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lamp and perched it on the sill. She blinked the light three times with her hand, like a mariner signaling a passing ship.
    A few minutes later, she heard a rap at the glass. Molly opened the window to find Kip crouched in the mud. “Boo,” he said, wind grasping at his hair.
    “Boo, yourself.” Molly took his crutch from outside and propped it against the bed frame. She grabbed him under the arms and helped him through the window. “Remember what we talked about: you’re to be up and away by dawn—before anyone sees you.” Molly knew it was dangerous to disobey her mistress, but she also knew that her brother needed some place dry and warm to sleep. “Watch your boots,” she warned too late as he touched down on the mattress. “And shut that window before any leaves get in.”
    Kip was a little out of breath and his cheeks were flushed. He peered over his shoulder, searching the darkness outside. “Comin’ over here, I coulda swore someone was followin’ me.” He shut the latch and carefully climbed to the floor.
    Molly set to making the bed. “Well, did you tell him to stop?”
    Kip sat on the floor to remove his boots and trousers. “I ain’t foolin’. I was out at the stables, waitin’ for your sign at the window. All of a sudden this wind comes and it gets real dark—no moon, no stars. That’s when I seen your light, so I set to walkin’ over here. I’m halfwayto the house when the hairs on my neck stand straight up. It was like I could
feel
it, Molls, right behind me. I turned around, and there, in the fog …” He shook his head. “For half a heartbeat, I thought I saw someone there, watchin’ me.”
    Molly continued with the bedding, trying not to look alarmed. It was her fault that he came up with such things. Her fault for stuffing his brain full of goblins and witches and giant squids. “I thought you said it was too dark to see,” she observed.
    “Well, I could see
this
,” he said through the nightshirt over his head. “He was real tall, dressed all in black, with a tall black hat. I walked a few more steps toward the house and looked again … but he was gone.”
    Molly helped her brother into the freshly made bed. “He probably got a look at your face and was scared off,” she said.
    “It’s no joke,” he insisted. “Something’s wrong with this whole place. You seen how pale they all are—it ain’t natural.”
    “That’s just how folks look in England.” Molly suddenly felt very glad that she had not told Kip about the portrait in the library. There was no reason to add to his worry. “I’m sure we’ll get used to it.” She blew out the lamp and lay down beside her brother. She stared at the ceiling, letting her eyes adjust to the night. In the shadows, she could make out the place where a thick root had broken through the exposed wooden beams. After all these weeks of struggle, she and Kip had finally made it to a safe, warm bed. And yet she couldn’t shake the feeling that they shouldn’t be here.
    “Molls?” Kip said softly. He was staring at the cracked button she had given him earlier that day. “Why’d they have to go round the world without us?”
    Molly propped herself up on one arm. “You know well as I do, Kip. They didn’t want us gettin’ hurt.”
    He nodded. “Drowning.”
    Molly swallowed a lump in her throat. “Aye. Or that.”
    Kip turned toward her, his eyes shining in that little-boy way that spoke of distant adventure. “Do you think they’ve seen any dragons yet?” he asked.
    “I’m sure of it. The ocean’s full of ’em. Maybe, if we’re good, they’ll even catch one for us.” She looked at him, very serious. “But in the meantime, we’ve got a job of our own.”
    “What’s that?”
    She smiled, pinching his side. “Gettin’ sleep.”
    Kip might have protested were he not already in the middle of a yawn. Molly had observed that for children of a certain age, thought is action. No sooner had she put sleep in his mind