The Black Tower (3 page)

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Authors: BETSY BYARS

BOOK: The Black Tower
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She looked at him closely. His face was as pale as if he had seen a ghost.
“Let's go home.”
“Gladly.”
They walked through the open gates. On either gate, the figure of a lion was worked into the wrought iron. One paw was raised as if, Meat thought, to menace visitors as they passed through.
“And the owner, Lionus Hunt,” Herculeah said, speaking as if she were reading from a guide book, “had these gates made in his likeness to guard the house. He wanted visitors to know the house was his and that they entered at their own peril.”
“Did you read that somewhere?”
“No, just made it up.”
“Well, if he really wanted to menace people,” Meat said, “he could have used that old woman's face.”
4
MAN OR BEAST
“Let me,” Meat said, reaching for the doorbell. Over his shoulder he said, “I hate this doorbell. It's like the ding-dong of doom.”
It was the next day, and Meat had walked Herculeah to Hunt House for her second reading of
The Terror in Black Tower.
It was one of those old-timey doorbells that had to be turned, and Meat gave it a manly twist. From deep within the house came the ding-dong.
They heard heavy footsteps. “It's a new nurse today,” Herculeah said. “I think her name's Miss—”
The door opened then, stopping Herculeah's sentence. Herculeah and Meat looked up. The smiles on their faces faded.
Nurse Wegman was big. Meat had seen bodies like that on
World Class Wrestling.
She was not as big as his father, of course. Few people were. After all, his dad was Macho Man, a championship wrestler. Just the thought of his dad brought back the picture of him entering the ring, the crowd chanting, “Macho,
Macho, Macho Man.” He could hear the music, feel the pride, the—
Meat's pleasant picture was shattered by one harsh word from the nurse. “Yes?”
“I'm Herculeah Jones.”
Nurse Wegman said another word. “So?”
“Didn't anybody tell you? I read to Mr. Hunt every afternoon at four o'clock. It's four now.” She lifted her arm to display her watch.
Meat thought Nurse Wegman looked as if she didn't trust Herculeah, so he came immediately to his friend's defense. “It's all right, Nurse. Her mom's a private investigator. She works for Mr. Hunt.”
That seemed to help Nurse Wegman make up her mind. “You'd better come in.”
Herculeah went inside, and Meat said, “I'll wait out here in case you need me.”
“You aren't coming in?” Nurse Wegman asked.
“No, sir.”
Meat turned away quickly, his face red with embarrassment. He hoped neither Miss Wegman nor Herculeah had heard that “sir.”
Inside, Herculeah followed Nurse Wegman up the stairs. “Your mother is a private detective?” the nurse asked.
“Yes.”
“What, exactly, is she investigating?”
“I don't know. She doesn't confide in me.”
“I was only asking because I've heard rumors about this place. People seem to think it's kind of spooky.” Her voice seemed to deepen. “I've even heard there's money hidden in here. Have you heard that?”
“Yes, I heard the Hunts didn't believe in banks.”
“Are there any rumors where it might be hidden?”
“Not that I've heard. It could be anywhere.”
“And this is a big house.”
“Yes.” Herculeah watched Miss Wegman's broad back, the ponytail that swung between her shoulder blades. At least, she thought, this nurse was big enough to take care of an invalid. “The book I'm reading to Mr. Hunt is The Terror in Black Tower, and this house even has a black tower, in case you didn't notice.”
“I noticed.”
Nurse Wegman opened the door to Mr. Hunt's bedroom. “I'll be around if you need me.”
Herculeah approached the bed. “Hi,” she told Mr. Hunt, “it's me again—Herculeah. Do you feel like hearing some more about the girl in the tower?”
For a moment Mr. Hunt didn't seem to recognize her. His eyes weren't as bright as yesterday.
“Do you want me to read?”
Three blinks.
What did that mean? Herculeah wondered. One blink meant “yes”; two meant “no.” Three meant what?
“Are you trying to tell me something, Mr. Hunt?”
One blink. Yes.
“Is it about the book?”
No.
She had a sudden insight and she asked, “Is it about Nurse Wegman?”
Yes.
“Is she—?”
From the doorway Nurse Wegman said, “If you came to read, read!” It was a command.
“I'd better read,” Herculeah said. “Don't you think?”
Yes.
“And I'll be sitting right out here to make sure everything's” —Nurse Wegman paused as if trying to find the right words—“all right.”
Herculeah picked up the book, opened it, and glanced down at the page.
“Ah, yes,” she said. Herculeah was smiling, but there was a false cheer in her voice. “The girl is still on the stairs. You know, people have climbed Everest in the time it's taken this girl to get to the top of the tower.”
Although the man on the bed could not move or speak, he seemed on occasion to send off signals—brain waves, maybe. At any rate, sometimes Herculeah seemed to know what he was thinking. Maybe, as the nurse suggested yesterday, Mr. Hunt had developed special powers.
“Yes,” she agreed, “that's true. People want to get to the top of Everest, and this girl definitely does not want to get to the top of the tower.” She lifted the book to the light. “But I do admit I wish she'd hurry up.” She began to read.
She took two more steps. The noise above her was unlike anything she had heard before. It was not a human sound, and it was not the sound of an animal—at least not any animal she had ever heard before.
 
 
Herculeah glanced up at the man on the bed. She grinned. “Man or beast?” she asked, trying to turn his attention to the book.
And the silent answer that seemed to come from the man on the bed was, “Beast.”
5
A PREMONITION
“You're awfully quiet,” Meat said.
He and Herculeah had left the grounds of Hunt House and were entering their own neighborhood. Now, in familiar surroundings, seeing familiar signs—BERNIE HOLDEN:
ACCOUNTANT, BESSIE FLOWER: ALTERATIONS, CAKES BY CHERI,
ONE-DAY DENTURES—Meat felt he was capable of holding an intelligent conversation.
“I'm thinking,” she said.
“About the book? Is it getting better?”
“The book couldn't get any better. It started strong and scary. That's my kind of book.”
Meat glanced at her quickly. “But why would you choose a book like that to read to someone who's sick?”
“I didn't have any choice.”
“You always have a choice.”
“Not this time. The book was chosen for me. Mr. Hunt picked it out himself.”
“How could he? I thought he could only blink.”
“The nurse—this was the other nurse, the one I liked, not Nurse Wegman—brought in hundreds of books, and he blinked at this one.”
“I wonder why.”
“Who knows. I tried to figure it out. It could be that he read the book a long time ago when he was a boy. And—this just occurred to me—in the book, there's somebody up in the tower, a prisoner maybe, and since Mr. Hunt probably feels like a prisoner himself ... he's identifying with the prisoner.”
“Yes, but you'd think, if he does feel like a prisoner, he'd want to hear a story about people outside doing things—climbing mountains and forging streams, looking for buried treasure.”
“Or maybe,” she said thoughtfully, “he's trying to warn us about the tower. The nurse said she'd had patients in Mr. Hunt's condition who got premonitions about the future. I hope that's not the case, because something terrible is going to happen and—”
She broke off and lifted her head. “That's strange,” she said.
They were now at the front steps of Herculeah's house. Her face was lifted to the window.
“What?”
“The phone.”
“What about it?”
“It's ringing.”
“What's strange about that?” Meat asked. “That's what phones do.”
Herculeah's face had that serious look, so he changed his question. “Why do you think it's strange?”
“Look at my hair.”
“It's frizzling,” he said.
“Yes! Exactly! As soon as I heard the phone ringing, my hair started doing this.”
“The phone's stopped ringing now,” Meat said. “Your hair can go back to normal.”
Herculeah didn't answer. It was as if she were listening to something happening inside the house. Meat didn't hear a thing.
“Your mom probably answered,” he said.
“Mom's not home.”
“Then someone's leaving a message.”
“That's what I'm thinking. The message is for me.”
“You don't know that.”
Herculeah reached for the banister and started quickly up the steps.
Meat followed. “This is what I don't get,” he said to her back. “Your hair is frizzling, which means there's danger, and here you are hurrying into the house. If there's danger, why would you go to meet it?”
She turned and looked at him. Her gray eyes were dark with concern. “Because I might not be the one in danger. Someone may need me.”
She unlocked the door and went inside, leaving Meat alone on the steps.
Well, he wasn't going inside. He'd never been foolish enough to rush to meet danger. Anyway, he knew Herculeah would tell him about it. She was very generous about sharing her danger.
He glanced across the street at his house. He could go home, but there wouldn't be anything to do there. He sat down on the steps.
Inside, Herculeah stood in the hallway for a moment. She listened. Someone was leaving a message on her mother's office answering machine.
The voice was old and shaky, but Herculeah could make out the message. Her blood froze.
“Meat!”
There was such urgency in her voice that Meat couldn't help himself. He jumped up and went to meet the danger, too.
When he entered the living room, he saw that Herculeah was standing by her mother's desk. She was bending over the answering machine. “You have to hear this,” she said.
Meat had the childish urge to put his fingers in his ears, but he resisted.
“Something's wrong, isn't it?”
“Yes.”
“Is it very wrong, medium wrong or”—he paused hopefully—“just some little thing?” He had asked Herculeah this question before, and he knew how she would answer. “It's very wrong, isn't it?”
“Dead wrong.”
6
THE WARNING
Meat moved closer to the desk.
“Listen,” Herculeah said. With quick, practiced motions, she rewound the message and played it. An old shaky voice came from the machine.
“—s a murderer. Stay away from the—”
“You must not have rewound it all the way. Try it again.”
She rewound the tape and replayed it.
Again the old voice said, “—s a murderer. Stay away from the—”
Well, Meat thought, maybe he couldn't begin the message for the old caller, but he sure could end it.
In the silence that followed, he finished the sentence. “Tower.”
For emphasis, to make sure Herculeah got the message, he said, “Stay away from the tower.”
“I hate it when people do that,” Herculeah said.
“Do what?” Meat asked. “Leave warning messages on the answering machine?”
“No, I hate it when they start their warning message before waiting for the beep. Half the message is lost.”
“I can finish the last half,” Meat said. “It's—”
“I heard you before. I'm going to play it again.”
“Good idea,” Meat said. Listening to the message had obviously become an instant addiction with Herculeah. He wouldn't mind hearing it again himself.
“Listen real carefully this time. In the beginning of the message, I think the person was saying either ‘He's a murderer' or 'She's a murderer.'”
“That's all there are—‘he's' and ‘she's.'”
“But they could have said a specific name.”
“Either way, it didn't sound good to me.”
She rewound the tape. “Listen.”
“—s a murderer. Stay away from the—”
Meat couldn't help himself. He said, “Tower.”
Herculeah glanced at him with irritation. “You don't know that it was tower.”
“Then why do I keep hearing it in my mind? You hear things in your mind and believe them completely.”
“You just think it's ‘tower' because you're afraid of towers.”
“I am not afraid of towers. I just can't see any good reason for putting one on a house. Oh, maybe if you had a mad relative that you wanted to keep out of sight—a tower would be good for that. Or if a parent had bad kids. I mean, ‘Go to your room,' is nothing compared to, ‘Go to the tower.”'
Herculeah didn't seem that interested. She plopped down in her mother's chair. “I think it was a woman's voice, don't you? Give me your thoughts.”
“My only thought,” he said, “is that it is a warning. I think that you should never go back to that house again.”

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