Let's Go Play at the Adams'

PREPARE YOURSELF

FOR A SHOCKING EXPERIENCE

Mendal W. Johnson's

LETS GO PLAY AT THE ADAMS'

"The unbearable tension of a silent scream. Johnson is telling us some horrifying things

about the hidden recesses of the human psyche. Wonderfully skillful.''

-Detroit Free Press

"Proceeds at a breathless pace, as horror multiplies it· self in geometric progression.''

-Hartford Times

"A superb new novel of suspense, which will hold the reader in its grip of horror until

the last page."

-Atlantic City Presa

LET'S GO PLAY AT THE ADAMS'

Mendal W. Johnson

To my wife, Ellen Argo Johnson

This low-priced Golden Apple Book has been completely reset in a type face designed for easy reading, and was printed from new

plates. It contains the complete text of the original hard-cover edition.

NOT ONE WORD HAS BEEN OMITIED.

LET'S GO PLAY AT THE ADAMS'

A Golden Apple Publication I published by arrangement with Thomas Y. Crowell Company

Golden Apple edition I December 1984

Golden Apple i.J a trademark of Golden Apple Publishers All rights reserved.

Copyright © 1974 by Mendal W. Johnson.

Cover copyright © 1984 by Golden Apple Publishers.

Thi.s book may not be reproduced in whole or in part, by mimeograph or any other means, without permission.

For information address: Golden Apple Publishers, 666 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10103.

On the keyboard of a piano--in this case, it is an upright-are two neatly positioned pairs

of bands. To the right is the pair (at C above middle C) which may be fairly said to be

the hands of a girl. They are terribly slender-only girls, only the young have hands like

that-and they are firm and strong and tanned. There is a decorative ring on the right

hand but nothing on the left: the girl is not yet engaged or married. The hands are

spread into a C-major chord and waiting. They begin.

What they are playing-and well enough-is "The Happy Farmer." It's a rather insistent

small tune that goes, "Dum dum-boom, boom-dum dum boom, boom-dum dum dum

dum;" etc. It goes to a similar conclusion. It is an inevitable tune; people have been

toying with it for centuries.

The hands disappear. "OK, now you try it."

Now it is the tum of the other pair of hands, the ones to the left, the pudgy, sunburned

(but wellscrubbed) little hands. They strain awkwardly. They achieve the necessary

chord and begin: "Dum dum boom, boom (mistake).', They reposition themselves and

begin again.

"Come on now. You can do that after church." "Just let me. Just once more-now?''

"OK, but you come when I honk the horn. I don't want to be late." The longer, more

slender hands pull

1

on a pair of short white gloves that stop exactly at the wrist. "Now, where's Bobby?

Bob-eeef'

"I'm coming, But it's early. We never leave until-"

"Let me see your hands."

These hands are also more or less clean; but they are definitely boy's hands. Against

the white gloves that hold them, they look knuckle-barked, calloused and innately

grubby in spite of their recent washing. Nonetheless they pass inspection.

"OK, let's go, Cindy.''

"Com-ing, Miss Barbara." There is some trucu-

lence here.

"You don't have to use Miss with me." "Mommy said to."

"All right, if she said so."

The parents are in Europe, so that the children are driven to church by the baby-sitter.

They make a pleasant sight.

Cindy Adams, the smaller piano player, is an impish little girl of ten. She is pretty

enough, and she has brown hair cut rather short for summer, because with swimming

and moist heat, it wants to spring into curls and spirals and tangles and become

unmanageable. She

is the sort of child that grown-ups instinctively want to pat.

Bobby Adams, her brother, is oddly enough the beauty. He is about thirteen, thin and

fair, with high coloring to his cheeks and fine, blond hair that requires water and sticky

stuff to keep it from floating around his head in an unruly halo. He rarely smiles, and he

of- - ten stands in thought with his hands thrust straight down, as deep as they will go

in his pockets. This position, rare in a youngster, is an unconscious copy of the position

his surgeon father often takes in conversation.

The white-gloved hands that swing the family station wagon into the churchyard,