Chessmen of Doom (4 page)

One night late in June something odd happened.

Johnny, Fergie, and the professor had gone to see a movie in Stone Arabia. The theater was air conditioned, and sitting in it was a delightful relief from the hot muggy air outside. Finally, when they had to leave, they grumbled a bit about the weather and then headed down the street to their parked car. As they walked, Johnny and Fergie suddenly noticed a very strange-looking man coming toward them. His face was round and ruddy, and he sported a well-trimmed mustache with waxed upturned tips. He wore an ulster, which is a kind of British overcoat with a half cape that comes down to the elbows, and under his arm he carried a small black leather case. The professor did not see the man at all— he was walking along with his head down, as he did sometimes. As they passed, the man in the overcoat stepped sideways to avoid the professor, and at that moment he coughed. At the sound of the cough the professor's head snapped up, and he muttered "Excuse me!" He stepped sideways, thinking that he was getting out of the man's way, but instead he slammed straight into him. The man made an indignant noise and stepped backward, dropping the case he was carrying. The lid popped open, and a dozen small white chessmen spilled onto the sidewalk. The chessmen weren't the ordinary kind that you see in stores. These looked like little men and women, with bug eyes and glum expressions on their faces. They were intricately carved from ivory, or maybe bone, and they looked as if they belonged in a museum.

In a flash the man in the overcoat fell to his knees and began frantically scooping the chessmen back into the leather case. When the professor stepped forward to help him, the man looked up with a wild look of anger and fear.

''Get away from me, you fool!"
he snarled.

Quickly the professor glanced at the boys, and then the three of them ducked around the lamppost and marched on down the street toward their car. Fergie threw a scornful glance over his shoulder.

"Boy, was that guy ever a grouch!" he muttered with a shake of his head. "And what is he doing wearing an overcoat on a night like this?"

The professor grinned. "Some people have thin blood," he said. "I had a cousin who never could get warm, even when it was ninety out. As for your other comment, I'd say you're right—that character makes me look sweet and lovable by comparison. People bump into each other all the time, and it's not a cause for nuclear war. By the way, what did you think of those . . ."

The professor's voice died. A line from Perry's crazy little poem had suddenly popped into his head.
Why pallid dwarves on a board that's not true?
When the professor stopped speaking, the boys turned and looked strangely at him.

"What's the matter, Professor?" asked Johnny, anxiously.

The professor forced himself to smile and shrug carelessly. "Oh, nothing. Really it wasn't anything terribly important. I was just wondering if I left the gas turned on—on the kitchen stove, I mean. But you know me: I'm always fussing about something."

As the professor stooped to unlock the car door, the boys exchanged glances. They were pretty sure that the professor was covering up some secret worry. Did it have to do with the man they had just seen? Whatever the problem was, the boys knew very well that they wouldn't get anything out of the old man by pushing and prodding. When he was good and ready, he would tell them what was on his mind.

They drove back to the estate in silence. In the distance heat lightning flashed, outlining the jagged edges of storm clouds. Finally the car pulled up in front of the old mansion. As he stepped out, the professor looked up, and then he gasped—there was a light on in the tower room! Although the windows were boarded, there were cracks between the boards, and lamplight shone through them.

In a flash the professor turned to the boys, who were standing on the other side of the car. "Has one of you been fooling around in that tower room?" he snapped.

"Not me, Prof!" said Fergie. "Why would I wanta go up there?"

"I haven't been up there at all," said Johnny firmly. He was scared of the place and wouldn't go anywhere near it.

The professor stared a long time at the two boys. "Well,
somebody
has been fooling around up there!" he said irritably. "I distinctly remember shutting that light off. Ah, well! Maybe it's ghosts." He laughed uncomfortably.

The three travelers went inside and ate a late supper at the kitchen table. No one said much, but as he was going upstairs to bed, Johnny turned and said, "Professor?"

"Yes? What is it, John?"

"Are you gonna go up and turn off that light?"

The old man turned pale, and he tried hard to hide his nervousness. "I intend to let the stupid thing burn all night, and then shut it off in the morning," he said primly. "I don't think our electric bill will go through the roof because of one crummy sixty-watt bulb."

Later, up in his bedroom, Johnny was getting ready to turn in for the night. He sat in a high-backed chair and looked around at the heavy oak furniture, the worn

Persian carpet, and the fancy light fixtures with their tulip-shaped blown-glass shades. As he let his eyes wander, he thought about the odd and frightening things that had happened since they came to this place. What did it all mean? Was there a pattern to everything or was it all just coincidence? Johnny sighed discontentedly—this was not a case where thinking helped very much. Barefoot, he padded down the hall to the big old-fashioned bathroom and washed his face in the marble sink. When he was back in his room, he climbed into bed, took off his glasses, and turned off the lamp that stood on the mahogany night table. Down Johnny sank onto the feather pillow, and for a moment he had a blurry vision of long linen curtains moving slowly in the pale moonlight. Then he was asleep.

Johnny wasn't sure who or what it was that awoke him. But he sat up with a start, as if someone had shaken him. Blearily he looked around, and with his right hand he fumbled for the glasses that lay neatly folded on the bedside table. Finally he put them on and looked again: the bureau and chairs were lost in shadow, and a long streak of moonlight lay on the rug. Straining his eyes, Johnny peered into the dark. To his horror he saw that somebody was standing in the shadows at the other end of the room. A breath of air from the open window carried an unpleasant smell toward him—a smell of mold, and earth, and the grave. The figure moved, and it spoke in a hoarse, croaking voice.

"Don't
let him do it. Stop him if you can."

Johnny stared. He felt his blood roaring in his ears, and he was afraid he might faint. The figure took a step forward, and Johnny was horribly afraid it was coming to get him. But at that instant the shape melted into smoke and drifted away out of the open window. For a long time Johnny sat rigid with terror, his back pressed against the high carved headboard of the bed. Minutes dragged past, but finally Johnny's heart began to beat normally again. He wiped the sweat off his face with his sleeve and closed his eyes, trying hard to get rid of the ghastly vision that still hovered in his brain. Should he go down to the professor's room and wake him up and tell him what had happened? But what if he met the figure again in the dark corridor? Or what if it was crouching by the side of the professor's bed? Slowly Johnny slid down onto his mattress. He rolled over onto his side and tried to sleep, but sleep was a long time coming. Gradually, though, weariness overcame him, and he drifted off.

The next morning, when he woke up, Johnny wondered if he had just had a bad dream. He knew that you couldn't always tell the difference between sleeping and waking, but still . . . well, maybe he'd better let the professor decide.

When he got down to the kitchen, Johnny found that the professor was trying to make toast in Perry's antique toaster. Even though he was rich, Perry Childermass had kept a lot of 1930's-style equipment in his house, and the toaster was one of those things with openwork wire sides, the kind where you have to do the toast one side at a time and then turn it over. Gingerly, with a pot holder in one hand, the professor took the toast out and turned it—and then he dropped it on the floor.

"Drat!" he growled. "Why did my idiotic brother fill his house with things that ought to be in a museum or—oh, hello, John. How are you? You don't look as if you slept very well last night."

Johnny smiled wanly. Then, with a lot of hemming and hawing, he sat down and told the professor about the frightening experience he had had last night. The professor listened with a solemn look on his face, and he nodded occasionally or shook his head. When Johnny had finished speaking, the professor was silent for a while. Then he picked up a knife and began to butter his toast.

"I'd like to think you had a bad dream," he said slowly, "but in view of the events that have happened since we got here I'd say that was just wishful thinking. I went up to the tower room this morning and turned that blasted light off, and I looked around, but I couldn't find anything wrong. Nevertheless, something very strange and sinister is going on, and I wish I could figure out what it is. Maybe it is connected with that weird poem that my brother sent me. I honestly don't know what to think! But I wish to
heaven
that some ghostly messenger would arrive and tell us, plainly, without a lot of double-talk, what is going to happen! I
hate
riddles!"

Johnny went to the refrigerator and poured himself a glass of milk. "Do you think I really saw a ghost?" he asked, as he turned around.

The professor shrugged. "You may have. You may even have seen the spirit of my dear departed brother. And what was it he said? 'Stop him,' or some such thing? Stop who from doing what? Do you see what I mean? We know something, but we just don't know
enough!"

At this point Fergie came running in from the front hall. He was pale and he looked very upset. "Hey, you guys! I found something outside. It's really kind of awful! Come and look at it!"

 

 

 

CHAPTER FIVE

 

 

Johnny and the professor were startled. They followed Fergie out to the wildly overgrown garden behind the house. At one time the place had probably been well kept and very pretty, but it had gone to ruin. The rose bushes were wildly overgrown, and so were the privet hedges. Tall weeds had choked the tulips and zinnias, which lay dead across the stone paths, and bindweed climbed the trellises where the hollyhocks were supposed to be. At the far end of the garden four marble pillars rose. On top of each one was the plaster bust of a Roman emperor: Otho, Vitellius, Trajan, and Hadrian were the names chiseled on the bases of the four busts. But the bust of Hadrian was gone. It lay in shattered fragments at the base of the column it had stood on. This was the thing that Fergie had brought them to see, and as they hurried along the weedy paths, he tried to give an explanation.

". . . and so I was battin' a ball in the air, an' I hit this line drive, an' it hit that statue, an' . . . well, Prof, I'm sorry about what happened, but—"

"Please spare me your apologies, Byron," snapped the professor. "Those busts are next door to worthless, and I wouldn't mind if you spent the day heaving rocks at them. But is that what you've brought us out here to see? Pieces of broken plaster?"

"No, Prof, there's something worse than that. Come on an' have a look!"

Without any more talk Johnny and the professor followed Fergie to the base of the column where the bust had once stood. Among the weeds lay pieces of broken plaster, and in the middle of everything, staring grimly up at them, was a human skull.

Johnny gasped, and the professor sucked in his breath with a hiss. "My God!" he exclaimed, as he bent to inspect the skull. "Do you mean to say that this was
inside
the bust?"

Fergie nodded. "Yeah, it was. If you look close, you'll see that there's little bits of plaster stickin' to the skull. Why would anyone do a thing like that?"

The professor grimaced. "Interesting question," he muttered, as he turned the skull over in his hands. "This place gets weirder by the minute, doesn't it? Hmm . . . I wonder who this belonged to. Maybe I should give the police a call. But do we really want those oafs trampling about here again? Probably not." He looked up suddenly. "Gentlemen, can you amuse yourselves for the rest of the morning while I go down to the public library in Stone Arabia? I'll see you later."

Before Johnny or Fergie could say anything, the professor tucked the skull under his arm and marched off toward the house.

"Hey!" exclaimed Fergie, as he watched the old man go. "He's got a bug in his ear about something, that's for sure! What do you think he's gonna do at the library?"

Johnny bit his lip. "I don't know, but you can be sure we'll find out about it if he does turn up something."

For the rest of the morning Johnny and Fergie played flies and grounders. Finally, around noon, they went up to the house for a glass of lemonade, and they were sipping and talking on the front porch when the professor's car came rattling up the drive. Out he sprang, and slam went the car door. As he walked toward the house, the boys saw that he had a funny little half smile on his face. Had he found out anything? It was hard to tell.

The professor walked into the house without a word. A few minutes later he came out with a large glass of ice water in his hand. Sighing, he sat down on a rocking chair and wiped his forehead with his sleeve.

"Hot, isn't it?" he said, after he had taken a few sips. "I hear it may turn into a heat wave, if this weather goes on long enough."

Fergie gave the professor an irritated glance. "Cut the comedy, Prof. Tell us if you found out anything. Come on!"

The professor shrugged. "Well, I did and I didn't. I wanted to find out if there was any record of graves being desecrated recently. So I dug into the files of the local newspaper for the last five years, but I found out absolutely nothing! It's odd, you know—I mean, that skull had to come from
somewhere!"

"Maybe the skull got stolen a long time ago," Johnny suggested. "That's possible, isn't it?"