Fiendish Deeds (3 page)

But it just didn’t look right. Somehow it looked less like some monster and more like an overweight cat.

“Joy,” said Miss Keener.

Joy dropped her pencil. She looked up, startled, and saw Miss Keener with the magic hat on her lap, holding up a slip of paper.

“Are you ready to do your book report, Joy?” asked Miss Keener.

Joy nodded.
Just get it over with,
she thought. She quickly collected her folder of papers and rushed up to the blackboard.

“For my report,” she began, trembling slightly as she addressed the class, “I chose a story called ‘The Bawl of the Bog Fiend.’”

There were a couple of snickers.

“That’s ‘bawl,’ with a
w
—it’s another word for ‘cry,’” she explained. “Anyway, the story was written by Ethan Alvin Peugeot, who lived over a hundred years ago. E. A. Peugeot wrote many stories, poems, and essays, and is considered one of the greatest contributors to suspense and horror literature of all time. ‘The Bawl of the Bog Fiend’ is the first story where we meet Peugeot’s best-known character, paranormal investigator Dr. Lyndon Ingram.”

Joy opened the stapled booklet from the EAP Society, which now had several paragraphs delicately underlined in pencil.

“Interestingly, Mr. Peugeot is believed to have lived somewhere in this area—near Darlington,” she added spontaneously, “although of course it didn’t exist back then. Exactly where he lived has always been a cause for much speculation,” she said, referring to the EAP Society biography.

“You see, Mr. Peugeot was a very mysterious person. He lived under false names and wore disguises. And there were all sorts of crazy rumors about him.” Joy read out: “‘There are even people to this day who believe that his supernatural stories were in some or all part true accounts of his extraordinary life.’

“He ultimately vanished from the face of the earth, never to be seen again.”

Joy glanced up. The class was listening intently.

“This is perhaps the greatest mystery of all,” she continued, “As the story goes, Mr. Peugeot only appeared at his publisher’s offices once a year, around October, when he would drop off new manuscripts and get paid before disappearing again.

“Then one year he did not show up. The publisher finally hired a private detective to go look for him. A month later, the detective sent a telegram to the publisher’s office.

“It said: FOUND OUT WHAT HAPPENED TO EAP STOP GETTING TRAIN BACK TONIGHT STOP,” she read out dramatically. “But the detective never returned—he, too, vanished without a trace.

“The only clue was this final telegram. But no one was even sure where it was sent from, as the receiving office noted it with only four letters: SPKG.”

“SPKG?” repeated Miss Keener.

“It was shorthand,” explained Joy. “For the place where the telegram was sent.”

The class was dead silent.

“Well?” asked Miss Keener. “Did anyone ever figure it out?”

“No,” replied Joy. “I mean, not until I did.” Her voice rose in triumph. “It was short for
Spooking
!”

A
fter lunch an announcement came over the PA system, summoning the children to the auditorium. Principal Crawley stood at the podium onstage, signaling the students to take their seats in an orderly fashion. He wore a sweater in a tangerine and teal diamond pattern under his ever-present corduroy jacket, the knot of his tie painfully cinched as if he had just climbed down from an unsuccessful attempt to hang himself.

The loudspeakers suddenly squealed horribly.

“Whoa,” said Mr. Crawley, adjusting the microphone. “That was certainly an ear SPLITTER…WHOA, VOLUME! VOLUME! TESTING, testing, testing, one, two, three. That’s better.

“Ahem, good afternoon, children. I’ve called an assembly because we have a special guest here today. Please give a big Winsome welcome to Darlington’s own Mayor Mungo MacBrayne!”

There was an explosion of applause from the dutiful children as the red velvet curtains rippled to life. Clapping and whooping with increasing enthusiasm, they watched as the curtains began boiling like the surface of a stormy sea. Then finally, just as the children began examining their stinging hands and clutching their aching throats, a man emerged, stumbling onto the stage.

He was an impressive figure, powerfully plump, like some mythological wrestler who had forsaken his toga for a tan suit. His hair was golden and ridiculously plentiful, with the tight curls of a cherub. In an incredible display, he instantly replaced an expression of absolute disgust with a broad blinding smile. His balance and dignity restored, the mayor crossed over to Principal Crawley and proceeded to crush his hand into paste.

At that moment, Joy glimpsed a pale man in a dark suit struggling with the curtains, looking flustered, embarrassed, and angry all at once.

Much like she’d probably looked earlier, Joy imagined, as the class laughed at her theory about the detective’s disappearance. Why had she bothered telling a bunch of brain-dead Darlings anyway? They’d never believe that someone as important and famous as Ethan Alvin Peugeot had ever lived in Spooking, or that the detective tailing him had vanished there. It wasn’t worth even arguing with them. Joy had instead stammered her way through her report before Tyler’s snickering at her use of the word “bawl” set the whole class off again, at which point Miss Keener told her to take a seat.

Joy watched the man, now flailing at the curtains murderously. With a final violent yank, he vanished from view.

“Thank you, Principal Crawley,” said Mayor MacBrayne, taking the podium. “You may not know this, but once upon a time, Principal Crawley and I were both students here at Winsome, back when the school first opened.” The children looked dumbly at Principal Crawley, who nodded in agreement. “And if I recall correctly, Peter, we were both in Mrs. Windlesworth’s grade six class together.”

Principal Crawley laughed and shook his head, offering a correction that was not picked up by the microphone.

“Well, her name started with a
W
, so close enough,” continued Mayor MacBrayne irritably. “The point is, what different paths we took from that same class, all those years ago. You see, the journey of life is a wondrous thing. There are no maps, and no rest stops. You follow the signs as best you can, and suddenly you’re there. Wherever you are, that is.

“Myself, I went on to become a leading industrialist—which means a really rich businessman, kids,” he explained with a wink, “before recently being elected mayor of Darlington in the greatest landslide victory ever recorded in the city’s history.

“Principal Crawley, on the other hand, stayed right here at Winsome. Which is also great! Because where would we be in life if some people didn’t stay right where they are, helping others to get off to a great start? Give him a hand, folks!”

The children obliged, but quickly discovered their hands were still smarting from the sustained applause earlier, managing only a small pitter-patter of appreciation.

“Anyway, I’m not here today to reminisce about the past—I am here to look to the future! And by that, I mean the results of the Darlington, City of the Future competition!”

There were cheers.

“Now, the day after I was elected, I sat down at City Hall and asked my colleagues a question: How can we make Darlington even better? How can we not only keep Darlington a great place to live, but make it somewhere that everyone across the country wants to visit? In short, how are we going to make Darlington
really cool
?

“Well, they didn’t have any answers. They’re great people, my colleagues—great, great people—but they just didn’t know. Meaning no disrespect, their ideas were old and tired, frankly.

“So I said to myself: Who
would
know? Who
are
the future of Darlington anyway? And then it struck me—the children. So I came up with the idea of having your teachers get you each to write an essay about what
you
wanted to see in Darlington’s future. We wanted your highest hopes. Your biggest dreams! And to make it even more exciting, we offered a prize for the winning entry.

“And oh boy, did we get some amazing ideas!” The mayor pointed into the audience, shouting: “A giant shopping plaza in the shape of a flying saucer! A towering complex of toy boutiques in the shape of an Ultradroid! And a mile-high megamall even more mega than the Darlington Megamall! All great, great ideas,” he finished. “But one of you really stepped up to the plate with a truly exciting plan. Something that could put Darlington on the map, and not just as a great place for shopping. Something to make it one of the most exciting places on the whole seaboard.

“The young lad with the big plan…A drum roll, please…is Morris Mealey! Come on up here, son!”

“YES, YES, YES!” A boy leaped out of his seat and sprinted down the aisle to the stage, taking the stairs two at a time. He skidded to a stop in front of the mayor and began pumping his fist in the air in victory. MacBrayne clapped a huge hand onto one of his slim shoulders to calm him.

“So how does it feel, Morris Mealey, to be a winner?” the mayor asked.

“It’s Morris
M
. Mealey,” corrected the boy loudly into the microphone.

“That’s great, son,” replied Mayor MacBrayne. “Mr. Phipps!” he called offstage. “Unveil Stage One!”

As the pale man behind the curtains came into view again, Joy was awestruck by his fearsome appearance: his tight-fitting suit and shiny shoes, pointed like dangerous weapons; his heavy arched brow, split at one edge by a long white scar; his hair an unruly coif, tar black with a shimmering hint of blue.

In front of him he pushed a squeaky trolley on which something sat upright, covered by a sheet. He turned to the audience as he walked, gazing out at them with piercing eyes. In the center of his forehead, a swollen ugly bruise seemed to almost visibly throb.

“Behold!” cried Mayor MacBrayne, yanking the sheet away with a flourish. “The artist’s conception of the new MISTY MERMAID WATER PARK! Coming soon to DARLINGTON, CITY OF THE FUTURE!”

Byron Wells hadn’t been paying the slightest attention to what was going on up on the stage.

How could he, when sitting directly in front of him was Lucy Primrose?

Which meant that—completely unobserved and without arousing any suspicion—he was able to bask in the golden light of her being, or at least the smaller but no less wonderful glow coming from the right side of her face as she turned to whisper to her best friend, Ella. In a semiswoon, he’d noticed the green plastic clips Lucy wore to hold back her long hair, her little ear like a cream-colored seashell below.

The fascination was quite unexpected for eight-year-old Byron. Was he the only boy this age who felt like this? He looked at the others in his row—scrawling on the backs of seats with markers, examining trading cards with a tiny camouflage flashlight, huddling over a handheld video game—and thought,
maybe it is just me.

At any rate, such feelings were something to be kept to himself. Lucy was a Darling, after all, and he was a Spooky. Such a romantic liaison was completely unprecedented—not to mention unthinkable.

And then there was Joy. The idea of her little brother having a crush on one of those “prissy little snobs” would surely make her physically ill, at the very least. Would she ever even speak to him again?

No, it was a secret he’d resolved to take to the grave.

When he heard a loud gasp around him, Byron looked up at the stage. He was astonished to see how many people had joined Principal Crawley up there: a large bear of a man with golden hair, a spidery man in a dark suit, and someone Byron recognized as the annoying dark-haired boy from his class named Morris. Between them was a large panel depicting a system of winding slides and what appeared to be a gigantic wave rising up out of a pool. At the top it read misty mermaid water park—artist’s conception.

Everyone was very excited now, including Lucy, apparently. Was it a field trip, Byron wondered? He suddenly felt scared—he didn’t even know how to swim, and some of the slides looking terrifyingly high, clinging to a cliff’s face.

“Once again, young Mr. Mealey, the City of Darlington appreciates your great, great idea,” said the big man. “And in thanks, I am happy to offer you a season pass!” he added, handing Morris a ticket.

The children managed a burst of exhausted applause as Morris held his prize aloft, as if it were the decapitated head of a bitter enemy.

“See you all there next summer!” cried the mayor. The man in the dark suit wheeled away the display. Principal Crawley, looking at his watch worriedly, quickly dismissed everyone, and the whole auditorium descended into chaos.

The children rushed down the aisles, talking excitedly. Joy stayed in her seat, waiting for the crowd to disperse while Byron was swept out of the auditorium like a stick in a raging river. Once outside, he broke from the current and slipped into the washroom.

The boys’ room was eerily quiet. Byron decided to forgo the urinals and lock himself into a stall. It was always a good precaution for a small Spooky whenever within kicking and screaming distance from things that flush.

Nevertheless, his blood froze when he heard footsteps. Hard-soled shoes. He breathed out in relief upon hearing grown-up voices.

“The boys’ washroom, delightful,” said a man, sounding fatigued. “I see they are still decorating the ceiling with balls of wet toilet paper.”

“Don’t be such a snob, Phipps,” replied a man with a loud, booming voice. “When a man needs to go, he needs to go. Did you see that? How crazy the kids went? This idea is a serious moneymaker.”

“Yes, Mayor. And all it cost us was a season pass to what is effectively a swamp at this point.”

“You’re a genius, Phipps, a real credit to the MacBrayne administration. I won’t forget this, come next salary review.”

“Speaking of which, when might such a review occur, sir?”

“Pure genius!” continued the man with the booming voice. “Speaking of the bog, how are the bulldozers doing? What’s the current schedule for clearing it all away?”

“The bulldozers have already cleared the scrub for the parking lot, but unfortunately we can’t give them the go-ahead to start major excavation and drainage until the resident vacates.”

“That crazy old woman’s still living in there?” The voice was alarmed. “But we need to start breaking ground! We won’t get a penny more out of our investors unless they’re sure we can open by next summer.”

“I know, sir.” There was a loud blowing of a nose. “However, the bog’s a pretty lonely place for an insane old widow. Plus, I didn’t mention—I was able to get the old man’s full name off his gravestone this morning. Now we can easily look into their ridiculous claim. Don’t worry—the project will go ahead as scheduled.”

Byron could hear the tap running and the
thwump-thwump
as bubblegum-scented soap was dispensed, then the tearing of scratchy brown paper towel.

“Okay,” said the man with the booming voice. “I trust you, Mr. Phipps,” he said, sighing heavily.

“Thank you, sir.”

There were footsteps again, then silence. Byron waited, then poked his head out. The washroom was empty.

He scurried off to class.

Byron and Joy sat side by side on the bus ride home.

“What do you mean, what was that all about?” asked Joy. “Weren’t you paying attention at assembly?”

“Umm, no,” answered Byron stiffly, “I was…drawing.” Byron didn’t often lie to Joy, and his throat clenched like he’d inhaled the eraser off a pencil.

“The mayor said they’re going to build some giant water park here,” explained Joy wearily. “The Misty Mermaid or something.” Joy rolled her eyes. “Mermaids, how lame is that? Why not sea monsters, or a ghost ship theme with skeleton pirates? I am sure it’s going to be all disgusting and cute….”

Joy then wondered what the judges had thought of her own entry in the Darlington, City of the Future competition. It was a drawing of Byron’s—the view from the ground as a hovering UFO unleashed a devastating heat ray on a happy little town. Under it she had written in large block letters: THE FUTURE?

“That big wave looked pretty scary to me,” said Byron.

“That was just the artist’s conception,” replied Joy. “A wave like that would put the food court in the parking lot—and believe me, that’s the last thing they’d want.”