The Ghost of Graylock (16 page)

F
OR A MOMENT
, N
EIL WAS THRILLED AND TERRIFIED
. The ghost knew their names! She’d spoken to them!

Then, as his brain began to work again, he came back down to earth.

“Bree?” he called out grudgingly.

Footsteps sped toward him, echoing in the other room like gunshots. Then his sister’s face was in the doorway. She was panting, out of breath. She did not look happy. “What are you two
doing
in here?”

“I could ask you the same question,” Neil shot back.

“You left me at home!” Bree stepped into the room, standing on the pile of folders that had sprawled on the floor.

“Sorry,” said Neil. “I didn’t want to make a scene.”

“I saw you head into the woods behind the barn. I didn’t think you’d actually come in here again. Are you
insane
?”

“If he’s insane,” said Wesley, “we’re all insane.”

Neil looked around, the evidence of the building’s history piled up everywhere. “We need to help her.” The word
her
hung between them, like the humming of a struck bell.

After a moment, Bree shook her head. “No. We don’t. What we need to do is ignore all this and go. Come on.”

“After everything we talked about last night? After everything you said?”

Bree closed her eyes. A glimmer of guilt wrinkled her forehead. “Yeah, well, I gave it some more thought, and I realized that my sanity and my safety are more important than helping some dead girl I’ve never met.”

Neil clenched his jaw. “You’re lying.” Bree glared at him. “I know you. I’ve seen how much this is bothering you.” She crossed her arms. Her face told him that he was right.

A metallic squeal sounded from the common room, followed by a loud bang. The three froze, standing wide-eyed in the office.

“You came alone, right?” Wesley whispered to Bree. She nodded sharply.

That queasy feeling gurgled in Neil’s stomach again. He thought of sharp metal objects, glinting in gloved hands, carried by a killer. Trying to calm himself down, he said, “There might be a simple explanation.” Then he stepped forward, twisting away from his sister’s grasp, and forced himself to peek out the door.

One of the chairs had toppled over, as if someone had kicked it away from the cake table, but that was not what captured Neil’s attention. On the floor between the table and the door, a thick brown folder was splayed open. He glanced back at the files that had toppled from the desk. The stray folder sat another ten feet or so from the rest. Could it have slid all the way there?

Bree and Wesley came up behind Neil, to see what had happened. Neil pointed at the folder near the table. “Was that here when you came in?” he asked his sister.

Blank-faced, Bree shook her head.

Neil glanced around, making sure no one was hiding under the table waiting to grab his ankle. Bending down, he examined the folder. He read the name on the tab. “Rebecca Smith?” He stood and held the folder out so they all could look at it. He flipped through several pages, which appeared to be doctors’ notes, test results, medication forms.

Finally, Wesley spoke up. “We came here looking for answers. I think someone just gave us a whole bunch.”

W
HEN THEY GOT BACK TO THE AUNTS’ HOUSE
, Bree ran upstairs ahead of the boys to change out of the white dress she’d put on that morning. It had gotten dirty during the impromptu excursion.

Luckily, Claire and Anna were still distracted in the barn. Sounds of the Grateful Dead blasted out from the workshop. Neil felt a pang of guilt as he strolled by the open door. Maybe they weren’t the best custodians, or caretakers, or whatever people wanted to call them, but he knew the aunts cared.

Carrying the file, Neil and Wesley came around to the front porch, where they lay their prize open between them. Bree sat down beside him before he’d turned a single page.

Maybe all she’d needed were further hard facts and fewer frightening visions. Maybe he saw their mom somewhere in all this mess. Either way, her new attitude gave Neil hope that they’d made the right decision in going back to Graylock.

“Look,” said Wesley, pointing at the top sheet. “Her name, birthday, and the date of her admission to the hospital.”

Neil reached out and turned the page. “And more. Much more.”

Some pages were clearly missing from the file. Others were stained, water-damaged to the point of illegibility. But there was still a lot of information to take in. As they sat and read, time swallowed the afternoon. The life of Rebecca Smith filled their heads.

According to the file, Rebecca had been seventeen years old when she first came to Graylock with severe depression. She’d asked to be admitted to the youth ward because she thought she’d be safe there — safe from whom, she didn’t say, but the doctors inferred she’d be safe from herself.

What little information the doctors were able to get from Rebecca revealed that her childhood had been fairly normal, unremarkable. Then, at fifteen, Rebecca’s mother was hit by a car while walking on the side of the road. After the funeral, Rebecca’d found herself unable to eat, unable to sleep. When she woke in the morning, she would be overcome by a sense of panic that something horrible was going to happen. Within weeks, Rebecca had slipped far away, into her head.

At Graylock, Rebecca eventually began to socialize with some of the other patients in the youth ward. After a few months, the staff claimed she might even benefit from being released. For Rebecca, this news was devastating. She withdrew into her bedroom — number 13 — rarely coming out except for meals and meetings, during which she refused to speak.

“That’s the room we got stuck in,” said Bree, her voice quavering.

“It’s her,” Neil whispered. “Rebecca’s our ghost.”

“Exactly,” said Wesley, shaking his head in disbelief. “So what was wrong? If she was getting better, why didn’t Rebecca want to leave Graylock?”

“Maybe she was scared of what she might do to herself,” said Bree.

“Or maybe she was scared of what someone else might do to her,” Neil whispered.

“Look here,” said Wesley, peeking ahead to the last of the pages. “It turned out that Graylock wasn’t the safest place for her after all. She died there. She
was
one of the girls who drowned in the lake. This file proves it.”

The three of them looked over the copy of the coroner’s report.

Bree covered her mouth and closed her eyes. “She was only a little older than me.”

The front door swung inward, and the three of them jumped. Neil swiftly closed the folder and sat on it.

“Hey, there,” said Claire, from behind the screen door. “Whatcha been up to?”

“Not much,” said Neil. “Just hanging out.”

Claire bit the inside of her mouth, as if she didn’t like that answer. “Anyone up for a trip to Rooster’s Drive-In? I don’t know about you all, but I’m hungry enough for a hot dog or two. My treat.”

Neil and Bree glanced at each other, silently questioning whether they had time for a break.

“They have go-carts,” said Wesley, as if that might seal the deal.

A
FTER A GREASY DINNER OF HOT DOGS AND
F
RENCH FRIES
, they all raced go-carts, taking the curves slowly so that none of them vomited. The aunts dared Neil to wallop them, but even after a few trips around the track, he couldn’t stop thinking of Graylock. It was as if Rebecca was sitting next to him, pulling at the steering wheel.

When the group returned to the aunts’ house, the sun was starting to set. With his bike helmet strapped on tightly and his lips pressed shut in a knowing smile, Wesley took off for home.

A message waited on the answering machine in the foyer — the red light blinking from the console like a stop signal at a crossroad. When Neil heard his father’s voice blaring from the speaker, he closed his eyes. “Hey, guys, sorry to miss you again,” said Rick. “I’ve got a big surprise that I’m sure will make you very happy. I’m busy tonight, but we’ll talk in a couple days. Love to you all.”

Click.

The aunts sighed and went into the living room, giving Neil and Bree privacy in the foyer. “You want to call him back?” asked Neil.

Bree shook her head. Her eyes glinted darkly, almost regretfully. “But there is someone I think we should try reaching out to.” Bree grabbed the cordless phone and dialed Information. “I’m looking for a phone number in Heaverhill, New York,” she said to the operator, “a nursing home called Whispering Knoll.”

Mrs. Reilly had been there on the night Rebecca had drowned. They both agreed that they needed to ask her about it.

Neil dialed the number Bree had written down. The phone rang once, twice, three times. He was about to hang up, when a voice said, “Good evening. Whispering Knoll. How can I help you?” Neil asked to be connected to Mrs. Reilly’s room. After some hesitation, the receptionist, told him to hold.

After nearly a minute, a male voice came on the line. “Who is this?”

Neil recognized Mrs. Reilly’s son. He didn’t sound happy. “Um … My name is Neil Cady. I met you yesterday —”

As if he’d been waiting for the call, Nicholas interrupted. “My mother has nothing more to say to you. And if you keep bothering us, you’re going to be very sorry. Do you understand me?”

Neil nearly dropped the phone. All the breath exited his lungs. “I …”

The line went dead, and moments later, a dial tone rang in his ear. Neil put the phone back in the cradle.

Bree leaned forward, eyes like flying saucers. “What happened? What did she say?”

“
He
said I was going to be very sorry.” Neil shook his head. “I don’t think we should call there again.”

L
ATER, UPSTAIRS
, N
EIL AND
B
REE SAT ON HIS BED
, discouraged, flipping through the pages of Rebecca Smith’s file.

“I still can’t believe Nurse Janet’s son,” said Bree. “So weird.”

“Yeah,” said Neil, unsure if
weird
was the right word for what Nicholas Reilly actually was. “I don’t know. I keep thinking about the way he watched us when we went up to Whispering Knoll, like he wanted us to disappear or something.”

“He’s trying to protect his mom,” said Bree, distractedly turning another page of the folder, landing on a blood-test report. She glanced up at Neil. “He doesn’t want her to have to deal with anymore Nurse Janet questions.”

Something popped into Neil’s head, something he hadn’t considered before. “Maybe he’s hiding something.”

Bree flinched. “Like what?”

“Mrs. Reilly could have lied,” said Neil, sitting back against the pillows near his headboard. “If Nicholas knew that, what would he do to keep anyone from learning what really happened at Graylock Hall?”

Bree pulled nervously on her hair. “You don’t think …” She exhaled slowly, evenly.

But for Neil, the room spun. “I don’t know,” he choked out. Nicholas’s voice stuck in his head like caramel. He tried to remember his dream from the other night, to make out the face behind the flashlight chasing him through the woods. Could it have been Mrs. Reilly after all? Maybe she actually
was
crazy. And maybe it ran in the family. “I wish Rebecca could just tell us what to do!”

Neil felt a chill. He glanced around the room. There was no breeze, and yet he was suddenly cold. Bree rubbed at her arms. The papers lying between them fluttered a bit. Neil and Bree both looked down, bringing their hands away from the folder. Something on the page caught his attention.

“Bree,” Neil whispered, “look.” He pointed at a name typed near the top of the document:
DR. JULIUS SIMON
.

According to the hospital record, the doctor who had ordered Rebecca’s tests was the same one who’d bandaged Neil’s leg. Neil drew back from the folder, as if it might suddenly slam shut on his hand.