The Black Tower (6 page)
Authors: BETSY BYARS
“Well, yeah, but you saw her throw something, right?”
“Right.”
Herculeah moved closer. Her gray eyes had that look that seemed to penetrate right into his brain.
“Go over it again. Describe what you saw.”
“Well, it was round. When it left her hand, it was roundâI'm sure of that. And then it was as if, I don't know, it sort of sprouted wings.”
“Wings! Like a bird?”
Meat drew in a deep, unhappy breath. “I know you wouldn't understand.”
“I want to understand. I've got to, because I know that whatever she threw had some meaning and that if we could find it, we would knowâ”
She broke off. Meat glanced quickly up at the tower, thinking Herculeah had seen something at one of the windows. He struggled to his feet and took a few unsteady steps backward.
“Is the old woman back?” he asked.
“No,” Herculeah answered. “But I just remembered where she probably is. She was outside Mr. Hunt's room, and I bet she went inside. I ran off and left Mr. Hunt at the mercy of that woman. Nurse Wegman did, too.”
Meat felt a pang of sympathy for the man. Being in the same world with that loony woman was bad enough; being in the same room would be unbearable. And the man was paralyzed. He couldn't protect himself. Meat took another backward step to get away from the thought.
“I've got to make sure he's all right. You keep looking for theâwhatever it is we're looking for. Don't leave.”
Meat could not have gone anywhere if he had wanted to, and he did want very much to go somewhereâhome. But he would settle for any place that didn't have a tower. He glanced around without enthusiasm at his possibilities.
Herculeah ran to the house. The front door stood open as if Nurse Wegman had had the same thought as HerculeahâMr. Hunt's safety.
Herculeah ran into the hallway and up the stairs. She took them three at a time. She crossed the hall and came to a stop in the doorway to Mr. Hunt's bedroom.
Nurse Wegman was beside the bed. She was leaning over Mr. Hunt's body, a pillow in one hand.
“Is he all right?” Herculeah asked.
Nurse Wegman straightened abruptly. She looked around, obviously startled. She punched the pillow with one hand, as if to make it more comfortable, and then settled it under Mr. Hunt's head.
“He's fine. The old woman was in here. She was by the bed, holding this pillow. I thought she was getting ready to smother him.”
Herculeah crossed to the bed and stood beside the nurse. She looked down into the bright hawklike eyes.
“I'm sorry I ran out like that,” she said, speaking to Mr. Hunt. “My friend fainted outside and that ... that woman who was in hereâyour sister, I guessâmust have thought he was dead. I don't know if you want me to come back or not, after the way I've acted.”
The blink came forcefully. Yes.
“Good. I want to come back. I'm going to redeem myself.” She picked up the book, slipped the newspaper clipping inside, and put it on the bedside table. “Next time we will do nothing but read.”
Herculeah paused. One hand still rested on the book. She had the feeling that Mr. Hunt wanted to tell her something, needed to tell her something important. He needs my help, she thought abruptly, and not just to read him books.
Nurse Wegman coughed to remind her to leave. When that didn't work, she said, “Go on now. Look after your friend. Mr. Hunt needs to rest.”
“I'm on my way.” At the doorway she paused. “I wonder if I could use the phone. I need to call my mom.”
“We don't need any private detectives around here.”
“No, but Meat and I are going to need a ride home. I don't think he can make it on foot.”
“The phone's downstairs in the hall.”
“Thanks. I'll see you both tomorrow?”
She glanced at Nurse Wegman, hoping for many reasons that it wouldn't be Nurse Wegman's day to be on duty.
But to her disappointment, Nurse Wegman said firmly, “I'll be here,” and then added, “from now on.”
14
MIRROR IMAGE
“I'm phoning my mom to come pick us up,” Herculeah called to Meat from the front door.
Meat turned toward her. His lips moved, and although she could not quite make out his words, Herculeah suspected they were something like, “That's the first good idea you've had all day.”
With one quick glance at the tower she disappeared back into the house.
Meat watched her go. Then with slow steps he began to make his way to the porch.
Herculeah glanced around the hall for the telephone. The hall was large, high-ceilinged, and dark. All the rooms in Hunt House, she thought, seemed to be shadowed in gloom, as if they had secrets to hide.
There. Herculeah found the phone at the back of the hall, in one of those gloomy shadows.
It was an old-timey black rotary phone, and as she picked it up, she shook her head. She had to dial the number. Dial! This was probably the first time she had ever not punched in the numbers.
She dialed and shifted from one foot to the other, waiting impatiently for the phone to be answered.
All of a sudden Herculeah had the feeling she was being watched. It was such a strong feeling that she glanced first at the portrait of Lionus Hunt. She smiled at her foolishness. Of course no hawklike eyes peered at her through slits in the painted eyes.
She turned slowly. She thought her hair was beginning to frizzle. She found herself looking into an old mirror. The glass was wavery with age, and so at first all she could make out was her own hair. Yes, it was definitely frizzling. Then she noticed a figure crouching behind her on the stairs.
She tried to breathe slowly, deeply to calm herself. The phone rang twice. Pick up, Mom, she said to herself. I'm in trouble here.
Now she could hear, above the ringing of the phone, the beginning of a childish giggle. It was low, broken by mutterings of the woman reminding herself to be more quiet.
Pick up, Mom. I need you.
A hand came through the banisters, reaching for her. The long-taloned fingers curled as if to grab. “Pretty,” she said. The fingers brushed her hair, and the old woman said, “Come closer.”
No way, Herculeah said to herself, and she moved away from the stairs. She was almost against the wall now. But she was in a better position to make a beeline for the door if that became necessary.
Answer me, Mom. Answer.
On the fourth ring, as if in answer to Herculeah's pleas, her mother's voice came on the line.
“Hello. You have reached the office of Mim Jones. I cannot take your call right now, but if you leave a message and phone number at the beep, I'll get back to you as soon as I can.”
The beep came and Herculeah said, “Mom, it's me. I'm at Hunt House. We've had a bit of excitement. I'm fine but Meat fainted, and I need you to come out and pick us up. Now.”
She waited because sometimes, when her mother was busy, she wouldn't answer her phone, but she always answered when she heard Herculeah's voice, especially when it was something urgent.
Her mother did not answer now, and Herculeah reluctantly hung up the phone.
“I've got to make one more quick call,” she said. She glanced up at the woman and then toward the front porch where Meat sat on the steps. “You aren't going to like this one, Meat,” she predicted as she dialed.
The phone was answered on the second ring this time, and Herculeah gave her message.
She glanced at the stairs. “Well, our ride is on the way; it'll probably be here any minute.”
The skeleton arm still reached through the banisters, the long fingers stretching for Herculeah's hair. And if it frizzled any more, Herculeah thought, she'd get it.
Quickly she returned the phone to the table and backed away from the stairs. “I'll wait outside.”
The fingers closed on air, and then the old woman spoke. It was as if she had awakened from a dream, as if she had been so dazzled by Herculeah's hair that she had forgotten her mission.
“Did you find it?” she asked in a tired whisper.
“What?”
“Did you?”
“Did I find what you threw from the tower? Is that what you want to know?”
“Yes.”
“No. What did you throw? Why?”
But the woman seemed to be fading, to be shrinking.
“I don't know.” Then she had one final burst of energy. “When you find it, you will know,” she said.
She got to her feet and, holding the banister, began to pull herself up the stairs.
“Wait.” Now it was Herculeah who reached through the banisters, her fingers brushing the worn fabric of the woman's dress as she moved out of range. “Wait.”
The woman shook her head. She chuckled to herself and disappeared onto the landing.
“It's not funny,” Herculeah said to the empty hallway. Then she sighed and walked to the door.
15
THE FOURTH FAINT
“I just had a talk with the woman who threw something at you from the tower,” Herculeah told Meat.
“You actually talked to her?”
“Yes.”
“She admitted she threw something?”
“Yes.”
“So what was it?”
“The most intelligent thing I got out of her was that when we find it, we will know what it is.”
“Great. So is your mom coming?” Meat asked.
“Our ride is on the way, Meat. Sit down.” She patted the step beside her.
“Your mom is coming, right? You didn'tâ”
To divert Meat, Herculeah said quickly, “You know, Meat, you really ought to do something about your fainting. You faint all the time.”
He was diverted. “I do not.”
“Well,” Herculeah said, “you fainted that time at Madame Rosa's.”
Meat said, “Yes,” quickly, hoping that would end the story.
“You were sitting out in the hall,” Herculeah recounted, “and you thought the murderer was coming down the stairsâ”
“The murderer
was
coming down the stairs.”
was
coming down the stairs.”
“Yes, it was the murderer, but you thought it was Madame Rosa's ghost. That's why you fainted.”
Meat said, “Getting back to our ride ...”
Herculeah said, “Then there was that time you were in the park and you thought some boys were going to punch you in the stomach.”
“They were going to punch me in the stomach.”
“But they didn't have to, because you fainted.”
Why was she doing this, Meat wondered, bringing up his fainting? Was she trying to divert him? Oh, yesâthe ride!
He heard a car turn into the driveway, looked up, and gave a gasp of dismay.
“Oh, here she is,” Herculeah said cheerfully.
“It's my mom. You said you were calling your mom.”
“I couldn't get her.”
“You didn't tell Mom I fainted.”
“I had to, or she wouldn't have come. Hi, Mrs. Mac,” Herculeah called as she went down the steps. “Thanks for coming.”
As he followed, Meat hissed, “Let me tell it.”
Meat flung the door open. He said, “I don't care what she said, Mom, I did not faint.” He got into the backseat and slammed the door.
Herculeah had known he wouldn't be pleased, but he had never slammed the door in her face before. She opened the door and said, “Scoot over.”
At least he wasn't too mad to scoot over, and Herculeah climbed in beside him. Meat's mom turned around and gave her son a hard look. “So,” she said, “if you didn't faint, what did happen?”
“Nothing! I was standing outside looking up at the tower and birds started flying out the windows. And then an arm came and threw something and somebody yelled something andâ”
“You didn't tell me she yelled something,” Herculeah interrupted.
“I couldn't hear what it wasâprobably something stupid like âLook up here!' Where else would anybody be looking?” He paused. “Anyway, I got dizzy. Looking up like that always makes me dizzy. I sat down, put my head between my knees, and was fine.”
Mrs. Mac's gaze turned to Herculeah, so she knew it was her turn.
“I was in the house when this happened, Mrs. Mac, so I didn't see it. I had found this old newspaper clipping. It was in the back of the book I was reading to Mr. Hunt. It was a clipping about a tragedy years ago at Hunt House and guess what the tragedy was?”
“Someone threw a stone from the tower and killed the governess,” Mrs. McMannis said.
“Yes! Exactly! But nobody threw it. It was a loose stone and it fell.”
“It was thrown.”
“How do you know? The clipping said no one was in the tower.”
“Someone was in the tower. There had to have been. My great uncle Ben was the stonemason who worked on the tower. He laid those stones, and he said those stones were laid to stay laid.”
“Why would anyone want to kill a governess?”
“Maybe the killer was aiming at someone else. I don't know.” Herculeah looked at Mrs. McMannis sharply. “Who was close to the governess at the time?”
“I have no idea.”
“Probably one of the twins,” Herculeah said thoughtfully. “The smaller one.” Her mind turned back to the family portrait on the stairs, to the figure of the smaller twin that had been damaged somehow.
“Did the article mention that this was the second tragedy?” Mrs. McMannis continued.
“Yes, I was going to the library to look that up.”
“A man working on the tower was killed. Ben was there when he fell. No big deal.”
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