Ghost Stories (4 page)

Frank and Joe Hardy were sauntering along “Underground Atlanta.” a collection of shops and stores built below street level.

Joe had bought the latest hit record in a music shop and Frank was carrying a bag from a bookstore.

“It's four o'clock,” Frank declared, looking at his watch. “I think we should go back to the hotel and shower. We have a dinner date with Dad at six-thirty, remember?”

Joe nodded when he spotted a strange shop. The front was taken up by a large window decorated all in black. A full-sized skeleton hung in one corner, and there was a display of books about witchcraft, magic, and the occult.

“Hey, Frank!” he exclaimed and pointed. “See that sign over there? It says ‘Readings Given.' Let's go
in and have our futures told. We have a few minutes to spare.”

Frank grinned. “Last time we had our fortunes read was in our sophomore year. The fortune-teller predicted that we both would marry a dark-haired, beautiful girl!”

“It can still happen,” Joe said. “Anyway, this might be fun. Let's go in.”

The boys entered the store. It was decorated like a witch's cave. Low lighting that changed slowly in color and intensity made everything look spooky, and weird music played in the background.

The walls were lined with cases containing strange merchandise. There were boxes labeled
Love Potion, Hate Potion,
and
Career Potion.
There were little open containers with strange, dried-up things, all brown and shriveled. Signs on the containers read
Hair of Dog, Eye of Newt, Peacock Liver, Snake Scales,
and
Mandrake Root.

“Look at the shrunken heads!” Joe said and pointed to a glass case. “They don't look very friendly.”

“If we're not careful, we may wind up right alongside of them,” Frank kidded.

“You know,” Joe said, “there's something about this place. I can't explain—”

“I know what you mean,” Frank said. He was also being drawn into the eerie atmosphere and actually had to remind himself that it was all make-believe.

“I feel as if we're being prepared for a human sacrifice in an Aztec temple,” Joe went on, trying to be casual. “Anyway, how come no one is here?”

Just then a sultry voice could be heard from the far end of the room. “And what is your pleasure, gentlemen?”

The boys whirled around and saw a woman emerge from the shadows. She wore a slinky black dress which enveloped her from her throat to her toes. Long black hair covered part of her face, which was pretty in an exotic way. Her dark eyes were somewhat slanted, and green eye shadow and blood-red lips gave her a vampirelike appearance.

“How much does it cost to have a fortune read?” Joe inquired.

“Ten dollars,” the woman replied.

Both boys rummaged in their pockets.

“I have four,” Frank said.

“I have about seven,” Joe offered.

The woman smiled. “Enough for one fortune. Whose shall it be?”

The boys flipped a coin and Frank won.

“Come with me,” the woman said and led them through a curtained doorway into another room. This one was even spookier than the shop. It was completely covered in black velvet and lighted by an ultraviolet lamp, so that everyone's teeth and eyeballs glowed ghastly white. Both Hardys had the feeling of being sucked into something they could not escape and hesitated for a moment. But the woman had already sat down at a low table and motioned to Frank to sit next to her. The table was covered with black velvet and on it was a huge crystal ball.

She took the boy's palm and looked at it for a
long time. Joe, who had sat down on a cushion in front of the table, kept staring at her curiously.

“You are eighteen years old,” she finally said. “You live in a town near the ocean, in a large white house. You play football and the guitar, and you are a good student. You are also very good at something else—a profession—observing … watching….”

She took a piece of paper and a pencil. “Give me the date of your birth,” she said.

Frank did and she wrote it down, drawing lines on the paper, crossing the lines, and making a circle.

“Look into the crystal ball!” she suddenly commanded.

Frank obeyed, but he was on his guard. He knew crystal balls were a great way to rivet someone's attention while hypnotizing him, and he felt there was a good chance that that was what the woman had in mind.

But he was wrong. After both had looked into the crystal for about a minute, she became agitated.

“You are a detective!” she cried out angrily. “Why have you come here? I have my license. I am doing nothing wrong. Nothing the police can complain about!”

“I'm not from the police,” Frank assured her. “My brother and I are amateur investigators and we came here only to have bur fortunes told.”

“Oh,” she said, obviously relieved. “That is different. I have several private detectives who use my services. You may want to hire me someday. I could be very helpful in some of your cases.”

“I bet you could,” Frank said. “You know everything about me and you've never seen me before.”

“Maybe she's seen our pictures in the paper,” Joe offered. “Every once in a while the press writes up our cases.”

The woman looked at him, scandalized. “I have never heard of you!” she cried out. “What I told you I knew by intuition. You may not believe me but you will when I'm finished.”

She went back to the crystal ball and stared into it once more. “I see motorcycles,” she said. “You were both on motorcycles.” Her voice became agitated again. “You've done this many times in the past. But now there will be danger. It could be very dangerous!”

“You mean, we'll have an accident?” Frank asked.

“No. It has to do with a new case. I see—I see a man with one blue eye. In a white car. He is very dangerous. Do not listen to him. Stay away from him!”

Her voice was almost a scream now and she appeared to be in a trance, unaware of where she was. Her eyes closed. “Beware of the Green Dragon,” she whispered. “Do not go there!”

“What's the Green Dragon?” Joe asked.

But she did not pay attention to him. Her fingernails were digging into Frank's hand, causing him considerable pain.

“Beware of the man with one blue eye!” she panted. “Beware of the Green Dragon. Oh! Oh, I see gold! Much gold, but no good will come of it. Do not
touch it. It brings—it brings—death! There is death around this gold and there is—”

Suddenly her eyes opened wide and she stared at Frank with a half-mad look. “Simbu!” she screamed. “Simbu is there! Do not go near him!” She gasped for breath, then she keeled over and fainted on the black velvet floor.

“Quick, Joe, see if you can find a sink and get some water!” Frank urged as he tried to revive the fortune-teller. He rubbed her hands and Joe came a moment later with a soaked hand towel and gently dabbed her forehead.

“For a moment I thought she was putting on an act,” Frank murmured. “But she really passed out!”

“What do you think she meant?” Joe was worried.

“If we can revive her, maybe we can ask her,” Frank said.

In a few minutes, the woman opened her eyes.

“Are you all right?” Frank asked anxiously.

She nodded slowly. “I received very strong vibrations,” she said. “Please, get out of Atlanta as fast as you can!”

“Who's Simbu?” Joe inquired.

“You'll find out if you don't listen to me,” she replied. Slowly she got to her feet and walked out into the store. The boys followed. She took a book from a shelf and handed it to Frank. “Here,” she said. “If you must know, you can read about him in here. No charge,” she added. “My compliments. Now go away and never come back. You are bad luck, gentlemen!”

Frank and Joe stared at her and Frank started to reply, but the expression on her face silenced him. She looked genuinely frightened.

“Come on,” he said to his brother and went to the door, nodding good-bye to the fortune-teller.

“Wow!” Joe said when they had left the strange shop. “What an experience!”

Frank nodded. “There was something about her and that place that almost made me believe her.”

Joe grinned. “Maybe you should!”

When the boys arrived at the hotel, Frank went to take a shower, and Joe curled up on the bed to read the book the woman had given them. It was about voodoo, the mystical religious cult that flourished on the island of Haiti but had its roots in Africa. The book described the more common practices and spells, incantations, and sacrifices necessary in order to perform various ceremonies.

When Frank came out of the shower, Joe said, “If I wish to cast a spell on you and make your arm hurt, all I have to do is put a needle through the arm of a doll and
you'll
feel the pain.”

“Hm, well, don't do it now,” Frank said. “We have to meet Dad for dinner, and I don't need a pain anywhere.”

“I suppose it wouldn't really work unless you believed in voodoo,” Joe went on. “It's all a matter of suggestion.”

“Have you found the part on Simbu yet?” Frank asked as he took a clean shirt out of the closet.

“He's a chubby little fellow with rather insane eyes that wander outward,” Joe replied. “See, here's a picture of him.”

Frank looked over his brother's shoulder at the reproduction. Simbu had both arms up in the air and ten fingers on each hand. He stood with his legs spread apart and had ten toes on each foot. A big belt or girdle encircled his waist.

“Cute,” Frank said. “Who's he supposed to be?”

“A rare character who guards his owner's possessions,” Joe explained. “Very few Simbu figures from the last century still exist and those that do are very valuable to collectors. There are apparently many modern imitations, but none that could pass as authentic antiques.” He handed the book to Frank. “Here, read it yourself while I take a shower.”

Frank sat down with the book. It seemed that Simbu was a character who did not want to be collected. His job was to stay by his master's side and protect him from evil. Whenever anyone disturbed Simbu or whatever he was guarding, terrible things would happen.

Two Simbu dolls had been found in Haiti and had been sold to museums. In both cases, the people who had discovered them had died soon thereafter under very mysterious circumstances—and not pleasantly. Not only that, but strange things occurred in the museums. Water pipes burst; heavy plaster fell from ceilings and smashed glass cases; a fire broke out. The problems did not stop until the Simbus were taken back to where they had come from.

Soon Frank and Joe were on their way to the lobby to meet their father. Frank carried a briefcase with several documents for the famous investigator that he had picked up from a law firm in Atlanta.
After they had greeted one another, they went out into the street where Mr. Hardy hailed a taxi.

“Take us to the Green Dragon, please,” he told the driver.

“What!” Frank exploded.
“Where
are we going?”

“A restaurant not far from here,” Mr. Hardy said. “I'm sure you'll like it. They have great seafood.”

The boys said no more until they were seated at a corner table in the restaurant. Then they told their father about their experience in the afternoon.

“A man with one blue eye, with a white car?” Mr. Hardy mused. “Well, that's no secret. I know who she's talking about.”

“You do?” Frank was flabbergasted.

“His name is Pierre Buffon,” Mr. Hardy explained. “He wears a white eye patch and drives a white Mercedes. He's one of the most cold-blooded cutthroats in this hemisphere.”

“Oh, great,” Joe said. “Just the guy we want to meet.”

“I've tangled with him several times,” Mr. Hardy went on. “But he's a slippery customer. Just when you think you have him nailed, he slips through your net, or the evidence you had evaporates and you're left with nothing while he skips off with the loot. He's a master thief, you see. But I also suspect him of having taken many lives in the course of his work.”

“What does he specialize in?” Frank inquired.

“Antiques,” his father answered. “Sometimes he holds them for ransom. Other times he sells them to unscrupulous collectors, who are too greedy to care
that they can never exhibit them publicly because they would be recognized as stolen goods.”

“The fortune-teller mentioned Simbu,” Frank said. “He's an antique. It all fits in.”

Mr. Hardy nodded. “I know about that deadly little rascal,” he said. Then he frowned. “But Buffon is a superstitious person. He'd stay away from anything having to do with a curse.”

“It's so crazy,” Joe put in. “Do you really believe in that woman's prediction?”

Mr. Hardy shrugged. “Who knows? Perhaps she really sensed something that could happen. We'll find out, I suppose.”

“The fact that you took us to the Green Dragon makes me tend to believe in her,” Joe sighed. “After all, you knew nothing about what happened this afternoon.”

“In that case,” Frank said, “my theory is that Buffon got hungry. Maybe he couldn't resist the Simbu despite his superstition.”

Joe paid no attention. He stared over his brother's shoulder, his eyes wide with surprise. Frank followed his brother's gaze and almost gasped.

“It's him!” he whispered. “The man with one blue eye!”

Mr. Hardy didn't have to turn his head. Pierre Buffon came right up to their table. “Monsieur Hardy, how pleasant to see you again,” he said in an oily, unpleasant voice.

“It's not a pleasure to see you, Buffon,” the detective replied. “What do you want?”

“I was occupying this table with some friends
before you came in. One of them dropped an envelope. Nothing important, it has sentimental value only. But he wishes to recover it. Have you seen an envelope, perhaps?”