The Wishing Game

In another excerpt from Jack’s first book, The House on Clock Island, Astrid and Max meet the Mastermind and tell him their wish: for their father to come home instead of working at his job in another town. The Mastermind asks them another riddle, which Astrid answers correctly. He tells them that with time, their father will return. They just need to be patient. However, Astrid insists that they can’t wait; they miss their father too dearly. The Mastermind asks if they can be brave, and both children say they can. The Mastermind laughs sinisterly.

As Lucy gets off the boat, a man is there waiting and asks for her bag. She quickly realizes that she isn’t properly dressed for Portland weather, and the man gives her his coat. Lucy realizes that the man is Hugo Reese and marvels at how much he’s changed from when she knew him as a young teen. She remembers how Jack told her as a child that she could come back as Thurl the raven’s butler when she was older. Hugo admonished him, prophetically claiming that he’d get someone killed by making such promises. Jack, however, told him to always be quiet when someone’s heart was breaking, as Lucy’s was then.