Ghosts of Rathburn Park (6 page)

If Matt hadn’t had that particular problem very often, maybe it was because he didn’t have many friends who did that sort of thing. Or if they did, they didn’t invite Matt to do it with them. But there had been a few times when he did something he didn’t want Dad to find out about. Like when he used to sneak out to visit Shadow and the rest of Mrs. McDougall’s dogs after Mom, and Dad, too, decided that wasn’t what he ought to be doing with so much of his spare time.

This particular Super-Parent Attack started with Dad asking all sorts of questions about how Matt was feeling about the move to Timber City.

“I know that none of you kids were too enthusiastic about leaving Six Palms right at first,” Dad said, “and I could certainly understand that.” He sighed. “Your brother had a few words to say on the subject, didn’t he?” Dad’s rueful grin made Matt remember what a fit Justin had about having to change schools. Dad sighed again and went on, “Courtney didn’t say as much, but your mother and I understood how difficult it was for her to lose a friend like…” Dad’s voice trailed off. “What was her name? That girl Courtney thought so much of?”

“Hilary,” Matt said. “Her name was Hilary.”

“Ah yes, you’re right,” Dad said. “And I’m sure there were a great many people you hated to leave too. Old friends like…” He paused again, waiting for Matt to fill in the blanks.

“Oh, uh…,” Matt stammered, thought of saying Shadow and changed it to—Sean. That wasn’t too far from the truth because there actually had been two guys in Matt’s class named Sean, and one of them had been kind of—if not exactly a friend, at least an acquaintance.

“Oh yes.” Dad looked a little puzzled. “Sean was…?”

With his mind still on Shadow, Matt said, “Kinda short-legged. With bushy hair.” Dad’s nod looked a little doubtful and Matt couldn’t help grinning as he considered adding, “With a curly tail.”

Dad thought for a minute, probably trying to remember a short guy named Sean with bushy hair. It was after he gave up trying to remember Matt’s friends that Dad stopped asking getting-to-know-you type questions. Instead he settled for inviting Matt to spend the afternoon at City Hall.

Matt gulped down the last bite of his sandwich and said, “You mean right now?”

“Sure thing.” Dad was grinning. “I’m going to have to leave in a few minutes, and you could come with me and…Well, you could bring along a book, and there are a lot of comfortable chairs in the reception room.”

“Well.” Matt looked at the clock over the dining room fireplace. Almost twelve-thirty. “Well, I think…I think I need a glass of water.”

In the kitchen, while he slowly filled his glass with water, Matt’s brain raced, trying to come up with a way to make Dad forget about the visit to City Hall without having to say he didn’t want to go. He didn’t come up with a good excuse, but as it turned out, he didn’t need one. When he got back to the table, he found that Dad had gotten up and gone to the window. Putting down his glass, Matt went over to stand beside him.

For a minute the two of them stood side by side looking out at the lawn and hedge, and above and beyond the hedge, the tree-covered hills stretching away, one ridge after the other. And then, without even knowing he was going to, Matt asked, “Dad, who lives in the old Rathburn house now? You know, the big old house people call the Palace?”

Without turning away from the window, Dad said, “Well, according to Mrs. Hardacre, one elderly woman is all that’s left of the original family.”

“Does she live there all alone?” Matt asked.

Dad shook his head. “Not entirely. I believe Mrs. Hardacre said that she has a small staff of servants.”

“But she’s the only Rathburn?”

“That’s what I understand.”

“And she’s an old lady?”

As Dad turned away from the window he said, “Very old, nearly one hundred, I believe Mrs. Hardacre said.”

“Wow,” Matt said. “That is old. And her name is…? Is her name Amelia Rathburn?”

“Why, yes,” Dad said. “I think it is. I’ve certainly seen that name on some of the account books. I believe she gives money to the city to maintain the park and the graveyard. They’re both on land that used to belong to the Rathburns.”

They were still standing at the window looking out at the lawn and trees, and after a while Matt asked why they were doing it. “Were you looking for something in particular?”

Dad was smiling when he turned away from the window. “No, not really. I thought I heard a dog barking in the yard but I guess I imagined it.” He glanced at his watch. “Uh-oh. Where did the time go? I’m going to be late. Are you coming, son?”

Looking down at his T-shirt and baggy cargo pants, Matt said, “Well, I’d need to change first, I guess. Maybe I’d better wait till next time. Okay?”

Dad patted him on the shoulder. “Good thinking, son,” he said. “Well, you have a nice afternoon. Okay?”

Matt stayed at the window a minute longer, but nothing moved in the yard and there was no sound except for a slight wind-blown rustle and the soft chirping of birds. A few minutes later he was on his bike pedaling toward Rathburn Park.

I
T WAS A VERY
warm afternoon, and Matt was sweating and puffing by the time he got off his bike and pushed it down the narrow path that led to the ruins of the old church. It wasn’t until he was inside the narthex that he stopped and checked his watch. Five minutes past one. She should be here if she was going to show up, which he wasn’t at all sure was going to happen. Actually there had been times, late last night when he was half-asleep, when he’d almost convinced himself that the whole thing about the Rathburn girl had been one of his crazy imagining games. Like the Robin Hood thing, for instance. On the one hand, he was absolutely positive it had really happened, but on the other—there was definitely something unreal about the whole thing, and he had lots of questions that didn’t have any answers.

Questions like where had the girl come from, and how did she happen to appear in the deserted church? And why was she wearing such weird clothing? And what was there about her face and the quick, light-footed way she moved that was definitely strange, or at least kind of out of the ordinary? And another question that he definitely didn’t have an answer to was why he’d gone to so much trouble to be here at one o’clock, when he should have known that she wouldn’t show up.

Matt checked his watch again—ten past one now. He kicked down the stand, put the lock on the bike’s hind wheel and gave the combination dial a spin. He looked around carefully again before he went on as far as the broken arch that separated the narthex from the main room of the church. Stopping there, he leaned forward, peering into the tangled jungle of trees and vines. No one. At least not where they could be seen. He waited several more minutes, standing right there in the doorway, before he took a few careful steps into the main part of the church.

Nothing. No sign of life anywhere. Outside the church there had been the leafy rustle of wind in the trees. But inside—not even that. Inside the tall, jagged walls the stillness was so deep it seemed to be a solid material, as if you could reach out and touch it. But Matt didn’t want to reach out. Instead he stood perfectly still, wishing he knew if the sound of a footstep or a spoken word could reach his ears, or if it would only be swallowed up by the soft green silence.

For what seemed like a long time he went on listening—and looking. Trying, without moving his feet forward, to see if he could lean far enough to look through or around the undergrowth to where the roof of Old Tom’s cabin might be visible. Somehow it seemed terribly important to catch a glimpse of the shack’s rusted tin roof and mossy green wall. After a while he discovered that by standing on tiptoe and leaning to his left, he was able to see through a clump of saplings and on down almost to the corner, where…He was stretching out, leaning even farther, when a loud noise right behind him made him jump, stumble forward and wind up on his hands and knees. Somebody laughed.

Matt’s brain registered the laugh before he jumped to his feet—and there she was. The Rathburn girl was standing right behind him.

“Wow,” he said as he got up and brushed off his knees. “What was that noise?”

“I did it,” she said. She clapped her hands loudly to demonstrate.
Smack!
Frowning now, she put her hands on her hips as she said, “Didn’t I tell you it was dangerous to come in here?”

“Wow,” Matt said again, shaking his head. “I wasn’t in here. At least not very far.” Then he grinned and added, “I wasn’t in any danger until you scared my feet out from under me.”

She didn’t think it was funny. She was staring at Matt with angry eyes, but as he went on smiling she suddenly turned her face away. When she looked back her expression had changed—not exactly smiling, but pretty close to it.

The rest of her looked about the same as it had the day before except that her long dress was blue now, and the collar was square and not as lacy. The hat was smaller, too, and trimmed with braid instead of ribbons. But like the other hat, it was covered with white veiling that seemed to be wrapped around her face and tied under her chin.

Back in the entryway she stopped to stare at Matt’s bike. “Okay,” he said, thinking, Oh no, not that again. “Okay. When do we start?”

Turning slowly away from the bike, she said, “Start where?” She was narrow-eyed again, frowning suspiciously.

“You remember,” Matt said. “To see the Palace. You said you’d show me a better way to get there.”

“Oh yeah.” She thought for a moment. Making it sound like a question, she said, “I guess you really want to see that crummy old place?”

“Yes, I do,” Matt said, grinning again. “Really.”

“Why?” she asked, slit-eyed and surly.

Surprised, Matt had to think for a minute. “Because, well, I guess it’s because I’ve always had this thing about history. You know, historical people and places. People like Robin Hood and Napoleon. And places where historical things happened. Like Sherwood Forest—and the Alamo. I already saw the Alamo. My whole family went to see it. Seeing the Alamo was really cool.”

The halfway snarl was still on the girl’s face. “Well, sure,” she said, “famous places like that. But the Palace is just a big old ugly house in the country. What’s historical about that?”

Matt was surprised. “Ugly?” he asked.

“Yeah, I think it’s ugly. And haunted. It’s haunted, too. Did you know that?”

Puzzled and more than a little suspicious, Matt said, “But you said—you said you live there?”

She shrugged. “Yeah, I live there. That’s how I know it’s haunted.”

Matt was speechless for a minute before he started to grin again. He asked, “Does that mean you’re a ghost?”

Her frown deepened, turning her big eyes into long, narrow slits. “No. Of course not. It just means—that’s how I know it’s haunted.”

Before Matt could decide what to say next she added, “And my name is—Amelia. I told you that. Remember?”

He nodded. “Yes, I remember.”

“Well, okay. And your name is Matt.” Suddenly her frown had changed to the strange almost-smile. “So come on, Matt,” she said. “Let’s go see the Palace.”

She started off across the parking lot, but not in the direction Matt was expecting her to take. Not toward the start of the Palace trail that Lance had pointed out. Instead, she turned to the right, straight across the baseball outfield, moving so lightly and quickly it wasn’t easy to keep up.

Almost running, Matt called after her, “Hey! Wait a minute.” When she finally stopped to look back, he pointed toward the parking lot. “Isn’t that where the path starts? Why are you going out here? That isn’t the way to the Palace. What I heard was that the trail that leads to the Palace starts way over there at the edge of the parking lot.”

“Yeah,” she said. “That’s the hill route. It’s the way people go who shouldn’t even be on Rathburn land. All they get is a far-off glimpse of the house. And the trail is, like, more than a mile long, and hard to follow.”

Matt nodded. Remembering his previous visit, he could agree with that. Long and hard to follow it certainly had been.

But Amelia was still talking. “It only gets you to where you can look down and see the house from way up on the side of a hill,” she said. “But you’re not very close to it and there’s this high iron fence that keeps you from getting any closer. This way is a lot quicker and it winds up right near the gate.” She went on then, walking even faster.

Way out beyond center field the ground became rough and overgrown by berry vines and patches of heavy brush. When Amelia finally slowed down, it was at the edge of a flat open area where nothing seemed to be growing except some clusters of reedy-looking plants. Reedy plants, coarse green grass and, farther out, patches where the sunlight glistened on what seemed to be pools of greenish gray water.

“It looks kind of—kind of swampy,” Matt said.

She nodded, “Yeah, you guessed it. That’s exactly what it is. A swamp.” She turned to look at Matt sharply. “You’ve heard about the swamp, haven’t you?”

“Well, yes,” Matt said. “This guy told me about a swamp but I kind of thought he was just trying to scare me.

“Well, it’s a swamp, all right,” she said. “I thought all the kids in Timber City knew about it.” She turned to face Matt. “What they get told is that the public property ends at the edge of the ball field and the swamp is on Rathburn land, so they shouldn’t be there in the first place. And they also hear that if they do try to cross it, they’ll end up like Frankie.”

“Frankie. Frankie who?”

“I don’t know. He died a long time before I was born, I guess. But I certainly heard about him. What I heard is he tried to cross the swamp and drowned.” She shook her finger, imitating a scolding adult. “And if you try to cross the swamp you’ll drown too. But it isn’t true. I do it all the time. Come on. Let’s go.”

“Wait a minute,” Matt said. “Wait a minute.”

She was already moving forward, picking her way from one clump of reeds to another. “Wait!” Matt yelled. “Hey, Amelia. Wait up!”

It was only then that she stopped, turned, and a moment later was back on solid ground. She was smiling. “Good,” she said. “You remembered my name.” But the frown returned as she went on, “What’s wrong? Why didn’t you follow me?”