Hangman's Curse (23 page)

“We'll find it. But be careful to stay away from the spiders! They're deadly poisonous! Do you copy?”

There may have been one clinging to her microphone as she spoke into it. “Yes, Mom. I copy.”

Sarah stayed on the radio. “Elijah? Are you there?”

Elijah was pulling on a protective suit from the Holy Roller. He'd already grabbed another radio and had the headset in place. “Yes, Mom. I heard what she said.”

“Tell the police. We have to find Norman.”

Officer Carrillo was running by. Elijah called him, “Officer Carrillo!”

The moment Carrillo got the word from Elijah, he handed Max to another officer and went on the prowl, chattering into his radio as he began circling the building. “Be on the lookout: Suspect is thin, with glasses, probably has pimples, isn't armed but is probably dangerous . . .”

He passed Mr. Harrigan coming the other way. Harrigan asked Elijah, “What's this about Norman?”

“Elisha saw him. He stuck his head in the door of the old furnace room and told her good-bye, and then he left her there. We have to find him. If he could just leave Elisha down there, then he must know a way out—which would be a way
in
.”

“He'll know more than that,” said Harrigan, looking around thoughtfully. “Let me try a hunch.”

And with that, he ran toward the school.

No one noticed. All around Elijah were running, shouting, noise, fear, commotion. Medics were running every which way, cops were herding hysterical kids, Max was sniffing everybody brought close to him. Ms. Wyrthen was right in the thick of it, using the bullhorn to maintain order, dashing about like a border collie as she separated kids who were clean from kids who needed to be quarantined.

It looked like the quarantine area might work. The students were lining up so Max could sniff them. Any student tainted with pheromone was getting set apart and checked over. The doctors and nurses were finding spiders, but now they had several cans of Raid from the local hardware store, and they were using it.

Oh, brother! Here came a team of medics carrying Mr. Marquardt on a stretcher, heading toward an ambulance. He was squirming and struggling the whole way, hollering like a wildcat and trying to bite anyone within reach. Elijah couldn't help staring as he zipped up the front of his suit and cinched up the gloves.

Then a voice behind him said, “Cool.”

It was Ian Snyder.

“Ian!” Elijah whispered, knowing Ian was still a fugitive.

Ian must have known it, too. His hair was cut, all his facial jewelry was gone, he was wearing a drooping hat, and—most stunning of all—he was dressed in designer jeans and a Chicago Bulls tee shirt. “So old Marquardt finally got cut down to size. You gotta love it.”

Elijah looked under the hat to catch Ian's eyes directly. “Ian. It was spiders. Norman Bloom was planting poisonous spiders in people's lockers and bags and coats. I don't know how he knew which kids you were cursing, but—”

“He was one of us.”

Elijah did a double take. “Excuse me?”

“Don't you get it? He's—he
was
—a witch. We had the same enemies. He was with us when we cursed those people.”

Elijah was incredulous.
“Norman?”

Ian shrugged. “Why not?”

Elijah considered that and had to nod in agreement.

“But yeah, I see it,” said Ian. “We put a curse on people, and then Norman sneaked off and planted the spiders.” He wagged his head in wonder. “So there never was a ghost.”

“No. People were hallucinating. The poison does that.”

Ian chuckled at himself, obviously feeling foolish. “Norman was with us at the séance when Abel Frye told us his name. He must have
made
the Ouija board spell it. And he probably made the Ouija board tell us what Abel Frye looked like, too.”

“Ian. Please don't hate him. You have enough problems without adding that.”

Ian wagged his head resignedly. “I don't hate him. I
envy
him, maybe. The guy's clever. He had all of us going. But I guess that doesn't matter much anymore.”

“Well listen . . .” Elijah tucked his protective hood under his arm. “Elisha's trapped under the school and we have to get her out.”

Ian went pale. “You gotta be kidding.”

Elijah came clean. “Ian, I have a confession to make.”

“You're a team of investigators.”

Elijah stopped and looked at him. “I guess it's kind of obvious by now, isn't it?”

Ian gave a playful smirk. “Oh, no. A lot of high school kids have drug-sniffing dogs, motor homes, bug-proof suits, and dads who aren't really janitors.”

Elijah twisted his lip in acknowledgment. “Well. I'm confessing it anyway. We know about that ritual chamber you have under the school. I'm sorry I didn't tell you, but we were in there, we know about it. We're going to have to go in that way to get Elisha—”

“It isn't there anymore.”

Elijah stared at him. “What do you mean?”

“It isn't there anymore. I took all that stuff out and burned it. It's history.”

“But the passageway—”

“I caved it in!”

That hit Elijah like a spear through the heart.

Mr. Harrigan had to try two different routes employing three different stairways to avoid spiders and reach his classroom. With advancing spiders only a few doors down the hall, he finally burst into the room, almost knocking over a model of a human skeleton, and rounded the corner into the supply room.

Tom Gessner was already there. “Mr. Harrigan! I was looking all over for you!”

And there, sitting next to the rabbit, snake, and mice cages, was Norman Bloom, his head in his hands, weeping.

Harrigan was impressed. He told Gessner, “Looks like you and I had the same idea.”

Gessner only shrugged. “Well, I was actually trying to find you because I thought you could help me find Norman. This was the last place I looked.”

Mr. Harrigan approached Norman and put his hand on the boy's shoulder. “This has always been Norman's little world back here, the one place where he feels safe. Am I right, Norman?”

Norman didn't look up but only said, “Just leave me here. Please.”

“Can't do it, Norman,” said Mr. Gessner.

“The spiders are moving up the hall,” said Harrigan. “We have to get you out of here.”

“You should let them kill me,” the boy replied.

Mr. Harrigan stooped low and made eye contact with him. “Norman. I'll come right out and say it: We should have been looking. We should have been there for you. The stuff you've gone through shouldn't have happened and we're partly to blame. But we're here for you now, and we're not going to leave you here.”

Norman looked away. “It's too late—”

Mr. Harrigan grabbed his chin and turned his head forward again. “Norman. You left somebody under the building, and I think you know what it's going to take to save her life. Now yes, we owe you, but you owe her.” Norman's eyes dropped. Mr. Harrigan followed and made even closer eye contact. “You owe Elisha, a gal who was a friend to you. What's it going to be, Norman?”

Norman looked back at Mr. Harrigan for a moment, then nodded. “I was scared.”

“But you're still here. I think you want to do the right thing, so come on. Here's your chance.”

He wiped his eyes, sniffed, and then said, “I need my coat. It's right over there.”

“We have to hurry.”

“NO!” said Nate. “NO, NO, NO!”

“Elisha!” Sarah called. “Are you still there?”

A faint voice came back. “Still here. Where are you?”

She couldn't give an encouraging answer. She, Nate, and the firefighters had reached the hole that led to the passageway, but stones and rubble now blocked the old opening. They wouldn't be going in this way.

“Dad!” Elijah hollered, running through the bushes with Ian right behind him. “Ian knows another way inside!”

Nate and Sarah took only a split second to adjust to Ian's new appearance, and then Nate said, “Lead on.”

Ian led them out of the brush and then farther around the building to an old Dumpster. He pushed on the Dumpster; they all helped, and the Dumpster rolled aside to reveal a sheet of plywood covering an opening in the concrete slab. To anyone who didn't know better, the plywood appeared to cover a grease pit and nothing more. But when they lifted it aside, they found a concrete stairway underneath.

“This wasn't on the plans!” Nate remarked.

“Ah, I'll bet this is a Barton!” said the fireman named Al.

“A Barton?”

“Barton was the old building inspector,” said the fireman named Larry. “He probably made the contractors put this in after the building was almost finished.”

Al the fireman laughed. “It's got to be a fire exit for the old basement. Barton was always requiring extra holes and tunnels and vents.”

“I think the county fired him before the town decided to hang him,” Larry added.

The two firefighters shared a laugh.

“Well, God bless him!” Nate countered.

“Got that right.”

“Come on,” said Ian. “I'll show you what I can.” He started down the stairs and the others followed.

Algernon was on the cell phone in the Holy Roller, the Yellow Pages open in front of him. “Yes, that's right. Tricanol. It's an insecticide.” He stuck a finger in his ear to block out the ambulance sirens. “Check your lawn and garden department, and if they don't have it, check the paint department, particularly the wood preservatives. If you have it, bring it.” He hung up, somewhat satisfied, then picked up a glass jar containing live specimens, crawling and scratching against the glass. “Ah, me. Your beauty is in your terror.” He looked toward the school. “Be careful down there.”

Elisha rose slowly, ever so slowly, to her feet. There had to be a way out of here. She scanned the room, rotating slowly like a lighthouse. The spiders didn't seem to like it. She stopped moving until they calmed down. The door Norman had looked through wasn't an option; it was unreachable. Were there any other doorways or exits? It was so dark it was hard to tell without moving her light around, which meant she had to move her head.

She felt a tickle on her neck, and fear jolted up her spine.

Ian and Elijah led the way through a tunnel up to a steel door. The lock on the door had been broken long before and the door swung open easily. On the other side was a room of the old basement, cluttered with fallen steel and concrete.

Since he was wearing a protective suit, Elijah went in first, shining his light in every direction, looking for spiders. Carefully, they continued into the weird maze of rubble and scrap, ducking, sometimes crawling, eyes wide open for any dark spots or blotches that might move.

“See through there?” Ian asked, pointing down a narrow space between slabs of fallen concrete. “That's the way to the ritual chamber.”

“So how do we get to the furnace room?”

“I don't know.”

Elijah stopped and looked at him. “You don't know?”

Ian shrugged. “I've got a confession, too.”

“Yeah?”

“I knew about the old stairway under the Dumpster, but I don't know where this goes.”

“You don't—!”

“I've only used this passage to get to the ritual chamber. I haven't explored the rest of it.”

Nate came up behind them, followed by the firefighters. “Problem?”

“Not yet,” said Elijah.

They got moving again.

Elisha drew short little gasps of air, each one quavering with fear as she felt a tingle here, a rustle there, a tickle moving across her skin. They'd crawled up under her hood, she didn't know how many. Should she move? Should she stand still? A trickle of sweat ran down from her forehead, down her cheek. Her face shield was fogging up.

“Dear Jesus, please help me,” she prayed, barely moving her lips.

Wait. She heard something. Movement, some thumping and scraping. Voices muffled by earth, walls, and concrete.

She spoke into her radio. “Mom? I think I hear something.”

“Yes, honey,” her mom came back. “Your dad and brother are on their way in. They have some firemen with them—and Ian Snyder, too.”

Then she heard a muffled voice from above. “Elisha! Elisha!” Her dad.

She decided she would answer. She didn't know how loudly, but there was no way on earth she would remain silent. “Hello!” It was a weak little sound. She could hardly hear it herself. “Hello!” The spiders tensed. She could feel their legs gripping her skin
. I'm going to faint.

“Elisha!” Her mother's voice came to her over her radio.

She drew a breath and answered. “They're getting close, Mom. I can hear them above me.”

Then her dad came over the radio. “Call out to us, honey. Let us know where you are.”

She called out
almost
loudly. “I'm in here!”

She heard the voices somewhere above, muted, but growing stronger. “I heard her.” “Over this way.” “Look out! There goes one!”

This time her brother called, “Elisha!”

She called out boldly. “Help! I'm in here!”

Someone rattled the door above, the one Norman had used. It didn't open. “Okay, stand back,” a stranger said.

“No!” she cried. “Don't make a disturbance!”

BANG! CRUNCH!
The door flew open from the blow of a sledgehammer, slammed into the wall, then fell from its hinges and into the room. Spiders went scurrying outward as from an explosion. An old nail pinged off Elisha's head and she flinched.

She felt a bite on her shoulder and screamed.

Another bite, on her neck.

A warm feeling began to radiate through her skin. The poison moving.

13
veritas

N
ow the beams
from several flashlights began to sweep about the room, and that upset the spiders even more. There was no time to worry about care and caution. Elisha called out desperately, “Please get me out of here! The spiders are biting me!”