Bringing Ezra Back by Cynthia DeFelice Page A

frame, with some hinges to allow for a door, and a canvas thrown over the top. I’d seen chicken coops and corncribs built better. It filled me with horror to think that this was where Trask kept Ezra. But I was confused, too. There wasn’t any lock on the door, so what was keeping Ezra there?
    â€œEzra?” I whispered finally. There was no answer.
    Miss Mary appeared at my side again. Quietly she said, “Trask used to lock him in. He stopped when he saw that your friend didn’t even try to get away.”
    With a feeling of dread, I pulled the door open. I did it slowly, not knowing if the hinges might need oiling, and was grateful when they didn’t make a sound. At first it was hard to make out anything in that dark, cramped space. But then the moonlight shone in on a figure lying slumped against the wall. I stepped in, bent down, and took Ezra by the shoulders.
    â€œCome on, Ezra,” I whispered urgently. “We’re getting out of here.”
    His eyes opened, but there was no sign that he recognized me or even cared who I was. He closed his eyes, and his head rolled onto his chest. Altogether he put me in mind of a doll Molly had when she was a baby, made out of raggedy old clothes. I shook Ezra gently, and heard the clanking sound of metal.
    The shackles! He was still wearing them. I turned to Miss Mary in despair.
    â€œTrask clamped those things on that first day. Calvin and me, we talked about trying to get ’em off tonight, but we couldn’t take the risk.”
    I put my head in my hands. It was all too much.
    â€œThose shackles, there’s not a lot to ’em, really,” Miss Mary said. “They’re mostly for show, to convince the crowd how dangerous the savage is.” She snorted with contempt at the idea. “Calvin and me, we think you might get ’em off pretty easy. You got any tools?”
    I pointed to my Barlow hanging at my side, and she looked at it doubtfully. “Nobody here would blame you if you backed out and went on home,” she said.
    I felt too hopeless to speak.
    Little Miss Mary continued, “But, like I said, Calvin and me talked it over a good bit. We thought of a way you just might do this.”
    I looked at her. “How?”
    â€œWell, your friend here is weak as a newborn kitten from being shackled. He barely eats enough to keep alive. He barely is alive, if you see my meaning.”
    My feelings at that must have shown on my face, because Miss Mary went on quickly. “So you’ll need a place to hole up for a while. Someplace Trask won’t find you if he comes looking, and I expect he will. Someplace close, ’cause you won’t get far with him the way he is, even if he wasn’t shackled.”
    â€œI got a place,” I said. “But I don’t know if I can get him there. It’s—”
    She held out her hand to stop me. “Shhh. Don’t tell me. If Trask suspects you had help, the less we know, the better.”
    I could see the sense in what she said, and I tried to calm myself and listen.
    â€œOnce you get to your hide, you stay there for a while. Three, four days, however long it takes for him to get his strength up,” she was saying. “It’ll give you time to figure a way to get those shackles off. Assuming Trask doesn’t find you in the meantime, of course,” she added.
    â€œWe’d best get started,” I said.
    She nodded. “I wanted to be sure you knew what you were getting into,” she said. Then she handed me a sack. “This here’s food.”
    She signaled to Pea-Head and Calvin, and they came over and helped me get Ezra to his feet. He didn’t raise his head, or twitch a limb. A quivery feeling, like hundreds of little fish were swimming through my insides, rose up in me. It made me feel weak, and I tried to fight it down.
    I’d been real scared before in my life, when I’d been stalked like an animal