The Fairy-Tale Detectives (The Sisters Grimm, Book 1) Page 18

  Hamstead got out of his car and, along with Boarman and Swineheart, rushed to the family's side.

  "I hope that you are OK, Relda," Hamstead said.

  "Of course, thank you very much, Sheriff," Granny replied.

  "You've got some pretty smart grandchildren," Hamstead said, smiling at Puck, Sabrina, and Daphne. "Not ones to let a man explain anything, and not so easy on my wardrobe, but I suppose they're pretty smart."

  He reached his hand out and Sabrina shook it. Daphne did the same.

  "In the future, kids, remember, we're the good guys," Hamstead said. "If you'll excuse me, I have to confiscate a little evidence."

  The sheriff looked at Mr. Canis and nodded his head.

  "Wolf," he said with an odd respect.

  "Pig," Canis replied, returning the gesture.

  Hamstead excused himself again and approached the cameraman and the reporter. He said something to them and they immediately began to argue. The portly sheriff grabbed the camera and tried to remove the videotape inside. He managed to take it out and break it in half, but got several whacks on the head from Wilma Faye's microphone for his efforts.

  "What about the reporters?" Daphne asked.

  "Glinda will make sure they don't remember a thing," Charming said as he entered the clearing. He was rubbing his head and placing his phone back in his pocket.

  Mr. Canis stepped closer to the family as Charming stopped in front of the girls.

  "Relda, your grandchildren are as meddlesome as you are," the prince continued. "But they were helpful in putting an end to Jack's plan."

  "Your Majesty," Relda chirped happily, "are you suggesting that the Grimms might be useful in this town?"

  "Hardly," Charming growled. He turned to the girls and looked at them darkly. "Remember what I said about tomorrow, children." He spun around and made a beeline for the sheriff.

  Daphne and Sabrina hugged their grandmother around the waist and burst into a torrent of happy tears. Granny Relda leaned down and covered the girls in kisses.

  "Lieblings, are you OK?" she asked.

  This time, Sabrina didn't feel like pulling away from the old woman. This time, Granny's hug felt like home.

  "I'm OK," Sabrina said, fighting back more tears.

  "We're sorry we almost got you killed," Daphne said. "We're not very good detectives."

  "Nonsense!" Granny Relda laughed as she led them to the car. "You rescued Mr. Canis and me and managed to prevent a serious catastrophe. I say the two of you are first-rate detectives. We should celebrate. Does anyone have any ideas?"

  Sabrina eased back into her seat. "I'd really just like to get out of these clothes," she said, looking down at the monkey hanging from the tree on her sweatshirt.

  HANG IN THERE, it read.

  • • •

  Elvis woke the girls the next morning with loving licks on their faces. Luckily, Jack had not hurt the dog too badly. His ribs were bruised and he would have to wear a bandage on bis side until the veterinarian could remove his stitches. But the only thing that seemed to truly hurt was Elvis's pride. Daphne apologized to him for not paying attention to his clue and promised that his opinion would always be considered in the future.

  Granny greeted them at the dining room table with more of her unusual culinary treats. That morning, they enjoyed blue scrambled eggs, some little orange nuts, home fried potatoes soaked in sparkly green gravy, and wedges of tomato. Mr. Canis was still in his room and Puck was nowhere in sight.

  "Is Mr. Canis OK?" Daphne asked.

  "He will be," Granny Relda replied. "I'm sure he'll be happy to hear you are concerned."

  "Where's Puck?"

  Granny Relda smiled. "He'll be here soon."

  After breakfast, the three Grimms went to the mall and bought the girls a dozen outfits apiece. Even Granny found a new hat with a sunflower on it that matched a yellow dress she said she hadn't worn in years. Sabrina suggested they burn their orange monkey sweaters and blue heart-covered pants but Daphne refused. Granny took Sabrina aside and apologized for the outfit, saying that Mr. Canis might not have been the right choice to shop for girls. After all, he was color-blind.

  When they got home, Granny had presents for them. The girls unwrapped them quickly and found they each had a brand-new, cloth-bound book, just like the one in which their father had kept his journal. The covers had their names stenciled in gold with the words FAIRY-TALE ACCOUNTS above them. When Sabrina opened hers, she found there was nothing inside, only hundreds of blank pages.

  "As your father and generations of Grimms before him did, it is your responsibility to put on paper what you see, so that future generations can know what you went through," Granny said. "We are Grimms. This is what we do."

  The rest of the day, the girls scribbled what had happened into the books. They picked each other's brains for anything they might have forgotten and when they were finished, Sabrina tucked the picture of her family inside her journal's pages. Together, the girls rushed downstairs and placed their books alongside their father's on the shelf reserved for their family.

  "Girls, I'd like to show you something else," Granny said. The girls followed her up the stairs, where she unlocked Mirror's room. The little man's face was in the glass again and he smiled when the old woman and the girls entered.

  "Good afternoon, Relda," Mirror said.

  "Good afternoon. I do hope you are feeling better," Granny replied.

  "Much better. The bruises look worse than they felt," Mirror said.

  "That's nice to know," the old woman said. She turned to the girls and took their hands. "Would you like to see your parents?"

  Sabrina's heart nearly jumped from her chest.

  "Is it possible?" she asked.

  Granny turned back to the mirror. "Mirror, mirror, near and far," she said aloud. "Show us where their parents are."

  The mirror misted over and two figures slowly appeared in the reflection. When the mist cleared, Sabrina saw her parents, Henry and Veronica, lying on a bed in a dark room. They were very still, with their eyes closed.

  "They're dead," Sabrina said, before she could stop herself.

  "No, not dead," Granny Relda corrected her. "Just sleeping."

  "We lost one of Dorothy's slippers," Daphne cried. "We could have used them to rescue Mom and Dad."

  Sabrina's face flushed with regret.

  "Liebling, don't you think I have tried the slippers and everything else inside the mirror?" Granny Relda sighed. "This Scarlet Hand, whoever they are, used strong magic to take your

  mom and dad away from us, but we aren't going to give up. We'll find them, I promise."

  The girls wrapped their arms around Granny Relda and hugged her tightly. Sabrina and Daphne sobbed, both tears of happiness that their parents weren't dead and tears of despair that they didn't know where they were.

  "I hope you'll let me into your family until we can all reunite," Granny said, breaking into tears herself.

  Suddenly, there was a knock at the downstairs door. The old woman took a handkerchief from her pocket and wiped the girls' eyes. Then she wiped her own and stuffed the hankie back into its home.

  "Come girls, we have guests," she said as she exited the room. The girls watched the image of their parents slowly fade from the mirror and then stood for a moment, staring at their own reflections.

  "We're home now," Sabrina said to her sister.

  "Well, duh!" Daphne giggled.

  The two left the room and closed the door behind them. Then they ran down the stairs to the foyer. Puck was already inside, carrying several boxes filled to the top with old toys, junk, and several dead plants. Behind him were Glinda, Hamstead, Boarman, and Swineheart.

  "What are the police doing here?" Sabrina asked.

  Glinda, Boarman, and Swineheart walked past them into the dining room and spread a huge roll of papers onto the table. When Sabrina got a closer look, she realized they were blueprints.

  "What's all this?" she asked.
<
br />   "We're putting an addition on your house," Hamstead said as his expression turned to a sly smile. "This house isn't big enough. You need another bedroom right away. Relda asked us for our advice. Before we went into law enforcement, we used to be in construction."

  "I'm getting my own room," Sabrina squealed happily. "I haven't had my own room in a year and a half."

  Daphne looked insulted and stuck out her tongue.

  "Oh, Sabrina, we're not building you your own bedroom, yet," Granny apologized. "No, we need another room because ..."

  "I'm moving in!" Puck interrupted. He shoved his box of junk into Sabrina's hands and joined the witch and the deputies looking over the plans.

  "He's lying, right?" Sabrina said hopefully. "You wouldn't let that stinky freak move in here with us?"

  "I think it's great!" Daphne cried.

  "Girls, he may not be my real grandson," Granny replied, "but I love him like he was my own."

  Daphne took her sister's hand and smiled. "I have a feeling we're going to have a lot more to write in those books."

  Sabrina scowled.

  To Be Contiinued....

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Michael Buckley has written and developed television shows for many networks. The Mole People and The New Sideshow can be seen regularly on the Discovery Channel. Michael lives in New York City. The Sisters Grimm books are his first.

  This book was designed by Jay Colvin and art directed by Becky Terhune. It is set in Adobe Garamond, a typeface based on those created in the sixteenth century by Claude Garamond. Garamond modeled his typefaces on those created by Venetian printers at the end of the fifteenth century. The modern version used in this book was designed by Robert Slimbach, who studied Garamond's historic typefaces at the Plantin-MoretusMuseum in Antwerp, Belgium.

  The capital letters at the beginning of each chapter are set in Daylilies, designed by Judith Sutcliffe. She created the typeface by decorating Goudy Old Style capitals with lilies.