Horus and the Curse of Everlasting Regret

by Hannah Voskuil

  He tried to haul Tunie over to the edge of the ship. She gripped the file and jabbed at the man’s arm. He howled and let go of Tunie, who turned to flee.

  Reid was too quick for her, though. With his uninjured hand, he grabbed hold of Tunie’s braids and yanked. Tugged backward, Tunie fell to the deck hard.

  “Oof,” she said, the air leaving her lungs on impact. The file clattered away across the deck. She managed to stand, but Reid grabbed her from behind, his arms around her in a crushing bear hug. Her arms were pinned to her sides. Tunie thrashed, and the back of her skull connected with Reid’s nose in a loud crunch.

  “Argh!” he shouted, dropping her and clutching his nose. Tunie spun away.

  Then, as she watched, a burlap sack flew through the air and over Reid’s head.

  Dark wings fluttered around the struggling man.

  “Perch!” Tunie cried.

  Perch flapped past Tunie, and she ran after him, taking advantage of Reid’s brief incapacitation. The bat guided her through a doorway. There was a hatch. Tunie lifted it and spied a ladder that led into darkness. It was a storage hold.

  Perch squeaked.

  “You lead,” Tunie said in a whisper. “Find me a good place to hide!”

  She descended the ladder and felt her way among the crates, groping in the darkness.

  Perch squeaked now and then, and she followed him through the close maze of cargo. She climbed up a few crates and then between some stacked trunks. Many of the boxes were under nets, tied down, so as not to shift. Tunie fit narrowly between two large, netted stacks.

  “Is help coming?” Tunie asked.

  Perch squeaked an affirmative.

  “So Peter and Dorothy made it!” Tunie whispered, relieved.

  Perch made a worried sound.

  “They didn’t?” Tunie said. “Perch, you have to find them! They were swimming for shore off the side of the boat more than an hour ago. They might be in trouble! Will you look for them? Please?”

  Perch gripped her finger with his claws in the dark, as if he didn’t want to let her go.

  “You’ve done plenty,” Tunie said. “I’ll hide here until help comes. Go!”

  Perch reluctantly flew away. Tunie realized then that they’d left the hatch open, and with the hatch open, Reid would know where to look for her. The ship’s hold was huge but not endless; eventually he’d find her.

  Tunie prayed that whatever help was on the way would hurry. She made herself as small as she could and listened. She heard the faint ringing sound of feet on the metal rungs of the ladder, and the sound of someone stepping down into the hold.

  Officer Hill knew at once that the handsome, well-dressed man approaching him across the wharf with two uniformed police officers was Christopher James. Officer Hill held out his hand, and Mr. James shook it.

  “Long story short,” one of the officers said to Hill. “The people who kidnapped Mr. James’s daughter demanded one of his steamships as ransom. He gave them the ship and has been waiting at a warehouse for them to bring his daughter in exchange. They didn’t show.”

  “I have a fast yacht at my disposal,” Mr. James said immediately, by way of introduction. “An express cruiser.”

  Officer Hill nodded curtly. “We’ll take it. The military is sending a boat, but it might take too long. Men!” He blew his whistle, drawing the attention of the other uniformed officers swarming the lantern-lit dock. “We have a boat! Let’s go!”

  Within a quarter hour, the sleek wooden cruiser lifted anchor with twenty policemen, ten sailors and a captain, and the shipping magnate Christopher James aboard. The police knew Reid and Shade would be sailing for the mouth of the harbor, if they hadn’t made it there yet. Mr. James insisted on remaining on deck, a spyglass to his eye. He scanned the water again and again.

  “There are fewer ships out here these days—we’re exporting half as much as we were before 1929. We can thank the Depression for that. The ship they’re on is a freight steamer, painted black,” Mr. James said. “The smokestack has four bands of color: yellow, red, white, blue. I’ll know it when I see it.”

  Officer Hill took in the man’s elegant double-breasted suit, his scattered, anxious air, and his weary aspect. In one fist, he tightly gripped a blue pocket kerchief, worrying the material between his thumb and forefinger.

  “We’ll find her, sir,” Officer Hill said reassuringly.

  Mr. James did not take his eyes off the horizon.

  “I should have come to you. I should have contacted the police right away; I see that now,” Mr. James said hoarsely. “But they threatened her. My little Dorothy. I couldn’t even tell my wife. They said they had a man on the inside, and they’d know the moment I contacted the police.”

  “Is that so? It might be Detective Dedrick Shade,” Officer Hill said. “He may be in league with a man named Curtis Reid. Two other children are missing along with Dorothy. Believe me when I say we’ll find out the truth about this, and whoever is responsible will pay.”

  “There! That painted smokestack!” Mr. James pointed it out to the captain. “It’s definitely my ship.”

  “I see it,” the captain said.

  The yacht swerved beneath their feet as the captain altered its course.

  They were almost there.

  It had been a great and terrible night. Horus breathed in the fishy salt air. He marveled at the stars and the moonglow, the slapping waves, the temperate breeze sifting through his linen wraps. He admired the gentle rocking motion of the boat, and the miracle of the sheer space around him, the endless space!

  As he tilted his head up once more, he spied Perch, blacking out the stars as he flapped toward their little boat.

  George ducked at first, but when Perch landed softly in the boat, he took a closer look. “Perch! We must be going the right way!” George exclaimed happily.

  Perch let out a series of screeches that let Horus know something was wrong.

  Horus touched the bat softly.

  “Do we need to change course?” Horus asked.

  Perch squeaked and indicated a direction. The little bat looked exhausted. His wings were drooping.

  Horus spoke loudly, using his influence over George to adjust their course. “Head westerly. The children are in trouble.”

  George frowned, and rowed with one oar, moving the boat a little more to the west. He was breathing hard with the effort of rowing, but in this direction, the little dory caught a current, and their pace quickened.

  The smack of the water against the boat’s wooden sides and the dip of the oars in the ocean were the only sounds as the night watchman, the mummy, and the bat headed out on the great expanse of water.

  Horus peered through the darkness and spied, at a distance, two pale figures in the water. They vanished behind a wave and reappeared, bobbing on the surface.

  “That way, George!” Horus said urgently, clutching the boat’s edge. “Faster, faster!”

  George, suddenly inspired to row even harder, bent over the oars.

  They were close now. As Horus watched the two people, one of them slid away, disappearing under the water.

  “No!” Horus shouted, leaning out over the shadowy water. He waited. Whoever it was did not resurface.

  Without pausing to think, Horus dove into the warm, salty sea.

  The liquid tugged at his wraps as Horus swam underwater, keeping his eye on the dropping figure, floating downward to the dark ocean floor. The person wore a dress that billowed out in a bell shape. A girl. He could almost reach her. The mummy kicked his small, bony feet. It was difficult to swim holding on to the sling stone. He hesitated for a moment—out here, he might lose it forever. And then he dropped it. The rock sank into the murk and vanished. Horus cupped his skeletal hands and moved his ancient arms as fast as he could.

  He had to get to her.

  Dorothy slid away under the water so silently that it took Peter a moment to notice. He’d been keeping his eyes turned toward the sky, to keep the
water off his face as well as he could. When her fingers drifted away from his, it took him a few seconds to look over to where she’d been.

  Dorothy was gone.

  Frantic, Peter began treading water, looking around beneath the surface, but though the moon was bright, it was difficult to see at all.

  “Dorothy!” he called. He took a great breath and went underwater, peering through the gloom, the salt stinging his eyes. He saw nothing.

  He broke through the surface, gasping for air, and tried again. He swam as deep as he dared, but soon his lungs were burning, and his body was tired, too tired.

  Peter used all his energy to swim up to the surface, and as he took in a great breath, he was nearly struck by a boat.

  “Help!” Peter shouted.

  The man at the oars quickly turned on his seat. A look of shock crossed his face, and he reached two wiry arms down for Peter. The wooden edge of the boat scraped Peter’s ribs as he climbed over the side. He was so exhausted he could hardly move.

  “My friend,” Peter said weakly. “There’s a girl. She was with me just a minute ago, and now I can’t find her!” He managed to sit up and point to the choppy water.

  “A girl?” the man said, sounding anxious. He, too, gripped the edge of the boat, searching. Then he shouted, “Tunie! Tunie, are you out here?”

  Peter stared. This man knew Tunie?! Then he heard a squeak and realized that Perch was in the boat, too!

  “Her name is Dorothy,” Peter said, but even as he spoke the words, he felt time sliding away too quickly. She had to come up for air or she’d drown. Where was she? The moon was bright, but the churning surface of the water obscured their view of anything underneath.

  Suddenly there was a great turmoil by the boat, and in a surge of white, bubbling water, Dorothy appeared, seemingly thrust upward from below.

  “Dorothy!” Peter cried. The man in the boat grasped her arms.

  Then, to Peter’s shock, he spied two eyes glowing under the water. Perch swooped near them and shrilled.

  “Horus?!” How had the mummy gotten here? As the man lifted Dorothy, limp and sopping wet, in his arms, Peter reached over and clasped the small, mummified hand that was stretching out of the water. Horus weighed almost nothing, but it still took an incredible effort to hoist him into the boat.

  Dorothy coughed, spewing seawater, and opened her eyes.

  “She’s alive!” Peter said. He started to cry, and Dorothy, catching sight of him, began to sob, too.

  “It’s okay,” said the kind stranger. “You’re all right now. You’re all right.”

  The two children hugged the man, and Peter kept his arm tightly around the mummy, too.

  “Thank you,” Peter said to his rescuer. “Tunie’s on a ship, headed that way.” Peter pointed in the direction he thought the ship had sailed. “We need to get to her quickly. The kidnappers are still on board.” Perch squeaked his agreement.

  Peter took in their small wooden dory with the splintery oars.

  “We’ll never catch up to their boat in this,” he said bleakly.

  Horus, who’d been squinting at the horizon, perked up. “Look!”

  Peter did. “A boat!”

  The outline of a large yacht was plowing across the waves. It would pass them in minutes.

  George picked up a lantern from the bottom of the boat. “Kids, hold this while I light it. Quick!”

  Peter held the glass lantern while George fumbled open its doors and lit it. Once it was glowing, George lifted the lantern high over his head, swinging it back and forth.

  “Over here!” he shouted in a loud voice. “We’re here! Over here!”

  Horus and Peter and Dorothy all joined in, yelling.

  At first it seemed the yacht hadn’t noticed them, but then, sure enough, it shifted.

  “It’s changing course!” Peter said.

  Dorothy sat up straighter. As the yacht drew closer, they saw lanterns illuminating several men on board. Dorothy cried out with delight.

  “Daddy! Daddy, is that you?” she called across the few feet of water that separated their boats, her voice shaking with emotion.

  “Dorothy?!” For a moment, it looked as if the man would leap over the wooden rail in his desperation to reach his daughter.

  “Wait, sir. We’ll bring them up,” said a sailor, keeping a hand on Mr. James’s arm.

  A rope ladder was unfurled down the side of the yacht, and the small group on the dory climbed up, one by one. Perch rode on Peter’s shoulder. Horus came last and stood near enough to Peter to be his shadow. Nobody noticed the mummy.

  Dorothy’s father dropped the kerchief he’d been gripping and clasped Dorothy to him in a tight embrace, saying “My girl” over and over.

  “Are you okay?” he asked finally. “Are you all right?”

  “Yes,” Dorothy said, weeping. The two clutched each other for a moment, while the rest of the crew gave Peter a towel and shook George’s hand. The dory was hauled aboard and secured.

  Peter spied Officer Hill and said, “Tunie’s still on the boat with our kidnappers,” he said.

  Mr. James straightened, keeping his hands on Dorothy’s shoulders.

  “Let’s get those animals,” he said fiercely.

  “I know the way,” said Peter.

  Beside him, Horus whispered, “Hang on, Tunie. We’re coming.”

  The swift yacht sailed off in pursuit.

  Tunie sat in the dark with her knees tucked up toward her chest, her stomach lurching. She hoped she wouldn’t be seasick; the sound and smell would lead Reid right to her. Where Tunie hid, it was stuffy and utterly black. She couldn’t see a thing. Somewhere down below her, near the ship’s metal hull, she heard a scrabbling sound. Rats, she supposed. She got gooseflesh thinking of them and hoped they would not crawl up the netting to where she sat.

  She kept her breathing as quiet as she could, swallowed against her rising nausea, and concentrated on listening for Reid. She’d lost him again.

  All at once, Reid’s nasal voice sounded out of the gloom.

  “I know you’re in here,” he said. He didn’t sound far away, but it was hard to tell in the blackness. “I’ll find you sooner or later. In fact, I’m thinking later. We won’t get to port for two weeks. How long do you think you’ll survive locked in here?” He laughed. “I can see the headline now: ‘Poor Stowaway, Too Stupid to Bring Along Food or Water, Perishes in Hold of Ship.’ What a pity. Not that anyone in the Caribbean will particularly care. Certainly, I won’t. I will sit beneath the palms and lift my drink to toast your end. Ta-ta!”

  With that, his footsteps receded. The hatch slammed shut. She heard a sound like metal scraping across it.

  Tunie released the breath she’d been holding. Had he really left, or was this all a trick? She decided she’d sit still, a whole day if she could, to make sure. Better not to risk anything.

  For nearly an hour, she sat unmoving in the dark, listening to the rats scrabble and the sounds of feet overhead, the water against the hull.

  Then it happened. Again she felt the itching, feathery feeling in her nose, that searing buildup that made her eyes water. She pressed her tongue to the roof of her mouth, trying to suppress the sneeze, but it was no use.

  “Ah-chooo!”

  Instantly a match flared.

  To her right, not six feet away, she saw the orange flame rise and ignite a lantern. Its glow brightened to reveal a gaunt face, curled mustache, and those cruel and terrifying dark eyes. Reid.

  Tunie tried to scoot away, but Reid grabbed an ankle and yanked, tugging her toward him and raking her back painfully across the wooden corners of the crates.

  “Argh!” Tunie cried out. She kicked at him with her other foot, hard, and accidentally connected with the lantern. It went flying. The space darkened, and she heard the sharp shattering of glass.

  Reid clawed at her, trying to grab her other foot. Something behind him lit up. The smell of smoke reached Tunie’s nose.

  �
�Fire!” she shouted, gesturing behind Reid.

  He turned, spied the fire, and swore, then abruptly released Tunie. He tore off his coat and tried to smother the flames, but the fabric ignited, too. Tunie ran over and stomped on the fire, but it was no use.

  Reid looked wild. He put his hands to the sides of his head.

  “My ship!” he cried. “We need water!”

  She scrambled after him as he ran for the ladder, but he reached the hatch before her. As he hurried out, the hatch overhead closed with a click. Tunie climbed up the ladder and pounded on it. It was stuck. She hammered harder with her fists.

  “Hey! It’s locked!” Tunie shouted. “Hey!”

  Gray-white smoke was rising up from the blaze. She could see the fire growing, the flames leaping from crate to crate.

  Tunie shoved against the metal hatch. She knocked on it with her fists.

  “Can anyone hear me? Help! Fire!”

  The smoke burned her lungs and made her eyes water. The cargo hold was becoming warm. Tunie coughed, banging continuously on the hatch overhead.

  “Let me out! There’s a fire!”

  She glanced down. Through the fog of smoke, she could see the flames spreading across the wooden pallets lining the floor, toward the ladder. She was trapped. What was taking Reid so long?

  The air was stifling. Darkness seeped in Tunie’s periphery, blocking out the edges of her vision.

  In a strangled voice, she called out, “Help! Someone!”

  It sounded weak. She beat her fists against the hatch, but her arms were growing tired. She doubted anyone above deck would hear her.

  Suddenly the hatch flung open. A policeman’s head appeared, and the officer hauled her out, shouting for help.

  “I found her! There’s a fire! Sound the alarm!” It was Officer Hill. In moments, the crew was in action.

  Tunie retreated with Hill, while the sailors formed a human chain, passing buckets of seawater down to those courageous enough to battle the conflagration in the hold. Both Tunie and Hill tried to keep out of the way. Hill led her across the deck. Tunie spied a yacht waiting there.