Katie wasn't really thirsty, but she took the glass of coke from her mother anyway. All she really wanted to do was tell the rest of her family about the weird villagers they'd met, and then she badly wanted to go through the Church documents her dad was currently rubbing between his stocky fingers. "The vicar was really strange mum," she said, as she took a small sip of coke. "He crashed into dad's car, and then he tried to blame him for the accident."
Mrs. Rusk worriedly looked across to where her husband sat. "Are you okay? Is the car badly damaged? Were the police called?"
Mr. Rusk held up a hand to calm his wife down a little. "He bumped into the car on his bike, we're both fine, and the car's only got a small dent where Mr. MacBlaine rolled over the bonnet. He didn't hit us very hard, and I'm sure he did that for dramatic affect."
"It's not a very good start to us living here if the local vicar hates us though is it?" Alex moaned, as he sat down, crossed his legs and folded his arms tightly across his chest. "We'll probably have to grovel for food," he pointed out.
Katie sighed. "Don't be such an idiot Alex. The vicar invited us back to his cottage for home made wine and biscuits after the accident."
"He what?" Alex asked disbelievingly.
"We sorted it all out, and dad's even brought
home some information that could help us solve what's going on here."
"What do you mean by that darling?" Katie's mum asked.
"The old lady we met in the grocers shop told us that during the Second World War and for a while afterwards, the house was used as a boarding school. She said her mum used to work here as a cleaner, and she'd told her that some of the children died here. But, nobody seems to know exactly what from, and from what I heard, nobody cares either. I think the little girl that Amber's seen twice now, might be a ghost."
Alex laughed loudly. "You obviously drunk a lot of wine Sis," he said sarcastically. "Ghosts don't exist."
"Oh really? Well how do you explain what Amber saw then?" Katie replied angrily.
Alex shrugged. "She's a little girl. Little girls make things up."
"Mum believes she saw the girl," Katie pointed out.
Alex, disbelievingly turned to his mother. "You don't believe this, surely?"
Mrs. Risk frowned. "Something's going on here Alex. We need to try and figure out what it is, and if it's okay to stay here honey. You don't want anything bad to happen to Amber now do you?"
Alex jumped to his feet. "Nothing's going to happen to anyone mum. This is all a lot of nonsense, and I can't believe you and dad are going along with it."
"You can't deny something's going on here son," Mr. Rusk said quietly. "Don't you think it would be interesting to find out what?"
Alex walked towards the door. As he reached it, and placed his hand on the handle, he turned to face his family. "I don't care what happened here. All I want to do is go home," he said, as he pulled the door roughly open, and slammed it behind him as he left.
"He's in a good mood then?" Mr. Rusk joked.
"Michael, he's just not settled yet. Give him time," Mrs. Rusk said lovingly.
"He always finds a way to stir things up Grace. Sometimes I wonder if he was dropped on his head at birth," her husband replied.
Mrs. Rusk smiled. "He takes after his father then doesn't he?"
Mr. Rusk held his hands up. "I suppose so.
Okay, let's leave Alex to sulk, and take a look at what Mr. MacBlaine gave us."
Katie watched her father spread the newsletters and parish lists on the coffee table, and then she joined him rummaging around, looking for the relevant dates.
"This is weird," her dad said, as he picked up a pink coloured leaflet, and examined the quality of the paper it was made from. "It feels new!"
"What year's that dad?" Katie asked, as she continued to hunt through the information.
"1945," her father replied puzzled.
Katie stopped looking and turned to her father. "The end of the War. How can that be new?"
"Maybe they had the records updated and then decided to print the whole thing again?" her mother said. "It doesn't mean anything suspicious has gone on."
"It might do if there are omissions in it," her father offered, as he furiously flicked through the pamphlet he was holding. "There's no entry anywhere for the Manor House. We know someone lived here and it was used as a school so why are there no records here?"
"Who told you it was a school love?" Mrs. Rusk asked.
"Mrs. MacDonald in the grocers," Katie answered.
"Did she sound reliable Katie?" her mum enquired.
"She sounded like she was on something to be honest," Katie said quietly, realising what her mother was suggesting.
"Maybe, and I'm just playing Devils advocate here. Maybe, she made it all up to scare the two of you. After all, we're the newbie's in the area."
"I thought she was telling the truth honey," Mr. Rusk murmured. "She was a bit eccentric maybe, but what she said made sense."
Mrs. Rusk took hold of her husbands hand. "Maybe it did. Maybe it didn't. What I'm suggesting is we need more than her word for it before we go round telling people we think church records have been altered to cover up the death's of children in this house."
Katie saw the colour drain from her mother's face, and watched in horror as she put a hand over her open mouth and started to cry. "Mum, mum. What's wrong?" she asked, as both she and her father cuddled Mrs. Rusk.
Between sobs, she managed to say, "I've just realised what I said. It might be that children died here, maybe they were...murdered."
"Murdered!" Katie said loudly.
"Yes, murdered. If there is a cover up, that's a strong possibility."
"Dad, what do you think?" Katie asked, as her heart started to thump faster and faster as the enormous and horrendous possibility hit home.
Her father frowned and rolled his bottom lip back and forward over his top lip. "I hope what you're mother's suggesting is way off the mark, but we have to look deeper now. I can't let something like this go, and I certainly don't want us living in this house if something terrible has happened in it."
"What now then?" Katie wanted to know.
"We need to go into Inverness and check out the history of the house in the library. Let's see if anything is mentioned there."
"I hope this isn't going to interfere with your work honey. You're due to start soon," Mrs. Rusk reminded her husband.
"I've still got a lot of days owing and I'm sure the company will let me take them if I say we're having problems settling in, especially if I say it's Amber. They all think she's a little darling."
"That's because she is," Katie said, smiling at the thought, and then shuddering. "What if the little girl Amber saw isn't a ghost? What if she's an Angel?"
Her parents looked at each other, shock written all over their faces. "What if?" they said in unison. "What if?"
YOU ARE READING
Lost Souls
Aktuelle LiteraturA family move into an old Mansion in the Highlands of Scotland unaware of the buildings terrible secrets. One of the children is particularly aware something is vastly wrong with the families new home.
