The Stolen Child(111)

I went back to work on my book, stuck mid sentence at the point where Igel is about to switch

with little Oscar Love. During my first visit beneath the library, I re-read the pages in light of what we

had discovered about Henry Day, and all that had been revealed to me through the other clan members

about my former life and circumstances. Needless to say, my first story reeked of false impressions. I

gathered my papers and the error-riddled manuscript and thought through the problem. In my original

version, I had assumed that my parents lived still and that they had spent their lives missing their only son.

Of the few chance encounters with my natural father, only one could possibly be true. And, of course,

the first story had been written with no real knowl-edge of the fraud and imposter who had taken my

place.

We started watching him again and found a troubled man. He carried on conversations with

himself, his lips mouthing a violent argument. Ages ago, he'd had a number of other friends as well, but as

his strangeness in-creased, they vanished from the story. Henry spent most of his time locked away in a

room, reading books or playing a booming organ, scrawling notes on lined paper. His wife lived in the

margins, working on her home, every day driving away and returning hours later. Onions thought that a

telltale unhappiness weighed heavily on the woman's mind, for when she was alone, she often stared into

the distance, as if to extract from the air the answer to her unuttered questions. The boy, Edward, was

ideal for the change, alone and distanced from the rise and fall of life, caught up in his own thoughts, and

wandering through his parents' house as if looking for a friend.

Waking in the middle of a full-moon night, I overheard Béka and On-ions whispering about the

boy. Cozy in their den, they expected a degree of privacy, but their conspiracy hummed along the

ground like the faraway sound of an approaching train.

"Do you think we'd be able to, ourselves alone?" Onions asked.

"If we can catch him at the right moment. Perhaps when the father is distracted or drowning out

every known sound on that infernal organ."

"But if you change with Edward Day, what will happen to me?" Onions said, never more plaintive. I

coughed to alert them to my presence and walked over to where they huddled, feigning sleep, innocent

as two newborn kits. They might be brazen enough to try, and I resolved to keep closer watch and

crack any plots before one might hatch.

In the past, the faeries refused to spy on one who had quit the tribe. The changeling was left alone,

forgotten, and given a chance to live out his human life. The danger of being exposed by such a person is

great, for after they make the change, they grow to resent their time among us and fear that other

hu-mans will discover their dark secret. But such concerns, once great, became less important to us. We

were disappearing. Our number had diminished from a dozen to a mere six. We decided to make our

own rules.

I asked them to find my mother and sisters, and at Christmas they were discovered at last. While

the rest of us dozed, Chavisory and Luchóg stole away to town, which glowed with blinking lights as

carolers sang in the streets. As a gift to me, they decided to explore my boyhood home, hoping to find

missing clues that might give my past more meaning. The old house stood in the clearing, not as solitary

as it had once been. Nearby farms had been sold off one by one, and the skeletons of new houses rose

in all directions. A handful of cars parked in the drive led them to believe that a celebration was taking

place at my former house, so they crept to the windows to see the assembled crowd. Henry Day, his

wife, and their son were there. And Mary and Eliza-beth. At the center of the festivities, a gray-haired

woman sat in an easy chair by a sparkling fir tree. Her mannerisms reminded Luchóg of my mother, upon

whom he had spied many years ago. He climbed a nearby oak and leapt from its outstretched limbs to

the rooftop, scrambling over to the chimney, its bricks I still warm to the touch. The fire below had gone

out, making it easier for him to eavesdrop. My mother, he said, was singing to the children in the old

style, without instrumentation. How I would have loved to hear her again.

"Give us a song, Henry," she said when they were through, "like you used to do."

"Christmas is a busman's holiday if you play the piano," he said." What’ll it be, Mom? 'Christmas in

Killarney' or some other blather?"

"Henry, you shouldn't make fun," said one of the daughters.

"'Angels We Have Heard on High,'" said an unfamiliar, older man who rested his hand on her

shoulder.

Henry played the song, began another. When Luchóg had heard enough, he jumped back to the