Deadman's Castle Read online

  “Not necessarily,” said Dad. “The Protectors tell me he might watch the house for three or four days. Maybe a week. He would learn our routine, how all of us come and go. He would choose the right time, the right place, and then—”

  “No!” said Mom. “I don’t want to even imagine this.”

  But we did. We sat in an awkward silence, all staring off in different directions, all picturing what might happen. Then Mom touched my arm and asked, “Do you have any questions? Anything to tell us?”

  “Now’s the time,” said Dad.

  I knew I had to tell them what Bumble had seen. But I didn’t want to do it right then. Couldn’t I wait till the end of school and Hayden’s party? On Saturday, Angelo would come for our last sleepover, and when he went home on Sunday morning I would tell him what was happening. I’d ask him to tell Zoe. Then I’d say goodbye and it would all be over. Just two more days, I told myself. Forty-eight hours, and I’d hardly be alone for a moment.

  It seemed safe enough. I would be very, very careful. And for once it would be me who was deciding when we were leaving.

  So I said nothing.

  Late that night, I lay in bed with my curtains closed to the narrowest slit, watching moonlight ripple on the river. It was just like the old days. I listened for the Lizard Man and tried to stay awake. When I heard Dad coming up to bed I called to him softly. “Dad?”

  He opened the door and stepped in, bringing the light from the hall along with him. I blinked and squinted.

  The last time my dad had come into my room in the middle of the night—except to drag me out of bed and bug out—I had been a little boy. He seemed uncomfortable doing it now, perching on the very edge of the bed, way down by my feet. He asked, “What’s on your mind?”

  I didn’t want to make him angry all over again, but I had to know.

  “What was my first name?”

  Slowly, Dad shook his head. “I can’t tell you that. The Lizard Man has never seen you. He has no idea what you look like. But he definitely knew your name, though I don’t know how he got it. Maybe from a neighbor. If he called that out and it made you turn around he would know right away that he’d found you.”

  “But that could happen if he just calls out ‘Weaver,’” I said.

  Dad looked torn, like he couldn’t decide what to do. Then he took a deep breath, and with a sigh he said, “William.”

  That didn’t sound familiar at all. I wondered if Dad had made up a name just to satisfy me.

  “We named you William,” he said. “After your grandfather. But everyone called you Billy.”

  I knew that was true. Every part of my body seemed to remember that name.

  THE YEARBOOK

  There was excitement and sadness as the school year came to an end on Friday. Kids like Trevis, who really hated spending days in class, had begun to remember that not spending days in class could be worse. For them, all that lay ahead was two months of sweat and boredom.

  For me, there was nothing. Our last day would be a short one, with free period right after lunch as the last class of the year. When I walked out of Rutherford B. Hayes at the end of that period, I’d be leaving the school forever. In a couple of days I’d be gone from the Horseshoe—to where, I had no idea. All the kids I’d come to know, I would never see again.

  It made me very sad to think about that, and I tried not to cry.

  It was hardest when the yearbooks arrived. They came in three boxes wheeled on a trolley, pushed by Principal Harris. Everyone wanted to open them right away, but Mr. Little said we’d have to wait. “You can pick them up on your lunch break,” he said.

  I didn’t want to be around when everyone got their yearbooks because there wasn’t one for me. I’d started school too late to have my picture taken, and Dad wouldn’t have allowed that anyway. So I spent the lunch break sitting all alone at the far corner of the field, and I made myself a little late for free period. I had to knock on the classroom door for Mr. Little to let me in.

  When it swung open and I saw all the kids in their places, it was just like my first day at Rutherford B. Hayes. Every one of them kept staring at me as I walked down the aisle.

  On my desk was a yearbook. I pushed it aside, not knowing whose it was. But as Mr. Little kept talking about report cards, I got curious. I opened the book and found the pages for my grade. They looked like a wall of graffiti, totally covered with writing. It looked like every kid in the class had jotted something there: UR 2 cool 4 school. Have a nice summer!

  It made me sad and jealous to see those things, and I started to close the book. But my own name suddenly leapt out at me among the scribbles.

  Good luck, Igor.

  I saw it again at the bottom of the page. You rock, Igor. At the left-hand side. See you in September, Igor!!!!! And right down the very middle, in the crease of the binding. I signed your crack, Igor.

  Zoe had written something. So had Angelo, and Trevis, and Mr. Little too: It has been a pleasure having you in my class. Even Mr. Moran had added something, though his spelling was never that great: Play the game, Egor.

  I read every comment; I read them two and three times and forgot all about Mr. Little. Then Angelo nudged my arm and I looked up to see everyone watching me.

  “That’s a gift from all of us,” said Mr. Little.

  I couldn’t say anything back. I thought I might choke up if I tried.

  All the kids brought me their books to sign. They shuffled past my desk in a long line, like I was a famous author or something.

  Last thing of all, as I was leaving the room, Mr. Little stopped me. “I just want you to know,” he said. “I’m very proud of you, Igor.”

  THE PARTY

  On Friday evening I dressed for the party in clothes that Mom had helped me pick out at Value Village: a white shirt over a black T-shirt, a pair of cargo pants with a hundred pockets. She wanted me to wear a tie. “I’m sure all the boys will be wearing ties,” she said.

  “I’m sure they won’t,” I told her.

  But she went ahead and got out the tie she’d given Dad in the motel room at Christmas. She held it up like a squashed snake. “You’d look very smart,” she told me.

  “No,” I said. “Please, Mom.”

  “All right, I won’t force you,” she said. “But just to satisfy me, would you put it in your pocket? Goodness knows you’ve got enough of them.”

  “Okay.” I zipped the tie into a pocket of my cargo pants, thinking it would still be there if I ever started school in my next house.

  I didn’t argue when Mom said she’d drive me to and from the party. I didn’t want to be alone if the Lizard Man was anywhere around. As we cruised down Dead End Road, I looked for him among the bushes in the park, between the town houses on the other side. Mom could see I was anxious, but she thought it was because of the party. “Don’t worry,” she said. “You’ll have a good time.” And I did.

  In the basement of Hayden’s place, music boomed from tall speakers. When Zoe showed up, I didn’t recognize her at first. She wasn’t wearing ghoulish makeup or glittering jewelry. Instead of her black coat and combat boots, she’d put on a yellow dress as flimsy as butterfly wings. Her shoes had daisies on them.

  She stood in the doorway and looked around the room till she saw me. Then she came straight through the crowd, weaving around the people who were dancing.

  The music was throbbing with guitars and drums and shrieking voices. I shouted at her, “Hi, Zoe!”

  She leaned forward, put her hand on my arm, and bellowed into my ear. “You can’t call me that!” Along with her clothes, she’d changed her name. “I’m Catalina.”

  That was a pretty name. She leaned back and I leaned forward to shout into her ear. “So no more cemeteries?” I shouted. “No more Deadman’s Castle?”

  “Are you kidding? I’ll be up there at midnight,” she told me. “Catalina’s only here for the party.”

  Zoe stepped back. Smiling, she held out her hands. “Wanna da
nce, Igor?”

  “I don’t know how!” I shouted.

  She was already moving her body. It snaked up and down; it wriggled back and forth. Smiling at me, still reaching out, she took two steps backward. Then she whirled away and danced by herself.

  It was amazing. The way a movie gangster staggers back while he’s been shot by a machine gun, that was how Catalina danced. All around the room she stumbled and lurched.

  When the music changed to slow and syrupy, she came back and pulled me away from the wall. She put her arms around me, and I put my arms around her, and we shuffled back and forth. I leaned my head on her shoulder. Her hair smelled like coconuts and roses.

  The song lasted three minutes. I wished it would go on forever, because this was probably the last time I’d see her.

  Dad went to work on Saturday morning. When Angelo came over in the afternoon, I took him straight up to my room.

  “There’s a weird guy out there,” he said.

  That sent a shock through me. “Where?” I asked.

  “In the park?”

  “What’s he doing?”

  “Feeding squirrels.”

  “What’s weird about that?” I asked.

  “It was the way he looked, Watson. Dark suit. Sunglasses.”

  “Did he have tattoos?” I asked. “Was he driving a big car?”

  “I dunno, Watson,” said Angelo. “He’s probably still out there if you want to look.”

  I walked over to the corner window, pried the curtains apart, and peeked through the gap at the trees and the bushes. There was nobody there.

  “Did you actually see him feeding squirrels?” I asked. “Did he have a bag of peanuts?”

  “Give it up,” said Angelo. “You sound just like your dad.”

  I had to laugh because he was right. Dad had made me so fearful that a guy feeding squirrels was enough to upset me. I let the curtains fall into place and got out the Game Boy Dad had given me.

  That night it was hot and muggy. We propped the window wide open by jamming a ruler on top of the box for Alfred Chicken.

  Smasher lay exhausted on my bed with her three legs sticking straight up. Beside her, Angelo leaned against the pillow and told the same ghost stories he’d told on our very first sleepover. He’d brought his flashlight, and he shone it on his face, and it was all I could do not to tell him I was leaving.

  Through the window came a river wind that was warm and wet. Rain showers drummed hard on the little porch roof, suddenly starting and suddenly stopping. Faraway thunder rolled through the sky.

  We stayed up past one o’clock. Then, according to our sleepover rules, I curled up on the floor under a thin blanket. Angelo, in his jeans and T-shirt, slipped into my bed. Smasher lay beside him.

  I was so tired that I could have slept till noon. But it was still dark when Smasher woke me up with a frantic whining. I banged the bed to get Angelo’s attention. “Your dog wants out,” I said.

  He didn’t answer.

  “Hey, Bonito!”

  Smasher practically howled. Afraid she would wake my folks, I said, “Come on, Bonito, let’s—”

  He wasn’t there. The sheet had been pushed aside and Angelo’s flashlight lay on the pillow. Outside, the moon was a ghostly circle in a sky full of racing clouds. It dimmed and brightened like a flickering lightbulb.

  Smasher was crying at the window. Balanced on her one hind leg, she was trying to leap up to the sill. “Are you out there, Angelo?” I said. But there was no answer.

  I crawled over the bed and put my head out the window. “Angelo?”

  From down below came a shuffling sound and a muffled sort of cry. Had Angelo fallen over the edge? I imagined him lying on the grass with an arm or leg twisted underneath him.

  Smasher was still trying to leap up to the windowsill. She kept falling back on the bed and squirming around to get up on her feet and try again. I put on my shoes, took the flashlight, and climbed out onto the porch roof.

  Wet with rain, the ivy was slick and slippery. I grabbed on to the wall to stop from falling, then shuffled to the edge and looked down.

  There was a man below me on the moonlit lawn. A dark shape in dark clothes, he was dragging something that struggled and kicked. Like an animal scurrying into its hole, he moved out of the light and into black shadows.

  The thing he was dragging was Angelo.

  IN THE MOONLIGHT

  Smasher kept whining. Down on the grass, the Lizard Man was heading for the bushes and trees at the edge of the park. Hauled along behind him, Angelo writhed from side to side. His mouth gagged, his feet tied together, he tried to wriggle free. But the Lizard Man kept moving steadily into the darkness until both of them vanished into the park.

  With a whimper, Smasher leapt through the open window. She hit the cardboard box and knocked it and the ruler loose.

  I saw the window closing. Angelo had made it slide so easily that it slammed shut before I could move.

  Startled by the sound, Smasher slipped on the wet ivy. She went tumbling down the roof, twisting and squirming, and got to her feet only to fall again. Flat on her belly, she slid backward toward the edge of the roof. At the very last moment she caught herself, and she clung to the ivy by the claws on her front feet. The vines stretched and tightened. The tendrils started popping loose.

  I took one step toward Smasher and my foot slipped out from under me. Suddenly I was down on my knees, clutching handfuls of ivy to hold myself there. I saw Smasher looking back at me, her eyes big and pleading. Then, very slowly, she slid over the edge and disappeared.

  I crawled up to the window to get back into the house. But the latch had clicked shut and the window wouldn’t open. So I knocked on the glass, banging with my knuckles until I realized it was useless. My parents were too far away to hear me, and Bumble could sleep through anything. To get off the roof I had to climb down.

  We could get down here easily, Angelo had told me. There’s kind of a trellis.

  I inched toward it, careful not to slip. I could see where the Lizard Man had climbed up to the window and down again. The ivy was stretched and broken, stripped of leaves in places. I shoved the flashlight into my pocket, leaned out, and clutched onto the vines.

  I went down in a rush, like a fireman down a pole, more falling than climbing. But I landed on my feet, and I found Smasher tangled in the vines just above the ground. She clung to them desperately, like she thought she was still ten feet in the air, kicking her one hind leg. I had to pluck her loose and set her down, and the moment her feet touched the grass she went dashing away across the lawn.

  She might not have looked like a bloodhound, but she sure acted like one. She raced across the grass toward the bushes and the trees.

  The clouds covered the moon, turning everything black.

  Somewhere out there the Lizard Man was hidden in the darkness. I wondered if he’d already figured out he had the wrong boy and was coming back for me.

  He’ll never know. A little voice seemed to whisper in my mind. Let him have Angelo and he’ll leave you alone.

  It was an awful, evil idea. The Lizard Man would never imagine that he’d taken the wrong boy. He had no idea what I looked like. I could let him do to Angelo whatever it was that he meant to do to me, and I’d be free of him forever. There’d be no more hiding from him, no more bugging out.

  But I didn’t want that to happen. I hated myself for even thinking about it. Angelo was my friend, and I would never abandon him. I would do whatever I could to save him.

  The clouds grew thin again, and the moon shone through. I couldn’t see Smasher anywhere, but I heard her moving through the bushes. In the darkness beside the house I stood listening for the Lizard Man and watched the clouds stream across the moon. I thought about pounding on the front door until I woke up Dad. But just then, on the other side of the river, the red glow of a brake light appeared. An engine started, and headlights glared white flashes through the trees. Beyond the forest, on a road across the
river, a car sped away in a blur of red taillights.

  Smasher went crazy. I ran through the bushes and found her barking at the bank of the river. I was sure she’d followed the trail of the Lizard Man right down to the water, and she knew that the car was carrying Angelo away. She knew he was gone.

  There was no time to get Dad. I had to follow the car. So I picked up Smasher and waded into the river.

  The water had risen with the rain. Little waves leapt over my shoes, and with every step I was afraid of plunging into a hole I couldn’t see. Smasher wriggled and kicked in my arms, but I held her tightly and set my feet down carefully. If I fell, Smasher would be swept out of my arms and carried away.

  When I was halfway across, the moon came out and the water in front of me turned sparkling white. Then the river grew deeper, and it started flowing faster as I got close to the other side. I slipped on a stone but caught myself and staggered the rest of the way.

  As I stumbled up onto the bank, Smasher rolled out of my arms. She fell to the ground with a thud, leapt to her feet, and went tearing off into the forest. I went blundering after her.

  She led me up to a street that I’d never seen, through a neighborhood that I didn’t know, past darkened houses with everyone asleep. One moment the moon gleamed through churning clouds, and the next the rain was falling again. It pooled on the pavement; it trickled down the gutters.

  Smasher kept stopping, sniffing frantically here and there before racing on again. At one dark corner where the gutter overflowed, she lost whatever scent she was following. She stood shivering in the rain, crying like a baby. There was no trail to follow anymore. But I didn’t think I needed one. I was pretty sure the Lizard Man was taking Angelo to Deadman’s Castle.

  A SECRET DOOR

  If you put away my boy, I’ll put away yours. That was what the Lizard Man had told my father. I’ll lock him up in a cold dark place and make sure he never gets out.