House of a Thousand Screams Read Online Free PDF Page B

you serious?” Freddy squeaked. “Jill, poltergeists are supernatural. They have powers.”
    Poor Freddy! He looked so scared that I forgot my own fear. I had to make him feel better.
    â€œSo what?” I demanded. “We have powers too!”
    â€œWe do?” Freddy looked doubtful. “Like what?”
    â€œWell . . .” I thought fast. “Uh—we’re from Texas. It’s like they say back home. Don’t mess with Texas!”
    Freddy was staring at me as if I had sprouted an extra nose.
    I hurried on. “Texans are the roughest, toughest, smartest people around. Right?”
    â€œIf you say so,” Freddy answered, still staring at me.
    But I was starting to get into it. “You bet I do. Remember the Alamo!” I called, and punched my fist into the air.
    â€œWe lost at the Alamo,” Freddy reminded me.
    Oh, yeah, I thought. Well . . .
    â€œIt doesn’t matter,” I argued. “It’s the Alamo spirit that matters. The Texas spirit. Where everything is bigger and better.” I was really worked up by now. “What state’s bigger than Texas?”
    â€œAlaska.”
    I shook my head. Freddy wasn’t catching my drift. “Alaska doesn’t count.”
    â€œIn fact,” Freddy went on as if I hadn’t spoken, “if you cut Alaska in half and made it two states, Texas would be the third biggest state.”
    â€œYou are getting to be a major drag,” I told him. “The point is, we’re not quitters. Would Sam Houston quit?”
    â€œNo. He wouldn’t.”
    â€œWould Davy Crockett quit? Would Jim Bowie quit?”
    â€œThey weren’t Texans,” Freddy objected.
    â€œOkay, forget about them.” I leaned forward. Time to pull out the big guns. “Would the Dallas Cowboys quit?”
    Freddy’s face lit up.
    â€œThe Dallas Cowboys! No way! They would never quit.”
    â€œAnd neither will we!” I grinned at my little brother. “Now, come on. We have a lot left to do before we can go hunting for that poltergeist.”
    We tore into the mess with a new spirit. As we cleaned, I thought about our plan of attack.
    If a poltergeist was hiding out in the house, therewas only one place it could be. The one place Mom hadn’t gotten around to organizing yet. The one place I’d carefully avoided ever since we moved in.
    The spookiest, scariest room in the house.
    The attic.
    But were we brave enough to go up there?

9

    B efore we did anything, I took a shower. I had to wash all the flour paste out of my hair. It wasn’t easy.
    Then Freddy and I tiptoed past Mom and Dad’s room, where Mom lay, “resting.”
    â€œShhh,” I warned.
    We climbed the narrow stairs and stopped at the attic door. Freddy whispered, “What do we do if we find it?”
    â€œI don’t know,” I admitted. “But we have to do something. Maybe we could chase it out a window.”
    â€œOr spray it with bug spray,” Freddy suggested.
    I nodded. “Whatever it takes. I just can’t handle another day like today.”
    My hair was still wet from the shower. Water dripped down my neck. It reminded me of the disasterin the kitchen. That made me mad all over again. I set my jaw and turned the knob.
    Thick, musty air greeted us as we stepped into the attic. The shutters had slats that sifted the late afternoon sunlight. Tiger stripes of light and shadow lay over mysterious mounds of stuff.
    I stepped forward quickly and pulled the string for the light. A bare bulb flickered on.
    It wasn’t so creepy with the extra light. The room was cluttered with Uncle Solly’s old junk. Boxes lay everywhere. A rocking chair with a broken rail leaned in one corner, more boxes piled on its seat. A dress dummy draped in rotting fabric stood beside it. That must have belonged to Uncle Solly’s wife, I guessed. She died years ago, before I was