Ghosts Beneath Our Feet by Betty Ren Wright Page A

shoulders. He looked excited and a little scared. The way I felt when I got home , Katie thought. Maybe he saw a ghost, too .
    â€œWhere have you been?” Mrs. Blaine asked. “It worries me when you sneak away without a word.”
    â€œI didn’t sneak. I just went.” He was scared. Katie could hear it in his voice, see it in the way he kept glancing over his shoulder.
    â€œGo upstairs and change,” Mrs. Blaine said. “You’re absolutely drenched. And then I want to hear about this Skip Poldeen.”
    Jay shot Katie a look of pure dislike.
    â€œI have a right to know whom you’re spending your time with,” Mrs. Blaine insisted. “And I want to know where you go. I’m responsible for you, remember that.”
    Jay clenched his fists. “I can look after myself,” he said, his voice squeaking out of control. “You don’t have to be responsible for me. I’m not your kid!”
    â€œYou are my kid. Your father and I—”
    â€œMy father’s dead! He’s not part of this anymore—”
    â€œâ€™Ere, ’ere!” Uncle Frank’s shout made them all jump. “You’re a saucy young feller, ain’t you? We don’t want such talk in this ’ouse, you ’ear? My boy Kenny never would have—”
    Jay ran out of the kitchen. Katie got up to go after him, but her mother put out a hand.
    â€œLet him be. He has to cool down.”
    â€œBut he was crying , Mom! He doesn’t mean all that stuff—”
    â€œI said, let him go.” Mrs. Blaine looked close to tears herself. “I’ll talk to him later. You can clean up the lunch dishes, if you want to help. I’d like to lie down—”
    The ring of the telephone cut her short. Mrs. Blaine hurried into the hall to answer it. Katie wondered if it was Joan, inviting her to come down the hill for the afternoon. She’d gladly walk through the storm to get away from the house for a while.
    But when her mother returned, her face was white with shock. “That was the sheriff!” she exclaimed. “He wants to know if I have a son and if that son was home this morning.” Katie waited, her heart thumping. “Two boys were seen running away from a cottage out at Tuesday Lake. They had forced a window to get inside and had taken some food. They got away on a motorcycle.”
    â€œPoldeen,” Uncle Frank said. “Poldeen’s got a motorcycle.”
    Mrs. Blaine looked at Katie, who said nothing.
    â€œâ€™E’ll come to no good, that Poldeen,” Uncle Frank predicted. “Needs a whuppin’, ’e does.”
    â€œWh—what’s going to happen?” Katie felt sick.
    â€œI don’t know. The sheriff said he’d be up here later to talk to Jay.” Mrs. Blaine sat down with a thump, as if her legs would no longer support her. “I should talk to him myself, but what if he runs off again and makes things worse? I don’t know what to do. I just don’t.”
    â€œYou could whup ’im,” Uncle Frank suggested. “I’d do it for ye, but ’e’s a mite big.” He stood up and stretched. “Time for my nap,” he yawned. “Old feller like me can’t take all this stirrin’ up.”
    â€œOh, Uncle Frank, I’m sorry.”
    The old man waved a dismissing hand. Katie decided that he wasn’t as upset as he pretended to be. Maybe any kind of excitement was better than none at all. She remembered what Joan’s mother had said: The old tales make life more interesting for Gram.… She needs ’em .
    It looked as if the Blaines were giving Uncle Frank plenty to think about.
    The thunderheads rolled away across the hills, and new ones took their place. The rain never stopped, a harsh downpour that threatened to drown the meadows around the house. Katie saw closed doors wherever she looked—Jay’s, her mother’s, Uncle