“I bet you don’t.”
“You’re thinking this is all a trick. You’re thinking Rictus is leading you on a mystery tour and there’s nothing at the end of it. Isn’t that true?”
“Maybe a little.”
“Well, my boy, I’ve got news for you. Look up ahead.”
He pointed, and there-not very far from where they stood-was a high wall, which was so long that it disappeared into the fog to right and left.
“What do you see?” Rictus asked him.
“A wall,” Harvey replied, though the more he stared at it the less certain of this he was. The stones, which had seemed solid enough at first sight, now looked to be shifting and wavering, as though they’d been chiseled from the fog itself, and piled up here to keep out prying eyes.
“It looks like a wall,” Harvey said, “but it’s not a wall.”
“You’re very observant,” Rictus replied admiringly. “Most people just see a dead end, so they turn around and take another street.”
“But not us.”
“No, not us. We’re going to keep on walking. You know why?”
“Because the Holiday House is on the other side?”
“What a mir-ac-u-lous kid you are!” Rictus replied. “That’s exactly right. Are you hungry, by the way?”
“Starving.”
“Well, there’s a woman waiting for you in the House called Mrs. Griffin, arid let me tell you, she is the greatest cook in all of Americaland. I swear, on my tailor’s grave. Anything you can dream of eating, she can cook. All you have to do is ask. Her deviled eggs” He. smacked his lips. “Perfection.”
“I don’t see a gate,” Harvey said.
“That’s because there isn’t one.”
“So how do we get in?”
“Just keep walking!”
Half out of hunger, half out of curiosity, Harvey did as Rictus had instructed, and as he came within three steps of the wall a gust of balmy, flower-scented wind slipped between the shimmering stones and kissed his cheek. Its warmth was welcome after his long, cold trek, and he picked up his pace, reaching out to touch the wall as he approached it. The misty stones seemed to reach for him in their turn, wrapping their soft, gray arms around his shoulders, and ushering him through the wall.
He looked back, but the street he’d stepped out of, with its gray sidewalks and gray clouds, had already disappeared. Beneath his feet the grass was high and full of flowers. Above his head, the sky was midsummer blue. And ahead of him, set at the summit of a great slope, was a house that had surely been first imagined in a dream.
He didn’t wait to see if Ricer was coming after him, nor to wonder how the gray beast February had been slain and this warm day risen in its place. He simply let out a laugh that Rictus would have been proud of, and hurried up the slope and into the shadow of the dream house.