"075 (B042) - The Gold Ogre (1939-05) - Lester Dent" - читать интересную книгу автора (Robeson Kenneth)

DON WORTH and the other three were rather close to speechlessness after the tale had ended. Telling ghost stories had been a favorite evening pastime at Camp Indian-Laughs-And-Laughs, but none of those hair-curlers quite equaled this one.
Without finding anything much to say, they went to bed. Because the house was small, they all bedded down on pallets in the living room. Mrs. Worth slept in the bedroom. The kitchen was the only other room in the small house.
Finally, Mental Byron spoke. "Don."
"Yes."
"Has there ever been any insanity in your family?"
"No," Don said, shuddering. "There hasn't."
Mental reached over and put a hand on Don Worth's shoulder. There was something that Don found definitely comforting about his touch.
"I've got a feeling in my bones, Don, that there isn't anything in the least wrong with your father's mind," Mental said earnestly.
Don couldn't have explained why, but the other boy's reassurance made him feel a great deal better. Still, however, he was not able to sleep, and he judged from the squirmings that the others were having the same trouble. They did not hold a long conversation, something they ordinarily would have done; probably the weirdness of the story which Mrs. Worth had told them held them to silence.
It must have been after midnight when Don—he was rather more than half asleep by now—realized that Mental was getting up. To a whispered query, Mental responded that he couldn't sleep and he was going out on the porch to sit and contemplate stars.
Don watched Mental move silently outdoors. It was a moonlight night, except at intervals when slinking clouds made it very dark. It would have been a quiet night, too, except for one thing—the snoring of Funny and B. Elmer. They were furnishing a goose-and-bumblebee duet, one doing the honking and the other buzzing accompaniment.
Came a moment when the clouds made it very dark. The interval of sepia lasted for at least five minutes, then it was suddenly bright moonlight again outdoors.
Abruptly, Mental whisked in from the porch. He moved silently, reached Don's side, and sank down.
Don realized with a start that Mental was trembling.
"Don!" Mental breathed. "I just saw a little golden man who wore a breechcloth and carried a club!"
Chapter III. THE OGRES AND THE BOYS
DON WORTH jerked upright, would have exclaimed aloud had Mental not pressed a hand over his mouth.
"Sh-h-h!" Mental whispered. "The little gold fellow is poking around the outside. He might hear."
"Show him to me!" Don ordered, as quietly as he could manage in his excitement.
The two of them crept to a window, and stood looking out in the moonlight. Mental pointed.
"There!" he breathed. "And I'm glad you can see him, too! I am afraid people would think I was crazy."
Don Worth stared.
"Great Gulliver!" he gasped.
His eyes had some difficulty distinguishing the little gold-colored man on the lawn. Then the midget figure stepped out into brighter moonlight, and it was more clearly visible.
The head of the little golden ogre would not reach to the belt of even Funny Tucker, whose belt was closer to the ground than any of the others. The dwarf was naked except for a brown fur loincloth and sandals, and his hideously gnarled hands gripped a club.
The tiny one trotted across the lawn and disappeared into shadows.
Don Worth gripped Mental's arm.
"We've got to follow that . . . that—whatever it is!" Don gasped.
"Well, we know now that your father wasn't crazy," Mental said tensely.
They awakened Funny Tucker and B. Elmer Dexter. It was no task to arouse B. Elmer silently, but they had the good judgment to jam a pillow over Funny's head and sit on it until he understood what it was all about. Funny's awakenings were something like a bull walrus having a spasm.
As swiftly as possible, they crept out into the night. All four were Boy Scouts, and Crescent City was in a forest section, so they all had some experience at woodcraft. Moreover, the art of trailing a quarry silently had been practiced in games at Camp Indian-Laughs-And-Laughs.
"Say, an Indian couldn't do a better job than this," whispered Funny Tucker.
They came upon the little golden dwarf so suddenly that they almost gave themselves away. Flattening their bodies in dew-wet grass, they watched.
The small ogre was obviously conducting a search. He was squatting and peering, giving particular attention to the vicinity of a stone fence. He began picking up rocks and peering under them.
Suddenly they heard him give a small, unpleasant grunt. He had found something under a rock.
"Maybe he's hunting his supper," Funny Tucker whispered.
But it was no fat grub or cricket that the little fellow had found. It was a paper, as nearly as the watchers could tell. Nearby was a corner street light, and the dwarf carried the paper to this, where they saw him peer at it for some time.
Another unpleasant grunt came from the weird creature.
He picked up a stick, poked around, found a soft spot, and carefully buried the paper. They watched him scatter the dйbris over the spot to cover his handiwork.
Acting satisfied, as if he had completed his night's work, the small man strolled away.
Don Worth scuttled swiftly to the spot, and aided by Mental and Funny, dug up the paper. They could read, by the street-light luminance, the words scrawled upon it.
THE GOLD OGRES HAVE SEIZED ME. THEY WERE AFRAID I COULD LEAD THE POLICE TO THEIR CAVERN.
Don Worth gasped, "That's my father's handwriting!"
None of the four boys were slow-witted. The significance of what they had found became plain to all of them at about the same moment. Mental Byron voiced it.
"They must have carried your father away, and he managed to leave a note by the stone fence. They seem to have found out about the note, and one of them came back to hunt it. He found it, and buried it where he thought nobody would ever locate it."
Don Worth nodded. "That's what it looks like. But how come they didn't find out about the note immediately?"
Mental gave his theory of the explanation reluctantly. "Your mother said that your father claimed he had been tortured."
"You think they've made dad tell about the note?" Don asked.
"Maybe."
Don shuddered.