. Curtain sat in startled silence. Then he laughed. Softly at first, then louder and louder — and screechier and screechier — until the walls of the cavern reverberated with the great screeching peals of Mr. Curtain’s triumph.
Old Friends and New Enemies
The hours that followed were wretched ones indeed. Mr. Benedict and the children were compelled to watch as Mr. Curtain and S.Q. diligently scraped duskwort from every surface within reach. It was Mr. Curtain who had brought the black metal boxes stacked beneath the table, the children discovered. Although he’d had no idea of the plant’s appearance or location, he’d long been a scholar of the duskwort legends, and some years ago had secured — in a dark corner of the world — a scrap from an ancient book offering instructions for the transport and preservation of the fragile plant. Evidently nothing more elaborate was required than darkness, moisture, and a certain degree of heat, and Mr. Curtain had devised special containers to meet these conditions. Whenever he or S.Q. opened a metal box to slide in another layer of the precious moss, steam wafted out as if from a modern-day witch’s cauldron.
“To think,” said Mr. Benedict, watching his brother stretch to reach a high patch of duskwort on a stalagmite, “if we had worked together, Ledroptha, we might have accomplished a great deal. We each knew things the other did not.”
“And still do,” said Mr. Curtain, standing on the seat of his wheelchair to reach the duskwort more easily. (The wheelchair, in response to an unseen signal, eerily circled the stalagmite as if it had a mind of its own.) “But as you’ve now witnessed, I’m perfectly capable of making you reveal the things I desire to know. I see no advantage in ‘working together,’ as you put it.”
“The advantage,” Mr. Benedict began, “would lie in —”
“I do not care to hear any more of your opinions,” interrupted Mr. Curtain, peeling away a strip of slimy moss. “Foolish opinions distract me, and I have no time for distraction.”
“You do seem rather in a hurry,” Mr. Benedict observed.
“What did I just tell you about your opinions?” Mr. Curtain snapped. “Once again you betray your simplicity, Benedict. How do you think I have avoided capture if not from choosing never to tarry, never to linger? Take the present case: Even if I did not receive word from your Miss Kazembe, I fully intended to leave this island today.”
“And abandon the duskwort?” Mr. Benedict asked, sounding mildly surprised.
“Again, Benedict. Simplicity of thinking. I intended to leave S.Q., of course, to continue searching for it while I investigated the matter elsewhere. One way or another I would have found the duskwort, I assure you.”
At this, S.Q. paused in his work. From his stunned expression it was clear he’d had no inkling of this plan to leave him alone on a deserted island.
“As usual, however,” Mr. Curtain went on, “I have achieved my goals in the most efficient manner possible. Still, it never serves to stay in one place for long. Therefore I proceed, as always, with due haste.”
“If you’re in such a hurry,” Kate put in, “why don’t you force us to help you gather the duskwort?”
Mr. Curtain uttered his screechy laugh. “I have quite enough help, thank you, Miss Wetherall! And I should have quite enough duskwort even if I were compelled to leave most of it behind. No, I believe it’s better if you remain locked up.”
“I can’t see why you don’t just dump us off the mountain,” Kate said. “Now that you have your stupid plant, we’re not much use to you.” (Her friends squirmed uncomfortably at these words, even though they knew Kate was trying to create an opportunity for escape.)