Dunc and the Flaming Ghost by Gary Paulsen

Author:Gary Paulsen [Paulsen, Gary]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-307-80373-3
Publisher: Random House Children's Books
Published: 2011-08-02T16:00:00+00:00

• 6

From the top of the stairs the cellar looked like a bottomless pit. The light from Eddie’s lantern didn’t seem to illuminate very much.

“Do you see anything?” Dunc asked.

“Nothing,” Amos said, “and I prefer to keep it that way.”

“Go down the steps a little farther.”

“Are you crazy?”

Dunc sighed. “I guess I’ll have to find the box myself. I’ll get all the credit, all the glory. My picture will be on Melissa’s wall.”

Amos led the way down the stairs.

The lantern light showed what looked like a typical cellar. All the walls were made of brick except the far wooden one. There were shelves filled with old boxes, jars, and wine bottles. Everything was dusty. It looked as if no one had been down there in fifty years.

“Look at the floor,” Dunc said.

There were footprints in the dust leading to the wooden wall.

“The two men in the van. It’s their tracks. See how they lead from the door to the wooden wall and back again?” He rapped the wood with his knuckles. It sounded hollow.

“I bet it’s a secret door,” Eddie said.

“I think you’re right.” Dunc pressed his ear to the wood. “I wonder how they opened it.”

“Maybe they have a key.”

“There’s no keyhole. There must be a secret latch or something.” He ran his hands lightly back and forth across the wood. “See if you can find anything.” Amos and Eddie began searching.

Amos looked through the wine shelves that ran perpendicular to the wall. He ran his fingertips along the little lip on the bottom shelf that kept the bottles from falling off. Nothing.

He did the same with the other shelves. He had to stretch himself out to reach the top. As he did, he smacked something with his leg.

“Ouch!”

He searched the bottom shelf again, more carefully this time.

“It’s a faucet.”

Dunc knelt down. “Eddie, have you seen any other plumbing in this house?”

“Only in the kitchen.”

“Then what’s a faucet doing down here?” He turned it on. No water came out.

“Look underneath it,” Amos said. “All the dust has been washed away.”

Dunc touched the floor. “It’s even a little damp. There was water coming out of this not too long ago.”

“Why doesn’t it work now?” Amos asked.

“I don’t know.” Dunc turned the faucet handle to off. He sat back and thought hard. After a minute he shrugged his shoulders.

“I can’t figure it out. Maybe there’s another valve somewhere that you have to turn on first.” They looked around for fifteen more minutes. They didn’t find anything.

“Too bad you’re not a real ghost, Eddie,” Amos said. “If you were, you could just stick your head through the wall and see what’s on the other side. It would save us a lot of trouble. I wish Blackbeard was here.” He stopped. “I take that back.”

Then Amos held up his hand. “Listen—do you guys hear anything? Like a sword rattling or something?”

“Be serious, Amos. I’m trying to think.”

“I am serious. Do you hear anything?”

A scuffling began very faintly on the other side of the wooden wall, then grew louder and louder.

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