The Figure In the Shadows (11 page)

Finally, in the middle of nowhere, the truck stopped. There was a wire fence, and some trees, and the snow and the moonlight. And that was all.

“Well, here we are!” said Jute. “I don’t know what the he . . . er, heck you want out here, but you’re old friends, and I’m glad to oblige. You want me to send somebody out to get you?”

“Yes,” said Jonathan. “Does that thing work?” He
pointed to a radio on the dashboard. There was a microphone attached to it.

“Sure it does.”

“Well, then, I want you to phone up Oaklawn Hospital and tell them to send an ambulance out here as fast as they can. No, I’m not going to explain. Thanks, Jute, and we’ll see you soon.” He opened the door and jumped out of the truck. Mrs. Zimmermann and Rose Rita followed him. As they walked around the front of the truck, Rose Rita looked up and saw Jute’s face. It looked green in the light from the dashboard, and it also looked puzzled. Jute was talking into the microphone, giving directions.

“Hey!” shouted Jonathan. “Look at this!” He waved his flashlight excitedly.

Mrs. Zimmermann and Rose Rita followed Jonathan over to the edge of the road. There were holes in the snow. Footprints.

“Wow!” said Rose Rita. “Do you think it’s Lewis?” For the first time in hours, she was feeling hopeful.

“Can’t tell,” said Jonathan, shining the flashlight into the dark holes. “They’re half full of snow, but they’re about his size. Come on. Let’s see where they go.”

With Jonathan in the lead, the three of them walked along by the side of the road until they came to a place where the footprints turned toward the fence. It was a barbed-wire fence, about chest-high to a man. A yellow tin sign advertising DeKalb Corn hung from the top
strand. It rattled in the freezing wind. Suddenly Jonathan gave a cry and stumbled forward. He flashed the light at the sign. “Look!”

Something was caught on the corner of the sign. Something that fluttered in the wind. A piece of brown corduroy. There was dried blood on it, and there were little dabs of blood on the sign.

“It’s Lewis, all right!” said Mrs. Zimmermann. “I don’t think he’s worn anything but corduroy pants since I’ve known him. But the blood! He must have cut himself going over the fence.”

“Come on,” said Jonathan.

Over the fence they went, one at a time. Mrs. Zimmermann was the last one over, and she caught her cape on a barb, but she ripped it loose and hurried on. The footprints went off across a snowy field.

Jonathan, Rose Rita, and Mrs. Zimmermann stumbled across the snow-covered field. They were headed toward a little grove of pine trees. Jonathan was in the lead, and he played the flashlight beam over the footprints they were following, though they could be seen quite clearly by the light of the moon. The ground was uneven under the smooth layer of snow, and every now and then one of the three would stumble and fall. But in spite of this, they pressed on.

As they got closer to the dark grove of trees, each of them had the same feeling about it, though nobody spoke. They all felt that the trees were like a curtain hiding some scene from their eyes. They pushed on into the
mass of fragrant boughs and shoved them aside. And there on the other side of the grove, they stopped.

Jonathan, Rose Rita, and Mrs. Zimmermann found that they were standing at the top of a low hill. At the bottom of the hill a wide space had been cleared in the snow. In the center of the patch of bare ground was a large well. Its top lay even with the ground, and nearby lay a heavy stone cover. Lewis stood a few feet away from the lip of the well. And a dark shape stood by the well, beckoning for Lewis to come.

Jonathan, Rose Rita, and Mrs. Zimmermann watched in horror. They could do nothing. Again the figure beckoned. Lewis stiffened. He did not move. Then the figure raised its hand and made a strange sign in the air. Lewis shuffled a few feet closer. Now he was almost at the edge of the well.

“Stop!” cried Mrs. Zimmermann. Her voice was loud and resonant, as if she were speaking under a dome.

Rose Rita turned and looked at her. Mrs. Zimmermann had changed. The folds of her ratty old purple cape were filled with orange light. A pale flickering light played over her homely wrinkled face. And in her hand, instead of an umbrella, she held a tall rod topped by a crystal sphere. Within the sphere a purple star burned. It threw a long violet slash, like a glowing sword, across the snow.

“I command you to stop!” Mrs. Zimmermann shouted again.

The dark shape hesitated. Lewis stood motionless, a few feet from the pit. Then a battle began.

It was like giant flashbulbs going off all over, all at once. It was like thunder, not only overhead but in the air all around and under the earth. Rose Rita fell to her knees in the snow and hid her face. When she raised her eyes again, the world lay in gray moonlight. Lewis had rushed back to the outer edge of the wide circle of snow. But the dark figure was still there by the well. And Mrs. Zimmermann lay crumpled in the snow. Near her lay the twisted wreckage of an old umbrella. The crystal knob had been shattered, as if by the blow of a hammer. Mrs. Zimmermann had lost.

Rose Rita sprang to her feet. She wanted to help Mrs. Zimmermann and help Lewis, to do everything all at once and save everybody. But she couldn’t do anything. Jonathan was bending over Mrs. Zimmermann. It looked like he was trying to help her up. Rose Rita whirled frantically and looked down the hill. Lewis was shuffling toward the well once again. The dark figure kept motioning him forward, waving its arms in strange rhythmical gestures. Then Rose Rita heard Mrs. Zimmermann’s voice. It was weak and raspy, like the voice of someone who has been sick for a long time.

“Rose Rita! Come over here! Come over here quick!”

Rose Rita thrashed through the snow till she was at Mrs. Zimmermann’s side.

“Hold out your hand!” Mrs. Zimmermann barked.

Rose Rita held out her hand. Mrs. Zimmermann reached into her pocket and pulled out what looked like a piece of phosphorescent chalk. When she put it in Rose Rita’s hand, it burned like an icicle.

“Take this and go to him! It’s our only chance. Go on, run, before it’s too late!”

Rose Rita took the thing in her fist and started down the hill. She expected it to be hard going, but it was strange. It seemed as if the snow was giving way in front of her. Before she knew it she was standing in the strange circular clearing. The shadow was still beckoning to Lewis. It took no notice of her.

And now Rose Rita was filled with anger at this horrible creature that was trying to kill Lewis. She wanted to rush at it and tear it to shreds. Was that what she was supposed to do, kill it? With the thing Mrs. Zimmermann had put in her hand? Or should she go straight to Lewis?

She didn’t have long to make up her mind. Lewis’s feet were touching the rock rim of the well. A slight push would send him plunging head first into darkness. With a loud screech Rose Rita ran forward. “Get away from him! Get away from him, don’t you dare touch him, you filthy rotten thing!” she yelled.

The shadow turned and faced Rose Rita. And now it changed. Before, it had been a hooded, muffled shape. Now it was a ragged, spindly silhouette. A blackened, shrunken corpse with living eyes. It moved toward her with outstretched, hungry arms. And Rose Rita heard what it was saying. She heard the words in her brain, although no sound was uttered. The thing was saying that it would wrap its arms around her and dive with her to the bottom of the dark, icy well. And there they would be, together, face to face, forever.

Rose Rita knew that if she thought, she would faint, or die. She clenched her teeth and rushed forward, saying over and over to herself the meaningless words of a commercial she had heard on the radio the other day. “Use Wildroot Cream Oil Charlie, use Wildroot Cream Oil Charlie, use . . .” The fearful shape rushed at her, and for a moment there was blackness all around her and the sickening, stifling smell of wet ashes. And then she was past it and standing by Lewis’s side.

Lewis was actually teetering on the edge of the well. He had put one foot forward into nothingness, like somebody testing the water before he goes in. With a hard shove, Rose Rita pushed him sideways and back. Now her hands were around his neck, groping for the chain. Lewis did not resist. He acted like somebody who had been drugged. Still, it was hard for Rose Rita to get the chain off, because she had to hang onto the cold glowing object Mrs. Zimmermann had given her. She had a pretty good idea of what would happen to her if she let go of it.

With a jerk, Rose Rita pulled the chain up over Lewis’s ears. She had it wadded in her hand now. When she turned toward the well, she saw the shape, muffled in darkness once again. It stood watching.

Rose Rita felt suddenly calm. Calm and triumphant.

“
You see this?
” she shouted, waving the amulet. “
Well, take a good look!
” And with that she flung the coin, chain and all, into the well.

There was a long second while the amulet fell. And then, from far below, came a tiny sound.
Plip.
And with that the dark hooded form vanished. It turned into a wisp of black smoke and was whipped away by the wind. Nothing was left, not even a smudge on the ground.

Rose Rita stood looking down into the well. It fascinated her. For a moment the well seemed like the only thing in the world. It was a great black whirlpool that would swallow her up. It was a dead eyesocket looking out of nothing into nothing. Rose Rita was caught in a sick convulsive shudder. She trembled from head to foot. But when she stopped trembling, her mind was clear. She stepped back from the edge of the well and turned to see if she could help Lewis.

Lewis was sitting on the ground crying. His face was red and raw from wind and snow and cold. His gloves were gone, his hat was gone, and there was a big piece torn out of his trouser leg. The first thing he said was, “Rose Rita, do you have a handkerchief? I have to blow
my nose.” Weeping with joy, Rose Rita threw her arms around Lewis and hugged him tight.

Now Jonathan and Mrs. Zimmermann were with them. They were crying too. But eventually Mrs. Zimmermann pulled herself together. She knelt down next to Lewis and started examining him like a doctor. She looked into his eyes, into his ears, and down his throat. She made him stick his tongue out and say “Aaah!” Jonathan and Rose Rita stood near, tense and nervous, waiting for Mrs. Zimmermann’s verdict. Finally she stood up. She shook snow out of her cape and smoothed down her dress. “All that’s wrong with
him
,” she snorted, “is that he’s been out in the weather too long. He’s exhausted, and I think he has a cold. Rose Rita, would you hand me that thing I gave you?”

Suddenly Rose Rita remembered the object that had saved her. It was still in her hand, though it no longer glowed or felt cold. She opened her fist, and there was a glass tube about two inches long. Inside the tube was a perforated metal sleeve, and inside that were some pale violet crystals. On the end of the tube was a shiny gold-colored metal cap. There were words stamped into the top of the cap:

Rose Rita turned to Mrs. Zimmermann. She didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. “You mean that’s all it was? One of those things you stick in your nose when your head is all stuffed up?”

“Yes, of course,” said Mrs. Zimmermann, impatiently. “Now give it here. Thank you.” As she worked over Lewis with the inhalator, Mrs. Zimmermann added: “It’s also a magic object, the first one I ever made. And up until a minute ago, I thought the thing was a total flop. You see, it was made so it would only work if it was in the hands of a child. It was supposed to protect the child who used it from evil creatures. And it was supposed to have certain healing powers. Well, after I made it I lent it to a niece of mine in Muskegon, and she kept it for years. She’s a grown-up woman now, and a few months ago she sent the thing back in a box with a little note saying that it was very good for clearing out a stuffy head, but that she didn’t see anything magic about it. So I put the silly thing in a pocket of my cloak and forgot about it—until just now.” Mrs. Zimmermann chuckled grimly. “I guess my niece just led a dull life. She never ran into anything like that dark shadow by the well.”

Mrs. Zimmermann stood up and shook snow out of her cloak. Rose Rita looked down at Lewis, and she felt like cheering. Lewis looked dazed, but remarkably healthy. Now Mrs. Zimmermann turned to Rose Rita. She handed her the tube. “Here. Take it. It’s yours. For good.”

Tears came to Rose Rita’s eyes. “Thanks. I hope I never have to use it the way I did tonight.”

“So do I,” said Mrs. Zimmermann.

“And I,” said Jonathan, helping Lewis to his feet.

After Jonathan had made an unsuccessful attempt to get the lid back on the well, the four of them set out for the road. When they got there, they found an ambulance with its motor running. And there was Jute Feasel with Jonathan’s car.

“Hi everybody!” Jute called. “I thought maybe you’d need this. I left my truck back where your car was, so if you’d drop me off there, I’d be obliged to you.”

“It’s a deal,” Jonathan called, over his shoulder. He was talking with the ambulance driver, telling him that he wanted Lewis to spend the night in the hospital because he was suffering from cold and exposure. After that, Jonathan did a good deal of conferring with Mrs. Zimmermann, and in the end it was decided that she would ride back in the ambulance with Lewis, and the others would go back in Jonathan’s car.

On the way back to New Zebedee, everybody in the car was silent for a long time. Jonathan drove, Jute rode next to him, and Rose Rita sat all by herself in the back. As they passed the
CITY LIMITS
sign, Jute spoke up. “I don’t mean to be nosy, but what the he . . . oh hell, you don’t mind if I swear, do you, Rose Rita? What the hell was Lewis doing out at the old Moss Farm in the middle of the night?”