by Dan Poblocki
On Friday afternoon, after Mrs. Glick assigned the Villain cast to their official dressing rooms, Viola and Rosie took some time to clean up and organize their spaces. The two girls even taped magazine cutouts of their favorite actresses onto their mirrors. They were happy that Clea had been placed a couple doors down from them.
They were practicing their lines, waiting for Mrs. Glick to call “places,” when from down the hallway, they heard a familiar sound — one that still sent chills through their bones. It was the same growl that they’d heard a couple weeks earlier, and it was once again coming from the boiler room.
Quickly, the two peeked out the dressing room door and into the empty hallway. The sound came again, this time louder. “What do we do?” asked Rosie. All color had drained from her face.
“Investigate?” said Viola.
They held hands as they made their way toward the boiler room door. The last time they’d walked this way, they’d been surrounded by their classmates. Now, however, everyone else had apparently gone upstairs to the stage. Being alone was much creepier. When they reached the door, Viola paused, then with a deep sigh, she reached out and turned the knob. The door swung inward, and the girls peered into the darkness.
The sound came at them again, bouncing off the cinder-block walls in long echoes. Whatever was growling at them sounded as though it was just a few feet away. The girls clutched at each other, but managed not to run. “Tall Ted isn’t real,” Viola whispered. “So this sound can’t be him.”
“Then what is it?” Rosie asked.
“I have an idea. Come on. Let’s see.”
Rosie nearly dragged her heels as Viola pulled her through the dark doorway. This time, Viola had her key chain light in her pocket. She flicked it on. The growl rumbled again, and now that they were inside the boiler room, the girls had a better sense of where it was coming from: the great big metal furnace near the far wall.
“Is it the boiler itself making the sound?” asked Rosie. “Maybe the pipes are expanding or something?”
Viola answered by shining her light into the space between the wall and the boiler. “Aha!” she said, reaching forward to grasp the object that was lying there. “I think we’ve found our culprit.”
“A walkie-talkie?” said Sylvester, feeling the weight of the device as Woodrow handed it to him. The group sat at the Harts’ small kitchen table, passing the walkie-talkie around.
It had been two hours since the girls had left the boiler room. Mrs. Hart had made some lemonade earlier in the day, and Viola poured everyone a glass.
“But who was on the other end?” Woodrow asked.
“That’s the big question,” said Rosie.
“As soon as we found it,” said Viola, “I picked it up and pressed the talk button. I growled back. Grrr.”
“You did not!” said Woodrow, laughing.
“She did too!” said Rosie. “But we got no answer. In fact, the static sound that had been coming from the speaker went silent. Whoever had the other walkie-talkie must have turned it off.”
“So they know they’ve been found out,” said Sylvester. “The walkie-talkie is our proof that Tall Ted actually is fake. You guys, we won the contest!”
“Not quite,” said Viola, taking the device back from him. “We may have proof that someone wants the students at Moon Hollow Middle School to believe we’re being tormented by a monster, but we still don’t know who it is. That’s the mystery we need to solve.”
Sylvester took a large swig of his lemonade. After wiping his mouth, he said, “Maybe we can have the walkie-talkie dusted for prints. If that escaped convict is the one pretending to be the monster, his fingerprints are probably on file in some sort of police database. Woodrow, doesn’t your dad have connections?”
“He does,” said Woodrow. “But I doubt the police will be able to pull a print off of this thing. I mean, we’ve been passing it around, so our fingerprints are all over it. Plus, Sylvester, you just wiped it on your sleeve.”
“I did?” said Sylvester. “Oops.”
“We’re closer than ever,” said Viola. “More important, we’re closer than Clea. We only have a little bit further to go. We just need to figure out the next step. Speaking of which, my mom hasn’t had time to look into a list of local crimes. As soon as she does that, we can look for connections between them.”
“I have an idea,” said Woodrow. “Kyle Krupnik mentioned that a bunch of kids from our class are meeting at the school tomorrow morning and riding their bikes up to Purgatory Chasm. They think that if they return the stones they took, all of this monster nonsense will stop. Maybe we should tag along with them and see if we come across any more clues.”
“But didn’t you tell Kyle what we’re up to?” Viola asked. “Our classmates don’t need to ride up to Purgatory with their supposedly ‘stolen’ stones if all they’re trying to do is remove a curse that doesn’t even exist.”
“I did tell Kyle that he has nothing to be scared of,” said Woodrow. “But I think it’s all gone too far at this point. Nobody knows what to believe anymore.”
“Well, I’m in,” said Rosie.
“Me too,” said Sylvester.
“And me,” said Viola, “of course.”
“Great,” said Woodrow. “We can ride to the school together.”
“I’ll need help pumping up my bike tires,” Rosie added. “I haven’t gone that far since last fall.”
It was a lovely spring morning — the dreamy kind of Saturday that tells a story of changing seasons. Birds were chattering loudly outside bedroom windows, waking and annoying late sleepers. The smell of cut grass lingered in the air. You could almost hear the Hudson River down the hill flowing along its ancient channel toward the Atlantic Ocean. The day was perfect for solving mysteries.
In the school parking lot, the sun provided warmth against the crisp breeze. Viola, Rosie, Sylvester, and Woodrow stood beside their bikes and watched as more and more of their classmates rode up the long drive to the school’s entrance.
Kyle Krupnik approached them, patting his jacket pocket. “I can’t wait to get rid of this thing,” he said.
The four knew he was referring to his Purgatory stone. They’d agreed to let their friends believe what they needed to in order to feel safe again. “Us too,” said Woodrow, pointing at his backpack.
“Oh my gosh,” said Rosie, looking over Kyle’s shoulder. “What are they doing here?”
Clea Keene was pedaling up the school’s driveway on a shiny pink bike. Rainbow streamers fluttered from her handlebars. Paul Gomez, Thomas Kenyon, and Shanti Lane followed close behind her on their own bikes.
“They must have had the same idea as us,” said Viola. “I guess I should stop underestimating them.”
A few minutes later, nearly twenty bikers set off together into the Moon Hollow Hills, winding their way up the road toward Purgatory Chasm, growing winded with each sharp turn. The Question Marks kept clear of Clea’s Troop. They wanted to stay on task and decided that to invite conversation might only provide distraction. Strangely, the Troop must have had the same idea, because Clea and her crew barely even glanced at the original mysterious four. It made Viola wary. What did Clea have up her sleeve?
When they finally reached the park and chained their bicycles to a wobbly wooden fence, everyone headed down the path toward the chasm’s steep cliffs. To Viola’s surprise, Clea rushed forward and held up her hands, stopping the group just before the two large boulders that marked Purgatory’s entrance.
“My older brother told me that the best way to keep Tall Ted from returning,” she announced, “is to place your stolen stone back in the location from which you took it.” A collective groan rose from the group, and Clea raised her hands even higher. “It doesn’t have to be perfect. The stones just have to be close. In other words, if you all just drop your stones right here, it won’t do any good.” Clea turned toward the shadowy ravine. “That’s where you’ll want to go. Down. Deep.” She took the fi
rst step. Everyone followed.
Since Viola, Rosie, Sylvester, and Woodrow were near the back of the group, they were the last to cross the chasm’s threshold. Once they did, they could sense the tension of their classmates, who were trying to remember the spots they’d picked up their stones. While trudging along, the four all tried to ask their friends about their recent experiences. Had anything else been stolen? Had they noticed any suspicious people since the Tall Ted rumors had begun? But no one was interested in talking. Viola began to worry that this trip wasn’t going to help the case at all.
When they finally made their way to the bottom of the ravine, the Question Marks regrouped. “What do we do now?” asked Rosie. “We’ve come to a dead end.” Already, their classmates had begun the ascent back up the wooded path beside the chasm. Even though the sky above was crystal clear, the bare branches cast spidery shadows upon everything, creating an odd twilight effect in the deep woods. It made sense that Tall Ted’s story was connected to this place. This would have been a perfect home for a hideous creature trying to hide from society. Or for an escaped prisoner on the run. But would either one leave the safety of the hills to torment a bunch of middle-schoolers?
There must have been more to the story. But what kind of story was it: a hard-boiled true-crime tale or a monstrous chiller-thriller?
“Whatever we do,” said Woodrow, “we should do it quickly. I don’t really want to be left behind.”
“Me neither,” said Sylvester.
“We’re not the last ones,” said Viola, heading toward a dark space at the base of one of the cliffs. A wooden post had been stuck in the dirt nearby. It read: The Devil’s Armpit. “Look.” Bending down, she pulled a backpack out from behind a small rock. “Someone else is still down here with us.”
“Hello?” Woodrow called out. His voice echoed all around them, hanging in the air for what seemed like an extremely long time. But no one and nothing answered.
“Let’s go,” said Sylvester. “I’ve got a bad feeling.”
“If this bag belongs to one of our friends,” said Viola, “we can’t leave them here.” The other three looked troubled as the shadows and cliffs started to work at their imaginations too. Viola shook her head, then opened the backpack. Inside, she found an apple, a pastel-colored teenromance novel, and a small spiral notebook. She pulled out the notebook and opened the cover. It was blank. When she examined the novel, she noticed a name written on the first page — Shanti Lane. “It’s the Troop,” said Viola. “They’re still here.”
“What are they up to?” Rosie asked.
“Maybe they’ve made a discovery,” said Sylvester.
“Can I see that?” Woodrow asked, reaching for the notebook. Viola handed it over. After brushing his fingers against the blank first page, he glanced at the rest of them. “I think I’ve made a discovery too. This notebook tells us exactly where Clea’s Troop went.” He nodded at the dark space at the bottom of the cliff. It was just tall enough for someone to crawl inside on their hands and knees.
“How did a blank piece of paper clue you in?” asked Sylvester, looking like he didn’t want to know the answer.
Woodrow held up the notebook. “The first page has been torn out. But Shanti’s pen mark left an impression on the second page. Look closely and you can see that she wrote down ‘The Devil’s Armpit’.” He pointed at the dark space. “She also drew what appears to be a map of the cave. She probably copied it from the Moon Hollow Hills Park website.”
“Do you think the entire Troop went in there?” asked Rosie, hugging her arms across her chest. “Why would they do that?”
“They must be looking for something,” said Sylvester.
“What are we waiting for?” said Viola, taking back Shanti’s notebook. Pulling a pencil from her own backpack, she carefully rubbed the graphite over the impression Shanti had left on the notebook’s second page. Shanti’s drawing stood out white against the gray. “We’ve got their map now. Let’s see if we can learn what they already know.”
“You want us to follow them?” said Sylvester. “Is it dangerous?”
Woodrow nodded at the Devil’s Armpit sign. “This is a ranger marker. If we stick to the route the park mapped out, we should be fine.”
“Should be?” said Sylvester.
“Come on,” said Viola, tightening her bag straps against her shoulders and peering beyond the jagged mouth of rock. “There’s no way I’m going to let them win.”
The entry was tight, but after a few feet, the ceiling of rock expanded enough so that the four could all stand comfortably. Dim light filtered in through the cave mouth behind them, barely bright enough for the group to make out one another’s faces. Luckily, Viola’s key chain light still had enough battery power to illuminate the map. When she shined it at the walls, another ominous entry revealed itself just ahead. “This way,” she said, squeezing into the passage, heading toward the darkened depths. The other three reluctantly followed.
The smell of damp earth was mixed with another strong, nearly overpowering scent. Sylvester gagged as he got a good whiff of it. But the stench was the least of their concerns.
With every twist of the cavern, the group knew they were moving farther away from the light of day and closer to some great unknown. The history of the place was almost tangible, like you could breathe it in and suddenly know more than you did before.
After coming through one particularly tight squeeze, Sylvester, who was trailing the rest, yelped. “Something dripped on my neck.”
“Bat droppings, probably,” Woodrow said.
“There are bats in here?”
“It was water, silly,” said Rosie. “Look, we’re practically walking through a stream of it.” Viola shined the light at their feet, revealing a small trickle of moisture that followed them deeper into the earth. “How much farther, Viola?” Rosie asked.
“I’m not sure,” said Viola. “There’s nothing on Shanti’s map that says where the Troop was going to stop.”
“Shh,” said Woodrow. “Listen.”
Sure enough, they all heard voices, whispering from somewhere ahead. Viola turned off her flashlight. In the distance, light glowed dimly. “I think we found them,” she whispered as quietly as she could. “Come on.”
The four treaded softly, trying to keep their presence a secret from the Question Troop. The light ahead grew brighter. They were almost upon Clea and her friends when there was a flash and they were blinded. None of them had a chance to cry out before another flash lit the tunnel. It was immediately obvious that someone up ahead had just taken a picture.
“A little warning would have been nice,” came Paul Gomez’s voice from around the bend.
“Sorry,” said Thomas Kenyon. “Just doing my job.”
“Have we got it, then?” said Clea. “The proof we came for?”
“Seems good to me,” came another girl’s voice. Shanti Lane.
Clea shushed them. After a second, she said, “I thought I heard something.”
Before any of the Question Marks could move, a beam of light was shining upon them.
“I should have known,” said Clea, peering at them. “We’ve been followed.”
“Oh no,” said Shanti. “I forgot my bag at the entrance of the cave.”
“Nice,” said Clea, turning away. “You tipped them off.”
“Sorry,” said Shanti.
With their own cover blown, Viola led her group into the space where the Troop had gathered. This new cavern was about the size of her bedroom, and it seemed to be just as cluttered. The tunnel continued into the opposite wall, but it had been blocked off by a single metal bar cemented into the stone. It was the Park Service’s way of telling would-be explorers Do Not Enter. But that wasn’t what captured the Question Marks’ attention.
Illuminated by the other group’s bright lights, the cave was filled with several satchels, a sleeping bag, and piles of half-eaten food. A few fast-food burger wrappers had been tossed haphazardly aro
und.
Someone had been living in here.
“What is all this stuff?” asked Woodrow.
“What’s it look like?” said Clea. “A camp. We’ve discovered the secret of Tall Ted. Sorry to say, we beat you to the prize, kids.”
“I don’t get it,” said Rosie, still unsure of what she was looking at. “What exactly is the secret?”
Viola wandered through the site, peering closely at the strewn detritus. Bending down, she lifted what appeared to be a pale rubber mask from the dirty sleeping bag. The mask was the head of a strange, bald creature, with dark, deep-set eyes. The mask looked like something out of a horror movie. Tall Ted?
“Isn’t it obvious?” said Clea. “We found the lair of the thief who’s been terrorizing the students of Moon Hollow Middle School.”
Woodrow peeked into one of the satchels. “She’s right,” he said. “This looks like the stolen stuff.” He reached into the bag and pulled out a couple of wallets.
“And check this out!” said Viola. Underneath the monster mask, she’d located an even more revealing clue: the twin of the walkie-talkie they’d found in the boiler room. “I guess this pretty much settles it.” Viola looked so disappointed, Rosie thought she might have been on the verge of tears. “They’re right. Whoever set up this camp is the guilty one. The thief was masquerading as Tall Ted, scaring students, then taking their stuff while they were distracted. Isn’t that what happened to Paul in the dressing room when we heard the growling sound near the boiler?”
Paul perked up, then nodded enthusiastically.
“So then … who is it?” Sylvester asked. “Who is the thief?”
“We think it’s the escaped convict everyone is talking about,” said Paul excitedly. Clea threw him a threatening glance. It was obvious that she felt this was her story to tell.
“The convict has been hiding out here?” Rosie asked, glancing around. “What if he comes back?”
“He just might,” said Clea. “That’s why we should probably get going.” She nodded at her Troop and they stood at attention, like loyal subjects.