The Skull of Truth

by Bruce Coville

“I hated it when that happened,” said the skull bitterly.

  They landed on the pile of dirt. Moments later the grave digger—who was standing in the grave—reached over and lifted the skull, raising it above him.

  “Whose do you think it was?” he asked, speaking to someone Charlie couldn’t see.

  “Nay, I know not.”

  The grave digger turned the skull around, at which point Charlie was able to see two young men staring into the grave-in-progress. Both were noble-looking; one, dressed all in black, had a tragic air about him.

  “My little buddy Hamlet Two, all grown up,” whispered the skull. “I wish—”

  He was interrupted by the grave digger shaking him. “A pestilence on him for a mad rogue! ’A poured a flagon of Rhenish on my head once. This same skull, sir, was, sir, Yorick’s skull, the king’s jester.”

  The man in black reached down and took the skull from the grave digger. “This?” he asked, his voice thick with horror and sorrow. With his fingertips he tenderly brushed away a bit of dirt from the skull’s left eye socket.

  “E’en that,” confirmed the grave digger.

  “Alas, poor Yorick!” sighed Hamlet. He turned to his friend. “I knew him, Horatio—a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy. He hath bore me on his back a thousand times.” Hamlet stared at the skull sadly, then pressed his finger to the ridge above the teeth. “Here hung those lips that I have kissed I know not how oft. Where be your gibes now, your gambols, your songs, your flashes of merriment that were wont to set the table on a roar?”

  Charlie half expected Yorick to answer the prince. When he remained silent Charlie asked him why.

  “I hadn’t figured out how to talk yet. Remember, this is a flashback. I hadn’t been out of the ground more than two minutes when Hamlet started going on like that.”

  “Tell me, Horatio,” continued the prince. “Dost think Alexander the Great looked like this once in the earth?”

  “E’en so.”

  “And smelled so? Pah!” With that he tossed Yorick back onto the pile of dirt. But he continued his talk of death and what it meant until he heard the funeral procession approaching. Then Hamlet and his friend stepped back among the trees to watch in secret.

  From their graveside spot, Charlie and Yorick had a perfect view of the action that followed.

  First the body of a beautiful young woman all wrapped in white was lowered into the grave.

  Then the queen—Charlie recognized her as Hamlet’s mother, though she was quite a bit older now—threw flowers into the grave. “Sweets to the sweet,” she whispered. “Farewell.”

  Then a young man jumped into the grave, crying, “Hold off the earth a while, till I have caught her once more in mine arms.”

  “Who’s that?” asked Charlie.

  “Her brother, Laertes,” replied the skull. “Nice guy, but he tended to get a little carried away. On the other hand, so did Hamlet.”

  No sooner had Yorick said this than Hamlet came rushing out of the woods shouting, “I loved Ophelia! Forty thousand brothers could not with all their quality of love make up my sum.”

  Before long, he and Laertes were fighting about who was most upset by the girl’s death.

  Finally the fight was broken up and everyone left.

  The skull was still lying out in the open.

  “Boy, those guys really got carried away,” said Charlie.

  “They had very dysfunctional families,” replied Yorick.

  The grave digger began to shovel the dirt back into the hole, whistling cheerily as he covered the body that lay within. When the grave was about half full he thrust the shovel under the skull and lifted it. Then, as if thinking twice, he set the shovel down, picked up the skull, and put it off to the side.

  Returning to his work, he soon had the grave filled.

  “Why didn’t he put you back?” asked Charlie.

  “Pocket money.” And indeed, after another “special effects” shift, Charlie was able to watch the grave digger carry the skull into a dark room. The man put the skull down, held out his hand, received a few tarnished coins, then went whistling into the dark.

  “This was when I found out part two of the curse,” said the skull. “Now that I was dead, I not only had to speak the truth myself, I compelled it from others. You don’t need the whole story, but believe me, no one wanted to keep me around for very long. I was extremely bad for business. So for centuries I passed from hand to hand, sometimes for money, more often not, given how badly people wanted to get rid of me. Finally I ended up with this guy . . .”

  Another whirl of color, and Charlie found himself sitting on a table in a sparsely furnished room. He felt something warm above him and asked what it was.

  “Wax. My new owner liked to use me as a candleholder.”

  As Charlie watched, a balding, bearded man sat down at the table, picked up a quill pen, and began to write.

  “What’s he working on?” asked Charlie.

  “A play. Hamlet, to be precise.”

  “That isn’t . . . ?”

  “Big Bill Shakespeare? Of course it is. Where do you think he got the story? This was a pretty happy time for me. Old Will loved having me around.”

  “Didn’t you get him in trouble?”

  “Oh, a little. But like fools, poets can be very good at telling the truth without getting into too much hot water for it. Besides, Will always said that what trouble I did cause was worth it for what I added to his poetry.”

  “You’re not claiming you helped Shakespeare write his plays, are you?” asked Charlie indignantly.

  “Of course not. But as long as he had me around he couldn’t write a line that wasn’t true. I saved him from some real clinkers.”

  “Are you telling me everything in his plays actually happened?”

  The skull sighed. “Truth comes in a lot of forms, Charlie. What I’m telling you is that everything he wrote after he got me was true in a way that few scriveners ever manage. True at the deepest level. I stayed with him till the very end . . . A few days after he was buried, someone came and bought me from his daughter.”

  As Yorick said this, Charlie saw a man who looked an awful lot like Mr. Elives pick up the skull and walk away with it. He thought about asking if it was Mr. Elives, decided the idea was absurd, then decided that given his current situation nothing was impossible.

  “That’s not the same old man I met in the magic shop, is it?” asked Charlie.

  “I can’t say,” replied the skull.

  Charlie had a feeling this was the absolute truth.

  “What I can tell you is that from that day until the day you took me from the shop, I hadn’t been out loose in the world.”

  “You seem to know a lot about the world for someone who’s been locked away for almost four centuries,” said Charlie, thinking of some of the jokes the skull had told him.

  Yorick chuckled. “When you’re dead you have other ways to communicate, sort of a psychic version of the Internet. And I have to keep up with things for professional reasons. After all, a lot of humor is very topical. Best joke I ever knew was about Millard Fillmore. Screamingly funny. Unfortunately, I doubt one person in a million would understand it today.”

  “Who’s Millard Fillmore?”

  “You make my point perfectly.”

  Charlie realized that the story was over, that he was once more aware of his room. “So how come you chose me to take you out of the shop?” he asked.

  “I keep telling you, you chose me. Looked right into my big empty eye sockets and asked me if I wanted to come home with you. I was restless, so I took advantage of the situation and sort of urged you to pick me up. I hope you don’t mind.”

  It was easy to respond truthfully: “I do.”

  The skull sighed. “You lack a sense of adventure.”

  “You lack a sense of decency,” shot back Charlie.

  “Oh yeah? Well you lack a sense of . . . of . . . oh, drat. I guess you don’t.”
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  “What? What were you going to say?”

  “That you lacked a sense of humor, but I couldn’t get the words out. So must be it’s not true.”

  “Heh. Just because I don’t laugh at your jokes doesn’t mean I don’t have a sense of humor,” said Charlie smugly.

  “Oh, that was low,” said the skull. “And I could say that, so you can see it must be true.”

  Charlie collapsed onto his bed. “Oh, it’s true all right.” He sighed. “I am low. Only a low, vile, rotten human being could do what I did to Gilbert yesterday.” He groaned. “Oh, god. I thought I was exaggerating! Must be I am low, vile, and rotten!”

  The skull began to laugh.

  “I don’t see what’s so funny!” snarled Charlie.

  “Okay, then try saying this: ‘Only a fine, sensitive human being would worry so much about how Gilbert feels.’”

  Charlie repeated the sentence. His eyes widened. “Did something break the spell?”

  “Of course not.”

  “Then I don’t get it. Supposedly I can only say what’s true. So which is it? Am I low, vile, and rotten—or fine and sensitive?”

  “Both, just like most human beings.”

  Charlie made a face. “That’s the silliest thing I ever heard.”

  “Hey, just because I only tell the truth doesn’t mean I have to make sense. Half of what I say is stranger than fiction. But it’s all true. Guaranteed.”

  When Charlie woke the next morning he was surprised to find his mother and sisters had already gone to church. His father was sitting in the living room, reading the funnies.

  “Morning, champ,” he said as Charlie stumbled down the stairs. “We decided to let you sleep in today.”

  “Thanks,” said Charlie, using his fingers to comb some of the knots out of his hair.

  Mr. Eggleston shrugged. “To tell you the truth, it made a good excuse for me to stay home myself.” He looked startled, then said gruffly, “There’s bagels in the kitchen.”

  Charlie looked at his father oddly, then went to get some breakfast. Afterward he rode his bike to Tucker’s Swamp and sat staring at the water for a long time.

  When he returned to his room Charlie noticed that Yorick was unusually quiet. Though he welcomed the silence, after about half an hour it began to get on his nerves. He wondered if the skull was angry at him.

  Finally he went to the closet and opened the door.

  “Why are you being so quiet, Yorick?”

  The skull didn’t reply for so long that Charlie wondered if it was going to refuse to answer altogether. He was considering just leaving the room when Yorick said, very softly, “I’m scared.”

  Charlie blinked. “Why?”

  “I told you last night: Something is coming. I don’t know what. I don’t know when. But whatever it is, it scares me. If I had a body, I’d shiver.”

  Charlie did shiver. The first time the skull had talked this way, Charlie had told himself it was probably joking, since that seemed to be all it did anyway. But now that he knew the skull’s story, he wasn’t so sure. Besides, the fear in Yorick’s voice felt genuine.

  “Maybe we’d better stick together,” said Charlie, somewhat reluctantly. He was about to ask the skull if it had any advice for dealing with the Gilbert situation when Mimi appeared at his door and said, “Mommy wants to talk to you.”

  Shifting to make sure he kept the skull hidden from her sight, he turned to face her. “What does she want?”

  Mimi shrugged and took a bite of her cookie. “I dunno.”

  Charlie sighed. “Well, did she sound mad?”

  “I dunno. She’s in her workshop.”

  “Tell her I’ll be right there.”

  “Okey-padokey!”

  He waited until Mimi had headed down the hall, then turned back to Yorick. “I’ll see you in a while,” he said. Then he closed the closet door and headed for the garage.

  His mother was on her knees, stripping green paint off an old kitchen chair. Scuds of it lay curled on the newspapers she had spread underneath the project. The wood she had revealed looked fresh and clean. A sharp chemical smell lingered in the air.

  “Mimi said you wanted to see me.”

  “I heard something at church this morning,” said Mrs. Eggleston softly, not looking up. She slid her blade under some paint, lifting it away from the wood. “Something that upset me a great deal.”

  He felt his stomach begin to knot up. “What was it?” he asked, trying to sound casual.

  “It was about you, Charlie. Do you know what it was?”

  Offhand, he could think of several things his mother might have heard about him that would upset her. But odds were good that the current item had to do with what had happened on Friday.

  “Was it about Gilbert Dawkins?” His voice came out tinier than he had meant it to.

  His mother set aside her scraper and stood up. When she turned to him, her eyes were sad. “Oh, Charlie,” she whispered. “How could, you?”

  To Charlie’s surprise, he started to cry. He didn’t say anything, just ran to her and threw his arms around her and buried his face against her like he used to do when he was little. Gasping sobs shook his body. When he could finally speak he said, “I didn’t mean to. I didn’t mean to. It just came out. And now everyone hates me!”

  She held him close and patted his back. “Oh, sweetheart. They don’t hate you.” Then, sounding slightly uncomfortable, she added, “But they probably don’t like you much right now.”

  “What can I do?” whispered Charlie, too upset at first to realize what was happening.

  His mother thought for a moment. “You’ll have to see if you can make it up to Gilbert somehow. Have you apologized yet?”

  Charlie shook his head. “I was afraid to. Besides, I feel so stupid.”

  “Don’t,” said his mother gently. She ruffled his hair. “We all make mistakes, honey. It happens. I think you should call Gil right away, so you can try to get things settled before you have to go back to school tomorrow.”

  Charlie sighed. “You’re probably right.”

  He turned to go. As he did, his mother said, “By the way, I’ve been meaning to remind you we’re having a family dinner to celebrate Gramma Ethel’s birthday tonight. Please don’t be late this time. And please have something to give her. It doesn’t have to be much. Just a card would be fine.”

  Charlie sighed again, more heavily this time. “Do we have to have so many family dinners? I’m getting tired of them.”

  “Well how do you think I feel?” snapped his mother. “They’re important for the family, but the truth is they’re a real pain in the butt for me!”

  Her eyes grew wide and she pulled her head back in astonishment. “Charlie, I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to say that!”

  Charlie nodded. He believed her.

  In fact, he had no question at all that she was telling the absolute truth.

  EIGHT

  A Promise, a Warning, a Shrug

  “It’s getting worse!” said Charlie, when he was safely back in his room.

  “What’s getting worse?” asked Yorick, his eye sockets starting to glow. “Your haircut? Your breath? Your grade-point average?”

  “Your jokes,” replied Charlie sharply. Then he smiled. “Heh. Must be that’s true.” His moment of triumph was short-lived, as he remembered what had happened downstairs. “But that’s not what I’m talking about. It’s the curse; it’s spreading. I think my mom is catching it!”

  “Uh-oh. This could be serious.”

  “What do you mean? My mother always tells the truth anyway.”

  “Are you kidding? If mothers started telling the absolute truth it would mean the end of life as you know it. Besides, if your mom always tells the truth, then what makes you think the curse is affecting her?”

  The phone rang, interrupting Charlie’s fumbling attempts to come up with an answer.

  “Charlie!” cried Tiffany. “It’s for you! It’s Karen.” She mad
e a series of kissing sounds, then began to giggle.

  “Saved by the bell,” muttered Yorick, as Charlie hurried to take the call.

  When Charlie picked up the receiver he found that his voice was so weak the words could barely pass his lips. “Hi,” he said, after two or three tries. “I thought you weren’t speaking to me.”

  “I’m not,” replied Karen. “I only called to find out what you were going to do to patch things up with Gilbert.”

  “I don’t know,” said Charlie miserably. Then, when there was silence on the other end of the line, he added in a rush, “But I’m going to do something! I can’t tell you how rotten I feel. Well, actually, I can. I feel like a two-pound ball of slug slime that’s been sitting in a closed container and turning—”

  “Oh, stop! I get the idea. And I believe you. But I don’t feel sorry for you. You should feel rotten.”

  “Do you have any suggestions?” asked Charlie.

  Karen paused. “No. I just wanted to make sure you were going to do something.”

  “I will. Right away. I promise.”

  Charlie knew Karen would believe that. Even though he always lied about things—or used to, before the skull came along—promises were sacred as far as he was concerned. The other kids had reached the point where they never believed anything he said without a promise; with a promise, they were willing to trust him completely.

  “All right,” said Karen. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  She hung up. Charlie put down the receiver, a broad grin creasing his face. She likes me! he thought. Then he realized with horror what he had just promised to do.

  When Charlie returned to his room, his brooding about how to handle the Gilbert situation was interrupted by Yorick saying, “We’ve got company.”

  “What are you talking about?” asked Charlie. Then he jumped as a rat came scurrying out from under his desk.

  “Surprise!” it cried, standing on its hind legs.

  “Jerome! What are you doing here?”

  “Don’t be so rude, Charlie,” said Roxanne, coming out to stand beside Jerome. “You could have said ‘Nice to see you.’ Or ‘Well, what a surprise! How are you, Jerome?’ Or something like that. Any of a number of things would have been more pleasant than ‘What are you doing here?’ Hasn’t your mother taught you any manners?”