The Mansion in the Mist (2 page)

He was beginning to feel uneasy about Emerson and Miss Eells, but he remembered that Miss Eells could be a fussy shopper. And both of his friends could get so wrapped up in bickering with each other that they lost track of time. It wouldn't hurt, Anthony decided, to keep himself busy by having a good look around. He took a kerosene lamp with him and headed upstairs.

The bedrooms there were all alike: small and rather homely. The walls were knotty pine, and the floors were covered with reed rugs. The beds were iron Army cots, and next to each one was a chair to hang your clothes on. The only decoration the rooms had were framed pictures made out of colored yarn. Anthony walked aimlessly from room to room. He wasn't really looking for anything in particular—he was just killing time till his friends came back. He looked out the window of one bedroom and saw that the stars were beginning to twinkle in the sky, but he saw no sign of the rowboat.

Finally he reached a room at the end of the corridor, a room that was different from the rest. There was no
bed in it, and the floor was very dusty. A sleepy fly buzzed and bumped stupidly against the dirty window-panes. In the center of the floor stood a large wooden chest. It was made of rough unvarnished wood, and a yellowed label had once been stuck to the lid, but someone had ripped it off so that only a fragment remained. Curious, Anthony knelt next to the chest and raised the lid. The hinges groaned, and a smell of raw wood rose to Anthony's nostrils. He looked in.

The chest was empty except for some dead insects. At first Anthony was disappointed, and he was about to close the lid when something stopped him. From inside the chest a whispering sound came. It was like many voices talking together, saying words that he couldn't understand. Anthony felt like someone who is hypnotized—he couldn't tear himself away. Now, as he stared into the old wooden box, the bottom filled with writhing curls of smoke. Then the smoke cleared, and blackness opened before him. It seemed to Anthony that he was looking down into a bottomless pit. Gripping the sides of the box, he went on staring, but then he began to feel the growing urge to clamber over the sides of the chest and throw himself in. At the last minute he pulled back with a shudder of fear. Down came the lid with a loud slam, and Anthony hauled himself to his feet with a mighty effort. Staggering like a drunken person, he reeled out through the doorway and collapsed in a dead faint on the hall floor.

Night was deepening on the lake as Emerson and Miss Eells came drifting up to the dock in their rowboat. Anthony was sitting on the end of the dock with his back toward his two friends. From the darkness Emerson called out, "Sorry to be so late, my boy, but Graceful Gertie here tried her hand at piloting us. First she ran us onto a rock and bent the propeller of my outboard motor, and then she managed to break both our oars. We had to paddle back to town with our hands to buy a new set. Did you miss us?"

Sitting next to his lighted lantern, Anthony did not turn around or respond to Emerson's call. After a quick worried glance at Anthony, Emerson tied the boat up to a post and held it close to the dock so Miss Eells
could jump out. Then he lunged out himself, did a barrel roll across the dock, and sprang nimbly to his feet. He and Miss Eells walked slowly toward Anthony. They stopped just behind him, and Emerson coughed and tried to look cheerful.

"Hem!" he said, as he reached down and gave Anthony a little pat on the back. "Are you getting interested in Buddhist meditation, my boy? If so, you should be sitting cross-legged and not waggling your feet in the—"

Emerson's voice died away when Anthony turned to face him. The yellow lantern light revealed Anthony's tear-streaked face. He looked utterly, totally miserable.

"What in the name of..." began Emerson, but he cut himself off. Then, more gently he added, "What's wrong, son?"

"I... I saw something awful," Anthony began haltingly. "It... it..." But he couldn't go on.

Miss Eells stepped forward. Stooping, she gave Anthony her arm and helped him to his feet. "Come on, Tony," she said softly. "Emerson, you bring the groceries. Let's go up to the cottage and have a talk."

A few minutes later, the three of them were sitting in the living room. The six oil lamps burned brightly, and the potbellied stove in the corner took away the evening chill. Anthony was sitting in a rocking chair with a glass of ginger ale in his hand. He still looked confused and half asleep, but the color was returning to his cheeks. Emerson and Miss Eells sat nearby. They
frowned anxiously and kept glancing at the floor, as if they couldn't quite think of what they ought to say. Finally Emerson broke the silence.

"Anthony, my boy," he said quietly, "it's terrible to see you in this state. But it'll be better for you if you can tell us what happened. Was there a burglar here? Or are you homesick?"

Anthony shook his head. "No, Mr. Eells, it's... It's not like that at all. Like I said, I saw something awful." Then, haltingly Anthony began to tell about the mysterious whispering chest. But he was only just halfway through his story when Emerson cut him off.

"Anthony!" he exclaimed. "This is incredible! I know this house as well as I know the back of my hand, and there isn't any chest in that room—or anywhere else in the house for that matter."

Anthony stared in amazement. Could Emerson be telling the truth? Carefully, Anthony set his empty glass down on a table. "Could... could we go up and look right now?" he asked in a faltering voice.

Emerson stared for a second and then he smiled confidently. "Of course we can!" he said as he sprang to his feet. Grabbing an oil lamp, Emerson motioned for the others to follow him. They went up the dark stairs single file and down the long corridor. The lamp cast weird shadows on the wall as they moved along, and through the open windows you could hear the wind hissing in the pines. At the far end of the hall, they paused outside the room that Anthony had mentioned.

Emerson went in first, with the lamp held high in his hand, and the others followed him. The wavering smoky light showed that the room was empty.

Anthony felt sick. He put his hand to his forehead and closed his eyes. A fit of dizziness came over him, and he shook his head violently. "It... it really was there," he muttered weakly. "Honest, it was!"

Emerson eyed him skeptically. "Anthony, my boy," he said, "has it occurred to you that maybe you fell asleep and dreamed the whole thing?"

Anthony looked disgusted. "Come on, Mr. Eells! I know when I'm asleep and when I'm awake! I really did see this big wooden chest, and it was right here where we're standing. Honest!"

"Well, in that case," put in Miss Eells calmly, "we have a mystery on our hands. I believe you saw something, Anthony, and if Emerson here wasn't such a know-it-all he'd agree with me. To tell the truth, I've felt that there was something creepy about this house ever since I first set foot in it. Em, do you think we should go home?"

Emerson shook his head vigorously. "Absolutely not! In the first place, I want to find out what happened to those three people I rented this place to. And in the second place, I'm not going to be scared off by tales of disappearing chests. Besides I enjoy the fishing and the whole relaxing atmosphere of this island."

"Relaxing!" snorted Miss Eells. "We'll see how relaxing things will be if more strange things happen." But
she knew there was not much point in arguing further with her stubborn brother, so she gave up and went downstairs to the living room with the others. Emerson banged out some ragtime on the piano while Anthony and Miss Eells played cards. After a short time they all got very drowsy and went off to bed, and Anthony fell asleep to the sound of water gurgling over stones outside his window.

Days passed, and nothing very exciting happened. Emerson found an old badminton set tucked away in a closet, and he set it up in the side yard. The three of them took turns playing one another, and they had a lot of fun. Anthony caught a few fish, but because they were small Emerson made him throw them back. Gradually everybody got used to life on the island, and for the most part they found it enjoyable and relaxing. Yet, the chest and the disappearing figure stayed on Anthony's mind—he couldn't quite get rid of them.

One still, muggy afternoon, while Emerson and Miss Eells were out fishing, Anthony began wandering about the house again. For the first time in days he was really beginning to feel bored. He poked into closets and found old croquet sets, bows and arrows, warped golf clubs, and one dead mouse. Then he went downstairs and decided to examine the small pantry that was next to the kitchen. On its dusty shelves he found old cloudy jars of preserves that probably weren't fit to eat, a tin pail that had once held Swift's lard, an inkwell, and an old wooden pen holder with a rusty metal nib. There was
also a brown earthenware jug and an old meat grinder that was missing its handle. Anthony was about to leave when he noticed the glimmer of something white behind one of the jars of preserves. Reaching in, he pulled out a fan-shaped vase made of milky white china. Turning it upside down, he shook out a small white card. It was covered with dust, but when he had blown the dust away Anthony saw that there was writing on the card in copper-colored ink. It took him a while to figure out what the handwriting said, but finally it became clear:

The password:
Auro est locus in quo conflatur.
And the greatest clue of all is in the Temple of the Winds.

Anthony stared at the card. He hardly knew what to think. What could this mean? Password? Password for what? He didn't know Latin, so he didn't have the faintest idea what the mysterious phrase meant. And the second sentence was pure gibberish as far as he was concerned. Nevertheless, puzzles fascinated Anthony, and he took the card away with him. He would show it to Emerson and see if he could make anything out of it.

Later that afternoon, when Emerson and Miss Eells came back, Anthony showed them the card. Like Anthony, Emerson had trouble with the handwriting, but he figured it out eventually. With a little shrug and an odd smirk, he handed the card back to Anthony.

"It's as clear as mud!" sighed Emerson. "The Latin phrase is from the Book of Job in the Bible. It means:
There is a place for gold where it is gathered together.
Good news for prospectors, I suppose, but not very helpful to anyone else. As for the second phrase, I have to agree with you—it's utterly meaningless. At one time rich people owned vast estates, and they built little ornamental buildings on the grounds just to pretty things up. Sometimes the buildings had names like the Temple of the Winds. But we don't have anything like that here. You know what I think? Some people who were vacationing here long ago played charades at night, and these were two of the phrases that people had to act out. And when you consider the Latin phrase, they were probably a bunch of professors. I wouldn't spend any time mulling over that card if I were you, Anthony—you'll just be driving yourself buggy over nothing. It's not a clue to help you find a gold mine or anything like that. Tear it up and sleep well tonight!"

Anthony nodded politely to Emerson and stuck the crumpled card in his pocket. In his heart he was not convinced by Emerson's wonderful explanation, but he didn't feel like arguing.

The rest of the day was spent playing badminton and pinochle and arguing over baseball trivia. After the sun went down the three campers sat in rocking chairs on the front porch and watched the twilight deepen over Shadow Lake and the stars come out. An ominous silence spread over the water, and in the west a dark thunderhead was rising.

"I think a storm is coming on," said Emerson, as he puffed at his meerschaum pipe. "And I'll bet it's going to be a real gully washer."

"You're such a great weather forecaster," said Miss Eells. "You ought to be on television."

"Isn't she wonderful, Anthony?" Emerson chortled. "And to think I've had to put up with her for more than sixty years. It's a wonder I haven't turned into an ax murderer or a mad strangler."

"There's still time," muttered Miss Eells, and then she burst into a fit of giggles.

Throughout all this kidding Anthony sat in stony silence. He was thinking of the mysterious disappearing chest. What if it returned to the empty room tonight? He hoped that it wouldn't. He really didn't want to see the thing again, ever. The trouble was, he couldn't get the chest out of his mind—it was burning a hole in his brain. What was it for? Did the password have anything to do with it? Every time he asked himself these questions his head ached.

The stormy darkness on the lake deepened. A jagged streak of lightning split the sky, and thunder rumbled in the distance. A cold wind began to blow, and the three campers went inside for more pinochle. Miss Eells had baked some peanut butter cookies in the oven of the old iron cookstove, and they were delicious. Everybody guzzled ginger ale, talked a lot, argued over points, and had a good time. Finally the old shelf clock in the kitchen whanged eleven times, and everyone began to yawn.

"Well, I guess it's sleepy time," sighed Miss Eells, as she gathered the cards together and stacked them neatly in the middle of the table. "There's one thing, you know, that's good about roughing it in the wilderness: If a storm hits, it can't knock out your power, because there isn't any."

"You always see the bright side of things," sniffed Emerson. "Next year I am going to have a generator installed up here. It won't be picturesque, but at least we won't ruin our eyes trying to read by oil lamplight."

One by one, Emerson, Miss Eells, and Anthony made their way to the table at the foot of the stairs. On it were three candles in brass holders, and several small boxes of matches. Everyone lit a candle and plodded wearily off to bed. But when Anthony got to the door of his room, he felt wide awake and tense. He sat down on the edge of his bed and tried to calm his beating heart, but in spite of all his efforts he still felt as if he was ready to jump out of his skin.
What was he so worked up about?
And then it hit him: the password, the Latin phrase he had found in the old dusty vase. What was it for? He had an idea now, a strange and fascinating idea. When he knelt over the old wooden chest in the back room, he felt that the swirling mists hid a doorway. A doorway to... to where? He had no idea where, but he did know that a password could unlock a door—at least, this is what the ancient tales said. All right then! What if...