Chapter One
Scotland
A large salmon swam to the surface of the loch, inches from a brightly colored fly. The fish scrutinized the insect carefully, unsure whether or not to bite. Although it did not notice the fishing line attached to the fly, it was instinctively apprehensive and cautious of such an easy meal.
It certainly had no idea that the line trailed from the water to a small wooden rowboat. The boat had seen better days, but then so too had its passenger, a man who was now reclined in it and napping, his hands gently gripping a wooden fishing pole. He was handsomely dressed in sportsman’s trousers and a blazer. His green, tweed fishing hat was lowered over his face, its brim filled with various types of tackle and bait.
It was dusk on a warm, summer evening. The calm loch in which the boat rested was surrounded by moors and thick night fog had begun to settle over the entire area. Normally a professor of archaeology would spend his vacation preoccupied with recovering ancient relics rather than seafood, but since the outbreak of the Great Depression it was even harder than usual to fund expeditions, and most museums had given up entirely. For most archaeologists this was a bitter disappointment; for this man, it had changed little.
The salmon made up its primitive mind, and the man’s fishing line went taut. He stirred and opened an eye, seeing the wooden pole buckle. In a flash he sat up and flipped the hat from his face. Anxiously, hopefully, he struggled to reel in his catch, but it fought hard. He cursed under his breath. He admired the fish’s spirit but desperately hoped to overcome it. This would become his first catch in nearly two weeks of vacation.
A Scottish-accented voice interrupted in the distance. “Dr. Jones! Dr. Jones!”
Annoyed, Dr. Indiana Jones turned in the direction of the sound. In spite of himself, he nearly dropped the line he was fighting with, so shocked was he at the sight.
Countless orange flames sparkled across the moors, torches carried by several members of the small nearby village, gathered behind a group of six policemen. The latter were headed by Inspector Angus MacGowan, a plump, balding fellow with a veiny, bulbous nose, beady green eyes and a thick, curled red mustache. It was MacGowan who had shouted, and now he continued. “Dr. Jones!” he called. “We need your assistance!”
Could he have timed it any worse? Indy glanced quickly from his bending line back to the police officer. “C’mon, Mac,” he pleaded. “It’s the first bite I’ve had all week...” That wasn’t entirely true, but the nibbles he’d gotten so far hardly counted.
MacGowan shook his head. “Please,” he said. “It’s very important.”
Indy struggled a bit longer with the line, but he could see the man was deathly serious. McGowan had warned him when he arrived about the queer events happening recently, and had solicited a promise of help from the American archaeologist, being familiar with and an admirer of his incredible adventures.
Finally Indy’s conscience prevailed and he dropped the fishing pole. As the salmon swam off he could have sworn it looked back and flipped its tail mockingly at him. With a grumble, he rowed back to shore.
Night fell as they walked the foggy moors. The policemen and following townspeople could barely see ten feet ahead as slowly, carefully, they searched, creeping, their faces tense; many unable to hide their fear. A summer wind sent an eerie howl whistling through the night air. Blue moonlight bathed the moors, creating stark, frightening shadows.
Creepy, but harmless. Indy’s annoyance multiplied. These superstitious simpletons were letting a bunch of nothing get to them, although he was glad to have a flashlight and not a torch. He moved up to the front of the group and grumbled to MacGowan. “Do you value our friendship, Mac?”
MacGowan looked hurt. “More than me nightly pint,” he insisted.
Impressive, Indy realized, considering they’d only met two weeks ago. “Then this better not be some wild goose chase,” he continued.
MacGowan was more serious than ever. “T’ain’t wild geese we’re after, Dr. Jones. You got me word on that.” He looked Indy straight in the eye. “And a MacGowan’s word is truer than an angel’s kiss!”
Indy was disturbed by the man’s demeanor, but he shook it off. These people were like stereotypes out of a bad movie. Whatever was going on, he was convinced there were no elements of the supernatural involved. Strange, even inexplicable, things happened sometimes, he’d be stupid to deny that; but the supernatural as a whole was a product of overactive imaginations. Of course, that didn’t mean it wouldn’t be dangerous, because people really were dying here.
A sudden scream signaled that one of the villagers had stumbled upon something. Everyone gathered around him. Speak of the devil, Indy thought as he pushed through them to get a look. When he saw it, he realized perhaps that wasn’t far off.
A man’s corpse lay before them. The body had a somewhat rubbery appearance, as if all of its bones had been broken. The man’s pale, greenish face was frozen in a hideous grimace. Indy stared in shock with everyone else, his heart suddenly cold. In terms of grisliness, this ranked right up there with some of the things he’d seen during the war.
The villagers glanced about nervously and whispered among themselves, afraid the man’s killer was still nearby. “Scotty Ferguson,” another young man confirmed.
“He’s the eighth,” an old woman said.
A middle-aged man could barely bring himself to speak. “Just like the others... all his bones busted... crushed...”
An old man voiced what they had been thinking from the beginning. “Whatever’s killin’ people around here ain’t human.”
Maybe not, Indy thought, forcing himself to study the body. Could an animal have done this? There were no claw or teeth marks visible. An anaconda, perhaps, escaped from a zoo or some idiot’s home?
He was startled by a woman’s shriek and spun around to see her pointing somewhere in the distance. “It’s there! Again!” She shot forward in that direction, the police and the townspeople right behind her. What the hell? Curious, Indy rushed to keep up.
The woman stopped in a clearing, stone stiff, pointing ahead. The villagers surrounded her and stared. Indy looked as well.
What they saw was an enormous, sixteenth-century Scottish castle. Tall, foreboding towers, lined with menacing gargoyles that could only have been conceived in madness, pierced the night sky. Its interior was completely dark, save for a small, flickering candlelight that burned from the castle’s upstairs window.
Kind of creepy, Indy admitted to himself, but were these villagers still just attaching undue significance to such things? He gave MacGowan a questioning look.
The Inspector pointed to the castle’s upstairs window, his finger trembling. “That light... only burns after a murder’s been committed.”
Indy’s earlier thoughts about this being like a bad movie returned. “Is that so?” he said. “Somebody’s mocking you. What have you found when you’ve investigated?”
MacGowan averted his eyes. “Er... funny you should ask that...”
“Why? You found something interesting?”
“Er... funny you should ask that...”
“Oh, dear Lord.” Indy grabbed McGowan by the face and forced the Scotsman to look at him. “Do you mean to tell me that there have been seven other murders with that candle burning there, and you never thought ‘Hey, maybe we should go check it out?’”
“‘Twas a too frightful prospect on our own! But with ye here now, lad, we’ll go in there and git to the bottom o’ this affair!”
“Damn right,” Indy said, but what he thought was just plain damn. The fog had thickened quickly, and the castle was looking much creepier than it had a moment ago. Nothing to worry about, he reassured himself, just a deranged guy who sends his pet anaconda after folks, probably. In any case there was no sense waiting around. “Let’s go.”
The villagers stepped back as one, eyes wide with terror, murmuring.
“Ain’t goin’ in there.”
“Nor I.”
“Got me a wife and kids.”
This time, Indy could hardly condemn their irascible fear. He turned to MacGowan. Even the usually sturdy Inspector was trembling. But, seeing Indy’s look, he turned to his men, forcing himself to be strong.
“Well... Ahmmmm... that is what we’re here for... eh, men?... ah...” Finger still trembling, he pointed at his officers. “Hennesey... Galbraith... Bottomley... You’re comin’ with us.”
As each man was called, the color left his face. The chosen policemen reluctantly joined the Inspector and Indy as they begin walking toward the castle. Indy couldn’t help but worry that their numbers were pitifully few, but of course the townspeople still needed protection outside.
The remaining villagers and policemen anxiously watched them leave. The elderly woman reached for the crucifix hanging from her neck. She kissed it tenderly as she stared at the departing men.
“May God help them,” she whispered.
***
No one was in the mood for small talk as they headed toward the castle. The closer they came, in the darkness of night and fog, the more Indy’s convictions against the supernatural were shaken in spite of his best efforts to remain calm. He mentally reevaluated the Scots. One could hardly blame them for being superstitious in a land like this. It was a wonder they hadn’t all gone mad.
He tried to occupy his mind by evaluating the archeological significance of the castle. He knew it was sixteenth century but not much beyond that. Still, if it was privately owned, than perhaps it hadn’t been examined by scholars, and could have all sorts of wonderful antiques and artifacts inside. Trying to psych himself up for that possibility worked only marginally.
It seemed an eternity and yet all too soon until they came to the two enormous wooden front doors. Intricate carvings of demons, serpents and gargoyles, also spawned of insanity, adorned the castle entrance. Indy shuddered as he imagined what, hypothetically of course, such creatures would be like if they really lived. He looked away and glanced to the upstairs window. The candle still flickered there.
He looked back at the entrance. No reason not to get it over with. A long, wooden bar, carved into the shape of a serpent, was fastened through the metal door latches, blocking the castle entrance. At a nervous nod from MacGowan, Indy and the policemen grabbed hold of the bar. It was much heavier than it looked. Only using all of their strength did they manage to slide the bar out of the door latches. It hit the ground with a thud, rolling down the castle stairs. The noise seemed to echo throughout the countryside.
Indy frowned. Impossible. This wasn’t the sort of terrain – never mind. They had more urgent business to attend to.
Without waiting for a signal he clutched the rusty, metal door handles and pulled hard. The doors creaked and groaned with an almost tangible sense of protest as they slowly opened. As he pulled them to a stop, a thick cloud of dust and cold air exploded from inside the castle and blew out all of the torches. The policemen cursed loudly in the sudden darkness, then hushed just as suddenly, lest the killer should hear them.
Behind the open doors there was only total darkness, making their surroundings seem like midday by comparison. Like Adolf Hitler’s soul, Indy thought. He cast this thought aside. He tried not to dwell on Europe’s political problems while on vacation. The flashlight’s beam cut through the darkness like a propeller through air, but it was pitifully short, pitifully thin. The policemen exchanged frightened glances as he took another step. Inspector MacGowan muttered a short prayer, then shoved them through the open doors.
The beam of the flashlight glazed over elaborate, antique furnishings, macabre sculptures and oil paintings. The place was bathed in dust and thick, long-abandoned cobwebs filled each corner. Indy stopped mentally reviewing the outrages of the Nuremberg Laws and switched gears to a professional curiosity about the pieces. In spite of the tarnishing many of them looked quite nice, and maybe after they arrested the killer he could take some home and pay the bills for a while longer. His beam paused on a statue he particularly liked; an angel playing bagpipes.
So engrossed was he that he hardly noticed the extreme cold, but the policemen did right off. Their breath was visible, and none of the summer night’s warmth passed the castle doors. Hennesey rubbed his folded arms. “It’s deathly cold in ‘ere,” he mumbled. “How could a human bein’ survive?”
His fellows exchanged terrified glances, their imaginations jumping ahead to a thousand possibilities, each worse than the last. Indy rolled his eyes. It wasn’t that cold. If anyone lived here, he probably was really a madman, and enjoyed this temperature. Indy reached for the angel statue to brush off a cobweb and noticed that this one still had a spider in it, albeit a dead one.
His finger touched it and he swallowed. Not only dead, but frozen stiff.
His earlier fear returned in a flash, and he resisted the impulse to wet his pants. It would not be good to get icicles down there. “Let’s keep moving,” he muttered, half to himself. “No time to waste.” He shone his flashlight around the room, looking for the way out. The beam came to a stop on a twisting stone staircase that spiraled upward along a far wall, leading to the second floor. A faint glimmer of light that had gone unnoticed emanated from the top of the stairs.
Indy forced himself to move toward them. Fixating his thoughts elsewhere was out of the question now, and he simply focused on putting one foot in front of the other, trying not to think about what lay upstairs. This is pathetic, he told himself. I bet in the daytime this place is as scary as Coney Island.
He looked over his shoulder. The policemen were staring at him and hadn’t moved an inch. “Well, come on,” he snapped in the loudest voice he could manage, which was still a mumble. “We have a job to do. Forward, men.” They began to move, their facial expressions never changing. Indy grew a bit bolder. “You know, in some precincts that would be your job,” he told MacGowan.
“Indeed,” MacGowan said.
They ascended the stairs slowly, silently, toward the light. Indy thought it terribly unfair for MacGowan and the others to let him, the civilian, a tourist no less, be in front, but he had a reputation to uphold and didn’t complain. As he made his way to the top, he examined the bizarre oil paintings that lined this wall - various portraits and landscapes, depicting everything from military battles to Sunday picnics. But the unsettling quality of the pictures was that, unlike the ones downstairs, they each featured the same white haired, elderly man.
“This guy’s got one hell of an ego,” he commented.
“Baron Seamus Seagrove III,” MacGowan told him in an almost reverential tone. “Some say ‘e walks the moors every midnight... others claim e’s been dead for years...”
Indy stopped and glared at him. “You know, Mac, that’s the sort of detail that would have been nice to know before we came in here. Sounds like a prime suspect to me.”
“We didn’ know ‘is was ‘is castle,” MacGowan said.
“We’re afeared to speak ‘is name,” Galbraith added.
Indy didn’t press the point, since they were almost at the top of the stairs and he just wanted to get this over with. He took the last few steps and rested his hand on a sculpture that was part of the banister – which, he noted uneasily, was a bust of Baron Seagrove. Egotism was just one aspect of madmen, and if this one was in the castle somewhere – he headed for the first doorway before he could allow himself to finish that thought. The door stood wide open, with a thick cobweb over the entrance, and it was from here that the light emanated.
There’s a time to be macho, and a time to be smart. Indy wiped away the web, but then gestured for MacGowan and the policemen to go first. Drawing their pistols, they did so. He followed, cautiously.
It was a bedroom, sparsely decorated with a few pieces of elaborate, ancient furniture and a large canopy bed. Like downstairs, everything in the room was caked with dust and cobwebs... save for the burning candle. It rested on the windowsill, in a sparkling, sterling silver holder, and bathed the room in an eerie orange light.
Once again, Indy felt stupid for his fear. Baron Seagrove or whoever was behind this must be a master of psychological torture. Well, it was a nice holder, and it would be nice to have something besides the flashlight again. He walked toward the candle to pick it up. The policeman were not so comforted and they watched silently, shivering and tightly gripping their pistols. He reached out for the candle –
With a loud whoosh it went out. Indy jumped back in surprise and dropped his flashlight, turning it off. Once again it was the darkness of Hitler’s soul, but this time they saw it from the inside. He wouldn’t have thought their blood could run any colder after that, but it reached absolute zero when he heard the distant, maniacal laugh of a man echoing through the castle. Indy was almost too scared to move, but he decided the darkness was worse than the laugh and quickly retrieved the flashlight, clicking it back on. As the laugh subsided, he noticed that the candle had disappeared altogether.
“What –?” he began.
MacGowan frantically looked over his men, a troubled look coming over his face. The Inspector’s eyes darted about the room. Hennesey was gone.
“Hennesey?...” he called hesitantly, then boldly grew louder. “Hennesey?”
Galbraith was on the verge of a panic attack. “‘E was standin’ right ‘ere! Just a second ago... Standin’ right beside me!”
“Shit,” Indy said.
Someone must have come in and taken the candle and Hennesey, hidden by the sound of that chilling laugh. But there were no other footprints in the dust of the floor, he realized. Before he could figure it out, the thick, dull ringing of a bell sounded in the distance, sending yet another chill through the men. Without a chance to think Indy darted out of the room in that direction. The policemen looked at each other, then without a word from MacGowan followed directly on his heels.
They hurried back down the stairs toward the sound, MacGowan calling for Hennesey the whole way. Indy dashed to another door along the far wall and flung it open. It led into a dark basement and the sound of the ringing bell echoed from inside. Seeing this, he grew cautious and slowed down to catch his breath. Carefully now, he motioned for the others to follow as he stepped onto the decrepit, narrow, wooden stairway that led into the basement.
Indy kept a death grip on his flashlight as they descended. The policemen clustered close behind him, taking each step with extreme caution. The boards creaked and groaned with their every move, and he gulped as he realized they may very well be too brittle to take everyone’s weight. It was a long staircase and the floor wasn’t even visible from here. He slowed down a smidgen more and motioned the others to do the same.
“Hennesey!” MacGowan yelled again, leaning to the side to peer out into the darkness. Suddenly, the rotted bannister snapped in two and he lost his footing, falling toward who-knew-where. Indy grabbed him by the collar with a reflexive speed born of duress, and the Inspector nearly pulled him over the side as well. Galbraith and Bottomley quickly stepped in to help, and together they pulled him back to safety. MacGowan caught his breath, shaking. “Thanks for catchin’ me,” he gasped.
“I’d rather be catchin’ trout,” Indy said. He was beginning to wish this had been a wild goose chase all along.
They continued down the stairs and arrived at a large, musty stone basement. Green moss covered the slimy walls and several doors of rotted wood stood along the wall. The sound of the ringing bell was much louder and quite aggravating.
With no better way to decide, he selected the first door and reached for the handle. The policemen drew their pistols once again. Indy jumped to the side as he pulled it open. This was a good decision, for a large object immediately shot out from inside, rolling at breakneck speed toward the men. They scattered quickly, firing several shots as they did. The object came to a stop and a deep red liquid began leaking out onto the floor.
Before anyone could stop him, Indy dipped his finger into the liquid and brought it to his mouth. His eyes lit up. Finally, here in the pit of hell, something to lift his mood. “Interesting blood type,” he commented.
The policemen stared, wide-eyed.
Indy smiled for the first time since coming to the castle. “Cabernet sauvignon, 1897,” he continued, shining his flashlight beam on the mysterious object, now revealed as a mere wine barrel, the label matching his diagnosis perfectly. Beyond the opened door was a deserted wine cellar. The wine was forty years old, but it was hard to imagine someone having come down here in twice that time. Promise or no, he decided he might just stay here for the night.
A loud creak echoed through the basement from somewhere behind them. Galbraith cried out, pointing. “Look!”
Everyone turned to see a large stone door, built into the wall, slowly opening. Indy stared with the rest of them, dumbfounded. What could they have done to trigger that? It came to a stop wide open. Another flickering light glimmered from inside.
“I dun’ like this,” Bottomley muttered.
And so I have to be first once again, Indy thought. He was more apprehensive than ever, but he was concerned for Hennesey’s safety, and he wanted to find the source of that infernal ringing that still clawed at his skull. So he peered cautiously inside, the police staying a few steps behind, and nearly had a heart attack.
It took a moment to regain the power of speech. He finally managed to say, “Then you’re really not going to like this.”
They had stumbled upon a family crypt. Stone coffins with glass covered tops lined the walls, displaying their comatose inhabitants for the world to see. Macabre, ghastly religious statues decorated the room, more grotesque by half than those upstairs and outside. Countless death masks covered the ceiling, all carved with that same frighteningly familiar face – Baron Seagrove.
And in a far corner of the crypt, the exact same candle from upstairs rested on one of the coffins’ glass tops, burning again. No, Indy scolded himself, that’s absurd; there’s no reason to assume it’s the same candle. It’s not like all candle-holders are totally unique.
A trembling MacGowan stepped back, away from the crypt. For the first time since before their arrival he took charge and blurted an order to his men. “Galbraith... You come with me!” he said. “We’ll search for Hennesey... out here! Bottomley... you go with Dr. Jones...” finger shaking, he gestured to the crypt’s interior “...in there.”
He and Galbraith nearly fell over each other as they scrambled back to the other side of the basement. “Thanks a bundle, Mac,” Indy yelled with as much sarcasm as he was capable.
“‘Ey, yer the adventurin’ one,” said McGowan. “I know ye’ll come out smellin’ like roses.”
“Ah, right,” Indy said. He shook his head when no one was looking. How had he gotten himself into this? All along he’d thought fishing was a more sensible choice of vacation than going to a brothel. Well, that and he could actually afford it. Hiding his fear once more, knowing his reputation was at stake now more than ever, he entered the crypt. A very reluctant Bottomley followed.
Of course, reputation hardly mattered next to one’s life, he reminded himself, but never mind, dead people wouldn’t hurt them. He dealt with dead people for a living. His flashlight beam danced across the glass coffin tops; the candle was not bright enough to provide a view inside them. Decayed corpses smiled cheerily, their hands tightly clutching crucifixes. Bottomley was horrified by the sight, but Indy quickly relaxed. Unlike the unfortunate Scotty Ferguson, these people all seemed to have died perfectly natural deaths. He continued ahead, past the burning candle, moving further into the darkness of the crypt. The shivering Bottomley stayed directly behind him. With their every step, the bell’s ringing grew louder... louder... how far did this place go?
The two men found out a moment later when they arrived in a circular chamber, located at the far end of the crypt. Here, the noise was nearly deafening as it echoed from above. Indy realized they were on the floor of the bell tower, and with a sense of trepidation he couldn’t explain, he shone his flashlight upward. The beam stopped on a humongous ringing bell that hung several feet in the air.
Well, of course it was a bell. What had he expected to –
Indy squinted, hoping he couldn’t possibly be seeing what he seemed to be seeing.
In place of a bell clapper, dangling by his feet, was the dead body of Hennesey. His body swung back and forth, the crunch of bones as it slammed into the sides drowned by the dull ringing it caused. Bottomley screamed.
Indy grabbed his arm. “Steady on,” he said. “We don’t know for sure if it’s Hennesey. Maybe it’s just a dead ringer.”
Bottomley screamed again. So much for humor lightening tense situations.
Indy was disturbed himself, though, and the more he thought about it the more so he became. How had the killer snuck into the room and grabbed both Hennesey and the candle, and left, without leaving footprints? A secret passage? But come to think of it, the ringing had started immediately after that and continued without pause, and there was no way for him to have gotten here that fast, not with all the secret passages in the world.
Well, whatever, they’d found Hennesey and that’s all they’d been asked to do. The killer was probably up there right this minute ringing the bell and laughing at them, but that wasn’t his problem. The police could come in force, and with guns. He tightened his grip on Bottomley’s arm. “Let’s get outta here,” he said.
No sooner had they turned to the crypt door than it began to close. The two men dashed forward, but somehow it seemed to move faster. Indy and Bottomley were only inches away when it slammed shut in their faces. They pushed and kicked but it quickly became obvious that the door wouldn’t budge. “Inspector MacGowan!” Bottomley yelled, on the verge of hysterics. “Galbraith! Open the door!”
Using his flashlight, Indy scanned the door, looking for a crack. He didn’t care how it had closed itself, he just wanted to get the hell out of here, out of this castle. Forget the artifacts, his life was enough of a prize. He nudged Bottomley and motioned to the candle. “I need more light!”
Bottomley hurried to the candle and reached out. With another loud whoosh the flame went out, plunging this room into darkness as well. It took Indy to realize that the bell had ceased, for its ringing still echoed between his ears and he could feel the beginnings of a headache.
Getting his bearings, he turned from the door. “Bottomley?!” he called. The poor nervous wreck must have dropped the candle.
Receiving no answer, he shined his flashlight toward the area. Not only was the candle gone, but there was no sign of Bottomley.
Indy took a cautious step forward. “Bottomley?!” he said again.
Again, no answer. He swept the flashlight beam across the room. It passed one of the coffins... then shot back. Indiana Jones was met with the latest in a series of shocking sights.
Bottomley lay inside the coffin, his face twisted in a ghoulish smile, all of his bones broken, his hands wrapped around a crucifix. Indy stared in horror. This certainly hadn’t been done by an anaconda, he realized. Who or what had done it was not something he wanted to think about right now. And he was still trapped in this accursed room.
But he didn’t have to wait long for a sound. Footsteps. Someone else was in here. The killer must have gotten down from the bell tower somehow, and was coming closer. Indy’s flashlight beam darted around the crypt, but found no sign of anyone. “Who is it?” he said, not even bothering to keep the fear from his voice. “Who’s there?”
The same crazed laugh as earlier echoed through the crypt. That does it, I’m leaving, I don’t care if I kill myself breaking the door down. But as soon as he turned, he was startled to find the crypt door covered with a thick sheet of sparkling, green ice. For a moment he was too dumbfounded to remember being afraid, and he reached out to touch it. His hand snapped back quickly, the fingers agonizingly burnt.
On the other side, MacGowan and Galbraith had finally responded to Bottomley’s cries, and they pulled desperately at the crypt door’s metal handles. But it was no more cooperative with them. MacGowan called through the door. “Dr. Jones! Try to push!”
Indy took a step back. “Can’t!” he said, even now trying to sound more matter-of-fact than panicky. “There’s some kinda hot ice coverin’ the –”
Then the floor disappeared under his feet.
Next: Chapter Two
It certainly had no idea that the line trailed from the water to a small wooden rowboat. The boat had seen better days, but then so too had its passenger, a man who was now reclined in it and napping, his hands gently gripping a wooden fishing pole. He was handsomely dressed in sportsman’s trousers and a blazer. His green, tweed fishing hat was lowered over his face, its brim filled with various types of tackle and bait.
It was dusk on a warm, summer evening. The calm loch in which the boat rested was surrounded by moors and thick night fog had begun to settle over the entire area. Normally a professor of archaeology would spend his vacation preoccupied with recovering ancient relics rather than seafood, but since the outbreak of the Great Depression it was even harder than usual to fund expeditions, and most museums had given up entirely. For most archaeologists this was a bitter disappointment; for this man, it had changed little.
The salmon made up its primitive mind, and the man’s fishing line went taut. He stirred and opened an eye, seeing the wooden pole buckle. In a flash he sat up and flipped the hat from his face. Anxiously, hopefully, he struggled to reel in his catch, but it fought hard. He cursed under his breath. He admired the fish’s spirit but desperately hoped to overcome it. This would become his first catch in nearly two weeks of vacation.
A Scottish-accented voice interrupted in the distance. “Dr. Jones! Dr. Jones!”
Annoyed, Dr. Indiana Jones turned in the direction of the sound. In spite of himself, he nearly dropped the line he was fighting with, so shocked was he at the sight.
Countless orange flames sparkled across the moors, torches carried by several members of the small nearby village, gathered behind a group of six policemen. The latter were headed by Inspector Angus MacGowan, a plump, balding fellow with a veiny, bulbous nose, beady green eyes and a thick, curled red mustache. It was MacGowan who had shouted, and now he continued. “Dr. Jones!” he called. “We need your assistance!”
Could he have timed it any worse? Indy glanced quickly from his bending line back to the police officer. “C’mon, Mac,” he pleaded. “It’s the first bite I’ve had all week...” That wasn’t entirely true, but the nibbles he’d gotten so far hardly counted.
MacGowan shook his head. “Please,” he said. “It’s very important.”
Indy struggled a bit longer with the line, but he could see the man was deathly serious. McGowan had warned him when he arrived about the queer events happening recently, and had solicited a promise of help from the American archaeologist, being familiar with and an admirer of his incredible adventures.
Finally Indy’s conscience prevailed and he dropped the fishing pole. As the salmon swam off he could have sworn it looked back and flipped its tail mockingly at him. With a grumble, he rowed back to shore.
Night fell as they walked the foggy moors. The policemen and following townspeople could barely see ten feet ahead as slowly, carefully, they searched, creeping, their faces tense; many unable to hide their fear. A summer wind sent an eerie howl whistling through the night air. Blue moonlight bathed the moors, creating stark, frightening shadows.
Creepy, but harmless. Indy’s annoyance multiplied. These superstitious simpletons were letting a bunch of nothing get to them, although he was glad to have a flashlight and not a torch. He moved up to the front of the group and grumbled to MacGowan. “Do you value our friendship, Mac?”
MacGowan looked hurt. “More than me nightly pint,” he insisted.
Impressive, Indy realized, considering they’d only met two weeks ago. “Then this better not be some wild goose chase,” he continued.
MacGowan was more serious than ever. “T’ain’t wild geese we’re after, Dr. Jones. You got me word on that.” He looked Indy straight in the eye. “And a MacGowan’s word is truer than an angel’s kiss!”
Indy was disturbed by the man’s demeanor, but he shook it off. These people were like stereotypes out of a bad movie. Whatever was going on, he was convinced there were no elements of the supernatural involved. Strange, even inexplicable, things happened sometimes, he’d be stupid to deny that; but the supernatural as a whole was a product of overactive imaginations. Of course, that didn’t mean it wouldn’t be dangerous, because people really were dying here.
A sudden scream signaled that one of the villagers had stumbled upon something. Everyone gathered around him. Speak of the devil, Indy thought as he pushed through them to get a look. When he saw it, he realized perhaps that wasn’t far off.
A man’s corpse lay before them. The body had a somewhat rubbery appearance, as if all of its bones had been broken. The man’s pale, greenish face was frozen in a hideous grimace. Indy stared in shock with everyone else, his heart suddenly cold. In terms of grisliness, this ranked right up there with some of the things he’d seen during the war.
The villagers glanced about nervously and whispered among themselves, afraid the man’s killer was still nearby. “Scotty Ferguson,” another young man confirmed.
“He’s the eighth,” an old woman said.
A middle-aged man could barely bring himself to speak. “Just like the others... all his bones busted... crushed...”
An old man voiced what they had been thinking from the beginning. “Whatever’s killin’ people around here ain’t human.”
Maybe not, Indy thought, forcing himself to study the body. Could an animal have done this? There were no claw or teeth marks visible. An anaconda, perhaps, escaped from a zoo or some idiot’s home?
He was startled by a woman’s shriek and spun around to see her pointing somewhere in the distance. “It’s there! Again!” She shot forward in that direction, the police and the townspeople right behind her. What the hell? Curious, Indy rushed to keep up.
The woman stopped in a clearing, stone stiff, pointing ahead. The villagers surrounded her and stared. Indy looked as well.
What they saw was an enormous, sixteenth-century Scottish castle. Tall, foreboding towers, lined with menacing gargoyles that could only have been conceived in madness, pierced the night sky. Its interior was completely dark, save for a small, flickering candlelight that burned from the castle’s upstairs window.
Kind of creepy, Indy admitted to himself, but were these villagers still just attaching undue significance to such things? He gave MacGowan a questioning look.
The Inspector pointed to the castle’s upstairs window, his finger trembling. “That light... only burns after a murder’s been committed.”
Indy’s earlier thoughts about this being like a bad movie returned. “Is that so?” he said. “Somebody’s mocking you. What have you found when you’ve investigated?”
MacGowan averted his eyes. “Er... funny you should ask that...”
“Why? You found something interesting?”
“Er... funny you should ask that...”
“Oh, dear Lord.” Indy grabbed McGowan by the face and forced the Scotsman to look at him. “Do you mean to tell me that there have been seven other murders with that candle burning there, and you never thought ‘Hey, maybe we should go check it out?’”
“‘Twas a too frightful prospect on our own! But with ye here now, lad, we’ll go in there and git to the bottom o’ this affair!”
“Damn right,” Indy said, but what he thought was just plain damn. The fog had thickened quickly, and the castle was looking much creepier than it had a moment ago. Nothing to worry about, he reassured himself, just a deranged guy who sends his pet anaconda after folks, probably. In any case there was no sense waiting around. “Let’s go.”
The villagers stepped back as one, eyes wide with terror, murmuring.
“Ain’t goin’ in there.”
“Nor I.”
“Got me a wife and kids.”
This time, Indy could hardly condemn their irascible fear. He turned to MacGowan. Even the usually sturdy Inspector was trembling. But, seeing Indy’s look, he turned to his men, forcing himself to be strong.
“Well... Ahmmmm... that is what we’re here for... eh, men?... ah...” Finger still trembling, he pointed at his officers. “Hennesey... Galbraith... Bottomley... You’re comin’ with us.”
As each man was called, the color left his face. The chosen policemen reluctantly joined the Inspector and Indy as they begin walking toward the castle. Indy couldn’t help but worry that their numbers were pitifully few, but of course the townspeople still needed protection outside.
The remaining villagers and policemen anxiously watched them leave. The elderly woman reached for the crucifix hanging from her neck. She kissed it tenderly as she stared at the departing men.
“May God help them,” she whispered.
***
No one was in the mood for small talk as they headed toward the castle. The closer they came, in the darkness of night and fog, the more Indy’s convictions against the supernatural were shaken in spite of his best efforts to remain calm. He mentally reevaluated the Scots. One could hardly blame them for being superstitious in a land like this. It was a wonder they hadn’t all gone mad.
He tried to occupy his mind by evaluating the archeological significance of the castle. He knew it was sixteenth century but not much beyond that. Still, if it was privately owned, than perhaps it hadn’t been examined by scholars, and could have all sorts of wonderful antiques and artifacts inside. Trying to psych himself up for that possibility worked only marginally.
It seemed an eternity and yet all too soon until they came to the two enormous wooden front doors. Intricate carvings of demons, serpents and gargoyles, also spawned of insanity, adorned the castle entrance. Indy shuddered as he imagined what, hypothetically of course, such creatures would be like if they really lived. He looked away and glanced to the upstairs window. The candle still flickered there.
He looked back at the entrance. No reason not to get it over with. A long, wooden bar, carved into the shape of a serpent, was fastened through the metal door latches, blocking the castle entrance. At a nervous nod from MacGowan, Indy and the policemen grabbed hold of the bar. It was much heavier than it looked. Only using all of their strength did they manage to slide the bar out of the door latches. It hit the ground with a thud, rolling down the castle stairs. The noise seemed to echo throughout the countryside.
Indy frowned. Impossible. This wasn’t the sort of terrain – never mind. They had more urgent business to attend to.
Without waiting for a signal he clutched the rusty, metal door handles and pulled hard. The doors creaked and groaned with an almost tangible sense of protest as they slowly opened. As he pulled them to a stop, a thick cloud of dust and cold air exploded from inside the castle and blew out all of the torches. The policemen cursed loudly in the sudden darkness, then hushed just as suddenly, lest the killer should hear them.
Behind the open doors there was only total darkness, making their surroundings seem like midday by comparison. Like Adolf Hitler’s soul, Indy thought. He cast this thought aside. He tried not to dwell on Europe’s political problems while on vacation. The flashlight’s beam cut through the darkness like a propeller through air, but it was pitifully short, pitifully thin. The policemen exchanged frightened glances as he took another step. Inspector MacGowan muttered a short prayer, then shoved them through the open doors.
The beam of the flashlight glazed over elaborate, antique furnishings, macabre sculptures and oil paintings. The place was bathed in dust and thick, long-abandoned cobwebs filled each corner. Indy stopped mentally reviewing the outrages of the Nuremberg Laws and switched gears to a professional curiosity about the pieces. In spite of the tarnishing many of them looked quite nice, and maybe after they arrested the killer he could take some home and pay the bills for a while longer. His beam paused on a statue he particularly liked; an angel playing bagpipes.
So engrossed was he that he hardly noticed the extreme cold, but the policemen did right off. Their breath was visible, and none of the summer night’s warmth passed the castle doors. Hennesey rubbed his folded arms. “It’s deathly cold in ‘ere,” he mumbled. “How could a human bein’ survive?”
His fellows exchanged terrified glances, their imaginations jumping ahead to a thousand possibilities, each worse than the last. Indy rolled his eyes. It wasn’t that cold. If anyone lived here, he probably was really a madman, and enjoyed this temperature. Indy reached for the angel statue to brush off a cobweb and noticed that this one still had a spider in it, albeit a dead one.
His finger touched it and he swallowed. Not only dead, but frozen stiff.
His earlier fear returned in a flash, and he resisted the impulse to wet his pants. It would not be good to get icicles down there. “Let’s keep moving,” he muttered, half to himself. “No time to waste.” He shone his flashlight around the room, looking for the way out. The beam came to a stop on a twisting stone staircase that spiraled upward along a far wall, leading to the second floor. A faint glimmer of light that had gone unnoticed emanated from the top of the stairs.
Indy forced himself to move toward them. Fixating his thoughts elsewhere was out of the question now, and he simply focused on putting one foot in front of the other, trying not to think about what lay upstairs. This is pathetic, he told himself. I bet in the daytime this place is as scary as Coney Island.
He looked over his shoulder. The policemen were staring at him and hadn’t moved an inch. “Well, come on,” he snapped in the loudest voice he could manage, which was still a mumble. “We have a job to do. Forward, men.” They began to move, their facial expressions never changing. Indy grew a bit bolder. “You know, in some precincts that would be your job,” he told MacGowan.
“Indeed,” MacGowan said.
They ascended the stairs slowly, silently, toward the light. Indy thought it terribly unfair for MacGowan and the others to let him, the civilian, a tourist no less, be in front, but he had a reputation to uphold and didn’t complain. As he made his way to the top, he examined the bizarre oil paintings that lined this wall - various portraits and landscapes, depicting everything from military battles to Sunday picnics. But the unsettling quality of the pictures was that, unlike the ones downstairs, they each featured the same white haired, elderly man.
“This guy’s got one hell of an ego,” he commented.
“Baron Seamus Seagrove III,” MacGowan told him in an almost reverential tone. “Some say ‘e walks the moors every midnight... others claim e’s been dead for years...”
Indy stopped and glared at him. “You know, Mac, that’s the sort of detail that would have been nice to know before we came in here. Sounds like a prime suspect to me.”
“We didn’ know ‘is was ‘is castle,” MacGowan said.
“We’re afeared to speak ‘is name,” Galbraith added.
Indy didn’t press the point, since they were almost at the top of the stairs and he just wanted to get this over with. He took the last few steps and rested his hand on a sculpture that was part of the banister – which, he noted uneasily, was a bust of Baron Seagrove. Egotism was just one aspect of madmen, and if this one was in the castle somewhere – he headed for the first doorway before he could allow himself to finish that thought. The door stood wide open, with a thick cobweb over the entrance, and it was from here that the light emanated.
There’s a time to be macho, and a time to be smart. Indy wiped away the web, but then gestured for MacGowan and the policemen to go first. Drawing their pistols, they did so. He followed, cautiously.
It was a bedroom, sparsely decorated with a few pieces of elaborate, ancient furniture and a large canopy bed. Like downstairs, everything in the room was caked with dust and cobwebs... save for the burning candle. It rested on the windowsill, in a sparkling, sterling silver holder, and bathed the room in an eerie orange light.
Once again, Indy felt stupid for his fear. Baron Seagrove or whoever was behind this must be a master of psychological torture. Well, it was a nice holder, and it would be nice to have something besides the flashlight again. He walked toward the candle to pick it up. The policeman were not so comforted and they watched silently, shivering and tightly gripping their pistols. He reached out for the candle –
With a loud whoosh it went out. Indy jumped back in surprise and dropped his flashlight, turning it off. Once again it was the darkness of Hitler’s soul, but this time they saw it from the inside. He wouldn’t have thought their blood could run any colder after that, but it reached absolute zero when he heard the distant, maniacal laugh of a man echoing through the castle. Indy was almost too scared to move, but he decided the darkness was worse than the laugh and quickly retrieved the flashlight, clicking it back on. As the laugh subsided, he noticed that the candle had disappeared altogether.
“What –?” he began.
MacGowan frantically looked over his men, a troubled look coming over his face. The Inspector’s eyes darted about the room. Hennesey was gone.
“Hennesey?...” he called hesitantly, then boldly grew louder. “Hennesey?”
Galbraith was on the verge of a panic attack. “‘E was standin’ right ‘ere! Just a second ago... Standin’ right beside me!”
“Shit,” Indy said.
Someone must have come in and taken the candle and Hennesey, hidden by the sound of that chilling laugh. But there were no other footprints in the dust of the floor, he realized. Before he could figure it out, the thick, dull ringing of a bell sounded in the distance, sending yet another chill through the men. Without a chance to think Indy darted out of the room in that direction. The policemen looked at each other, then without a word from MacGowan followed directly on his heels.
They hurried back down the stairs toward the sound, MacGowan calling for Hennesey the whole way. Indy dashed to another door along the far wall and flung it open. It led into a dark basement and the sound of the ringing bell echoed from inside. Seeing this, he grew cautious and slowed down to catch his breath. Carefully now, he motioned for the others to follow as he stepped onto the decrepit, narrow, wooden stairway that led into the basement.
Indy kept a death grip on his flashlight as they descended. The policemen clustered close behind him, taking each step with extreme caution. The boards creaked and groaned with their every move, and he gulped as he realized they may very well be too brittle to take everyone’s weight. It was a long staircase and the floor wasn’t even visible from here. He slowed down a smidgen more and motioned the others to do the same.
“Hennesey!” MacGowan yelled again, leaning to the side to peer out into the darkness. Suddenly, the rotted bannister snapped in two and he lost his footing, falling toward who-knew-where. Indy grabbed him by the collar with a reflexive speed born of duress, and the Inspector nearly pulled him over the side as well. Galbraith and Bottomley quickly stepped in to help, and together they pulled him back to safety. MacGowan caught his breath, shaking. “Thanks for catchin’ me,” he gasped.
“I’d rather be catchin’ trout,” Indy said. He was beginning to wish this had been a wild goose chase all along.
They continued down the stairs and arrived at a large, musty stone basement. Green moss covered the slimy walls and several doors of rotted wood stood along the wall. The sound of the ringing bell was much louder and quite aggravating.
With no better way to decide, he selected the first door and reached for the handle. The policemen drew their pistols once again. Indy jumped to the side as he pulled it open. This was a good decision, for a large object immediately shot out from inside, rolling at breakneck speed toward the men. They scattered quickly, firing several shots as they did. The object came to a stop and a deep red liquid began leaking out onto the floor.
Before anyone could stop him, Indy dipped his finger into the liquid and brought it to his mouth. His eyes lit up. Finally, here in the pit of hell, something to lift his mood. “Interesting blood type,” he commented.
The policemen stared, wide-eyed.
Indy smiled for the first time since coming to the castle. “Cabernet sauvignon, 1897,” he continued, shining his flashlight beam on the mysterious object, now revealed as a mere wine barrel, the label matching his diagnosis perfectly. Beyond the opened door was a deserted wine cellar. The wine was forty years old, but it was hard to imagine someone having come down here in twice that time. Promise or no, he decided he might just stay here for the night.
A loud creak echoed through the basement from somewhere behind them. Galbraith cried out, pointing. “Look!”
Everyone turned to see a large stone door, built into the wall, slowly opening. Indy stared with the rest of them, dumbfounded. What could they have done to trigger that? It came to a stop wide open. Another flickering light glimmered from inside.
“I dun’ like this,” Bottomley muttered.
And so I have to be first once again, Indy thought. He was more apprehensive than ever, but he was concerned for Hennesey’s safety, and he wanted to find the source of that infernal ringing that still clawed at his skull. So he peered cautiously inside, the police staying a few steps behind, and nearly had a heart attack.
It took a moment to regain the power of speech. He finally managed to say, “Then you’re really not going to like this.”
They had stumbled upon a family crypt. Stone coffins with glass covered tops lined the walls, displaying their comatose inhabitants for the world to see. Macabre, ghastly religious statues decorated the room, more grotesque by half than those upstairs and outside. Countless death masks covered the ceiling, all carved with that same frighteningly familiar face – Baron Seagrove.
And in a far corner of the crypt, the exact same candle from upstairs rested on one of the coffins’ glass tops, burning again. No, Indy scolded himself, that’s absurd; there’s no reason to assume it’s the same candle. It’s not like all candle-holders are totally unique.
A trembling MacGowan stepped back, away from the crypt. For the first time since before their arrival he took charge and blurted an order to his men. “Galbraith... You come with me!” he said. “We’ll search for Hennesey... out here! Bottomley... you go with Dr. Jones...” finger shaking, he gestured to the crypt’s interior “...in there.”
He and Galbraith nearly fell over each other as they scrambled back to the other side of the basement. “Thanks a bundle, Mac,” Indy yelled with as much sarcasm as he was capable.
“‘Ey, yer the adventurin’ one,” said McGowan. “I know ye’ll come out smellin’ like roses.”
“Ah, right,” Indy said. He shook his head when no one was looking. How had he gotten himself into this? All along he’d thought fishing was a more sensible choice of vacation than going to a brothel. Well, that and he could actually afford it. Hiding his fear once more, knowing his reputation was at stake now more than ever, he entered the crypt. A very reluctant Bottomley followed.
Of course, reputation hardly mattered next to one’s life, he reminded himself, but never mind, dead people wouldn’t hurt them. He dealt with dead people for a living. His flashlight beam danced across the glass coffin tops; the candle was not bright enough to provide a view inside them. Decayed corpses smiled cheerily, their hands tightly clutching crucifixes. Bottomley was horrified by the sight, but Indy quickly relaxed. Unlike the unfortunate Scotty Ferguson, these people all seemed to have died perfectly natural deaths. He continued ahead, past the burning candle, moving further into the darkness of the crypt. The shivering Bottomley stayed directly behind him. With their every step, the bell’s ringing grew louder... louder... how far did this place go?
The two men found out a moment later when they arrived in a circular chamber, located at the far end of the crypt. Here, the noise was nearly deafening as it echoed from above. Indy realized they were on the floor of the bell tower, and with a sense of trepidation he couldn’t explain, he shone his flashlight upward. The beam stopped on a humongous ringing bell that hung several feet in the air.
Well, of course it was a bell. What had he expected to –
Indy squinted, hoping he couldn’t possibly be seeing what he seemed to be seeing.
In place of a bell clapper, dangling by his feet, was the dead body of Hennesey. His body swung back and forth, the crunch of bones as it slammed into the sides drowned by the dull ringing it caused. Bottomley screamed.
Indy grabbed his arm. “Steady on,” he said. “We don’t know for sure if it’s Hennesey. Maybe it’s just a dead ringer.”
Bottomley screamed again. So much for humor lightening tense situations.
Indy was disturbed himself, though, and the more he thought about it the more so he became. How had the killer snuck into the room and grabbed both Hennesey and the candle, and left, without leaving footprints? A secret passage? But come to think of it, the ringing had started immediately after that and continued without pause, and there was no way for him to have gotten here that fast, not with all the secret passages in the world.
Well, whatever, they’d found Hennesey and that’s all they’d been asked to do. The killer was probably up there right this minute ringing the bell and laughing at them, but that wasn’t his problem. The police could come in force, and with guns. He tightened his grip on Bottomley’s arm. “Let’s get outta here,” he said.
No sooner had they turned to the crypt door than it began to close. The two men dashed forward, but somehow it seemed to move faster. Indy and Bottomley were only inches away when it slammed shut in their faces. They pushed and kicked but it quickly became obvious that the door wouldn’t budge. “Inspector MacGowan!” Bottomley yelled, on the verge of hysterics. “Galbraith! Open the door!”
Using his flashlight, Indy scanned the door, looking for a crack. He didn’t care how it had closed itself, he just wanted to get the hell out of here, out of this castle. Forget the artifacts, his life was enough of a prize. He nudged Bottomley and motioned to the candle. “I need more light!”
Bottomley hurried to the candle and reached out. With another loud whoosh the flame went out, plunging this room into darkness as well. It took Indy to realize that the bell had ceased, for its ringing still echoed between his ears and he could feel the beginnings of a headache.
Getting his bearings, he turned from the door. “Bottomley?!” he called. The poor nervous wreck must have dropped the candle.
Receiving no answer, he shined his flashlight toward the area. Not only was the candle gone, but there was no sign of Bottomley.
Indy took a cautious step forward. “Bottomley?!” he said again.
Again, no answer. He swept the flashlight beam across the room. It passed one of the coffins... then shot back. Indiana Jones was met with the latest in a series of shocking sights.
Bottomley lay inside the coffin, his face twisted in a ghoulish smile, all of his bones broken, his hands wrapped around a crucifix. Indy stared in horror. This certainly hadn’t been done by an anaconda, he realized. Who or what had done it was not something he wanted to think about right now. And he was still trapped in this accursed room.
But he didn’t have to wait long for a sound. Footsteps. Someone else was in here. The killer must have gotten down from the bell tower somehow, and was coming closer. Indy’s flashlight beam darted around the crypt, but found no sign of anyone. “Who is it?” he said, not even bothering to keep the fear from his voice. “Who’s there?”
The same crazed laugh as earlier echoed through the crypt. That does it, I’m leaving, I don’t care if I kill myself breaking the door down. But as soon as he turned, he was startled to find the crypt door covered with a thick sheet of sparkling, green ice. For a moment he was too dumbfounded to remember being afraid, and he reached out to touch it. His hand snapped back quickly, the fingers agonizingly burnt.
On the other side, MacGowan and Galbraith had finally responded to Bottomley’s cries, and they pulled desperately at the crypt door’s metal handles. But it was no more cooperative with them. MacGowan called through the door. “Dr. Jones! Try to push!”
Indy took a step back. “Can’t!” he said, even now trying to sound more matter-of-fact than panicky. “There’s some kinda hot ice coverin’ the –”
Then the floor disappeared under his feet.
Next: Chapter Two
