A Haunting Collection

by Mary Downing Hahn

  After Ms. Trent left, I sat on the deck, watching for Dad’s car. It was almost five thirty. The sky had clouded over, promising rain once more, and daylight was already fading. Inside, Dulcie was preparing a special seafood dinner, and Emma was playing with the paper dolls I’d made.

  Dulcie came to the window and looked at me. “It’s about to rain,” she called. “Aren’t you cold?”

  I shook my head. “It’s nice out here.”

  Dulcie shrugged. “Suit yourself.”

  As she turned away, I heard a car coming toward the house. I jumped up and ran to meet my parents as if we’d been apart for years instead of weeks. I hugged Dad tight and then threw my arms around Mom. She cried, wetting my face with tears, and turned to Dulcie.

  “I never thought I’d see this place again.” Mom looked around, her face worried. “It’s just as I remembered. Nothing’s changed.”

  “Except us,” Dulcie threw her arms around Mom. “It’s good to see you, Claire.”

  As she hugged Dad, I glanced at the oak tree. Sissy watched from the shadows, her pale face expressionless.

  Emma saw her, too. I grabbed her arm to stop her from running to meet her, but I needn’t have bothered. Sissy was already gone.

  “Why did she run away?” Emma whispered. “Is she still mad?”

  “It’s got nothing to do with you and me,” I told her. “Sissy wants to see our mothers. But she doesn’t want them to see her.”

  Taking her hand, I led my cousin into the house. For once, she didn’t argue.

  While the adults chatted, Emma and I set the table for dinner. No one mentioned Teresa Abbott—not then and not during dinner. Emma and I talked about swimming and drawing and Webster’s Cove. We complained about the rain and the fog and the mosquitoes, and my parents complained about the heat and humidity at home.

  Mom told me the kid next door had broken his ankle skateboarding. My friend Julie got a hideous permanent and was threatening to shave her head. Mrs. Burgess had named her new baby girl Meadow, of all things. We laughed and talked and enjoyed the flounder-and-scallops extravaganza that Dulcie had invented.

  After we’d cleared the table and washed the dishes, Dad built a fire. Dulcie produced marshmallows for Emma and me to toast. It had begun to rain while we were eating, and it was coming down harder now. The wind had risen, too. Thunder boomed, and lightning flashed. Emma and I abandoned the marshmallows and curled up with our parents.

  “I hate storms,” Mom said.

  “I love them—the wilder and fiercer, the better!” Dulcie jumped to her feet and ran to a window to watch the lightning. I wondered if she were putting on an act for Mom, striking a pose, trying to convince us she was fearless. She didn’t fool me. I knew her too well now, maybe even better than Mom did.

  “Come away from the window,” Mom pleaded. “Lightning might strike you.”

  Dulcie laughed. “Don’t be silly, Claire. The chances of that are a billion to one.”

  Emma ran to her mother and tugged at her hand. “Sit on the couch with me, Mommy.”

  Suddenly, Dulcie gasped and backed away from the window.

  “What did you see?” Emma pressed her face to the glass. “Is it Sissy?”

  Dulcie ran her hands through her hair, tugging it back from her face. “Come away, Emma. No one’s there.”

  “Sissy,” Emma persisted. “Sissy’s out there.” She pressed her face against the glass and peered into the rain.

  Mom looked up from her magazine, her face anxious. “Was someone at the window?”

  “Of course not,” Dad said quickly. “Who’d be out in a storm like this?”

  I could have said, Someone who doesn’t mind being wet. But I didn’t.

  “Who was it?” Mom asked Dulcie. “Don’t lie. Tell me, tell me now!”

  Alarmed by her rising voice, Dad moved closer to her. “No one was there, Claire.”

  Mom ignored him. Her attention was fixed on her sister and the window behind her. “It was her, wasn’t it?”

  “Calm down, Claire,” Dad begged. “Breathe slowly, deeply. Relax. You’ll give yourself a headache if you get upset.”

  Dulcie stayed by the window, holding Emma tightly. “Do you really want to know?” she asked Mom. Her voice was calm, but her face was flushed, her eyes bright as if she had a fever.

  Dad looked from Dulcie to Mom and back to Dulcie. “What kind of game are you playing now?”

  “No game.” Dulcie smoothed Emma’s hair. “I grew out of games a long time ago.”

  Emma squirmed free of her mother and ran to Mom. “Don’t worry. Sissy won’t hurt you. She just wants to see what you look like now.”

  Mom shuddered and drew back. “Sissy?”

  “Teresa,” Dulcie said. “She’s been calling herself Sissy. The girls have seen her, played with her.” She hesitated a moment. “They even went out in the canoe with her.”

  Mom looked at me, pale and wide-eyed, like someone waking from a nightmare and finding it’s not a dream after all. “You saw Teresa? You got in a canoe with her?” Shaking with anger, she turned to her sister. “Oh, Dulcie, Dulcie, how could you let them do it? I knew you wouldn’t watch them. I knew it!”

  “If you’d been here instead of moping in Maryland, afraid of everything—”

  Emma spoke up loudly enough to get her mother’s attention. “Sissy showed us how Mommy threw Edith in the water.” To demonstrate, she made a throwing motion. “She wanted me to get Edith, but she fell in, too. I thought she was going to drown all over again. And then the canoe got upset and I was afraid me and Ali would drown.”

  Mom gasped and leaned against Dad’s side. For a second, I thought she was going to faint. “See what you’ve done?” she asked Dulcie. “You’ve brought it all back. Why couldn’t you have let things be?”

  “So you could have headaches all your life?” Dulcie asked bitterly.

  I squeezed onto the sofa beside Mom and clasped her hands in mine. “Don’t you see? Dulcie had to come here. She had to tell the truth so Sissy—Teresa—”

  “Don’t say her name.” Mom started crying. “I can’t bear to hear it.”

  “Sissy won’t hurt you, Aunt Claire.” Emma climbed into Mom’s lap and wrapped her arms around her. “She just wants you and Mommy to tell what really happened.”

  Dulcie gently pulled Emma away from Mom. “That’s enough, sweetie,” she said softly. “It’s time for bed.”

  Emma started to protest, but the look on her mother’s face silenced her. Meekly, she let Dulcie carry her out of the room.

  Dad looked at Mom as if he feared she was hallucinating. “What are you so upset about, Claire? You told me Teresa drowned years ago. How can she be here now?”

  Mom didn’t answer. She was watching the window as if she expected to see Sissy’s face.

  Turning to me, Dad said, “Can you please tell me what’s going on?”

  Before I could answer, Mom pressed her fingers to her temples and said, “I can’t stay here a minute longer, Pete. Please take Ali and me to Webster’s Cove. Find a motel, a bed-and-breakfast, whatever. I’ll sleep in the car if I have to—any place but this cottage.”

  Dad stared at her, shocked. “We can’t walk out on your sister. What will she think?”

  “My head aches so badly, I don’t care what anyone thinks, least of all Dulcie,” Mom said. “I’ll lose my mind if I don’t get out of here.”

  “I don’t understand,” Dad said. “What is it about this cottage? You’d think it was haunted or something—”

  “It is haunted,” I said. “Weren’t you listening to what we said?”

  “That’s crazy, absolutely crazy,” Dad said. “I thought you had more sense, Ali.” Giving me an annoyed look, he went to the door and peered into the darkness as if he expected to see a little girl outside—a real little girl who’d laugh and admit she’d played a trick on us. Of course, he saw no one.

  Shaking his head, he sat down beside Mom again. “It’s a hoax,” he
said. “Someone with a grudge is behind the whole thing. Maybe Teresa has relatives who blame Dulcie and you for what happened. They could have a daughter who looks like Teresa.” Dad sounded as pleased as if he had solved a tricky math problem. “They got her to pretend to be Teresa’s ghost.”

  I looked at my father and almost pitied him—reasonable Dad, the man who depended on logic and common sense. There was no room in his world for the supernatural. No matter how much proof I gave him, he’d never believe me.

  “Please,” Mom said. “Let’s leave, right now, before—”

  “Before what?” Dulcie watched us from the shadowy hall. “Before Teresa drags us into the lake and drowns us? Is that what you’re scared of?”

  Mom got to her feet and faced Dulcie, her fists clenched as if she wanted to punch her sister. “I won’t stay here another second!”

  Dad put his arm around her. “Claire,” he said softly, “it’s after ten. We’d never find a room at this hour. And, as much as I love you, I’m not going to sleep in the car.”

  “Pete’s right,” Dulcie said. “There aren’t many motels, and you can bet they’re all filled by now. Why don’t I make up the sofa bed?”

  Dad yawned. “One night, Claire. We’ll go home tomorrow.”

  Mom turned to Dad, suddenly tearful. “I want to leave, but I’m so tired, I ache all over.” Her eyes strayed to the window and the darkness pressing against it.

  “How about a glass of warm milk with honey?” Dad asked. “That always helps you relax.”

  “Can we keep the light on all night?” Mom asked.

  Dulcie laughed. “You sound just like Emma.”

  I braced myself for another quarrel, but before Mom could object, Dulcie added, “I might keep my light on, too.”

  After I kissed Mom and Dad good night, I gave Dulcie an extra-big hug for admitting she was scared. Maybe there was hope for her and Mom after all.

  I climbed the stairs wearily, hoping to fall into bed and sleep till noon, but I should have known better. As usual, Sissy was waiting for me.

  21

  “I saw you bury that bird today,” Sissy said. “It had a nice funeral. You sang a song and said the right words. All that fuss for a bird.”

  “Emma saw a cat kill it. She wanted to—”

  “A bird shouldn’t get better treatment than a person,” Sissy said. “Or am I wrong about that?”

  “I know what you’re thinking,” I said, “but you have a memorial in the cemetery. There must have been a funeral and flowers and the right words and lots of people crying,”

  “But I’m not buried there, am I?” She held Edith a little tighter. “So none of it counts.”

  “But nobody knows where you are. Ms. Trent told me people searched the lake, the police sent down divers, they did all they could to find you, but—”

  “They didn’t try hard enough,” Sissy interrupted. “Or I’d be buried in the cemetery instead of—” She broke off with a shudder and went to the window. “Do you think I like being out there?”

  I joined her at the window and peered at the lake, barely visible in the rain and darkness. “If you tell me where you are, the police could get you.”

  “I tried to show you,” Sissy said, “but you were scared to come and look. Remember?”

  “I thought you were going to push me off the cliff.”

  Sissy laughed. “I just wanted to show you where I am. Deep down in the cold dark water, under three big rocks. All alone except for Edith . . . and the fish.”

  “That’s where you are?” My voice dropped to a whisper, and my skin prickled with goose bumps. It was almost as if I’d just realized I was actually talking to a girl who’d been dead longer than I’d been alive.

  “Why would I lie about it?” Sissy shoved her angry face close to mine. “I’m sick of being there. I want to be buried in the graveyard where the angel is. Is that too much to ask?”

  I drew away from the stale smell of the lake that clung to her. “Of course it’s not too much,” I stammered. “You should be there, it’s where you belong.”

  “If the truth is told and I’m buried properly, if the right words are said over me and people bring flowers and someone cries, then I won’t trouble anyone again.”

  Although it scared me to touch her, I put my arm around her shoulders. She felt solid but cold through and through, and I wished I could warm her somehow.

  “Kathie Trent’s gotten so old,” Sissy said sadly. “Dulcie and Claire, too. I guess Linda must look different. But not me. I’m just the same. I’ll never grow up. Or get old.”

  The sorrow in her voice hurt me. If only I could make it up to her, give her the life she should have had. But there was no way to undo what had happened that day on the lake. Thirty years ago, Sissy had lost her life, her future, and everything that might have been hers.

  “Do you think I would’ve been as pretty as Linda?” Sissy asked. “Would I have gotten married like her, would I have had kids?”

  It was hard to answer without crying. “I bet you would have been even prettier than Linda,” I told her. “And you would’ve gotten married and had kids, and all that stuff.”

  Sissy pulled away, suddenly angry. “Don’t you dare feel sorry for me! Just make sure all the things I said should happen do happen.”

  Leaving her words hanging in the air, she vanished, and I was alone at the window. The rain fell softly, the wind blew in the pines, the lake murmured—gloomy sounds, all of them. Sissy was right. What happened to her wasn’t fair. It was sad and awful and it hurt my heart.

  The next morning, I tiptoed through the living room. Dad snored on the sofa bed, and Mom slept beside him, curled close. Dulcie was in the kitchen, drinking coffee and staring at nothing.

  I poured myself a glass of orange juice and sat down across from her. “Telling what happened isn’t enough,” I whispered. “She wants a proper burial.”

  Dulcie stared at me over the rim of her mug. “How can we do that? Her body was never found.”

  “She told me where it is.”

  Dulcie closed her eyes for a moment. Taking a deep breath, she said, “How will you explain that to the police? A ghost told you? I can imagine their reaction.”

  “I’ll say I had a dream, I’m psychic, I’m—”

  “Will this nightmare never end?” Dulcie lowered her head.

  I leaned across the table to make my aunt look at me. “Sissy must be buried. The right words must be spoken. There must be flowers and somebody crying. She saw us do that for the bird. Doesn’t she deserve the same thing?”

  “Are you talking about Teresa?” Mom stood in the doorway behind me, her hair tangled from sleep.

  Dulcie sighed. “Apparently, Teresa told Ali where her body is. She’s demanding a proper burial.”

  I twisted around in my chair to face Mom. “She just wants peace, Mom. Is that too much to ask?”

  “I dreamt about Teresa last night.” Mom stood beside me and stroked my hair back from my face, her touch soft and tender, her voice calm. “She begged me to help her pass from this world to the next.”

  Dulcie jumped up and began pacing around the kitchen. If she’d been a tiger, her tail would have lashed furiously. “She came to me, too,” she muttered. “With the same request. Usually, I don’t put stock in that sort of nonsense—dreams, ghosts, things left undone, but . . .” She shrugged, and her shoulder blades shifted under her thin T-shirt. “Well, no matter. l agree that Teresa needs to be laid to rest, but how do we explain knowing where her body is? People will think we’ve known all along.”

  Dulcie’s voice rose as she spoke. “Someone will say I shoved Teresa out of the canoe and left her to drown. Next thing you know, I’ll be hauled off to jail.”

  “I was there, too,” Mom said. “What we did was stupid, wrong, horrible, but you didn’t push Teresa into the lake. You didn’t mean for her to drown.”

  Dulcie sat back down and rested her head in her hands.

  “Do you w
ant more coffee?” I asked.

  She surprised me by shaking her head. “All I want is to go to sleep and wake up and find out I dreamt the whole thing. It’s what I’ve wished for all my life—it was a dream, it didn’t really happen. But I just go on dreaming. I never wake up.”

  “I’ll tell the reporter Teresa told me where her body is,” I said. “I’ll say I saw her ghost.”

  “Maybe—” Dulcie began, but she was interrupted by the arrival of a beat-up red sedan. A short man draped with cameras opened the car door and headed toward the cottage. He wore his gray hair in a scraggly ponytail, his jeans drooped below his belly, and his black T-shirt had an old rock star’s picture on it. Mick Jagger, I thought. Or was it one of the Beatles—John, maybe?

  “The photographer,” Dulcie muttered. “He’s early.”

  Mom ran to wake Dad, Dulcie hurried to greet the photographer, and Emma slid into a chair across the table from me. “Did you see Sissy last night?” she asked me.

  “She came to my room.”

  “She came to my room, too.” Emma paused and picked at a scab on her knee. In a low voice, she said, “She told me where her bones are.”

  “She told me the same thing.”

  Emma went on picking at the scab. Sunlight slanted through the window behind her and backlit her hair. “She wants to be buried. Like the bird.”

  “I know.” Outside I saw the photographer taking pictures of the cottage. He posed Dulcie, tall and thin in a pair of paint-spattered denim overalls, head tilted, hair curling out of its topknot. She didn’t smile. Her face was serious, contemplative, as if she were acting the part of the repentant adult.

  Emma raised her head and looked at me. “If Sissy gets buried, will we ever see her again?”

  I reached across the table and patted her hand. “Sissy’s here because she wasn’t buried. When everything’s done properly and people know what happened, she’ll be at rest.”