The Stone of Blood (49 page)

The days had become shorter now as the autumn leaves danced in the lively fall breeze; just as the cool brisk winds brought cold chills with em’ that could freeze you clear to the bone!

Normally, Mr. Roberts’s cows were kept in this barn. But they had been shipped to market a few weeks back, leavin’ only the smell of the manure and the shell of the old buildin’ …except for the rungs of tobacco that hung from its rafters and a few hay bales scattered here, there and yonder.

“So what you’re telling me is that this hole we’re diggin’, out here in your neighbor’s barn in secret and without him knowin’,
and
right out in broad daylight…” Colby stated as he sat down upon the ground with his legs dangling down into the hole and smilin’ about as big as his face could handle it. “…is because of ‘
werewolves
’ and that ‘
ghost
’ out there in y’alls barn?”

“Yep.” I answered as I stopped diggin’ and leaned against the shovels handle. “That’s what I’m sayin’.”

“Well then…this is just about as fun as
hell!
N
ow aint it?” Colby said as he lit up the end of a cigarette butt and exhaled its smoke!

“Colby!” I exclaimed. “Be careful with that!” I said as I reached out and grabbed the cigarette from his mouth and threw it down upon the ground and stomped it out! “We don’t want to burn the barn down!” And then I rolled my eyes at him. “And just exactly when was it that you started smokin’ anyways?”

“Well, just exactly
when
was it that you started seein’ that girl now, huh?” he answered. “Just when were you gonna let me in on
that
little secret?”

I just rolled my eyes at him again and started back to diggin’.

“Hey!” Colby exclaimed moments later after he’d given it some thought. “Does she got a sister?” He asked as he lit the end of another cigarette and ripped off another puff!

It hadn’t taken no whole lot of convincin’ to get Colby to come over and help me. All I had to do was to let him know that he was ‘
of great importance to the mission
’ and that ‘
I needed his expert leadership’
to make it work! What that
really
meant was that I needed him to help me dig, and to help keep a look out for anybody comin’! I don’t guess he’d thought much about that dream he’d had a couple of weeks ago about the cave. I just reckoned he’d forgotten about it!

Accordin’ to the farmer’s Almanac, the full moon was set to rise tonight … Friday, October 7th!

Now I don’t know how Colby got to come over and spend the night durin’ the middle of the week,
and
on a school night too! But like I’ve said, Colby was an
expert at sneakin’, spyin’ and gettin’ away with stuff! He just made it happen! Even if it didn’t make no sense at all!

And his sneaky plan on how we’d get away with skippin’ school had been successful too! His plan was that when the school bus come up the road and it was still dark outside and all, that me and him would walk down the road a piece and act like we were gonna catch it! Only we’d slip inside of Mr. Roberts’s red barn at the last moment instead! That way when the school bus driver Ms. Ferguson stopped, she would think we wasn’t ridin’ it; while my mama would think that we’d both just gotten on! Sometimes things just worked out better if you kept it simple!

You see, sneakin’ and stuff
wasn’t
somethin’ that I was very good at. Colby had to come up with the idea; I just had to make sure it was followed through on! I mean, I knew we’d have to skip school and all, but I hadn’t figured on just how we was gonna do it! I wasn’t no good at lyin’ none neither! Cause just about every time a lie started to rise up from out of my mouth, my heart would start to thumpin’ and I’d have to swallow it real hard! So I had to be real careful what I said.

I just found it better not say nothin’ or do
nothin’
that needed to be lied about.

“Now how is it Toby…?” Colby asked me. “…that you figure …that this here spot is
where
that thing you’re lookin’ for is buried?” Colby asked me as I wiped the sweat off my brow and looked up at him and scowled. “I mean, what if it’s over here instead?” He suggested as he stepped three spaces to his right. “And then, what if it’s over here or here, or over here?” he said as he moved from place to place and made fun of me. “I mean you could dig that hole, clear to
China
, and still miss it by a foot and a half!” Colby exclaimed as he stood there and folded his arms like he was proud of himself for thinkin’ it. “I mean, if it’s
even
there!”

Colby was kinda smart about things when he put his mind to it and didn’t act so stupid! So that’s when I told him about how I’d seen Mr. Roberts walkin’ around his place the other day, lookin’ for arrow heads and old coins and stuff like that. And about how he was usin’ a metal detector that let him see where the stuff was, way down deep in the ground! And well, the long and the short of it was that he’d let me borrow it!

I’d been honest with Mr. Roberts! I’d told him that I believed there was a treasure buried beneath this old barn! And he listened to me too! And when I’d finished tellin’ him my story, he smiled at me and he told me that ‘
I could dig all the holes that I wanted to out there in his barn! As long as I filled em’ back in when I was done!
’ And then he went on to tell me that ‘
anything that I found in his barn, like buried treasure or whatever…’
he said that,
‘I could keep!
’ So that’s how I knew to start diggin’ there, right there in that
spot.
C
ause right under that
spot
was where
I’d seen the shadow; the long darkened shadow shaped like a coffin.

“Toby!” Cricket yelled as she snuck up from behind me and wrapped her arms around me tightly standin’ down in the hole. “I missed you!” She whispered as she gave me a quick kiss on the back of my neck. And then I whispered back that I’d missed her too!

“Get a room!” Colby jeered as he lit up another cigarette.

“You’re just jealous!” Cricket chided as she hugged me again quickly and then jumped up on the ground where Colby was sittin’ and sat with her feet hangin’ down into the hole as well.

“How’s Ms. Lillie?” I asked her. “Is she doin’ Okay?”

“She’s doin’ alright.” Cricket answered. “She told me to tell you that she was praying for you.”

Cricket hadn’t been to school all week. And I’d really missed her! She’d come by the house yesterday and I’d introduced her to Colby. But after that she’d run off again to Ms. Lillie’s house. That’s where she’d been stayin’. I reckoned that …what had happened with
Lucian
had scared her somethin’ awful, so she’d decided to stay over there with Ms. Lillie for a few days.

“It’ll all work out.” I said to console her. “You’ll see.” And then I returned to my diggin’.

The hours passed by quickly as me and Colby took our turns at diggin’, and as Cricket kept a look out. Almost five feet of earth had been removed from that hole, but we still hadn’t found nothin’! And e
ven I
had begun to wonder if this was the right spot!

Clunk!

The sound resounded and vibrated through the handle as my shovel struck the wood!

“Hey!” I said excitedly. “I think we’ve found it! I’ve just hit somethin’!”

I knelt down and scooted away the dirt from the wooden lid with my hands. And Colby and Cricket jumped down in the hole beside me! And all three of us scraped away and scooped away at the dirt!

“Stand back!” I said. “Ya’ll jump out for a minute. I’m gonna open it up!” Colby and Cricket hopped up out of the hole and stood and watched as I reached down …and let go the latch that sealed the coffin!

“Hey! Wait a minute Toby! Wait!” Colby shouted as he held up his hands and ran to the other side of the barn. “Listen! I hear the bus coming!” He shouted again as he looked outside through the slats between the boards. “It’s already time for the bus to let out! Toby, we’ve gotta go! Or your mom will find out we skipped school! We’ve gotta go play like we’ve just got home!”

This was definitely Colby’s area of expertise! I was so glad that he’d been paying attention!

“Come with us Cricket!” I urged her. “You can come over and have some supper with us.”

“Okay.” She answered as she nudged me like she was sayin’ thanks.

We put our tools down deep into the hole and we scooted a couple of hay bales over top of it that lay by one of the walls of the barn. And then we hurriedly exited the barn and walked up the road just as the school bus passed. That way it looked like we’d just gotten off of it!

“
We were just like the Three Musketeers
…” I thought. “…
Colby, Cricket and me. Only one of the Musketeers was a girl! And she was the one I liked!
”

Mama said that she didn’t mind havin’ another mouth to feed at the table when I told her I’d invited Cricket to supper. And she’d told me that she ‘
thought the world of her
’ and that it was ‘
okay with her if she comes over anytime, as long as she knew she was comin’ and I kept my door open upstairs!
’ And I guessed that was okay with me since we were mostly outside when she’d come over anyways.

My dad liked Cricket too! And he kidded with her and stuff. Girls usually liked my dad cause they thought he was handsome. And I didn’t mind that none as long as they understood that
he
was where
I got my looks from!
I mean …like father like son, you know?

Well anyways, we ate our supper and we did our visitin’ and we rested up for a while afterwards cause of all that diggin’ we’d done.

And no one suspected at all that we’d skipped school!

When the clock struck seven and the darkness had begun to fall, we started back out again for Mr. Roberts’s red barn.

“Now, don’t ya’ll stay out too late now!” My mama told us. “Toby, we’ll leave the back door light on and the door unlocked, cause we’ll probably be going to bed soon. Okay?”

“Okay Mom.” I answered.

“Good night Mrs. McAnully.” Cricket said. “Thank you for being so nice.”