Donna Tartt - The Little Friend

“What?” said Hely, wiping a forearm across his sticky forehead.

Harriet cut her eyes to the side in a way that meant let’s go . Without a word, they turned and walked their bikes politely away until they were around the corner and out of sight.

“But where were the snakes?” said Hely, plaintively. “I thought you said they were in the truck.”

“They must have carried them back in the house after Mr. Dial left.”

“Come on,” said Hely. “Let’s ride over there. Hurry, before they finish.”

They jumped back on their bicycles and pedalled to the Mormon house, as fast as they could. The shadows were getting sharper, and more complicated. The clipped boxwood globes punctuating the median of Main Street glowed brilliantly at the sun’sedge, like a long rank of crescent moons with three-quarters of their spheres darkened, but still visible. Crickets and frogs had begun to shriek in the dark banks of privet along the street. When, at last—gasping for breath, stepping down hard on the pedals—they rode in sight of the frame house, they saw that the porch was dark and the driveway empty. Up and down the street, the only soul in sight was an ancient black man with sharp, shiny cheekbones, as taut-faced and serene as a mummy, ambling peacefully down the sidewalk with a paper bag under his arm.

Hely and Harriet concealed their bicycles beneath a sprawling summersweet bush in the median’s center. From behind it they watched, warily, until the old man tottered around the corner and out of view. Then they darted across the street and squatted amidst the low, sprawling branches of a fig tree in the yard next door—for there was no cover in the yard of the frame house, not even a shrub, nothing but a brackish tuft of monkey grass encircling a sawn tree trunk.

“How are we going to get up there?” said Harriet, eyeing the gutter which ran from first to second story.

“Hang on.” Breathless with his own daring, Hely shot from the shelter of the fig tree and ran pell-mell up the stairs and then—just as rapidly—skimmed down again. He darted across the open yard and dove back under the tree, by Harriet. “Locked,” he said, with a silly, comic-book shrug.

Together, through a tremble of leaves, they regarded the house. The side facing them was dark. On the street side, in the rich light, the windows glowed lavender in the setting sun.

“Up there,” said Harriet, and pointed. “Where the roof is flat, see?”

Above the pitched roof-ledge peaked a small gable. Within it, a tiny, frosted window was cracked an inch or two at the bottom. Hely was about to ask how she planned to get up there—it was a good fifteen feet off the ground—when she said: “If you give me a boost, I’ll climb up the gutter.”

“No way!” Hely said; for the gutter was rusted nearly in two.

It was a very small window—hardly a foot wide. “I’ll bet that’s the bathroom window,” said Harriet. She pointed to a dark window positioned halfway up. “Where’s that one go?”

“To the Mormons. I checked.”

“What’s in there?”

“Stairs. There’s a landing with a bulletin board and some posters.”

“Maybe—Got you,” said Harriet, triumphantly, as she slapped her arm, and then examined the bloody mosquito smeared on her palm.

“Maybe the upstairs and downstairs connect on the inside,” she said to Hely. “You didn’t see anybody in there, did you?”

“Look, Harriet, they’re not home. If they come back and catch us we’ll say it’s a dare but we need to hurry or else let’s forget about it. I’m not sitting out here all night.”

“Okay …” She took a deep breath, and darted into the cleared yard, Hely right behind her. Up the stairs they pattered. Hely watched the street while Harriet, hand to glass, peered inside: deserted stairwell stacked with folding chairs; sad, tan-colored walls brightened by a wavery bar of light from a window facing the street. Beyond was a water cooler, a notice board tacked with posters (DO TALK TO STRANGERS! RX FOR AT-RISK KIDS).

The window was shut, no screen. Side by side, Hely and Harriet curled their fingers under the tongue of the metal sash and tugged at it, uselessly—

“ Car ,” hissed Hely. They flattened themselves against the side of the house, hearts pounding, as it whooshed past.

As soon as it was gone, they stepped out of the shadows and tried again. “What’s with this?” Hely whispered, craning on tiptoe to peer at the center of the window, where the top pane and the bottom pane met, perfectly flush.

Harriet saw what he meant. There was no lock, and no space for the panes to slide over each other. She ran her fingers over the sash.

“Hey,” whispered Hely, suddenly, and motioned for her to help.

Together, they pushed the top of the pane inward; something caught and squeaked and then, with a groan, the bottom of the window swung out on a horizontal pivot. One last time, Hely checked the darkening street—thumbs up, coast clear—and a moment later they were wriggling in together, side by side.

Hanging head down, fingertips on the floor, Hely saw the gray specks on the linoleum rushing in at him, fast, as if the simulated granite was the surface of an alien planet hurtling at him a million miles an hour —smack , his head hit the floor and he tumbled inside, Harriet collapsing on the floor beside him.

They were in: on the landing of an old-fashioned staircase, only three steps up, with another long landing at the top of the stairs. Bursting with excitement, trying not to breathe too loudly, they picked themselves up and skittered to the top—where, turning the corner, they dashed almost headlong into a heavy door with a fat padlock dangling from the hasp.

There was another window, too—an old-fashioned wooden one, with a sash lock and a screen. Hely stepped over to examine it—and while Harriet stood staring at the padlock with dismay, he began gesturing frenetically all of a sudden, his teeth gritted in a rictus of excitement: for the roof ledge ran beneath this window, too, directly to the window in the gable.

By pulling hard, until their faces were red, they managed to wedge the sash up eight inches or so. Harriet wriggled out first (Hely steering her legs like a plow until unwittingly she kicked him, and he cursed and jumped back). The roofing was hot and sticky, gritty beneath her palms. Gingerly, gingerly, she eased to her feet. Eyes shut tight, holding the window frame with her left hand, she gave her right hand to Hely as he crawled out beside her.

The breeze was cooling off. Twin jet trails traced a diagonal in the sky, tiny white water-ski tracks in an enormous lake. Harriet—breathing fast, afraid to look down—smelled the wispy fragrance of some night-scented flower, far below: stocks, maybe, or sweet tobacco. She put her head back and looked up at the sky; the clouds were gigantic, glazed on their underbellies with radiant pink, like clouds in a painting of a Bible story. Very, very carefully—backs to the wall, electrified with excitement—they inched around the steep corner and found themselves looking down into the yard with their fig tree.

With their fingertips hooked beneath the aluminum siding—which held the day’s heat, and was a little too hot to touch comfortably—they sidled towards the gable inch by inch. Harriet made it first, and shuffled over to give Hely room. It was very small indeed, not much larger than a shoebox and cracked open only about two inches at the bottom. Carefully, hand by hand, they transferred their grip from siding to sash and pulled up, together: timidly, at first, in case the thing flew up without warning and knocked them backward. It slid up four or five inches, easily, but then stuck firm, though they tugged until their arms trembled.