“Do you like dolls?” Mrs. Hallovich asks.
“Uh . . .” I shrug my shoulders. “Not really.”
Truth is, I never play with dolls. But, I do sleep with a stuffed moose.
“I have more than just dolls upstairs. Would you like to see the playroom?”
“Sure,” I say.
What else is there to do today? I woke to rain coming down softly on the roof, and we drove over with rain coming down in buckets. The news this morning called for the raining of cats and dogs for the entire day. No further outdoor exploring in the forecast.
We’ve just finished our second day of having our second breakfast - Belgian waffles, crispy on the outside, fluffy as a cloud on the inside. I take hold of Tommy’s hand and we follow Mrs.Hallovich out of the kitchen and back to the front entrance. We are going to go up that beautiful staircase! The carpet runner going up the steps is a faded pinkish color that’s worn through in patches. Now that I’ve spent a day here, I’m starting to notice details that I didn’t notice before. It must have all been magnificent once upon a time.
“This house is really pretty.” I say.
Mrs. Hallovich seems happy about that comment.
As we climb, I get a better look at the stained glass window at the top of the landing. I know it’s gray outside, but the glass is so dark and dirty that there’s no light at all able to pass through. Some of the glass pieces are cracked. It makes me sad. I wonder what it would have looked like when it was new. At the landing we take the stairs that go off to the left. That still leaves a mystery on the other side.
“What’s up those stairs?” I ask, pointing up to the right.
“Two bedrooms, including my own, and a bathroom.”
“Can I see them?” Immediately after asking, I’m afraid I sound nosy, but Mrs. Hallovich doesn’t seem bothered.
“Of course you can,” she answers. “We’ll take a look after lunch.”
This left side of the upstairs has a short hallway with two doors. Mrs. H. opens the first one, and steps into a huge bedroom.
“This room belonged to me when I was a girl, and then Gertrude.” She stands aside so that Tommy and I can step in.
“Wow! You had a fireplace in your bedroom?”
“That was how we heated back then,” she says. “The fire would die down overnight, and I would wake to freezing cold. I can remember a few times when I had to break a thin layer of ice in my wash basin, just to be able to wash my face.”
She has walked over to a dresser, where a large bowl sits with a pitcher nestled in its center.
“Why didn’t you use the bathroom?”
Mrs. H. smiles down at me. “We didn’t have a bathroom in this house. Can you imagine that?”
“But there’s one downstairs and you said there was one across the hall.”
“Those were added much later.”
No bathroom. Unimaginable.
“So where did you . . . ?”
Thankfully she knows where I’m headed with this question and she laughs out loud. “An outhouse in the backyard.”
“I don’t think I could live through that,” I say.
The room has a canopy bed. I’ve always dreamed of having a canopy. Maybe I could survive using an outhouse for a canopy bed. There’s also a giant wardrobe that’s every bit as big and beautiful as the one with a secret passage to Narnia. I’m walking toward it to take a peek inside when she begins to lead Tommy back into the hallway.
“Come along, Ella Dear,” she says to me.
I follow her down the hallway and she throws open the next door.
“Here’s the playroom!” she announces.
This room is even bigger than the last. It also has a large fireplace. There are a few big objects covered with sheets, just like you’d find in any haunted house. In the corner is another large, sheet-covered object. It sits in a circular area with three tall windows and window seats, like in the parlor downstairs. Then, it hits me. These spaces are the inside of the turret! Duh. Now I know what’s inside a turret!
For such a gray, gloomy day, there’s plenty of light coming in. I walk into the turret and look down onto the street in front of the house. There’s the sidewalk Daleni and I have always avoided. Funny how things can change so fast.
“Taaa daaa!” I hear Mrs H., and turn to see that she has pulled a sheet down from some shelves. The shelves hold all kinds of playthings: a jack-in-the-box, a drum, wooden soldiers, and dolls. So many things!
Tommy is toddling toward me, about to grab hold of the sheet covering the big shape beside me, when Mrs. Hallovich sweeps him up and carries him back to the shelves. She deposits him in her lap while plunking herself on the floor in front of all the toys.
I wonder if she does yoga.
She pulls out some pieces from a train set on the bottom shelf. Tommy picks up the caboose and starts in with his “vroom vroom” noises.
Mrs. H. laughs, picks up the engine car, and demonstrates to Tommy the ch-ch-ch-ch ch-ch-ch-ch sound that a train is supposed to make. Tommy copies those sounds, and then Mrs. H. does a woo-woo sound like a train whistle, and I know I’m going to be hearing these noises out of my baby brother for the rest of my life.
She fiddles with the headlight. “This used to work when Henry was a boy. Shame it doesn’t anymore.” She messes with it a minute more and puts it down.
Tommy crawls away from her, steering his little caboose out onto the open floor and around the mysterious ghost furniture.
Mrs. H. reaches over and pulls out something that looks like a really old briefcase.
“This was my son Henry’s prized possession.”
I’m always interested in what can be classified as a prized possession, so I walk over to investigate.
The case is made of light brown leather that has been scuffed up in places. She flips the rusty latches, opens it, and turns it toward me. Inside are all kinds of small toys and games, each with its own compartment: jacks with a rubber ball, marbles, pick up sticks, cards, a yo-yo, and a variety of colored game pieces. The lid of the case has a belt across it holding in different game boards. Checkers is on top.
“Have you ever played with one of these?” she asks. She holds up a wooden stick with a cup on the end and a wooden ball nestled perfectly within.
“I don’t think so,” I say.
She dumps the wooden ball out of the cup where it dangles from an attached string.
“The trick is simply to swing the ball up and into the cup. Like this.” She demonstrates. The ball makes a gentle arc and plops neatly into the cup. Ridiculous. Of course it’s going to plop into the cup. That’s where it’s attached. Have I ever seen a more stupid toy? I don’t think so.
“You try,” she says.
I take the toy. I’m ten years old for crying out loud. This toy is more Tommy’s speed. I tip the cup. The ball falls out. I feel a smirk on my face, but I can’t get rid of it. I swing the ball out like Mrs. H. had done. The ball makes a big circle, up and over, about a mile away from the cup. The smirk falls, like magic, off my face.
“A little gentler,” she says.
I’ve got this. I swing the ball up more gently. The string sags and the ball drops about a mile in front of the cup.
“It just takes practice. You’ll get there.”
Is that a smirk on her face?
I continue to practice as Mrs. H. pulls out more goodies from the box.
“The kids and I would spend entire afternoons playing jackstraws,” she tells me.
“Is that the same as pick-up-sticks?”
“Mmm-hmm.”
Mrs. H. has a kind of not-all-here look on her face, then her eyes clear and she stands.
A doll sits on the shelf at her eye level.
“This is Emily,” she says taking her down. She straightens the doll’s gown. It’s not a babydoll. It looks more like a teenager. Her dress is green and brown and reminds me of Andes mints.
“I taught Gertrude to sew by making dresses for her. There’s a whole trunk of clothes and accessories around here somewhere.”
“Daleni, would love her.” I say, and I really mean it. Daleni loves all kinds of dress-up, whether it’s dressing Barbies, or putting dresses on herself. We like to put on the ones that belonged to her mom when she was dating Daleni’s dad. Her mom was into sparkles.
“Well, I will find that trunk and you can bring your friend up here to play sometime.”
I just smile. Probably not gonna happen.
“I’ve got one more thing to show you before I go downstairs to start lunch.” She moves toward the piece of ghost furniture in the turret.
“This was Gertrude’s prized possession.”
She flings off the sheet like a magician. Underneath is a miniature version of Willow House, minus all the overgrown shrubbery.
My eyes bug out of my head, and I’m seriously wondering if a person’s eyeballs could drop right out onto the floor.
“You’ve never seen a dollhouse?” Mrs. H. asks.
“Not like this.” I say.
Mrs. H. smiles and swivels the house around on its little swivel-y stand so that the interior faces toward me. I drop to my knees, and everything but the house disappears from my vision. This must be what falling in love is like.
The rooms have tiny furnishings that look a lot like the furniture in Willow House. The kitchen has food, the library has books, the playroom has toys, the bedrooms have clothes. One of the bedrooms has a canopy bed like in the room down the hall from me. It has real pillows! I pick one up and give it a gentle squeeze. A bed made for an itty-bitty princess is what this is.
I think quite a bit of time goes by. I’m sitting in a trance in front of this dollhouse, and I guess my jaw has been hanging open ‘cause there’s a little drool on my chin. I hear Mrs. H. moving around. She picks up a basket and starts filling it with some of the train pieces.
“How ‘bout you and I go down and start some lunch,” she says to Tommy.
She hands him the basket to hold, then picks him up, arranges the whole package on her hip, turns to me and says, “I’ll leave you to it.”
I’ve looked away from the dollhouse long enough to notice that more of the sheets have been removed, revealing a rocking horse and a full sized rocking chair. I give Mrs. H. a smile, which she returns with a wink.
Before they are out the door, Tommy reaches into the basket and pulls out the engine. The light on the front immediately comes on.
“Well, would you look at that.” Mrs. H. says as she walks away.
That’s a bit strange, but my focus is drawn back to this, the queen of all toys. I investigate each room. Windows open, drawers open, hinges hinge. Tiny perfume bottles made from glass beads form a line along a dressing table. There’s a tiny birdcage just like the one in the greenhouse. Kitchen cabinets hold plates, and bowls, and tiny cups. I twist an old fashioned faucet in the kitchen, and I’m truly surprised there’s no running water. There’s a staircase that splits in two, just like Willow House, complete with a stained glass window on the landing, showing a twisted weeping willow tree. I glance down to the entrance hall and sure enough, a chandelier to match. There are people as well - a father, mother, small boy and big sister - probably the Hallovich family in miniature.
Time once again passes without me realizing, until I hear Mrs. H. call from downstairs, “Soup’s on!”
“Coming!” I shout back. I’m holding the big sister doll and set her down in the parlor with the rest of her family. I’ve arranged them so that they can talk to each other while I’m gone. (Yeah, I know what you’re thinking, but you probably do things like that too).
Mrs. H. is calling from the landing now. “Don’t worry about covering the dollhouse back up. You can play again later.”
I can’t wait. Before walking through the door, I turn and look back one last time. I almost can’t believe my luck at being able to play here with the most beautiful dollhouse in all the world. One of the curtains in the tiny study blows inward. A small chair on the front porch begins to rock.
