by R. L. Stine
Was it Harrison Sadler? Or was Harrison telling us the truth? Were our three friends the ghosts?
My sister is really crazy, I thought, shaking my head. She risked our lives because she had to solve the mystery.
“Let us go,” Sam told the old man, breaking into my thoughts. “Let us go, and we won’t tell anyone we saw the ghost.”
The torchlight dipped low as a strong gust of wind invaded the cave. Harrison’s eyes seemed to grow darker. “I’ve waited too long to get you here,” he said quietly.
Louisa suddenly reached out to Terri. “Help us!” she cried. “You believe us—don’t you?”
“You know we’re alive, not ghosts,” Sam said to me. “Help us get away from him. He’s evil, Jerry. We’ve seen his evil our whole lives.”
I turned from Harrison to the three kids.
Who was telling the truth? Who was alive? And who had been dead for over three hundred years?
Harrison’s face hovered darkly in the dipping, waving torchlight. He pushed his long, stringy hair off his forehead with his free hand. And then he startled us all by puckering his dry lips and letting out a long, high-pitched whistle.
My heart skipped a beat. I gasped. What was he doing? Why was he making that shrill sound?
He stopped. Then whistled again.
I heard the scraping of footsteps, rapid footsteps on the stone cave floor.
And then a low, dark figure came loping toward us out of the darkness.
26
A monster! I thought.
A ghost monster.
It uttered low, menacing growls as it neared. Its head bobbed low, and two red eyes flared as the creature bounded into the light of the flaming torch.
“Oh!” I cried out as I saw that it was a dog. A long, lean German shepherd.
The dog stopped a few feet in front of us. When it saw Harrison, it bared its teeth. Its growl became a ferocious snarl.
Dogs can recognize ghosts, I remembered.
Dogs can recognize ghosts.
The dog’s red eyes caught the light of the torch as it turned to Louisa and her two brothers.
It reared back on its hind legs—and began to howl and bark.
“They’re the ghosts!” Harrison Sadler cried triumphantly to Terri and me, pointing.
Snarling, the big dog leaped at Sam.
With a cry of fright, Sam raised both arms to shield himself.
The three kids edged deeper into the cave.
The dog barked fiercely, baring its jagged teeth.
“You—you really are ghosts?” I cried out.
Louisa let out a pained sigh. “We never had a chance to live!” she cried. “The first winter—it was so horrible!” Tears rolled down her cheeks. I saw that Nat was crying, too.
The dog continued to snarl and rage. The three kids backed farther into the dark chamber.
“We sailed here with our parents to start a new life,” Sam explained in a trembling voice. “But we all died in the cold. It wasn’t fair! It just wasn’t fair!”
The rain started up again. The wind blew sheets of water into the cave entrance. The torch flame dipped and nearly blew out.
“We never had a life at all!” Louisa cried.
Thunder roared. The cave seemed to shake. The dog growled and snarled.
And as I stared at the three kids in the wavering light, they began to change.
Their hair dropped off first. It fell in clumps to the cave floor.
And then their skin peeled away, curling up and falling off—until three grinning skulls stared at Terri and me through empty eye sockets.
“Come stay with us, cousins!” Louisa’s skull whispered. Her bony fingers reached out toward us.
“Join usssss!” Sam hissed. His fleshless jaw slid up and down. “We dug such nice graves for you. So close to ours.”
“Play with me,” Nat’s skull pleaded. “Stay and play with me. I don’t want you to go. Ever!”
The three ghosts moved toward us, their skeleton hands outstretched, reaching, reaching for Terri and me.
I gasped and stumbled back.
I saw a frightened Harrison stagger back, too.
And then the torch blew out.
27
The torchlight flickered and died.
The heavy darkness made me gasp.
I could feel bodies moving, scraping over the wet stone cave floor.
I could hear the whispered pleas of the three ghosts.
Closer. Closer.
And then a cold hand gripped mine.
I screamed before I heard her whispered voice: “Jerry—run!”
Terri!
Before I could catch my breath, my sister was pulling me through the darkness.
Into the rain. Onto the slippery rock ledge.
“Run! Run!” Terri cried, her eyes wild, her cold hand still gripping mine.
“Run! Run!”
The word became a desperate chant.
“Run! Run!”
But as we struggled to lower ourselves down the rocks, the roar of thunder drowned out Terri’s shouts.
The ground shook.
My legs nearly slid out from under me.
I cried out when I realized the roar in my ears wasn’t thunder.
Half-blinded by the rain, Terri and I spun around in time to see the rocks topple from the top of the cave.
The rain and wind must have loosened them. And now the big boulders rumbled down, cracking, knocking against each other, bumping, and rolling.
Rock after rock, thudding onto the stone ledge.
Until the dark cave mouth was completely covered.
Shielding my eyes from the rain with both hands, I peered up at the cave, and waited.
Waited to see if anyone would come out.
But no one did.
No ghostly kids.
No old man.
Harrison Sadler had given his life to capture the ghosts.
The cave glimmered white in a flash of lightning.
Now it was my turn to pull Terri away. “Let’s go,” I pleaded.
But she didn’t budge. She stood staring through the rain at the closed-up cave.
“Terri—please. Let’s go. It’s over,” I said, tugging her away. “The mystery is solved. The terror—it’s all over.”
28
A few minutes later, Agatha threw open the front door of the cottage and rushed out to greet us. “Where were you? Brad and I were worried sick!”
She ushered us in, fussing over us, shaking her head, talking excitedly, glad we were back safe and sound.
Terri and I got dried off and into clean clothes.
The rain had stopped by the time we joined Brad and Agatha in the kitchen for steaming mugs of hot cider. Outside the kitchen window, the wind still blew the trees, sending water cascading down from the leaves.
“Now tell us what happened to you,” Brad said. “Agatha and I really were terribly upset that you were out in this storm.”
“It’s kind of a long story,” I told them, warming my hands on the hot cider mug. “I don’t know where to start.”
“Start at the beginning,” Brad said quietly. “That’s usually the best place.”
Terri and I did our best to tell them the whole story of the three ghostly kids, the old man, and the frightening cave. As we talked, I could see their expressions changing.
I could see how worried they were for Terri and me. And I could see how unhappy they were that we had ignored their wishes and ventured into the cave.
When I finished the story, the room grew quiet. Brad stared out the window at the dripping rainwater on the glass. Agatha cleared her throat, but didn’t speak.
“We’re really sorry,” Terri said, breaking the silence. “I hope you’re not angry at us.”
“The important thing is that you’re both safe and sound,” Agatha replied.
She stood up, stepped over to Terri, and gave her a warm hug.
Agatha started toward me, her arms outstr
etched—when a sound outside made her stop.
Barking. Loud dog barking.
Terri lunged for the back door and pulled it open. “Jerry—look!” she cried. “It’s Harrison Sadler’s dog. He got out of the cave. He must have followed us here.”
I moved to the open doorway. The dog had been drenched in the rain. Its wet gray fur was matted to its back.
Terri and I reached out to pet the dog.
But to our surprise, it reared back and growled.
“Easy, boy,” I said. “You must be really frightened, huh?”
The dog snarled at me and started to bark.
Terri bent down and tried to soothe the animal. But it backed away from her, barking ferociously.
“Whoa!” I cried. “I’m your friend—remember? I’m no ghost!”
Terri turned to me, her expression puzzled. “You’re right. We’re not ghosts. Why is it carrying on like that?”
I shrugged. “Whoa. Easy, boy. Easy.”
The dog ignored my pleas, barking and howling.
I turned back to see Brad and Agatha huddled against the kitchen wall, their faces tight with fear.
“That’s only Brad and Agatha,” I told the dog. “They’re nice people. They won’t hurt you.”
And then I swallowed hard. My heart began to throb.
I realized why the dog was barking like that. He was barking at Brad and Agatha.
Agatha stepped into the doorway, shaking her finger at the snarling animal. “Bad dog!” she cried. “Bad dog! Now you’ve given away our secret, too!”
Terri gasped. She realized what Agatha was saying.
Agatha slammed the kitchen door hard and turned back to Brad. “What a pity that dog had to show up,” she said, shaking her head fretfully. “Now what do we do with these two kids, Brad? What do we do with the kids?”
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