Pluto slid himself out between the plank doors, blocking the Darrows before they had time to realize what had happened.
In the few minutes it had taken the Darrows to reach the cave, old Pluto had had an idea close to inspiration. Quickly bending down, he untied his shoes and removed the laces. Then, catching one end of his throw in his palm, he tied it to his wrist with a shoelace. When both ends of the throw were tied to both wrists, he pulled the neck of the throw behind his head, and fitted it over his top hat. What greeted the Darrows as they beamed their flashlight was a grotesque and chilling scene.
From the black mouth of the cave came an enormous bat with wings outstretched. By the time the Darrows realized it was Pluto, he was towering over them. With his arms held out to the height of his shoulders, he began to speak, his face turned toward the heavens.
“Come, my winged bird, my glory, night-bird! Come, all ye demons three who walk with me forever. Come parade awhile with Pluto, who has missed ye so!” His voice roared through the clearing. The Darrow men ducked down. One of them dropped the flashlight. When it hit the ground, it broke and went out.
In the trees on top of Mr. Pluto’s cave, Pesty let drop the canvas sheet that had hidden the painted brilliance of Mr. Pluto’s bay horse. Already mounted on the horse, she took a sure hold on each of the gossamer wings attached to his withers. As she dug her bare toes into the bay’s flanks, she began to work the wings up and down.
What the Darrows saw was a glowing giant of a thing, with wings as translucent as glimmering silk. The great wings brushed the air as lightly as feathers. The thing itself seemed to rise up and down, making only a muffled, soft sound.
There was a moan, as one Darrow sank down before the winged creature atop the cave.
Another one of them was yelling in a kind of strangled, husky scream.
The third and last began to jump up and down, first on one foot and then on the other.
The sight of the glowing bay with glimmering wings was indeed terrifying. Thomas, who was now supposed to come forward with Mr. Small and Mayhew, thus trapping the Darrows between ghosts and devils, was sagging down himself. He had not been prepared for the way Pluto looked, nor for the flashlight suddenly full on him. And no one had told him Pluto would say anything. Why had Pluto said what he had?
All at once Thomas was overcome with the night and with all the fear of Pluto that was buried deep inside him. He could not see Pesty on the bay’s back. The reason he couldn’t was that she was lying nearly flat, but Thomas didn’t think of that. He simply saw that glowing devil of a horse and he began to sink down.
Mayhew grabbed hold of Thomas and carried him forward.
“Come to,” he whispered. “We have got them. Stand up!”
Thomas stood, but barely. He and Mayhew and Mr. Small now spread themselves in a half circle behind the Darrows.
Just then, the Darrow who had fallen to his knees was lifted up by another Darrow and dragged away from the specter of Pluto and the winged demon, only to be dropped brutally at the sight of the three apparitions at the edge of the clearing. They shimmered so brightly that all three Darrows fell down.
All the Darrow men were yelling now. And Mayhew, as old Mr. Drear, was laughing in a most horrifying, crazed sound, screeching and groaning as he inched toward them. The laugh tore through what little courage Thomas had left, and he folded up again.
Mr. Small hissed at Thomas, rattling his chains and moaning so that Thomas would at least pump his arms, causing some of his own chains to clank.
The effect of Thomas’ own fear was perhaps most convincing to the Darrows, for it seemed to them that he was a slave ghost still driven by invisible tormentors.
“Let me out of here!” one Darrow screamed.
“Mr. Pluto, Lordy, call ’em off. Call ’em off! Please, let me go! I won’t come back, oh please!”
Mr. Pluto commenced to laugh. It was a deep, hateful sort of laugh, full of malice and memory of malice. He laughed and laughed. With his laughter, and Mayhew still screeching as Dies Drear, the whole hill rocked with the most earsplitting noise.
“Get them, my demons, get them!” cried Pluto.
Mr. Small raised his chains. So did Thomas. Mayhew folded his flowing arms around the closest Darrow.
Men were scrambling all over the clearing, Thomas got caught in his own chain and nearly broke his ankle; someone pulled him to his feet. He found himself face to face with a Darrow, and the Darrow was about ready to foam at the mouth. Suddenly all the Darrows broke away and were running free.
Mayhew began to laugh in his own voice. He slapped his hip and threw back his head and bellowed. One Darrow stopped dead in his tracks, just at the edge of the clearing where Thomas had been hiding. Mr. Pluto began to laugh, too, like a man who had successfully played a wonderful joke on someone. His was now a pleasant, healthy sort of laugh; he put his arm around Mayhew, folding him tenderly inside his throw. The Darrow stared at the two of them for the longest moment, then walked away.
When the Darrows had gone for sure, Mr. Small said, “You laughed too soon. The last one of them knew we were putting on for them.”
“They would have figured it out, all of them, in another minute anyhow,” Mayhew said. “The point is that for about fifteen seconds, we scared the living daylights out of them. And to make it worse, we laughed at them to their face because they allowed themselves to be fooled.”
“You have to know Darrows,” said old Pluto to Mr. Small. “It’s bad enough that anybody would dare trick them. But to get away with that and then to laugh at ’em right in front of ’em, why they’ll never live it down!”
“And they’ll be about ready to pray we won’t spread it around how we made fools out of them,” Mayhew said. “I’m going to have Pesty tell them we let all the Carr boys watch!”
Mr. Small had to smile. “You are surely something,” he said.
Then Mayhew and Pluto laughed and laughed.
Gently Mr. Small led Thomas into the cave. The boy was trembling all over. Mr. Small tried not to let Thomas know he had noticed.
Thomas was so ashamed. He would never be an actor. Never in a million years.
Chapter 19
IN THE CAVERN of Dies Drear, Mr. Pluto sat behind his elaborate desk with a most satisfied grin upon his face.
Mr. Small and Thomas were tired out. They had changed from their slave costumes into their regular clothes. They’d finished removing the makeup and had piled their chains, wigs and such into a heap.
Pesty came in with the gossamer wings, which she placed on the very top of the heap. “I put the bay back in his stall,” she said to Mayhew. “I cleaned the paint off him, too.”
“You are a good baby,” Mayhew said. “Now you ought to go to bed.”
“Come here, Miss Bee,” Pluto said to her. “Come sit on my lap. You know, you handled that horse and those wings just about perfect.” He folded the smiling child within his throw, so that only her head, with eyes black and bright, peeked out.
“That was about the best show I’ve ever seen,” Pluto said. “And you all wanted to put me in a hospital!”
“My mistake, Father,” said Mayhew. He hadn’t felt so friendly toward his father in a long time. “How in the name of heaven did you think up fixing that throw the way you did?”
“When you came out of that cave,” said Mr. Small, “you looked like a huge, frightful bat.”
“And what you said,” Thomas said to old Pluto. He was still weak and trembling, and he wouldn’t look at any of them. “You scared me, Mr. Pluto.”
Mr. Pluto laughed softly. “It was a thrill for me,” he said. “I had the best old time!”
Glancing at Thomas, Mayhew felt sorry for him. “Father did look pretty awful, what with that throw fixed the way it was. But being the way he is, I knew he would say something to terrify those Darrows. If I’m an actor at all, it’s because he was one before me.
“I didn’t do so well, did I?” Thomas said. “I guess I�
��m not too good as an actor.” He couldn’t find the words to apologize for his fear.
“You did just fine, son,” said Mr. Small. “Having to lie there for so many hours—you did real well.”
Thomas couldn’t stand being treated so politely by them. He was growing angry at himself for being such a coward, and angry at them for being so nice about it.
“I think I’ll go on home,” he said. “See if Mama is sleeping.”
“I’ll walk over with you,” Mayhew said. “Pesty, you ready to go over to Thomas’ house and sleep?”
“She’s asleep already,” said Mr. Small. “Look.”
It was true. Pesty had snuggled down against Mr. Pluto and was now fast asleep.
“Let her alone, Mayhew,” Pluto said. “Mr. Small can take her home when he goes along—you will stay awhile, won’t you, Mr. Small?” Mr. Small and old Pluto silently surveyed one another. Mr. Small nodded that he would stay.
“Why do you have to stay?” Thomas asked his father. “Why won’t you come on home now?”
“Never you mind,” said Mayhew. “Let’s get going, see if we can find any more Darrows in the trees.”
“There won’t be any more Darrows,” Thomas told him, “and I don’t need you to walk me home.”
“I’m not walking you home,” said Mayhew. “I’m just going to walk with you, that’s all. You don’t want to be friends with me?”
Without Thomas becoming aware of it, Mayhew was leading him up the ramp and out of the cavern.
“I don’t mind being friends,” Thomas said. Secretly he was pleased that Mayhew had thought to go with him. “But I don’t need anyone to take me home.”
“I’m not taking you home, for pity’s sake!” Mayhew said. “Man, you sure are a tough one to handle. How come you are so hard on people?”
“Well, I’ve always been independent,” Thomas said seriously. “I make wood sculpture. I’m an artist, some say, and you have to be pretty much by yourself to be able to carve well.” He felt full of pride when Mayhew looked at him with real interest.
“Wood sculpture? No kidding?”
“Sure,” said Thomas. “I have even sold pieces to strangers. But mostly I just keep the pieces for myself and my family. Papa says I have a real talent for wood sculpture.”
They went into Mr. Pluto’s cave. The wall of the cave slid across the opening, shutting off the cavern of Dies Drear.
In the cavern, Mr. Small stretched out on the floor to one side of Mr. Pluto’s desk. He folded his arms across his chest and sighed deeply. Closing his tired eyes for a second, he opened them again to stare at the immense, vaulted ceiling far above his head.
“I think now you can tell me what this is all about,” he said to Pluto. He was so tired, he would have no trouble falling asleep right where he was.
Mr. Pluto cleared his throat. “Mayhew said he would leave it to you,” Pluto said. “Mayhew he told me this morning, whatever you said to do with this cavern was all right by him. And so I leave it up to you. I will trust you to do the right thing.” Pluto tried to keep his voice casual, but deep within it was all his hope and his desire.
“I see,” said Mr. Small. He sat up and fixed his gaze on the intricate, carved detail of the desk. “I was wondering a moment ago if anyone … Dies Drear, I mean, ever made a list of all the things in this cavern.”
“No, not that I have found,” Mr. Pluto said. “I have been through all the ledgers and books. I’ve found no list, nor no record of where he got any of it.”
“Fascinating,” said Mr. Small. “He never ever meant any of it to be sold. And what a job to inventory all this. But I think I should, don’t you? Give each piece a number, a name and description, and try to fix a value for it. What do you think, Mr. Skinner?” Mr. Small deliberately kept from looking at Pluto or around at the cavern.
And it was some time before Pluto spoke. Mr. Small was afraid he had fallen asleep, so still was he holding Pesty. But then Pluto breathed deeply.
“That will take as long as the rest of an old man’s life,” he said softly.
Mr. Small looked at him and smiled gently. “You know, sir, you have a way of saying things that I do admire,” he said. “Your son, Mayhew, has the same gift with words. But just as you say, to inventory all this will take that long, at least.”
“You will not turn this place over to the foundation right away?”
It was Mr. Small’s turn to remain silent. When he did speak, it was with relief that at last he knew he had made up his mind. “All this has remained hidden for a century. Keeping it hidden awhile longer won’t matter much.” Saying this, Mr. Small felt peaceful inside.
Ever so carefully, Pluto got to his feet. “You take Miss Bee on home now,” he said. His old eyes looked mistily at the child. “Just carry her like this, and she will sleep all the way.”
Mr. Small did as he was told. “I will begin in the morning,” he said. “I will inventory the books and ledgers first.”
“They’ll be ready,” said Pluto. “Come as early as you will.”
That was all then. Mr. Small left, carrying Pesty through the trees as carefully as old Pluto would have. Part way home, he passed close to someone he could but barely see. There was a laugh, a deep, sharp sound in the pine boughs. It was Mayhew coming back. He didn’t stop to speak, nor did Mr. Small.
A half hour before, Thomas and Mayhew had gone through the trees all the way home. Thomas wouldn’t have believed they could become friends so quickly.
“You can learn a lot about acting in the month I’ll be here,” Mayhew had said.
“You mean you will teach me?”
“I can teach you a good amount if you think you really want to learn,” Mayhew said.
“I don’t think I’d be much good at it,” said Thomas. “But there’s one thing I’ve seen you do that I’d like to learn.”
“What’s that?”
“How is it you can seem to flow out of doorways,” Thomas asked, “like you were liquid spilling into the night? How do you do that, Mayhew?”
Mayhew laughed. “I’ll have to think about that one. Maybe I can break it down and show you.” He laughed again, and they walked without speaking.
“You know,” Mayhew said suddenly, “I’m glad we did what we did tonight. Not so much scaring the Darrows. That was important, too, because now they know they can never fool with your father the way they did with mine. They’ll fear your father in a way they never feared mine. They’ll fear him not as a devil but as a man. He will have the right to say who can pass here and who cannot. Yes, they’ll be afraid of him and the law he won’t hesitate to use against them.
“But what I meant to say about being glad is that my father had such a good time with it. I felt closer to him tonight than I think I ever have.”
“You never liked him much?” Thomas asked. He felt he could ask that. He felt Mayhew wouldn’t mind talking about it.
“No, I never did,” Mayhew said. “It’s hard for a boy growing up without his father, not even able to wish for him since he didn’t like him to begin with. You like your father though, don’t you, Thomas?”
“Sometimes I get angry with him,” Thomas said. “He always has to figure out everything before I do. Like in the house when we were planning to scare the Darrows.”
Mayhew smiled. “Your father knew we were going to too much trouble to be scaring just plain people.”
“No,” said Thomas, “he had a report from the foundation about the whole history of the house, and from it he must have figured out that the third slave and you and your father and the Darrows were all mixed up together.
“But sure, I like him fine. He’s pretty smart, you know. Folks always did say he had a powerful brain.”
Mayhew laughed softly.
Then Thomas said, “Do you suppose I and that youngest Darrow, that Mac Darrow, do you think we could get to be friends?”
“Oh well,” Mayhew said, “the Darrows aren’t going to want him or Pesty fooli
ng around here for a very long time. And you have to remember, Macky’s a Darrow after all—we did fool his brothers pretty bad. He has to live it down, too, you know. But give it time. Anger might die down by the change of a couple of seasons. Wait for the winter. You’ll most likely run into Macky here in these trees full of snow, when you both are out hunting rabbit.”
“It will take that long a time?” Thomas said.
“That’s not a long time. When you begin to think it is, just remember Father hunting thirty years for his legacy, which might have never existed. Yes, winter will be here before you have got to know this land properly. You will feel and breathe an air so cold that all things holding warmth will be your friend.”
“You love it here,” Thomas said. “How come you go away from it?”
“That’s my secret, my friend,” said Mayhew. “Not all questions can have answers to be said out loud.”
They had entered Thomas’ house. Mrs. Small was asleep on the couch in the parlor. On the floor beside the couch was Thomas’ baseball bat.
“I’ll be going,” Mayhew whispered again. “I won’t see you tomorrow. I have to take care of business in Dayton. I’ll see you the next day though, and we will maybe start your stage lessons.”
Thomas said good night to him. He didn’t wake Mrs. Small, but went up to his own room. He didn’t even bother about the captain’s chair, which still sat with its back to the room. There were his carvings, so familiar, grouped on the mantelpiece. Falling across his bed, he was instantly asleep.
Thomas awoke about ten o’clock the next morning. His clothing was hardly wrinkled, but he was stiff in every muscle. He washed his face, brushed his teeth and combed his hair. Not bothering to change his shirt, he went quickly down the hall and down the stairs. He found his mother busy with the twins in the kitchen. She looked tired, but she smiled at Thomas pleasantly and fixed him a heaping plate of ham and eggs with potatoes. Thomas ate all of it in a few minutes. He had two glasses of milk and two slices of toast besides.
The House of Dies Drear Page 17