The Tower at the End of the World (Action Packs)

by Brad Strickland

Clusko wriggled uncomfortably. “No,” he said. “Nn-nn-ooo. . . .” Then his lips twitched. He spat out each word unwillingly: “It . . . is a spell . . . of revealing. It is in the Key of Solomon. B-but there are wards. He will know if you use the spell.”

  Uncle Jonathan leaned closer. “Then how can we get to the island without his knowing?”

  Clusko closed his eyes. “Please. Please. He will do terrible things to me. . . . You . . . must wait until he passes through the barrier, to the island or away from it, and move quickly . . . I feel his mind! No! No, master! Help me! He knows I’m here!”

  The last words came out as a desperate groan. Lewis winced. He almost felt sorry for this frightened little man.

  Jonathan said, “Help us and we will protect you. Now, here’s the sixty-four dollar question: What do you know about the Doomsday Clock?”

  Lewis was astonished at the change in Clusko’s face. It turned red, then white. The man’s eyes rolled, and his mouth quivered as if he were trying to clamp it shut. “Time is running out!” he shouted, spitting flecks of white foam. “When the clock counts noon on the fifteenth, a Day of Darkness will begin! Fire will consume all the unworthy, and only his followers will remain to inherit the earth—no, master! I didn’t mean to tell them! I won’t—I won’t—help me!”

  Rose Rita jumped in alarm. Lewis cried out. Something had seized Clusko, something that Lewis could not see. It jerked the little man this way and that, and then rose into the air with him. He dangled like a mouse caught in the clutches of a hawk. Against the crimson sky a huge dim shapeless shadow fluttered and flapped. Clusko gibbered and screamed, his voice thin. Mrs. Zimmermann spoke a spell and raised her umbrella. Purple light flared, and for a second Lewis saw the outline of something like a vast dark bird with outspread wings.

  Suddenly Clusko’s flesh bubbled as if tiny creatures lived inside and were trying to burst out. His eyes swelled and drifted apart, and a dark hole gaped open where his nose used to be. Human flesh became green scales, and claws grew out of his shrinking limbs.

  The force that had seized Clusko shook him and threw him aside. Clusko’s body flew through the air and hit the rocks with a squelch. The misshapen thing that had once been human bawled in a terrible animal way. Claws clicked on the rocks as the thing scuttled into the dark water of the lake. Then it was gone.

  Lewis heard Rose Rita gasping and sobbing. Mrs. Zimmermann had her arm around Rose Rita’s shoulders. “Our friend Mr. Izard doesn’t like it when his slaves turn on him,” she said grimly. “I should have seen that coming.”

  From the house Grampa Galway called, “So six of us for dinner, then?”

  With a sick look on his face Jonathan yelled back, “Just five. Mr. Clusko didn’t stay.”

  The next day Uncle Jonathan and Mrs. Zimmermann tried out the walkie-talkies that Jonathan had bought at the Army surplus store. Mrs. Zimmermann also took Lewis aside. “I have something for you,” she said. “First, take the slip of parchment from your wallet. Do it very carefully.”

  Lewis began to breathe hard. He removed the piece of parchment, hating its strange texture and the way it seemed to wriggle in his grasp as if it were alive.

  Mrs. Zimmermann held out a small book, barely three by five inches. It had a badly scuffed blue cover, and the edges of its pages were yellow with age. “Here,” she said. “Put the parchment between two leaves toward the middle.”

  Lewis opened the book at random. It was written in some foreign language, with English translations between the lines. At the top of the page was the heading “La Vega’s Tagalog/English Maritime Phrasebook.” Lewis saw that the English sentences on the page said things like “When, pray, is the next spring tide?” and “I require a pilot to assist my vessel.” Quickly, though, he put the parchment in the book and then closed the covers. Mrs. Zimmermann handed him a thick rubber band. “Now snap this around it, just for insurance,” she said. “You don’t want to let that parchment get away from you.”

  When he had finished, Lewis asked, “Is this some sort of magic?”

  Mrs. Zimmermann winked. “It could be. You could think of this old book, which I bought for a quarter at a junk store, as having all my most powerful magic spells in it, written in code. You could say that I’d be helpless without it, magically speaking. Just imagine that it contains a powerful spell that could even destroy a magical clock.”

  Lewis felt confused. Was Mrs. Zimmermann telling him that this actually was a book of magic? He had never known her to use one before. Her magic was all done with amulets and spoken spells and her umbrella-staff. But, following Mrs. Zimmermann’s advice, he put the book in his hip pocket. “Now what?” he asked.

  “Now comes the hardest part,” replied Mrs. Zimmermann in a solemn voice. “We wait.”

  Days passed. Lewis grew more and more troubled. The twelfth arrived. Then the thirteenth. He had only two days left! Perhaps the whole world did! That night he lay awake fretting and worrying. That was why he heard the voices.

  His uncle had said that he was going to scout around, and he had left for his fishing cabin that afternoon. But Lewis heard him speaking and guessed he must have returned. Lewis slipped out of bed, threw on his clothes, and went down the hall. The voices were coming from Mrs. Zimmermann’s room, and once he was close enough, Lewis realized that his uncle wasn’t there. He was speaking to Mrs. Zimmermann on the walkie-talkie.

  “He’s just left,” his uncle was saying. “If my blasted outboard hadn’t gone on the fritz—listen, Florence, go fire up your boat and get to the point as quickly as you can. He’ll be there in half an hour. The barrier will be down as he passes through, and you can enter. It’s our only hope!”

  “I’m on my way,” said Mrs. Zimmermann. She began to move around in her room, probably getting dressed.

  Lewis gulped. He and Rose Rita had made a pact that one of them had to go along on expeditions like this. He knew that Mrs. Zimmermann was going to try to follow Ishmael Izard right onto Gnomon Island.

  He reached a decision. He would have to go with Mrs. Zimmermann. He couldn’t very well wake Rose Rita and beg her to go! Though he was scared to death, the look of contempt he would be sure to get from Rose Rita if he failed bothered him more than his fear. Moving as softly as he could, Lewis ran outside and darted down to the dock.

  Where could he hide? He clambered into the rented boat. Right up forward was a little compartment for life jackets, fishing tackle, and such. It had a sliding door that Lewis yanked open. He crept inside, turned, and pulled the door closed again. The fit wasn’t comfortable. He sat with his knees drawn up to his chin, the top of his head touching the deck. But he was hidden, at least.

  After what seemed like a long time he felt the boat rock. Then the engine sputtered to life, and the boat was moving. Lewis tried not to rattle around as the bow rose and dipped. He held on tight to a life-jacket rack beside him. Minutes passed. Then Mrs. Zimmermann cut the engine, and for a time they just drifted.

  The forward compartment smelled of old bait and fish, and soon felt as muggy as a steam bath. A sweaty Lewis strained for any sound. Finally he caught a whine almost as thin as a mosquito’s buzz. It was another boat. He could tell that it passed by. And then he heard the splash as Mrs. Zimmermann started to row. He felt a cold, electric tingle all over. He had felt that before, when they passed through the barrier around Gnomon Island.

  Lewis realized that something terrible could happen at any moment.

  Their boat was taking them straight into the clutches of a powerful and crazed magician.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  The sun was just coming up as Rose Rita heard the boat approaching Ivarhaven Island. She ran to the docks. As soon as Jonathan Barnavelt came close enough, she yelled, “Mrs. Zimmermann’s gone! And Lewis too!”

  Jonathan looked up sharply. “What! Lewis?”

  “It’s my fault,” confessed Rose Rita. Hurriedly she explained how she and Lewis had worried and how they had pledged to follow if Mrs. Zimmer
mann tried to slip away on her own. “I’m worried sick,” she finished.

  “I’ll go after them,” said Jonathan.

  “Me too.”

  Jonathan gave her a long look. “Okay, but let your grampa know—”

  “He knows.”

  Rose Rita jumped a mile. Grampa Galway had been walking down the path from the house to the dock, and now he was right behind her. He put a hand on her shoulder. “Your old granddad isn’t stupid,” he said softly. “Jonathan, for some time now I’ve suspected that you had more up your sleeve than parlor-magic tricks. And I’ve always known there was something, well, different about Florence Zimmermann. I think it’s probably just as well that I don’t know exactly what’s up, but I do know that you have some serious business to attend to. Watch after my granddaughter.”

  “I will, Albert,” said Jonathan. “Climb in, Rose Rita! Time’s a-wasting!”

  Rose Rita waved good-bye to her grandfather as they roared away from Ivarhaven Island. She felt anxious. Would she ever see him alive again?

  Would she ever see anyone alive again?

  It was the fourteenth of August.

  Could it be the world’s last day?

  From the moment he had set foot on Gnomon Island, Lewis had felt strange. He had waited in the cramped compartment of the boat until Mrs. Zimmermann left the boat. Then he had crawled out and followed her. The night was dark, with no moon, and Lewis quickly became lost.

  To his surprise the sky began to lighten. More time had passed than he had thought. As the sun rose, he found that he was wandering in a tangle of fir trees. He climbed the slope until he reached the edge of the lawn in front of the dark tower. From there he could see that the sky was red in the east. Overhead, clouds that twisted and formed into terrible likenesses of screaming faces and clutching hands were gathering.

  Lewis found the pathway that led down through the trees and followed it. Soon the little cottage came into view. Through the single window Lewis caught a flash of purple. Mrs. Zimmermann! Relief washed over him in a soothing wave. But then, in the next second, fear clamped a cold fist on Lewis’s heart.

  He heard a sneering voice say, “You were foolish to come. You can do nothing! Not without this!”

  Mrs. Zimmermann’s voice replied, “That’s what you think, Ishmael Izard. You have studied magic. You should know that a sorcerer can store great power in a grimoire. Well, it so happens that I have entrusted a book to a good friend of mine. A book with something very special in it that can take care of you and your insane plans.”

  The man laughed. “So you’ve given a book of spells to that bumbling, red-bearded, potbellied fool who bought my father’s house! He will be very easy to deal with. I can take your grimoire away from him as easily as I took your stupid umbrella away from you! Now what to do with you? I don’t want to kill you, because after the world has changed, I will need servants. I know! I have just the spot. You will have a ringside seat at the end of the world! Come along with me—I command it!”

  Lewis shrank around the corner of the house. Crouching low, he saw a tall man with long gray hair step out of the cottage. He wore a black suit and a black turtleneck shirt. With bony arms he made mystic gestures, and in obedience to them, Mrs. Zimmermann walked out of the house. Her white hair straggled loose from its bun. She wore one of her purple dresses and her black sensible walking shoes. With her back straight, she strode up the path. Izard’s expression was cruel and triumphant as he marched her toward the tower. Soon they were out of sight.

  Lewis hurried to the front. The cottage door was open. He went inside and looked wildly around. Then he saw what he was looking for. Someone had stuck Mrs. Zimmermann’s black umbrella, its crystal globe gleaming dully, up in the rafters. It was far out of Lewis’s reach. He looked for something to climb on—and then he heard the crunch of footsteps outside! Without hesitating, Lewis dived under one of the beds in the room. He pressed against the wall, hoping that no one could see him. It was dusty under there, and his nose itched, making him want to sneeze. Lewis squeezed his nostrils shut with his fingers, fighting the feeling. He glimpsed Izard’s feet. He heard the man chuckle. “So much for the real wizard,” the man growled to himself. “Now to lay the trap for the fool!”

  Lewis realized that Izard was talking about his uncle. He was so frightened that he thought he would lose his mind.

  “We have to get more gas,” said Jonathan Barnavelt. “I’ve got some at the fishing cabin.”

  Rose Rita was beginning to feel panic. It was almost sunset. For several hours she and Jonathan had been zigging and zagging across the surface of the lake, trying to catch sight of Gnomon Island. Jonathan had used the walkie-talkie time and time again, but he had failed to make contact with Mrs. Zimmermann.

  Jonathan guided the boat to shore, then hurried up the hillside to a log cabin. He soon came back, carrying a red gas can. He glugged gasoline into the outboard motor tank. Rose Rita wrinkled her nose at the sharp smell. “Okay,” he said. “Let’s try again.”

  Before long they were back on Lake Superior. Rose Rita kept looking uneasily toward the west. The sun was getting low, and she knew that if they didn’t find some trace soon, they would have to head back to Ivarhaven Island. She wondered if they were even on the right track. Jonathan seemed convinced that Mrs. Zimmermann had headed for Gnomon Island, but maybe she had come up with a different plan. She might be anywhere—

  “There it is,” said Jonathan suddenly.

  Rose Rita saw the ripply waves of air. Jonathan turned the nose of the boat and gunned the engine. “It’s going away!” she yelled as the ripples began to fade.

  “Hang on!” roared Jonathan.

  Rose Rita grabbed hold of the boat’s side with a tight grip. The craft almost leaped out of the water as Jonathan gave it the gas. Bouncing on her seat, Rose Rita thought this was the way a skimmed stone might feel as it went skipping over water—slap! Slap! Slap!

  They reached the barrier and zoomed through it, and suddenly the eastern side of Gnomon Island reared dead ahead. The tower with its flying-buttress stair was jet-black against the crimson sky. Jonathan turned, cut back on the gas, and they followed the shoreline to the left until they came to the inlet and the pier. “They’re here,” Rose Rita said, pointing to the dock. Mrs. Zimmermann’s rented motorboat was tied there. It was the only one.

  “And it looks as if Sneaky Pete is away,” Jonathan declared. “That’s just peachy keen, as far as I’m concerned.” He grabbed the walkie-talkie and said into it, “Florence! Are you there? I’m about to dock at Gnomon Island.” He switched to “listen,” but all Rose Rita could hear from the little speaker was a crackle of static.

  They secured the boat and climbed onto the dock. Rose Rita looked up the winding pathway with doubt in her heart. It would be dark very soon. And then what? She could only hope that Mrs. Zimmermann and Lewis were all right.

  When night fell, Lewis was still hiding. He had crawled out from under the bed as soon as Izard left. At the doorway he caught a glimpse of the man striding down the path toward the dock, and a few minutes later he had heard the sound of a motorboat moving away. Immediately Lewis had run to the dark tower. Mrs. Zimmermann was nowhere to be found. He yelled her name, and only faint echoes of his own voice answered.

  Lewis spent the day roaming the island, trying to find some hiding place where Mrs. Zimmermann might be locked away. No luck. He got hungry enough to return to the cabin in the afternoon, where he opened a can of beans and ate them cold. Then he hid the can. He found a stack of spare Army blankets on a shelf in the cottage, and he took one. He went down to the dock and looked through Mrs. Zimmermann’s boat for some weapon he might use, but he found nothing. Then, when he heard the distant drone of a returning motorboat, Lewis fled into the woods. He found a place where some fallen branches had made a sort of cave. Creeping into this, Lewis rolled up in the blanket. He was close enough to the path that ran to the tower to see anyone passing by. His plan was just to wait a
nd watch, but minutes passed, and then hours. Sometime around sunset he fell asleep, exhausted by fear and by the long day he had spent.

  He dreamed of hairy, creeping things. . . .

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Jonathan and Rose Rita explored Izard’s cabin without finding any trace of him or Mrs. Zimmermann. Then, in the falling dusk, they climbed up to the tower and scouted around there. Still no luck. Jonathan took a deep breath. “I can think of one place they might be,” he said. “But it’s not somewhere you can go, Rose Rita. Too dangerous. You wait here.”

  Rose Rita watched Jonathan walk to the base of the strange leaning stairs up to the top of the tower. He hesitated, then began to climb. Rose Rita grew dizzy just watching him. The steps were high, and walking up them looked awkward. The light was fading now, so Rose Rita could see the tower, the steps, and Jonathan only in silhouette.

  After what felt like an hour Jonathan reached the top of the tower and stepped onto a sort of round platform that ran around it. “There’s a door,” he called down in a voice made thin by distance.