The Witchmaster's Key Read online

  The man spoke again. “You must swear allegiance to me!”

  Joe clenched his fist and screwed up all his courage. “Nuts to you!” he replied.

  “Second the motion!” Frank blurted out.

  Satan shook with rage. “You cheeky impostors! You’re no apprentices! No!”

  His seething voice became a low whine. “You had your chance to leave England. We gave you plenty of warnings. You refused to heed. Now you will remain with us forever! He Goat, prepare the rack! But first, the potion!”

  Several men seized the boys, pinioning their arms and forcing their heads back. Two women came forward with gold flagons in their hands. The metal gleamed in the dim light.

  Frank recognized the crest–a griffin carrying off a knight in armor and the legend: Avoir la Serre Bonne.

  The flagon was from Professor Rowbotham’s Witch Museum! A split second later Frank felt something cold touch his lips. The witch tilted the flagon and a bitter liquid streamed into his mouth and down his throat. He choked on it.

  Joe was also forced to swallow the fluid. They felt themselves growing faint.

  “They’ve poisoned us!” Frank coughed.

  Satan cackled. “It would be fortunate for you if we had. This potion will make you easier to handle, that is all. We want you to be awake for the climax.”

  “The climax?” Joe gasped.

  “The rack!”

  Two medieval torture instruments occupied one corner of the room. They looked like wooden bed frames with slats held together by thick ropes. But the head and foot of each frame were movable and could be extended by a winch.

  The Hardys were thrown on the racks. Their hands and feet were bound tightly in a spread-eagle position.

  He Goat chuckled. “Now we are going to give you the treatment!” As he turned toward the winch, his mask slipped far enough to reveal his face.

  Goodman, the Craighead butler!

  “How did you get here?” Frank cried out.

  He Goat adjusted his mask and chuckled again. “It doesn’t matter that you know who I am. You won’t tell anybody.”

  Seizing the handle of the winch, he began to turn it. Frank felt his arms and legs drawn taut by the ropes. The stretching continued, causing sharp pains in his wrists and ankles.

  Another witch turned the handle of the rack Joe had been tied to. The pain became agonizing, and when the boys cried out for help, the witches erupted into spasms of fiendish mirth.

  They ceased at a signal from Satan. “That will do for now,” he commanded. “The torture will resume in a moment. Keep the racks in readiness.”

  Descending from his wooden throne, Satan approached the Hardys. He drew a large, ornate key from under his robe and flaunted it in their faces.

  “This is the key of death!” he cackled. “Look well at it!”

  “What–is–it?” Joe gasped.

  “The key to the door of your tomb!”

  He was about to say something else when a small red light in the ceiling blinked on and off.

  “Visitors!” Satan hissed. “To your work–all of you!” He handed the key to He Goat. “Keep this for me. I want to use it later.”

  Frank and Joe were released from the ropes that held them and hauled to their feet. The witches draped the black hoods over their heads and pushed them to an exit. Again a car with motor idling awaited them.

  In the fresh air the boys became alert. They ripped their hoods off and sailed into the witches, who were attempting to force them into the car.

  “Let ’em have it!” Frank shouted as he gave He Goat a karate chop.

  “But good!” Joe exploded, hitting another witch with a haymaker.

  The whole coven seemed to be there, except Satan. Witch robes were shredded and witch masks torn off as the Hardys battled their captors.

  The fight was still raging when footsteps were heard pounding inside the building. The witches ran. He Goat jumped into the car and sped off.

  “Are you all right, Joe?” It was Shirley’s anxious voice.

  “Yes–eh–fine. But you came just in time!” Gratefully the boys looked at their rescue squad–Chet and Phil, accompanied by Mr. Evans and his daughter.

  Frank fought for breath as he gave Chet a weak slap on the back. “How’d you find us?”

  Chet told him that he saw the Hardys taken out the back door of Black Magic Hall. “Phil and I had no way to follow you. So we went to Mr. Evans and asked him where the old castle was where the black witches met.”

  “I happened to know it was here,” the lawyer told them.

  “So, we drove over at once,” Shirley added.

  “We heard an alarm bell ringing in the castle,” Phil said. “The witch sentinels must have spotted us. Anyway, we rushed the front door and ran through to the back.”

  Frank and Joe quickly explained what had happened after the kidnapping. Then they led the way into the castle and attempted to find the room in which the witches had held them captive.

  They went up and down stairs and along the corridors of the decrepit building. They pushed doors open and cased room after room. Each was empty!

  “We were blindfolded,” Frank pointed out. “That’s why we can’t retrace the route.”

  “We made more turns than a ball in a pinball machine,” Joe said.

  They went back out to the spot where the fracas had occurred. Chet stubbed his toe on something lying in the grass. It was a large, ornate key!

  “That’s the one Satan waved at us!” Frank said. “He gave it to He Goat!”

  “You mean Goodman,” Joe observed. “He must have dropped it when you hit him with that karate chop.”

  “Maybe it fits one of the doors in this place,” Phil said.

  “Let’s try it,” Frank suggested, and the boys went back into the ancient castle, followed by the Evanses. But the key did not fit any of the doors.

  “Perhaps it belongs to Craighead Castle,” Joe said. “After all, Goodman lives there!”

  “You’re right!” Frank said excitedly. “We’ll have to try it!”

  “That can wait,” Evans suggested. “We had better report to the police that strange things have been going on here. Come with me.”

  He drove to the nearest town and parked in front of police headquarters. They all took turns explaining to the sergeant on desk duty.

  “So you see,” Frank concluded, “the castle is being used by a coven of witches.”

  The sergeant shook his head. “I doubt that we have the authority to do anything about it. Witch covens are not illegal.”

  “But they were torturing these boys!” Mr. Evans protested.

  The sergeant raised his eyebrows. “That’s different. We can’t have that sort of thing going on. I’ll round up some of my men and a police dog, and we’ll give the place a thorough search.”

  Within minutes they were on their way back to the castle. The Evans car followed the police, and both vehicles drew to a stop in front of the building.

  The sergeant took the police dog on a leash and held an abandoned witch mask under his nose. After sniffing, the animal padded around the castle and stopped at a grove of bushes. Behind the shrubbery was a sloping ramp.

  “This is where we entered!” Frank exclaimed. “The dog’s a better detective than we are!”

  The animal went down the ramp, tugging at his leash, and up a flight of stairs.

  “This is where I tripped!” Joe said.

  The dog began moving around corners, along corridors, and up and down more stairs until he reached one last flight of steps going down. Whining eagerly, he stopped at a flush panel.

  The sergeant pushed it. Nothing happened. Then he tried to slide it open. It moved!

  “This is it!” the Hardys cried in unison.

  They all entered the quiet dungeon and looked about. The candles were still flickering and the air was pungent with smoke from the dying fire. Satan’s wood throne stood empty against the wall.

  “There’s the cof
fin!” Joe said. Shirley covered her face with her hands while the others stepped forward. Inside the box was the mummified body of a man whose wizened features were contorted into a savage scowl.

  “John Pickenbaugh!” Joe gasped. “The witchmaster of East Anglia!”

  All were appalled by the spectacle of the mummy. Even the police could not repress a shudder. The dog sat down, raised his muzzle toward the ceiling, and howled mournfully.

  Something suddenly moved in the shadows behind Satan’s throne. Shirley turned to look, then screamed out in terror!

  CHAPTER XX

  The Skeleton

  IT was Satan himself! His repulsive mask looked more diabolical than ever in the flickering candlelight! The purple feathers of his headdress made him seem like a monstrous bird of prey!

  Uttering an oath, he leaped from the shadows and flung himself on Joe. “I helped you!” Satan screamed. “And you ruined everything!”

  The police overpowered him while he struggled, kicked, and shrieked. Frank ripped off the satanic mask and stood dumbfounded.

  “Doctor Burelli!”

  “My dentist!” Joe exclaimed. “So you’re the new witchmaster of East Anglia!”

  The Evanses looked on open-mouthed as the drama unfolded.

  “That workshop in your basement gave you a great cover,” Frank said. “We never guessed you were making masks for your witches as well as for your Gravesend Players!”

  Joe’s mind was working at top speed. “You’re the one with the shock of gray hair and the bushy beard, Burelli. You carried the sword at John Pickenbaugh’s funeral.”

  “And you had Pickenbaugh’s body dug up afterwards and brought it here!” Frank went on. “But why?”

  “It is a satanic relic!” Burelli screeched at them. “Do not touch it, ever!”

  “Who’d want to?” Frank said. “And when we got interested in your satanic relic, you had us pushed into the open grave. And you had Ellerbee harrass us.”

  Burelli’s smile was evil.

  “He was probably He Goat’s accomplice at Stonehenge,” Joe said. “The ‘friendly old man’ who gave Professor Rowbotham the fake message and planted the cablegram.”

  “Now I get it!” Frank said. “Remember, Goodman has a cousin in New York? No doubt he sent it!”

  “And it’s obvious who robbed the museum in Griffinmoor,” Joe deduced. “The purple feather fell out of the good doc’s fancy Easter bonnet!”

  Chet nodded. “He probably wore it to frighten anyone who might surprise him. And it sure would have worked!”

  “Robbery, eh?” one of the policemen took up the thread. “But why would a black witch rob a witch museum, of all places?”

  By now Burelli realized he had lost. “We needed money for our coven,” he said dejectedly. “And being black witches, it was easy for us to sell the artifacts as family heirlooms.”

  “Was Sears in on it?” Joe asked.

  “No. He’s innocent.”

  “And Milton Craighead?”

  “He is too.”

  Frank nodded. “And when we tried to find a clue in the empty museum, someone familiar with the place turned off the master fuse. Was it you?”

  “Yes. I wanted to scare you out of the building. All your snooping could come to no good.”

  “When we found the imprint in the cement and went to Lance McKnight for a cast,” Joe said. “He sent us off to Hopkins and London into the hands of enemies. Black witches too, no doubt.”

  “McKnight? Hopkins?” Burelli looked surprised. “They’re not witches. I had nothing to do with them.”

  “What about the key you waved at us before?” Frank pressed on.

  Burelli’s eyes narrowed. “You’ll never find it!” he said craftily.

  Frank drew it out of his pocket. “Here it is. Goodman dropped it!”

  The dentist erupted into another paroxysm of fury. “No!” he bellowed. “You can’t have it! The key is mine! Do you hear? Mine!”

  Since he refused to calm down, the police dragged him out of the castle and put him into the back seat of their car. It took two bobbies to hold him.

  “We’ll arrest him,” the sergeant said. “And round up the rest of the black witches.”

  “By the way, the special exhibit at Black Magic Hall was stolen from Griffinmoor,” Frank said, and he explained their mission to England.

  “We’ll see that everything is returned,” the policeman promised, then got into the front seat. The dog leaped in beside him, and the car drove off.

  The Hardys and their friends returned to Douglas. When they had said good-by to the Evanses and were back in their room at the inn, Frank said, “We’ll go back to Griffinmoor as soon as possible and see if that key belongs to Craighead. Want to come?” he asked Phil and Chet.

  “I’d rather stay for the motorcycle races,” Phil said.

  “And I want to corral me a pair of Manx cats,” Chet added, “and go into business. They should be a hit in Bayport.”

  Next morning Frank and Joe flew to London and then went to Griffinmoor. They told Professor Rowbotham that they had found stolen items of his collection on Man and that they would be returned to him.

  “With the pieces from London and those Sam Radley found in New York,” Frank said, “you’ll have most of your collection back now.”

  “Ah–ah, that’s splendid,” Rowbotham stated. “The Witch Museum can reopen. The case is solved, thanks to you.”

  “Not yet, professor,” Joe told him. “The key we brought back from the Isle of Man has to be checked out.”

  “There is something you–ah–ought to know before proceeding,” Rowbotham declared. “It is said that Eagleton Green will be sold to the London Syndicate. They will have a mass meeting this afternoon.”

  “Good. How would you like to be the star speaker?” Frank said. Rapidly he laid out their suspicions about the criminal pressure being put on the artisan colony to sell out.

  “You can throw the wrench–er–spanner in the works,” Joe said.

  “I say,” the professor replied, “that would be–ah–proper retribution. I’ll do it!”

  Frank and Joe, meanwhile, drove to Craighead Castle, accompanied by a constable with a search warrant. Joe brought a flashlight.

  When Mrs. Goodman saw the Hardys, her eyes opened wide in disbelief. “You–you—”

  “Yes. We returned in one piece,” Frank said. “Where’s your master?”

  “And we don’t mean witchmaster,” Joe added.

  The woman said Milton Craighead was in London. When she turned to hurry off the officer restrained her.

  “I need you as a witness,” he said. “I have a warrant to search this castle.”

  “Why?”

  “To see if this key fits,” Frank said, displaying the ancient relic.

  Mrs. Goodman’s hands began to tremble. She took a deep breath. “Where would you like to start?”

  “In the turret,” Joe said. “More specifically, in the armor room.”

  Shakily, the housekeeper led the way up the stone stairway and stopped before the storage room. The policeman opened the door, and Joe shone his light inside. Then all three searched amid the relics of medieval warfare.

  Finally the constable said, “I say, what are we looking for?”

  “A hidden door,” Joe said. “Leading to a hidden room.” He told of the outside window, located roughly in this area.

  “Oh yes. I see. But there is no door in here.”

  “Hold it,” Frank said. He stopped behind a suit of jet black armor. “Here’s something.” With both hands he pushed against a panel in the wall. It slid silently to one side, revealing an oak door about five feet high!

  Frank pushed Burelli’s key into the lock and exerted all his strength to turn it. Grating harshly, the lock snapped open.

  The constable put his shoulder against the oak and pushed. The door swung back on creaking hinges. The trio ducked and entered a small chamber while the woman stood in the doorwa
y.

  It was musty with dust and cobwebs. Light came from the window Joe had noticed. It fell upon a treasure trove of witchery.

  Charts bearing weird signs hung on the walls. Jars of herbs occupied the shelves. Cauldrons, wands, daggers, stuffed animals, and dolls pierced by pins were scattered around the room.

  A ray of sunlight slanting through the window fell upon a bundle of old tweeds lying on the floor.

  “Holy cow. Look!” Frank exclaimed.

  From above the coat collar protruded a grinning skull! Bony hands extended from the cuffs!

  The constable bent down on one knee to examine the label inside the jacket. On it was the name of a London tailor and the words, “Made exclusively for Lord Craighead.”

  “Good grief! We’ve found him!” Joe exclaimed.

  Further scrutiny revealed that a vial was lying next to one hand, a piece of paper near the other.

  Frank read it. “Looks like the formula for a potion,” he said.

  Suddenly the trio noticed that Mrs. Goodman had vanished. “I’ll get her,” the constable said. He hurried off, and in a few moments returned with the weeping housekeeper and Professor Rowbotham.

  “I say, astounding news,” the professor said breathlessly. “Lord–ah–Craighead. Really.”

  “Looks like it,” Frank said and added, “I thought you went to the meeting.”

  “Most certainly. It’s–ah–all over.” He paused, looking down at the skeleton. “Poor fellow.”

  “How about this?” Frank said and handed him the paper.

  “This is the formula for an ancient rejuvenation potion. It’s in Lord Craighead’s handwriting.”

  Frank shivered. “Then this must really be his skeleton! It’s been locked in this room for five years!”

  “Maybe he came in here to drink the potion and become young again,” Joe theorized. “Perhaps it poisoned him.”

  The professor shook his head. “Only if someone exchanged the liquid in the bottle for another. The potion is harmless.”

  Rowbotham leafed through the papers on a small desk. “Here is more information,” he said. “It certifies that Lord Craighead was the witchmaster of East Anglia! Dear me! And his assistant was John Pickenbaugh! They practiced the arts of witchcraft in this secret room!”