The Haunting by Lindsey Duga

Author:Lindsey Duga
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Scholastic Inc.

Archie sniffed the threshold of the library door. Emily held the key ring in her hand, but she was having a hard time preventing them from jangling. Her fingers just kept shaking.

What was she doing back here? What was she hoping to prove? That she wasn’t imagining everything? That she wasn’t going crazy?

The questions spun in her head as she pushed the big brass key into the lock and turned it. The click that followed sounded very loud to her, and the creak of the door as she pushed it open, even louder.

But the library during the day was like an entirely different room. It was bright, with sunlight pouring in through the windows, showing off tiny little dust motes floating in midair. Archie bounded into the room, his tail wagging, clearly much happier in the warmth of the summer day. Feeling braver, Emily hurried through the room. Even if the atmosphere was much different than last night, the bookshelves still felt threatening, after one had nearly crushed her.

Toward the back of the room, she came across the big mess. Except that she suspected either Miss Greer or Mr. Thornton tried to clean it up a little. The bookcase still lay splintered and cracked, but the books were stacked neatly in towers off to the side.

Seeing the broken furniture, though, brought the fresh memory straight to the surface.

She’d seen enough.

Emily rushed out of the library. “Archie!” she called as she got to the door. The dog ran to her side quickly and she turned and locked the door again.

Yes, the bookcase had indeed fallen. But she still had no idea if the moving shadows had been real.

Making sure her heart rate was normal, Emily hovered near the door until she heard a sound toward the end of the hallway.

Her heart leaping into her throat once again, Emily whipped her head in the direction of the sound. It had been metallic, not unlike a key fitting into a lock.

The corridor was long with few windows letting in daylight, so the gloom toward the end of the hall was concealing and mysterious. Emily wanted to back away, but she forced herself to move forward. It made her feel better that Archie wasn’t whimpering or growling.

Three steps farther and she could see a shape; one step farther, and she could distinctly make out the form of a woman.

Emily gave a start. Mrs. Thornton!

But Emily had barely seen Mrs. Thornton beyond the first floor and a few rooms on the second floor, including her own. What was she doing so far back here?

The light shifted beyond the windows, making something in Mrs. Thornton’s hands sparkle. In fluid movements, like Mrs. Thornton had done it a thousand times, she stuck the item in her hands into the door, turned it, then withdrew it and reached back, clasping the object around her neck.

For a moment, Emily was simply stunned. The strangely shaped pendant that Mrs. Thornton always wore and fiddled with was a key. She wasn’t sure why she’d never realized it before.

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