Miss Eells was almost speaking in a whisper. Anthony could hear the fire crackling and the Waterbury clock ticking on the mantel. Suddenly he was filled with righteous anger. They couldn't do this to Miss Eells—they just couldn't! Quickly his anger turned to fear. If Miss Eells was fired, how would she manage to live?
Miss Eells looked at Anthony and smiled wanly.
"Don't worry, kid," she said, chuckling. "I have some money put away, and what with Social Security checks and sponging off my rich brother, I'll survive. But—"
Suddenly there was a loud, reverberating peal of thunder and an instant later a blue flash of lightning leaped through the living room windows. The antique plates on the mantel rattled, and the lights dimmed. Miss Eells looked stunned for a second; then she leaped out of her seat. Motioning for Anthony to follow her, she rushed out into the hall and headed for the front door.
They paused on the front stoop and looked up. The air was bitterly cold; the sky was clear. Overhead the stars were clustered thickly, and the faint whitish track of the Milky Way visible. In the distance the dark, irregular shadow of the Mississippi bluffs rose against the sky. But all that they could hear was a faint rumble, like the sound of a distant train. Miss Eells and Anthony looked at each other fearfully. Then Miss Eells turned and gazed off toward the faraway line of bluffs. The anxious look on her face had changed to one of grim determination.
"I think we had better get busy," she said quietly. "And I hope to God we are not too late."
CHAPTER SIX
The dreary days of November dragged past. After a brief spell of clear weather the sky became overcast and stayed that way. Cold, drizzling rain fell, and raw, gusty winds blew from every corner of the compass. Anthony didn't enjoy working at the library as much anymore. Miss Pratt, the assistant librarian, was in charge now, and she and Anthony had never gotten along very well. But very often on his way home from the library Anthony stopped to see Miss Eells.
On the first of these visits Anthony brought his copy of old Borkman's journal with him and left it with Miss Eells so she could study it. In turn Miss Eells reported to Anthony that she had talked on the phone with her brother, Emerson. She had finally managed to persuade him that there was a dangerous situation developing in Hoosac. But Emerson needed some time to formulate a plan, and he said he would call her when he was ready.
Two days before Thanksgiving, Anthony got a phone call from Miss Eells. She said that Emerson was at her house. Could Anthony come over for a short while that evening? Breathlessly he answered that yes, of course he'd be over, as soon as he could get away after dinner. Then he hung up and went in to eat with his family. He tried hard to act normal, but his dad and Keith both noticed that he seemed edgy. When Keith asked him what was bothering him, Anthony replied that he was cramming for an algebra test that he had to take early in December. That seemed to settle the matter—at least Anthony hoped that it did.
Later, when Anthony entered Miss Eells's living room, there was Emerson, sitting at the parlor organ. He was wearing an expensive-looking dark wool sweater and blue pin-striped pants, and he was puffing on one of his many antique meerschaum pipes. This one was shaped like a sea nymph who had her arms wrapped around a cornucopia. As soon as he saw Anthony, Emerson grinned. He stopped playing, put his pipe in an ashtray, and bounced to his feet.
"It's good to see you again, Anthony!" he said as he vigorously pumped the boy's hand. "I haven't laid eyes on you since the affair of the Winterborn treasure, and I've been wondering how you were doing. Myra says that you want to become a doctor someday. Is that right?"
Anthony nodded, and he had just opened his mouth to say something, when Emerson cut in.
"Well, I think that's fine. But whatever you do, for heaven's sake don't change your mind and decide to become a lawyer! When I was a kid I read bloodcurdling novels about lawyers who became detectives in their spare time, shooting at villains and saving beautiful women from danger. Now that I really am a lawyer, I spend my time reading great, thick, dull books and drawing up wills for elderly misers. I'm so bored that I'll even jump at the chance to take part in one of my sister's hare-brained schemes."
"Thanks a lot, buddy!" said Miss Eells. She was sitting in her wing chair by the fire and sipping creme de menthe from a delicate liqueur glass. "Don't let my dear brother kid you," she went on to Anthony. "If he didn't believe that this whole thing was pretty darned serious, he wouldn't be down here. Would you, Em?"
Emerson's manner changed. He stopped acting devil-may-care and grew very serious. Sitting down on the piano stool, he cocked one leg up on his knee. Then he folded his arms across his chest and scowled at the rug. "I wouldn't, indeed," he said, nodding gravely. "Something has got to be done—no doubt about it. As soon as Myra told me over the phone about the things that had been happening to you two, I knew right away that you had been the victims of a sorcerer."
Emerson glanced up, and when he saw Anthony's astonished expression, he laughed. "Surprised that I know about such bizarre things? Well, I'm not nearly such an old fuddy-duddy as I may seem. Actually, I am interested in magic. I've read a great deal about wizards, and I've delved into their books of spells. I know what they can and can't do, and I can tell when a genuine master of the black arts is at work."
Emerson smoothed his sweater fussily and then took his pipe out of the ashtray and began to turn it over in his hands. Suddenly he shot a piercing glance at Anthony. "We are up against someone who is very dangerous," he said, pointing a warning finger. "Unless I miss my guess, Anders Borkman is a cold-blooded fanatic who will stop at nothing to carry out the ghastly plans of his maniac father. According to an article I saw in the newspapers, he's already dragged those four statues out of the garage. There was a picture with the article showing the statues set up in a corner of his estate. Furthermore, I've looked at the copy that you made of old Borkman's crazy journal. Well, it doesn't take too much savvy to figure out what he has in mind! He wants to use the weather to wipe the earth as clean as a billiard ball so that the world could start all over, fresh and clean, shiny and new." Emerson grimaced. Then he laughed harshly. "Hah! He's not the first one who's thought that the world would be better if we could all go back to the beginning again! But none of the other crackpots who've had that idea have actually had the ability to turn their dreams into reality." Emerson shuddered. He was thinking of the power that Anders Borkman wielded. Then he looked hard at Anthony again.
"If you decide to be part of our little raiding party," he said solemnly, "there is some risk involved. I wouldn't think you were a coward if you decided not to go along with Myra and me when we take a closer look at Borkman's estate."
Anthony did not flinch, but met Emerson with a steady gaze. "I want to go with you, Mr. Eells," he said quietly.
Emerson Eells smiled warmly. He got up and walked over to Anthony and gave him a good strong squeeze on the arm.
"Good for you, my boy," he said. "Actually, if we manage this thing right, there won't be an awful lot of danger. But there's always the unknown factor, and I thought I'd better warn you. Now, then! I think we all ought to adjourn to the dining room. There are some documents and maps that we should be looking at. Myra, would you get Anthony a Coke and bring me a bottle of beer? Maps tax the brain and parch the throat, you know."
A few minutes later Anthony, Miss Eells, and Emerson were all standing around the dining room table looking at a large cracked map that had been spread out in the middle of it. The four corners were held down by three German beer steins and a chunk of roseate quartz. In one corner of the map was a label inside a fancy Victorian engraved border. The label said:
The Country Estate of
WEATHEREND
Formerly the residence of the noted industrialist Jorgen Knut Borkman, Esq.
Near the map was a stack of dark old engravings. The one on top showed a ring of standing stones in a field of long, rank grass. The caption identified the site as The Weird Sisters, Carmarthenshire, Wales.
Emerson Eells took a swig from the beer bottle in his hand. Then he gave the picture of the standing stones to Anthony. "Those stones," he said, tapping the edge of the picture with the bottle, "were involved in a case of witchcraft that might be similar to the one we're dealing with. Somebody drilled holes in them and inserted little packets of beeswax wrapped in paper. Imbedded in the wax were clots of human blood, fingernail parings, snippets of hair, and little pieces of bone that—"
"Hey!" said Anthony, interrupting. "I bet it was Borkman that stole all those altar stones from the churches around here! They've got bones in 'em, and—"
"I'm way ahead of you," said Emerson with a superior smile. "Myra told me about the altar stones over the phone earlier, and I'll get to them in good time. But to return to the Carmarthenshire case, the packets were inserted in the stones to set up magical lines of force, influences stronger than the strongest electrical field.
Then, I imagine, some rather picturesque rituals were performed, and incantations were chanted. The result was that certain things started to happen."
Anthony had been studying the picture. Now he looked up. "Things?" he said in a puzzled tone. "What kind of things?"
Emerson shrugged carelessly. "That part of Carmarthenshire started having the most wild and woolly weather that anyone can remember. Hail and winds violent enough to blow the roofs off houses. Blizzards in places where there hadn't been any for over four hundred years. And colored lightning and mysterious underground rumblings. People later claimed that the ghosts of dead friends and relatives had been seen wandering the streets and pressing their noses against people's windows in the middle of the night."
Emerson paused. "I mention all this," he went on, "because I think the same sort of thing is going on here. In the case of the Weird Sisters of Carmarthenshire the disturbances stopped after the angry townsfolk tipped over the stones, extracted the little packets, and burned them. Now, here's what we have to do."
Miss Eells and Anthony crowded in close to the table. Taking a pencil that was stuck behind his ear, Emerson pointed at the snaky line that ran up the middle of the map.
"This is the driveway that runs from the entrance of the estate right up to the circular carriage drive outside the front door of the mansion," Emerson said. "Down here, not far from the entrance, is an unused tennis court and some dilapidated buildings that used to contain showers and dressing rooms. There's an old dried-up ornamental fountain too, and—"
"Wait just a minute," said Miss Eells, interrupting. "How come you know so darned much about the Borkman estate? You're giving us information that you could never have gotten from just studying this forty-year-old map."
Emerson smirked. "My dear sister, do you think I spend all my time sitting up in my room in St. Cloud, making cats' cradles with yarn? Do you remember when I came down to visit you early last summer? Well, on my way out of town I stopped by Weatherend to poke around. I had heard about its sinister reputation from some friends of mine, and I was curious. Fortunately young Borkman had not repaired the wall around the estate then, so I was able to sneak in. But back to the business at hand. Near the tennis court and the fountain is a small grove of cedar trees, and inside that are the four statues that we are concerned with. Now, what I propose to do is this. I have an old paneled truck with doors on the back. I'll have it painted so it looks like it's from the Hoosac Gas Company. Then I'll get some gray coveralls, and—"
Once again Miss Eells interrupted. "Oh, come on, Em!" she said, laughing. "You look about as much like a gas man as King Kong. How on earth do you expect to fool Borkman?"
Emerson Eells glowered at his sister. "My dear Myra," he said frostily, "I wasn't aware that gas men came in only one size and shape."
"All right, all right, you're a gas man!" said Miss Eells, shaking her head. "So after you've arrived in your impenetrable disguise, what do you do then?"
"If you'll shut up and listen, I'll tell you," snapped Emerson. With the pencil he tapped the oblong space on the map that was labeled Tennis Court. "You two," he went on, "will be hiding in the back of the truck. I'll let you out near the tennis courts, and then you will run and conceal yourselves in the ruined buildings. Then, while I'm up at the mansion distracting Borkman by pretending to read his meter, you'll go skulking over to the grove of cedar trees. Now, understand! I don't want you to do anything fancy. I just want you to examine the four statues and find the holes that—if I'm right—will have been drilled in them. They'll almost certainly be camouflaged in some way. Plugged with gray putty perhaps. And in the holes—if my guesswork is correct—will be little packets of bones. From the altar stones that you mentioned earlier, Anthony. Almost certainly, the theft of those bones was Borkman's work. The blessed bones of saints can be used by evil men for evil purposes. But, remember! Don't try digging the packets out of the holes. Just find the holes and mark them with white chalk. Then, when you've done that, skedaddle back to the tennis court and stay out of sight till I come by and pick you up in the truck."
"Are we gonna come back and knock over those stones sometime?" asked Anthony.
Emerson pursed his lips. "My dear Anthony," he said, smiling in his precise and infuriating way, "we are not going to do anything of the sort! I have a cousin who's in the construction business, and he knows how to handle dynamite. If you have found any bone holes, he and I will come back to Weatherend, and we will dig the bones out of the holes, plant some dynamite, and blast those accursed statues into powder. There will be considerable risk, and I don't want you and Myra. anywhere in the vicinity when the real dirty work is being done."
Miss Eells was hopping mad. "Now look here, Emerson! I know I'm a bit on the clumsy side, but I'm as brave as you are and maybe braver! When we were kids, who was it who went out in Farmer Swenson's field and dared the bull to come after her? You were hiding somewhere under Dad's car! And who was it who went down in the cellar of our house at night to see if there really was a ghost there? Hmm, who? I can understand why you might want to keep Anthony out of this, but I'll be darned if I can see why I should stay home and twiddle my thumbs!"
Emerson was aghast. He was the head of his own law firm, and he was used to giving orders and making people toe the line. But he had always been a little bit scared of his sister. Beads of sweat broke out on his forehead, and he took out his handkerchief and dabbed at his face. "Well, we could work out something, I'm sure," he muttered, throwing nervous sidelong looks at his sister.
Miss Eells grinned. "Do you mean, dear brother Em," she said in a mocking tone, "that I can actually be of some small use to you?"
Emerson took off his wristwatch and wound it busily. "Of course," he said in a low voice, without looking up. "We've always done things together. But perhaps maybe to start with we could, uh, well... carry out the first part of my plan the way I've outlined it?" Emerson paused and glanced questioningly at his sister. "Okay?"
"I'll think about it," said Miss Eells, and she bit her lip to keep from laughing.
And so it was arranged. The three of them would meet on Saturday, the first of December, to implement step one in Emerson's plan. Anthony also wanted to help the demolition squad later, but he didn't have the power to change Emerson's mind. To make Anthony feel better, Emerson told him how smart he was for making the copy of old Mr. Borkman's journal and added that it was likely to be useful in their fight against Anders Borkman's evil plans.
"After all," he said, "if Borkman stole the journal back from you—and it looks very much as if that is what happened—then it must be important to him. As far as I'm concerned, most of it is gibberish, and we've deciphered the important information already. But maybe if we study it carefully, it will yield some more meaning."
After some additional planning Anthony, Miss Eells, and Emerson went back to the parlor and played Scrabble for a while. Amid the good-natured post-game bickering between Miss Eells and her brother, Anthony noticed that it was way past ten o'clock. His mother always got upset when he
stayed out late, and he did not want her to start calling around to locate him. So he said his good-byes hurriedly and left.
As Anthony disappeared down the walk the other two stood in the doorway and watched him go. Miss Eells looked worried.
"Do you think it was wise to include Anthony in this thing?" she said, turning to Emerson. "What if something goes wrong?"
Emerson smiled and blew a stream of pipe smoke into the chilly night air. "I haven't miscalculated," he said coolly. "We're not going to be at the estate very long, and it'll be during the day, when the power of those evil stones is at its weakest. We'll be in and out of there before Borkman knows what hit him."
CHAPTER SEVEN
Saturday the first of December was a cold, windy day. Anthony woke up feeling anxious, like a soldier who has just been told that he is going to be parachuting into enemy territory. For days he had been brooding about Anders Borkman and the evil ring of stones. Sometimes the whole situation seemed completely unbelievable. Could that nasty, cold-blooded man really control the weather? A year ago Anthony would have said that the idea was just too fantastic. But he had seen a lot of strange things lately, and Emerson had made him realize that Borkman's statues were as dangerous—in their way—as atomic bombs. But even though Anthony was pretty scared, in the midst of his fear he knew an expert was on his side. Emerson Eells had studied magic, and he would use his knowledge to take care of Mr. Borkman and his crazy plans.
Anthony whiled away the morning. He rode down to the A&P with his dad and helped him bring the groceries home. Then he went out to the garage and watched his brother, Keith, tinker with a car. But while Keith tried to explain to Anthony about pistons and cylinder heads and camshafts Anthony's mind was elsewhere. He was thinking about three o'clock that afternoon and the four grim stone statues.
The Dark Secret of Weatherend Page 6
