Philip and the Monsters (9781619500464)

by Paulits, John

  Chapter Twelve

  There was no dinner that night. After much apologizing but little explaining, the families agreed to have dinner the next night. In a restaurant. They agreed to leave all the children at home with baby sitters.

  The following evening, Emery’s aunt came over to mind the two babies. Philip’s aunt came to mind baby Becky. A Talbot cousin came to take care of little Frankie, and Emery and Philip ended up at Mrs. Moriarty’s.

  “I hear you boys had an interesting evening last night,” Mrs. Moriarty said when the two boys arrived and slumped mournfully onto her sofa.

  “My father called me a nincompoop,” Emery reported in a sad voice.

  Mrs. Moriarty laughed. “That’s not good.”

  “My father kept asking my mother whether she brought the right baby home from the hospital,” said Philip.

  Mrs. Moriarty laughed again. “That’s not good either.”

  “My mother keeps finding the crosses we made with the Popsicle sticks all over the house. Sixty-four of them so far. She told my father, and that’s when he called me a nincompoop.”

  “Well, you two certainly got yourselves a strange notion about your new assistant principal.”

  Philip and Emery moaned in unison at the words new assistant principal.

  “We’re gonna have to see him in school every day,” Emery mumbled glumly.

  “And we don’t graduate to another school for more than two years,” Philip muttered from deep in his gloom.

  “If he lets us out at all,” Emery added. “Maybe we’ll be lucky, and he’ll throw us out of school right away.”

  “How did your parents explain things to Mr. Talbot?”

  “My dad told him I was a nincompoop and promised to punish me,” said Emery.

  “Did he yet?” Philip asked.

  “I think he’s going to cancel Christmas.”

  “Wow!” Mrs. Moriarty sympathized. “What about you, Philip?”

  “I had to go over to Mr. Talbot’s house this morning with my dad and apologize and explain.”

  “You didn’t tell me that,” said Emery.

  “I didn’t see you till now.”

  “You poor boy,” Mrs. Moriarty laughed. “Well, I guess I’ll go fix dinner.”

  When Mrs. Moriarty left, Emery said, “What did you tell Mr. Wolfman about us?”

  “That we thought he was a werewolf.”

  Emery moaned, clutching at his forehead. “What’d he say?”

  “He said if we wouldn’t call him ‘Mr. Wolfman’ in school, he wouldn’t call us the chicken noodle dancing assassins.”

  Emery moaned again. “Like we would. But all the clues were there. What about his name?”

  “He said his father and his grandfather were both named Lawrence, and his grandfather lived way before the movie we saw. His name had nothing to do with the movie.”

  “What about the bat flying in the window? We both saw it.”

  “Little Fwankie has a stick for her stupid bird,” Philip explained disgustedly. “That’s why she knew the word stick at dinner. She puts the bird on the stick and makes it fwy. From outside through the shade . . . well, you know what it looks like.”

  “What about her baby Frankenstein box?”

  “Their dog came in it. We heard their dog howling. Mrs. Wenner’s dog smelled it or heard and kept howling to it, and they howled back and forth at each other. The night we were in his yard, we heard Mrs. Wenner’s dog howling at their dog. Mrs. Wenner’s dog must have put the teeth-marks on the yardstick I brought back with us. I don’t know why she lets such a dangerous dog run around loose. When we were in the box, Mr. Talbot’s dog sniffed around us. It’s a good thing the family called it upstairs, or we would never have gotten out.”

  “Does he know we were in his house?”

  “I don’t think so. He didn’t say anything, and neither did I.”

  “So the job in the letter was to be our new assistant principal.”

  Philip nodded and Emery moaned again.

  Mrs. Moriarty poked her head back into the living room. “I got you boys a movie. It’s in the machine. Just push play. You can watch some of it now while I cook and finish the rest of it after dinner.”

  “Want to?” Philip asked in a quiet voice, his mind still focused on his dancing like a crazy string puppet in Emery’s dining room in front of his new assistant principal.

  Emery shrugged, reached for the remote, pushed Play, and the movie began.

  The movie was in black and white. A thick test tube sent heavy white smoke swirling across the screen. The title of the movie melted down from the top of the TV and spelled out:

  FRANKENSTEIN MEETS THE WOLFMAN.

  Both boys sat hypnotized as the names of the players swirled down onto the screen. Finally, their worst fears came true.

  AND LON CHANEY, JR. AS THE WOLFMAN.

  The boys stared, frozen in fearful wonder.

  On the screen, a full moon sits in the night sky while heavy clouds rush all around it. A sign appears: HERE REST THE DEAD OF LLANWELLY. Two men walk through the dark cemetery. Leaves, driven by a brisk wind, fly all around. A crow caws spookily.

  “Where are they going?” Emery whispered.

  “I don’t know. Watch.”

  The two men go down some broad steps and walk through the graves until they come to a large, stone crypt. There are big letters across the top, above the door.

  “TALBOT,” Philip whispered, reading the letters.

  The two men climb through a window above the door.

  “I don’t think they’re supposed to go in there,” said Emery.

  “I know, I know,” said Philip. “Shhh.”

  The two men look around. They read, Martin Talbot, 1837; Elizabeth Talbot, 1845. They keep looking until they come to an enormous stone casket right in the middle of the floor. One of the men reads a plaque on the outside of the lid. “Lawrence Stewart Talbot, Who Died at the Youthful Age of Thirty-one. R. I. P.”

  “What’s R. I. P.?” Philip asked.

  “It probably means Really Interesting Person,” Emery replied with certainty.

  Philip gave him a look. “I think you’re an R. I. P.”

  “Look,” said Emery. “It’s the one they want. They’re opening it!”

  “Shh. Listen.”

  One man says, “This gives me the creeps. What do you think it’ll look like after so many years?”

  “Just bones and an empty skull. Watch the lamp.”

  The other man moves the lamp, and they open the casket.

  “Give me the light.”

  Whatever is in the casket is covered with sticks and leaves. The two men start pulling the sticks and leaves away.

  “Wolfbane,” says one.

  “Wolfbane?”

  “Yeah.

  Even a man who is pure in heart

  And says his prayers by night

  May become a wolf when the wolfbane blooms

  And the autumn moon is bright.

  Now the lantern light moves up the body—

  “It’s him,” says Emery, breathlessly. “It’s Lawrence Talbot.”

  “He’s not just bones and an empty skull,” said Philip.

  One man says, “Let’s get on with it.”

  “First the ring.”

  The men take the ring off the dead finger and stare at it. One man says, “Gold.”

  “Look!” said Philip. “The dead guy’s hand’s moving. He grabbed the guy!”

  Horror crosses the face of one man. “It’s holding me. Help me! Help me!”

  The other man’s eyes open wide. “Alive!” is all he says.

  “Help me! Help me!”

  The free man drops the lantern onto the wolfbane on the floor and a small fire starts. He backs away.

  “Don’t leave me,” the captured man begs, but his friend climbs back out the window, and the last we see of him he is running through the cemetery.

  “Turn it off!” begged Philip. “Turn it off!
”

  “Where’s the remote?” Emery asked in panic.

  “You have it.”

  “Where? Where? I don’t have it.”

  “It’s in your hand, you dope.”

  Emery pushed a button, and the movie disappeared.

  When, a few moments later, Mrs. Moriarty popped her head back into the room and said, “Dinner,” she was surprised to see the TV showing Sylvester the cat climbing up Tweety Bird’s bird cage pole.

  “What happened to the movie I got for you?”

  “Oh . . . we . . . we saw it before,” said Philip. “We took this other one from your shelf. But thanks.”

  “Yeah, thanks,” said Emery. “We don’t need to watch scary movies anymore since we finished our projects.”

  “Did you finally choose a topic, Philip?” Mrs. Moriarty asked as the three of them settled down at the kitchen table.

  “Yeah,” Philip said in embarrassment. “I did yesterday. My dad told me what to do.”

  “And?”

  “He said if Emery could do a report on being scared, I should be able to do a report on misunderstanding.”

  Mrs. Moriarty laughed. “If you get stuck, I’m sure you can ask Emery for some help.” Mrs. Moriarty laughed again. “Well, enjoy your spaghetti. After dinner I have some ice cream, and you can watch all the cartoons you want.”

  “Maybe I’ll eat so much ice cream I’ll get sick and have to stay home from school. Until I’m sixteen,” said Philip.

  Mrs. Moriarty smiled reassuringly. “Oh, you’re lucky Mr. Talbot has a sense of humor. Don’t worry. It’ll be all right. Oh, maybe after dinner you could show me the dance you have to do for school. I heard it’s very entertaining.”

  Emery moaned and, with deep sighs, both boys lowered their heads and concentrated on twirling their saucy spaghetti around their forks.

  The End

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  John Paulits is a former teacher in New York City. He has published seven other children’s novels, several about Philip and Emery; a collection of horror short stories, OLIVER MUNCING, EXORCIST; as well as three adult science fiction novels, HOBSON’S PLANET, BECKONING ETERNITY and LANYON FOR HIRE. His first Gyspy Shadow book, PHILIP AND THE SUPERSTITION KID, was voted best children’s novel of 2010 in the Preditors and Editors readers poll. PHILIP AND THE MONSTERS is his fourth chapter book with Gypsy Shadow and follows PHILIP AND THE HAUNTED HOUSE and PHILIP AND THE ANGEL.

  Learn more about John here:

  WEBSITE: www.johnpaulits.com

  BLOG: http://johnpaulits.wordpress.com/

  FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=750790110