The Thief Of Always

Without adults at their side, the boys quickly locate the magic wall. Harvey says that their goal is to get back inside, find Mr. Hood, and make him give back all the years he stole. They re-enter the grounds and are welcomed with warm sunlight, enticing aromas, and beautiful sounds. In moments, Wendell is entranced once again and wants to visit the treehouse. Harvey reminds him of their plan, but Wendell says, “Who cares?” Frustrated, Harvey heads for the House, and Wendell follows, drawn by the delicious kitchen smells.

Once they’re inside, Rictus slams the door shut and welcomes them, saying he knew they’d return. Wendell hurries to the kitchen, but Harvey resists. Stew-Cat appears and rubs against Harvey’s legs. Harvey tells Rictus that he left his presents and thinks they might be in his bedroom, and Rictus hurries to retrieve them. Harvey finds Jive cooking in the kitchen and Wendell devouring platefuls of food. Remembering that all the food is probably made of dust, Harvey resists the temptation to join Wendell.

Stew-Cat stares at Harvey, and then walks up the stairs. Harvey follows, and the cat leads him to a door he hadn’t noticed before. The cat rubs against a nearby table on which Harvey finds a boxed key that he uses to unlock the door and follow the cat down a dank, dark staircase that ends in a dusty cellar. In the center is a large, padlocked coffin-shaped box. Stew-Cat jumps on it and begins clawing at it. Hanging out of the box is an apron string. Harvey calls out, for Mrs. Griffin and is answered by a thump from within the box. Harvey finds two rocks, breaks the padlock, and opens the lid.

Harvey helps Mrs. Griffin out of the box, and she says that Rictus and Jive locked her in. Harvey insists that Mr. Hood must have given the orders; Mrs. Griffin agrees, and to her surprise, sheds tears. She says happily that Harvey has broken the curse that prevented her from crying. She explains that she was the first child to visit Holiday House after she ran away when her cat died and her father refused to get her another one. The first gift the House gave her was three cats, and the voice of Mr. Hood promised that, if she stayed, she would never die and never weep again. Trapped there, she grew old quickly, and all she could do was try to make the visiting children as happy as possible. All she wants now is to die, but Mr. Hood won’t let that happen.

Marr appears on the stairs and tells Harvey to come to her so she can convert him into something “humble” like a worm. He walks toward her, asking what she dreams of being. She looks confused. He grabs her hands—he wants nothing more than to be himself, so her magic no longer has any effect on him—and the power she emits reflects back onto her. Her body begins to dissolve and ooze away, and she shrinks down, saying, “I dream of nothing” (145). She disappears into a grimy puddle. Harvey says there are three to go, and Mrs. Griffin warns him that Carna is still alive as well, shrieking at night and hungering for revenge. Mrs. Griffin admits that Harvey is the first child who has a chance of vanquishing Mr. Hood.

Rictus meets Harvey at the top of the stairs and calls the boy a murderer, but Harvey replies that none of the servants are alive to begin with. Instead, they’re “illusions.” He lets Mrs. Griffin outside and heads for the main stairway. Jive appears with a plate of delicious-looking ice cream and pie, which Harvey refuses to eat, reasoning that it might be poisoned. When Jive takes a bite of the food to prove it’s safe, Rictus cries out a belated warning, but it’s too late. Jive drops the plate and clutches his stomach. Dust pours from his mouth, and he begins to crumble. Calling for help from Mr. Hood, Jive tries to climb the stairs, but he collapses in a cloud of dust. Quietly, Harvey intones, “Two down.”

Wendell comes in from the kitchen with his mouth full of food. Seeing the dust cloud, he wonders if someone has been beating the carpets and says happily that the food is delicious. Shaking his head in disappointment, Harvey goes upstairs.

Harvey climbs to the top floor hallway, where five doors await, each slightly ajar as if tempting him. Instead of entering the rooms, he finds a chair, places it beneath a ceiling trapdoor, and pulls himself up into the attic. By contrast with the rest of the House, the attic is dark, dank, and cobwebbed. Harvey calls to Mr. Hood, demanding that he show himself, and hears the growl of Carna, who rises up from a cluttered corner. Harvey backs away as the creature heaves its wounded body forward. The boy notices four glowing balls rising up through the floorboards toward the roof. He looks up and sees Mr. Hood, whose face is spread out across the ceiling with his mouth stretching 10 feet wide. Hood berates Harvey for killing Marr and Jive and threatens to send Carna after the boy in retribution.

Hood offers to take Harvey back into Holiday House, insisting that he has done the boy no damage. Harvey protests that Hood stole years of his life, but Hood retorts that he merely saved Harvey from living the days he didn’t want. He tells the boy, “We’re both thieves, Harvey Swick. I take time. You take lives. But in the end we’re the same: both Thieves of Always” (160). He offers to train Harvey in the “Dark Paths,” adding that Harvey already has something of a vampire in him. Harvey cringes—Hood might be right—but he refuses the offer. Hood commands Carna to devour Harvey. Carna lifts itself and moves toward the boy, but Harvey reaches out and touches the creature gently on the head. Carna groans with relief, presses its head briefly against Harvey’s hand, then backs away and collapses into a thousand dry and dusty pieces. Harvey climbs out of the attic. As he departs, Hood says, “Oh my little thief […] What shall we do with you now?” (163).

Rictus nervously awaits Harvey and offers the boy anything he wants in exchange for staying forever at the House. Harvey wants his years back; Rictus says, “Anything but the years, thief. You can’t have those” (165). He warns Harvey that he can’t kill Hood, who’s already dead. Harvey asks about the fish in the lake, and Rictus lies and claims that they are happy. Harvey pushes the servant aside and heads downstairs. Rictus follows, offering him motorcycles, books, puppies, parrots, even tigers, but Harvey rejects everything.

Harvey walks outside. Mrs. Griffin, holding Stew-Cat, smiles. Harvey calls for Wendell, but there’s no answer. From the porch, Rictus suggests that Wendell went swimming and wonders if the boy might look better as a fish. Harvey yells up at the House, crying that hurting Wendell is unfair. All Harvey has left are his wits, “and his wits [are] about at an end” (170).

Harvey demands to speak to Hood again. Rictus gestures toward the House, and when Harvey asks if Hood is still in the House, Rictus replies, “He is the House” (172). Harvey asks the House if it will give him anything in exchange for his agreeing to stay. The House answers by forming words out of creaking, rattling noises and claims that anything can be had. Harvey demands another ark with live figurines. The House obliges. Harvey then demands flowers everywhere, with no two blossoms alike. The House obeys, the ground shakes, and thousands of blossoms burst forth from the lawn.

Next, Harvey demands special cuisine: roast swan, frog’s legs, caviar, oysters, horseradish. The food appears in the hallway, dish upon dish, until Harvey feels nauseated by all the smells. He begins making up new dishes, stating, “I want crawfish cooked in cherry soda and horse steaks with jelly-bean sauce, and Boston Cream Cheese and pastrami soup” (176). Straining to perform all this magic, the House begins to crumble. Realizing that Harvey is testing its limits, the House insists that the boy can have only one more wish, and then he must swear allegiance forever. Harvey demands all the seasons at once.

The seasons appear simultaneously on the grounds and battle one another. Storms fight sunlight while spring growth gets shredded by gales. Snow becomes rain, and rain becomes vapor in an endless cycle. Harvey stands firm, determined to witness the last thing he may ever see as a free person. The weather beats and tears at the House until a lightning strike sets fire to the structure, which finally collapses.

The storms subside; only motes of dust and floating petals are left. The glowing light balls from the attic sail off toward the lake. Mrs. Griffin says they’re the souls of the trapped children. She looks down and is delighted to see that she and her cat are becoming translucent. She tells Harvey that he’s the “brightest soul” she’s ever known, and she hopes that he’ll keep shining. She says goodbye, and she and the cat disappear.

Lulu appears. She’s wet, but her fish shape rapidly returns to a human one. Harvey runs and hugs her. In the distance, other fish from the lake transform back into children and walk toward the remains of the House. Among the ruins, they find a box of clothes and select things to wear. Lulu gives Harvey a kiss on the cheek and heads for the clothes. Wendell appears and jokes that he’s not going to kiss Harvey. A roaring sound erupts from the lake; Harvey hurries toward it and sees the water escaping in a whirlpool.

Harvey turns and discovers that Rictus is still alive. The servant has a small globe filled with magic that he stole from Mr. Hood and states his plans to start a new house, with Harvey as his servant. From the rubble, a hand reaches up and grabs Rictus by the neck, and a voice demands that he return the magic. Terrified, Rictus breaks the globe, and the magic pours into the ground. A human-like shape rises from the ground. It’s Mr. Hood, wearing robes made of curtains, his body built from the remains of the House.

Hood grabs Rictus and twists off Rictus’s head, which flies away like an open balloon, foul air escaping from it until it falls lifeless onto the ground. Rictus’s body shrinks and disappears. Hood grabs for Harvey and catches him by the jacket. Harvey slips out of the jacket and runs to the lake, where Lulu is calling to him. Hood catches up and offers Harvey a quiet death. When he reaches for the boy, Harvey rips away Hood’s robes, revealing a void of nothingness at the monster’s center.

Enraged, Hood tries to snatch back the robes. Harvey retreats to the slippery rocks at the edge of the water vortex. Hood follows, and Lulu hits him from behind with a length of timber. Harvey tosses the robes into the vortex; Hood lunges for them and falls into the water, where he is dragged screaming into the whirlpool and disappears into the yawning maelstrom. Harvey hugs Lulu, and they laugh and cry. Wendell arrives and points to the flotsam still spinning in the whirlpool, asking what it is. Harvey replies, “Who cares?” 

Free at last, the children say goodbye at the wall of fog. Harvey asks them to tell the story to others and to recall it every morning so they will never forget what happened. Wendell makes Harvey promise to recognize him, even if they’re no longer the same age in the real world. They shake hands, and Wendell leaves. Lulu says she wishes she could grow up with Harvey, but her time in the real world will be much earlier than his. Once through the wall, Harvey heads for home, but, exhausted by the long day, he falls to the ground. A couple of strangers offer to help him, and he accepts. The next thing he knows, he is waking up in his old bedroom. When he sees his parents he whoops for joy to realize that they are still young. He tells them the whole story, but they don’t believe it.

The next day, he walks them to where the House once stood and finds that it is now just a park enjoyed by visitors young and old. Harvey digs into the soil, but the House’s ruins are nowhere to be found. A man standing nearby agrees that it’s strange that all evidence of Mr. Hood is gone. Harvey’s parents ask what he knows of their son’s story; the man assures them the boy tells the truth, and that Harvey is a genuine hero. He points down the hill to a young woman wearing a white dress and says she was there. Harvey starts to walk to her, but the man asks him not to, saying the woman wants him to remember her as a child. He shakes Harvey’s hand and says he hopes he’ll be as good a husband to her as Harvey was a friend. In the following weeks, no more is said about Harvey’s adventure, but the family knows that it’s good to be together. They’re all grateful, and they enjoy every precious day.