Wrath of the Grinning Ghost (3 page)

This time, though, the odor filled him with dread. It was, Johnny imagined, like the smell of a tomb full of dusty bones. Behind it he sensed centuries of weary time, years and years of hungry waiting. Waiting for what? Johnny could not say. He opened the book carefully. The pages inside were brittle and brownish yellow with age. The handwriting on them had faded to the color of pale rust.

But it was no handwriting that Johnny could read. The letters, if they really were letters, were bizarre loops and whorls and jagged lines, making the words seem slashed right into the paper. The writing crammed page after page, a tightly packed, crabbed penmanship. Here and there in the book were hand-drawn pictures of bizarre flowers with human faces, nearly shapeless things that might have been animals slouching along on their hind legs, maps without directions or scale. Even the cover felt wrong under his fingers, oily and quivering with a hateful sort of life. Johnny wanted to throw the book away from him.

But he remembered that Madam Lumiere had told him the dark birdlike shape was a protective spirit. That creature had told him to get in touch with "Professor Frizz-Face" as soon as possible, and now Major Dixon had suggested that Johnny take the book to Professor

Childermass. "Professor Frizz-Face" had to be Johnny's neighbor, who wore a set of wildly sprouting white side-whiskers. That seemed too much like fate to Johnny. And there was something familiar about the voice too, something he could almost, but not quite, remember. He clenched his teeth and decided that the professor had to see this strange volume. He shut it and said, "Thanks, Dad."

That night, Johnny climbed into bed sure that he would not be able to sleep a wink. His room was tiny, with barely enough space for his narrow bed, a dresser, and a coatrack. The window looked out through trees to the Gulf of Mexico beyond. If Johnny sat up in bed and looked out, he could see the gleam of moonlight on water. Lots of times he had done just that, imagining that he was living in the 1700's, when pirate ships menaced these waters. Sometimes he could almost see them, black silhouettes leaning with the wind, their sails billowing as they sought ships to loot. Often he had dreamed about them.

Tonight, though, Johnny lay back in bed, his breath coming rapidly and shallowly. He mumbled all the prayers he could remember and thought of his friend Father Thomas Higgins in Duston Heights. He wished he had the priest's stern courage and faith right now.

Because the cabin had only one air conditioner, the major and Johnny always slept with their bedroom doors open. Before long, Johnny heard his father's snoring. It might have bothered anyone else, but Johnny found the sound comforting. He closed his eyes and tried to relax.

He had just drifted off to sleep when something awakened him. It was a sound. Not a loud sound or a sudden sound, but a soft, slithery one. Johnny sat straight up in bed. He was terrified of snakes, and he knew that in the South there were lots of poisonous serpents: copperheads and cottonmouths and the dreaded rattlers. Was one in his room?

He reached out a shaking hand to click on his bedside lamp. Then he froze, a horrible thought hitting him. What if a snake were draped over the lamp? What if it were waiting there in the dark, its mouth open and its fangs dripping?

Johnny began to shake with fear. He heard the sound again, and this time it was less like a hiss than like quiet laughter, as if someone or something were chuckling at him in a horrible whispery voice. He looked around frantically. The room was dark, but a rectangle of pale moonlight lay across his sheets. It spilled from the foot of the bed down onto the bare wooden floor. Johnny had dropped the strange flat book beside the bed when he had turned in. Now the moonlight touched the cover, not bright enough to show him any of the colors, but making the book look as if it were a dark opening into some other world.

Johnny stared at the book so long that his eyes watered. Minutes crawled by. The path of moonlight grew longer as the moon slid down the sky outside, heading for the Gulf and for moonset. The sound of his own pulse hammered in Johnny's ears.

Was the book
changing
in some way? Johnny squinted his aching eyes. Maybe it was a trick of the light, or of his watery vision, but the dark shape on the floor was wavering, dancing slowly, as if he were seeing it beneath clear but troubled water. From somewhere far away he heard a steady roaring sound. It was not like the gentle surf of the Gulf, a surge and a pause. It was more like the sound of a distant fire, hoarse and continuous.

What was happening? Part of him wanted to jump out of bed and run shouting to his father. But Johnny held on. He knew that his dad would think he had just had a nightmare. Somehow, Johnny hated to act scared or childish when his father was around. He knew the major was a very brave man. He had even been shot down behind enemy lines once and had single-handedly fought through to freedom. Johnny wished he could be like that. Now he was ashamed to run screaming like a little baby. He told himself he could take it, whatever "it" might be.

Then he saw it. A greenish shape rose slowly from the black rectangle on the floor, flowing out like vapor. It grew longer and longer, glowing with its own light. It began to curve across the floor, back and forth, as if it really were a snake. A snake made out of fog, not of flesh and blood.

Johnny thought he was going to faint again. He struggled to breathe. What if that terrible thing crept up the bedpost? What if he saw it slithering over his sheets, heading right for his face? What would it do to him?

He desperately wanted to look away, but he could not. He felt as if he were frozen. Now the serpentlike shape was ten feet long, writhing across the floor in loop after loop. It coiled, just like a rattlesnake getting ready to strike.

Johnny forgot about looking silly in front of his father. He opened his mouth to scream. Nothing came out but a mousy "e-ee-ee-ee" that no one outside the room could possibly hear.

The misty serpent reared, like a cobra ready to bite. The greenish head swayed back and forth. It was a head without a face, without features. Then it slowly turned. The creature flowed out the door in a long, sinuous stream. It vanished without a sound.

Still Johnny could not stir. He heard his father's snoring suddenly stop—

Johnny jumped out of bed, a scream just behind his teeth. He caught it before it escaped.

Johnny listened hard. The air conditioner hummed and sighed. The old refrigerator clattered and groaned. Crickets and cicadas zinged and chirred out in the Florida darkness. Johnny heard all these, but he did not lie down until he was sure he heard his dad's regular snoring again.

A dream, thought Johnny. I just had a dream. That's all. He reached out to turn on the lamp, hesitated, and then clicked it on. Yellowish light flooded the room. His wristwatch said it was nearly three in the morning. His shorts and shirt lay on the floor where he had tossed them, and beside them lay the book.

Johnny got out of bed. He reached for the book, but then changed his mind. Biting his lip, he grabbed his shirt and shorts and dropped them down on top of the volume. It was a childish action, he knew, like hiding under the covers to escape from an imaginary goblin.

Still, covering the book made him feel better. He turned his lamp off again, lay back, and soon was asleep.

This time he didn't dream at all.

CHAPTER THREE

Something really odd happened the next morning. Johnny and his father got up, showered, ate the last of their cereal and milk for breakfast, and packed. Not once did Johnny think about the strange book. Not even to notice that it had somehow, mysteriously, disappeared. When he picked up the dirty clothes he had used to cover the puzzling book, it was nowhere to be seen. But he forgot all about it in their rush to get their suitcases packed.

They took a little bright yellow speedboat to the sleepy Gulf town of Alachamokee, a scattering of filling stations, fishing supply shops, and general stores. In front of Art's Bait and Tackle, they caught a Greyhound bus to Tallahassee, where they boarded a train. Major Dixon had booked a sleeping compartment for them.

Johnny always enjoyed traveling on a train at night, lying in his berth and looking out the window at the dark countryside flashing past. He loved to imagine the stories taking place in the houses that he saw only as lighted windows. Sometimes they rattled through big cities too, splashes of neon lights roaring past like comets. Johnny didn't stay awake very long, though. The rumble of the train was somehow very soothing, easing him into sleep.

They arrived at Duston Heights the next day, early in the afternoon. Professor Childermass met them at the station in his maroon Pontiac. He was a short, elderly man with a wild nest of white hair, gold-rimmed eyeglasses, and a red, pitted nose that always reminded Johnny of a strawberry that had turned a little too ripe. As Johnny and the major stepped off the train, Professor Childermass took out his pocket watch, made a big show of looking at it, shaking his head, and then he snapped it shut. "About time!" he snarled. "Two minutes and thirteen seconds late! In my day the engineer would have to answer for that!"

Johnny couldn't help smiling. Professor Childermass had such a cranky temper that he terrified almost everyone in Duston Heights, and yet he and Johnny got along famously. The old man was, as he put it, out of uniform. He was wearing tan wash pants, a soft blue shirt, and bright red suspenders. "I don't have to dress up when I'm not teaching," he announced smugly. "I intend to spend the whole blessed summer being a slob!"

The professor bustled Johnny and the major into his car, and then took them on a quick, careening trip through Duston Heights and across the Merrimack River. Never a very good driver, the professor talked a mile a minute, turned halfway around in his seat. He complained of the hot, dry spell that had ruined his nasturtiums, and then he demanded to know how they had enjoyed their trip. Sometimes Johnny closed his eyes as they came roaring up to an intersection, but the professor somehow managed not to hit any pedestrians, signposts, or other cars. At last he turned onto Fillmore Street and drove up the long hill to Johnny's house.

Johnny saw Gramma and Grampa Dixon standing on the front steps. They smiled and waved as the professor brought the Pontiac to a halt with a screech of brakes and a pungent blue-gray cloud of smoke from the overheated tires. "Here they are, safe and sound, just as promised!" the professor bellowed as he flung open the driver's door. "Stuffed to the gills with tales of the fish that got away, no doubt! Come on, you two! We'll help you carry your bags inside, and then we want the whole story."

That was a happy homecoming. Johnny's grandmother was a short, white-haired woman who was a fanatical housekeeper. A speck of dust never had a chance in the Dixon house. She also happened to be a fabulous cook. In honor of the occasion, Gramma Dixon had made a delicious meal, a New England pot roast.

Professor Childermass, who taught history at Haggstrum College but whose hobby was baking, contributed a yummy, gooey Black Forest cake.

Johnny and the major distributed the souvenirs they had picked up in Florida: a hand-painted plate for Gramma, showing a marlin leaping from the water; a fancy leather spectacle case for Grampa with Seminole beads worked into it; and for the professor, a jaunty, long-billed red fishing cap, which he popped onto his head and wore for the rest of the afternoon. Gramma liked her plate, and Grampa seemed pleased too. Henry Dixon was a gaunt, tall, slightly stooped man with just a few strands of hair combed over his bald, freckled head. He also wore old-fashioned gold-rimmed spectacles, which he took off and slipped into the leather case. "Perfect fit!" he announced happily.

Later that afternoon Johnny's best friend came over. His real name was Byron Ferguson, but he hated to be called that and allowed only a few people, like the professor, to refer to him as "Byron." Most knew him as Fergie. He was a tall, skinny, dark-haired kid with a long, droopy face, jug ears, and big feet. Fergie was as good at sports as Johnny was at history and English, and the two of them got along really well. Fergie was kind of a smart aleck too, but Johnny could take his kidding and dish some of it right back at him. They had liked each other almost from the moment they had met at Boy Scout camp, and Johnny had picked out a dandy souvenir for his friend. It was a pocketknife with mother-of-pearl handles, but it had hidden talents. A little fork and spoon folded out of it, along with a saw blade, a file, and a regular knife blade. Fergie grinned as he thanked Johnny and shoved the knife down into his jeans pocket.

As twilight fell, Johnny and Fergie went for a long ramble down Fillmore Street. It was a clear New England evening, very cool after the muggy Florida weather. They strolled past old houses, going from one little yellow island of light to the next as they moved from lamppost to lamppost. Fergie had told Johnny that their friend, Sarah Channing, still wasn't home. Her dad taught English at the same college as Professor Childermass. He had taken Sarah and her mom on a long vacation to England. They wouldn't be back until the beginning of July.

"So, Dixon," said Fergie, "how was Florida this time?" The two walked by the weathered brick buildings that had once been shoe factories. Just ahead was the old iron bridge over the Merrimack River.

"Great," returned Johnny. "Dad and I went fishing on the Gulf just about every day."

"I noticed you were kinda red," said Fergie with a chuckle. "Just a little bit, sort of like a hard-boiled lobster. Wait'll that sunburn starts to peel. I'm gonna have to call you 'banana nose'!"

Johnny shrugged. "People with blond hair don't tan, I guess," he said. "On the other hand we are
lots
smarter than you poor souls with black hair!"

"Says you!" howled Fergie. He laughed, then asked, "Seriously, Dixon, did you get to hunt any pirate treasure? Did you learn about any crumbling, mysterious old parchment maps? Or at least bring home a new model ship?"