Mystery of the Sassafras Chair

by Alexander Key

  “Yep. He’s been out searchin’ near every night. Sammy, he’s pigheaded. I figger he’s fool enough to think it was Nathaniel’s box I throwed from the truck when Gatlin was after me, an’ that it ain’t never been found.”

  Timor considered this a moment, then shook his head. “Mr. Pendergrass, I think you’re wrong about Sammy. But first, what was it you threw out of the truck?”

  Old Wiley looked uncomfortable. “Pshaw, Timmy, it was just my cough medicine.”

  “Your cough medicine!”

  “Yep. My cough was bad that night, so I took the medicine along in a little glass jar, but I couldn’t afford to have them deputies catch me with it. You see, it come out of one o’ Joey’s jugs.”

  “Oh!” Timor almost burst out laughing. Finally he said thoughtfully, “Mr. Pendergrass, if Sammy was sneaking around the back of Nathaniel’s place that night, he’d know very well you didn’t take the box. What’s more, if he didn’t take it himself, he—he’d be bound to know who did. So, what is it he keeps looking for along the road?”

  Wiley gaped at him. “Blessed if I know. If the box got lost on the road somehow, you’d think Gatlin would be lookin’ for it too. But Gatlin ain’t never been out searchin’. By Dooley, I know I ain’t figgered him wrong—but I sure done some wrong figgerin’ somewhere.”

  The old man sat scowling a moment while he slowly pounded one fist against the chair arm. Abruptly he said, “Time’s passin’. I better start trackin’ this down fast, while I still got my juice an’ cackle.” He stood up, started to fade, then clutched the chair again. “Timmy, don’t stay here tonight. Go back to your uncle’s—it’d be a heap better, an’ you don’t want folks to worry.”

  “But—”

  “Do like I say. But before you go, you’d better hide the chair.”

  “Hide it? You really think—”

  “You’re tootin’ right I think it better be hidden. Joey, he ain’t the only person scared of it by now. The word’s out that you got a talkin’ chair that tells secrets, an’ there’s plenty folks with a bad conscience would like to take an ax to it. By mornin’ there’ll be some of ’em lookin’ for it here.”

  “Do you think it’ll be safe in your barn?”

  “Nope. Put it in them bushes behind my spring. You’ll need a flashlight—there oughta be one in the table drawer. An’, Timmy, you be mighty careful goin’ home. Don’t let nobody see you …”

  Wiley faded suddenly away.

  9

  Sammy

  FOR A MOMENT after Wiley had gone, Timor stood blinking unhappily at the chair. He suddenly dreaded the hours ahead. Return and stay at his uncle’s place? No, he couldn’t face the colonel again, at least not tonight. Yet the search party ought to be stopped. He must slip back and manage somehow to see Odessa.

  But first the chair must be hidden.

  Hurriedly he began to dress. His shirt was still too damp to wear; after a quick search in the cupboard he found a clean one of Wiley’s, and an old jacket which he drew on over it. The jacket swaddled him, though it was comfortable enough with the sleeves rolled up.

  The flashlight was in the table drawer. He tested it and found that the battery was still good. Unbarring the back door, he opened it cautiously and stood listening to the night; finally he carried the chair into the shed and closed the door behind him.

  Wiley’s spring lay several hundred feet away, on the slope behind the tumbledown barn that had not been used in years. With the chair balanced over his head, Timor set out warily through the dark, following the overgrown path leading to the barn. Every movement of the light brought the shapes of twisted trees leaping into view, and unpleasant shadows that seemed to crawl threateningly all about him. Fearful that the light might attract attention, he kept it at an angle and began using it sparingly. Near the barn he paused. The path here was muddy from the rain. Mindful of telltale footprints, he circled away from the barn and kept to the woods until he reached the slope. He found the spring at last, and carefully thrust the chair into the rhododendron thicket above it.

  Relieved, yet missing the comfort that the chair somehow gave him, he retraced his steps to the path. A few yards from the cabin he stopped, wondering which would be the best route to his uncle’s place.

  Directly on his right, winding through the blackness on this side of the creek, lay the old wagon trail, now overgrown with small trees. It was the way he had usually taken when visiting Wiley, and it would hardly be overlooked by anyone searching for him. Maybe it would be safer to cross the footbridge and use the road on the other side. He would have to hide from cars, but he doubted that anyone would be watching for him in that direction.

  Timor had reached the little bridge spanning the creek when he remembered that he had left Wiley’s lamp burning on the table, and the back door unbarred.

  He turned back, hurried through the shed, entered the rear door and slid the bar in place. To leave, he would have to use the front door, and manipulate the bar on the outside by means of the wire hook and a second thong.

  Timor found the hook, blew out the lamp, and unbarred the front door. He was on the point of leaving when he thought of the blanket he had used earlier. He slipped the hook and flashlight into his jacket pocket, rolled up the blanket quickly, and threw it across his shoulder as he headed for the door.

  Too late he heard the stealthy tread on the front porch. He leaped for the bar, but a heavy hand thrust the door open in his face.

  Timor staggered backward, staring with sudden terror at the hulking figure that nearly filled the doorway. In the dim red glow from the fire the broad face under the cap was hardly recognizable as belonging to Sammy Grosser.

  “W-what do you want.?” Timor stammered.

  Sammy did not answer immediately. He moved inside, kicking the door closed behind him; his mouth worked soundlessly as his little eyes darted about the shadowed room. There were several chairs in the cabin, two of them graceful ladderbacks Wiley had made. Sammy’s gaze fastened on one, newer than the other.

  “Is that it?” he demanded, his voice oddly tight and hoarse. Without waiting for a reply he snatched up the chair, raised it high and smashed it against the floor. Then he leaped upon it, stamping it to pieces under his boots. Breathing rapidly, he backed away from the wreckage, a look of almost frightened satisfaction twisting his features.

  Timor glared at him, shaking with sudden fury and disgust. “You—you’ve no right to destroy other people’s things!” he burst out.

  “You’d kill a snake, wouldn’t you?” Sammy muttered. “That thing’s worse’n a snake, but it won’t be tellin’ no more tales!”

  “What are you so afraid of?” Timor cried angrily. “Did you rob Nathaniel?”

  “No, I never robbed ’im! Who says I did?”

  “You were seen there that night.”

  Sammy glowered at him, and licked his lips. “Who says he seen me?”

  But the moment the words were out he gulped, and fright widened his little eyes. “Honest,” he pleaded. “I can’t help what W-wiley told you, but I swear I never took that box! I swear it!”

  “But you wanted it, and you know who did take it,” Timor insisted. “And you know it wasn’t Wiley.”

  Sammy swallowed again, but he refused to speak.

  Timor found himself asking, “Does the man who took it know what you’ve been doing every night? You—you’ve been seen out along the road, searching …”

  “No—no!” Sammy backed away, badly shaken. His foot touched a splintered slat from the broken chair and he kicked at it savagely. The slat flew across the hearth into the glowing coals. As it caught fire he stared at it in a sort of horror, as if suddenly realizing the enormity of allowing this particular bit of wood to burn. Abruptly he lunged to the fireplace and snatched the piece out.

  His face went blank with surprise. Slowly his jaws knotted. “This ain’t sassafras. It—it’s just plain hickory.”

  He hurled the fragment back into the fire and
turned furiously on Timor. “You tricked me! Where’s the chair Wiley made for you? What’d you do with it?”

  Timor edged away, retreating behind the table.

  “Where is it?” Sammy ground out. “You tell me, or I’ll make you wish you was dead.”

  Timor dodged the clutching fingers and raced around the table to the door. He managed to jerk it open just as Sammy’s big paw came down on his shoulder. He felt the blanket being jerked from him, then he was free and running blindly into the night.

  Behind him a light swept the trees. Timor dropped to the ground and crawled to the nearest trunk and crouched behind it, trembling. As the light moved closer he tried vainly to slow his frightened breathing, which seemed loud enough to be heard above the clatter of the creek. The light stopped, swung about, and began angling in what he guessed was the direction of the bridge. Presently it vanished in the thick growth.

  Timor got up and began feeling his way cautiously through the blackness. It was reassuring to hear the creek on his left. That meant he was heading downstream, following the old wagon trail. It would be foolish to turn back now and risk crossing the bridge. Sammy must have come that way if he had driven up from the Forks, and would surely be waiting somewhere near the bridge, watching for him to cross.

  Timor drew out his flashlight, but it was long minutes before he dared use it, and then only with cautious flickers. Save for the slender young poplar trees that had grown up in the trail, the route was fairly easy, if winding. As the danger from behind lessened, he began puzzling over what he had learned.

  He was sure now that Sammy hadn’t taken the box. But if Sammy had seen Gatlin take it, why all the searching for something along the road? If the box was lost, wouldn’t Deputy Gatlin and his brother be looking for it too? What had happened to the box if neither of the Gatlins had it?

  Timor stopped, suddenly forgetful of the uncertain blackness pressing about him. In spite of what Wiley thought—and Wiley had been wrong before—had they all made a mistake about the deputy? Was someone else involved, someone they hadn’t even thought of? As Nathaniel had said, they’d certainly overlooked something. Even Wiley admitted that. What could it be?

  Somewhere in the back of his mind Timor could feel the answer lurking. It was like a hidden trout in a shadowed pool. If he could only reach out and get closer to it.… He closed his eyes and tried hard to bring the overlooked thing into view, but the effort only drove it farther away. Answers, he’d learned, usually came to him unbidden. It didn’t help to strain over them.

  He opened his eyes to the reality of the dark, and stiffened as a light swept through the trees ahead.

  Timor crouched and scrambled quickly out of the trail. Instinctively he had turned to his right, where the ground sloped upward through heavy timber. Stealthily he began crawling over the sodden leaf mold, groping in the blackness for a hiding place. His hand touched what seemed to be a stump or a dead tree, and he managed to squirm behind it just as the exploring light flicked along the slope.

  Presently he heard the low murmur of voices, then the crunch of damp twigs near him on the trail. Two men were talking. One muttered, “He never come this way. Reckon we ought to go on to Wiley’s?”

  “We’d better,” the other advised. “He’ll cut over in this direction if he ain’t lost.”

  “You don’t believe he’s lost?”

  “With that devilish chair? Don’t seem likely. I say he’s hidin’, but he’ll try to make it to Wiley’s when he gets hungry an’ wants a place to sleep.”

  “But Sammy’s keeping watch up there.”

  “Sammy ain’t got no patience. If that kid ain’t showed up by now, Sammy’s liable to leave. That chair’s got ’im mighty upset.”

  The man with the deeper voice cursed. “Sure save us a heap of trouble if that little varmint was to take a fall an’ get his neck broke.”

  “I’d rather see the chair broke first. Look at that mark yonder—know what made it?”

  “Can’t tell in these wet leaves. Wasn’t no deer.”

  Timor chilled. He risked a stealthy glance around his hiding place and made out two figures stooping to examine the ground. They were barely twenty feet away. He drew back quickly as the light swept up the slope toward him.

  The man with the light grunted. “Someone’s been through here tonight. Couldn’t be nobody but that boy.”

  “Which way’s he headin’?”

  “I ain’t one for readin’ trail sign. If Rance Gatlin was here …”

  “Glad he ain’t. Dunno how he feels about all this.”

  “He’ll never tell you, but I know.” The light probed upward. “Mighty thick up yonder. Don’t seem reasonable anybody would be goin’ in that direction. Most likely he was comin’ down, aimin’ for the old road here an’ Wiley’s. These marks are recent. Bet that varmint ain’t far ahead of us.”

  The light went out. The other man said, “Put it on—we got to catch ’im!”

  “No—he may see us comin’. Be too easy for ’im to hide the chair an’ take off. We’d best wait till he gets to Wiley’s an’ settles down.”

  They were silent for a while. Then the deeper voice said, “They say the kid didn’t take no light when he left. How can he see in the dark?”

  “He’s got the chair, ain’t he? If the devilish thing can talk to ’im, it can do his seein’ for him.”

  “You believe that, Fritz?”

  “I don’t know what to believe, but that ain’t no ordinary chair, an’ I ain’t takin’ no chances. Didn’t you hear Brad tell about it?”

  “Yeah, but Brad, he acts like the little varmint’s just crazy in the head.”

  “Brad’s just whistlin’ in the dark. He’d be the first one to bust up that chair if he ever laid hands on it. Mebbe the kid is crazy in the head—but if he is, it’s the same kind o’ craziness old man Gatlin, Rance’s pa, had.”

  “I never knowed the old man.”

  “Good thing. He had second sight, sort of. You couldn’t hide nothin’ from the old rascal. That’s why Rance an’ his brother Jake left home. Scared blue of their pa—but you’ll never hear ’em admit it. Rance, he’s had schoolin’, but it ain’t changed him inside. He wouldn’t burn sassafras no more’n you would.”

  Again they were silent. Then the deeper voice growled, “If that little varmint’s got second sight …”

  “I don’t really think he has. I figger it’s mainly the chair.”

  “Better be. If it ever come out about our likker trades …”

  “Won’t, if we get the chair. That kid, he’s got his mind on what happened at Nat’s place.”

  The other grunted. “That was a queer thing. You an’ me know Wiley never took that box ’cause he was in the store making a deal with us when it happened. You reckon it was Rance Gatlin himself took it?”

  “Couldn’t ’a’ been, or Brad would ’a’ knowed about it. Can’t figger it. All I know is we better find that kid before Nat Battle does. Did you hear Nat arguin’ with that Colonel Hamilton?”

  “Heard part of it. Thought they was going to have a fight.”

  “Almost did. Each one seemed to be blamin’ the other for the kid runnin’ off an’ gettin’ lost. That Nat, he’s as sharp in the woods as Rance Gatlin; he’ll track the kid down for sure by mornin’ if we don’t catch ’im tonight.”

  “I think we’ve waited long enough. Let’s get on to Wiley’s.”

  The light appeared again and began moving away. Timor waited until he could no longer see it, then crept down to the trail. At the thought of Nathaniel he began hurrying, plunging through the new growth and racing over the open stretches as fast as his small feet would carry him. His uncle’s place couldn’t be much farther ahead. If he could get there in time to stop Nathaniel …

  Long minutes later he broke through the grove of hemlocks behind the cabin and stood gasping for breath while he studied the yard and the lighted windows.

  All the lights in the place were on, though he c
ould see no one moving inside. He darted to the side of the building, stole a cautious look through the kitchen window, and crawled on to the shrubbery at the corner of the front porch. He could hear voices now, and when he raised his head he could see a small group standing by the steps—his uncle in jacket and boots, facing him a sturdy figure in uniform whom he recognized as the local game warden, and a much smaller man in a business suit who wore glasses. Neither Nathaniel nor Odessa was in sight.

  Timor glanced despairingly around the yard. The bright lights from the porch shone on Nathaniel’s jeep, parked just beyond the game warden’s truck and a grey car with a press sticker on the windshield. His uncle’s station wagon was gone.

  The man with glasses must have just arrived, for Timor heard him ask, “Exactly where are they searching?”

  “Nat Battle’s gone up by Lost Falls,” the warden told him. “That’s the general area the boy seems to have disappeared in. Miss Hamilton is patrolling the road in her car, and the Grossers and Al Means are covering the wagon trail—though I think that’s all a waste of time. If the boy ever came down on this side of the ridge and struck the trail, he’d know how to get home. Unless, of course, he’s hurt. He hasn’t got a light.”

  “Why didn’t the others go along with Battle?” the small man asked. “That would have made better sense.”

  “Nat wanted to work alone,” the warden grumbled. “There’s nothing the rest of us can do till daylight.”

  “How long has the boy been gone?”

  “Since eleven o’clock this morning,” the colonel growled. “I know my daughter’s raised a storm over this, but I don’t believe Tim’s lost. He’s been acting like a stubborn fool over that confounded chair …”

  “Colonel Hamilton,” the game warden interrupted, “in these mountains we can’t take chances when a boy goes off alone and doesn’t come back. It’s past midnight now. Your nephew’s been gone over thirteen hours. A lot could have happened to him in that time. This is wild country.”

  The small man said, “I’ve been hearing a lot about his chair. I understand, Colonel, there’s something about it that’s convinced both your nephew and Nat Battle—”