The Black Heart Crypt

“Forever and ever, Norman. You shall be the evil king. I shall be your wicked queen!”

  Norman boldly stepped over the flickering candles to stand in the center of the pentagram. “Let’s do this thing!”

  Jenny handed him a sheet of paper.

  “The raven-throated voice spoke these words unto me. Recite them, Norman, and all will be as it should.”

  He stared at the words. They seemed to be seared onto the page.

  “Ancestors, hear me!” Norman’s voice grew stronger and steadier. “I praise you for the courage and cunning you showed while alive. Now, through the mists of time and the thinning veil of death, I invite you in. Take my body and use it as you see fit. Remove my cowardly soul and replace it with brazen hatred for all the weaklings of this world!”

  He dropped the script. He didn’t need it anymore.

  “I, Norman Ickleby, no longer have any desire to use this body for my own purposes. Take it. Take me. Take me now!”

  At that instant, thunder clapped and a leaf-swirling wind blew out the circle of twelve candles.

  The man who used to be Norman Ickes slumped to the ground, an empty vessel longing to be filled.

  Barnabas and the other ten remaining Ickleby souls surrounded the pentagram, each man standing where an unlit candle stood.

  They stared down at the quivering body of their heir, Norman Ickleby.

  They made the witchy woman feel an icy prickle of fear and foreboding up her spine.

  “Let me enter the body!” demanded Cornelius, the notorious embezzler.

  “Fie upon it,” cried Silas, who in 1789 had been executed for treason. “I have suffered in this interminable limbo far longer than he!”

  “I want to live again!” whined Rilke, the mass-murdering scoundrel.

  “Silence,” rasped Barnabas. “I have made my decision. Isador? Enter this newfound flesh.”

  “Sure, sure,” said Crazy Izzy, the gangster from the 1930s. “I’ll give little Zack Jennings the big kiss-off. I’ll bump off his mutt, too!”

  “Go! Steal Norman’s body! Use him to do all the things I command you to do!”

  Crazy Izzy transmogrified into a throbbing ball of searing ultraviolet light.

  “I get first dibs ’cause them Jennings bumped off my son and my grandson—Little Paulie and Eddie Boy. Right?”

  “No,” said Barnabas, his eyes burning brightly inside the slits of his mask. “You are given this chance simply because you, like I, have no qualms about killing children.”

  Crazy Izzy’s soul shot across the threshold between the living and the dead.

  He took over the body of Norman Ickes.

  “Did Aunt Ginny give you any clue as to what the heck’s going on?” Judy asked as she tucked Zack in for the night down in the rumpus room.

  “Not really,” said Zack. “Just that the ghost downtown was an Ickleby and that Ginny and her sisters will take care of everything before they leave.”

  Zipper, who was curled up near Zack’s knees, wagged his tail, happy to hear that the elderly aunts would be leaving. He hoped the cats would be leaving, too!

  “But it sounds like the worst will be over by tomorrow morning,” Zack continued. “I think everybody has to be back in their coffins by sunrise.”

  “Good,” said Judy. “Oh, I almost forgot.”

  “What?”

  “While you guys were downtown, your aunt Francine called.”

  Zack sank about three inches under the covers. “Really?”

  “She said she wanted to come see you.”

  “What’d you tell her?”

  “That this wasn’t a very good time.”

  “Excellent! Thanks.”

  “You and your dad never liked her, huh?”

  “Nope. I think Aunt Francine hates me even more than my mother did. Blames me for killing her sister.”

  “Which you didn’t do, Zack.”

  “I know that. But, Judy?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Aunt Francine doesn’t. At the funeral, when nobody else was around, she said, ‘This is all your fault.’ ”

  “That’s horrible.”

  Zack shrugged. “By then, I was sort of used to it. Whenever Aunt Francine would visit, she and my mom would sit in the dining room and smoke cigarettes and tell each other what a rotten kid I was.”

  “Zack, I am so sorry.…”

  “Yeah. Me too.” Zack took in a deep, steadying breath. “But that was then and this is now. I just don’t want Aunt Francine bringing too much ‘then’ up here to mess with my great new ‘now.’ ”

  “Tell you what,” said Judy. “If she calls again, I’ll just tell her there’s no room at the inn.” She leaned down and kissed Zack on his forehead. “I’ll deal with Aunt Francine. You stick to the ghosts.”

  “Deal.”

  “Sleep well, honey.”

  “Will do.”

  Zack pulled a sage candle out from under his pillow.

  “What’s that?” asked Judy.

  “My little friend,” said Zack, doing his killer bee accent. “Aunt Ginny gave it to me when she came down to tuck me in.”

  “So you’ve been double-tucked?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Good. You deserve it.”

  “Oh, shoot,” said Zack.

  “What?”

  “I meant to tell Aunt Ginny that Malik loaned her puzzle to a friend.”

  “Huh?”

  “We found this brainteaser in her trunk and Malik asked me if his friend could borrow it. I said yes. I was going to tell Aunt Ginny but things got so busy, first in the hardware store, then here, I just forgot!”

  “You found this puzzle in her trunk? The trunk that seems to have exploded all over your bedroom?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Don’t worry. I don’t think Aunt Ginny will mind. Trust me—she still has plenty of other toys to play with.”

  Zack smiled. “Okay. Thanks, Mom.”

  “See you in the morning, hon.”

  She flicked off the lights and shut the door.

  Zack closed his eyes and, wiped out from the most exciting and most exhausting Halloween he could remember, started drifting off to sleep.

  * * *

  Around midnight, Zack heard Zipper panting.

  Really loudly.

  And the wet dribble of dog drool.

  Actually, it couldn’t be Zipper. The panting was too heavy and Zipper seldom slobbered.

  Zack opened an eye.

  Grandpa Jim was sitting in his favorite chair again. This time, he had brought along the big black dog with the glowing red eyeballs.

  “Rest up, Zack,” he said, patting the dog on its massive head. “Shuck and I will keep our eyes peeled for any trouble.”

  “Is it coming?”

  “Most likely. I have a feeling this thing will get worse before it gets any better.”

  Jenny Ballard watched Norman Ickes twitching on the ground, his kicking feet knocking down the dead candles.

  “Norman?” She bent down to touch his cold and clammy forehead. “Norman?”

  He wasn’t breathing.

  “Ohmigod. Norman? Norman!”

  An eye popped open.

  Jenny put a hand over her racing heart.

  “You scared me. I thought you were dead.”

  Norman’s head and torso bolted upright into a sitting position. He sucked down a deep breath.

  “That’s it, Norman,” said Jenny. “Breathe. Nice and easy.”

  A smirk curled Norman’s lip. “What’s your name again?”

  “Jenny. Remember?”

  Norman stood up. His legs seemed kind of rubbery as he dusted off his pants. “Sure, sure. Jenny. You’re the dame Barnabas has been bossin’ around.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “What’s this?” Norman, more uncoordinated than usual, dug into his pocket and pulled out a black stone shaped like a heart. “Well, ring-a-ding-ding. Your Norman was a swell egg. Scamming the charm off the witches? That
’s smooth.”

  “Huh?”

  “This here’s the warden’s key, toots.” The man who looked like Norman tossed the shiny stone up and caught it as if it were a black apple. “So, did you bring the knife?”

  “Yes, Norman. I did everything the raven voice told me to do.”

  “Atta girl. Fork it over.”

  Jenny handed the weapon, which had a curved blade on the bottom and jagged saw teeth on the top, to the man who really wasn’t Norman anymore.

  “Who are you?” she asked. “Are you one of Norman’s deceased ancestors?”

  “That’s right. My friends used to call me Izzy. Crazy Izzy Ickleby.”

  “When did you die?”

  “About seventy years before you.”

  “What? I’m not—”

  Before Jenny could say “dead,” the man who used to be Norman jammed the knife blade into her stomach and twisted it sharply to the right.

  “Say hello to all my pals on the other side, toots.”

  And those were the last words Jenny Ballard ever heard.

  Around ten, Judy sat down in the breakfast nook with a second cup of coffee and breathed a sigh of relief.

  It was the morning after Halloween. Zack and the whole family had survived. Yes, there would be some expenses related to the damages at Ickes & Son Hardware and they’d need to fix up the porch railing where it had been scarred by a ghost’s extremely lethal knife, but all in all, things could have been worse.

  Now it was November 1, the sun was shining, George had gone down to New York City on the 7:10 train, Zack had taken the bus to school, and Judy had the house to herself. Well, except for George’s three aunts, who seemed to be sleeping in.

  Zipper sank into his doggy bed and let out his own long sigh. Poor guy looked bushed.

  “Relax, Zip,” said Judy. “Halloween is officially over.”

  That was when George’s three aunts bustled through the kitchen, making a beeline for the back door.

  “Good morning, Judy,” chirped Aunt Ginny as she bobbled by.

  Aunt Hannah and Aunt Sophie were right behind her.

  “Good morning, ladies,” said Judy. “Hey, I was wondering—should we talk some more about last night and all these Icklebys?”

  “We were wondering the same thing,” huffed Aunt Hannah. “Sisters? Outside. Now!”

  “Can I come with you?”

  “Sorry, dear,” said Aunt Sophie. “It’s not a good idea.”

  “Huh?”

  “Enjoy your coffee, dear,” said Aunt Ginny. “We really don’t have anything to talk about besides this lovely weather.…”

  “Oh, yes we do, Virginia!” said Hannah.

  The three sisters, trailed by their three cats, scuttled out the back door.

  Judy gave the ladies a few seconds and then slipped over to the sink so she could spy on them through the curtains.

  The three of them were standing in a circle around the kettle-shaped barbecue grill.

  “Perhaps we should eat breakfast first?” said Aunt Sophie.

  “No,” fumed Aunt Hannah. “Virginia, you did this, didn’t you?”

  “I did not!” said Ginny. “But now that they’re out, we need to act swiftly. I think we should—”

  Suddenly, Ginny glanced at the kitchen window.

  Judy hurriedly retreated from the sink, returned to the breakfast nook, and snapped on the countertop TV so she could pretend that was what she’d been doing all along if Aunt Ginny came back in.

  “And in local news,” said the television anchorwoman, “police suspect foul play in the Haddam Hill Cemetery outside North Chester, where, late last night, some local teenagers discovered the body of Ms. Jenny Ballard. Dressed in what the police described as a ‘witch’s robe,’ the young girl may have been murdered in what authorities speculate was a bizarre Halloween ritual.”

  The TV showed the crime scene marked off by police tape in front of a mausoleum. A name was chiseled over the door:

  ICKLEBY

  Ickleby!

  Who were these people?

  Judy gulped one last swig of coffee. “Zip, guard the house. I need to run to the library—now.”

  Crazy Izzy Ickleby walked up the main drag of North Chester inside Norman Ickes’s body.

  His new skin suit didn’t quite fit right, so his feet kept slip-sliding sideways, like he was walking around in socks on a just-waxed wood floor. Izzy didn’t care if he looked like a loose-limbed palooka. He had a body. He was breathing again. He was alive!

  And he had a job to do for the big cheese, Barnabas.

  He needed to get hold of a gun and some money.

  Fortunately, while shoving Norman’s soul out of the driver’s seat, Izzy was able to tap into the sap’s memory banks. He now knew everything Norman had ever known, including all sorts of useless bunk about solving puzzles and the different sizes of crescent wrenches.

  He also knew where Norman’s coworker, Stephen Snertz, stashed his heater—a six-shot Smith & Wesson.

  Izzy walked Norman up the sidewalk to the hardware store. Some jingle-brained mug was on a ladder, painting over “Son” in the Ickes & Son Hardware sign.

  “That’s Snertz! Stephen Snertz!” said whatever bit of Norman was still awake inside his brain. “Kill him! Kill Snertz!”

  “Later,” Crazy Izzy thought back. “I promise.”

  “Hiya, Steve,” he had Norman say out loud, just to sound sociable-like.

  “Norman? What are you doing here, you idiot? You’re fired.”

  “Yeah. Thanks for reminding me, pal.”

  Izzy gave the ladder a swift kick.

  Snertz and his paint bucket went splat all over the concrete. The big lug wasn’t dead, just conked out. Of course, he wouldn’t be dancing no time soon, neither.

  “Ooh, that felt good!” sighed the Norman inside Izzy’s head. “Real good.”

  “Don’t worry, kid,” Izzy thought back. “That’s just the start of what we’re gonna do to that big lug.”

  Whistling nonchalantly, he had Norman amble into the hardware store, hop over the counter, and grab Snertz’s pistol, which was stashed on a shelf with a box of bullets. Since no one was looking, Izzy popped open the cash register and pocketed a couple hundred clams, too.

  “Can we go shoot Snertz now?” asked the Norman voice.

  “Not yet, kid. First we need to stash the black heart stone, hide it someplace safe where no one can find it.”

  Fortunately, the raven had told Barnabas exactly where Izzy should squirrel the rock. And if anybody tried to tag along to see where he ditched the stone, he’d drill ’em full of lead.

  Because, thanks to Norman, trigger-happy Izzy had a brand-new trigger finger.

  Most sixth graders would probably consider a class field trip to the town library kind of dull, but Zack couldn’t have been more excited.

  He wanted to ask the town librarian, Mrs. Jeanette Emerson, a few questions about this Ickleby clan—the family who seemed to have some kind of feud going against the Jennings family.

  Zack, Malik, and Azalea climbed aboard the big yellow bus waiting for them in the parking lot of Pettimore Middle School.

  “Hello, again!” said the smiling lady behind the big steering wheel. “How are my three musketeers?”

  “Just fine, Ms. Tiedeman,” said Zack.

  The bus driver, Ms. A. J. Tiedeman, picked up Zack, Azalea, and Malik at their bus stops every morning and brought them home every afternoon. She always drove the school bus safely but she also knew how to make all sorts of tire-screeching evasive moves in case she had to—like she was a stunt double in an action movie. Fortunately, she was also one of the first owner-drivers to install three-point seat belts on her bus. One rumor had it that before moving to North Chester, Ms. Tiedeman had raced tweaked-out trucks around mud tracks in Mississippi. Another said she was the original driver of Bigfoot’s Panic Attack, the top truck from the Monster Jam that played big-city arenas all across the country.

&
nbsp; Whatever her background, A. J. Tiedeman—who always wore leather driving gloves, wraparound shades, and a jumpsuit with flames on the shoulders and a sequined “A. J.” splashed across the back—was the coolest school bus driver Zack had ever met.

  She cranked shut the door after the substitute history teacher, Mrs. Chang, climbed aboard.

  “Buckle up, everybody,” she said to her huge horizontal rearview mirror as she goosed the gas pedal a few times, making the bus rumble and roar. Zack often wondered if A. J. Tiedeman had replaced the original school bus motor with the engine from Bigfoot’s Panic Attack.

  “Good morning, everybody,” said the librarian, Mrs. Emerson, when Zack’s history class entered the quaint old building. “My assistant, Ms. Sharon Rawlins, will give you a tour of our historic facility. But remember: A library is not a shrine for the worship of books. It’s a place where history and ideas come to life!”

  While the rest of the class followed Ms. Rawlins over to a big stained glass window, Zack slipped away from the pack to talk to Mrs. Emerson, who had wiry white hair and wore purple reading glasses—not to mention funky sweaters with junk like pumpkins or autumn leaves knit all over them—and was always saying stuff like that thing about libraries. It was why Zack and Judy both thought she was pretty cool.

  “Mrs. Emerson?”

  “Yes, Zack?”

  “I need your help.”

  “Well, dear, that’s why I’m here.”

  “I need to learn about the Ickleby family.”

  “The ones up in the Haddam Hill Cemetery?”

  “Yeah. Those guys.”

  “Right this way. I’ve already pulled everything we have on the subject.”

  Wow. Mrs. Emerson was some kind of super librarian. She knew the answers to Zack’s questions before he even asked them!

  “Mrs. Chang?” she called out to Zack’s teacher. “Zachary and I will be in my office working on a history project.”

  “Oh,” said Mrs. Chang. “But he’ll miss the tour.”

  “That’s okay,” said Zack. “I’m a regular here.”

  Mrs. Emerson led Zack around a cluster of reading tables.

  “Quite the crime family, these Icklebys,” said Mrs. Emerson. “One was a bank robber and another was a miner who stole other miners’ gold. There was even a gangster whom Al Capone himself nicknamed Crazy Izzy Ickleby.”