The Haunting of Hounds Hollow

by Jeffrey Salane

  But Lucas wasn’t listening. His mind was on another clue they’d found inside the locked desk. “Hey, your mom runs the paper. Do you think she has copies of every issue ever printed?”

  “Knowing my mom, I bet she does,” said Lens. “Why?”

  “That article we found, it was about the fire that burned down this house. But it’s just the first page. There’s got to be more to the story!”

  Lens smiled. “That’s brilliant! Feel like taking a trip into town?”

  “Yeah, my mom could drive us,” said Lucas.

  “No,” said Lens. “You’ve got your bike, right?”

  “Sure,” Lucas said with a smile. “Let’s go for a ride.”

  Riding a bike next to a galloping horse was something Lucas never imagined he’d do, yet there he was, riding his bike next to Lens and his horse. The dirt road thundered and erupted in a cloud of dust next to him with every hoofbeat.

  “Bolt’s not an ironic horse name, huh?” Lucas hollered through his BMX bike helmet. His legs burned as he pedaled hard to keep up with Lens.

  “Nope!” Lens leaned in closer to Bolt and pulled ahead of Lucas.

  They traveled a back path that was hidden away from the main road. When they’d started riding, Lucas was worried that they might come across the beast again. But with trees crowding the way and roots pushing up through the dirt, Lucas spent most of the ride trying not to crash.

  Taking the path was a surprisingly faster way to town because it cut a straight line through the forest instead of following the winding, paved roads. Lens and Bolt were trotting down Main Street in no time. Lucas wobbled on his bike just behind them.

  Lens pulled up to the hitching post in front of the Dog Ear bookshop and slid off his horse. A car stopped alongside him and rolled down the passenger’s-side window. Gale from the local general store called out, “Deshaun Lindsay! What have I told you about riding that horse in town?”

  “Good morning, Ms. Gale,” said Lens as he tied Bolt up to the hitching post.

  “I will take this to the council again,” Gale threatened. “It’s not normal.”

  Lens exhaled deeply. “Neither is having hitching posts in front of your stores. I’ve told you, Bolt isn’t hurting anyone, and my mom is fine with the way I ride.”

  “Well, I’m not fine with it,” snapped Gale. “I’m not fine with it at all. And if you think you can ride your horse over to our end-of-summer barbecue, I’ll give you and your little friends the boot.”

  Lens smiled but didn’t look at the older woman. Instead he patted Bolt’s neck and the horse whinnied. “No horses at the barbecue, Ms. Gale. I hear you.”

  Lucas cruised to a stop with his thin breath wheezing through his helmet. The bike almost fell over as he was getting off, but Lucas held it upright. He reached instinctually for his inhaler, but decided to give it a second to see if he could catch his breath without the medicine.

  “What’s wrong with your friend?” Ms. Gale complained. “Is that the Trainer boy from Sweetwater Manor? Are you sick or something? Can’t barely stand up. Or have y’all been—”

  “He’s fine, Ms. Gale,” said Lens, who came to Lucas’s rescue and helped him get off the bike. “We’ll see you at the picnic.”

  “Without that horse!” Gale yelled as she drove away.

  Lucas leaned his bike against the post. As he steadied his breathing, he pulled off his helmet. “What was that all about?”

  “Oh, that’s just Ms. Gale,” explained Lens. “She likes life to be nice and orderly, which sounds awful and boring to me.”

  “Yeah,” Lucas said. “She was nice and kinda mean at the same time.”

  Lens snapped his fingers and pointed. “Yes! Exactly! That’s her style. Now come on in before she comes back.”

  In front of the store, Lucas noticed a corkboard filled with pictures of people. Some were having picnics with their family, some were at the lake, some were out hunting, and some looked like mug shots from the police. Lucas wasn’t sure why, but even though the pictures seemed normal, they made him feel nervous. “Did you take these?”

  “Nah.” Lens seemed uncomfortable. “These are the people who’ve gone missing from town. My mom thought that maybe if she posted pictures, someone might recognize them.”

  “Whoa,” said Lucas. “I didn’t know. That seems like a lot of people.”

  “Yeah” was all Lens said.

  In the photographs, most people were smiling. Suddenly a sense of dread fell over Lucas. These people lived in houses. They had families. They were alive once … and maybe they still were, but for their families, it was like they’d walked out of the picture frame and disappeared.

  Lens motioned for Lucas to follow him and pushed the front door open. A small bell chimed. “Mom, it’s me.”

  The Dog Ear was crowded with books. Handwritten notes hung under the shelves marking each section: poetry, history, fiction, literature, mystery, horror. Every stack of books had another stack of books directly behind it. Lucas felt at home instantly. The narrow aisles, the closeness of the room … it was like he was back in the city.

  Behind the counter in the back of the store, a woman was reading. Her short, braided hair bounced as she looked up and smiled. “Hi, Deshaun. Did I hear Gale’s motormouth running outside?”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Lens motioned behind him with a nod of his head. “But that’s not why we’re here.”

  “We?” asked Mrs. Lindsay. “Oh, you must be Lucas! Deshaun has told me all about you. I feel like we already know each other.”

  “Nice to meet you, too, Mrs. Lindsay,” said Lucas.

  “Mom, we need to look up some old issues of the Hounds Hollow Gazette,” said Lens. “Can you help?”

  “Of course,” she said. “What are you looking for?”

  After a brief pause, Lucas spoke up. “I’m hoping to find some history about Silas and our house.”

  “Well, then, you’ve come to the right place.” She pulled out a laptop computer and opened a search window. Her long fingers danced over the keyboard as she continued. “Everyone who knows me knows that I love history.”

  Mrs. Lindsay’s hands flashed in front of the screen like a magician as a program opened up. It read “Hounds Hollow Gazette Archive” across the top. “This was one of my favorite projects. I even worked with the local librarian to collect all of the past issues in one place. Do you know the date you’re looking for?”

  Lucas closed his eyes and tried to picture the folded, old paper in his mind. “August 12, but I don’t know the year.” His face fell. “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s fine!” she cheered. “I developed this to be foolproof.” Mrs. Lindsay typed in August 12 Silas Sweetwater.

  One entry flashed with that date on the screen. “Here you go, Lucas. You do the honors and I’ll leave you both to your research.” Then Lens’s mom walked to the front of the store and started shifting books in the rows so that the spines were all even and flush on the shelves.

  Lucas moved the cursor with the trackpad until it locked onto the link and clicked it. Almost instantly a digitized article appeared—the very same front page as the newspaper from the rolltop desk. The two friends read the article together.

  Fire at Sweetwater Manor

  On Friday, a fire destroyed Sweetwater Manor. The cause is unknown, but James and Martha Sweetwater survived the blaze along with their son Silas. Local residents could see the inferno for miles, and the blaze almost spread to the neighboring woods. Luckily the volunteer fire brigade was able to contain the damage, saving the town and the countryside from the threat of wildfires. If not for their dedicated work, the danger to Hounds Hollow would have been unimaginable. Unfortunately for the Sweetwater family, this fire wasn’t the first tragedy to strike, after

  Lucas scrolled down the page in search of the next passage. There were ads for toothpaste, medicines, and tonics he’d never heard of, each one promising longer, healthier lives. They reminded him of the pop-up ads he always s
aw online, usually about zit cream.

  “There it is,” said Lens.

  their son Abel died the week prior.

  Abel, Lucas thought. That must be A. from the notebook!

  “Whoa, Silas had a brother?” Lens pointed to the screen and continued reading.

  The Sweetwater brothers were known in town as the hound collectors. For years, Silas and Abel took in stray dogs and nursed them back to health. Unfortunately the animals under their care did not survive the fire. Neither did the house. When reached for a comment, the Sweetwater family vowed to rebuild their home and their life as best they could. The authorities have ruled out foul play and claim that the fire started due to a gas leak within the home.

  “What happened to Abel?” asked Lucas. He felt a pain in his chest. “What else does it say?”

  “That’s it,” said Lens. “That’s the end of the article. Poor Silas. He lost his brother, then he lost his house.”

  Lucas’s stomach turned at the thought of the notebook and the photos he’d found. His eyes itched as he blinked. “He lost his dogs, too.”

  “I know,” Lens whispered. “What now?”

  Lucas clicked on the search bar again and typed Abel Sweetwater. Several links appeared. The first article was about the brothers beginning their animal shelter. It started with two dogs, Scout and Shadow, both found wandering through Hounds Hollow and picking through the town’s gardens. The sheriff had wanted to put the animals down, but Silas and Abel promised to take care of them. After that, whenever someone in town found another stray, they delivered it to Sweetwater Manor.

  He exited the article and clicked the next link, “The Sweetwater Brothers Grow Their Hound Pound.”

  “Hmm, they sure loved their stray dog news,” said Lens.

  That made Lucas laugh. It was only a snort, but it felt good, like his sadness was slightly diffused. He closed the article and looked to the next link.

  “Sweetwater Brother Dies.”

  The headline winded Lucas worse than the bike ride into town.

  Abel Sweetwater has passed away as a result of tuberculosis. He was twelve years old. The famously kind and loving Abel had always been a local character. Best known as one-half of the Hound Pound, Abel was happiest at home with his brother, Silas, and their pack of stray dogs. During his final days, though, much of the person Abel had been began to change, according to friends and family. As the sickness took hold, Abel’s physical appearance altered. He became thin and emaciated, and lost pigment in his eyes and hair.

  “Hey, Mom, what’s it mean when someone loses the pigment in their eyes and hair?” asked Lens.

  “Color, dear,” said his mom. “It means that a person’s hair and eyes turned white.”

  Lucas grabbed his inhaler and took a deep breath.

  “You okay?” Lens asked.

  “Yeah,” said Lucas. “It’s just that tuberculosis is what the doctors thought I had at first. They put me in quarantine and wouldn’t even let me near my parents. Turns out I didn’t have it, but it was scary, like being in jail.”

  “That’s crazy,” snapped Lens.

  Lucas nodded. “Yeah, tuberculosis is no joke. It used to be called consumption a long time ago because if someone had it, they seemed fine on the outside, but their insides would break down. Then they’d stop eating and lose so much weight that it looked like they were consuming themselves. In fact, some towns thought that consumption victims were actually vampires or that they were cursed.”

  “No way!” Lens’s jaw dropped. “For real?”

  “Yeah,” Lucas continued. “It’s highly contagious, so people who had it were usually separated from everyone else around them … and probably died alone.”

  “You know a lot about this, huh?” asked Lens.

  Lucas didn’t answer. Instead of reliving every doctor’s diagnosis, he scrolled through the article about Abel. A picture appeared and Lucas fell out of his chair.

  “Are you okay?” asked Mrs. Lindsay as she rushed to help him back up.

  “Yes, thanks. Don’t know what happened,” he said quickly. Then Lucas snapped the laptop closed and backed away from Lens and his mother. “Sorry about that, Mrs. Lindsay, but thank you for your help. I think we’ve learned enough about my family for one day.”

  “You’re welcome, Lucas. Come back if you need help with anything else.”

  She put her hand on Lucas’s shoulder, which made him flinch; it reminded him of how the doctors used to treat him just before another test. Lucas walked to the front door, tracing his fingers across the book spines until one fell off the shelf. “Sorry, Mrs. Lindsay!”

  “That’s no problem.” She smiled. “It’s easy enough to pick up.”

  Lucas grabbed it from the floor and turned the book over in his hand. “Hey, it’s Goosebumps,” he said, trying to play it cool. “I loved these stories.”

  “Not me,” whispered Lens. “I’ve got enough scary in my life with a certain you-know-what.”

  “Wow, so you like haunted stories?” Mrs. Lindsay asked.

  “More like ghost histories, I guess.” Lucas’s mind was racing. Reading the articles about his distant family gave Lucas another keyhole into the strange happenings in Hounds Hollow. The more he peered through, the more seemingly random events were coming into focus.

  “Well, then take the Goosebumps book, Lucas,” offered Mrs. Lindsay. “It’s on the house.”

  “Oh no, I couldn’t,” Lucas said, but Lens insisted.

  “Just take the book, man. If you don’t, I’m going to have to dust it for eternity.”

  Lucas relented and smiled. “Okay, thank you.”

  Once they were outside, Lens turned to Lucas. “What was that all about? You seemed legit spooked at something.”

  “There was a picture of Abel Sweetwater,” said Lucas as he climbed on his bike. “And I’ve seen him before.”

  Bess was sitting by the side of the road with her basketball. As they approached, Lucas realized how ridiculous they must have looked—Lucas on his bike, wearing an outdated helmet, and Lens riding horseback with a Polaroid camera slung over his shoulder. But if they did look outrageous, it didn’t faze Bess. Lucas had a feeling that nothing would.

  She rolled the basketball back and forth from her right hand to her left hand. “I suppose you’re here to apologize?”

  “No,” said Lucas. “I stand by my theory that you’re crazy. But crazy is what we need right now.” He jumped off his bike and sat next to her. “Do you believe in ghosts?”

  “No,” said Bess.

  Lucas nodded. “Then what do you think the beast is?”

  Bess raised an eyebrow. “You think the beast is a ghost?” The sound of the basketball rolling on the dirt echoed in the afternoon. “You’re wrong. The beast is a real-life monster.”

  “What if we’re both right?” Lucas slipped off his backpack. “There’s something you need to see.”

  After explaining about Silas, Abel, and their Hound Pound, Lucas and Lens watched as Bess studied the photographs.

  “Well, what do you think?” asked Lucas.

  “You’re saying that the beast has something to do with the Hound Pound and the fire.” Bess wrinkled up her face. “How?”

  “I don’t know,” admitted Lucas. “It sounds crazy, and I don’t know how to explain it, but they’re connected.”

  “I need more than a feeling,” said Bess. She stood up and bounced her basketball. “See that? I throw the ball, it hits the ground, and then it comes back. I see it and I feel it. I experience it. Gimme something like that. Gimme proof.” She shoved the ball against Lucas’s chest to emphasize her point.

  Lucas thought back to all of the suspicious moments he’d had since moving to Hounds Hollow. Except for the car accident, they’d all centered around one place.

  “Sweetwater Manor,” he said with certainty. “Silas’s house is the proof. You don’t build a place as weird as that without a reason. Let’s find the control room and start the h
unt.”

  “A ghost hunt?” Bess wore a grimace of doubt.

  But Lucas could see a spark of interest in her eyes. She was dying to get back into that house, he knew it. “I can’t say if we’re dealing with ghosts or not, but whatever the beast is, it’s not normal. And I think it’s reaching out to us for a reason. You can’t tell me that it roams through the same woods night after night without having a connection to that place. The beast could have gone anywhere in the world. Why does it stay in Hounds Hollow?”

  Bess took the ball and bounced it once more. “I’m in.”

  “I’m in, too,” said Lens, who was still on horseback. “Let’s go check out your creepy old house again. But this time, maybe let’s not jump out a window.”

  The trip through the woods was short, but Lucas still couldn’t get used to traveling next to a horse. Bess took the lead since she knew the paths like the back of her hand, so Lucas kept close to her as Lens galloped in and out of the trees beside them.

  When the woods opened up, the house lay before them. Lucas pedaled faster, hoping to reach his home before something dangerous woke up. Once Lens had tied his horse to the porch, the three friends went inside.

  “Mom, I’m back with friends,” Lucas called out, but no one answered. “Mom? Dad?”

  The house was absolutely still.

  “I’m sure they’re here,” said Lucas. “The car’s parked outside.”

  “This place is huge,” said Bess. “Maybe they’re exploring the house, too.”

  “Yeah, must be,” Lucas agreed, but he felt like something was missing. His parents usually left notes if they went anywhere. Actually, they left notes even if they were just watching a movie in their room.

  “Where should we look first?” asked Lens.

  “Most of this place was burned down because of a gas leak, according to what we know,” said Lucas. “But I think at least one room survived—the barn.”

  As they went to his room, Lucas felt the house around him. It was as if the air was pushing against him, like walking through a swimming pool dressed in all his clothes. His arms and legs treaded heavily through the hallway.