The Black Knights vs The Mummy
...Maybe, just maybe, this story - which is totally true - just amuses me - now that it's
over. But, it's being written for you. Don't play with matches - Don't make fun of the things that go "boooo" in the night. You know what I mean, because - they will get you as sure as
it snows in winter and rains in April.
...We had weekly meetings of the Black Knights club every Friday evening. Each week was at someone else's house. I won't tell you the name of the kid whose house it was this particular week, because we'd all be arrested - that's for sure - but his initials were J. L. and we were all about ten years old - maybe eleven.
We were finishing off our snacks of pretzels and cokes. This was usually the high point of our meetings, when someone asked J. L. what they had down in the basement. That's when he warned us; "There's a mummy down there - you don't want to go down there". Now, you have to realize that, even then, people didn't mention things like this - not over cokes and pretzels - maybe sometimes out camping at night telling ghost stories or something - but not in a real house where you were having your weekly club meeting. So it went over with a sort of questioning curiosity mixed with a little bit of challenge against who knew what was actually down there - if anything. "What, someone asked, is he alive?" I don't remember the actual conversation but it went something like that. "He's a mummy!", came the reply. Again, that's the darned best I can remember this. Remembering anything at all after the mummy has to be a great accomplishment, you understand.
Now look, it wasn't for nothing that we were called the Black Knights. We were a force to be dealt with whether on our bikes or on foot, especially on Halloween at night when we rang doorbells and engaged in all kinds of mischief - better left unsaid.
...I forget who, but one of us decided to laugh off the whole idea of a Mummy in the basement and show the world just who the Black Knights were. He was the first in line down the steps and I was a few guys behind. We went down slowly. Each step was like a "no way back" descent into the depths of the lair of the evil one himself. I'm not kidding you.You could feel the damp fear closing in on you, cold and mean, like a hungry werewolf, or something so horrible, no one has ever imagined it. At the first step down, there was fear, real fear, and the second step was total abject terror. It wasn't a question of smelling it or hearing it - you knew it was there and was going to eat you - at least this.
...It's not clear yet, who bolted first, but it was sheer stampede back up the steps. "I told you", J. L. said matter of factly...
That was the last meeting of the Black Knights...
