The House With a Clock in Its Walls

by John Bellairs

  Lewis was silent. He had always thought that courage had something to do with riding your bicycle through bonfires and hanging by your knees from the limbs of trees.

  Mrs. Zimmermann picked up a plate of chocolate-chip cookies and passed them around. Jonathan took two and Lewis took several. There was another silence while everyone munched and sipped for a while. Jonathan threw more papers into the fire.

  Lewis squirmed around and stared at the dark house across the street.

  "Do you think Mrs. Izard could ever... come back?" he said in a faltering voice.

  "No," said Jonathan, shaking his head gravely. "No, Lewis, I think that when you smashed the clock in the walls, you destroyed any power she might have in this world. Just to be on the safe side, though, I put what was left of her back in the mausoleum and locked the doors with a nice shiny new lock. A lock that has had spells said over it. That ought to hold her for a while."

  "What about the Hanchetts?" said Lewis. "I mean, are they going to come back to live in their house?"

  Jonathan paused for a minute before speaking. He clicked the paper clips on his watch chain. "I think they are," he said at last. "But certain rites will have to be performed before they return. When an unclean spirit inhabits a house, it leaves behind a bad aura."

  "Speaking of bad auras and unclean spirits," said Mrs. Zimmermann, "do you have any idea of what happened to Hammerhandle?"

  Jonathan's face grew grim for an instant. He had made a few guesses about Hammerhandle's fate, but he had kept them to himself. For one thing, he knew that the blood of a hanged man went into the making of a Hand of Glory.

  "No idea at all," said Jonathan, shaking his head. "He seems to have vanished from the face of the earth."

  Suddenly Lewis began to squirm and scrunch around in his seat again. He was on the brink of saying something.

  "Uncle... Jonathan?" Lewis's voice was dry and throaty.

  "Yes, Lewis? What is it?"

  "I... I let Mrs. Izard out of her tomb."

  Jonathan smiled calmly. "Yes," he said. "I knew you did."

  Lewis's mouth dropped open. "How did you know?"

  "You left your flashlight up at the cemetery. I found it in a pile of leaves when I went up to put Mrs. Izard back in her tomb."

  "Are you going to send me to the Detention Home?" asked Lewis in a tiny, frightened voice.

  "Am I going to what?" said Jonathan, staring at him in disbelief. "Lewis, what kind of ogre do you think I am?

  "And besides," Jonathan added with a sudden smile, "why should I punish you for doing what I tried to do myself when I was a boy? Like you, I was interested in magic at an early age. It runs in our family, I guess. I was trying to impress a girl. You wanted to keep Tarby for a friend. Isn't that right?"

  Lewis nodded sadly.

  "By the way, Lewis," said Mrs. Zimmermann. "How are things between you and Tarby these days?"

  "Not so good," said Lewis. "I don't think Tarby and I were meant to be friends. We're not the same type. But it doesn't matter."

  "Doesn't matter?" said Jonathan. "Well, it certainly does matter! If he's such a stuck-up little..." He stopped because he saw that Lewis was smiling smugly.

  Jonathan wrinkled up his eyebrows so that they looked like two mating auburn caterpillars. "Lewis Barnavelt!" he roared. "Are you hiding something from me?"

  Lewis was trying very hard to keep from giggling. "Oh, nothing much, Uncle Jonathan," he said. "Except that I have a new friend."

  "Whaaat? You dooo?" said Jonathan and Mrs. Zimmermann in unison.

  "Yes. Her name is Rose Rita Pottinger, and she lives down on Mansion Street. She knows the names of all the different kinds of cannon. Want to hear them? Saker, minion, falconet, demi-culverin..."

  "Aaaaah!" screamed Jonathan. He threw two fistfuls of paper into the fire. "That's all I need. An expert in Elizabethan ordnance. Promise me one thing, Lewis."

  "What's that?"

  "If you and tiny Rosie decide to start a cannon foundry in our basement, let Mrs. Zimmermann and me know so we can go visit my relatives in Osee Five Hills. Okay?"

  Lewis giggled. "Sure, Uncle Jonathan. I'll let you know."

  Jonathan waved his pipe at the bonfire. The leaves stirred uneasily, and then they gathered into a large black

  ball. The bonfire turned into a jack-o'-lantern. Now the three of them took turns pitching chestnuts into the eyes, nose, and mouth of the ferocious lantern. Pop! Pop! Pop! The chestnuts went off in a ripping string, like a fusillade of musket fire.

  Jonathan, Lewis, and Mrs. Zimmermann sat around the fire talking until the scowling orange face fell in with an airy whoosh. Then they got up, stretched, and went wearily off to bed.