The House in the Cerulean Sea(83)

The woman squinted at him. “Are you all right, sir? Are you senile?”

Linus sighed as Lucy cackled.



* * *



The total, after being rung up, was astounding. Linus had never spent so much on gardening tools in his life.

Talia smiled up at the woman. “Can you excuse me for a moment?”

The woman nodded.

Talia turned away from her, smile disappearing. She looked frantic. She grabbed Linus’s hand and tugged on it, pulling him down. “I don’t have enough,” she whispered. “And we can’t push her down and steal it, right? Because that’s wrong.”

“We absolutely cannot push her down and steal it,” Linus said.

Lucy rolled his eyes. “I knew you were going to say that.” He frowned and then reached into his pocket. He pulled out a handful of crumpled bills. He held it out to Talia. “Is that enough, you think?”

Talia shook her head. “No, Lucy. You can’t. Those are for your records.”

Lucy shrugged. “I know. But not all of them are broken. And the ones that did break were my fault anyway. You can have it.”

“Put your money away,” Linus said quietly. “Both of you.”

“But, my tools—”

He stepped forward to the counter, dropping their hands as he pulled out his own wallet. He smiled weakly at the woman as he handed her his Diners Club Card, something he only used in emergencies. She placed it on top of the imprinter and snapped the handle over for the receipt.

He heard whispering behind him and glanced back, wanting to make sure that they weren’t actually planning on robbing the garden store. Instead, he found Talia smiling, her eyes wet as Lucy wrapped an arm around her shoulders.

The woman cleared her throat, and Linus turned back around. She handed him his card and started to bag up the tools. Linus felt Talia step beside him, reaching up to the counter, waving her hands as she couldn’t quite see over it. The woman handed her the bags.

She hesitated. Then, “This garden of yours. It sounds lovely.”

“It is,” Talia replied without a trace of ego.

“Would it—I like to take pictures of the gardens here in Marsyas.” She pointed toward a cork board on the wall with photographs of different gardens. “From the people who shop here. Every garden is different, I think. They reflect the personalities of those who care for them.”

“There are no dead bodies in our garden,” Lucy said helpfully. “But other than that, it’s pretty much exactly like Talia.”

“That’s good to hear,” the woman said faintly. She shook her head. “Perhaps—if it’s all right with your Mr. Baker here—perhaps I could come out and see your garden one day? In the spring, when things are blooming? Or sooner, if that would be all right.”

“Yes,” Talia said, eyes sparkling. “Oh yes. Except, it wouldn’t be Mr. Baker. You’ll need to ask Arthur. But I’m sure he’ll be okay with it. Mr. Baker is here to make sure we aren’t starving or getting beaten or being kept in cages. He goes home soon.”

Linus turned his head toward the ceiling, asking silently for guidance.

“Oh,” the woman said. “That’s … good?”

Lucy nodded. “So good. But Mr. Baker isn’t all bad. I mean, sure, I tried to scare him off the island when he first arrived, but now, I like that he’s alive and not … the other way.”

Linus sighed.

“Wonderful,” the woman said weakly. “Lovely to hear. I’ll send word to Arthur when I can make the trip.”

Talia gave her a dazzling smile. “I hope you’re prepared to be amazed. My garden makes all those ones on your picture wall look like crap.”

It was time to go. “Thank you,” Linus said stiffly as he grabbed the children by the arms and began to pull them from the store.

“Bye, plant lady!” Lucy screeched. “See you real soon!”

They were outside back in the sunlight when Linus was able to breathe again. But before he could speak his mind, he was surprised when his right leg was wrapped tightly in a hug. He looked down to find Talia holding on to him. “Thank you, Mr. Baker,” she said quietly. “That was very nice of you.”

He hesitated, but then reached down and patted the top of her head through her cap, something he wouldn’t have dared to do even a few days ago. “Think nothing of it.”

“He’s so wonderful and generous,” Lucy said, spinning in a circle on the sidewalk, arms outstretched for reasons Linus didn’t understand. “And I hope he remembers to do the same for me, so I don’t have to spend my own money and feel left out and have to open a pit to hell and watch this village be swallowed whole. Because that would just be so easy.”

Linus barely had time to wonder why Lucy’s threats didn’t scare him as much as they once had before they were on their way.



* * *



“Far out,” the man in the record store breathed, eyes glazed and bloodshot. He had long hair that fell on his shoulders and he looked as if he could use a bath.

Which meant, of course, that Lucy was entranced. “Far out,” he agreed. He’d managed to climb onto the countertop, and was sitting in front of the man—“Call me J-Bone, can ya dig?”—on his knees. There was another man in the back of the store, watching them warily.