Chris Grabenstein - The Black Heart Crypt

“You mean when they’re on their way to school?”

Jack smiled beneath his grinning mask.

“Why, Padre, what an excellent suggestion!”

Zack, Judy, Zipper, and Aunt Ginny crept into the Ickleby family crypt on Haddam Hill with their flashlights.

Aunts Sophie and Hannah would “wait outside, thank you very much.”

Zack had never been inside a tomb before.

The flaking plaster walls were caked with black stains, covered with mold and mildew. They were so crackled you could see the exterior blocks and the lumpy mortar slathered between.

Zack swung his flashlight over to a stack of three coffins. One was dark brown wood; one seemed to be gilded with gold. The third was a rotting pine box with its knotholes popped out. Zack heard a tiny squeak and almost dropped his light when he saw a mouse scurry out of the coffin.

“Where’s Barnabas?” asked Judy.

“I’m not sure,” said Aunt Ginny. “The coffins have shifted positions since the workmen placed them here all those years ago.”

Great , thought Zack. The ghosts have spent thirty-some years in here playing musical coffins .

“As I recall, the oldest coffin looks like a mummy’s casket made out of iron,” said Aunt Ginny. “The Ickleby family crest and the letter ‘B’ are emblazoned on its top.”

Zack and Zipper drifted off to explore one corner of the crypt while Judy and Aunt Ginny moved to the opposite end of the dank tomb.

Zipper barked. Zack raised the beam of his light and saw a long box made out of gray washtub metal. There were handles on the side, a hump in the middle for the chest, and a bigger bump at the bottom for feet. The lid over where the head would be was already open.

Zack moved forward, saw the family crest and big letter “B” on the coffin cover.

He looked down into the head hole.

He wished he hadn’t.

“You guys? I think somebody got here before us.”

Judy and Aunt Ginny hurried over.

“Oh, my,” said Aunt Ginny. “That’s inconvenient.”

“Yeah,” said Zack.

Inside the coffin was a skeleton.

Well, the collarbone and rib cage.

No head, though.

Someone had stolen the skull.

Which meant they had taken all the teeth, too.

“That settles it,” said Aunt Ginny with a defeated sigh. “We must find the original black heart stone. It’s our only hope!”

“So, thisis Spratling Manor?” said the nervous priest as he drove the stolen car under the arched gates at the entrance to the estate.

“Yes,” croaked his masked passenger.

“They’re the ones who had the spare burial chamber,” Father Abercrombie prattled on. “The Spratlings. Unusual name. One you remember. Spratling.”

“Pull up to the carriage house.”

A black raven cawed at them from its perch on the building’s roof.

“A crow sitting on a house is an evil omen,” commented the priest. “It means someone will die here. Tonight.”

The masked man gestured with his twin pistols. “Step out.”

“It’s late. I really should head back to—”

“Out! Now!”

The priest stepped out of the car. The raven swooped down to land with a hollow thud on top of the automobile. Jack the Lantern extended his arm. The bird hopped over to it like a falcon to a falconer.

“Fly, my dark friend. Seek out the Jennings boy. Bring me word of his whereabouts, for come the new day, I shall head out to strike him down.”

The bird took off like a shot, its broad black wings blocking out the moon as it circled overhead.

Much to Father Abercrombie’s surprise, the masked man brought a hand up to his jagged mouth hole and yawned.

“I must rest. I have become uncomfortably drowsy. I had forgotten how human bodies wear down on a daily basis.”

“Yes,” said Father Abercrombie urgently. “Sleep will do you good. It’s so quiet and peaceful here, you should sleep quite soundly. No noise at all …”

“There is no noise because we are surrounded by forest, Father. The trees swallow up all sound.” Jack the Lantern once more raised his double pistols. “By the by, that evil omen you spoke of will prove true. Someone will, indeed, die at this house tonight. You.”

The devil squeezed the triggers. Two flints sparked.

Father Abercrombie heard the roar of the twin gunpowder blasts.

And then he heard nothing.

“Try toget some rest, you guys,” Judy said to Zack and Zipper as she switched off the lights in the basement rumpus room. “I have a feeling tomorrow’s going to be a busy day.”

“So no school?” asked Zack from the sofa bed.

“No. Your dad and I just discussed it on the phone. Too many Icklebys had ‘hurt Zack Jennings’ on their To Do List. Barnabas probably does, too.”

Zack nodded. “Payback for Dad’s aunts yanking out his tooth.”

“Exactly. So you and Zip are with me until the police arrest Norman Ickes.”

Zack was exhausted and quickly fell asleep.

He had a horrible dream about mice playing card games in coffins with crazed cats, followed by another, featuring headless skeletons being chased by a demented dentist screaming, “Did you floss between your ribs?”

Around three in the morning, Zack woke up when he once again heard heavy panting and the sloppy sound of dribbling dog drool.

He peeled open an eye and looked over at the battered lounge chair. His grandfather was sitting there, petting the slobbering Black Shuck dog, who had dimmed his eyeballs to an orangish night-light glow.

“Hey, Grandpa.”

“Zack. How you holding up, champ?”

“Pretty good, I guess. Your sisters sent a dozen Ickleby souls on to, well, wherever it is souls like that go. But now we have to find the black heart stone we gave to Norman so we can seal up Barnabas, who everybody thought was a good guy, but, it turns out, he’s where the evil all started.”

Grandpa Jim nodded.

“But,” said Zack, “there’s only one problem: Nobody knows where the black heart stone is except Norman or Barnabas or maybe this ghost named Crazy Izzy Ickleby, but your sisters already sent him away and …”

Zack saw a strange look flicker across his grandfather’s sparkling blue eyes.

“What?” he said. “Do you know where Crazy Izzy hid the stone?”

Now Grandpa Jim squirmed in his chair.

“Even if I do, Zack, I can’t come right out and tell you.”

“Are those guys upstairs ever going to change these stupid rules? Because I gotta tell you, Grandpa, they sure make dealing with demons a whole lot harder than it has to be.”

“And when I tell you about the stone, should I tell you who thinks you’re the cutest boy in the whole sixth grade?”

“Well, you don’t have to tell me everything . You can definitely skip the mushy junk.”

“I’m trying to make a point here, Zack.”

“I know. Oh, did you hear? My real mother popped by for a visit.”

“I know.” Grandpa Jim leaned forward and looked around to make sure nobody was listening (even though nobody else was in the basement, just the two dogs). “You should listen to what your mother told you tonight.”

“Really?”