The Goonies (6 page)

It was the beginning of the place on the old map that didn't show up on the tourist map. It was marked by those three rocks,
and by this tall, natural pillar of rock that stuck straight up at the bottom of the hill that we were at the top of.

It was a steep hill with lots of jutting, jagged slabs pointing out all over and hardly a bike path down through it, nothing
we would've taken if it hadn't been on the secret map.

But we took it now.

We walked our bikes, it was so steep. At the bottom it turned into a sort of gravel path that veered off in a funny direction
just past the tall stone pillar. We got on our bikes and rode real slow.

The coast road was behind us now, and then I don't know where it was. We went through this place with mossy trees, and then
there was this rickety old wooden bridge across a creek, so we walked our bikes over that, and then next thing, we were out
of the woods and onto this rocky beach.

We kept going. Trees came right up to the beach at one point, and we were through 'em, down a hollow and up a hill where the
trees thinned out again and left us with a clear view of the ocean right below us. And here's what we saw.

There was a small peninsula with waves smashing all around it. On the near side was a little cemetery with a bunch of crooked
old falling-down gravestones. Beyond that, at the tip of the land, was a tall stone lighthouse, broken off at the top and
bent over so it almost looked like it was a giant tombstone too.

And sitting between them was a square one-story building. Real run-down. It was made of wood, painted white about a hundred
years ago, it looked like. It sat kind of crooked, too, like the gravestones, like maybe one end of it had started to sag
into the ground. Its windows were twisted and dirty, and a broken red-and-green neon sign was sort of stuck on top like a
big wind had planted it there by accident. It said L
IGHTHOUSE
L
OUNGE
.

There was an O
PEN
—C
LOSED
sign hanging in front of the front door, but it was flappin' around in the heavy wind, so sometimes it showed one side and
sometimes the other.

The place looked pretty spooky, I gotta say. None of us said a word.

And then, swear to God, I saw a shadow pass by one of the windows inside.

I looked at the other guys, but nobody was talkin'.

I stared out over the sea. Those three rocks we'd passed before were sitting out there in the distance, way behind the lighthouse,
and it made me think of something, but I didn't know what. But then I knew what.

I took out the doubloon. It had these three holes cut into it, so I held it up to my eye—the holes lined up exactly with the
three rocks and the lighthouse. They were even shaped the same. Not only that, there was an
X
etched on the coin that seemed to sit right over the Lighthouse Lounge.

I passed the coin around, and everyone had a look.

I looked back at the map. It seemed to end right where we were, but it was hard to tell, because this crease ran through that
part where it had been bent in on itself for a long time, before it had been framed.

I tried to straighten it, but it wouldn't straighten, and that's when I remembered how the doctor had had to break my arm
back the other way from the way it was broken in order to straighten it. So I folded the map backward to undo the crease,
and that's when I
really
saw what was what.

I saw it worked like a fold-in on the back cover of
Mad
.

And when I folded it in completely on itself, it formed an exact replica of the doubloon, with the holes marked at all the
same places, and an
X
right by the third hole.

And when I put the doubloon down over the three signal
rocks on the map, the
X
in the side of the coin exactly laid over the lighthouse.

I showed the guys. “We're here,” I said, pointing to where the little square wooden building was sinking into the sand. This
is where the treasure's buried.”

I indicated the
X
on the map, and then, once more, pointed toward the lighthouse. “Right down there.”

The Lighthouse Lounge… Gunshots… The Old Lady… Jake's Fish Surprise… The Thing in the Basement… Brand Catches Up… The One-Bag
Trunk… Stef and Andy… Descent into Darkness.

Mouth read what was written beside the cross on the map.

Six times five

Stretching feet,

To lowest point

Get the treat.

We paused, calculating.

“Six times five. That's thirty,” I said.

“Brilliant,” said Mouth.

“Stretching feet,” said Data. “Your feet stretch when you walk.…”

“So that's it!” I said. “If we walk thirty paces, to the lowest point, we'll get the riches.”

Chunk shivered. “I dunno… it's gettin' late. My mom's gonna be worried.” I knew what he meant. It was down and gloomy. “Besides,”
he said, “what's that place doin'
open in the fall? It's only a summer place—I was here once when I was a kid. But I think I just saw someone walkin' around
in there. Seems pretty creepy.”

All of a sudden a car pulled into the drive. It stopped in front of the building, and two guys got out wearing dark business
suits. They walked up to the front door and went inside.

“See,” said Data, “there's nothin' to be scared of. There's two other customers goin' in.”

“Maybe they ain't customers,” Chunk whispered. “Maybe they're drug dealers or somethin'.”

Data didn't buy it. “Drug dealers? Did you see their clothes? J.C. Penney polyester. Drug dealers wouldn't be caught dead
in those rags.”

I had to agree, although I should say I don't know exactly what drug dealers would be caught dead in. Probably we were all
thinking along the same lines, because Mouth seemed kind of put-offish. “So what made you think nobody ever followed this
map before and split with whatever's buried there?” he said.

“They could've,” I told him. “But I never heard of anybody finding more stuff than already's in the museum. And anyway, to
grown-ups this is already worth enough—you know, they dig up an old map and threw a wooden frame around it and hang it in
a museum and can it art.”

“Okay, but how're we s'posed to dig for anything?” Mouth wanted to know. “Knock on the door? Ask whoever's there? 'Scuse me,
mind if we wreck your floor? Borrow a cup o' jewels, golden rules, ship of fools'?”

They were starting to chicken out, and I was too chicken to do it alone, so I had to get 'em up for it. “Look, the place is
obviously open for business. We can pretend like we're comin' in for somethin' to eat and then joint the case.” Or maybe I
meant get on the case.

“You mean case the joint,” said Data.

“Yeah.” That's what I meant. I was just talkin' outta the wrong movie.

We walked down the hill and parked our bikes at the base, right next to the near side of the graveyard. The clouds were almost
black and rippin' by like a stormy ocean above us. Man, it was somethin' else.

We stepped real slow between the gravestones. They were at all different angles, so you couldn't tell if you were walkin'
on somebody's grave exactly or not, so we tried to go gentle wherever we put our feet. A cemetery's not a place where you
want to offend anyone.

Made me think of this
Twilight Zone
where on a dare this gunfighter has to stick a knife in the grave of the man he killed. So he sticks his knife in the grave,
but he accidentally sticks it in his coat, too, so when he stands up, he thinks the guy's tuggin' at him from the grave, so
he dies of fright.

I checked to make sure my coat wasn't draggin' on the ground.

Suddenly we heard a loud bang, like a firecracker, coming from the house. We stopped. Then two more:
Bam! Bam!

It seemed kind of scary, but it also seemed like here we were in this graveyard, nearly Halloween, and it was really neat
scarin' ourselves at any sudden noise.

“That sounded like gunshots,” whispered Chunk. “Not the big ones like you hear in war movies but real ones.”

“Gunshots. Jeez, Chunk, turn off your brain,” I said.

“No problem there,” said Mouth.

“Somebody probably just dropped a pot in the kitchen,” I added, just for an example. I mean, I really thought it was probably
somethin' like that. So I started walkin' toward the lighthouse again.

When we got there, it was real quiet. Mouth looked through the front-door windows, but they were too dirty to see anything,
he said. Me and Data went to the side of the building, but the windows were too high. Chunk walked over to the garage while
I piled a couple of orange crates for me and Data to stand on. We climbed up, put our noses to the glass, and looked inside.

It was a restaurant with a bar, but it looked shut down, and pretty ratty for sure. The kind of seafood place with shredded
fishnet hanging on the ceiling, all covered with dust and cobwebs. There were stuffed fish on the walls, too, except they
looked plastic, and crossed oars with rusty pins, and the whole place looked like it had been left behind somebody's refrigerator
for about ten years.

Way in the back I saw two people. Shadows of people, actually. Probably the guys we saw go in. They were dragging two long,
limp sacks across the floor. I figured flour, or maybe a couple of big swordfish, so I figured these guys were makin' a food
delivery, or maybe they were the off-season kitchen help, so I figured maybe they could tell us what the story was.

So I jumped down off the orange crates and went inside. Mouth and Data followed.

It was, like I said, real quiet. The ceiling had high beams that kind of swallowed up all the light from the few bulbs stuck
along the walls. Some of the furniture was broken, some of the plaster was cracked. It seemed deserted, but at the same, time
I felt watched.

Chunk suddenly came running in, waving his arms and jumpin' around real crazy. There was this old jukebox near the bar, and
in a weird way it looked like Chunk was dancing to some silent song that he could hear and we couldn't.

That happens to me sometimes: I hear some melody, I
guess it's in my head, 'cause when I say, “Did you hear that?” someone like Brand looks at me like I was crackin' up. But
it's there, swear to God, just like the pictures are really there in the clouds, just like there are patterns in the jigsaw
puzzle some people can see and some can't. I mean, maybe that
does
make me a dreamer. But don't you have dreams?

So Chunk started gaspin', “Guys! Guys! We gotta get outta here! There's a car in the garage with—”

But before he could finish, a slamming door cut him off. I jumped high enough to hurt myself coming down. We all turned toward
the sound of the door and saw a woman standing there, and I jumped again.

She was sort of old but looked like she could eat the four of us alive and was thinkin' about it. She had on an ugly black
dress, black shoes, a black beret, and a black scowl. There was a tattoo on her left arm. Damn, she looked mean.

“How long you boys been at that window?” she growled.

“Long enough to see that this place needs about four hundred roach traps,” said Mouth. Only Mouth could have thought up a
crack that fast to this lady. It kind of broke the tension for me, though, and I nearly laughed, especially because you could
see she really had it in for Mouth now, so the heat was kind of off the rest of us.

She pulled out a chair at one of the grungy tables and motioned us to have a seat, which we did. She called out, “Jake! We
got customers!”

We heard a loud thump in the back room, and then someone called back, “Whattaya mean, customers? This ain't no—” As he was
sayin' this last part, he stuck his head out and saw us and said, “Shit, Mama,” real soft.

The old lady snapped her fingers at him, “Now go on. Get in the kitchen. Warm up the stove.”

Jake walked across the room to the kitchen door, giving us the eye the whole way. He was an older guy, maybe thirty, with
round, wire glasses and a cool vest and a temper you could see all under everything.

“Okay,” said Mama, “we got a specialized menu here.” She had to be kidding. The table we were at was wobbly and filthy enough
to make my mom puke if she ever saw it. I tried to pick up a rusty fork, but it was half stuck down with an expired glop of
chewing gum. Really gross.

The other guys looked pretty leery, but Chunk looked like a jumpin' bean, he was squirmin' around so much.

Mama kept talking. “We serve one thing. Fresh Fish Surprise.”

“What kind of fish?” said Chunk. Food could take his mind off anything.

“I said it's a surprise!” shouted Mama, crashing her hand down on the table.

“Okay. Okay. I'll take it,” said Chunk. He looked pretty scared.

I suddenly know she was tryin' to scare us off, so I suddenly didn't think she was really all that scary. Just kinda weird.

And I also thought that if this ugly old lady wanted to scare us away, maybe there
was
gold buried here. So I was more fixed than ever to stay.

“What about the rest of ya?” said Mama.

“Just a glass of water for me,” I said. The other guys all ordered the same. No one knew what to make of this mess.

“Okay, one Surprise and four waters. That it?” she snarled.

“I'd like-a the antipasto salad, the fettucini Alfredo, the-a veal scallopini, and a bottle of Boticelli, 1981.”
This was Mouth doing his Italian imitation, which means that this was Mouth mouthing off from nervousness 'cause he just couldn't
shut up.

So he laughed nervously with his tongue flappin', and the old lady grabbed it—grabbed his damn tongue!—and pulled a pocketknife
out of her dress and put the blade to that tongue in Mouth and said, “We got one more thing on the menu—tongue. You boys like
tongue?”

We shook our heads fast. That was when I realized this lady was not only trying to scare us off, she was a little nutsy.

She let go of Mouth's tongue with a smile then, like she was just kidding all the time, and walked into the kitchen.