The Black Tower (7 page)

“Except to the man who fell,” Herculeah said, “and his family”

Mrs. Mac didn't care for the comment. “No good can come from that tower or that house. You stay away from that place, Albert.” She turned the key and started the car.

“He has to come, Mrs. Mac,” Herculeah told the back of her head. “It wouldn't be any fun without him.”

Meat looked at her in amazement. Fun? Hunt House was fun? He read the answer in her face. She thought it was fun, like something in an amusement park where no danger is real.

As if the matter was settled Herculeah said, “Here's what we've got to do tomorrow. Something was thrown at you from the tower, and it wasn't a stone.”

“ No.”

“And,” Herculeah continued, “I don't think it was anything that would have done you harm. I think the old woman was trying to tell you something or warn you of something.”

“Why me?”

“Maybe because she needed someone and you were there. We're getting close. Whatever fell from the tower is the answer to the mystery. We've got to find it.”

Mrs. McMannis glanced at Herculeah in the rearview mirror and smiled sweetly. Herculeh never trusted Mrs. Mac when she smiled like that.

“Oh, Albert won't be able to go with you tomorrow.”

Herculeah said quickly, “You don't have to worry about him, Mrs. Mac, I'll be with him every second.”

“No, I won't worry about him.” Now her smile changed as she looked at Meat, but Herculeah didn't trust that smile, either. “Albert, guess who called this afternoon. And it wasn't Steffie.”

Now she looked at Herculeah. They were stopped at a red light now, so Meat's mom was free to smile triumphantly without causing a wreck. “I'm not sure you remember Steffie, Herculeah. She's that girl that was visiting and was so crazy about Albert.”

“I remember Steffie.”

“Anyway, it wasn't Steffie this time. Albert, it was your dad. You need to stay home tomorrow so you won't miss the call.”

The light changed. The car moved forward, but the three people inside had nothing more to say.

Herculeah took out her granny glasses. She put them on, hooking the thin metal wires behind her ears.

Herculeah had gotten these glasses at Hidden Treasures, a secondhand store where she often shopped. Herculeah bought some of her clothes there, and other useful things. Once when she had been in Hidden Treasures, she had tried on these glasses. She couldn't see anything out of them, but she discovered she could think better. The world seemed to blur into a mist, making her ideas stand out. “It's like being in a think cocoon,” she had explained to Meat.

She was sitting on her bed, waiting for her thoughts to clear when her mother came and stood in the doorway.

“Have you got on those ridiculous glasses again?” her mother said. “You're going to ruin your eyes.”

Herculeah couldn't see her mom, but she knew she was there. She pushed the glasses to the top of her head.

“Hi, Mom.”

“So what was the phone message about? Why did you need me to come pick you up?”

“Oh, that. I meant to erase it. Meat's mom came and got us. It was nothing. Meat fainted.”

“Fainted?”

“Oh, Mom, he faints all the time.”

“I didn't know that. So what was the excitement you mentioned?”

“Meat was standing out in the yard and someone threw something out of the tower window, and Meat got dizzy watching it and fainted. End of story.”

Herculeah sincerely hoped it was.

“Someone was in the tower?”

“Yes, the sister.”

“I thought it was locked.”

“The new nurse said there are keys if you know where to look.”

“How would she know that? The woman's only been there one day.”

“Good question.”

“I'll have to talk to the lawyer. There's been enough tragedy connected with that tower.”

“I know. Meat's mom told us. Someone threw a stone from the tower and killed the governess.” She eyed her mother, pretending to be critical. “You could take some lessons from Mrs. Mac.”

Her mom knew Herculeah's opinion of Mrs. Mac. She smiled. “How so?”

“She tells us things. For example, if she knew what you were working on for Mr. Hunt, she would tell us. She doesn't treat everything as a big secret.”

Her mom seemed to think that over. “Mr. Randolph, the lawyer, was drawing up a will for Mr. Hunt. This was before his stroke, and he wanted some investigative work done. He contacted me. I was to find the other sister. That was the extent of my involvement, but I became interested in the old man. I felt sorry for him. I used to drop in and see him from time to time.”

“This sister you were going to find. It's not the old crazy one who left the message on your machine.”

“No. There were younger sisters—twins. Only one of them is alive now, and that was who I was to find.”

Herculeah had her mom talking now, and she didn't want her to stop. “Everybody says there's money hidden in the house—even Nurse Wegman. By the way, I don't trust her. She's weird.”

“Mr. Randolph hired the nurses himself. They're the same team that nursed his invalid mother, so you don't have to worry about them.”

“So is there money hidden in the house?”

“I hope you haven't been poking around the house looking for it.”

“Of course not. Give me some credit. I'm smarter than that.”

“Too smart sometimes.” Her mother changed the subject. “Did you get supper?”

“I ordered pizza. There's some left if you want it.”

“I grabbed a bite on the way home. Incidentally, I'll be leaving early in the morning.”

“Don't work too hard.”

“I won't.”

She left and Herculeah put her granny glasses on again. “Think,” she told her brain. “Think about what could have been thrown from the tower. What could have sprouted wings? What—?”

Before her brain had a chance to work, the phone rang. “I'll get it, Mom, it's probably Meat.

“Oh, hi, Meat,” she said, “I was hoping it was you. Also, I'm hoping that you'll go to Hunt House with me tomorrow. It won't be any fun without you.”

“Didn't you hear what Mom said in the car? My dad's going to call.”

“I heard, but if he calls early ...”

“Maybe.”

“Don't you want to find out what was thrown at you?”

“I guess.”

“Remember that old song ‘Blowin' in the Wind'?” She tried to make her voice mysterious so he would be interested.

“Yes.”

“Well, something was blowin' in the wind at Hunt House.”

“And you're going to find out what it was.”

“I've got to.”

“Call me when you get back.”

“I will. Maybe I'll call before I go—try to change your mind. I gotta go now. Good night, Meat.”

“Good night.”

Herculeah sighed. Maybe she could compete with a phone call from an airhead like Steffie, but not a call from Macho Man. She adjusted her granny glasses and waited, hoping to get an idea of what had been blowin' in the wind.

This was the first time Herculeah had come to Hunt House without Meat at her side. She missed him. Being with Meat always made her feel she had to be brave and protective. She didn't want anything to happen to him. And she knew she was going to have to be especially brave today.

The night before, when her mom came in to say a final good night, she had said, “I'd rather you didn't go back to Hunt House to read to Mr. Hunt.”

“Mom!” “At least not until I've had a chance to talk to Mr. Randolph about the situation.”

“Mom!”

“And I'll do that tomorrow. Good night, Herculeah.”

Her mother had not, Herculeah reminded herself, said, “I forbid you to go to Hunt House.” She had said, “I'd rather you didn't go back to Hunt House to read to Mr. Hunt.” And she wasn't going to read. She wasn't even going into the house. She was going to clear up a mystery.

The house came into view, and Herculeah had to admit that the house did have a face, and not a welcoming one. She paused inside the open gate. Which was not welcoming, either. It was rather like a Venus flytrap, open to lure in the unwary. See, she told herself, if Meat were here and said something like that, I would make a joke of it.

She continued up the drive to the house.

The day matched her mood—gloomy. The gray arch of the sky overhead was lower today. She felt she could almost reach up and touch the dark patches of clouds.

“It's going to rain,” she told herself. Hurrying, she left the gate behind and, as if on cue, something hit the dry ground at her feet. It hit with such a sharp sound that Herculeah thought at first of a bullet.

She glanced down. A raindrop. She smiled at herself.

Meat, I could really use you, she said to herself. This house is getting to me.

The single raindrop was followed by a smattering of them. Herculeah crossed the drive quickly and took shelter in a grove of trees.

She paused. She hadn't heard thunder or seen any lightning, so it didn't seem reckless or unsafe to wait for a few minutes under the trees.

As she waited, she moved slowly toward the tower, keeping under the protective branches. She felt an odd tingling as she got closer. It was as if she were moving not just closer to the tower but to the solution of its mystery.

And there was a mystery.

She turned her eyes from the tower to the house. There were no signs of life around Hunt House today. There were no lights in the windows, no smoke in the chimney. It reminded Herculeah of the vacation houses at the beach that had been closed for the winter.

Herculeah continued to move closer. Now she could see the very spot where Meat had stood when he had seen something coming toward him from the tower, the exact spot where his body had lain after he had fainted.

Her eyes narrowed in concentration. She began to calculate distances.

But wait a minute, she cautioned herself. Meat had said something about wind. He'd told her that a sudden gust of wind had come up and sent the missile straight toward him.

But nothing had touched him. So whatever it was had to have been carried farther by the wind. Perhaps it had gone over his head.

Her gaze swept over the ground behind where Meat had fallen.

And, she remembered, the missile had been light. It was not stone; Herculeah was sure of that. So if something light was thrown from the tower—a ball of fabric or a balled-up garment, and this ball became unfolded or unwrapped by the wind in the process, well it might have looked like it sprouted wings, as Meat described....

Her thoughts were going so well, Herculeah thought it was as if she had on her granny glasses.

And, her thoughts raced, if this something came unwrapped and was caught by the wind, then it could have gone much, much farther than she had thought.

She began to retrace her steps, keeping close to the trees. The brief rain had stopped, but she somehow sensed that she still needed the protection of the trees.

She glanced at the house. There was still no sign of life there. These grounds had once been tended and cared for. This had been a beautiful lawn with birdbaths and statues. She came to an overgrown clearing.

In the center of the clearing she could see the ruins of an old fountain. Stones had fallen from the sides. The statue that had once graced the center of the fountain had fallen on its side.

There! She saw what she had been looking for.

It was a brown, stone-colored bundle blown against the fallen statue. It was so much the color of the statue that it was as if it had been deliberately camouflaged.

She approached carefully, looking over her shoulder at the house. No one seemed to be watching, so she bent and picked up the bundle.

It was a large piece of fabric, a garment of some kind, slightly damp now from the recent rain shower. She gathered it up and moved back into the shelter of the trees.

She unfolded the garment and held it up. It was a coat. It was one of those practical all-purpose coats that Herculeah's mother was always after her to buy.

She drew in her breath and peered closer. There were dark stains on the fabric. Brown stains. And Herculeah knew instantly what the stains were.

Blood.

Herculeah felt an instant and deep concern for the owner of this coat. And, at the same time, she felt a deep determination to find out what had happened to the owner.

The belt of the coat hung loosely to the ground. She ran her fingers over it thoughtfully as if seeking a clue.

She realized that if the raincoat had been wrapped and tied with the belt before being thrown from the tower, it would look exactly as Meat had described it. First it would appear to be round, even a stone, and then as it unfolded and was blown by the wind it might seem to have wings.

But whose coat was it?

She held it against her, checking the size. It was a small coat, too small to fit her. And way too small for Nurse Wegman.

She eyed it. And it couldn't belong to the sister. She hadn't been out of the house for fifty years. The style of clothing she wore was so old that even Hidden Treasures wouldn't carry it.

She patted the pockets.

Yes! Now at last she would learn something about the owner of the coat. What people kept in their pockets was often revealing.