didn’t say a word or make a move. She didn’t even blink. She was frozen. Finally, Ray glanced at me, then ripped the newspaper from Nova’s hands and threw it out the window, which prompted the driver to yell something back at Ray. Ray ignored him and gently lowered Nova’s eyelids with his fingertips, then held his hand in place over her eyes. Gently, he pressed her head down on his shoulder and she relaxed, falling asleep the rest of the way.
“She has done this before, no?” Opari asked Ray.
Ray looked up at Opari and nodded, then whispered, “More than once.”
“Is she also having visions again?”
“No…not visions.”
“What then?” Opari whispered.
Ray turned his head as far to the right as he could and looked at me. “Dreams,” he said.
Carolina’s neighborhood was in full bloom. Overhanging trees and thick green hedges made her house barely visible until we turned into the long driveway. The driver let us out under the stone arch and Jack unlocked the big house first, then the carriage house above the garage and swung the louvered windows out wide. He told Ray to let Nova rest in Carolina’s room overlooking the “Honeycircle.” Jack said a soft breeze filled with the scent of honeysuckle might be just what she could use.
Geaxi, Opari, and I opened all the windows of the big house, letting the fresh air circulate. Jack had closed everything tight when he left for Cuba, nearly two months earlier. As I walked from room to room the hot, slightly musty air made the house seem old for the first time. In Caine’s room, I paused, then remembered something. I looked in his closet. I was fairly certain it would be there. I reached up and pulled down the shoe box where I knew he kept it, along with neat’s-foot oil and a clean cotton cloth. I took the lid off the shoe box and picked it up. It was small, made for a child, and old, a relic by modern standards, but the stitching still held and the leather was soft. I put one hand inside and pounded the pocket with the other. It was Mama’s glove and it fit me perfectly. I rubbed the pocket slowly with my fingers and thought about Mama. I could see her cutting and stitching the leather. She’d laughed at my first dream, which was baseball, but she’d also created with her own hands and imagination the means to pursue it. Mama gave me her glove and Papa gave me his baseball and they both gave me what was inside—the Stone of Dreams. Unconsciously, I reached down and felt for the ancient egg-shaped black rock. I took it out and held it in my palm, staring at it, wondering what it truly was, what it truly meant.
“Z…where are you?” It was Opari and she was standing in the doorway, but she didn’t see me in the closet. I walked out, holding the Stone and still wearing Mama’s glove. She glanced down at my hands. “Zianno, what are you doing?”
I paused, then slid the Stone back in my pocket, placed the glove back in the shoe box, and put the shoe box back on the shelf. I turned and walked over to Opari and took her hands in mine. I held them up to my lips and kissed her palms. I looked in her eyes and they were black as coal, just like Mama’s. “I suppose I was dreaming,” I said.
Opari smiled and kissed the back of my hands. “Then I must wake you,” she said, leading me toward the door. “Come, my love. Jack is about to open Carolina’s safe.”
We hurried downstairs and through the alcove leading to the little room Carolina called Georgia’s room. It was her sanctuary in the big house and always had been. Books filled the oak shelves and Georgia’s piano still sat in its place against the wall. Carolina’s beautiful cherrywood desk and Tiffany lamp rested in front of the only window in the room. Her desktop was crowded with photographs of Jack, Star and Caine, Owen Bramley in various parts of the world, and one picture each of Nicholas and Solomon. As we entered, Jack was opening the window for fresh air. Mowsel sat on Georgia’s piano bench, staring somewhere beyond the little room, and Geaxi sat next to him.
“Where’s Ray?” I asked.
“He stays with Nova,” Geaxi answered.
Just then, Ray burst through the door. “You ain’t opened it yet, have you? I love to open safes. You never know what you might find.”
I looked at him. “How’s Nova?”
“Asleep,” he said. “She’ll be fine in a while.”
I glanced at Opari and her expression said differently. She was concerned for Nova.
Ray walked over and ran his fingers along the edge of Carolina’s desk, admiring the grain and color of the wood. He sat down on the corner of the desk. “Where’s she hide it, Jack? No, don’t tell me. Don’t even move. Let me look around first and I’ll tell you where it is.”
Jack laughed and said, “All right, Ray—where is it?”
Ray had his beret in one hand. He placed it at the proper angle on his head and scanned every wall of the little room, then took three steps over to a space between the bookshelves where an oval mirror in a white frame hung on the wall. He grinned at the rest of us and gently pulled on the bottom of the frame. The mirror swung out on its hinges without a sound, revealing a square wall safe with a black combination lock. “Sometimes, it’s obvious,” Ray said. He removed his beret and took a deep bow, waving his beret in front of him.
We all laughed, including Mowsel, though I’m not sure he knew why, then Geaxi said, “Open the safe, Jack. Let us see what this ‘List’ contains.”
Jack read the numbers Carolina had given him and turned the lock four times, twice right and twice left, and the door opened. He shuffled through a few papers, mumbling to himself, “Deeds…contracts…property.” He took out the papers, along with pieces of jewelry and a few other things belonging to Carolina, and set them on the desk. He looked in the safe again and removed two items that were behind the papers. One of them I recognized. I’d seen it once before on the day it was put in the safe, the day of Solomon’s “remembering” in 1904. Scott Joplin had surprised Carolina and me in the little room and requested a favor. He had written an opera especially for Lily Marchand to sing, but she had disappeared. He wanted Carolina to keep the manuscript for him until she was found. Unfortunately, I was the one who found her two years later, butchered and murdered by the Fleur-du-Mal during a hurricane. Scott Joplin died a decade later without ever knowing what happened to Lily. Jack read the title of the piece,
The other item was an elegant black lacquered box, probably Chinese, with the initials S.J.B. painted on top in crimson red. The box was old, yet still in excellent condition. Jack unfastened the tiny latch on the front and lifted the lid. He looked inside. “It’s a letter,” he said. Jack took the envelope out gently and laid it on Carolina’s desk. The paper was yellowed and fragile, but the ink of the writing was visible and clear. The letter was addressed to Solomon J. Birnbaum, Hotel de Mondego, in Macao. It was stamped and dated September 1, 1885. Jack handed the letter to me. “You knew him best, Z. You should read it.”
I took the two-page letter out of the envelope and unfolded it carefully, making sure not to tear the paper at the creases. The first page read:
Monsieur Birnbaum,
Please excuse my English. Within this letter you will find the names of all the men I have met in the Orient who have done business with the Magic Child you seek by the name of Sailor. I have also included five names of men I know who knew another, only this one is not familiar to me. His name is Xanti Otso. Beware, these men are of doubtful and dangerous character. I now consider my debt to you, sir, to be paid in full. Adieu and God bless.
The second page of the letter was filled with three columns of names. The first two listed the Giza who had known Sailor and the third listed the five who had “done business” with Xanti Otso. The names were in a dozen different languages and beside each name Captain Boutrain had written the man’s country of origin or the port where they had met. I read the lists out loud to everyone and no one recognized any of the names. Silently, I read over the lists again to myself. Suddenly one of the names looked familiar, then a face to match the name came to mind. It was the face of an old Ainu man I’d first met on the train to St. Louis, then again at Solomon’s “remembering.” There, through his granddaughter Shutratek, he asked me, “What do you keep alive?” It was an unusual question to ask and I never knew why he asked it. Still, I answered with the truth. I told him, “The Meq is what I keep alive.” My answer seemed to please him, but it definitely did not surprise him. Now I knew why. Sangea
