The Smoky Corridor

  Judy volunteered as a class mom a couple of times and got to meet a few of the ghosts. Bartholomew Buckingham gave her tips on how to make Curiosity Cat more Shakespearean.

  “I saw your show,” he told her. “Jolly good fun. But perhaps you might consider having a few of your cats duel each other in the final act?” He then put on a brief demonstration of feline fight choreography. There was a lot of leaping, prancing, hissing, and posing.

  Judy told him she’d think about it.

  Benny had new ideas every day (except when Judy was the class mom) about what Zack should blow up next.

  Azalea depressed everybody with gloomy poems she wrote (but she always winked to let Zack and Malik know she was messing with their heads).

  Chuck Buckingham’s irregular heartbeat turned out to be a pretty common heart murmur, so he could take gym class, which he and Zack were actually enjoying, because Coach Mike—despite the whistle, shorts, and buzz cut—wasn’t the typical P.E. teacher. More encouraging, less screaming. By the fourth week of September, when Zack flexed his arm, he could swear he saw a muscle bump.

  Assistant Principal Crumpler was grouchier than usual, because Wade Muggins, the school’s custodian, had “gone AWOL”—which Zack found out from Azalea was an army term for not showing up to do your job. There was a new janitor every week. They all kept quitting. None of them could stand working for Mr. Crumpler.

  Ms. DuBois ate at Zack’s table whenever she was on cafeteria duty. So did Ms. Rodgers, the school nurse.

  Even Kyle Snertz, Kurt’s younger brother, was sitting at the table and he wasn’t mumbling anymore, either. In fact, he was pretty funny. Everybody swore he would be a stand-up comic on TV someday and he said, “Wow, maybe I will.”

  And so far, his big brother, Kurt Snertz—who said he hated Zack even more for turning his little brother into a “nerd loser”—hadn’t made good on his multiple threats to stick Zack’s head down a toilet.

  Some days, after school, almost half of the sixth grade would hang out at Zack’s house. (Well, it felt like almost half.) Everybody wanted to meet Zack’s famous stepmom, Judy Magruder, because they had all grown up reading her Curiosity Cat books. They all liked Zipper, too.

  Yep, for the first time in his life, Zack Jennings was cool.

  He was also popular—well, at least with all the other unpopular kids, who, come to think of it, always outnumbered the popular kids anyhow. There could be only one star quarterback, one head cheerleader. There were tons of geeks, nerds, dorks, and dweebs. That was probably why they had so many names for being different.

  All in all, September was a totally awesome month.

  Then, in early October, Zipper got lonely.

  41

  Zipper stood on the couch, gazing out the window.

  Watching Zack disappear. Again.

  His tail wilted.

  Where did his boy go every morning, five days in a row?

  Was it more fun than staying home and throwing the squishy ball in the backyard?

  More exciting than pretending they were on a safari?

  More laughs than when all the other boys and girls came by the house and Zipper showed them his tricks?

  Hey, where were all those other kids during the day?

  Did they go to the same place Zack went?

  If so, it must be a fun place.

  Very fun.

  More fun than the house without Zack.

  Zipper sniffed.

  Zack’s scent was easy to pick up, even though Judy was burning toast in the kitchen again and the neighbors had just mowed their lawn, because Zack was his extra-special person. Every dog has one. Zack was his.

  Zipper tiptoed through the kitchen.

  “Going out, Zip?” Judy said as his nails clacked crisply on the tile floor.

  Zipper gave her a quick yap and a tail wag.

  “Have fun,” she said. “Just don’t water my rosebushes for me.”

  He gave her another yap, this one signaling he understood where the approved rest areas were located in the backyard. He stepped through the flapping doggy door.

  Judy and George had taught him not to stray beyond the backyard when he went out to do his business. Not to bother the neighbors or venture into the street.

  But that had been before Zack started disappearing every morning.

  Zipper sniffed twice.

  Zack’s scent was in the wind.

  All Zipper had to do was follow it.

  So he did.

  42

  Eddie strode into the main entrance of the school and found Assistant Principal Crumpler’s office, just like the boss had told him to.

  It was upstairs in the building that had once been Horace P. Pettimore’s mansion.

  He rapped his knuckles on the bald man’s half-open door.

  “What?”

  “I’m your new janitor, sir.”

  “Humph. How long do you plan to stay on the job? A day?”

  “As long as you need me, sir.”

  “Humph.” Mr. Crumpler stood up from his desk and clipped a walkie-talkie to his belt, muttering the whole time: “Lousy board of education. Think I should unclog my own toilets … cafeteria tray washer flooding … lima beans on the floor … sloppy joes …”

  That was enough to get them out the door and headed down the sweeping staircase to the main hall.

  “Do I have an office?” Eddie asked.

  “You don’t need an office! You need a mop! A bucket!”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Eddie was wearing a green shirt over green work pants and had a ring of keys clipped to his belt. He looked very janitorial. The boss wanted him at the school because that was where they had the best chance of finding the special child the spirit of John Lee Cooper had spoken of through the medium.

  Eddie and Crumpler reached the grand foyer.

  “Mighty fine oil painting,” said Eddie, admiring the large portrait of Horace Pettimore in its gilded frame.

  The bald man propped his hands on his hips and sized Eddie up.

  “You’re not from around here, are you?”

  “No, sir.”

  “That why you talk like you have molasses in your mouth?”

  “I suppose so. I hail from Chattanooga, Tennessee, which, coincidentally, is very close to the Georgia border.”

  “So?”

  “Just makin’ small talk.”

  “Well, knock it off! You’ve got work to do!”

  “Yes, sir, Mr. Crumpler.”

  Eddie wouldn’t say another word.

  He wouldn’t point out that he came from a city extremely close to the Georgia home of Patrick J. Cooper, the hero teacher who had died in this very school, valiantly attempting to “save” the two Donnelly brothers in the smoky corridor.

  Another terrible “accident.”

  He chuckled quietly.

  And that was when the small dog darted through the front doors Eddie must have forgotten to close when he’d entered the building.

  43

  “Mrs. Pochinko?” Mr. Crumpler yelled into his walkie-talkie. “Alert animal control! We need a tranquilizer gun!”

  He and the new janitor had chased the dog west, out of the main hall, past a few classrooms, up the steps, and into the cafeteria.

  The fifth graders, who ate earliest, were squealing with delight as the mangy mutt scampered under their tables.

  “Stop! Bad dog! Bad dog!” Mr. Crumpler was screaming. The bewildered children stared at him. “Eat your vegetables!” he hollered. “Eat them now!” He punched the talk button on his radio again. “Mrs. Pochinko?”

  “Sir?”

  “Give me a hallway lockdown. Give it to me now!”

  “On it, sir.”

  Mr. Crumpler stood frozen, mopping the top of his bald head with a paper napkin he had swiped from a boy who looked like he used his shirt sleeve instead of his napkin anyway.

  This was Carl D. Crumpler’s worst nightmare come true. A wild dog running amuck,
jeopardizing the safety of all his students. Chaos. Rabies. Armageddon.

  “You think maybe we should chase after it?” asked the rookie janitor.

  Crumpler gave the man a look. “You bet I do, mush mouth!”

  44

  When Zipper sprang through the open door and leapt up onto Zack’s desk, the whole classroom cracked up.

  When the dog started licking his face like he was a ham-flavored ice cream cone, they went wild.

  “Friend of yours?” asked Ms. DuBois.

  “Yes, ma’am. This is Zipper. I guess he missed me.”

  That was all he got to say before Mrs. Pochinko started braying over the PA: “Teachers, students, please stay in your classrooms. There is an animal control issue in the hallways. Mr. Crumpler has the situation under … eh … he’s working on it.…”

  “Uh-oh,” said Ms. DuBois.

  Malik raised his hand.

  “Yes, Mr. Sherman?”

  “If animal control comes, they will undoubtedly want to take Zipper to the dog pound. I think it would be wise for us to hide him.”

  “Where?” asked Ms. DuBois.

  “We’ll find a place,” said Zack.

  Ms. DuBois gestured for them to hurry. “Go on, boys. I’ll call your mother, Zack, to tell her to swing by and pick up the dog. Meet her out front in the visitor parking lot after the next bell.”

  “Thanks, Ms. DuBois! You’re the best!”

  “Hurry! Before Mr. Crumpler sees you!”

  So Zack grabbed Zipper; then he and Malik hightailed it out the door.

  45

  Mr. Crumpler and his new janitor, Captain Cornpone, had cleared the cafeteria and the wood shop and had entered the infamous smoky corridor when he noticed an open door.

  The DuBois woman’s classroom.

  “This way!” he said, and they stepped inside.

  “Hello, Mr. Crumpler,” said the history teacher, who had the same sort of Southern drawl as the new mop pusher.

  “Your door. Has it been open long?”

  “Not very.”

  The classroom was full of students. Two desks, however, were suspiciously empty.

  “Is there some sort of problem?” asked Ms. DuBois.

  “Yes!” said Mr. Crumpler. “I am looking for a dog. Have you seen one?”

  Ms. DuBois rubbed her chin thoughtfully. “A dog? Hmmm …”

  Some of the kids giggled.

  “Oh, you mean that sweet little pooch who just jumped out our window?”

  “What?”

  “Heavens, I almost forgot. See, we had the window open—this old room gets stuffy sometimes—and all of a sudden, out of nowhere, the cutest little doggy you ever did see comes scootin’ through that door, zips up the center aisle, and with a hop, skip, and a jump leaps out the back window.”

  “You let him get away?”

  “Why, we barely knew he was here before, zip, he was gone.”

  “Which way did it go?”

  “Heavens, I couldn’t say.”

  Mr. Crumpler narrowed his eyes. “Who sits in those two seats?”

  “The two empty desks?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Nobody. I believe that is why they are empty.”

  The children looked ready to giggle again.

  So Mr. Crumpler gave them his glare. The one that said, I’ll see you all in detention hall if you so much as breathe!

  That shut ’em up.

  “If the dog returns, call the office!”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Mr. Crumpler straightened his tie and strode out the door.

  When he hit the hall, he wasn’t sure, but he thought he might’ve heard children tittering behind him.

  No. That was impossible.

  The children feared Carl D. Crumpler far too much to laugh at him behind his back.

  46

  “We should head downstairs and double back!” shouted Zack, hugging Zipper close to his chest.

  The dog kept licking him. First the chin. Then the nose.

  “Excellent idea!” said Malik.

  They raced down a staircase to the basement.

  “We need to stay close to the main entrance!”

  “Well, we can’t take him up to the cafeteria,” said Malik. “And if we head out to the parking lot too early, Mr. Crumpler might see us.”

  “How about the janitor’s closet?” said Zack.

  “Excellent! It’s dead ahead. Is it unlocked?”

  Zack jiggled the knob. “Yes!”

  “Hurry.”

  They scurried into the dark room and closed the door.

  “Lights?” Malik asked.

  “No,” said Zack. “Someone might see it under the door.”

  Zipper grumbled and squirmed, so Zack put him down on the ground.

  “Stay right here, Zip, okay? Judy’s on her way. How much time till the bell?”

  Malik pushed a button on his wristwatch and the numbers glowed. “Twenty-five minutes.”

  Zack exhaled. “Ms. DuBois is so cool … covering for us.”

  “Yeah.”

  And then the boys heard the tick-tick-tick of dog claws on concrete.

  “Zipper?” Zack said in a tense whisper. “Come back here. Zip? Zipper!”

  Zipper started to whine. And then scratch. And then dig the way he did when his ball got stuck in the corner of the couch.

  A flashlight clicked on.

  “I found it on a shelf,” said Malik. He handed it to Zack.

  Zack shone the beam over to where Zipper was pawing furiously at the leg of an industrial shelving unit crammed with jugs and bottles and boxes of toilet paper.

  “Zipper? You’ve got to be quiet. There’s no food on those shelves. It isn’t like the pantry. It’s just a bunch of janitor junk.”

  Zack leaned on the shelving unit to make his point.

  “Leave it alone.”

  And when he let go, the whole steel rack slid forward.

  “Wow! What is that?” asked Malik, who had grabbed a second flashlight and was examining the opening in the wall.

  “I dunno,” said Zack. “Some kind of secret entrance?”

  “To what?”

  “Good question. Come on! But watch your step. There’s a low stone wall.” He stepped over the short barrier and sniffed the air. “It smells different back here.”

  “Indeed,” said Malik. “Earthy.”

  Wooden, not steel, shelves lined the walls on the other side of the secret entryway. A few held old-fashioned glass jars. Malik picked one up. Blew the dust off the lid. “‘Wild indigo root compound,’” he read. “‘Prepared 1875.’ Amazing. This must be the root cellar for the old Pettimore estate. This is where they would store food for the winter.”

  “Zipper must’ve liked the smells leaking under the hidden panel.” Zack swung the flashlight across the dirt floor. “Zip? Zip?”

  Finally, the light hit Zipper. He was standing in front of a hole in the stone wall, pawing at something on the ground.

  “What’d you find this time? An antique cheeseburger?”

  Zipper whimpered and kept scratching at the ground.

  “What is it, boy?” Zack asked.

  And then he and Malik saw what Zipper had just uncovered.

  47

  “Well,” said Zack, “the middle part is obviously a warning, like a No Trespassing sign. But the rest? Maybe they’re Egyptian hieroglyphics or something.”

  “No,” gasped Malik. “It’s code!”

  They studied what someone had carved into the stone:

  “It appears to be a diagrammatic cipher,” said Malik.

  “Huh?”

  “It substitutes symbols for letters instead of letters for letters as you might find on a decoder ring.”

  “What’s it say?”

  “Not certain. But I believe the coder is using what is called the pigpen cipher, a substitution code often used by the Masons. Each clustering of letters indicates a new word.…”

 
“How much time do we have until the bell rings?”

  Malik checked his watch. “Not much. Perhaps I should take a rubbing of the inscription. That way, we can finish cracking the code at a more convenient time.”

  “Yeah,” said Zack.

  “We need a sheet of paper and a crayon of some kind.”

  Zack scanned the room with his flashlight. On the wall he saw some rock concert posters and another one of those prints of Horace Pettimore. They might work. Then, on a rack, he saw a stack of brown paper grocery sacks. “There’s your paper!”

  “Excellent!” Malik grabbed a bag and tore out a flat panel.

  Zack turned his flashlight left. Saw more jars of pickled preserves. A pile of moldy potatoes. A stack of candles, some white, some black.

  “Hey, how about a black candle for your crayon?”

  “Perfect! I should be able to pick up the impressions using the same technique one would employ to do a gravestone rubbing.”

  “Do you need the light?”

  “No.”

  Malik started rubbing. Zack moved his flashlight beam up to the jagged hole in the wall just past the spot where they’d found the secret message. The fieldstones circling the three-foot-wide opening were scorched black. Zipper sniffed the edges.

  “Careful, boy,” said Zack. He didn’t want Zipper falling through the hole. There was some kind of chute, like an enclosed playground slide, on the other side. Maybe that was what the warning was all about: descending into whatever hell was down there in the darkness.

  He couldn’t risk it. Zack scooped his dog off the ground. Cradled him in his arms.

  “Finished!” said Malik.

  “Great. How much time till the bell?”

  Malik rolled up his paper and checked his watch. “Two minutes.”

  “Okay, Zipper, under my shirt. We need to smuggle you out of the building.”

  The boys made their way through the swiveling shelves to the janitor’s closet—shoving the shelf unit back into place.

  And then, at the sound of the bell, they ran out the door faster than either one of them had ever run before.