The Ghost in the Big Brass Bed

by Bruce Coville

  Norma took a sip of coffee and said, “I have bad news.”

  I looked at her nervously. “What’s wrong?”

  “Phoebe Watson is in the hospital.”

  “What happened?” I cried.

  “Heart problem. Fairly mild, I think, but she’ll be in for several days. I went to visit her this afternoon. She asked if you would mind going over to her house on a mission of mercy.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “She wants you to take care of General Pershing.”

  I must have looked blank because Norma laughed and said, “Her cat. Remember? I’d do it myself, only I’m allergic, and Phoebe wants someone to make a fuss over the obnoxious little beast.”

  I hesitated for a moment. The idea of going back to Phoebe’s house by myself was frightening. On the other hand, it was hard to say when either Chris or I would have another chance to visit the place.

  “I’d be glad to,” I said. “How do I get in?”

  “Phoebe keeps a key under a flowerpot on the back porch. The cat food is in the cupboard next to the refrigerator.”

  I wanted to sit and talk to Norma, but if I was going to feed the cat, I had to get moving. I hurried home to work things out with my father. We decided I would ride my bike over to Phoebe’s, and he would come get me about forty-five minutes later.

  The reason I was riding my bike over was that he was in the middle of cooking supper. The reason he was going to drive me back was that he doesn’t want me out on the streets alone after dark. He says he’s afraid the bogeyman will take me away.

  Actually, I know he has good reasons not to want me out after dark. But it makes me mad that I can’t walk a mile or so through our own neighborhood by myself.

  I thought about calling Chris. But she wouldn’t be able to get to my house in time to go with me, so I decided I should just get moving. I knew she would be annoyed that I had done this on my own, but I couldn’t figure any way around it. Phoebe had asked me to feed the cat, and it needed to be done that night.

  By the time I got my bike to the top of Phoebe’s hill, I was panting. The light was almost gone—you could just see the sun setting beyond Phoebe’s house. The shadow of the tower stretched toward me like a long finger of darkness. Each of the jagged stones from the broken wall cast a little shadow of its own. I remembered that one of the Fletcher pictures we had seen in the museum was called “Stones Can Break Your Heart.”

  The flagstone path that led from the street to Phoebe’s house was too steep to ride up, so I got off my bike and walked it to the porch, where I discovered that I had forgotten to bring my lock. To be safe, I took the bike around back.

  The shrubs and bushes in the backyard were overgrown and tangled. It looked as if it had been years since anyone had really taken care of the place. The yard stretched down the far side of the hill.

  I realized how isolated Phoebe’s house was.

  As I leaned my bike against an old tree, the sun, which had almost set anyway, disappeared behind some clouds. It was getting hard to see.

  The wind began to blow harder, swirling the dead leaves around my feet.

  Nice setting for a haunted house, I thought.

  Back on Norma’s porch this trip had seemed like a good idea. Now I wasn’t so certain. It suddenly hit me that the fact I had never met a ghost who was actually bad didn’t mean there was no such thing. And even a ghost that isn’t nasty is pretty scary when you’re on your own.

  It’s interesting how you can explain to yourself all the reasons why you shouldn’t be scared, and have your body completely ignore the fact. I could feel my stomach start to twist. The hairs at the back of my neck were beginning to prickle. And I hadn’t even gone inside yet.

  I found the key and unlocked the door. As I turned the knob, the storm began.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Footsteps in the Dark

  Lightning ripped across the sky. Raindrops exploded around me, pelting down so hard you would have thought they were coming from guns instead of clouds. I dashed inside and slammed the door shut to get away from them. I stood in pitch darkness, the rain racket making me feel as if I were trapped inside a drum.

  Suddenly I felt something rub against my leg. I jumped and yelled, then laughed when I realized it was only the cat that I had come to feed.

  “You lonely, kiddo?” I asked, scooping the mass of black and white fur off the floor.

  General Pershing opened his mouth and hissed at me.

  “Great,” I said. “You ought to meet my cat. You have a lot in common.”

  I dropped the general and felt around for the light switch.

  Rain continued to pound against the windows.

  With the lights on I quickly found the cat food, right where Norma had said it would be. I tried to make a fuss over General Pershing, but he was far more interested in his meal than in me. It was clear I would have to wait until he had finished eating to give him the attention Phoebe wanted him to have.

  I decided to go into the parlor and look at “Early Harvest.”

  I suppose that sounds kind of dumb. I mean, I’ve already told you how much I hated the thing. So why was I going back to look at it again? I don’t know. Maybe it was the same kind of thing that makes people stop to look at accidents—or watch the evening news, for that matter.

  I switched on the parlor light, then crossed to the fireplace. Resting my hands on the mantelpiece, I stared at the picture.

  A streak of lightning sizzled through the night.

  Thunder shook the house.

  I swallowed. As before, I could feel myself being drawn into the picture. The storm made it seem even more real than it had seemed the first time. In my head, the booming of the thunder became the roar of cannons. Once again the smell of smoke and blood seemed to fill my nostrils.

  I staggered forward and felt a branch lash against my face.

  Nearby a dying man cried out. He reached for me, begging me to save him. As I stepped closer, he moaned and closed his hand around my ankle.

  I screamed—and found myself back in Phoebe Watson’s parlor, trembling like a stretched rubber band that’s just been plucked. I closed my eyes and rubbed my hands over my face.

  Had I actually stepped into the painting?

  Was I somehow slipping into the past?

  Or was I just losing my mind?

  Before I could decide, I heard a new sound. Not the wind and the rain. Not the crash of thunder. Not the cat. Just a small voice, crying out somewhere above me.

  A human voice, a little girl, crying out in a house that was empty except for General Pershing and me.

  A shiver rippled through me. I had to get out of there!

  I started for the door and then stopped.

  “What are you so afraid of, Nine?” I whispered to myself. “You know who that voice belongs to. It’s just a little kid—a lonely little girl, crying in her bed.”

  All right—so it was a dead kid. She was still lonely.

  Even so, I doubt that I could have done what I did next, if not for my previous experiences with ghosts.

  Taking a deep breath, I headed for the stairs—and the waiting ghost.

  Again I found the light switch. I flicked it on, partly because I wanted the light and partly, I’ll confess, because I thought it might make the ghost disappear. However, the single dim light that appeared at the top of the stairs wasn’t apt to frighten away any spirit that wanted to be heard.

  Putting my right hand against the peeling wallpaper, I started up the stairs.

  “Daddy!” cried the voice. “Daddy, where are you?”

  A lump was starting to form in my throat. Not a scared lump; a sad lump. I took another step.

  Thunder shook the house.

  I continued to climb. At the top of the stairs, I turned right and headed for the tower room.

  The door was open.

  The shaft of light that stretched across the floor didn’t quite reach the big brass bed. It didn’t matte
r—pale and colorless as they are, ghosts seem to have some internal light of their own. I could see the little girl more clearly this time. She was huddled in the covers. She looked miserable and lonely.

  What could I do for her? I certainly couldn’t get her daddy. I didn’t even know for sure who he was.

  Besides, I had a feeling that whoever he might have been, he was long dead himself by now.

  Lightning sizzled and snapped through the air outside. During the long crash of thunder that followed, the light flickered and then went out.

  I stood in the darkness, not daring to move.

  I don’t think darkness makes any difference to ghosts. At least, the little girl in the bed didn’t seem to notice the change. As I watched, she got to her knees. Crawling to the foot of the bed, she grabbed the knob that topped one of the bedposts and tried to turn it.

  Nothing happened.

  After a while she lay back down and stared at the ceiling, tears rolling down her cheeks.

  I didn’t know what to do. I wished I had some sort of manual I could read, something that provided advice on dealing with different kinds of ghosts.

  While I stood, staring, the ghost slowly faded out of sight.

  I took a deep breath and sighed. My sense of relief didn’t last long; seconds later I heard something moving downstairs. At first I thought it was the cat. I wouldn’t even have minded if it was another ghost. But ghosts don’t stumble and curse.

  Someone else was in the house.

  For an instant I hoped it might be my father. But he wasn’t due for another twenty minutes, and we had agreed that he would honk for me when he got there. So he wouldn’t be in the house.

  But if it wasn’t him, then who was it?

  I held my breath. I could hear the intruder, whoever it was, walking along the downstairs hall.

  Then the footsteps started up the stairway.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Dumb Waiting

  I had to hide someplace. But the only thing left in the room was the ghost’s bed. I was more than willing to help the ghost who slept in it; I wasn’t sure I could bring myself to hide underneath it.

  Even so, I might have had to—if I hadn’t remembered the dumbwaiter.

  I slid across the floor without lifting my feet, then groped around on the dark wall, searching for the little door.

  The footsteps had reached the top of the stairs. There was a moment of silence. Then I saw the beam of a flashlight sweep up and down the hallway.

  Finally I found the dumbwaiter door. I fumbled with the latch. The door swung open. I paused to listen.

  Whoever was in the hall was coming toward the tower room.

  I had no choice. Climbing into the dumbwaiter, I scrunched up as small as I could. Then I used my fingertips to pull the door most of the way shut.

  The intruder stepped into the room. “Who’s there?” asked a gruff male voice. The flashlight beam swept across the walls. Holding my breath, I pulled the door the rest of the way shut. Then I pressed my head against my knees and hoped the pounding of my heart wouldn’t give me away.

  After a few moments I heard the man leave the room. I thought I was safe—until the dumbwaiter started to move.

  I choked back a cry of fright.

  If I was scared when the dumbwaiter started to move, I was even more so when it stopped. I mean, how would you like to be trapped in a box in a wall in a haunted house in the middle of a storm while a prowler roamed the halls looking for you?

  It was not, shall we say, the best moment of my life. In fact, I was pretty much convinced I was going to die.

  Having met a few ghosts, I’m not as scared of dying as some people I know. After all, I have pretty good evidence that dying isn’t the end of everything. On the other hand, I still have things I want to do in this lifetime. So as far as I’m concerned, I am much too young to take the Big Dirt Nap.

  I began to wonder just how long my air was going to last. After a few seconds I decided that given the construction of the shaft, air could probably get to me.

  Food and water, on the other hand, could not.

  What did that mean?

  I wasn’t sure. After all, it’s not easy to work things through when your brain is screaming, “JUST GET ME OUTTA HERE!”

  Suddenly I became aware that my first problem wasn’t going to be air or water. It was going to be cramps. My body was realizing it had not been designed to be stuffed into a tiny box. My legs started to complain, and I had a pretty good idea that the feeling was going to get worse, fast.

  Suddenly the thing I wanted most in the whole world was to be able to stretch.

  I began to wonder if you could die from muscle spasms.

  Think! I commanded myself. And not about dying, stupid. All right—what else was going to happen?

  Well, my father would be there in a while. He would park outside. He would honk. When I didn’t come out, he would come to the door. It would be locked. He would yell. No one would answer. He might go around back. The door was unlocked, so he would come in. So far, so good—except there was someone else in the house.

  A horrible thought hit me. What if the intruder was carrying a gun?

  I swallowed hard. This was like planning a chess game: You make a move, which causes your opponent to make a move. Now you’ve got choices—and each choice creates more possibilities. All of a sudden your brain is frying. For example, would Dad’s arrival scare away the intruder—or would it get him shot?

  I had to get out of there!

  Finally I did the only thing I could think of, which was to jump. That may sound silly—I mean, you can’t really jump when you’re scrunched up inside a little box. The movement I made was more like a heavy-duty twitch—up, then down.

  To make things trickier, I was trying to do it without making any noise. On my fifth bounce the dumbwaiter started to move. Unfortunately, the movement lasted less than second. I think I managed to go about an inch and a half.

  Well, it was a start.

  I bounced again.

  Another inch.

  A bounce, an inch, a bounce, an inch, a bounce—and suddenly the dumbwaiter broke loose, and I went plunging down the inside of the wall.

  I buried my scream against my knees—which were still only about a quarter of an inch from my face.

  I don’t know what my fall sounded like from the outside, but from where I was, the noise was appalling.

  I was terrified. But my fear didn’t last long; it took only a few seconds for me to hit bottom.

  I landed with a thump that made me bite my tongue. I could taste blood. Suddenly I heard a slithering noise above me—the broken rope coiling down on top of the dumbwaiter.

  I hesitated. Should I get out and make a run for it? Or stay here and hope the intruder wouldn’t be able to figure out where the noise had come from?

  If I was lucky, I might even have scared whoever it was away. On the other hand, if the intruder did decide to investigate, I’d rather be out of the dumbwaiter than in it. I didn’t like the image that flashed through my head of someone throwing open the door and shining a light in my face.

  I liked even less the thought of what might happen next.

  I pushed on the door—softly, with the hope that it wouldn’t make any noise.

  To my relief, it swung open without a sound.

  I figured I was in the kitchen—that was the only place it made sense for the dumbwaiter to have landed. So the odds were good that I could find plenty of places to hide if my unknown friend decided to show up. Even better, maybe I could get to the door and get out.

  Taking a deep breath, I stretched my right leg down to the floor. No sooner had I found solid footing than General Pershing decided to rub against my ankle. I thought I was going to have a heart attack right then.

  Trying not to step on the cat’s tail, I finally got both feet on the floor. My legs began to wake up, which meant that I had a pincushion attack. I ignored it and tried to figure out exactly where I
was. The power was still out, but a flash of lightning showed me the door. Thank goodness!

  Working slowly, trying to be silent, I groped my way across the floor. It was a little early for my father to be there. But I figured it was better to wait outside and get drenched than to wait inside and get killed.

  As I was feeling around for the doorknob, I heard a new sound. It was very soft, so low that I wouldn’t have heard it had there not been a momentary lull in the storm.

  It was the sound of someone singing.

  Only this didn’t come from upstairs—I was too far away for that. It came from the cellar.

  “‘Over there,’” sang the voice. “‘Over there. We’ll be over, we’re going over, and we won’t come back till—’”

  A new burst of rain drowned out the rest of the sound. Even though the words were muffled, the voice seemed oddly familiar.

  What was going on here?

  I wasn’t sure I wanted to know. Finding the doorknob, I turned it softly and then stepped out into the rain.

  I thought the excitement was finally over—until I looked up and saw the ghost of Cornelius Fletcher floating in front of me.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  In the Gazebo

  Fletcher’s ghost was sort of standing in the rain. I say “sort of” for two reasons.

  First, I’m not sure he was really in the rain. Water was pouring down all around him, but he didn’t look a bit wet. Of course, maybe ghosts don’t get wet. What I really wondered about was the rain that was landing on him. I didn’t see it going through his misty form, but I didn’t see it running off either. I have no idea where it was going.

  The second reason I say “sort of” is that I’m not sure he was really standing. The image of the ghost was clear from the top of its head to its waist. Below that it began to fade. From the knees down you could barely see him at all.

  It was those misty, almost-gone legs, eerie reminders of a distant tragedy, that convinced me this was the ghost of Cornelius Fletcher.

  His lean face was filled with despair; his large, dark eyes looked like holes into another world. His hair was long, but I couldn’t tell what color it had been. He had a straight nose and a square, outthrust jaw. He was a good-looking man, or would have been, if not for the sorrow and anger that twisted his features.