The ghost wasn’t cackling that crazy laughter anymore. He was hogtied to that tombstone like a calf at a rodeo.
Tom motioned for me to follow him as he ran down the trail toward Corry Street. I sure didn’t need any encouragement.
I guess the ghost was so surprised he couldn’t think of anything to say until then.
“Come back and let me go!” I heard him shouting. “I won’t hurt you!”
Tom and I didn’t stop until we reached Whiskey Row. “I got him tied so he can’t get away,” he said puffing. “You go get Papa and Uncle Mark. I’ll wait here.”
I tried to speak but couldn’t for a moment. I was so chilled with fright I felt as if I was in a bathtub filled with ice.
“I thought you were going to interview the ghost,” I finally managed to say and my voice sounded as if it was far away.
“I decided to let Papa do that if it is a real ghost,” Tom said. “Now go get him and Uncle Mark.”
I didn’t stop running until I flung open the front door of our house and entered the parlor, where Papa, Mamma, and Aunt Bertha were sitting. They all stood up at the same time and stared at me as if I’d popped right up out of the floor.
“What are you doing out of bed?” Mamma demanded.
Papa looked at the dirt and cockleburs sticking to my Levi britches and shirt. “And where in the name of Jupiter have you been?” he asked.
I tried to talk but couldn’t because my breath was like fire coming out of my lungs.
Papa began to pound me on the back to try and help me catch my breath. Mamma ran into the kitchen and came back with a glass of water. With Papa pounding my back and Mamma getting some water down my throat, at last I could talk.
“T.D. has captured the ghost of Silverlode!” I cried. “He has the ghost tied to a tombstone in Boot Hill and wants you to come interview it, and bring Uncle Mark!”
Papa looked at me as if I was a ghost. He stood there stunned. Then he held out his hands in a pleading gesture toward Mamma. “Why, oh, why did you have to give birth to a son who hasn’t given us a moment’s peace since the day he was born?”
Mamma ignored the question and acted quickly, as she always did in a crisis. She went to the telephone and called the Allies Saloon. Uncle Mark wasn’t there so she called the other saloon and got him on the phone. She told him to come at once and to bring a couple of horses.
Papa and I were waiting at our front gate when Uncle Mark rode up riding a strange horse and leading another one.
“Tena said it was urgent,” he said. “I borrowed these horses from a couple of cowboys. What is this all about?”
“You will never believe it,” Papa said as he mounted the extra horse. Uncle Mark held out his hand and lifted me up behind him.
“T.D. has got the ghost of Silverlode tied to a tombstone in Boot Hill,” I shouted at Uncle Mark. “Let’s hurry before the ghost gets loose.”
Uncle Mark didn’t waste any more words. We galloped off toward Silverlode.
Tom was waiting at the corner of Whiskey Row and Corry Street for us.
“Did the ghost get away?” I asked as I slipped off the rump of the horse.
“No,” Tom said. “I walked up the trail just a minute or so ago and he is still tied to the tombstone.”
Papa and Uncle Mark dismounted, with Papa glaring at Tom. “I’ll deal with you later,” Papa said.
“My great brain did it,” Tom said proudly. “If it is a real ghost, you can interview it and that will make you a famous journalist.” Then Tom shook his head. “But my great brain keeps telling me there is no such thing as a ghost. That is why I sent for you and Uncle Mark, so you could lock up in jail whoever it is that has been scaring kids and grownups with this ghost business.”
Then we walked to the end of Corry Street and started up the trail to Boot Hill.
“I wonder who the poor fool is,” Uncle Mark said and surprised me by laughing. “It would serve him right if we left him there until morning.”
“It is the ghost of Mr. Tinker,” I said. “He came up from the grave just like he did last night.”
“Last night?” Papa asked. “It gets worse and worse.”
We came to the end of the trail to where we could plainly see the ghost tied to the tombstone.
“I assure you, John,” Uncle Mark said, “that it isn’t the ghost of Mr. Tinker.”
The ghost must have heard us. “Whoever you are get me out of this,” he shouted.
Uncle Mark began to laugh softly as we walked to the tombstone. He was still laughing as he untied the lariat.
“Let’s see what we’ve got here,” Uncle Mark said as he lifted the sheet off the ghost. “As I live and breathe if it isn’t Steve Smith, the old ghost-story teller himself, caught in his own trap.”
And sure enough, there was Seth’s uncle looking as if he wished he really was a ghost and could disappear.
“I was only trying to help,” he said. Then he got angry. “You were one of those who encouraged this ghost of Silverlode business.”
“Guilty,” Uncle Mark said. “But I only did it to make sure the kids in town don’t dare come here and end up like the Knudson and Bartell boy. I didn’t come here and run around this cemetery with a sheet on.”
“I had to do it,” Steve Smith said. “Yesterday my nephew told me that he and some other boys were coming here after curfew last night. I figured I’d give them such a scare that he would never come here again. Well, I did give all those kids such a scare last night by pretending to be a ghost I didn’t think any of them would ever dare set foot in this ghost town again.”
“That is understandable,” Uncle Mark said sympathetically.
“But when my nephew told me after supper tonight that one boy still wasn’t convinced there was a ghost, and they were coming here again tonight,” Steve Smith said, “I thought if I pretended to be the ghost of Silverlode one more time, it would convince even this boy there was a ghost.”
Then he looked at Papa as if he wanted to take a punch at my father. “But that son of yours wasn’t satisfied to see and hear a ghost two nights in a row. He had to capture a ghost.”
“I’m sorry, Mr. Smith,” Tom said, “but my great brain wouldn’t rest until I found out if there were really ghosts or not. If it was real, I wanted to interview it and find out all about ghosts so my father could print the story in the Advocate, and it would make him famous. And if the ghost was a fake, I wanted to prove to the other kids that there was no such thing as a ghost.”
“I’m glad I don’t live in Adenville,” Mr. Smith said. “When this story gets out, I doubt if I’ll ever even come here to visit my brother and his family again.”
“Nobody will ever know except us,” Uncle Mark said. “If the story got out, every kid in Adenville would start making this ghost town a playground, and that could lead to another tragedy.”
Then Uncle Mark put his hand on Tom’s shoulder. “You and John are going to tell a hair-raising tale of what happened here tonight. You are going to say when you tried to lasso the ghost, the lariat went right through him. You are going to say the ghost caught you both and threatened to take you back into his grave with him if you ever set foot in Silverlode again.”
“But that would be lying, Uncle Mark,” Tom said. “And besides, I’d have to admit my great brain was wrong, and there really are ghosts.”
Papa had been standing with his cheeks so blown up I thought he’d take off like a balloon.
“You and J.D. will do exactly as your Uncle Mark says,” Papa said. “This ghost town must be strictly off limits to every boy in Adenville. Now give me your word as a Fitzgerald that you both will do as your uncle has suggested.”
Tom sure looked disappointed. “All right, Papa,” he said. “Word of honor.”
“Me too,” I said.
Uncle Mark looked at Seth’s uncle. “I suppose you came on a horse,” he said.
“I hid it in back of the old Miners Hotel,” Steve Smith said. “And
thanks, Marshal, for keeping this story a secret.”
I rode behind Papa and Tom behind Uncle Mark until we stopped in front of our house. We slid off over the rumps of the horses. Papa dismounted and handed the reins of the horse to Uncle Mark. Then my uncle looked down at Tom.
“I will sort of hate seeing you leave for Salt Lake City in a couple of weeks,” he said. Then he rode down Main Street laughing as if he’d just told a very funny joke.
Mamma and Aunt Bertha began hugging Tom and making a fuss over him when we entered the parlor. I was as much a part of the adventure as my brother, but they just ignored me. Papa walked to his rocking chair and slumped down in it. He put his head between his hands and his head began swaying back and forth as if he had a terrible headache. Finally he looked up at Tom.
“I don’t know what I’m going to do with you,” he said.
“The boys are safe,” Mamma said, “and let us thank their guardian angels for that.”
“We have one son who is absolutely deaf in his left ear,” Papa said, as he pointed at Tom.
“What makes you say a silly thing like that?” Mamma asked.
“Every boy is born with a guardian angel on his left shoulder,” Papa said. “And that guardian angel whispers into the boy’s ear every time that boy does something wrong or even thinks about doing something wrong. That is why I say that T.D. is stone deaf in his left ear. He hasn’t heard one word his guardian angel whispered in his ear since the day he was born.”
Papa could sure exaggerate at times.
“I can’t help it,” Tom said, “that I was born with a great brain that has to know everything. I just had to find out if there was such a thing as a real ghost.”
“Then why in the name of Jupiter didn’t you just ask me?” Papa demanded.
“I did ask you a long time ago,” Tom said. “And you led me to believe there was a ghost of Silverlode.”
“I think he has you there, my dear,” Mamma said with that sort of half smile on her face she always got when teasing Papa.
“That is right!” Papa cried as if being persecuted. “Put all the blame on me. If we had woke up tomorrow morning and found our two sons missing and their bodies had never been found like the Knudson and Bartell boys, you would be the first to blame me for not telling them there was a ghost of Silverlode to scare them away from the place.”
Tom’s great brain must have been working like sixty to try and get us out of being punished. “If you’d told me the truth,” he said as if everything was Papa’s fault, “I’d have kept the secret from the other kids.”
“It is very late,” Mamma said, putting an end to the argument. “You boys go to bed. We will discuss it further in the morning.”
Papa stared at Tom as if saying a prayer. “And please stay in bed until morning,” he pleaded.
* * *
The next morning Papa kept us in suspense until we had finished eating breakfast and he was having a second cup of coffee.
“Your mother and I have talked things over,” he said. Then he looked straight at Tom. “You and S.D. will be leaving for the Academy in Salt Lake City in two weeks. We all want to be as close as a family should be during that time. There will be no punishment.”
Then Papa looked at Tom with an appealing look in his eyes like a hungry dog begging for a bone. “Do you think it possible, T.D., for you and your great brain to give your mother and me and the rest of this town a breathing spell for just two weeks?”
“I think so,” Tom said.
Papa lost his temper and slammed his fist down so hard on the table it shook the dishes on it. “I want you to do more than just think about it!” he said.
“All right, Papa, I promise,” Tom said.
* * *
Tom kept his word to Uncle Mark and Papa. He told such a hair-raising tale about the ghost of Silverlode that you couldn’t have got any kid in town to pass that sign on the road to Silverlode for all the gumdrops in the Z.C.M.I. store.
He also kept his word to Papa by giving his great brain a rest and doing everything he could to please Papa, Mamma, and Aunt Bertha. And, I guess, because his great brain was resting and not working in its usual style, he got very generous with me. He told me the day before he was to leave for Salt Lake City with Sweyn that he would let me use his bike for just ten cents a week.
“You can afford it, J.D.,” he said as we sat on our back porch making the deal. “I’ve talked to Papa, and he admits it is only fair to raise your allowance to twenty cents a week because you will be doing all the chores.”
It was the best deal I’d ever made with Tom and it gave me an idea. I wasn’t the smartest fellow around, but I’d been swindled so many times by the Great Brain that I knew all the angles. That was one advantage of being the victim of a swindle. It taught a fellow how to make other kids the victims. I knew plenty of kids in town who didn’t own a bike who would gladly pay me five cents a day to use Tom’s bicycle.
And why should a smart kid like me, who knew all the angles now, do my own chores? The Jensen family were very poor. I could get Frank or Allan to do all my chores for ten cents a week, which would leave me a neat profit of a dime a week. It would be me and not Tom sitting on the corral fence watching somebody else do the chores.
And look at all the things I’d learned from Tom about trading and swapping things. Enough of my brother’s great brain had rubbed off on me. There wasn’t anything any kid in town had that I couldn’t get. The thought didn’t bother my conscience a bit. Somebody had to take my brother’s place in Adenville, and it might as well be me. There wasn’t a doubt in my mind that I’d soon be the richest kid in town.
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