Chris Grabenstein - The Black Heart Crypt

“Fascinating,” said Malik. “I’ve never been inside a clock before.”

“Me neither,” said Zack.

There was a ten-foot-square wooden deck in the middle of the crowded room, its oak planks stained with globs of grease and machine oil. A series of toothy gears, spiraling springs, and cogwheels—each one larger than the one before it—climbed up to the cranks and axles that once turned the clock hands.

“Okay,” said Zack. “If you wanted to hide the stone puzzle, where would you put it?”

“Someplace high,” said Malik. “You could scale those gear teeth and prop it on a ledge or on top of an idle crankshaft.”

Zipper barked once. His nose was still glued to the floor, the way it had been all the way up the steps. Now he sniffed a straight line across the wooden deck and came to a large lead weight tied to a thick rope.

“You think he smells Norman’s scent?” asked Malik.

“Yes! That’s why he ran up the staircase so fast!”

Zip went up on his hind legs and barked at the rafters, where the rope looped over a pulley.

Great .

Zack Jennings, who had flunked every phys ed test he had ever taken, would need to shinny up a rope to see if Zipper was right.

“Wish me luck,” he said to Malik.

Zack knew he was the one who had to do the rope climb.

Because Malik Sherman was the only kid at Pettimore Middle School who had flunked more P.E. tests than he had.

The ropewas tied to a bell-shaped lead weight, part of the old clock’s winding mechanism, similar to the chained brass pinecones that drove his grandfather’s cuckoo clock.

Zack grabbed the cord with both hands above his head. Pulling down on the rope while jumping, he lifted himself into the air. He quickly used his feet to pinch the rope and anchor himself in position.

Now he reached as high as he could with his arms and gripped the rope tightly so he could release his feet and, crunching his stomach muscles, bring his knees to his chest and once again snag the rope between his feet.

“How’d you do that?” asked Malik.

“Coach Mike taught me.”

Now he just had to do it five or six more times.

And not look down.

Looking down always made him realize what he was actually doing, and then he couldn’t do it anymore.

Grunting, groaning, grabbing, and gripping, he finally made it up to the pulley.

“Is it there?” Malik shouted from below.

“Hang on.”

Now Zack had to try something he’d never trained for: While holding on to the rope with one hand and squeezing his feet hard, he reached up and felt around on the top of the grimy crossbeam the pulley was bolted to.

He felt nothing but splinters.

So he slid his hand the other way.

And knocked something off the ledge!

“Got it!” shouted Malik.

Zack looked down.

His friend had made a perfect two-handed breadbasket catch.

Zipper barked and wagged his tail.

“Is it the black heart stone?” Zack shouted.

“Yep! Come on down.”

Zack slid down the rope.

Exactly the way his gym teacher, Coach Mike, had told him not to.

He had nasty rope burns on his palms and knees but he didn’t care. Malik was already twisting and turning the black heart stone and taking it apart!

“I need to find the signal mirror,” said Zack, rummaging through Aunt Ginny’s bag. “It’s time to call in the herbologists!”

He found the silvery square and ran over to the clock face.

There was a broken-out spot about two feet off the floor, between the V and the VI.

He knelt down to flash Judy the signal.

He could see her near the school bus, shielding her eyes with one hand, staring at the base of the tower.

He tilted the mirror back and forth a couple of times, bounced Judy a sunbeam.

She blinked. Looked up. Waved.

A raven cawed.

“Haw-haw-haw.”

Zack stuck his head through the hole.

The big black bird was perched on the frozen minute hand.

It ruffled out its giant wings and took off—flying straight for the big yellow bus!

Azalea staredat the muzzle of the pistol the masked maniac had pointed at her nose.

“Where have all these people come from?” he asked.

“Well, these days, when there’s, like, a disaster, word spreads fast. Text messages, tweets …”

Jack the Lantern shook his head. His eyeballs were looking crazier and crazier.

And the nut job had three weapons: two old-fashioned pirate pistols, one very modern revolver.

“This is not how I had planned it to be! I am outnumbered. Out-armed. I must act boldly! Where is Zachary Jennings? Why is he not on this carriage?”

“I think he took a sick day,” said Azalea.

Suddenly, glass shattered.

A giant black bird busted through the rear window of the bus and swooped up the center aisle. It landed on a seat back and started croaking and cawing like crazy. Glass chips tinkled out of its feathers.

Pumpkin Head tilted his head sideways and started nodding—like he understood everything the crow creaked out.

“But did he find the black heart stone?” he snapped.

“Haw!”

“Curses!” Pumpkin Head balled up his fist and shook it at the bus’s ceiling. “Why must this Jennings family torment me through the ages?”

Furious, he clutched Azalea’s arm and dragged her up the aisle to the back door of the bus.

When the police raised their pistols and rifles in response, the masked man jammed one of his pistols into Azalea’s ear.

“Satan! Come hither!” he shouted out the broken window as he kicked the door open.

As the black steed approached the door, the crazed bandit called to the crowd, “Shoot me, and she dies.”

Now, keeping his back to the school bus and never lowering his pistol, Jack lifted Azalea into his arms and leapt into the horse’s saddle, holding the girl in front of him.

“Come, lass. You and I are going across the street to visit with your friend.”

Malik seemedto be having a hard time taking the black heart apart.

Zack and Zipper were both watching every move he made. Even the ones that didn’t seem to work. Pieces weren’t coming out of the puzzle at the same pace they had when Malik tore the thing apart the first time.

“Everything okay?”

“Zack?”

“Yeah?”

“I don’t perform well under pressure.”

“Right,” said Zack, backing up toward the clock face. “So me and Zip will just wait over here. Give us a holler when you’ve got the black heart core. We’ll just be waiting.…”

“Zack?”

“Yeah?”

“You’re pressuring me again!”

“Sorry.”

Malik swiped some sweat out of his eyes.

Zack figured he’d better not say anything else.

So he peeked through the hole in the glass and checked out the action over by the school bus.

He wished he hadn’t.

Jack the Lantern was leaping from the back of the bus onto the black horse, using Azalea as his human shield!