“A seance,” Pilot said uneasily.
“Like in the movies.”
“Yeah, but—”
“You said we needed monster-mashers, Flyboy.” Artie snickered. “Be careful what you wish for!”
Pilot bit his tongue and let the twins do their thing.
“There are several different methodologies,” Tweed said in a scholarly tone, “drawn from several different sources.”
Cheryl nodded decisively as she attempted to fold her legs into the Lotus position. “Oh sure. You’ve got your straight-up general haunted house flicks—for example, our own expertly curated double bill—or you can go the more specialized seance-centric route with titles like just plain old Seance! or Night of the Ghouls or Seance in Suite 777 …”
“The Trouble with Seances.” Tweed picked up the list. “Ghost Host, The Crystal Ball Comrade—a foreign film, obviously—Hey, Spooky! and Hey, Spooky! 2: Electric Spookaloo, Host a Ghost—”
“You already said Host a Ghost,” Feedback pointed out, coming in with the crystal ball.
“I already said Ghost Host,” Tweed corrected him.
“Oh.”
Feedback blinked and handed the crystal ball down to Cheryl. The thing was as big as a fishbowl—the kind that could comfortably house a good-sized school of guppies—and surprisingly heavy, and she grunted with the effort of not dropping it as she placed it carefully on the floor in front of her.
“My point is, there are many variations on the procedure. But I think we should go for the straight-up classic,” Tweed said with assurance. “Crystal ball, pad of paper for auto-writing in case any of us gets possessed, some questions, some answers, and hopefully nobody’s eyeballs explode.”
“Wait.” Artie blinked rapidly. “Is that an actual possibility?”
Tweed shrugged. “Maybe keep yours closed. You’re kind of susceptible to weird stuff like that.”
Cheryl examined the crystal ball closely. It was large and heavy … and hollow, with a hole in the bottom concealed by the elaborate brass stand on which it stood. It would have been easy for a sham mystic to pump a little dry ice fog in through that opening or shine a light up from a hole in the table on which it stood.
“Huh,” Cheryl said and showed Tweed what she’d found.
“I’m thinking maybe our Mr. H wasn’t quite as accomplished in the spectral arts as he professed to be,” Tweed said, her eyes narrowing.
The disembodied voice of Simon Omar, ex-mystic, sighed from where Tweed had instructed Cheryl to place him on the floor in the middle of their circle. “Can’t say as I blame the chap,” he said. “I’ll tell you, it wasn’t easy. You really had to be a special kind of nutcase to commune with the spirit plane.” His voice was instantly muffled when Cheryl suddenly plunked the oversized glass globe overtop of him like an astronaut’s helmet. “I was that nutcase!”
“Good for you!” Cheryl enthused. “Be that nutcase again!”
“Right!”
Tweed told Pilot to cut the overhead lights and asked Feedback to light some of the candles that stood on the dressing-room vanity. When he couldn’t find any matches, Feedback just shrugged and fired up the app on his phone that simulated a lighter flame and was useful for waving around at rock concerts during power ballads. Then, sitting in a circle on the floor, in the darkness and the silence, they waited.
“Okay …” Tweed whispered. “Any time now …”
“Psst.” Cheryl nudged Simon’s globe with her toe. “Make like a mystic.”
“Hmm? Oh! Right …” He hemmed. “Been a while. Let’s see if I can remember how to do this now … ah! I’ve got it. Hellooo … spirit plane?”
“Are you sure it wasn’t just a malfunctioning stage prop that blew him up?” Pilot asked.
“Shh!” Tweed shushed him.
“Er, knock knock …” The speaker tried again. “Anyone home?”
Silence.
“What’s going on?” Artie asked, his eyes still squeezed shut behind his glasses. “My eyeballs aren’t even tingling.”
“Shh!” Cheryl shushed him.
The twins knew these things took time sometimes. It wasn’t like just switching on a radio or—
Suddenly, they heard a sound like a switched-on radio coming from inside the crystal ball. A staticky sound, like the radio wasn’t quite tuned to a station. Crackling and hissing and then a weeeEEEOOoooOOWWwwee noise filled the dressing room, as if an invisible hand was turning a dial trying to find a clear transmission.
Simon giggled and said, “Hey! That tickles!”
“Shh!” Tweed hushed him. “Concentrate.”
The inside of the crystal ball began to glow crimson with the brightening light of the Spirit Stone and to fill with wispy, vaporous smoke. Simon cleared his throat— or, at least, made a sound like it—and stifled another giggle.
“I think I might be picking up something,” he said, and his voice warbled strangely.
The misty wisps snaked out through the surface of the globe and into the room, slithering in serpentine fashion through the dark air, warping into grotesque faces and twisty, trailing limbs. Feedback’s eyes were so wide Cheryl was afraid that, if anyone’s eyeballs were going to explode, they’d be his, not Artie’s. The digital flame on the screen of his phone suddenly began to flicker wildly. Then it burst into a purple fireball and snuffed out, just like a real candle in a gust of wind.
“I think we’ve definitely attracted the attention of the spirit realm …” Simon said nervously.
Even without the phone light, there was enough pulsing crimson illumination in the room, coming from the crystal ball and its occupant, to confirm that Simon’s assessment was a little on the conservative side. Attracted the spirit realm’s attention? More like, invited them to a fancy-dress party!
The twins and their friends watched in astonishment as the vaporous entities floating about the room suddenly went for the racks of clothes and began to tug at them. A couple of the lace and satin dresses slipped from the hangers and began to swirl and float about the room like a pair of dancers at a ball, graceful and terrifying at the same time.
“Former occupants of the house, I think,” Simon murmured. “Having a bit of fun …”
Unable to resist peeking at what was happening, Artie had popped open one eye in time to see an identical suit to the one he was wearing jerk from its hanger like a puppet on strings. It flapped about awkwardly as a head on a long skinny neck and gangly limbs poked out of the collar and cuffs. The head bore the beaky-nosed face of an old man who peered through beady, angry eyes at the excessive lengths of wrist and ankle he was showing.
“Who shrunk my suit?” he demanded in a warbly voice. It would have been pretty hilarious if it wasn’t quite so terrifying. Then he peered about the room. “Who are you gaggle of urchins?” he asked in an accusing screech. “What do ye here?”
“Uh … we … we’re …” Cheryl stammered, her heart in her throat as the ghost’s eyes blazed red.
“Art thou on my lawn?!” the creepy old ghost shrieked, clearly unhinged at the prospect. “Avaunt and quit my yard!”
His whole head was blazing now, like a jack-o’-lantern carved by an overly enthusiastic trick-or-treater, and the dancing dresses were gyrating and throwing their sleeves in the air in dismay.
The circle of friends sent up a collective wail of terror …
And POOF!
The suit and dresses dropped limply to the floor.
All was suddenly silent. And dim. Only a faint glow pulsed from Simon’s Spirit Stone inside the globe. There was the faint scratching of a pencil on paper and they all turned to see Artie scribbling away.
“Art-Bart?” Pilot asked warily. “Are you possessed?”
“What?” Artie blinked his one open eye and looked down at the notepad. “Oh. No. I doodle when I’m terrified. See?” He held it up. “Snoopy.”
Everyone breathed a sigh of relief, except Cheryl, who rounded on the crystal ball. “What didja do that fo
r?!” she demanded angrily. “Who in the heck was that old geezer?”
“Don’t ask me!” Simon protested. “I just opened the portal! I can’t control who comes through—”
“That was Granddad Hecklestone. He was a big old meanie.”
“Oh,” Cheryl said. “Well, that explains—GAH! Who said that?!”
They all turned toward where the whispery voice had come from, and there, standing—well, floating, really— in each of the dressing room’s three long mirrors, were the shades of the Hecklestone children fading into view: Daphne, Roderick and Edwina.
“I’ma gedoutta here,” Feedback squeaked. “Please?”
“Please …” echoed one of the shadows in a polite and very proper English accent. “Don’t leave us. We didn’t mean to frighten you …”
“Guh … g-guh …” Artie began to stammer. “Guh-g-guh …”
“Ghosts,” Pilot finished for him in a strained whisper. “Yeah. I think we’ve established that.”
“Holy moly,” Cheryl said.
“Cooool …” Tweed said. “Also, incredibly terrifying.”
“The Hecklestone kids, I presume?” Pilot said, and swallowed nervously.
The tallest apparition—a willowy young girl who looked to be about ten years old, with ringlets tied up in bows and a pretty lace dress with a high collar—nodded.
“You must be Daphne,” Pilot said cautiously and tipped his hat to her.
The girl curtsied prettily. “My siblings, Roderick and Edwina.”
Edwina, who looked to be about seven, floated off to the side of her mirror so that she peeked out shyly around the frame, her pinkie finger stuck in the side of her mouth. Roderick, who was dressed in yet another dapper little suit almost identical to Artie’s borrowed duds, gave a little gentlemanly bow. He was tall for his age whereas Artie was short for his, which had worked out nicely in Artie’s favour, tailoring-wise.
“What are you doing in there?” Artie asked.
“We’re grounded,” Roderick said with a sour pout.
“The house …” Edwina said in a shy whisper. “It’s very angry with us.”
“Your friend in the metal box was right,” Daphne explained. “After so many years of our father holding his seances and conducting his experiments, this house is more ectoplasm than brick and plaster!”
“Why’s it angry?” Tweed asked.
“Because we exploded it up!” Roderick exclaimed and floated in a twirl inside his mirror with his arms outstretched, making explosion noises.
Daphne rolled her ghostly eyes in the direction of her little brother’s mirror. “We didn’t mean to. But now it’s punishing us. It won’t let us go. It’s making us do things—mean things—to you.”
“Naughty house!” Edwina made a terribly fierce little scowl.
“We just want to be free,” Daphne said. “We want to leave.”
“Er … I don’t know if that’s exactly possible,” Simon muttered.
“Then maybe you could all stay!” Edwina said. “It has been fun having someone else to play with again.”
“Play with?!” Cheryl sputtered. “What the—you mean like when you threw a piano at us! I heard you little brats laughing. You coulda killed us, you know!”
“The house made us do it—I swear!” Daphne pleaded.
“It really did.” Roderick nodded. “But it was a spectacular crash! Even if it was only an illusion. We used to do things like that all the time with our governesses.” He grinned. “They never minded. Of course, most never seemed to last for very long …”
“Well, listen here!” Tweed said sternly. “We’re your babysitters—”
“Our what?” Edwina asked.
“Your … er … governators!” Cheryl clarified. “And there’ll be no more of that kind of behaviour tonight!”
Edwina pouted. “Boo.”
“That’s what all the ghosts say,” Tweed said.
“What happened the night the house went kablooie?” Feedback asked. “What caused the explosion?”
“That was all Roderick’s fault!” Edwina said, jamming her chubby fists on her ghostly hips and glaring at her departed brother.
“Was not!” Roderick said and reached out the side of his mirror, into Edwina’s, and yanked on one of her pale braids.
“Ow! Was too!”
The two ghostlings started a spectral slap fight that was pretty strange to watch, because their hands kept passing through each other.
“Hey,” Tweed said. “Hey!”
They turned to her.
“Now cut that out,” she admonished. “Like Cheryl said. We’re the sitters here and so you have to do what we say. Now. Tell us what happened.”
“Daddy was away—again—and Daphne and I were bored,” Edwina said.
“The latest governess had handed in her resignation— after a whole week this time,” Daphne explained, “and the domestic agency told us there was no one to replace her on short notice so we’d have to fend for ourselves that night. Imagine.”
“Imagine.” Artie snorted. “No one to torment!”
“Exactly!” Daphne exclaimed, as if it made perfect sense. “Such a bore. So Eddy and I thought, for a lark, that we’d try to contact Mumsy in the beyond.”
“Daddy was forever holding seances,” Edwina piped up. “And I always listened at the keyhole. So we knew how to go about it. But Roddy’s a silly old boy and didn’t want to play. He went off tinkering in the silly old basement instead.”
“Which was strictly not allowed!” Daphne shook a ghost finger at her little ghost brother but he just stuck his ghost tongue out at her. “Daddy kept all the dangerous toys in there locked up tight.”
“You found the trap door, didn’t you?” Tweed asked.
“Yup!” Roderick nodded brightly. “Daddy would use it to make ghosts appear sometimes when the seances he held weren’t going so well. Old magician’s trick.”
“Ha!” Simon barked a muffled laugh from inside his globe. “Told you so. Old Heck was a faker!”
“Only sometimes,” Daphne said. “But he had to keep up appearances so that all his tea-and-seance ladies would keep coming back.”
Cheryl shook her head at the mischief-makers. “So you two holed up in the study messing around with stuff you shouldn’t have—”
“How were we supposed to know it would actually work?” Edwina pouted.
“—and you went down into the lab and started messing around with stuff you shouldn’t have—”
Roderick shrugged innocently. “How was I supposed to know nitroglycerin was that explosive?”
“Right. And so your little chemistry experiment,” Cheryl continued, “and your inter-dimensional tea party combined to send this old house ka-booming right into the stratosphere.”
“Sadly.” Daphne nodded. “Then, as far as I can tell from what you’ve all been saying about those carnival shenanigans and such, you lot messed around with matters you shouldn’t have and look where we all are now!”
“Touché,” Cheryl admitted. It had, after all, been their rescue of Zahara-Safiya that had started the whole ball of mystical wax rolling.
“It’s a naughty house!” Edwina pouted and kicked the surface of her mirror. The image in the glass rippled outward from where she’d made contact.
“So what’s the deal with this whole house-sitter competition?” Feedback asked.
“Well, when the house rebuilt itself—with us poor shades trapped inside, subject to its awfully grumpy will—and we regained awareness of all that had happened, Roddy and Eddy and I became desperate,” Daphne explained. “We thought we’d try and possess some of the local townsfolk and try to escape.”
“You were gonna possess us?!” Tweed glared disapprovingly at the trio.
“Not you. Them. The two girls that left. And, well, you.” Daphne pointed at Feedback.
“Not cool!” Feedback exclaimed, going pale at the thought. “Not cool!”
“If you only wanted Cindy an
d Hazel and Karl”— Pilot frowned—“then why did you invite C and T, here?”
“We didn’t.” Daphne shrugged.
“Here we go again!” Cheryl threw her hands up in the air. “What the heck’s wrong with us? Is it this thirteen thing again? Is that it?”
“Well.” Daphne shrugged. “You are twelve.”
“ARRGH!” Cheryl’s pigtails bounced in her frustration.
“It’s only that, without a governess, if we managed to successfully possess someone, we’d have to fend for ourselves,” Daphne explained. “And thirteen is a more respectable age to be out and about in the world. We could get nice jobs.”
“Or go to the pubs!” Roderick clapped his hands.
“Er … maybe back in Victorian days you could,” Pilot said. “But not now. And I don’t think most of the jobs back then were very nice.”
“Well, it’s rather beside the point now.” Daphne sighed. “Those other girls turned out to be quite selfish and, while very competent at complaining and picking locks and eating sweeties, rather useless overall. Not at all capable of helping us out the way you lot seem to be. No imagination! That’s why we siphoned some of the ectoplasm out of the door lock and helped them escape when the house was distracted by you having a bash at the windows.”
“Told you,” Simon said.
“Well, I guess that explains that,” Tweed said, allowing herself a slightly satisfied grin. “What it doesn’t explain is why we got the invites anyway.”
“Er … Mrowr …” From beneath a hanging rack of frilly petticoats, the gargoyle Ramshackle made a slightly guilty noise.
“You did that, Shack?” Artie asked.
“Murmmle-rrorwrgg,” the gargoyle answered. “Mrowow.”
“Uh-huh …”
The gargoyle chirped and burbled away, Artie nodding as he listened.
“Uh-huh …”
“What’s he saying, Shrimpcake?” Cheryl asked impatiently.
Artie put up a finger and listened some more. “Uh-huh … right.” He turned to the others. “He said the Hecksters, here, sent him out to find three suitable possession candidates to lure to the house after dusk yesterday. He found Cindy and Hazel gossiping about sitter stuff in the park—something about the latest Binky Barker episode and how Hazel had managed to set her free—and figured they’d do for the girls. Then Feedback’s name came up and Shack thought he was good to go. He waited around, resting his damaged wing in a tree, until he could follow Cindy and Hazel home. And that’s when he heard them saying stuff about you two. After he delivered the invites, he kinda had second thoughts. Ramshackle thinks weirdness is an asset, y’see. So, he dropped off another invitation at the barn.”
The Haunting of Heck House Page 13
