None of us said a word. I knew Lilah wanted to because I saw her look away, her eyes tearing up. I opened my mouth, but then closed it. I was smart enough to know you couldn’t force someone to be McGinty. It had to come from the heart.
Finally Haggerty had the last goat in place and we were ready to go. We all piled into the sled and Haggerty jumped up on the driver’s seat. He raised his whip and was about to crack it when we heard the singing. It seemed to be coming from a great distance.
“It’s the kids in Mingley’s school,” said Haggerty. “She’s getting ready to put them through the horror of the Amberlight thing. The poor things are forced to sing that song about an hour before she starts.”
Harriet looked at Haggerty. “Can we get there in time to save them?”
He sighed. “I’m not sure. We’ll try certainly.”
“We have to do more than try,” Jack suddenly burst out. “We have to stop her.” He stood up in the sleigh, looked skyward in a distracted way, then jumped down and ran into the house. When he came out he was wearing the white sport coat.
You might have thought we’d cheer like crazy, but no one made a peep. I think we all felt the seriousness of the moment: Jack had made a huge life decision, and certainly the danger of dying young was part of it. Especially if Ming had anything to say about it.
Jack jumped in without meeting anyone’s eyes. “Let’s roll,” he said.
59
a silver trumpet for courage
That was the Jack Hastings I had waited so long for, and a surge of golden confidence flared through me. “Let the Wild Bunch ride!” I cried out.
Haggerty cracked his whip right on my last word. The goats sprang forward in their harnesses, and slowly but steadily the sleigh began moving across the snow. I felt a pang of frustration as I thought about going at this slow pace back across the valley of paperbacks, but that disappeared in a flash as Haggerty turned to the left and we swept downward in a sickening rush.
Everyone was yelling and screeching in fear as we thundered down the mountainside. I could hear Haggerty bellowing to the goats and it took me awhile to realize that he was simply excited and happy. For most of that early part of the trip down, I just shut my eyes and held on tight.
We slowed a bit when the goats crossed the snowline and we hit the first of the bare books and magazines. I thought this marked the end of the scary part, but I was wrong. Haggerty managed to find a trail down through the books that made the first run look like a trip down a kiddie slide.
“You fool!” I heard Jack bellow out. “Slow down!”
“We’re going to diiiiie!” Teddy’s scream trailed back like smoke on the wind.
Someplace along that last section of mountain, Harriet’s hand found mine and we held on tightly to each other the rest of the way. After a hair-raising jump over a ledge of books, we crunched in for a landing on the desert floor.
When we hit the sand, the sleigh slowed to a groaning crawl. The goats objected to the weight and gave out a collective bellow of irritation.
Haggerty quickly pulled a lever and down came wheels that had been tucked under the sleigh. The ride smoothed out quickly and the goats began picking up speed. We went on like this for what seemed like forever.
I lost track of time, and I was shocked when we rounded a small dune and there in the distance, waiting like a shadowy beast, stood Ming’s awful school. Haggerty brought us to a stop, and everyone stood up to get a better view. Several Stormie trucks were parked out front, but there was no sign of movement and the whole place was as quiet as a tomb.
“Holy Crow,” muttered Ray. “I can’t believe I came back here.”
“Shouldn’t we stop and think of some kind of plan?” asked Teddy, nervously.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” said Haggerty. “We have to strike quickly.” He raised the whip and cracked it loudly. “On, boys!” he thundered.
The goats lunged ahead and we went rolling faster and faster toward the monstrous building. When we careened around a second hillock, we couldn’t have been more than fifty yards from the front entrance.
“Get your instruments up and ready!” shouted Haggerty. He didn’t have to tell us, because we were scrabbling wildly to do just that. A piece of music flew past, and I grabbed it and handed it back to Harriet. At the last second, Haggerty turned the sled and we slowed to a stop not thirty yards from the front steps.
Lilah had moved to the front of the sleigh and was clapping her hands, trying to get our attention, when the big doors groaned open. Ming stood in the dim light of the hall, her pale blue eyes staring at us.
We should have started playing right then. Instead, we simply sat there, peering at her like frightened sheep. Strobe appeared behind her, his face looking as pimply as ever, then Fundabore joined them. All three carried big ugly eraser guns. Ming was smiling, and I realized the bright outside light was making it hard to see us clearly.
“What do we have here?” she called out. “A traveling circus group? A gypsy band? Rag pickers perhaps, come to seek shelter?”
Her smile began to fade. “Wait, I see who you are! Jack Hastings, Lilah Corbett …” Now she spotted me, and that awful vein on her forehead darkened and began to expand. “You.”
That’s when Lilah gave us the downbeat. The problem was, only Jack and Harriet actually started playing. The rest of us were still staring, lost in fear. Now Haggerty started oompahing away, Ray finally came wailing in on his sax, and I sputtered around, hitting some wrong notes.
We must have been the worst-sounding band in the universe. The great music in “Unicorns” was totally lost as we honked and squealed. Above the racket I heard Ming, Strobe, and Fundabore burst into laughter. That’s when Lilah grabbed up the cello and started playing, trying desperately to get us together.
Luckily, Ray and I found the right place and I heard Lilah say in that high, even-pitched voice, “Go back and repeat the opening!” Following her, we did. This time we were together, and it didn’t sound bad.
Ming, Strobe, and Fundabore stopped laughing. They stood there, still amused, but looking a bit more unsure. When we rocked into the Spanish-sounding part of the opening, I saw Ming actually take a step backward. Strobe and Fundabore quickly clamped their hands over their ears. Ming rushed over and began pressing an alarm button, and I heard a yowling siren start up.
When she came back, she started punching Strobe and Fundabore, urging them to charge. I could tell they didn’t want to take their hands away from their ears. Ming began kicking them, and reluctantly they grasped their guns.
“Watch out!” I yelled.
Strobe and Fundabore let loose a barrage of erasers, and I heard the scary thwwut thwwut sound as they flew by. Instinctively we played louder, and those two stopped shooting and again clamped their hands over their ears.
Ming bellowed in rage, lifted her own gun, and began firing. Erasers slapped loudly against the side of the sleigh and one made a loud twinng! as it glanced off the side of Ray’s sax. To his credit, he went right on playing. Lilah and Teddy crouched behind the meager shelter of Jack’s small piano while Haggerty, the bravest of us all, went on oompahing from the front seat of the sleigh.
Strobe and Fundabore were screaming in pain and holding their ears, but Ming came down off the steps and started straight for us, firing as she came.
“Play!” cried Lilah. “Play for your lives!”
And brother did we ever, or at least we tried. We actually reached the wild tango part of the piece and I thought that would stop Ming, but she kept coming. She couldn’t have been five yards away when she hit Haggerty right in the face. The poor old guy groaned loudly, then fell backward to the ground.
The goats let loose with a loud behhhh! and lunged forward, throwing Jack off his feet. Ming screeched like a banshee, and for a moment I thought we were goners, but the rest of us kept playing loudly and she couldn’t take it.
With a horrible cry of rage, she retreated, trying desperately to shie
ld her ears. That’s when the other Stormies came rumbling outside, their guttural voices rising with fury. The music must have pained them terribly, but they began shooting wildly at us.
Several erasers bounced off Teddy’s chest and head and Lilah screamed when he fell forward, his violin flying into the sand.
“Keep playing!” shouted Jack. He was still pounding the keyboard hard, his jaw clenched. I blasted as loudly as I could, and I knew Harriet and Ray were doing the same, but we were losing the battle and I think we all knew it. Lilah was bent over Teddy, trying to see how badly he was hurt, when she was struck on the shoulder, then the cheek. She sank down without a word, her eyes still open.
Losing Lilah was the final stroke of doom. When Jack saw her go down, he faltered badly and almost stopped. At that point, the rest of us began to fall apart. Ray was playing too fast and I simply lost my place. Harriet alone was still trying, and it was her playing that kept the
Stormies from charging.
Looking pale and lost, Jack made one last valiant effort to get us back together, but in his determination he forgot to crouch behind the piano. He was standing up defiantly when he was hit in the neck, then the forehead. He sank down slowly, then crashed sideways across the piano keys.
Ray panicked then. “Retreat!” he yelled. In a frenzy, he leaped over the side of the sleigh and started across the sand.
“Ray! Nooo!” I yelled out just as he was struck in the back and fell heavily, his sax skidding away in the sand. Harriet, who was the only one still playing, stopped now. We both sat, too stunned to do anything.
Ming held up her hand and signaled the Stormies to stop shooting. She came forward cautiously. I could see a thin trickle of blood from one of her ears.
“You ugly, imbecilic little boy …” she began. She reached down and ripped open my shirt. In one powerful motion she grasped the book and pulled it to her.
She raised the eraser gun. “Now we shall have one less coward in the world.”
When she said that, something snapped inside me. I raised my horn and blew the opening notes of a bullfight straight at her. She jumped as if she had been stung and screamed in pain.
Without thinking, I broke right into the first part of “Malagueña” and Ming stumbled backward. “You filthy little thing!” she cried out. “You’re hurting me!”
Strobe, Fundabore, and the other Stormies started for me, bellowing with rage, and I went totally bonkers. Anger swept through me, and I jumped out of the sleigh and blew some high notes that drove Ming and the whole crowd of them back. I pointed the bell of old Todd Lemons’s trumpet at them like a gun barrel and blew my lungs out. I hit some clunkers, but you could tell what I was playing in a heartbeat. Spanish music.
I sprayed them with notes, then did some made-up runs and went right back into the melody of “Malagueña.” And they were retreating. Ming was down on one knee holding her ears. I was totally out of my mind, and it took me a few seconds to realize Harriet was right beside me, playing just as loudly. Man, we were looking good for about a half-minute, and then a squad of Stormies began shooting at us from the rear.
Harriet and I faltered, and the next thing I knew, we were caught in a murderous crossfire. Something ricocheted off Harriet’s clarinet, sending it flying. Now Ming and the Stormies were charging us again.
“Back to the sleigh!” I shouted to Harriet, and we dodged back with erasers and chalk flying past us. When we reached the sleigh, we crouched briefly behind the goats and I tried feebly to play some more, but my concentration was gone.
I had one last glimpse of Ming’s contorted face as she led the Stormies on the run toward us. I closed my eyes, waiting for the fatal shot, but it didn’t come.
Instead, I heard a tremendous chord of music, a fantastic, earth-shaking roar of music. It was “The Young Shall Ride Unicorns” like I’ll never hear it again.
Harriet shook my arm. “Look!”
I snapped my eyes open and saw Ming, Fundabore, and Strobe scurrying toward the school doors. The crowd of Stormies had stopped and were staring off into the distance.
Coming across the desert was a humongous band—hundreds of kids and teachers from the Blue Grotto, led by Adjana, all playing that glorious music. I stared, speechless, but then I saw a sight that really made my eyes bug out. Alvin and Weeser were marching in the front row of the band and it looked like their fur and tails were gone.
Harriet yelled excitedly in my ear. “It’s them! They’re okay!”
Alvin was playing a big tuba while Weeser banged away on a snare drum. I could hardly believe my eyes. How had they managed to get away from Ming?
The Stormies, seeing Ming retreat, headed back toward the school, shooting as they went. The tide of battle was shifting.
I jumped to my feet with a yell. The Grotto band roared into the tango section of the song and, like a maniac, I began playing along with them, improvising from “Malagueña,” and it worked like the best moments of jazz. Stormies began tumbling to the ground, holding their ears.
“Yes!” cried Harriet. “Keep it up!”
She ran over and grabbed her clarinet and joined in. Before I knew what had happened, Alvin and Weeser had rushed over and joined us, and the four of us were wailing along with the Grotto kids. I’m telling you, if I live to be a hundred and ninety-two, I’ll never hear such music again. And Ming? She, Fundabore, and Strobe hadn’t made it to the doors but were down on their knees, hands over their ears as they crawled slowly along.
The huge Grotto band came to a halt near us and I could see Adjana directing it. She was being helped by Perkins and Toddwilly, who marched on either side of the huge group, trying to coordinate the beat.
Adjana led the band into the final section of “Unicorns” while Harriet, Alvin, Weeser, and I kept up the fantastic improv stuff right to the final climatic section. When we reached that part, I saw a sight that actually made me stop playing.
The front doors of Ming’s school began to shudder. With a great squealing racket, they came loose and crashed down with a thunderous roar. Now the roof began to shake and rumble. Ming’s school was beginning to come apart.
“Wait!” I shouted. “Hold it down! We’ve got to get the kids and teachers out!”
Adjana was ahead of me and already lowering the volume. She signaled to Perkins to take over the directing, then she hurried over to us. She had a sword on her belt, and I noticed the other Grotto teachers wore them also.
“We’ll keep repeating the chorus, Billy” she said. “Hurry up and get them out.”
I nodded. “Jack and the others are hurt bad.” I paused and then blurted out, “I think they’re dead.”
Adjana put out a sympathetic hand. “We’ll check them right away.”
“Also, Ming has the book,” I said.
Adjana’s blue-green eyes took on a wintry look. “Not for long. Now hurry—Alvin and Weeser, you can help. Let’s get everyone out!”
The four of us took off on a headlong run for the school. Harriet, Weeser, and I darted around Ming, who lay sprawled out, great tears of rage coursing down her cheeks. Alvin insisted on leaping over her, yelling out, “Not lookin’ so good, Merci!.”
We raced up the steps and into the gloomy building. I could hear a distant moaning sound, like a great animal in pain.
“They’re in the gym,” I cried.
We pelted down the dim halls, hurtling over the writhing bodies of fallen Stormies. When we burst into the gym, we found the Grindsville kids and the teachers crying and groaning as they marched in place. It looked like the Stormies had just started giving them more Zorca before marching them to the basement for the Amberlight extraction. The wavy floor was covered with small paper cups, and a lot of the Zorca had been spilled.
“Well, this is a nice fardexy scene,” said Alvin with a grimace.
“It’s sickening,” said Weeser. “Let’s get them out of here.”
Yelling at the top of our lungs, we began herding the whole bunch towar
d the exits. While we were doing this, Principal Plumly, who obviously hadn’t gotten his Zorca and was well into withdrawal, rushed threateningly at me.
“What are you doing, Wise?” he bellowed. “You have no authority here!”
In answer, I raised the trumpet and popped out some crisp Spanish notes. He quickly covered his hairy orangutan ears and scuttled away. At that moment, the roof gave off some loud cracking sounds as if beams were snapping in two.
“Out everyone!” I yelled. “Hurry!”
The crowd began moving faster, and the next thing I knew the entire group stampeded for the exit. Alvin and Weeser went on with the first wave, but Harriet and I waited until the last monkey kid and orangutan teacher were out, then we left that dark, stinky room for good.
When we got outside, we found things had changed dramatically. Eddie and his buddies were in the process of tying up Ming, Strobe, and Fundabore. One of the Grotto teachers had taken over the band and had them repeating the tango section, which kept the Stormies helpless. Adjana, Perkins, Toddwilly, and others were over by the sleigh, but I turned away from that quickly.
“We’d better get back into the band,” cried Alvin. “I love this music!”
“We’ll talk later,” said Weeser. “Tell you about our big adventures!”
They rushed back, starting to play before they even got to their rank.
Harriet turned, and I knew she was looking at the activity around the sleigh.
“I can’t look at that,” I said to her. “Can’t.”
“Maybe you should,” she replied. There was a strange look on her face.
Reluctantly I turned back. For a moment I could only stare at the scene. The world seemed to slow and then come to a swift and silent halt. I couldn’t believe my eyes.
60
the good old blue grotto water
Raymondo was on his feet, standing next to Adjana. She and Perkins were handing out glasses filled with blue water to Jack, Lilah, Teddy, and Haggerty, who were sitting up.
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