Then he faced the People Taker and said, “I’ve got to hand it to you. All you had to work with was a Pit and a pair of planks, and you came up with a truly classic death trap.”
“Thank you.” The People Taker beamed like a pastry chef complimented on the quality of his blueberry muffins. “I’m ssssso glad you like it.”
Gustav blinked. “I didn’t say I liked it.”
“I’m not sssssurprised. Nobody likes being beaten.”
“I didn’t say I was beaten, either. You see, I don’t like bullies. I don’t like people making games out of hurting others, and I don’t like you coming back into my house causing more trouble when we all did a perfectly acceptable job of getting rid of you once before. Most of all, you silly, silly person, I don’t like you thinking that I entered this room unprepared and capable of being stopped by a simple little problem like this, when my good friend here just finished telling me a little while ago that she believes in me.”
For a fraction of a second, the People Taker didn’t look quite as much like the unstoppable force of nature he usually was . . . but like a pale, unnerved ghost of a man, recognizing in the face of an enemy a force far more powerful than himself.
In the second it took him to recover his composure and replenish the menace dripping from his smile, Nebuchadnezzar changed shapes from a scowling old woman to a leering skeleton in robes and spoke for him. “You’re bluffing.”
“Try again,” said Gustav.
Reaching into his jacket pocket, he did something he almost never did; something that, at this particular moment, was likely the most frightening thing he could have done.
He smiled.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
“NERTS”
Gustav’s hand emerged from his jacket pocket with a whistle in it.
Nebuchadnezzar gasped in horror. “You said you sent your dinosaur away with the whistle!”
“With that whistle,” Gustav said. “You were supposed to believe that it was the only one. I have a whole drawer full of them, and they all call Fluffy.”
He tossed the whistle over his shoulder to Fernie, who caught it in the air.
Then he took another out of his pocket.
“See?” he said. “I have plenty. I always keep my pockets filled with them in case I lose one.”
The People Taker’s grin returned. “Vvvvvery clever, boy. But as master plans go, it’s not that impressive. Fffffrom what I’ve observed tonight, it always takes your pet dinosaur several minutes to arrive. You could blow that whistle now and I’ll ssssstill have more than enough time to toss the Whats into the Pit.”
“I’m certain,” Gustav conceded, putting his whistle back in his pocket, “that if that were all I had in mind, I’d be in a lot of trouble now. But it’s not. We probably won’t even need the dinosaur whistles, because you have a couple of other surprises coming. For instance, remember when I said that I wasn’t holding out hope that my shadow would catch up with us? That’s because I didn’t have to hold out hope. He’s already here.”
This was news to Fernie. She looked around, searching the room’s many dark places for signs of movement, but saw nothing. Nor was she the only person it baffled; the People Taker was also glancing to and fro, looking considerably less confident than he had even a moment earlier.
“I don’t see him anywhere,” Nebuchadnezzar offered.
“Then find him!” the People Taker snapped, just a little bit more loudly than he had to.
Once again cowering as if expecting to be hit, Nebuchadnezzar began to glide around the room, checking every dark place, poking around in every nook. The red balloon bobbed along with him, scraping dust off the ceiling whenever he flew too high. At one point, when he drew close to Fernie and sniffed around her to confirm that she wasn’t carrying Gustav’s shadow on her person, the latex of that red balloon bulged for just a moment in the shape of her father’s face—actually, she corrected herself, in the shape of her father’s shadow’s face. He appeared to be shouting something she couldn’t hear. Probably let me out.
Unfortunately, she did not have a pin. But she understood that by keeping the People Taker occupied with clever talk, Gustav was giving her a chance to do something.
She considered blowing the extra whistle Gustav had tossed her. It was tempting to believe she could solve everything by just dumping the whole problem in the tyrannosaur’s stubby hands. But Gustav hadn’t blown the whistle when he had a chance, and after a moment of consideration, she saw why. The last thing she could afford to do, while her father and sister were so precariously balanced on their planks, was anything that made the floors shake. The whistle could only be a backup plan, to be saved until there was no other choice.
She inched to the edge of the Pit and knelt at the base of the plank bearing her unconscious sister. Pearlie seemed closer to waking up than their father; even as Fernie watched, her sister licked her lips, swallowed, and fell into a doze again, her dangling arm continuing to stir the shadow-stuff in lazy circles.
Emerging from under a set of three stairs leading to one of the room’s four exit doors, and dragging the remains of a cobweb as well as the leashed balloon behind him, Nebuchadnezzar exploded with curses. “I don’t see the boy’s shadow anywhere!”
“And yet,” Gustav said, “somehow the two of you both know I’m not lying.”
The People Taker grimaced. “I believe that’s the lassssst ssssstraw . . .”
During their prior encounter, Fernie had been astounded by just how quickly the People Taker could move when he wanted to, and had almost forgotten that terrible speed in light of all the strange shadow-magic she’d seen since. But he demonstrated his terrible swiftness again now, disappearing from the spot where he’d been standing and appearing, almost without so much as a blur, within grabbing range of Gustav.
At least, he appeared within grabbing range of where Gustav had been.
But even as the People Taker’s hands clutched empty air, Gustav appeared on his shoulders, neatly plucking the bent top hat off his head and leaping away with it in his hands.
“Come back with that!” the People Taker roared.
“I’m almost sorry I took it!” Gustav noted. “Don’t you ever wash your hair?”
Bellowing, the People Taker gave chase. Fernie had never seen a grown man run so fast—it was almost impossible to make out his movements, only the blurs and brief little impressions of his terrible form whenever he slowed down for another grab at Gustav. She caught a glimpse of him clutching for her friend, of her friend diving between the People Taker’s knees, of the two of them leaping past each other in midair, of the black cape slashing to and fro like the wings of some furious bird. There was nothing Fernie could do to get in the middle of that. She could only try to help Pearlie and their father while the People Taker was distracted.
The only problem was, she still had no idea what to do.
She knelt by the end of the plank bearing Pearlie and felt her heart almost burst from her chest when her big sister suddenly moved.
Pearlie pulled her arm back up to her chest, then seemed to realize that something was terribly wrong and groped at the empty space beside her, feeling nothing.
Fernie cried out. “Pearlie! Don’t move an inch!”
Pearlie twitched and came very close to rolling over the side, but suddenly froze as she registered the narrowness of her wooden bed and the terrible unsettling emptiness beneath it. Without even opening her eyes, she said, “Oh, nerts. We’re still in Gustav’s house, aren’t we?”
“Yes,” Fernie said. “In the Pit room. Whatever you do, don’t roll over.”
Across the room, a familiar hateful voice cried, “I said, give me back my hat!”
Pearlie stiffened further. “Was that the People Taker? Again?”
“Yes.”
“Nerts,” Pearlie said, this time with feeling. “I really hate that guy.”
Across the room, Gustav leaped off one of the short sets of stairs, kicked off
the wall just ahead of the People Taker’s clutching fingers, and seized the red balloon from the end of Nebuchadnezzar’s string. A stunning pop, somehow louder than the mere sound it made, filled the room as he burst it with his fingers in midair.
A hundred tiny spots of darkness exploded in all directions, expanding to become the shadows Nebuchadnezzar had taken captive: shadow dogs, shadow cats, shadow insects, all manner of stranger creatures, tumbling to the stone floor and fleeing for cover from the battle taking place around them. The two largest freed shadows belonged to Pearlie and Mr. What, bobbing about in too much of a daze to react as quickly as the lower animals.
The flesh-and-blood Pearlie almost jumped out of her skin when she heard the pop, and almost fell over the side of her plank. She squealed, clamped her knees tight, and pulled herself back on top with her hands, hugging the wood with a desperation that looked like she would have been perfectly happy to just hold on tight and not make any further attempt to crawl to safety.
“Don’t open your eyes,” Fernie advised. “Just guide yourself along with your hands and pull yourself to me.”
Even as Pearlie inched along, freezing again with every slight movement of her plank, the People Taker saw that at least one of his victims was now trying to save herself. He abandoned his pursuit of Gustav and charged the Pit, screaming, drawing back one leg for a kick that would have sent plank and girl plummeting into the Dark Country.
Two dark blurs, the shadows of Pearlie and Mr. What, tackled him at the shoulders, landing with absolutely no weight and not at all slowing him down. Gustav tackled the leg the People Taker had planted on the floor and had better effect. The People Taker fell over, boy and man disappearing under the same billowing cloak.
There was no way to tell what was happening under that cloak, but it was angry and it was violent. The People Taker cried out in sudden pain. A punch landed in somebody’s stomach. Gustav gasped. The cloak billowed up and down like an angry sea disturbed by beasts fighting just below the surface. Nebuchadnezzar, now looking like a wizened old man, hovered low above the fray, looking for a chance to enter it . . . and then was dragged in by his ankle by a shadowy gray hand that looked like Mr. What’s.
They were all still fighting, only a few steps away, as Pearlie came close enough to the end of her plank for Fernie to pull her to safety. The two sisters embraced, just for a second—and might have hugged for much longer than that had Pearlie not opened her eyes for the first time during the ordeal and seen their father still precariously balanced on his own plank.
“Oh, no! Dad!”
“He’s next,” declared Fernie, who immediately jumped up and started pulling Pearlie’s plank to safety on her side of the Pit.
Several feet away, the snarling People Taker managed to stand, despite the several shadows and squirming boy still clinging to him. It was no surprise that their combined efforts would not be enough to stop him, since a much greater weight of struggling children and motivated shadows had barely slowed him down the last time he and the kids had fought a dire battle in this room. He peeled Gustav off his shoulders and held him at arm’s length by the collar, leering at the boy’s ineffective punches. He glanced at the Pit, where the girls were running around the far side carrying the now-unoccupied plank. With supreme disdain he addressed his servant: “Oh, Nebuchadnezzar? I’m bored with my game. Do make sure their fffffather falls in.”
Nebuchadnezzar tore himself away from Mr. What’s shadow and assumed what might have been his true shape, a runny-faced goblin with fiery eyes and a fang-lined, twisted mouth, but there was still something terribly childlike about him, as if he’d become the monster he was at a very young age and had never grown out of it.
There was no way to stop him from planting both his feet on her father’s chest and howling in the voice of the fake little girl Fernie had rejected. “You should have accepted my friendship, Fernie!”
He raised both arms high above his head, displaying hands that had become more like claws, with nails that ended in barbed hooks.
Fernie cried out as those barbed hooks came down.
But Nebuchadnezzar’s claws never came close to touching Mr. What.
A patch of darkness scrambled out of Mr. What’s shirt pocket, unfolded into the shape of a boy, seized Nebuchadnezzar by the wrists, and drove him into the air.
It was Gustav’s shadow.
Fernie suddenly remembered: Gustav had told Nebuchadnezzar that he wasn’t about to pull the shadow out of his pocket—but he hadn’t said anything about Mr. What’s.
On their trip through the Hall of Shadow Criminals, even before the prison break began, he must have taken this extra precaution to make sure Mr. What remained safe. His shadow had been hiding on Mr. What ever since, waiting for the most advantageous moment to jump out and act.
Gustav’s shadow began wrestling with Nebuchadnezzar in midair but was having trouble with him, because he was limited to the form of a boy and the shape-changer was building up his arms to make them stronger and bulkier and more like the arms of a giant. The two slashed and punched and kicked at each other, but Nebuchadnezzar was clearly stronger, clearly more savage and dangerous; whatever damage shadows in battle were capable of doing to each other, Nebuchadnezzar was surely ready to deliver more.
“Fernie!” Gustav’s shadow shouted. “Save your dad while you have a chance!”
Across the room, the People Taker hurled Gustav to the ground, then—showing his disdain for his enemies with his lack of any particular hurry—reached down to pick up his fallen hat. Though stunned by his fall, Gustav still managed to kick it away. The hat rolled across the room, and the People Taker shrieked, momentarily more concerned with his headwear than with either the girls or their father. He darted for it, but Pearlie’s shadow snatched it up and tossed it overhand to Mr. What’s shadow, who tossed it back, the furious People Taker leaping first one way and then the next in momentary utter distraction from the job he was here to do.
Over at the Pit, Fernie took the rescued plank from Pearlie, put it down by her side, and knelt down at the side of the Pit nearest her dad’s feet. She confirmed that the plank he rested on was longer than the diameter of the Pit by about two feet, with an equal amount resting on each edge of the Pit.
“Quick, weigh down the end nearest his head!”
Pearlie didn’t ask any questions. She ran around the Pit again and dropped down onto her knees, resting all her weight on the end of her father’s plank.
Above them both, Gustav’s shadow clung to Nebuchadnezzar, trying to prevent those terrible sickle arms from slashing downward. Nebuchadnezzar shifted shape again, and a tail started to emerge from his back—an awful, segmented shape, like a scorpion’s stinger.
Below, Fernie carried the other plank a third of the way around the Pit and lowered one end into the murk, extending it outward until it passed under the section of her father’s plank that bore his outstretched legs. After a moment she pulled it back, reconsidered, and moved closer to the base of the circle, where the two sides of the Pit were only a few feet apart. This time she didn’t have to extend her plank too far beneath her father’s and was able to reach the stones on the Pit’s opposite wall. The other end of the plank she held hit stone only a couple of feet below the rim.
“Pearlie!” she cried again. “Grab the other end!”
Pearlie rushed to help, plopped down on her belly, and reached down with both arms to grab the other end of Fernie’s plank. It took her two tries to get it, but she did, securing her grip before pulling her end up.
In the air, the clawed and fanged Nebuchadnezzar whipped his scorpion tail at Gustav’s shadow, who avoided the strike by dropping like a stone and grabbing hold of the other shadow’s ankles as he went. Nebuchadnezzar hadn’t expected this. Both shadows fell into the Pit, disappearing below the surface murk.
Across the room, the People Taker leaped up and snatched his hat out of midair, placing it very firmly on his head and even adjusting it to the pro
per angle before glancing at the Pit and seeing the two What girls working together to rescue their father. This infuriated him. He spun with a twirl of his cape, driving back the two shadows and one boy in the act of charging him again, and stormed toward the girls, screaming, “You’re not going to get away with it this time, you little brats!”
Gustav and the shadows of Pearlie and Mr. What were close behind him and catching up, but in that second, there was no doubt. The People Taker would get to Fernie and Pearlie and Mr. What first.
And yet Gustav hadn’t lied before when he’d told the People Taker that the extra whistle and his own hiding shadow weren’t the only surprises he’d prepared. Another, as startling as the rest put together, now stormed into the room wearing a scowl of pure rage and placed himself in the People Taker’s path.
Fernie gasped when she saw who it was. “Hives?! But you’re supposed to be a terrible butler! You’re not supposed to help anybody unless they order you to!”
Hives hammered the People Taker with flurries of angry blows. “That’s my job description, miss! But why else do you think Gustav made such a point of giving me the night off? When I’m on my own time, I can do anything I want! And I want to help my friend Gustav!”
The girls now had a few seconds to complete their own critical job. The extra plank now bridged the Pit underneath the one holding Mr. What, bracing it at a right angle, like a cross. Mr. What’s plank had angled upward by an inch when the other one was slipped under it . . . but his delicate balance had held.
His own plank didn’t tip at all as the two straining girls pulled it toward safety.
Unfortunately, the jarring woke him up. His eyes shot open, and he instinctively sat up on his plank—just in time for the jarring to unbalance him completely. His arms spun like the blades of a windmill, fighting for balance. One leg shot up, the other slipped off the side of his plank, and he yelled, “Fernie! Pearlie!”
Nebuchadnezzar’s head popped up above the Pit’s murk. Whatever had happened between him and Gustav’s shadow in the last few seconds, he no longer wore a scorpion tail, but was just an innocent-looking little girl again, one who flashed the sweetest and cutest little smile as he launched himself at Mr. What’s back.
Gustav Gloom and the Four Terrors Page 12