Baby-Sitters' Haunted House Read online

  “But we need your help,” Claud said. “And Mary Anne’s.”

  When I heard their idea I thought we might be able to put an end to the ghost talk that very night. It sounded dangerous. But I agreed to it. (Mistake #1!)

  Mary Anne and I were supposed to go outside at nine-thirty and watch the mansion to see if the fourth-floor lights went on again. Meanwhile, Claudia and Dawn would be spying in the fourth-floor hall to see if anyone else (meaning the one person who has a key to the fourth floor — Georgio) came upstairs.

  When nine-thirty arrived, Mary Anne and I were hidden behind some bushes. We had a perfect view of the back of the mansion.

  “I could never in a million years do what Dawn and Claud are doing,” Mary Anne told me. “I’d have a heart attack from fear.” (Mistake #2 was thinking that our job wasn’t as scary as Claud’s and Dawn’s.)

  Later Claud told us that she and Dawn were both terrified as they went upstairs. What if someone — or something — were already up there? But they peeked around the corner into the hallway and didn’t see anyone. So far, the coast was clear.

  “I wish Lydia’s room weren’t locked,” Dawn whispered to Claudia.

  “We could peek through the keyhole,” Claud said.

  Dawn volunteered to do the peeking.

  The keyhole provided Dawn with a view of the room. She took a quick look around and reported to Claud, “No one’s there, unless they’re in the closet.”

  Claud and Dawn hid themselves in the hallway alcove and waited to see if anyone went in, or out of, that room.

  Meanwhile Mary Anne was keeping an eye on the back door to see if anyone went into the house. And I was watching the row of bedroom windows on the fourth floor. Suddenly I saw a light go on in the same room in which I’d seen it the night before. “Mary Anne,” I whispered. “Look.”

  The light stayed on for about two minutes and then went off. During the time it was on we checked to see if it was caused by a reflection from the lighthouse beam. But it was a clear night and the lighthouse was dark. Besides, the light in Lydia’s room looked identical to the warm glow given off by all the other electric lights in the house.

  We stood still and clutched one another while we watched that window. The light went back on after a couple of minutes. A few minutes later it went off again.

  Mary Anne was whispering, “Where are Dawn and Claud? Oh, Kristy, I’m so worried.” I tried to calm her down but I was pretty scared myself, and I think she could tell.

  When the light had stayed off for five minutes, we decided it was time to go in and tell Claud and Dawn what we’d seen. “I hope Georgio didn’t find them spying on him,” Mary Anne whispered to me as we walked toward the house. A moment later, Mary Anne cried out and hid her face in one hand while she pointed to the top of the mansion with the other. “Tell me I didn’t see that,” she mumbled into my sweatshirt.

  I saw a figure in white walking on the widow’s walk. I knew I saw it. It wasn’t my imagination. Even after the ghostly figure had disappeared, I was shaking with fright.

  “It’s gone,” I told Mary Anne.

  I grabbed her hand and we ran all the way to the mansion and into the kitchen. Elton was sitting at the table reading the newspaper. He looked up and asked, “What’s wrong, girls? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

  “We didn’t,” I said quickly. “We’re in a hurry.” It wasn’t until later that I wondered why I didn’t tell him that we had seen a ghost.

  We raced up the stairs to the third floor. I was terrified. If Georgio were trying to scare us, he was going to a lot of trouble to do it. What else would he do? How dangerous was he? Then again, if the ghosts were real (which I didn’t truly believe), they were probably evil ghosts. Dangerous ghosts.

  When we saw Dawn and Claud in our hall we all hugged. Dawn and Claudia were pale. We all rushed off to Mary Anne’s room to talk. Mary Anne started crying, I guess with relief that they (and we) were safe.

  First I told Claud and Dawn about the figure in white. Then we went over everything that had happened, step by step. Claud and Dawn had also seen the light in the room. The hall was dark, so the light glowed through the keyhole. (They were both too frightened to actually look in the keyhole.)

  “It’s Lydia’s room,” Claud said. “I just know it. And I’m pretty sure Georgio isn’t responsible for any of this. We would have seen him.”

  “Unless he was hiding in a closet in the room,” Dawn said.

  “What about the figure in white?” Claud asked. “Georgio couldn’t have been in both places at once.”

  “Maybe he has a woman accomplice,” Dawn suggested. “Kristy said the figure in white looked like a woman.”

  I could tell that Claud was hoping with all her heart that Georgio wasn’t our villain. And she probably didn’t want to hear that he had a female accomplice. Poor Claud.

  We were so frightened that we whispered our good nights.

  A little later, while I was trying to fall asleep, I went over the day’s — and night’s — events and asked myself questions. What would happen next? Who was doing all these creepy things? And most mysterious of all, why?

  The wind — or was it a ghost? — rattled the window.

  I lay awake listening to my heartbeat. Finally, I closed my eyes and tried to fall asleep.

  I soon felt a thump on my legs. I opened my eyes and stared into yellow-green eyes. I thought of Dracula, and bats, and stories I’d heard of campers waking up to find a snake crawling over them. As my eyes became used to the darkness I was sure a big bat was sitting on my legs. But when the “bat” hss-sshed, and jumped over me and off the bed, I realized it was Spooky.

  I saw him run through the bathroom toward Mary Anne’s room. I jumped out of bed and followed him. If Spooky did to Mary Anne what he had just done to me, she definitely would have a heart attack.

  I opened the door onto the hall, hoping Spooky would leave. He did. Then I checked to be sure that Mary Anne was still asleep. She was. But it was a very long time before I fell asleep.

  “Mal, I don’t feel like being president today,” Jessi told me. “You can do it.”

  We were in Claud’s room for our Wednesday BSC meeting, and we were pretty tired from all the baby-sitting we’d been doing. We were the only ones at the meeting. Shannon had a dentist appointment and Logan was working at the Rosebud.

  “I don’t want to be president either,” I said. “Since there’re only two of us, we don’t really need one.”

  Jessi agreed with a nod. “Let’s take turns making calls to the people who left messages,” she suggested.

  “Sure,” I said.

  I pressed the play button. I had a piece of paper and a pencil ready to write down the names and phone numbers of callers. But that wasn’t necessary for the first message. It was from Jessi.

  “This is me — Jessi — just making sure the machine is on and working.”

  “That was a good idea,” I told her. My mood picked up a little. Maybe we weren’t doing so badly after all.

  “Thanks,” Jessi said.

  “Beep. Beep. Beep.” Three beeps meant there were no more messages.

  “I guess my message was the only one,” Jessi concluded glumly.

  I sat next to her on the bed. “Look at the bright side,” I said. “We won’t have to turn down so many people.”

  “Maybe they’re waiting until the meeting to call,” Jessi suggested.

  But fifteen minutes passed and the phone didn’t ring once.

  “Nothing seems right since the others left,” Jessi said. “I’m tired from so many baby-sitting jobs. And Becca is sulking because I don’t have time to teach her how to Rollerblade.”

  “My mom is really grumpy with me, too,” I told Jessi. “I explained that it’s not my fault that all the sitters left town. But she said we should have planned better. I promised her I’d take all my brothers and sisters to Celebrate America! Day.”

  Jessi and I were looking forward to C
elebrate America! It was Stoneybrook’s big summer celebration, starting with a parade in the morning followed by a barbecue picnic at the playground. During the afternoon there’d be games from colonial times, and hands-on activities, such as kite making.

  Jessi looked at the record book. “But you’re scheduled to take the Rodowskys to Celebrate America!”

  “Mrs. Rodowsky is going to be at the fair running the dunking booth, and my mother will be at the kite booth. Since they’ll be there, they decided it was okay for me to watch all the kids. I just have to keep ten kids safe and happy!” It sounded like a tough job even if Mrs. Rodowsky and my mom were going to be there.

  “I’d help you, but I’m overbooked, too,” Jessi said. “I’m going to take the Braddocks, the Marshalls, and Becca. Mrs. Braddock and my mother are working together on the make-your-own rag doll booth. So there’ll be a lot of adults around that we know. But it’s still a huge amount of work.”

  The BSC phone finally rang.

  It was Mrs. Prezzioso wanting a sitter on Celebrate America! Day for Jenny, Andrea, and the twins.

  I looked at the list of times Shannon and Logan were available to take jobs. Neither of them had listed that day.

  “Sorry, Mrs. Prezzioso,” I said. “There aren’t any sitters available.”

  When I hung up I told Jessi, “You know what Mrs. Prezzioso said? ‘But I thought the point of the club was to have sitters available. I’m very disappointed.’ ”

  “I guess a lot of people are disappointed in us,” Jessi said with a sigh. “What are we going to do, Mal? We’ve ruined the club.”

  “Maybe we should make posters and put them up around town,” I said. “Or send a letter to our clients.”

  “By the time they get the letter Kristy and everybody will be home and things will be back to normal,” Jessi pointed out.

  “Or ruined forever,” I added darkly.

  “We could put posters up right away,” Jessi said.

  We talked about the poster idea, but eventually realized that it would be too hard to explain what had happened to the BSC in a few words.

  As we left Claud’s room I remembered all the wonderful meetings we’d been to there. This hadn’t been one of them. Would we ever have good meetings again? Or had we ruined the BSC forever?

  “Mary Anne, take me to see the boats now. Puh-lease.”

  I opened my eyes. It was Wednesday morning and Andrew had climbed onto my bed to wake me up.

  “Oh, goody, you’re awake,” he said. “Kristy’s asleep and I want to see the boats. Okay?”

  “Is it a sunny day?” I asked, rubbing my eyes.

  “Very sunny,” he answered. “There’ll be lots of boats. This many.” He held up both hands to show me his ten fingers.

  I explained to Andrew that our day’s plan was to spend as much time as we could outdoors, starting at the community swimming pool. “After that we’ll go to the harbor and see the boats. But first we’ll swim. Okay?”

  “I can swim,” Andrew said. “I pretend I’m a boat.”

  I gave him a hug. Andrew’s a great kid.

  Jill and Dawn came into the room. “We have our swimsuits on under our shorts and T-shirts,” Jill informed me. “And we both have on blue T-shirts, see?”

  I reminded myself that we had to help Jill make some friends her own age in Reese.

  After breakfast Kristy and Jason headed off to the ballfield. Lionel said he’d stay home and read Dracula (the novel by Bram Stoker). He wanted to read the novel before he saw the play. The rest of us walked the half mile to Reese Community Pool. It was a huge pool near the ocean. That morning the pool was divided in half with a buoy rope. One half was reserved for the members of the swim team who were waiting poolside in their matching navy and white suits. The other half of the pool was open for general free swim. There was also a kiddie pool, which was perfect for Andrew-the-Boat.

  I thought if both Jill and Martha signed up for the swim team, they’d be involved in an activity they could share while meeting kids their own age.

  “Girls,” I said, “let’s go check out the swim team.”

  “Martha, you should be on the swim team,” Karen exclaimed. “I bet that’s a great way to meet people.”

  I noticed that Martha put as much distance between herself and Karen as she could without being rude. Dawn managed to persuade Karen to stay with Claud and Andrew, then she and I took Jill and Martha to the swim team side of the pool.

  We sat near the lifeguard stand and watched the team go through their warm-up exercise. Dawn told Jill she used to be on a swim team in California and how much she liked it. Meanwhile, I talked to Martha about how much fun it was to swim. And she told me she took swimming lessons at the day camp she went to in Boston.

  When the team was practicing the butterfly stroke, Jill proudly announced, “I can do that.”

  “Can Martha?” I asked.

  “Sure, she’s a good swimmer, too,” Jill said. “Especially for a little kid. We both passed intermediate.”

  I winked at Dawn. She smiled back. Our idea just might work.

  Two coaches were conducting the swim team session. I decided that the one with the whistle and clipboard was the head coach. “Is it too late for kids to sign up for the team?” I asked her.

  “No. Anyone who’s passed Beginners can join,” she told me.

  “I’m asking for two sisters who might like to join,” I said. “One is ten, the other is seven.”

  “Have them come on over,” she said.

  I returned to Dawn and the girls. “If you’ve passed Beginners you can be on the team.”

  Jill leaped up. “All right!” she said. “Come on, Dawn. You and I can join.”

  “Jill, you know I’m going back to Stoneybrook next week,” Dawn said. “I can’t join. But you and Martha could. And I’d watch your practices every day until I leave.”

  Jill sat down again. “I’m not doing it if you aren’t, Dawn,” she said emphatically.

  “Martha, you could join anyway,” I said. “I know you like to swim.”

  “If Jill doesn’t do it, I won’t,” Martha whispered to me.

  Just then the instructor approached us. “You must be the new girls,” she said to Martha and Jill. “We sure could use you on the team.”

  Jill said, “No, thanks.”

  Martha looked at the ground and didn’t say anything.

  “Martha and Jill are still thinking about it,” Dawn told the coach.

  “We’re having a mini-fair tomorrow — a fundraiser, put together by the kids, with games and a bake sale,” she said. “Why don’t you all come? It’d be a great way to meet the other kids on the team and talk to them about it.”

  We said thanks and that we would be there.

  “Hope to see you tomorrow, Martha and Jill,” the coach said as she headed back to her team.

  Just then I noticed Karen making her way toward us. The last thing Martha needed now was Karen’s over-exuberant efforts.

  “Let’s go back to the other side of the pool and do some swimming,” I said. While Dawn took the girls in the water, I sat by the kiddie pool where Claudia was watching Andrew, and told Claud about the mini-fair.

  “That sounds like fun,” Claud said. “I wonder what we could do to help? I know! Maybe they would let us have a face-painting booth.”

  When the swim team practice was over, Claud and I told the coach our idea. She thought it was terrific.

  Then we told our kids.

  “I want Claudia to make me a cat,” Karen said. “What do you want to be, Martha?”

  Martha said, “I don’t know.”

  “I want to be a frog,” Andrew said.

  Karen asked Jill how she wanted her face painted.

  “However Dawn has hers,” Jill answered.

  After swimming and fooling around at the pool, we were all pretty hungry. So we went to the harbor and bought lunch from an outdoor stand, then sat near the dock and watched the boats while we ate.
Andrew was thrilled.

  When we finished our lunch I told Dawn, “The historical society is open this afternoon. I’d like to go over there for a little while.”

  “The girls are pretty wiped from swimming,” Dawn said. “And Andrew could use a nap. Claud and I can take them back to the house and you can go alone.” I thought that was an excellent idea. I had some serious research to do, and it’d be easier to do it without baby-sitting responsibilities.

  The historical society is in an old brick house off Main Street. The door was open, so I walked inside. It was dark and cool. After the bright light and heat of the outdoors, it felt wonderful.

  A tiny white-haired woman was sitting at a small table in the front hall. “Good afternoon,” she chirped. “May I help you?”

  “I’m interested in learning more about the old houses around here,” I told her. “This seems like a good place to start.”

  “Indeed it is,” she said. She stood up. “I’m Eleanor Butterfield and I’ll do what I can to assist you.”

  I explained that I was mostly interested in the Randolph mansion. “I’m hoping you have some old architectural plans of the house,” I said.

  She led me into the front parlor, which serves as the historical society library. “I believe we have something in the vertical files,” she said. I followed her to a file cabinet.

  While she was going through old documents, I told her that I’d heard about A Historical Tour of Reese by Millicent Ellsworth.

  “Oh, yes,” she said. “But Millicent got a bit carried away with her stories. She had a flair for the dramatic.”

  When I asked what she meant by that, Mrs. Butterfield explained, “Millicent’s dates for births, deaths, fires, and such were all accurate. But when it came to personal stories, she was known to exaggerate and even veer from the truth.”

  I related the story of Reginald and Mary Randolph that Claudia had read in A Historical Tour of Reese.

  “Well, my dear,” Mrs. Butterfield said, “some people like to believe those stories. I suppose it’s good for tourism. The facts about Mary Randolph are these. She had two children and six or so grandchildren. Her son and his family lived at the mansion with her. It was a lively place back then. I’ve seen references in diaries and journals to parties and hunts and all sorts of joyous events at the mansion in the years that Mary was a widow. And I’ve seen her name listed among those who did volunteer work at the local hospital and for the Seamen’s Widows and Orphans Society. I expect Mary Randolph did indeed grieve for her husband. Perhaps she even took to the widow’s walk now and again. But she wasn’t ‘flung to her death’ from it in a storm. Town records inform us she died in her sleep.”