Kelly’s first intuitive guess, that the Linden home was the only neutral place in the community, had turned out to be correct; no one in Soda Creek visited any of their neighbours—except the Lindens. Even the Shuswap Indians from the Soda Creek Band, who had so little to do with the white community, would call Alan for help with their cars, water pumps or other malfunctioning machines. The group from the commune, too, came to Alan when they needed help, although they avoided the other townsite residents, uncomfortably aware of the harsh feelings over their wandering cows. They had added bee-keeping to their homesteading activities, and Mrs. Terpen, whose twins were allergic to bee stings, had been outraged.
Everyone came to Alan Linden for help, for conversation, for friendship. And he gave it freely, laughing as he repaired Ed Crinchley’s toaster so it would give the blasted bread back’, changing the oil in Ben and Bob’s car, replacing the motor in Clara Overton’s washing machine or the broken chains of the twins’ bicycles. He supplied enough crabapples from the old orchard behind the jailhouse for the Grinch’s crabapple wine, Miss O.’s Christmas jelly, and the tart apple sauce the twins loved, and allowed the group from the commune to gather the bruised windfalls for their livestock. He listened and he helped. He lent his tools, his skills, his time, and he filled his weekends with people.
When they had first come to Soda Creek, only months after her mother’s death, Kelly and her father had found a comforting Sunday morning routine for themselves. They would sleep late, make a large breakfast, then spend the rest of the morning at the kitchen table, refilling their coffee mugs and talking. Talking about their week, about the funny or sometimes serious happenings at Gibraltar Mine, about Kelly’s school, her new painting, her friends. And they’d talk about her mother, too; quietly, without tears, exchanging memories, reminding each other of things that had been said, things that had happened, times they had shared when they were a whole family, when her mother was alive.
Sunday morning together, just Kelly and her father, had been a ritual that Kelly suddenly realized that she missed desperately now, for it had been over a year since they had been alone on a Sunday morning. Somehow, people had started coming over for coffee, often before breakfast, staying to share bacon and eggs, others arriving as soon as the first visitors left, staying through lunch, and still others arriving on their departure, often not leaving until evening. Her father sat there smiling, sharing, doing minor repairs right on the kitchen table, listening, giving his Sunday to these people who wouldn’t even all come and visit at the same time so it would be over and done with, but who drifted in, one group after another, careful not to run into their other neighbours.
Kelly sat up in bed, now fully awake and back in the present. “It isn’t fair,” she thought. “Just because they don’t like each other and won’t speak to each other, they expect Dad to be available all weekend.” She still heard voices from the kitchen, and felt herself growing angry. Well, this Sunday morning was going to be different, was going to be like the first Sundays she and her father had spent in Soda Creek. She would get rid of whoever was with her father, then she’d fix breakfast, and she and her father would sit and talk, just the two of them.
Hair quickly braided, the stubborn bits at her temple tucked under a green ribbon headband, Kelly pulled on her clothes and walked, none too quietly, to the kitchen.
Clara Overton was sitting at the table, close to Alan, one hand clutching his sleeve, the other flourishing a wilted handkerchief.
“Oh, Alan,” she said, ignoring Kelly, “It was SO frightening, SO upsetting. . .”
“Dad,” Kelly interrupted, speaking over Clara Overton’s head, “Dad, let’s have breakfast by ourselves this morning, the way we always used to.”
“Kelly,” said her father, a warning in his voice. “Clara is very upset.”
“But she’s been here for ages,” Kelly hissed in a half whisper, not caring if the teacher heard. She pulled out a chair and sat down on the other side of the table, her eyes not leaving her father’s face.
“Kelly!” her father said again, this time his meaning unmistakable.
Kelly sighed. “Okay, Dad. Sorry,” but a small voice inside whispered to her that she wasn’t the least bit sorry, and maybe Miss O. would take a hint and leave.
Clara Overton dabbed at her eyes with the handkerchief, smearing mascara down her cheeks. “Oh, Kelly,” she said. “You don’t know how lucky you are to have such a STRONG man for a father. I have such a DELICATE nature, and I desperately need his SUPPORT this morning.”
Kelly reached for the coffee pot. “Stupid woman,” she thought. “I’ll bet the Grinch snarled at her.” She squeezed out a small, artificial smile. “I’m so sorry, Miss O. What happened?”
“Oh, Kelly,” Clara Overton reached across the table and grabbed Kelly’s hand. “Oh, Kelly, you won’t BELIEVE it. Last night I saw a GHOST!”
Chapter 3
Kelly didn’t react for a few seconds, and Clara Overton repeated herself, her long fingernails digging into the back of Kelly’s hand as she spoke. “A ghost, Kelly, a most upsetting, FRIGHTENING apparition.”
Shaking off the woman’s clutching hand, Kelly moved to the stove, replacing the coffee pot. As she set it down her hands shook, rattling the pot against the chrome ring of the element. She had pushed the thought of the little ghost to the back of her mind. Now this ridiculous woman sat in the kitchen, clinging to Alan Linden’s arm and blithering about apparitions.
As politely as she could, Kelly forced a smile and said, “Oh? I didn’t think anyone believed in ghosts anymore.”
“Oh, Kelly, I don’t you know, not really, but I get these FEELINGS sometimes, and when I saw her standing. . .”
“Her?” Kelly spoke sharply. “What kind of a ghost do you think you saw, Miss Overton?” She glanced at her father, hoping to see him share a smile with her, give her some signal that he was as irritated by this hysterical woman as Kelly herself was, but his face remained serious.
“Clara said it was a child, or the ghost of a child,” he said. “She saw it about three this morning.”
“But I saw it first,” thought Kelly, irrationally. “What did your ghost look like, Miss O.?” she asked, her voice too loud.
“It was a GHASTLY sight, simply horrible. It had the whitest face, and it stretched out those tiny arms as if it wanted to grab me!”
“A child ghost? How old was she?” Kelly was upset, and could barely keep her voice from shaking. If there had been a ghost, it was her ghost. She had seen it first, just after one o’clock, and it wasn’t frightening, well, not very much, and certainly not as ‘ghastly’ as Clara Overton was claiming.
“I think she was two, maybe three years old, and dressed most PECULIARLY. Oh, Alan.” She fluttered the handkerchief, turning back to him. “Oh, Alan, you have no idea what a SHOCK it gave me.”
Kelly interrupted as Alan placed his hand