Here's another story. I'm posting this one on this thread in three parts.


As usual, driving up Highway 7 toward Hot Springs with Heather at the wheel proved a harrowing experience. Nobody who saw Heather’s usual quiet, even slightly timid self would ever imagine how uninhibited she could be about driving at full speed down a winding mountain road. “This road sure does have some hairpin turns,” Nik observed, hoping that Heather would take this as a hint to watch her speed.

“You should have seen it when we drove down this way to my grandparents’ house when I was a girl,” Heather replied cheerfully, as she hit the brakes for the briefest of moments before careening around the next curve. “It used to be a lot worse before they widened the road and relocated some spots. They even eliminated Deadman’s Curve.”

“And it was very nice of the Highway Department to do that,” said Lindy. She had not let go of the arm rest on the front passenger’s side door for the last several miles.

Heather flicked on the left-turn signal for a split second and pulled into the left lane. She gunned the car past an elderly pickup truck to the right. “I’m also glad that some of the curves have two lanes so that you can get around slowpokes. We make so much better time not having to wait for them!”

“I’ve always paid less attention to making good time than to getting there at all,” Nik commented, still hinting.

The wooded mountains through which they drove gave way to somewhat less steep terrain. They began to see more houses and open spots along the sides of the road. “We just crossed the Garland County Line,” Heather announced. “Just a few more miles to Lake Hamilton. Lindy, you’ve got those directions to Lisa’s lake house, don’t you?"

“They’re right here in my hand. We’ll turn right onto Highway 290. It should be just about another two miles.”

With Lindy reading Lisa’s directions, Heather had little trouble navigating from the main highway to the network of little roads that wound around the steep, twisting eastern banks of Lake Hamilton. Nik felt relieved to see Heather slow down, the better to read signs and look for turnoffs. They soon arrived at the appointed address.

“Hey, it looks like we beat Lisa here. I knew we were making good time!”

“I’m just glad we made it,” Nik muttered to herself as they got out of the car. She took a good look at their destination. From the road the lake house looked like an unprepossessing older home, covered with old-fashioned siding. It seemed a bit nondescript, a little worn with age, but somehow pleasant nonetheless. A grove of good-sized pines shielded it from the early summer sun. Around the side of the house they could just see the lake.

“Here comes Lisa,” said Lindy.

The others listened and heard a car approaching along the road. Sure enough, they heard it slow down and recognized it as their friend’s vehicle. Lisa pulled into the driveway behind Heather’s car.

“How did you know that was Lisa before you saw her car?” asked Nik.

“I recognized that Ford engine. And it was knocking noticeably. She really needs to remember to use a higher-octane grade of gasoline.”

Heather raced to give Lisa a hug as she stepped out of her car. “Hey, girl! It’s been so long since we’ve seen you!”

Lisa laughed. “It’s only a few weeks since school let out. If you miss me so much, I can’t imagine how you’re doing without Glenn!”

“You ought to hear how much time they spend on the phone with each other,” Nik said, as she and Lisa exchanged hugs.

“I hope you haven’t been waiting long.”

“Oh, we just got here. We made good time on the road.”

Nik sighed. Heather and her “good time on the road!”
“Well, come on, let me show you Grandaddy’s lake house!”

Lisa produced a key and opened the door. As she stepped over the threshold she turned to the left and began punching a little keypad on the wall. A sudden loud beep made everyone jump, especially Heather. “Sorry. I just had to turn off the alarm first thing. It does that every time someone arms or disarms the system. I guess I should have warned you. Anyway, welcome to the Childers family lake house!”

They stood in the lake house’s living room. It was of modest size, with a vaulted ceiling that went all the way to the eaves. Exposed ceiling beams and a stone fireplace on one end gave the place a somewhat rustic look. The room had the usual living room furniture, all old and a bit worn. Quaint-looking pictures of rural and lake scenes decorated the walls. The room looked and smelled rather dusty.

“This room seemed so big and tall when I was a girl!” said Lisa. “We spent a week or two here every summer when I was growing up. Once in a while we came during the winter holidays too. One year we even had Christmas here. That was one of my favorite Christmas times!”

Lisa led them through a door on the right that passed into the kitchen and dining area. The kitchen had the same comfortably worn look as the living room. “Nannie always had eight-ounce sodas in bottles waiting for us in the refrigerator when we came in from a hot day outside. And any time we caught fish she cooked them up right here.”

A door in the kitchen took them out onto a large screened-in porch with chairs and a chaise lounge. “We’d sit out here in the evenings where the bugs couldn’t get us. On really hot evenings we’d even sleep out here. I remember it raining sometimes while we were on the porch. I’d just listen to the rain and the thunder in the distance. It made you feel so close to the outdoors.” Lisa closed her eyes and smiled.

In a moment she came out of her little reverie. She unlatched a door and led the others down a flight of steps. Nik could see now that this lake house, like others on the lake, was perched on a steep hillside. The hillside leveled a little as they reached the edge of the lake. A small boathouse and dock, both in need of repair, jutted into the water. Across the sunny stretch of water they saw a wooded shore with another, somewhat larger lake house.

“With all these trees around you could almost think you were out in the middle of the wilderness,” said Heather.

“I know. My sister and cousins and I used to pretend we were. We would explore the woods. There were spots where we could get out of sight of the house. Grandaddy owns six acres along the lake. There weren’t any fences, so we could go onto the neighboring properties, as long as we didn’t get too close to the houses. This part of the lake is still pretty underdeveloped compared to a lot of it. Nowadays some places have houses and condominiums almost touching each other. I hope this part can stay like this for a while longer.”

Lisa sighed. “Grandaddy has been sick a lot in the last couple of years. He can’t come out here much any more. You might have noticed that the place needs a bit of cleaning! That’s part of why he let me bring friends out here—so somebody would be able to enjoy using the house and clean it up and make it lived-in. That, and I asked him nicely!”

She sighed again. “Grandaddy has started thinking about selling it. He could sure get a lot for it and the land now! I don’t think he will, though. He loves the place, and he knows the family does too. Well, let’s go start making this house look lived-in!”

Lisa led them back to the house, steadily reminiscing about the good times she and her family had spent there. Nik felt glad that their friend had thought to invite them here to spend a long weekend. She felt even happier that she had been able to get some time off from her camp counseling job to take advantage of it. It would be nice to have some vacation time of her own, instead of spending the whole summer helping kids with theirs!

Back in the house, the group spent a little time tidying up the place for their stay. “When was the house built?” Lindy asked, as she wiped one of the kitchen windows.

Lisa paused from her own window wiping. “It was in the late 1940s—1947, I think. The man who built it was a wealthy Little Rock businessman who came down here for his vacations. He didn’t get to enjoy it for very long.”

“What hap....”

A scream from a cupboard near the sink interrupted Lindy’s question. Heather darted away from the cupboard, her hand on her chest. “Oh my gosh, a big spider just crawled out of there!”

The spider appeared on the wall, heading toward Lindy’s window. Lindy stepped back with a slight gasp, hands raised in the air at her sides.

“Somebody kill it!” Heather wailed.

Nik sighed with exasperation and made for the wall with the broom she had been using on the kitchen floor. She swung at the spider and missed. It raced down the wall, dodged another swing of the broom, and began scuttling across the floor toward the others. Heather yelped. She and Lisa both shrank back from the arachnid’s approach.

Lindy stood her ground and began stomping on the floor, her foot stretched out as far as she could reach. Now the poor spider had to dodge both Nik’s broom and Lindy’s foot. Lindy’s shoe made contact first.

“Nailed him dead center!” Nik cried in triumph. “He won’t have the guts to try that again!”

Heather made a small sound in her throat at that, and Lindy winced.
“I…think I need something to wipe my shoe with.” Lindy’s voice sounded low and calm as usual. Nik thought it carried just a hint of forced calm.

Lisa handed Lindy a wad of paper towels. Lindy gingerly wiped her sole, slowly looked at the results, made a face, and wiped again. Satisfied, she disposed of her paper towels in the trash can.

Nik returned to the spot where she had been sweeping. “Now that the excitement’s over, we can get back to work.”

“What if I find another spider?”

“That’s kind of the idea of cleaning house, isn’t it? Better to find stuff like that when you’re looking, in the daytime, than when you aren’t, like at bedtime.”

As they returned to their cleaning, Lindy remembered her question. “What happened to the house’s original owner?”

“He got into some real trouble,” Lisa said. “He kept coming down for the weekend with his…girlfriend. One night he and some of his cronies had a party. It got kind of wild. Somehow or other his girlfriend drowned in the middle of it.”

“That’s horrible!” said Heather.

“It created a real scandal. The owner of the house and his other guests convinced the police that it was an accident. Some people spread rumors that it wasn’t—or at least that if it was an accident, the owner was responsible. His reputation was ruined. He sold the place and his business and ended up leaving the state.

“A couple of other people owned the place over the years. Grandaddy bought it in 1972, when I was just a little girl. By that time it had a ghost story attached to it.”

“Really?” Nik caught the unmistakable interest in Lindy’s voice.

“Yes. There were stories about how the ghost of the drowned girlfriend would rise from the water and walk up to the house, looking for her killer. People said that was what made the original owner sell the house.”

“Is anyone supposed to have seen the ghost since?”

“I’ve heard stories about the other owners of the house seeing it, but I never met anyone who said he or she had personally seen it. My cousin Morgan did wake up one night saying he had seen a woman who wasn’t supposed to be there standing in the room with him. That was when I was about twelve and he was eight. He was afraid to spend the night here for a long time after that. We all figured he had just been dreaming.”

“No doubt.” Lindy stepped back from the window. “I’m done here. Should I start on the living room windows next?”

“Yes, please.”

The house cleaning proceeded without further incident. Nik did see another spider; she dealt with it before anyone else could see it and freak out over it. After the cleaning, they cleaned themselves up and went out for a bite to eat.

Back at the house, they visited and played board games from the house’s supply of these until nearly midnight. Lindy and Nik had been ready to turn in for some time by that point. Eventually Lisa got the hint from their constant yawning and suggested that they all go to bed.

As they moved to their rooms, Lisa checked the locks on the doors and windows. She then armed the alarm system with a loud beep.

“You’re…” Lindy yawned, “…awfully security-conscious here.”

“Grandaddy had some trouble with vandals a while back. Grandaddy’s business partner, Mr. Raymond, suggested that he put in the alarm system. Mr. Raymond knew a lot about them, so he helped Grandaddy pick out a good system. Now that the alarm is set, if anybody opens any of the doors or windows the alarm will go off if they don’t punch in the code to disarm it within thirty seconds.

“Grandaddy made me promise up and down that I’d be sure to set the alarm at night! He worries about me staying out here with friends if he or another man isn’t here. He’s been worrying about a lot of things since his health started to go bad in the last couple of years.”

Nik dozed off fairly quickly, grateful that the early summer night felt cool enough for her hot-natured body. She slept quite soundly until a scream awakened her. She rose up on her elbow and looked around in the dark room.

She heard the scream again.

“What was that?” came Lindy’s voice from the dark beside her.

Nik rolled out of her bed and groped for the door. She had the bed closest to it; Lindy had insisted on sleeping in the bed next to the wall.

“Heather! Lisa! We’re coming!”

Hardly bothering to think about what she might be encountering, Nik snapped on the room’s light and pulled open the door. In the hallway she saw the door to the room Heather and Lisa shared standing open. She strode to the door and pushed through it.

By the dim light coming from her own room she saw Heather and Lisa sitting up in their bunk beds. “Are you two all right?”

“I…I saw somebody here in the room with us,” stammered Lisa, who had the bottom bunk.”

“You saw what?” Lindy had made it to the room, unruly red hair streaming over the shoulders of her pajamas.

“I saw somebody in the room with us. It was a woman. I only saw her lower body. She wore a dress. It looked sopping wet….”
“What did you do?”

“I screamed, and I pulled the covers over my eyes. Lindy, she was glowing! Or anyway her dress was.”

“Heather did you see anything?”

Heather looked back from the top bunk, eyes wide. “No. I just heard this scream. It took me a moment to wake up enough to react.”

“We’d better look around to see if we can find a prowler,” Nik said.

They searched and found nothing. The outside doors and windows were all still closed and locked. The keypad in the living room showed that the alarm was still armed.

“I guess I was just dreaming,” Lisa admitted. “That was the room Morgan said he saw a ghost in years ago—the one with the bunks was always where the boys slept. I thought about that just before I went to bed. It seemed so real!”

They walked back down the hall toward their rooms.

“Eeyewwww!”

“What are you `eeyewwwwing’ about, Heather?” wondered Nik.

“I keep stepping in something wet! It’s like somebody mopped the floor and it didn’t dry completely. But we just swept, we didn’t mop!”

Lindy knelt and took a close look at the wet spot. “I thought I stepped in something wet a few moments ago as well. Here’s a wet spot here. And another one further down the hall a little way…. And another!”

Lindy returned to Lisa’s and Heather’s room. “Here’s a wet spot by the bed.”

She stepped back into the hallway and traced the trail of wet spots out the other end. “The wet spots lead through the living room. Right up to….here!”

Lindy had stopped in front of the outside door. “Those wet spots are far enough apart to be footprints. It’s somebody with a stride similar to mine. There was somebody with sopping wet feet here only a short time ago.”

Heather shivered. “Oooo, that’s creepy! I can’t believe somebody was in here!”

“Me neither,” said Lindy. “Since the door is still locked and the alarm is still armed!”

Lisa began to tremble. “Maybe I wasn’t just seeing things. Maybe there really is a ghost haunting this house!”

Part two:

It took some doing to get Lisa calmed down enough to go back to bed. Nik did not blame her that much. Either a stranger had broken into the lake house without needing to unlock the doors, or else the house really did contain a ghost.

“I admit, those are both disturbing possibilities,” said Lindy, as they discussed the incident in their room. “Or it could be there’s an explanation for the wet spots that we haven’t figured out yet. We’ll take another look at it in the morning.”

“You can get back to sleep after what just happened?”

Lindy yawned. “I’m tired enough to sleep after just about anything right now! Good night.”

Once the lights were out and everything grew still, Nik found herself able to sleep as well. It took her quite a while to get there, especially after Lindy began snoring.

They naturally arose rather late the next morning. Lindy did a very careful search of the house. She could not figure out how an intruder could have gotten in—or how water could have dripped inside. “It didn’t rain last night, and there’s no sign of leaky plumbing. Too bad we don’t have Glenn Greeson here to double check.”

“Well, as soon as we can get to a telephone I’m going to call Mr. Raymond and see if he can check the alarm for us,” said Lisa.

“Does he live near here?” asked Heather. “I thought he lived in Little Rock, like your grandfather.”

“No, they have a branch of the business in Hot Springs. Mr. Raymond manages that part of it. He’ll probably take over running it all when Grandaddy retires.”

“Let’s not let it ruin our day,” said Lindy. “We had plans to spend the day in Hot Springs. We might as well go ahead and do as we planned.”

They all dressed for town and got into Lisa’s car. At a convenience store Lisa called Mr. Raymond’s office. A quick conversation ensued. Lisa returned to the car with a smile on her face. “He said he could come this afternoon at about five-thirty. I’ll feel better once we’ve had someone check the locks and the alarm.” Lisa lowered her voice. “Look, I didn’t tell him anything about what happened last night. I just said something about thinking the alarm could use a check-up. I don’t want Mr. Raymond to know we saw something there last night, or he’ll tell Grandaddy and Grandaddy will be worried.”

Lisa next turned up Highway 7 toward Hot Springs. The road carried them across Lake Hamilton, via three bridges and two islands. The shores of the lake in this area were lined with houses, condominiums, restaurants, and boat rentals. The place looked as if it had been about as heavily developed as it could possibly be.

“I miss how this area used to look,” said Heather. “When I was a girl a lot of these buildings weren’t here. And there used to be this great old bridge with a fancy balustrade and little ornamental benches running along it. The new bridge they replaced it with is so…nondescript!”

They continued downtown, past the Oaklawn race track. “Good thing it’s not racing season. The traffic is just insane then!”

Lisa nodded. “I know what you mean, Heather! We only came through here during racing season once. We never forgot it!”

They drove on down the main road, into the heart of Hot Springs. The old downtown looked like no other place Nik had ever seen. Old two- and three-story store and commercial buildings lined the streets. Usually old downtown areas like this were surrounded by miles of blight and suburbs. But here the steep, wooded cliffs of the Hot Springs National Park came right down to the edge of the buildings. Downtown Hot Springs looked like it had been stuffed into a little niche within a nature preserve. And in essence, that was what had happened.

They parked and set out to tour the downtown area on foot. First they walked along Bath House Row. Eight historical bath houses stood there, with names like Fordyce, Buckstaff, and Ozark. The buildings were done in a variety of architectural styles. The friends admired the arches, awnings, and whitewashed brick facades. Between two of the bath houses stood a huge, elaborate staircase leading up the steep hillside behind the row.

“Most of the hot springs that gave the city its name are somewhere along that hillside,” said Lisa. “I’ve seen pictures of what it used to look like. Now the springs are all covered to prevent pollution. Most of these bath houses were active until the 1970s or early 1980s. Now only the Buckstaff is still a bath house. The National Park Service has restored the others. The Fordyce is now a museum of Hot Springs history.”

“What about that great big old building at the end of the street? Nik pointed to a huge structure with at least ten stories topped by two little towers.

“That’s the Arlington Hotel. It’s also a bath house. That is one swanky place! Grandaddy took us to a function there when I was younger. He says when I get married he’d like to have the reception there.”

“That would be wonderful!” said Heather. “I bet it’s too expensive though—even for your grandfather.”

“You’re probably right. He’d try to book it anyway, though, if I let him.”

They drew near a fountain beside the sidewalk. Nik held out her hand and caught a few drops of the sparkling water. “Wow, that water is hot!”

“And it comes out of the ground like that!” said Lindy. “People used to think that drinking and bathing in that mineral water would cure all kinds of illnesses. Some people still do. Look, there’s somebody going to get some right now!”

Sure enough, they saw a middle-aged man approaching a tap on the side of the road with a pair of large plastic jugs. He began to fill them as they watched.

They stepped into the visitors’ center in the old Fordyce bath house. It took them over an hour to check out all of the exhibits. The bath house’s many rooms had been restored to look as they had at various times in the old building’s history. They saw dressing rooms, bathing and massage areas, special therapy facilities, and more. Nik felt as if she had stepped back in time as they passed all the old white tubs, the stainless-steel therapeutic showers and tables, and the old wooden dressing stalls. Some rooms had elaborate stained-glass windows and mosaics.

After exploring the museum, they crossed the street and began browsing the long line of shops. Nik and Lindy (especially Nik) were not the world’s biggest shoppers. Lisa and Heather were in their element. Nik and Lindy talked, until they passed a clothing store and Lindy joined the shopping. Clothes were her one weakness! Nik glanced at the merchandise a bit. She devoted the rest of her attention to watching the comings and goings of her friends and the other people there.

Nik got up more interest when they entered one of the area’s art galleries. She especially admired some nice rural scenes by a local artist. One of them was a beautiful canvas showing a farmer plowing a long row on his tractor beneath a dark, rainy sky. It reminded her of a time when she was a girl and had gone riding on her father’s tractor as he plowed, on a day a lot like the one in the picture.

For lunch they drove back to the lake and ate at a lakeside restaurant. They sat at an outside table, shielded from the sun by a large roof. There were plenty of people there, and Nik enjoyed watching them. Nik could not have asked for a better day for outdoor sightseeing. The skies were nice and blue, and the temperatures not bad at all in the shade.

After lunch Lisa drove them downtown again. “Now I’m going to take you all for a duck ride.”

“A what?” asked Nik.

“A duck ride!” seconded Heather. “You know that weird-looking truck with the awning on it that we passed on the way into town this morning? That’s a duck!”

“It’s a DUKW amphibious vehicle like they used in World War II,” Lindy explained. “People call them `ducks.’ It’s a floating tour bus.”

“I rode on one when I was a girl,” bubbled Heather. “It was so much fun! I guess Lisa’s been on them too. Have you ever ridden one, Lindy?”

“No. Daddy has told me about them. One of his fellow mechanics used to work on them when he was in the service.”

One of the duck tour operators had a duck parked on the curb near Bath House Row. They arrived just a few minutes before its next run. They boarded it up a little metal stairway—not before Lindy had taken the best look she could of the vehicle’s propeller housing. On board they sat down in seats like those on an old school bus. The whole vehicle reminded Nik of a funny-looking, open-sided school bus.
The vehicle had close to a capacity load of riders of all ages.

Everybody got a life jacket to put on. The driver, who wore a charter boat operator’s cap, introduced himself, gave everybody a couple of safety rules, and started up the engine. With a grinding of gears the old vehicle pulled onto the street.

For a while the drive ran like a normal bus tour, with the operator pointing out the sights and making a few funny comments. Then they got to Lake Hamilton. The duck pulled off of the road into a small lot with a boat ramp. The driver climbed down and opened the gate across the ramp. The duck then eased down the ramp and into the water. Some of the children on board were very excited. Heather seemed almost beside herself. Nik thought it pretty neat to be driving into the water too. She could not resist sticking her hand over the side and trying to feel the duck’s wake.

The duck cruised around the banks of the lake for a while, pointing out several lake houses that had had famous owners and other sights. It then returned to the boat ramp and drove back up out of the water. The tour finished up back where it had started. As they dismounted, Lindy asked the driver a few questions about the duck’s engine, drive shaft arrangement, and other technical details. He answered them readily, looking as bemused as most men were when Lindy asked them those sorts of knowledgeable questions about machinery.

After their duck tour they drove to the Hot Springs Mall and did some more shopping. At length (more length than Nik would have liked) they returned to the Childers family lake house.

When they arrived they saw a car there already. “I think that’s Mr. Raymond’s car. He must be here checking the alarm.”

As they approached the house, a loud siren sound burst from it. Everybody jumped, especially Heather and Lisa. The alarm shut off after only a few seconds.

A slim, graying man in his fifties stepped out of the house. “Hello there, young lady!” he greeted, as he saw Lisa.

“Mr. Raymond, these are the friends I told you about—Heather, Lindy, and Nik.”

The man gave them all a large and winning smile. “Paul Raymond, at your service. I’m pleased to meet you all. As I’m sure you all just heard, I’ve been testing the alarm on this place. It checks out fine. I inspected all the locks as well.”

“You didn’t find any evidence of any problems with any of them?” asked Lindy.

“Not a one. This place is as sound as a forty-year-old lake house can be. There’s no way anybody could get in short of breaking down a door or window. I don’t think you’ll have any more trouble tonight. So, have you ladies got any big plans?”

“We were going to have dinner and see a movie,” Lisa said. “We’re not big night owls. We’ll probably be back by ten or so.”

“Well, good. I know your grandfather would feel better knowing you aren’t staying out too late.”

Mr. Raymond checked his watch. “I’d like to stay and chat, ladies, but I’d better head home. Lisa, I hope you’ll give my regards to Van next time you see him.”

“Of course, Mr. Raymond. Grandaddy sends his regards, too.”

Mr. Raymond walked to his car. “Goodbye, ladies!”

“He looks like he could be a real charmer,” said Lindy, as they watched him pull away.

“He’s a good-looking man for his age, that’s for sure,” agreed Lisa. “He’s a little too charming. He and his wife divorced a while back. I overheard Grandaddy saying something about him having too much of an eye for the ladies. Grandaddy was sad about that. He really admires Mr. Raymond otherwise.

“Well, we need to get ourselves straightened up. I plan to take you all for a night on the town!”

They spent a little while getting ready. Lindy changed out of the tennis-style outfit she had worn that day and into a blue blouse and skirt that brought out her eyes. She also put on a contrasting scarf that Nik recognized as one Lindy had bought that day at the mall.

“What is it with you and scarves? I’ve never seen you without a scarf!”

“I just…like to wear them,” said Lindy. “Come on, let’s join the others. I hear the place Lisa’s taking us is one of the best restaurants in town.”

“Do I look sharp enough for it?”

Lindy stepped back and considered the dark skirt and blouse Nik had just put on. Nik did not particularly like dressing up to go out. She felt awkward and self-conscious at her lack of Lindy’s sense of style.

“You’ll do,” said Lindy simply.

“You mean it?”

“I don’t say things I don’t mean. Relax, Nik, you look just fine!”

The restaurant was indeed a nice place, with candlelight, tasteful décor, and soft music. Nik still felt a bit out-of-place. She enjoyed being with her friends, though, and thoroughly savored her surf-and-turf meal. Nik had never had lobster before. She loved it.

After the meal they drove to the nearest movie theater and took in the latest romantic comedy. It was set in the 1960s. Lindy spent much of the movie identifying the make of each and every car that appeared onscreen. Nik, to be honest, found that at least as interesting as the story. She had to admit that the movie had a sweet finish.

They spent most of the drive home discussing guys—more particularly, Lindy and guys. “Yeah, Lindy keeps turning those heads as she walks by,” Heather remarked.

“I can second that,” Nik put in. “I saw some doing that while we were downtown today.”

“I’d be interested to know what it’s like to attract that kind of attention some time,” said Lisa.

Heather sighed. “Me too.”

Lindy rolled her eyes. “That’s really something, coming from the first runner-up for the Miss Quapaw University pageant a few months back. And Heather, you know everybody thinks you’re a doll.”

Nik gave a somewhat sardonic chuckle. “Then there’s me. The guys pretty well just think I’m one of them!”

Lindy grabbed Nik’s hand. “Oh, come on! You probably have more guys who like to hang out with you than any of the rest of us.”

Heather looked back at them from the front seat, china-doll eyes sparkling mischievously. “I think somebody’s trying to distract attention from herself. I believe we were talking about you! I’m pretty sure Lisa doesn’t even turn as many heads as you do.”

“I don’t think I turn my own head as much either! Lindy is a master at checking the guys out. Notice how she discreetly lowered her sunglasses every time a nice-looking guy passed by today? Lindy, my friend, you’ve got a case of the boy-crazies.”

“I saw you making eyes at that waiter this evening,” Nik said. “Every time he came by the table.”

“Which he did quite a bit,” Lisa added.

“Can you blame me? He had the most gorgeous eyes!”

Heather giggled. “See! Boy-crazy!”

They continued joshing Lindy until they reached the lake. Lisa drove around a bit to show her friends the lights along the lake shore. By the time they reached the Childers family lake house it was well after ten.

Heather gave a little spin on her heels as she entered the living room and flopped down in a chair. “This has been a great evening, Lisa! Thank you so much!”

“It’s the least I can do for some of my very best friends!”

Lindy put her hands together above her head and stretched, stifling a yawn as she did so. “I don’t think I’ll need to be rocked to sleep tonight.”

Nik yawned also. “My neither! We might have gotten started late, but we had a full day. We also didn’t sleep too well the night before.”

Heather drew her short legs up close to her in her chair as if she were cold. “Oooo, don’t remind me! I really want to have a good rest tonight.”

“Oh, we can’t turn in yet!” Lisa protested. “Let’s at least go out on the screened-in porch and admire the evening. I never go to bed when I’m at the lake until I’ve taken a good look at the water.” She walked out to the porch. “Come on,” she called. “The stars are out and the moon is mostly full.”

They stepped out onto the covered porch with Lisa. The four friends looked through the screened windows at the lake scene below them. The moon looked lovely, both in the sky and reflected on the lake’s surface. Across the lake they could see the lights of the nearest lake house on the opposite shore. All they heard was the chirping of crickets and the rumble of a distant boat motor.

“Hey, I see a light down near the boat house,” said Heather.

Nik looked down at the dark water by the bank. Sure enough, she made out a kind of glow on the water. Even as she spotted it, she saw the glow begin to rise out of the water. The glow took on the form of a head…and then shoulders…and then a torso. A whole body was rising from beneath the surface of the lake, moving toward the shore. Moving toward the house….

Part three:

Heather gasped. In the dim light from the living room door Nik saw her standing with her hand to her mouth, trembling, eyes wide. Lisa looked about as terrified. Nik felt pretty terrified herself!

Lindy’s eyes were wide as well, but she did not appear on the verge of panic. “All of you, be quiet!” she whispered.

The apparition had by now risen completely from the water. It began walking up the bank toward the house, with a slow, steady tread. Now they could see that it had the form of a woman wearing a rather old-style party dress. Nik could just make out long, streaming hair framing the figure’s indistinct face.

“Oh my gosh, it is a ghost!” Lisa moaned.

The figure stopped at the base of the steps leading up to the screened-in porch. She stood only a few yards away and looked up at them. Nik saw a pair of baleful eyes glaring at her and the others. The figure hated them—it hated everyone in the house where it had died!

A moment later the ghost turned and strode back toward the water. Within a few moments it had reached the dark water’s edge. The woman simply kept going, sinking further and further into the water. At last her head disappeared from view, leaving only a little smear of light. Then it seemed to fade and swirl away into nothingness.

“We’ve got to get out of here!”

“No, Lisa, we’re staying right here.”

“Lindy, I’m not spending another night in this house. We can get a room in town!”

“Well I’m going down to the water to take a look first.”

Heather looked horrified. “Lindy! What if you go down there and the ghost….”

“And the ghost does what? Rises up out of the water and drags me to a watery grave? If it is a ghost it’s bound to be harmless. If it’s not a ghost, it will have left a trace of some kind.”

“If you really think that wasn’t a ghost, then we need to call the police!” said Lisa.

“It’ll take a while to get to a telephone and fetch them out here. I want to check out that spot right now! Nik, are you with me?”

Nik swallowed hard. She did not at all like the prospect of walking down where that thing had just appeared! But Lindy seemed very sure that they needed to inspect the scene of the apparition right now. Nik had always known her to have good instincts.

“If you’re brave enough to go down there, I am too!”

“Okay, then, let me get a flashlight from our room. Nik, keep an eye on the boathouse while I’m gone.” Lindy rushed away and returned a minute later with a small light.

“Lisa, your keys to the house include a key to the boat house, don’t they?”

“Yes.”

“We’ll need those, then.”

“Why do you want to look in the boat house? Grandaddy told me there’s nothing there. He hasn’t had his boat on the lake in a couple of years.”

“Because I think what we just saw is a flesh-and-blood person. She emerged from the water next to the boat house. That’s also where she disappeared. Unless she has an underwater headquarters somewhere nearby, that’s the only place she could have gone. But she could still give us the slip if we don’t go ahead and move!”

As they prepared to step out onto the steps down to the lake, a thought struck Nik. “What do we do if we open up the boat house and there’s somebody inside?”

“You’ll adopt your most intimidating voice and tell them to come out.”

“Okay…but what if they’re armed?”

“I doubt that very seriously. These `haunting’ activities don’t require the haunter to carry a weapon. I doubt whether she’s an experienced criminal who’s accustomed to going armed.”

They stepped down to the lake shore, with Lindy in front bearing the flashlight and the key to the boat house. Neither said anything. All Nik heard were their footsteps and the chirping of the crickets around them. Nik swallowed hard a few times, trying to force her heart and breathing to stay at their normal speeds. She told herself again that Lindy’s guesses about things were usually right.

The approached the boat house door. Lindy fumbled with the key, trying to insert it in the lock. A loud sound of rattling metal startled them.

“What’s that?” wondered Nik.

“That’s somebody opening the garage door on the water end of the house! Oh, come on! This stupid lock doesn’t want to open!”

Now they heard a whirring sound from inside, like that of an electric motor. Lindy finally got the key to turn and threw the door open. She flashed the light inside.

The boat house stood empty. Through the open garage door on the far end they saw a figure on a small boat drawing away from the boat house out into the lake. Nik at once recognized the boat as a little sport fishing craft with a quiet electric motor to avoid scaring the fish.

“They’re getting away!”

Lindy sighed. “There’s nothing we can do about it now!” She began to shine her light around the interior. “Maybe our prowler left some evidence behind.”

Most of the inside of the boat house was open to the water, with only a small area of flooring by the landward end and catwalks running along the sides. Lindy’s light found nothing but a rusty gasoline can, some old life jackets, a broken paddle, and a few other odds and ends.

Lindy now turned her beam to the ceiling. “It looks like there’s a shelf running right overhead up under the eaves. Here, Nik, give me a boost so I can check that `attic.’”

Nik squatted. Lindy, a former cheerleader, mounted her shoulders easily. Nik straightened with a grunt. Lindy was slim, but not skinny—and not terribly light!

“Now this looks interesting! Can you move just a little bit closer?
There’s something up here. It looks like it was shoved into this space from the other end.”

Nik moved right up to the crawl space. “My feet are awfully close to the water’s edge here!”’ she warned. “Hey! Watch it!”

“Sorry. I’ve got to climb higher on your shoulders to reach in here. Okay, I’ve got it!”

Nik heard something slide along the shelf. A moment later it plopped to the floor beside her. Lindy leaped off of Nik’s shoulder and landed like a cat behind her.

Nik rubbed her shoulders. “Glad that’s over! What did you find?”

“It looks like a duffel bag.” Lindy unzipped the bag. She pulled out a handful of cloth. It glowed. “Jackpot!”

They lost no time carrying their find up to the house for a closer look. Lindy carefully laid the wet garment she had found in the bag out on the kitchen floor.

“What is that?” asked Heather.

“It’s a bodysuit of some kind,” Lindy replied. “It has a dress sewn right onto it. It’s all covered with a phosphorescent compound of some sort.” She rummaged in the bag some more and hauled out another item. “Look at this.”

Nik took it from Lindy’s hand. It was a face mask, outlined with rudimentary facial features. “Is this supposed to be the ghost’s face? It looked a lot more lifelike when we saw it.”

“It only needed to be a suggestion of a face. Our imaginations filled in the details in the dark. This outfit could be worn over the prowler’s normal clothes and pulled on and off quickly as needed.

“She must have sneaked into the boat house in that stealth boat of hers. All she had to do was drop into the water, move over a few feet, and stand up and start walking out of the water. She wouldn’t have had to hold her breath for long. Then she could disappear back into the lake by reversing the process.”

Lindy had been examining the duffel bag as she spoke. “Well, there’s nothing else in there. And unfortunately no clue to the owner’s identity. Now let’s have a better look at that bodysuit.”

Heather knelt beside the outfit and fingered it. “You know, this feels like a real old outfit. I’m surprised the water hasn’t ruined it yet.”

Lisa felt the cloth as well. “I think you’re right. It looks like something you might find at Melody’s.”

“At where?”

“Melody’s Classic Clothes. It’s a vintage clothing store in Hot Springs. I was thinking of taking you all there tomorrow.”

Lindy thoughtfully fingered a lock of her red hair. “I think we should pay that place a visit tomorrow. In fact, I think there are several people we should contact tomorrow. But first we might as well go ahead and get some sleep.”

“Sleep!” Heather shuddered. “How are we supposed to sleep now?”

“By going to bed and shutting our eyes. How else do you go to sleep? It’s a sure bet that prowler won’t be back here tonight, after almost getting caught!”

The next evening Paul Raymond pulled up to the Childers lake house a little after five. Lisa and her friend Heather stood outside waiting for him.
“So you need me to take another look at that alarm, huh?”

Lisa seemed very nervous. “Yes, Mr. Raymond. It’s not working right. There…there’s somebody here who wants to talk to you about that.”
The door to the house opened. A police officer stepped out, followed closely by Nik and Lindy.

“Paul Raymond? You’re under arrest for criminal trespassing, unlawful entry, and tampering with a security device.” The officer began to read him his rights.

Raymond looked bewildered. “What are you talking about?”

“We’re talking about the ‘ghost’ that has been haunting this house the last two nights,” said Lindy.

“The what? I don’t know anything about a ghost here the last two nights.”

“I believe you do, Mr. Raymond. When Lisa called you yesterday, she made no mention of our having experienced any trouble at the lake house the night before. Yet you told us that you thought we would not experience any more trouble. You knew we had experienced some.”

Nik thought she saw Raymond starting to look worried—guilty-type worried! “I still don’t know what’s going on!”

“Sir, these young ladies tell me that this morning they called Roberson Security Systems in Hot Springs and had them check the alarms on this house. The technician found that someone had altered the alarm so that it would sound a test alarm, but would not sound when a door or window was opened. Miss Childers and the others are all prepared to testify that you were the last person seen working on the system.

“They also say that they have had a trespasser disguised as a ghost for the past two nights. The night before last this trespasser entered the house while all the doors were locked without breaking in. That suggests that this person had keys to the house. You’re known to possess a set.”

Raymond glared at the officer—and at the girls. “None of that proves that I did anything. People can break in without ruining a lock.”

“We also have other evidence,” Lindy announced. “The trespasser left her ghost outfit in the boat house. Part of it was a dress that we learned this morning had been purchased at Melody’s Classic Clothes in Hot Springs. The purchaser was a young woman who used a credit card that we’ve traced to you. And I would bet they’re going to find your fingerprints inside the alarm keypad, where you’ve been monkeying with it.”

The officer resumed speaking. “We’ve already spoken with the young woman, a Stacey Mylam. She confessed everything. According to her, you wanted to frighten the Childers family into selling their property to you, so that you and she could profit by reselling it.”

Raymond’s mouth fell open. “Stacey…. She wouldn’t….”

“She did!” Lindy’s voice carried a note of triumph. “And since you hadn’t yet gone to the trouble of marrying her, she won’t have any trouble testifying against you in court.”

Raymond made no attempt to resist arrest. It seemed as though his will had simply collapsed from the shock of being caught.

That evening the four friends had a cookout at the lake house. “I hate that we had to spend most of the day at the police station,” said Lisa, as she helped Heather grill the hamburgers. “I had really looked forward to taking all of you for a picnic at Gulpha Gorge.”

“Maybe next time,” said Nik.

“How did your Grandfather take it when you told him over the telephone about what Mr. Raymond had done?” Lindy asked.

Lisa sighed. “He had a really hard time believing me. A police officer had to get on the phone and speak with him to help convince him. He’d really upset at Mr. Raymond betraying him like that. But he was glad that we’re okay.

“I asked him if he would ever sell the place. He told me no, he was going to keep it in the family no matter what! I was really glad to hear that.”

Heather looked around at the trees, the house, and the lake. “I’m glad. I hope you and your family will get to enjoy this place for years to come!”

“And your friends!” Nik added. “It ought to be a lot more fun now that there are no longer any ghosts!”