"A what?" Johnny had never heard this strange word before.
The professor was astonished. He knew that Johnny read a lot, and so—unreasonably—he thought that Johnny ought to know all sorts of obscure things. "You don't—well, I never! All righty then—this is what a ushabti is." The professor paused and laid the figurine down on the desk. He stubbed out his cigarette, shoved his chair away from the desk, folded his hands in his lap, and stared dreamily up at the ceiling. "First," he said, "you ought to know that the ancient Egyptians thought the next world—the place you go when you die—would be a lot like this world. And so in the next world people would have work to do. Plowing and sowing, carrying water up from the river, making bricks out of clay—stuff like that. Well, to the Egyptians it didn't seem right that the pharaoh would have to do work in the next world. It would be... well, it would sort of be like making the President of the United States polish his own car. So the Egyptians made these little dolls called ushabti, and they were supposed to do the work for the pharaoh in the next world. Sometimes they put whole armies of these ushabtis in the tombs with the pharaohs. They come in all shapes and sizes: sometimes they look like dolls, and sometimes they're just miniature mummies, like this one here. The guy who designed this souvenir must have seen a ushabti in a museum, and he must have copied it. But this is a souvenir and nothing else. I'm sorry to disappoint you, but I'm afraid that's the case."
As Johnny listened to what the professor was saying he found that he was struggling to find some way of proving that the figurine was really magic after all. Johnny was a stubborn kid about the things he believed. He did not give up easily. "But, Professor," he said plaintively, "what about Father Baart and the wood-carver and all that stuff? People always said that the wood-carver gave Father Baart something magic, didn't they? And there's that piece of paper there, with Father Baart's handwriting on it, isn't there? What about that?"
The professor turned to Johnny. There was a sheepish, sad look on his face. "I'm afraid, my boy," he said, "that I started all this business by telling you that ghost story. I'm terribly sorry—I deserve to be punched! The trouble with me is, I love to tell stories, and I like to make them seem as realistic as possible. Now, it is true that several people have claimed that they saw Father Baart's ghost in the church. And for all I know they may really think that they did see him. Personally I don't believe in ghosts, except when I'm telling ghost stories. As for this scroll here"—he tapped the paper with his finger—"it is Father Baart's handwriting—that much I can tell you. I used to be the official historian of St. Michael's Church, and so I know about things like that. But what does this prove? Not much. The whole business with the book, the figurine, and the warning note may have been Baart's idea of a joke. Or he may have been serious. He may have thought this silly statue was really enchanted. Who knows?"
Johnny hung his head. "Is it all a fake, then? The whole darned story? Did you make it all up?"
The professor shook his head vigorously. "Oh, goodness, no! Most of the details in the story I told were true. Mr. Herman and Mrs. Mumaw really did get killed, and Father Baart really did disappear. But the two deaths were just a coincidence, and I don't think there was anything supernatural about Baart's disappearance. Baart was insane, and he probably had some insane reason for wanting to disappear. As for the note that was found on his desk, he probably wrote it himself. It's easy enough to disguise your handwriting if you want to do that sort of thing."
The professor paused and flicked the ash off his cigarette. He gave Johnny a hangdog, guilty look. "I'm sorry to pull the rug out from under you this way, John," he said in a low voice. "Next time I'll think twice before I tell a ghost story. But please don't think that this blue doojigger is magic—it isn't!"
Johnny sighed. He wanted to be mad at the professor, but he just couldn't manage it. In spite of his lousy temper, in spite of his love of making up things, the professor was really a nice guy. Johnny could tell that, and he felt that he could forgive the old man for having told a few white lies.
At this point the professor glanced at his watch. He said that he had papers to grade and that he was going to have to chase Johnny out of the house.
"However," the professor added, grinning slyly, "I would like to issue an invitation: This evening, after dinner, how would you like to come over for a game of chess and a piece of chocolate cake? I play a superlative game of chess, and the cakes I make are also excellent. How about it? Are you interested?"
Johnny nodded and grinned. He loved to play chess, but right now he didn't have a partner. Grampa's game was checkers, and sometimes Johnny got very bored with it. And he was nuts about chocolate cake with chocolate frosting. So it was decided: Johnny would come back after dinner and have dessert. But before he went, he had one more question.
"What should I do about this stuff?" he said, pointing to the book and the two objects that lay inside it. "Do you think I should try and take it all back?"
The professor thought a bit. He drummed his fingers on the desk top, and he puffed at his black and gold cigarette. "I definitely think," he said at last, "that you should not take these things back. In the first place, if Father Higgins or Mr. Famagusta caught you in the basement of the church, there'd be hell to pay. And in the second place, it occurs to me that the blue figurine may be valuable. People collect things, you know. They collect salt shakers and medicine bottles and old flatirons and buttonhooks. The figurine is only a souvenir, but it's an old souvenir—sixty years old, or more. I think you should write to Hobbies magazine and find out if your doohickey is worth something. In the meantime, however, if I were you, I'd keep the thing hidden. If your Gramma sees it, she'll ask where it came from, and then where would you be? Just take it back and put it in your closet. First, though, you'd better make sure the coast is clear. Come on. I'll go down with you and check."
Johnny took the book in his arms and followed the professor downstairs. At the front door they stopped, and the professor peered cautiously out.
"Good!" he said, nodding. "They're not back yet. You'd better get while the getting is good. Bon voyage! And don't forget about our chocolate cake date tonight!"
"I won't," said Johnny, grinning. "G'bye!"
While the professor held the door for him Johnny raced across the street. Into the house he went, and up the stairs to his room. Once again he put the old black book in the bottom of his closet. Again he piled stuff on top of it. Then he closed the closet door and went across the hall to wash his hands, which were dirty from handling the book.
That evening at dinner, just as Gramma was about to serve dessert, Johnny announced that he had been invited over to the professor's house for cake and a chess game. He announced this shyly and hesitantly, because he didn't know what Gramma's reaction would be. Grampa was a pretty easygoing sort—he usually let Johnny do what he wanted to do. But Gramma was more strict, and she didn't like the professor much. Furthermore she was proud of her desserts—Johnny didn't want to hurt her feelings or make her angry.
But all Gramma said was "Humph! I guess it's all right." And she added, in a disparaging tone, "I didn't know he baked cakes." Gramma had lived across the street from Professor Childermass for twenty years, but there were a lot of things she didn't know about him.
Johnny excused himself and went across the street. He had a great time that evening. The professor was a crafty and merciless chess player. He was every bit as good as Johnny was, and maybe even a bit better. As for the cake... well, Johnny had theories about chocolate cake. He felt that the cake part of the cake was just an interruption between the layers of frosting. As it turned out, the professor's opinions about cake were similar to Johnny's. The cakes he served had three or four thin layers, and the rest was a huge amount of good, dark, thick fudgy frosting. And he served second helpings too.
Around ten o'clock that night Johnny said good-bye to the professor and started across the street toward his house. He paused on the curb for a minute or two to look
around. It was a beautiful cold winter night. Icicles hung from all the houses, and they glimmered gray in the moonlight. Snowdrifts lay everywhere. In the street were ridges of ice, knotted and iron-hard. Johnny blew out his cloudy breath and felt contented. He had made a new friend, he was stuffed with chocolate cake, and he had won one of the three chess games they had played. Once more he looked around, and then he stepped forward into the street. As he stepped he happened to glance to his left, and he stopped dead.
There was somebody standing across the street, watching him.
Johnny stared. Who was it? He couldn't tell. All he could see was a short, stocky figure standing in front of Mrs. Kovacs's house.
"Hi!" called Johnny, waving.
No answer. The figure did not move.
Oh, well, thought Johnny, it's probably Mr. Swart-out. Mr. Swartout was a creepy little man who lived at the end of the street. He never said anything to anybody —wouldn't give you the time if you asked him for it.
Shrugging, Johnny walked straight on across the street and into his house. Later, upstairs, when he was in his pajamas and getting ready to climb into bed, Johnny looked out the window. His bedroom was at the front of the house. From it you could get a good view of the whole length of Fillmore Street. He looked toward the place where the figure had been standing, but there was no one there. For some reason Johnny felt relieved. Then he peeked at the moon, which was silvering the shingles of the professor's house. Johnny yawned and climbed into bed, and very soon he was asleep.
CHAPTER FIVE
In the weeks that followed, Johnny and the professor became friends. It was an odd kind of friendship, the old man and the twelve-year-old boy. But the friendship worked. Johnny was a shy kid. He did not feel at home with very many people. But he felt comfortable talking with the professor. At chess they were pretty evenly matched: Johnny won about half the games they played. As for the professor's famous temper... well, he didn't use it around Johnny. He crabbed now and then, but he crabbed in a humorous and kidding way, so that Johnny always knew he was not being serious. Gramma —as you might guess—did not know what to make of the friendship that had developed between these two. She herself did not care much for the professor's company, but she didn't have anything serious against him, so she just sighed and shook her head and said many times that it takes all kinds to make a world.
The blue figurine stayed in its box in Johnny's closet. One afternoon when he was on his way home from school, Johnny took a detour and stopped in at the library. He went to the reading room and picked up a copy of Hobbies magazine. As the professor had said, it was a magazine for antique collectors. It was full of information about mechanical banks and oil lamps and bisque figurines and Toby jugs and Simon Willard clocks. And on one page there was a question and answer column. Johnny sat down and copied the address of the magazine into a notebook he was carrying. Later, when he was back at home, he went up to his room and got out his Royal portable typewriter. He set it up on his bed, and kneeling in front of it, he pecked out a note:
Dear Sirs:
I own a blue statue shaped like an Egyptian mummy. It is old and the label on the bottom says SOUVENIR OF CAIRO, ILLINOIS. I wonder if this statue is valuable.
Sincerely,
John Dixon
23 Fillmore St. Duston Heights, Mass.
P.S.: Do not send a reply to my home. I will go to the library in the coming months to read your magazine and see if you have answered my query.
Johnny folded this note up neatly, put it in an envelope, and printed the Hobbies magazine address on the outside. He slapped on a stamp and put the letter in his briefcase, and the next day, on his way to school, he dropped the letter into a mailbox. And he thought about how nice it would be if the blue gizmo turned out to be worth fifty thousand dollars or something like that.
March was a wintry month in Massachusetts that year. Sea gales battered the town, and the snow stayed on the ground. Life went on in its usual routine for Johnny, for a while. But in the middle of March some rather odd things started to happen.
First there was the problem of the spiders. One day Johnny came home from school and found Gramma down on her knees on the parlor floor. She had a spray gun in her hands, and she was squirting insect spray along the baseboard. She looked upset.
"Hi, Gramma!" said Johnny. He threw his books onto the couch and walked over to get a closer look at what his grandmother was doing. "Whatcha doin', huh?"
Gramma glowered. She hated stupid questions. "What does it look like I'm doin', huh? I'm sprayin' away like crazy with this Black Flag insect stuff, on account of the house is full of spiders! Spiders! Can you imagine it, in the middle of winter?"
Johnny wanted to point out that it was not exactly the middle of winter but more like the end of it. But Gramma didn't like being corrected, so he said nothing.
He watched for a few minutes as she shuffled along on her knees, spraying as she went.
"I haven't seen any spiders," said Johnny after a while. "What kind are they?"
"Those rotten little gray ones," Gramma grumbled. "And if you haven't seen 'em, you must be goin' blind! Go out in the kitchen and have yourself a look. You'll be lucky if they don't carry you away with 'em. Spiders in winter! Lord! Where do you suppose they can be living?"
Johnny went out to the kitchen and looked. Sure enough, scooting here and there over the floor were small gray spiders. They were like the spiders he had seen crawling over the black book. Johnny felt an odd, queasy stirring of fear in his stomach. Quickly he told himself that he should not let his imagination run wild. These were just spiders and nothing more. And to prove this to himself he put out his foot and crushed one.
The spider invasion lasted several days. Then, mysteriously, they disappeared. Gramma was convinced the Black Flag spray had done its work. Johnny was not so sure.
One windy night toward the end of March Johnny went to the movies by himself. He went to see a spooky show called The Ghost Returns. By the time he got out of the theater, he was in a pretty nervous state. And as he made his way along the dark deserted streets toward home he began to get the feeling that someone was following him.
This is a maddening and frightening feeling, as everyone knows. Johnny kept telling himself that it was all in his mind, but still, as he walked from streetlight to streetlight, he found his fear growing. Once or twice he stopped suddenly and spun quickly around, but there was never anyone there.
When he got home, Johnny was somewhat taken aback to find that the house was dark. A note was taped to the window of the front door:
Gone next door to visit. Home later. Key under mat. Gramma and Grampa
Johnny got out the key and let himself in. He was determined to shake off the nervous, frightened feeling that had come over him. First he turned on some lights. Then he marched straight out to the kitchen and got the pimiento-flavored cream cheese and the crackers. Then he went to the parlor, planted himself in the bristly brown chair, turned on the radio, and sat back to listen and munch. It wasn't a spooky show. It was Camel Caravan, a musical program that did the hit tunes of the week. Vaughn Monroe was on it, and some other singers that Johnny liked. Nevertheless, as he listened Johnny found his nervousness returning. He kept glancing toward the dark doorway of the room, but the doorway was always empty.
At ten o'clock Gramma and Grampa came home, and Johnny was very glad to see them. Gramma went straight up to bed. Grampa hung around downstairs to talk with Johnny for a while. But he was pretty pooped, so he did not stay very long. After a few minutes he too went to bed, and Johnny decided that it was pretty lonely sitting around downstairs. Wearily he climbed the steps. He washed up and brushed his teeth and put on his pajamas. Then he jumped into bed and pulled up the covers. Almost immediately he went to sleep. And he had a very odd dream.
He dreamed that he was back in Riverhead, walking down Main Street late at night. He was headed for the United Cigar Store. In real life Johnny had gone to the United Cigar Stor
e many, many times. He had bought his first deck of Bicycle playing cards there, and he had picked up other things too. Odd trinkets like a ball-and-cup magic trick, a Chinese puzzle, a dribble glass, a joy buzzer. Now, in the dream, he was going to the United Cigar Store again, though he really didn't know why. He passed the Sunoco station, and then he was there. But what had happened to the store? Over the big red-and-white United Cigar sign a weathered wooden slab had been hung. The letters on the slab said:
R. BAART - ANTIQUES AND CURIOS
In the midst of life, we are in death.
Johnny looked up at the sign. It wasn't the sort of sign you usually saw, even on antique stores. But there was a light on inside, and for some reason Johnny wanted very much to go in. As he started up the steps he glanced at one of the display windows and noticed that the pipes and fishing reels and Kodak cameras were gone. Instead the bottom part of the window was full of grayish sand, and from the sand little blue mummy figurines stuck out. Each one had a grinning skull for a face.
Johnny opened the door and went in. The shop was dusty and disorderly. Gray spiders scurried across the floor. There was a heap of broken furniture in the back, and the only light came from a bare bulb that hung from a frayed black cord. There was a counter, with a display case below, but the windows of the display case were so flyspecked and dirty that Johnny couldn't see what was inside. Behind the counter stood the proprietor of the shop. She was an old lady, in a shapeless gray sack of a dress. She wore a large green eyeshade that covered the top half of her face.
"Can I help you, young man?" The voice was horrible and croaking.
The Curse of the Blue Figurine Page 4