Ghosts Beneath Our Feet (12 page)

“Good night, Uncle Frank.”

Later, when the long evening had ended and Katie was in bed, she wished she'd jumped up right then and given Uncle Frank a hug. The wild-looking, frightened old man who'd shouted at her the day they arrived in Newquay had turned into a different person. The real Uncle Frank was kind and caring, not at all the way he'd seemed.

Died young, 'e did—thirty years ago tomorrow
.… The anniversary of the mine accident had finally arrived, and tomorrow Gram Trelawny would be watching for knackers around every corner. Katie wondered if Joan had told her family about the voices in the shaft house. Probably not. Mrs. Trelawny would say Joan had imagined the whole thing, and Gram would be frightened out of her wits.
I'll have to tell Joan about Jay and the tape player tomorrow
, she decided.
When we go out to the lake
.…

Sleep was impossible. The old house creaked and groaned in a rising wind. The curtains danced at the windows, and the pages of a magazine lying on the dresser lifted and turned.

The bed moved.

For a second or two, Katie wasn't sure. Then she heard a crash, and a door opened in the hall. She snatched up her flashlight and ran out, nearly crashing into Jay.

“What the heck was that?” he demanded. “My lamp fell over. The whole darned house shook.”

“Jay, look!” Katie pointed down the hall with the flashlight to where the mirror hung at a crazy angle. “There she is!”

From out of the darkness the golden-haired girl limped into the beam of light. Her lips moved and her eyes were wide and frightened. One hand gestured frantically.

“She—she's saying something,” Jay muttered. “But I can't—”

The hallway filled with wind. The girl's lips moved again, and now a thin, sweet whisper filled the hallway, like the voice of the wind itself.

“Go,” it said. “Go now.” And then, as Katie clutched Jay's arm, the vision faded, the wind stopped blowing, and the mirror crashed to the floor.

Chapter Sixteen

“Katie! Jay! What's going on out here?”

Mrs. Blaine stood silhouetted in her bedroom doorway. Katie threw herself into her mother's arms.

“Mom, something awful's happening! The house moved—”

“Oh, Katie, stop it!” Mrs. Blaine stepped back. “Stop screaming and tell me what this is all about.”

“The house is—”

“Look at the mirror,” Jay interrupted.

Mrs. Blaine stared at the shattered glass. “How in the world did that happen?” she demanded. “What's going on here? That mirror meant a great deal to Uncle Frank—he told me it was to have been a wedding present for his son. He's going to feel just terrible when he finds out—”

Katie and Jay exchanged a look. This was no time to mention May Nichols's appearance in the mirror.

“Mom, the house shook just now,” Katie repeated. “My bed moved, and Jay's lamp fell over. And then the mirror slipped off the wall. Didn't you feel
anything?
”

“No, I didn't,” Mrs. Blaine snapped. “I was sleeping, and that's what you should have been doing, too. Come on, Katherine Jane, we don't need play-acting in the middle of the night.”

“We have to get out of here,” Jay said. “This old barn could fall down any minute.”

“Now, you stop that!” Mrs. Blaine turned on her stepson. “Haven't you caused enough trouble and heartache for one day? I don't know what this is all about, and I don't want to. A mirror doesn't just jump off the wall—”

“What's 'appenin' up there? What's goin' on?” Uncle Frank was at the foot of the stairs.

In the half-light from the bedroom, Jay looked as if he'd been slapped. Katie went to the top of the stairwell on legs that threatened to fold under her. “We'll be right down,” she called. “Just a minute, Uncle Frank.”

“You aren't going anywhere except to bed,” Mrs. Blaine said. “I'll explain to Uncle Frank that there's been an accident, though
how
I'll explain it I can't imagine.”

“You can tell him the truth,” Jay suggested in a voice so coldly adult that Mrs. Blaine paused. “This place is collapsing, no matter what you think. Stuff is falling off the walls. We have to get out.”

For the first time Mrs. Blaine seemed less certain. She looked from Jay to Katie, then turned back to the broken mirror. “You mean neither of you touched the mirror?”

“No!” Katie exclaimed. “It fell by itself. And my bed moved, Mom. It really did. If you'd been awake, you'd have felt it, too.”

Mrs. Blaine pursed her lips. “I suppose I can tell Frank the house is settling a little, and the mirror fell,” she said slowly. “We can have someone come and check the foundations.”

“It's too late for that,” Jay said. “We have to leave.”

“What's 'appenin'?” Uncle Frank was beginning to sound desperate. “Somebody come 'ere!”

With a sigh, Mrs. Blaine went down the stairs, leaving Katie and Jay in the shadowy hall.

“I don't know about you, but I'm leaving,” Jay said. “You heard what that—that thing in the mirror said.”

“She's not a thing,” Katie protested. “Her name is—was—May Nichols. She was going to marry Uncle Frank's son, and when he was killed, she got sick and died, too. Joan's Gram told me.”

“Well, I don't care what her name is,” Jay retorted. He glanced over his shoulder as if he expected the spirit to reappear at any moment. “She meant it when she said ‘Go,' and I'm taking her advice. If you're smart, you'll come, too.”

Dazed, Katie let him pull her down the stairs. Angry words from the parlor stopped them at the front door.

“—Not so,” Uncle Frank shouted. “There's nothin' wrong with my 'ouse. You've been listenin' to Nancy Trelawny an' 'er wailin' about them knackers.”

Mrs. Blaine broke in with a soothing murmur.

“No! Nobody's goin' to poke around 'ere and tell me my 'ouse is fallin' down. I won't 'ave it!”

Katie shook off Jay's hand and went into the parlor. Uncle Frank, in wrinkled pajamas, was sitting on the high-backed sofa. Mrs. Blaine was beside him. When Uncle Frank saw Katie, he smacked his knee with a gnarled fist. “You're the one, missy,” he roared. “You're the one listens to Nancy and brings back tales—”

Katie realized that there was more than anger in Uncle Frank's eyes. There was fear, too.

“You felt the house move tonight, didn't you, Uncle Frank?” She asked it hurriedly, not daring to look at her mother.

“I never! There's nothin' wrong with this 'ouse, I tell ye!”

Katie sat down at Uncle Frank's other side. Jay watched and listened from the doorway.

“I don't believe in knackers, Uncle Frank,” she said. “Honestly I don't. I know your son could never be changed into an evil spirit. I don't think Gram Trelawny believes that either. It's just a kind of game she plays. But there's something else. Uncle Frank, there
is
a ghost—I've seen her, and Jay has seen her, too. We saw her tonight.”

Mrs. Blaine gasped. “Katie, be still this minute.”

“She has long yellow hair,” Katie continued. “And she limps when she walks. Tonight Jay and I both saw her in the mirror upstairs. She told us to get out of the house right away.”

Uncle Frank fell backward against the cushions as if someone had pushed him. “May?” he whispered. “You seen my May?”

“Katie, this is unforgivable!” Mrs. Blaine exclaimed. “Go upstairs at once.”

“What did my May tell you?”

“She told us to leave,” Katie repeated. “Uncle Frank, the house is in danger, and May Nichols is trying to save us. She's trying to save us all, because she loves you so much. Mrs. Trelawny told me the ground above the mine has been shifting and sinking for a long time. I've heard it and felt it myself—once in the backyard, and once in the kitchen.”

“Katie,
please
.” Mrs. Blaine sounded totally exasperated.

Uncle Frank drew a long, shuddering breath. “May was like my own,” he said. “Lost a son and then a daughter, I did, all in a month. And now you tell me she's come back.… If my May says go, you best go. I ain't leavin', but you go.”

Mrs. Blaine jumped up. “This has gone far enough,” she said. “Uncle Frank, I'll get you a nice cup of warm milk to calm you down, and then we'll all go back to bed. We've had enough talk about ghosts and mysterious warnings for one night.”

“I did feel the 'ouse move,” Uncle Frank admitted. “Felt it tonight and felt it lots of other times, I 'ave. But I'm not leavin'. This is my place.”

“But you can't stay here,” Katie protested. “Not if the house is going to collapse.”

Uncle Frank stood up, looking dignified in spite of his pajamas and his ragged mane of hair. “I want you to go,” he told Mrs. Blaine. “Go right now.”

“But we can't leave you—”

“I asked you to come an' I'm askin' you to go. I don't want you 'ere anymore.”

“Now look what you've done, Katie,” Mrs. Blaine stormed. “This is all your fault.”

The house shuddered. Mrs. Blaine sat down hard as a vase danced over the edge of an end table, and the painting above the sofa slipped sideways. Out in the foyer, the long-silent grandfather clock chimed twice.

“Let's move.” Jay spoke from the doorway. “Talk it over outside if you want to.”

Mrs. Blaine looked around the parlor unbelievingly. Her gaze settled on the fallen vase. “Maybe we'd better.…” She hesitated, then made up her mind. “Jay and Katie are right, Uncle Frank, we'd better leave. We'll go down the hill for the rest of the night—I'm sure the Trelawnys will take us all in. And tomorrow we can get a builder to come up here and look—”

The house moved again.

Jay threw open the front door. Katie and her mother each took one of Uncle Frank's arms and tried to pull him to his feet, but he shook them off. “Go along!” he shouted. “Get out!”

Mrs. Blaine stepped back. “Katie, you and Jay go outside. Wait for us—Uncle Frank and I will be out in a few minutes.”

“Go!” the old man bellowed, his face becoming dangerously red. “Go now. All of you!” He raised an arm as if he would drive them from the house.

Mrs. Blaine gave up and let Katie pull her toward the door. “We're going to wait for you right outside,” she called over her shoulder. “You know you can't stay here alone.…”

As soon as they were out on the porch, the door was slammed behind them. The key turned in the lock, and Uncle Frank looked out at them triumphantly through the glass.

“We shouldn't have given in to him,” Mrs. Blaine cried. “He's so upset, he doesn't know what he's doing. He could have another heart attack and die in there!”

Jay pulled them down the steps and out onto the road. “You run for help,” he ordered Katie. “I'll try to get him out.”

“No, you won't!” Mrs. Blaine panicked. “You can't! Oh, this is crazy!”

Katie dashed away, hardly aware that she was barefoot and wearing nothing but one of Tom Blaine's extra-large T-shirts and the bottom half of her shortie pajamas. She hesitated only a moment at the woods, then plunged ahead, following the turns in the road from memory. At the other end, the gentle meadow wind seemed to speed her down the hill into the sleeping town. She flew past dark houses and empty fields until she recognized the Trelawnys' rooftop against the sky.

“Joan! Mrs. Trelawny!” She beat on the door, turned the knob and found it open. In the dark entryway she screamed again.

Mr. Trelawny, in T-shirt and shorts, was the first one down the stairs. Joan and her mother were right behind him, followed by Edward and Lillian. Mrs. Trelawny threw her arms around Katie.

“What is it, girl? What's happened?”

“The house—” Katie sobbed. “The house is moving—I think it's going to fall down—and Uncle Frank won't come out. He won't listen.…”

Mr. Trelawny dashed back up the stairs, returning almost at once in trousers and shoes. “I'm goin',” he shouted. “Don't know what's goin' on up there, but I'll find out.”

Katie slipped from Mrs. Trelawny's embrace and ran after him.

“Wait for me,” Joan cried.

Katie felt as if she were caught up in a nightmare and must run forever. Going uphill was harder; she was aware now of her scratched and bleeding feet. Lights flickered on in some of the houses, and she glimpsed Mr. Trelawny pounding ahead of her. Scared-looking faces peered from windows.

Katie was only a few steps behind Mr. Trelawny when they hurtled out of the woods. He stopped so suddenly that Katie bumped into him.

“What's this, now?” he exclaimed. “Look at that, will you?”

Katie stared. The old house loomed like a lighted ship in the darkness, a ship on the slope of a wave. The whole facade was tilted. Katie's mother stood out in front, alone on the road.

“Mom!” Katie screamed. “Where's Jay?”

Mrs. Blaine pointed at the house. “I—I couldn't stop him. He broke a window and went in!”

Mr. Trelawny took the porch steps two at a time and disappeared through the gaping parlor window. Katie clung to her mother as the ground trembled under their feet and the house groaned.

“I tried to hold on to him,” Mrs. Blaine sobbed. “He broke away from me—oh, Katie, they'll be killed in there. I know it!”

The yard began to fill with people, most of them in bathrobes. Joan pressed close to Katie, and Mrs. Trelawny stood behind them, her face grim.

The house tilted more sharply.

“Is my husband in there?” Mrs. Trelawny's voice was steady.

Katie nodded. “And Jay and Uncle Frank.”

“It'll be all right,” Mrs. Trelawny said. “If the gas line just don't break.”