THE DEARLY DEPARTED
Betsy Haynes
Smashwords Edition
Copyright Betsy Haynes
Chapter 1
GRANNY THISTLE TAKES A RIDE
There went Uncle Morton, whirling around the living room again with a big grin on his face. He was all by himself, but he held his arms up in the air as if he were dancing with a partner.
Susannah smiled and went right on dusting. The ghost of Aunt Gladys was here. Aunt Gladys visited Uncle Morton every Thursday afternoon, and he would slick down his hair, dress up in his best suit and put a stack of records on the old Victrola. Then around and around they would go. Today they were dancing the Tango with its quick, jerky steps and dramatic deep dips.
Susannah, age eleven, was very much alive, but Aunt Gladys was one of the Dearly Departed, as the Colby family ghosts had come to be called. Susannah’s mother always said that the reason their spirits remained among the living was because they couldn’t bear the thought of leaving all of their loved ones. The Colbys were a happy, close knit family who lived in a rambling New England farmhouse well past the edge of a tiny town in the hills of New Hampshire and ran an Antiques and Junque Shop in their barn.
Aunt Gladys had once been a Radio City Music Hall Rockette until she met Uncle Morton, and from that day on the two of them thrilled audiences with their beautiful, gliding ballroom dancing. Besides Aunt Gladys, there was Granny Thistle. As a young girl she had been The Beautiful Theresa, a daring acrobat who crossed the high wire on a unicycle in Captain Ezekial Grundy’s Daredevil Circus and Wild Animal Show. There was also Madd Maxx, who had been The Beautiful Theresa’s younger brother. At age thirteen he had joined Captain Grundy’s circus himself to become one of the world’s youngest and greatest--though ill-fated--daredevils. The last member of the Dearly Departed was Mumps, who had been Susannah’s fat faced cat.
Most of the time, the Dearly Departed were no trouble at all. They came and went, visiting one family member or another most politely and with the greatest consideration for everyone concerned. But every now and then something went wrong and one or another of them got slightly out of hand. As Susannah dusted, she had the feeling that one of those times was about to occur. In fact, it was more than just a feeling. The evidence was right there before her eyes, written in the dust on the coffee table in Granny Thistle’s scrawly handwriting.
PUT THEM BACK!
Susannah dropped her dust cloth and rushed into the library where her mother sat at an ancient roll top desk entering figures into a desktop computer which held all the accounts of their antique business.
“Mom, did you take another box of Granny Thistle’s circus things out of the attic and put them up for sale in the shop?”
Her mother looked up with a sigh and slowly nodded.
“But you know how upset she gets,” Susannah insisted. “Do we HAVE to sell her things?”
“I’m afraid we do. You know how terrible business has been lately. We really need the money.”
Poor Granny Thistle, thought Susannah. It was bad enough that The Beautiful Theresa had to get old and wrinkled and lose her teeth so that every time she said her own name it came out “Thistle.” But for the family to have to sell her things now that she had passed on, it was no wonder she was upset.
“Granny Thistle will just have to understand,” Mrs. Colby said sadly. “Besides, she really has no use for them now...”
Her words were chopped off in mid-sentence by a woman’s scream. It had come from the direction of the barn, and Susannah and her mother hurried outside to see what had happened.
Leaning against the barn door, right under the sign that said ANTIQUES AND JUNQUE SHOP was a short, plump woman with reddish blond cork-screw curls and a pushed in face that reminded Susannah of a Pekinese dog. She was shrieking and pointing a trembling finger toward something that seemed to be floating through the air.
It was Granny Thistle’s pink silk parasol! The one she had carried in the circus. And it sailed right past Susannah and made a bee-line for the house.
The woman was bug-eyed with fright. “I...I was going to buy it,” she sobbed. “And suddenly it jerked itself out of my hand and just...just FLOATED AWAY!”
The woman looked as if she might faint, and Susannah’s older sister Nell, who had been minding the shop, came racing out looking confused, which didn’t surprise Susannah. Nell’s joy in life was composing romantic poetry, no matter what else was going on, and she had her notebook filled with poetry tucked under one arm. By this time the whole Colby family had gathered to see what all the commotion was about. Uncle Morton, and probably Aunt Gladys, hurried out of the house. Gramps hobbled around from the back porch where he had been dozing in the afternoon sun. Mr. Colby and his oldest son Eric slammed shut the hood of the old pickup truck and rushed toward the barn with wrenches still in their hands. And little Alan, who was only four, peered cautiously over the front porch banister.
Mr. Colby handed his wrench to Eric and moved forward with take-charge strides. “What seems to be the trouble, Ma’am?”
The woman calmed down some and she told him how the incredible pink parasol had refused to be bought and had floated out of the shop and off toward the house.
‘Doggone that Granny Thistle!” shouted Gramps, shaking a fist in the air. “She’s the most cantankerous, mule-headed old lady ever to draw a breath.”
The woman narrowed her eyes and glanced suspiciously at each family member. Then she asked in a nervous voice, “Who is Granny Thistle?”
“Pay no attention to Gramps,” said Mr. Colby in his most soothing voice. “He gets a mite confused sometimes.”
“Dad! Gramps is not...” Alan began in an insistent voice.
Mr. Colby scooped Alan up into his arms to shush him and went right on talking in a loud voice, “Come into the shop with me. I’m sure we’ll find a simple explanation to this. But in the mean time, I’d like for you to pick out something else. It will be a gift. Just our way of apologizing for your being so upset.”
The woman smiled faintly. “Well...if you insist.”
“Yes, Ma’am. I do insist,” said Mr. Colby, guiding her toward the door of the shop and shooting a warning frown back over his shoulder toward Gramps.
“Confused my foot!” muttered Gramps when they were out of earshot.
Susannah went to him and hooked an arm through his. She gave him a sympathetic smile, remembering that he had once been a star circus performer, too. Wearing the baggy pants and red putty nose of an acrobatic clown, he had made the crowds laugh and had won the heart and the hand of The Beautiful Theresa. That was years ago, before the two of them retired from the circus and moved here to raise a family.
“It’s all right, Gramps. Dad just doesn’t want anyone to find out about the Dearly Departed. You understand about that, don’t you?”
Gramps nodded sadly, and he and the others drifted away, leaving Susannah standing alone. A moment later she heard the strains of Tango music coming from the house, which meant that Uncle Morton had started up the Victrola and that he and Aunt Gladys were whirling around the room again. That’s a relief, thought Susannah. Granny Thistle must have taken her parasol and gone off somewhere to pout. Feeling sure that the crisis was over, Susannah went back to the house to finish her dusting.
Inside the Antiques and Junque Shop the woman with the pushed in faced browsed among the flower pots and tea services, old clothes and furniture and other oddments that were heaped and stacked around the room, while Mr. Colby and Nell talked in low tones near the cash register.
The woman could not shake off the eerie feeling she had over the strange behavior of the pink parasol. And those Colbys were an odd bunch, too. Where was the Granny Thistle the old man had spoken of? she wondered, thinking that she would have to mention the whole affair to her sister Gertrude when she got home.
The woman fingered a delicate black lace shawl that was draped around the shoulders of a wire dressmaker’s dummy. Next she caught sight of a tiny beaded purse with a long gold chain for a handle. She picked up the purse and began to examine it closely. It must be very old, she thought.
All of a sudden a small, red unicycle that had been leaning against the wall in a dusky corner of the shop jolted upright. Before anyone knew what was happening, it kicked up a puff of dust and took off across the floor with its pedals spinning. It hesitated beside the woman, whose eyes were bugged out twice as far as before. The beaded purse flew out of her hand and hung suspended in air above the unicycle for an instant. Then there was a loud screech of wheels on the barn floor as the unicycle shot off again, careening out the door with the purse trailing along behind.
Chapter 2
THE SEANCE
The mood around the supper table was glum.
“That lady was awfully scared,” said Nell. “Did you see how she jumped into her car and screeched off down the road? I sure hope she doesn’t come back and bring newspaper reporters.”
“Or even worse, the police!” said Uncle Morton.
“Wow! That really could be trouble,” said Eric. “Especially if Granny Thistle decided to go tearing around on her unicycle again.”
“Isn’t anyone even the least bit concerned about Granny Thistle?” asked Susannah, feeling exasperated. “I don’t blame her for wanting to keep her own belongings, particularly the ones she had in the circus. And I think it’s terrible that none of you cares one little bit.”
“Susannah, we’ve been all through that,” said Mrs. Colby. “It isn’t that we don’t care.”
“Well, I can’t help feeling sorry for her and being on her side anyway,” said Susannah.
“Crazy old lady,” muttered Gramps. “Thinks she’s still in the circus. Always was a confounded daredevil.”
“As sorry as I am to say it, Granny Thistle leaves us no choice,” said Mrs. Colby. “We’re going to have to call a family conference and talk to her about her behavior right after supper.”
“Oh, boy! A SEANCE!” shouted Alan. He had been pouting all through supper over the scolding Mr. Colby had given him for almost giving away the presence of Granny Thistle’s ghost.
Family séances were reserved for emergencies and for times when one member of the Dearly Departed could not be reached any other way. That “one member” was most often Granny Thistle, who was fond of pouting. But the séances almost always worked. Even Granny Thistle could scarcely resist the combined power of the entire Colby family holding hands in the dark and calling out to her.
Everyone loved a good séance. As soon as the dishes were cleared, Susannah drew the drapes tightly closed over each of the dining room windows. Chairs were drawn up to the big circular table again. When everyone was in place, Nell switched off the lights. Mr. Colby lit a single tall, slender candle in the center of the table. Its flare sent shadows ghost-dancing across the walls. Now the room that had been so warm and cheery a few moments ago took on an eerie, spectral air.
Shivers of excitement tiptoed up Susannah’s back as she reached to find the hand on either side of her. Gramps’ leathery fingers laced hers tightly, but Alan’s fingers tapped against her hand in nervous excitement.
At first there was some shuffling as everyone got settled. Susannah opened her eyes wide and peered into the pitch blackness overhead where the spirits of the Dearly Departed were probably hovering at that very moment.
As soon as everybody was quiet, Mr. Colby cleared his throat and began to speak in a sort of chant. “We have gathered here to call on the spirit of our dearly departed loved one, Theresa Colby. Oh, Granny Thistle, won’t you speak to us, your loving family?”
The grandfather clock ticked loudly in the corner of the room as they waited anxiously for a reply. None came.
After a few moments, Mr. Colby tried again. “We call on the spirit of Granny Thistle. Please give us a sign that you hear.”
Again, there was no answer from Granny Thistle. But an instant later the sound of a loud smooch filled the air!
“Gladys, for goodness sake!” whispered Uncle Morton, sounding embarrassed and rubbing the top of his balding head. “Not during a séance!”
Susannah smiled to herself. Aunt Gladys had always been an incurable romantic, and that was probably why Nell was, too. She had inherited it from her aunt.
“Isn’t Granny Thistle going to talk?” piped up Alan, and he was shushed from four different directions.
“Muliest woman ever born,” mumbled Gramps. “Wouldn’t SHUT UP if that was what you wanted her to do.”
He was shushed, too, but he squeezed Susannah’s hand, which she knew was his way of smiling in the dark, and she squeezed a smile back to him.
“Granny Thistle, won’t you please give us a sign that you hear us?” begged Mr. Colby. “We want to know that you are okay.”
At that instant Susannah could feel the dining room table begin to vibrate. The movement began slowly. It was almost unnoticeable at first. Then it grew until the table wobbled and trembled and quivered and quavered as if it were having its own private earthquake. Gradually it slowed, and for a moment it seemed to stop. But it took off again, wildly pitching and plunging from side to side. Finally it leveled itself and began ascending ever so slowly until it was nearly three feet above the floor.
Alan scrambled to stand up in his chair, trying to keep his hands from slipping off the table. Susannah stretched her hands upward, still holding onto Gramps and Alan. Her heart was in her throat.
Suddenly the table dropped to the floor with a resounding THUD!
Granny Thistle had heard, all right, and boy, was she hopping mad.
Chapter 3
THE SLEEPWALKING GHOST
Somebody switched on the light and the séance was over. Susannah couldn’t remember when she had been so disappointed, but there was no use trying to coax Granny Thistle to talk until she got over her huff.
Drifting into the living room, Susannah stopped to gaze at the old circus poster that had been framed and hung proudly above the mantle. It was the picture of a lovely, dark haired girl dressed all in white. She was riding a unicycle across a high wire and carrying a pink parasol in her hand. Over her head, spelled out in big black letters, were the words: THE BEAUTIFUL THERESA AND HER DEATH DEFYING UNICYCLE ACT.
There were other smaller figures in the background. The ringmaster stood tall in his scarlet cutaway coat and silk hat. The lion tamer held a pair of cats at bay with a whip and chair. Madd Maxx was diving off his 35 foot ladder, heading straight for a tiny pool of water. Gramps was in the picture, too. He was wearing baggy trousers and a red putty nose and was in the midst of a backwards somersault off the rump of a horse.
Susannah sometimes dreamed of being in the circus, too. She never grew tired of looking at the poster and trying to imagine Granny Thistle as young and beautiful and in love with a fearless acrobatic clown. But circuses were different now, she thought with a sigh.
Wearily Susannah scuffed off to her room. It was late, and she was feeling tired from all the stress and excitement of the day. She would read for a while, she decided, and then go to bed. She was barely settled in her chair when a green tennis ball came whizzing across the floor followed by a ghostly purr.
Mumps is here! She thought with delight. She chuckled and stopped the ball with her foot. Then she kicked it back toward the spot near the door where the purr was coming from. Mumps was the ghost of the furry gray cat Susannah had raised from a kitten. Mumps was the tiniest member of the Dearly Departed and she visited Susannah from time to time. Susannah batted the ball back again, hitting it so hard that it rolled under the bed.
Susannah got down on her knees and raised the corner of the bedspread. She reached into the darkness, but what she pulled out was not a green tennis ball. It was a pink parasol!
Letting out a shriek of joy, she reached under the bed again. Sure enough, there was the beaded purse. Then, stretching herself as far as she could, her fingers touched cold metal. The unicycle was there, too. Retrieving the ball for Mumps, Susannah pulled the beaded purse out of its hiding place and hugged it to her. She couldn’t remember ever seeing it before today, and she inspected it lovingly. She was glad that the lady with the pushed in face had lost her chance to take it away.
Susannah could feel something small and hard inside the purse. Curious, she opened it and drew out a gold chain necklace. Hanging from it was a lion’s tooth. It was polished to a star shine, and the tip was sharper than a snake’s fang.
She whistled low and swung the necklace back and forth to catch the light. It was more beautiful than a precious jewel, and for an instant she was tempted to borrow it. She wouldn’t wear it, only keep it in her room for a while and look at it now and then. Apparently Mumps was just as enchanted with the necklace as she was, because suddenly the chain jerked back and forth as if it was being batted by a cat!
“Mumps, you silly kitty. This is a necklace, not a toy,” she said.
Sighing, she dropped it back into the purse. I’d better not keep it for myself, she thought. Not without asking. Especially now, when Granny Thistle was so upset. Besides, hadn’t Granny Thistle chosen her room as the place to hide her treasures?
Susannah replaced the beaded purse and the pink parasol in their hiding place with the unicycle and pulled the door ajar for Mumps before she climbed into bed. She was glad that Granny Thistle trusted her, and she promised herself that she would keep the secret safe.
She fell asleep quickly and slept peacefully as time tiptoed around midnight clocks. Then suddenly she awoke and sat up in bed, listening. Footsteps. She was sure of it. Someone was walking in the hall.
It’s probably Aunt Gladys, she thought. Aunt Gladys had been an incurable sleepwalker before she became one of the Dearly Departed. She and Uncle Morton had tried every new idea that came along, from anti-sleepwalking pills ordered from a magazine to tying her foot to the bed post. Nothing they tried had ever worked, and not even her final rest had stopped her nocturnal wandering.
Slipping out of bed and to the door, Susannah peered out through the crack. It was just as she had suspected. There was no one in the dimly lit hallway, at least no one who could be seen. Wearily she closed the door again. She had always wondered where Aunt Gladys went when she walked in her sleep, but tonight was not the night to follow and find out. Her eyelids could scarcely stay open long enough for her to find her way back to bed.
Just as her head snuggled into the pillow, Susannah thought she heard a door squeak and wondered for a fleeting instant if she should get up to investigate. No, she decided. It would just be Aunt Gladys out for a midnight stroll. And she drifted back to sleep.
Chapter 4
UNEXPECTED VISITORS
Dawn reared up with the first thunder clap. Before long a deluge of pounding rain had turned the front walk into a chorus line of frogs. Susannah lay in bed, listening for sounds of the Dearly Departed. Thunderstorms stirred them up something terrible. According to Eric, who had taken sophomore physics the year before, it had to do with extra electrical charges in the air. What ever the reason, no one could recall one single stormy day when the Granny Thistle, Madd Maxx, Aunt Gladys and Mumps hadn’t torn around like crazy, getting into all kinds of mischief. And with Granny Thistle already riled over having her things put up for sale, there was no telling what would happen today.
Madd Maxx was the only one who was predictable. He would spend the day diving from the topmost cupola of the roof into the rain barrel. That was what he always did when it rained.
Susannah lay still for a time with her ears stuck out like antennae, but all that she could hear was the rain splishing against the window and the frogs singing in the shower and an occasional thunder roll. The Dearly Departed were uncommonly quiet. It was beginning to worry her. Was something wrong?
Finally she got up and went to the window. Opening it, she stuck out her head. Sure enough, she could hear Madd Maxx splashing into the rain barrel and sloshing out again. At least HE could be counted on.
All of a sudden a deafening chord of music rolled through the house, nearly pushing out the walls and rattling the windows and furniture. At first, Susannah thought that it was thunder carrying a tune. Then, as the strains of “Hernando’s Hideaway” became clear, she began to smile. It was Aunt Gladys playing the pipe organ in the back parlor. She liked to play music on the pipe organ almost as much as she liked to dance to it. Susannah chuckled and hummed along. One more of the Dearly Departed was accounted for. But there was still no sign of Granny Thistle, and that was a worry.
Still, she told herself, if Madd Maxx was diving into the rain barrel and Aunt Gladys was playing “Hernando’s Hideaway” on the pipe organ, there was probably nothing to worry about. More than likely, Granny Thistle was down in the kitchen juggling teacups or in the dining room swinging from the chandelier or in the shop... In the shop! Why hadn’t she thought of it before? What if that had not been Aunt Gladys sleepwalking in the hall last night? What if it had been Granny Thistle instead? She could have been heading for the shop again. Add one good thunderstorm to that and you’ve got trouble!
Pulling on her clothes, Susannah dove down the stairs, taking them three at a time. Eric was the only one down for breakfast when she got to the kitchen. He was a computer nerd and so busy arranging his alphabet cereal to spell “microprocessor” that he scarcely looked up.
“Granny Thistle?” asked Susannah between puffing breaths. “Any sign of her?”
“Nope,” said Eric. He was fishing around in the milk with his index finger for a missing “p”. “Probably wouldn’t hear her anyway with Aunt Gladys playing the pipe organ.”
Just then Alan bunny-hopped down the stairs and into the kitchen. He had his Chutes and Ladders game tucked under his arm.
“Hey, Eric! Want to play a game with me?” he asked excitedly.
Eric didn’t look at Alan. Instead he rolled his eyes at Susannah and mouthed the word “Help!”
“Why don’t you go out to the shop with me, Alan?” asked Susannah, motioning for him to follow her.
The rain had eased up some by the time Susannah led Alan outside. But just as she passed the rain barrel, Madd Maxx dove in, sending a sheet of water crashing over her like a tidal wave and soaking her to the skin. Ordinarily she applauded when Madd Maxx made a dive. It really pleased him. But this time she kept on running toward the barn. Unlocking the door, she hesitated a moment, almost afraid to look inside. Finally she opened it a crack and peered in. To her utter surprise, not a thing had been disturbed.
Granny Thistle’s black lace shawl was draped around the shoulders of the wire dressmaker’s dummy, just as it had been the day before. Her flowered china teapot rested its stout bottom on the same gate-legged table as always. The lampshades and silver platters were in their proper places. So were the high buttoned shoes, the antimacassars and the camisoles, as well as the other whatcha-ma-bobs and thinga-ma-jiggers. From the ceiling the bear trap dangled by its chain the same as always and the iron pots and kettles hung on their pegs undisturbed.
Alan made a bee-line for the wooden soldiers posed as if they were marching across a table in the corner. Susannah frowned and leaned against a red and white striped barber pole in puzzled thought. This wasn’t what she had expected to find at all. Had something happened to Granny Thistle? Could ghosts get sick? It didn’t seem likely.
Before she had time to give it much thought, she heard the screech of brakes outside the barn door. An instant later, a woman’s voice mingled with the slamming of car doors.
“It was the most extraordinary thing,” the voice was saying. “First the pink parasol jumped out of my hand...”
Susannah grabbed Alan and slapped a hand over his mouth. Then she froze icicle stiff. It sounded like the woman with the pushed in face, and she had brought someone with her--probably the police. A big wad of panic the size of a baseball leaped into her throat and nearly choked off her breath.
What if the lady had brought the police to investigate the strange goings on in the Antiques and Junque Shop? And, even worse, what if Granny Thistle decided to show off again? After all, it was a stormy day, and she was just as cantankerous and mule-headed as Gramps said she was, although no one else ever said so out loud. It would be just like her to come whizzing in on her unicycle and scare the wits out of everybody--including the policeman.
Susannah needed help. She needed rescuing! She reached for a string hanging by the back wall that ran all the way to the house and connected to a bell in the kitchen and yanked so hard it nearly snapped. At that same instant, the shop door opened, and the woman with the pushed in face stepped inside.