The Beast Under the Wizard's Bridge (16 page)

He just hoped it would not be too late.

Rose Rita reached the end of the rope. She had it tied around her left wrist, and she flailed out with her right hand. In a strangled, choking voice, she said, “Here! Grab hold!”

“You can't hold my weight!” said Lewis. “Let me give you what I found—”

“We're both going back up,” Rose Rita declared. “Take my hand!”

Lewis grabbed her wrist. She groaned as he pulled himself up, bracing his feet on the slippery bricks. He got his other hand on the end of the rope, clung on for dear life, and said, “Go! I'm okay now! Go!”

Rose Rita began to climb. Lewis wound the free end of the rope around his left wrist and held on with both hands as Rose Rita's movement swung him this way and that. She paused halfway up, breathing hard and whimpering. “I can't!” she said.

Lewis climbed up below her. “You can do it. Come on! Race you to the top! It's just like climbing the rope in gym class!”

“I can't do that either!” wailed Rose Rita.

“Next year you'll be able to!” shouted Lewis. “Because we're practicing! Put your bottom hand on top! Grip the rope with your knees! One inch at a time, if you have to!”

Slowly, Rose Rita began to climb again. Lewis thought
his arms would pop out of their sockets. He followed Rose Rita up, inch by painful inch. At last Mrs. Jaeger helped haul Rose Rita over the edge of the well, and then both of them leaned down to give Lewis a hand up. He emerged into twilight. The sun was down behind the trees.

“T-time?” he asked.

“Well past eight,” Mrs. Jaeger said. “Oh, dear. We'd better hurry!”

From the direction of the ruined farmhouse, someone laughed harshly. “Hurry off? But you have to stay! I insist!”

Rose Rita screamed in alarm, and Lewis felt as if he was going to pass out.

From the shadows near the old house a tall, white-haired figure stepped out. She was holding a magic wand.

Ermine Moote had found them.

For a moment no one said a word. Then Ermine Moote stepped a little closer. “Now, what were you doing down there, hmm? I wonder. Is there a secret passageway, perhaps? What have you meddled in?”

Lewis was thinking furiously. In one pocket he had the ruby heart. In the other, he had—well, something that might come in handy. “We know all about what was under the bridge,” he said.

“I doubt that,” said Ermine Moote. “I doubt it very much.”

“It's the ashes of old Jebediah Clabbernong,” said Rose Rita. “He was supposed to change into a Great Old One, but something went blooey with the spell, and he wound up as some kind of monster.”

Lewis saw Ermine Moote's eyes grow round with
surprise, then narrow with suspicion. “No one knew that! No one but my husband and I!”

Mrs. Jaeger crossed her arms. “You would be surprised,” she said in a calm voice. “The Capharnaum County Magicians Society knows much more than you suspect. And they are meeting tonight to deal with your precious red star and all the rest.”

Lewis put his hand in his pocket. He found what was inside and gripped it tightly. “Did you know that your husband is going to leave you behind? He told me so. He said he was going to be the only one who changed, and all the other humans would be wiped off the face of the earth. And that includes you!”

“The worm wouldn't dare!” shouted Mrs. Moote. “Why, I was the witch who knew all about the Clabbernongs and their magic! I married Mephistopheles Moote to get close to Elihu Clabbernong! My husband was just a country lawyer then—but he was Elihu's attorney! Between us, we got Elihu to tell us many things. If only the old man had lived a few more months, we would have forced all his secrets from him, including—” She broke off, then laughed nastily. “Of course,” she said. “Of course! You found what Elihu had hidden! So it was in the well, was it? Why, with that, I can restore Jebediah Clabbernong's memory and awareness! I won't even need Mephisto! Who has it? You, girl? Or you, Lewis Barnavelt?”

“You can't have it!” Lewis shouted, tightening his grip.

“Oh, but I can,” replied Mrs. Moote, leering. “I can turn you into a rat—or I can fry you right where you
stand and take it from the ashes! It's in your pocket! Give it to me now, and maybe I'll go easy on you!”

“Don't do it, Lewis,” said Rose Rita. “She's bluffing!”

Mrs. Moote flicked her wand to the side. A jet of crimson light shot from it and struck the old farmhouse. With a groan of wood and a clatter of tin, it collapsed, sending up a cloud of choking dust. Mrs. Moote stalked forward, her eyes blazing, the wand pointed at Lewis. “Bluffing, am I?”

Lewis held out his fist. “Don't hurt me,” he pleaded. “And don't hurt my friends. Let us go, and you can have this.”

“No!” said Mrs. Jaeger.

But she was too late. The triumphant Ermine Moote was reaching out for what Lewis held.

And he dropped it into her outstretched hand.

For an instant, the rivet from the wizard's bridge lay on her bony palm. Then it flared to life, its colors shooting like spears. “No!” screamed Ermine Moote, dropping her wand. Frantically, she shook her hand, but the rivet clung there as if it had been welded on. “No!” With a loud shriek, she ran stumbling past the ruin of the farmhouse, vanishing in the cloud of dust. Lewis ground his teeth at the gobbling, maddened yelps she made. “What did I do?” he asked. “I was just trying to buy time—”

“Hush, dear,” said Mrs. Jaeger. “I can guess where that piece of iron came from. You didn't know about its power. It isn't your fault—”

Then something unexpected happened.

On the ground, the wand that Ermine Moote had brandished suddenly snapped in two, with a sharp noise like a pistol shot.

Mrs. Jaeger took a long, deep breath. “It's over for her,” she said. “When a magician dies, his or her wand breaks. Let's go.”

What was left of Mrs. Moote lay on the rutted path to the road. It was a vaguely woman-shaped mass of ashy gray dust. One arm must have been outstretched. The rivet lay there, still gleaming with those unearthly colors.

“She—she dissolved,” said Rose Rita.

“She was very old. Her whole body was held together by magic,” explained Mrs. Jaeger. “And that enchanted iron took away all her power. We may need it again. Lewis, you'd better pick it up. I
am
a witch, even if I'm not a very talented one. No telling what it might do to me.”

Grimacing with distaste, Lewis plucked the rivet from the pile of ash and dust. With his sneakers squelching at every step, he ran with the others to Mrs. Jaeger's car. They saw the Mootes' automobile nearby, off the far side of the road and half hidden in some rhododendrons. “We have to hurry,” said Mrs. Jaeger. “Midnight is coming, and now we have less than four hours.”

Still, she drove very slowly. And she insisted on stopping at Lewis's house so he could change into dry jeans and shoes. “Dear, there's no sense in your coming down with pneumonia,” she said firmly.

What with one thing and another, two hours passed before Mrs. Jaeger pulled her car over on a hillside north
of New Zebedee. By then the night sky was very dark, and when Lewis and Rose Rita climbed out of the car, Lewis didn't even have to glance up. The red comet was bright enough to give the whole countryside a faint tinge of scarlet.

The members of the Capharnaum County Magicians Society stood in a circle on the hilltop. Each of them held a lighted candle. Jonathan Barnavelt came hurrying over, his eyes wide with astonishment. “What in the world is going on?”

Lewis hastily tried to explain, with Rose Rita putting in a word now and then. Lewis pulled the ruby from his pocket and handed it to his uncle. “And there it is,” he finished. “We think it holds Jebediah Clabbernong's soul.”

“I think you're right,” said Mrs. Zimmermann, who had come over to listen. “Jonathan, we've been trying to raise a cone of protection for New Zebedee. From what Lewis tells us, it seems that Mephisto Moote has his sights set on the whole world. We have to change our plan.”

“But we can't attack him with magic,” objected Jonathan. “The spirit that Jebediah called from the depths or snared from space thrives on magic—feeds on it! Any magic we throw at it only makes it stronger—especially because Jebediah's ashes gave it a body.”

Mrs. Zimmermann touched her chin with one finger. “Then maybe we throw our magic another way,” she said thoughtfully.

At that moment, someone higher up on the hill shouted out, “Something is happening!”

Lewis and Rose Rita turned. Everyone was stumbling away from the summit of the hill. A few people had dropped their candles. Lewis blinked. A fog was forming up the slope. A swirling, glowing crimson fog. It pulsed almost like the throb of light in the ruby. Abruptly, it condensed—

“So,” snarled Mephisto Moote. “All here in a pleasant little party, hey? And you didn't invite me!”

Mrs. Zimmermann carried her umbrella. She raised it, and in an instant was transformed. Instead of her purple dress, she wore flowing black robes outlined in purple flame, and the umbrella had become a tall staff with a bright purple star at its tip. “Mephistopheles Moote,” she said in a stern voice, “half your power is already gone! Your wife has tried to fight us and has failed!”

“Half my power?” sneered Moote. “My dear Mrs. Florence Busybody Zimmermann, she was not a tenth of my power! Behold! I summon the Great Old One! No one can stand against him!” And he began to chant “Ry'leh! Ny'arleth! Yog-Shoggoth!” and other sounds that, to Lewis, meant nothing.

Again the crimson fog formed and condensed—and this time, from its depths, a terrible, shifting form stepped out. It was gigantic, twelve feet tall. Its writhing, boneless arms thrashed. It quivered and rippled, its face sliding all over its misshapen head. Around its feet, the grass immediately died, turning the crystalline gray of the vegetation at the Clabbernong farm. “Hunger!” it bawled in a terrible, thick voice. “I hunger!”

“That's Jebediah Clabbernong!” shouted Mrs. Zimmermann. “Or what's left of him! Is that what
you
expect to be, Mephisto? A slobbering, lurching pile of mindless jelly?”

“I will be transfigured!” howled Moote. “I will live forever!” He lifted a trembling finger and pointed to Mrs. Zimmermann. “Destroy her!” he shouted. “Destroy them all!”

Mrs. Zimmermann lifted her wand and spread her other hand as if she were about to cast a spell. The monster halted and braced itself, obviously anticipating a blast of magic. Then, suddenly, Mrs. Zimmermann turned and yelled, “Run for it, everyone! No magic!”

The crowd of people streamed down the hill. Jonathan hustled Mrs. Zimmermann and the others into his car, and they roared away. Lewis turned in his seat and stared back. The monster was thrashing and bellowing. It struck a tree, and the tree shattered as if it were made of glass. “Whoosh!” gasped Mrs. Zimmermann. “Everyone all right?”

“Yes, Florence,” Mrs. Jaeger said. She was in the backseat with Lewis and Rose Rita. “I left my car!”

“We'll get it later,” said Jonathan. “I'm sure we'll be the target Moote will follow. He wanted us to use our magic. Now he'll be angry. We have to do something—and before twelve o'clock! But what?”

“Uncle Jonathan,” said Lewis, “I have the rivet from the old bridge.”

“Good for you,” replied Uncle Jonathan. “Well, Florence? Any ideas?”

“The spark of one, perhaps,” said Mrs. Zimmermann. “Let's get to the place where the old bridge used to stand. Time's a-wasting!”

Twice before they reached the spot, Lewis thought it was all over. Near town, the monstrous jelly creature popped up just ahead of them and swiped at the car. Jonathan yanked the steering wheel, and the car's right tires jolted onto the grassy shoulder. The beast's squelchy tentacle left a long, slimy smear down the driver's-side windows. Then, just south of town, Mephisto Moote stood on a rise near the road, waving a wand. Fireballs shot from the wand, sending sizzling red globes that whizzed toward them. Two missed, but the third struck the car roof a glancing blow, with white-hot sparks of metal flying.