by Dan Poblocki
“But …”
“I know I sound like a jerk,” she said, “but after last night, I realized that I need to do this alone, or not at all. This is about my family. You shouldn’t be involved, Timothy.”
It took him a moment to catch his breath. “Abigail, what I said to you on the bus was really unfair.”
“You’re right. It was. And that’s fine,” she answered, blushing and turning back to the screen, “but your apology doesn’t change my mind. Besides, this is a small room, and your gym bag sorta stinks.”
“Oh,” said Timothy, getting up and backing toward the door. “Right. Sorry. I’ll just … wait out here until you’re done.”
“Cool,” she said, scrolling through the article on the machine.
At the doorway, Timothy couldn’t help himself. “Abigail, please,” he said. “I’m really sorry.”
She turned to look at him. In the half-light, for just a moment, he could see something in her eyes, something that told him she was sorry too. “You already said that,” she answered, then turned away.
Timothy sat at the bottom of the staircase just outside the microfiche room. The carpet was worn, its threads just barely covering a flight of wooden steps that led upward. Frustrated, Timothy pulled at the weave, loosening it further.
Fine, he thought. Be like that. At least I tried.
Timothy stood up and strolled through the last few rows of books, but he and Abigail were losing precious time. What was she doing in there?
Moments later, distracted, he crept up the stairs. With each step, Timothy grew angrier. He’d only ever tried to be nice to this girl. Right now, she was being meaner than Stuart could ever imagine.
Timothy found himself standing in the middle of a dark landing. A black plastic tarp hung loosely from the ragged wallpaper near the top, covering part of the wall. Renovations? After a moment, Timothy pulled the tarp aside. Behind the black plastic, he found a dark gap, and then an older wall, a foot behind the first one. In the center of this second wall was a door with filthy pebbled glass, so it was impossible to see inside the room.
As Timothy stared at the dirty glass, he saw that there had once been words decaled that had since been scratched off.
Dropping his bag to the landing floor, he went limp. He grabbed on to the knob for support, reading again the impression of the scratched-away words.
DR. CHR TIAN H SSEL S–
PROFES OR OF H ST RY
30.
Timothy turned the knob and the latch clicked. The door wheezed open a crack. A sliver of darkness stared at him. Timothy took a step backward, trying to catch his breath. He glanced down the stairs, toward the main reading room. Daylight spilled across the floor. No one seemed to notice him.
Frances May had told him that this man had been a professor. According to Zilpha Kindred, Hesselius had done something bad and had been locked away. This room must have been the man’s office. The door had been walled over, erased. Weird. Why would the college abandon an entire room?
Curious, Timothy nudged the door open. The hinges creaked quietly. He listened for any sound of movement. “Hello?” he whispered. After a few seconds of silence, he realized he was alone. He pushed the door open fully. The room was not as dark as it had first seemed. From the doorway, Timothy noticed small details: a thick oak desk, a green glass lamp, a wall of bookshelves filled with bell jars, academic volumes, and picture frames. Velvet moth-eaten curtains hung from the tall windows. Next to the windows, two cracked leather chairs stared at each other, like a pair of old gentlemen whose conversation had run out.
Abigail needed to know about this, but would she listen?
Tentatively, he stepped inside. He strolled through the chamber, feeling like a ghost, as if he’d accidentally stepped outside of time. Finally, he pulled the curtain away from one of the windows. Light flooded the room, dust erupted in a torrent of motes, and he was blinded. He shaded his eyes. He saw the glass top of the Husketomic Lighthouse across the river.
The room was both larger and more cluttered than it had first appeared. Two flags stood erect on either side of the window—one was the American flag; the other was a pale gray felt, embroidered with a white triangle of stars. Timothy lifted the second flag to see it more clearly. In the center, three hand-stitched words echoed the triangle:
RIGHTEOUSNESS, INTEGRITY, SACRIFICE.
What kind of flag was this?
The intense beam of light that flooded the room was at the perfect angle to illuminate a crooked frame hanging on the wall opposite the window. Timothy crept across the room and straightened the frame. Inside was an old photograph of the lighthouse, the Taft Bridge, and cliffs across the river. Faint pencil marked the matte-paper frame behind the glass. In old script, someone had written Hesselius Illuminarium. 1940. A Light in the Darkness.
Timothy gasped. His brother’s mantra. Was this an example of Ben’s Order in Chaos theory—literally, his Light in the Darkness—or was this just more coincidence? Either way, Timothy felt the need to look closer, as if he’d been meant to find this office.
Someone touched his shoulder, and Timothy spun. Behind him stood Ben, purple lips pulled back into an awful smile.
31.
Timothy tripped backward and was about to scream, “Get away from me!” when he heard Abigail’s voice say, “Didn’t mean to scare you.” Suddenly, Ben flickered and disappeared. In his place stood Abigail.
Timothy blinked and exhaled. He slowly reached out and poked her shoulder. She was solid. Good. “You … shouldn’t sneak up on people,” he said, shaking the phantom from his mind’s eye.
“I, uh, just wanted to let you know the microfiche machines are free,” said Abigail, clutching a pile of papers. She eyed him suspiciously, then glanced at his bag on the floor near the open door. “I followed the chlorine smell. What is this place?” She reached out and touched the pane of glass where Dr. Hesselius’s name had once been painted. “Oh my gosh,” she whispered.
“His office,” said Timothy.
“You mean, it was right above my head the entire time?” Her face went pale.
Timothy nodded.
“But what’s with …?” She gestured to the tarp.
Timothy shook his head. “I think …” He paused, unsure if Abigail would understand Ben’s Order-Chaos theory. “It’s complicated,” he answered. “The important thing is that we’re closer to an answer.” Abigail began backing away, crushing the papers against her chest. She looked like she had last night, just before she’d run away. “Oh, come on, Abigail, you can’t do this by yourself,” he said. She still seemed unsure. “Look around,” he added. “This isn’t just about your family.”
Abigail surveyed the room. After Timothy showed her the strange gray flag, she was confused too. Finally, he led her to the wall with the photo of the lighthouse.
As she examined the writing, he noticed another frame filled with old-fashioned baseball cards sitting on the bookshelf next to the wall. Names were printed on the cards underneath the players’ photos, but Timothy couldn’t read them through the thick layer of crud.
“Timothy, what’s—?”
“Hold on,” he whispered, leaning closer to the bookcase. He grabbed the frame from the shelf, cleaned the dust from the glass, then noticed three familiar names in the bottom right corner. In order, they were the men who played second, first, and third bases on this team. He gasped.
“Tell me what’s going on,” said Abigail. “What are you looking at?”
Timothy showed her.
“Baseball cards?” she said, skeptically. “So what? According to the articles I found, Dr. Hesselius was a well-known collector of Americana. As a historian, that was one of his special interests.”
Timothy smiled. “Nothing more American than baseball, is there?” he said. “Check out the bottom.” When Abigail read the names, she dropped the papers she’d been holding. As she bent down to retrieve them, Timothy looked closer at the portraits and whispered, “Car
lton Quigley. Bucky Jenkins. And Mr. Leroy ‘Two Fingers’ Fromm.”
32.
A few minutes later, they were seated in the dusty leather chairs. Abigail examined the framed collection of baseball cards, then picked at the frame’s backboard, which was held in place by several stubborn nails. Timothy flipped through the articles she had printed. Headlines leapt out at him. Confession! Kidnapping Tragedy! Professor Tied to Evil Cult! On one page, Timothy thought he saw a photograph of Abigail herself, but realized it was a picture of her grandmother. Zilpha Kindred, Hero, read the caption.
Timothy glanced at Abigail, who had managed to pry away one of the frame’s rear prongs. “What are you doing?”
“These cards have secrets,” she said. “Can’t learn them if they’re locked away.”
“Speaking of secrets,” he said, as she continued to pick at another stubborn nail, “what did you find? There’s too much here to go through.” Abigail sighed. Timothy chuckled in disbelief. “You still don’t want to talk? Fine, then I will.”
Timothy told Abigail about seeing Ben the night before. Abigail listened, but she did not seem as astounded as he expected her to be. She hung her head and wouldn’t look at him. Back to her old tricks, he thought, but when she finally began her own story, he changed his mind.
“Last night,” Abigail began, “the Nightmarys came back.”
“Oh,” he whispered. Zilpha hadn’t told him this part.
“I’d been so upset by what had happened earlier—you know … on the bus—that after I lay down on the couch and they showed up, I finally followed them.”
“After everything we’ve been through?” said Timothy. “How? Why?”
Abigail pulled her hair away from her face and leaned back into the chair. “I didn’t plan on it. They wore me down. I felt like I was sleepwalking down the hallway, but I knew I was awake, and I couldn’t stop or even scream. Something inside me actually wanted to follow them, telling me that I deserved whatever happened next.
“Gramma found me at the elevator. I told her everything. I promised her I’d stay out of it, but you know that’s impossible now. I won’t see her get hurt. This morning, I wrote a note that I was going back to New Jersey. I snuck out early so no one could stop me. I came here to the campus. Like I said downstairs, I didn’t want you involved, because I don’t want you to get hurt either. And here we are, together again.”
Silence filled the room.
Finally, Timothy said, “But I’m a part of this now. You know that. I need answers as much as you do.”
“You’re right, Timothy,” said Abigail, smiling weakly. “We are really close to figuring out something huge.”
“Dr. Hesselius is behind all of this.”
Abigail nodded, still pulling at the frame. “But there’s just one problem.”
“What’s that?”
She glanced up. “Dr. Hesselius is dead.” She took the papers from Timothy. Flipping through them, she stopped at an article near the back of the packet. Mad Doc Hangs, read the headline.
“That’s what Zilpha told me. He was executed?”
“No,” said Abigail. “He did it in his cell a few years after the trial. Here, start at the beginning.” She shuffled through the pages again. “We’ve got a nearly complete biography here. The New Starkham Record has snippets of Dr. Hesselius’s career going back to the early nineteen twenties.”
“What does it say?”
“Well, here’s a blurb from when New Starkham’s history department hired him,” said Abigail, perusing the article. “His family was really rich. He played baseball at his Ivy League school. He was a private in the army during World War One. The article goes on, stating his specialties in ancient civilizations, particularly the histories of warfare and engineering, which he taught here.”
“Sounds normal for a professorish type of person,” said Timothy. “But where’s the ‘bad’ part?”
“This is only the first article. There’s tons more,” she said. She held up another page. “He was really generous. He gave to all sorts of foundations—museums, sports programs, schools. He was involved in local elections and helped his favorite candidates win. He donated money to build that lighthouse across the river and even helped design it. People here seemed to love him.”
“I’m still not hearing the ‘bad,’” said Timothy.
“That’s because there’s not much ‘bad’ to say about him,” said Abigail, looking up. “Not yet.” She shuffled some more pages. “Here’s his marriage notice. And here’s a small piece about the birth of twins.”
“He had kids?”
“Two boys,” said Abigail. “He lost one of them in World War Two. A bomb …” Abigail stopped.
It took Timothy several seconds to realize why she didn’t finish her sentence. Timothy spent several seconds forcing Ben’s zombie face out of his head. He leaned forward. “And?”
“The other one never served. Didn’t pass the medical exam, I think. The death of his son seems to have been the turning point,” said Abigail. “Dr. Hesselius was devastated. He’d been proud to send one of them to fight for his country, just like he had in the first war. He never expected …” She blinked and pressed her lips together.
“Go on,” he said.
“Let’s see. Here, from the college paper, History Professor Takes Leave of Absence.” She read through the page quickly. “The article hints at some sort of breakdown. Exhaustion. Psychiatric treatment. It doesn’t go into details.” She shrugged. “There’s no other mention of him until a few years later.” She flipped through more pages. “After the war ended, he was back …”
Timothy took a deep breath. “Here comes the ‘bad’?”
Abigail nodded. “Local Professor Questioned in Disappearance of Child,” she read. “From an article in the New Starkham Record.” She handed the page to Timothy, so he could read it.
July 7, 1946 – New Starkham – Dr. Christian Hesselius, a local professor, is being questioned by police about the July 4 disappearance of 14-year-old Delia Benson of Dreyer Street. Zilpha Kindred, a student at Thomas Jefferson High School, brought to the authorities’ attention a photo she had taken at the city’s annual Independence Day Parade. The blurry image appears to show the professor with Miss Benson in a Johnson Street alleyway. According to Miss Kindred, “Delia was interviewing the crowd, while I took pictures for the first issue of the school paper. My camera captured what my own eyes did not.” Ms. Benson’s younger sister, Emma, who was marching in the parade, also places Hesselius at the scene. She boldly stated, “I will testify. Anything to find my sister.” Dr. Hesselius has taught at New Starkham College for over twenty years. He has yet to be charged with any crime.
Timothy looked up from the page. “That is really freaky. Your poor grandmother.”
“I know,” said Abigail, shaking her head. “But that’s nothing compared to the article a couple days later.” She handed him another page. “Hesselius Charged with Kidnapping,” she said. “Formal charges were made and bail was set really high. He confessed to kidnapping Delia a few days after that, but he refused to say where he’d taken her and what he’d done to her.”
Timothy shuddered. The office walls encroached, as if the room itself was listening. “Why did he confess if he wasn’t going to tell anyone where she was?”
“According to the article,” said Abigail, scanning the page, “he knew the evidence was against him, but he also said Delia wasn’t ready yet.”
“Wasn’t ready for what?”
“It’s kind of crazy. According to court transcripts, he’d locked her away as a sacrifice to …” Abigail shook her head. “The Daughter of Chaos?”
Timothy blinked. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
“The paper says Hesselius had uncovered an ancient Scandinavian tribal sect that worshipped obscure gods, goddesses, giants, and spirits. They believed they could harness ancient magic during their rituals using strange metals.”
“The Da
ughter of Chaos … Like what the placard at the museum said.” Timothy gasped. “Abigail, Zilpha said after today, all this will be over. Do you think she was at the museum that day looking for the jawbone?”
Abigail nodded. “The Daughter of Chaos was one of the obscure goddesses worshipped by the sect. They believed that if you appeased her, she gave you great powers.”
This was starting to sound familiar. Zilpha Kindred’s uncle hadn’t strayed very far from the headlines for the plot of The Clue of the Incomplete Corpse. “Such as?”
“Such as the ability to control fear,” said Abigail.
“And … how would they appease this goddess?” he asked, though he felt like he already knew the answer.
“The sect built temples at the locations of great natural ‘chaos.’ Waterfalls. Chasms. Caves. Volcanoes. The tribe would place a corpse inside the temple. A chip of the tribe’s sacred metal was inserted into a tooth socket of the corpse. This metal ‘tooth’ infused the corpse with a connection to the spirit of the goddess. Then a ritual was performed to ‘charge’ the tooth. A person, often an enemy of the tribe, was locked in the temple with the corpse as a sacrifice. Supposedly, at the full moon, the corpse rose, all vampirelike, and drained the life essence of her victim. With the goddess satisfied and the metal charged, the corpse would again fall into slumber.”
“So Delia was the … sacrifice?” said Timothy, feeling sick. “The battery?”
Abigail nodded again. “Once the tooth was charged, the cult would remove the jawbone from the goddess corpse. From here on, the story pretty much mirrors what we read about my great-uncle’s book. Whoever holds the jawbone controls the Daughter of Chaos’s power.”
“The fear thing?”
“Right.”
“The placard at the museum said you needed to grasp the jawbone and speak the victim’s name, and then the soul’s charge inside the metal tooth would place a curse on the victim. The user could control the victim by psychically manipulating what they were afraid of.” Timothy paused. “So what did Doctor Crazy plan on using it for?”
