The Mummy, the Will, and the Crypt

by John Bellairs

  Godfrey de Bouillon

  Herb-Ox Bouillon Cubes

  Johnny's brain turned somersaults. It spun like a merry-go-round gone crazy. What if? What if he had found the will? Had he thrown away the greatest clue of all? Could he still...

  As if in answer, the building rocked. It shook as if the walls were made of cardboard, and pieces of stone, roof tiles, and bricks from the chimney stack came raining down. The room that Johnny had just left was already on fire. Huge jagged cracks had opened in the floor, and red flames were shooting up through them. Again the mansion shook. The enormous statue tottered on its base and then went crashing through the railing of the balcony. Johnny clung to a carved pilaster and prayed: Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, hear our prayers and grant our petitions, Jesus, Mary, and—

  Something hit him in the head, and he blacked out.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  When Johnny woke up he found that he was lying in a hospital bed. It was daytime, and cold winter light was streaming in through large windows. Next to him, sitting in an armchair by the bed, was the professor. He was wearing an egg-stained brown sweater, and he was smoking one of his eternal black-and-gold cigarettes as he grinned broadly at Johnny.

  "So!" he exclaimed in a pretend-gruff voice. "You've decided to favor us with your presence at last! And about time too! How do you feel?"

  Johnny was still dazed and uncertain. He didn't know quite how he felt. But now he realized that there was something on his head. He reached up and touched the stiff white cloth of a bandage. Then he remembered being out on the balcony and getting hit on the head.

  "Have I been...?" he began, but he found he was having trouble putting words together. He felt vaguely dizzy, and when he moved, a throbbing headache started, just above his left eye.

  "Yes, you have been indeed!" said the professor, smiling gently. "You have been totally unconscious for about two days. It's a concussion—no, don't worry, it's not fatal. I had one myself once, when I was hit in the head with a shell casing at the Battle of the Argonne Forest. You'll be up and around in a few days. In case you're wondering, you're in a hospital in North Conway, New Hampshire. It's the nearest one we could find. North Conway is a rich little town where people come to ski and drink and sit around and be bored. You should see the overpriced dump that I'm staying in. It's a fake Swiss chalet, with cuckoo clocks and everything. Fortunately it isn't the skiing season yet, or the room would cost me half my year's salary at the college. And the bed is lumpy too—would you believe it?"

  The professor crabbed on. Johnny grinned and listened appreciatively. He knew that this was cheerful crabbing, a sign the professor was in a good mood. And as the professor talked Johnny found that the cobwebs in his head were clearing away. He remembered why he had come up here—the will, the reward, and everything. He thought about Mrs. Woodley, and Chad, and Godfrey de Bouillon. There were a million questions that he wanted to ask.

  "Is... is the mansion all burned down?"

  The professor nodded. "It is indeed. Burned to a nice crunchy crisp. It's just a heap of rubble now. But it was still going strong when Fergie and I arrived on the scene. We—"

  "Fergie?" exclaimed Johnny, interrupting. "What was he doing up here?"

  The professor eyed Johnny sardonically. "He came up here with me to rescue you. And you will have to admit, my friend, that you needed some rescuing. You were lying in the bushes near the mansion when we found you. The mansion was going like... well, it was going like a house afire. Flames shooting out of all the windows, walls crashing down all over the place. Well, Fergie—or Byron, as I prefer to call him—Byron and I fought our way in, and it was hot, let me tell you. But we got to you and pulled you free just before the whole bloody wall came down—blooey, crash, bam!—right where you'd been not a moment before. How about that, eh?"

  Johnny was silent. So he had missed death by just that much.

  "Mrs. Woodley probably started that fire," the professor went on as he lit another cigarette. "And she started the earthquake and the lightning and all the other fireworks that helped to wreck the mansion. She did it by remote control, with the aid of a very strange witchcraftical box that she found when she was nosing around out at the estate, looking for the will. And how do I know all this? Because of a diary that was found in the bedroom of the dear sweet departed old—"

  "Departed? You mean she's—"

  The professor nodded solemnly. "Yes, I'm afraid so. Kindly old Mrs. Woodley, the proprietor of the friendly Squam House, has gone to glory... or she has gone to someplace, at any rate. They found her in her bedroom, slumped over that witch box I told you about. Heart attack, I'm told. If she were alive, she'd have a lot to answer for. According to her diary, she did in Chad Glomus and three other people she found poking around the estate. She was obsessed with her brother's will—terrified somebody would find it and it would turn out that she had been cut off without a nickel. Mrs. Woodley was a clever old bat, I'll give her that. Like you, she figured out the "Staunton Harold" part of the puzzle. But she couldn't get any further. Did you manage to figure it all out? The tea shop sign and everything?"

  Johnny frowned. "Sort of. Only I didn't know it. When I got to the last clue, I didn't realize what it was. I thought I'd got rooked. Do you wanta hear about it?"

  The professor nodded. And as he smoked, Johnny told him about the inscription over the chapel door. He explained about the two ye's and the can of bouillon cubes and the statue of Godfrey de Bouillon. "...and so I think the will has got to be inside of the statue," Johnny-concluded. "I mean, it stands to reason that that's where it'd be. Do... do you think you could have the police go and find out if it really is there?"

  The professor considered this. "Hmm. Well, I guess we'd better have them investigate the matter. The mansion is just a ruin now, as I said before. But the statue is probably there somewhere in the rubble. Godfrey de Bouillon. Huh! Well, you know, while I was waiting for you to recover, I read the little guidebook that you had in your coat pocket. And I did notice the part about the Nine Worthies."

  "Yeah," said Johnny. "Who were they, anyway?"

  The professor smiled smugly, as he always did when he knew something that somebody else didn't know. "They were sort of a Hit Parade of warriors and heroes of the ancient world," he said. "Let's see, there's Joshua, David, Judas Maccabeus, Hector, Alexander... um, don't rush me... Ah, yes! And there's Julius Caesar, and King Arthur, good old Charlemagne, and of course our soupy old friend, Godfrey de Bouillon, the noted knight and leader of the Crusaders. That's nine, isn't it? And in case you're interested, I also know all about the inscription over the chapel door and what it means. But I'll bore you with that some other time. We have more important things to discuss now."

  The professor's jaunty, kidding manner disappeared. He grew serious and solemn. "Did you know that Fergie and I were arrested?" he asked.

  Johnny was stunned. "You were? What for?"

  "For arson, trespassing, and attempted burglary... those are all the charges, I think, though there may be more. You see, as soon as we had dragged you away from the burning building, we heard this incredible racket. It was the firemen and policemen bashing open the gate in the fence to get in! Yes, indeedy! There must've been about eight fire trucks and I don't know how many police cars, and, luckily, there was also an ambulance. But when the cops found us, they figured we had set the fire. Can you imagine! I mean, what a bunch of ninnies!"

  Johnny was worried. "Are... are you gonna hafta go to jail?"

  The professor chuckled and shook his head. "No, we aren't going to jail. You see, in a case of this sort the owners of the property would have to prefer charges. As you know, the owners are the surviving members of the Glomus family. And when they found out about Mrs. Woodley—Mr. Glomus's sister that was—and the thing that was discovered in the ruins of the mansion, and all the other things that were scattered all over the grounds of the estate... well, they were in no mood to prefer charges against anybody!"

  Jo
hnny's mouth dropped open. "Things? What things?"

  The professor smiled wryly and flicked the ash off the end of his cigarette. "Oh, not much. Just a few hard-to-explain items. First, the police found a mummified body in the ruins of the house. From the clothes, and from the ring and the wallet and the other personal belongings, they have concluded, reluctantly, that it is the body of Chad Glomus. They're going to have to consult dental records to be sure, but for myself I have no doubt that it's the young man who disappeared early in October. Nobody can figure out how the body came to be—"

  "I didn't tell you everything," said Johnny, interrupting. "I mean, Fergie and me, we were with Chad just before he died. We... we kind of wanted to keep it a secret."

  "Yes," said the professor quietly. "I know. Fergie has already spilled the beans. And I must say, it is quite an amazing tale. There's more too. The police decided to do a thorough search of all the buildings on the estate. And what do you suppose they found in Mr. Glomus's mausoleum? The bodies of three other people who disappeared up here during the last few years. They were mummies too, and they were standing up, stiff as boards, against a wall. They were all local characters—two old derelicts and a woman who lived in a tar-paper shack near Mount Chocorua. And they all must've made the mistake of breaking into the estate and nosing around. Mrs. Woodley found out, and that was the end of them!"

  The professor paused for breath. He heaved a deep sigh and folded his arms. "Well, now, would you like to see what the newspapers have been making of all this?"

  Without waiting for an answer, the professor reached down beside his armchair, picked up a thick sheaf of newspapers, and threw them onto Johnny's bed. They were all copies of the Manchester Union-Leader, the most popular paper in New Hampshire. Johnny looked at the headline that was lying on top. HORROR MUMMIES IN CEREAL MAGNATE'S TOMB. He flipped to the next one and read THE WITCH OF KANCAMAGUS CENTER? Another said WAS CHAD MURDERED? MYSTERY DEEPENS.

  Johnny flipped quickly through the stack. "Oh, my gosh," he said. It was not much of a comment, but it was the only one he could come up with.

  "You see?" said the professor, cocking his head to one side and grinning in that know-it-all way that he had. "This whole shindig has given the Glomus family some very undesirable publicity. And as far as I can tell, they would like to have it all hushed up as quickly as possible. So unless I miss my guess, they're not going to charge the three of us with anything. There will, however, be an inquest. There has to be when four bodies are discovered. And you know something? I would love to know what those crime-lab clowns are going to say about those mummies! I wonder what sort of silly, trashy, pseudoscientific flummery they will—"

  "Hey!" said Johnny, interrupting again. He sat up suddenly, and then, as a sharp searing pain slashed through his head, he sank back onto the pillow. "I... we... we have to do something! Right now! We have to get the cops to go out to the mansion an' look inside of that statue to see if the will's there! I mean... I mean, Gramma's sick, an' if I don't get the reward money right away, she might die! Please, professor! Can you get 'em to do something, right now? Can you?"

  The professor put his hand over his face. "For Pete's sake!" he said through his fingers. "Is that why you went after the will? John, as Jimmy Durante would say, you been laborin' under a misprehamprehension! Your grandmother isn't dying! The operation was a success, a complete and unqualified success! Of course, she's no spring chicken, but still... good grief, why didn't you ask somebody?"

  A tear trickled down Johnny's cheek. "I was scared. I mean... I mean, I got all this bad news, about Dad and all, and I thought the world was comin' to an end! And then I found that letter from the undertakers, so I thought..."

  The professor nodded somberly. "I see it all now. What a comedy of errors! John, my lad, do you know what that letter was probably about?"

  Johnny sniffled. He took a tissue from a box on the table and blew his nose. "Nope. What was it about?"

  The professor grinned. "A few years ago your grandfather's brother Willie died. He was next door to being a bum, and after the funeral Willie's wife wrote a check to the funeral parlor, and the check bounced. Well, the undertakers had a fit, and they got after Willie's widow, and she went to your grampa for help. There was a big fight in your grampa's family about who would foot the bill, and, well, your grampa finally persuaded his other brother, Vic, to pay it. Vic is a filthy rich farmer up in Menominee, Wisconsin, and he could afford it. So I suspect—though I'm not absolutely sure—that the letter you saw was just a note from somebody at the funeral parlor thanking your grampa because he had managed to pry the money out of his tight-fisted brother. I'd be willing to bet that that's all there was to that ridiculous letter. And next time if you have any doubts about a letter's contents, steam the bloody thing open and peek inside, for heaven's sake!" With an exasperated "Hmph!" the professor ground out his cigarette in the ashtray. He dug another one out of his pocket and lit it.

  Johnny's lower lip began to tremble. Tears were rolling down his cheeks. "I... I'm sorry," he stammered. "I didn't know, I..."

  The professor was shocked—he hadn't meant to make Johnny cry. With an agonized look on his face he jumped out of his chair and rushed over to Johnny's bed. He took the cigarette from his mouth and, after looking about distractedly, he dunked it in a glass of water that stood on the bedside table. When he turned back to Johnny, the professor's eyes were filled with tears.

  "Oh, John!" he cried as he seized the bedsheet in his hands and began to twist it. "Please don't cry! I'm just a cranky old man, and I can't help sounding grumpy sometimes! It's one of my many faults."

  Johnny smiled and dried his eyes with a tissue. "It's okay, Professor," he said, sniffling. "I just feel... kinda weird right now, and it's easy to cry. And I'm happy I'm not gonna be alone in the world. That makes me wanta cry too."

  "Well, you mustn't!" said the professor, and he smiled a weak, wan, half-joking smile. Still twisting the bed-sheet, he stared hard at Johnny. "Look," he said in a grave but gentle voice. "I... I think I understand why you did what you did. And in connection with that I have something to tell you. I was going to save this for later, but... your dad has been found." Johnny's eyes opened wide and he exclaimed, "When—" But the professor replied quickly, "I'll give you the details later; I just wanted you to know he's all right. But even if he hadn't been found, and even if both your grandfather and your grandmother were to die, I'd still be there to take care of you. I've never had any children of my own, but if they'd let me, I'd adopt you. I'm only seventy, you know. My father made it to a hundred and three, and his father was ninety-eight when the horse he was riding threw him. You don't need to worry about ever being an orphan."

  Johnny was going to say something in answer to the professor, but the old man turned away quickly and walked to the window. As he stood glaring out at the snow-covered hillside he harrumphed loudly several times and clicked his false teeth in and out. The professor hated it when he got emotional in front of other people. Then he sat down and talked with Johnny about his father.

  Johnny stayed at the hospital in North Conway for a week. During that time the professor went on living at the expensive hotel, and Fergie stayed with him for a day or two. Together they visited Johnny at the hospital every day. Finally Fergie gave a statement to the local police, and then he went home on the train to Duston Heights. After the police got statements from Johnny and the professor, an inquest was held. The coroner's jury decided that Chad and the other three had died "of unexplained causes."

  Acting on information from Johnny, the police went out to the Glomus estate, poked around in the ruins, and found the broken, charred statue of Godfrey de Bouillon. By tapping with hammers they discovered that the base of the statue was hollow. A sliding panel of stone could be pulled back, and inside the base of the statue they found... a small heap of ashes. The statue had fallen into the basement of the burning building, and the heat there had been so intense that it had been like a brick oven. T
he will of Mr. H. Bagwell Glomus was gone forever.

  Johnny was unhappy when he heard this, but now that he knew his grandmother wasn't dying, the will had become far less important to him. The professor merely repeated what he had said when he heard that Mrs. Woodley had died—Good riddance to bad rubbish!

  After a week the professor drove Johnny home to Duston Heights. When he arrived, he got lots of hugs and kisses from his grandmother, who was bustling around like her old self now. And Grampa shook the professor's hand so many times that the professor finally had to tell him to stop.

  That evening Fergie came to visit Johnny. Despite their chats at the hospital, they had not had a chance to have a really private conversation. So, the first chance Johnny got, he took Fergie up to his room, and they had a long and excited gabfest. Later, while they played chess, it occurred to Johnny that he had at least gotten one good thing out of this whole mess: He had found a new friend.

  The next day Johnny went back to school. He tried to pretend that nothing had happened, but everyone had read about Johnny's adventure in the newspapers. They all wanted to ask him questions, and some kids even wanted his autograph. So, by the time he left school at three fifteen, his nerves were thoroughly frazzled. As he turned onto Fillmore Street and started walking toward his house, he found that he had yet another jolt in store for him on this busy, trying day. There was a car parked in front of his house, a sleek black limousine with a chauffeur at the wheel. A wild thought leaped into Johnny's mind: Could it be his dad?

  But it wasn't his dad. Johnny's grandmother met him at the door. She was clearly quite upset and nervous as she explained that there was a lady waiting for him in the parlor. Johnny felt let down, but he was still curious. Who could it be? When he walked in, he saw, seated on the couch, a tall, haughty-looking old woman. She wore an expensive flowered silk dress and a pearl necklace. Rings glittered on her fingers, and her iron-gray hair was arranged in a ripply permanent wave. When she saw Johnny, the woman smiled. Surprisingly it was not merely a polite smile but one of genuine warmth and friendliness.