Jessie's Ghosts Read Online Free PDF Page A

outside.’
    ‘What did your Nanna say?’
    ‘First she said I was probably dreaming, but
then she told me that sometimes in the country you can hear voices from a long
way away. She thought maybe it was someone talking up on the road.’
    ‘Mmm. You don’t think so, do you?’
    ‘No. I think it’s something else.’
    ‘How come?’
    ‘I saw something last night. Something …
strange.’
    ‘Like what?’ Harmony raised her eyebrows.
    ‘There’s a painting, well it’s a portrait,
in my Nanna’s hallway. And last night there was a strange light coming out of
it.’
    ‘Cool.’
    ‘What do you think it was?’
    ‘Mum says that some of the old houses around
here are haunted. Maybe there’s a ghost in your Nanna’s house.’
    ‘Do you believe in ghosts?’
    ‘Of course,’ Harmony replied, ‘Don’t you?’
    ‘I’ve never really thought about it.’
    ‘Well, they’re everywhere. You just have to
be sensitive to them.’
    ‘What does that mean?’
    ‘You just have to be aware they’re there. I
did a project on it at summer school.’
    ‘What’s summer school?’
    ‘I went there when my parents split up. They
do … different things than school, like drawing, and music. And there was this
class on the paranormal – ghosts - that I went to.’
    ‘Do ghosts only haunt houses?’
    ‘What do you mean?’
    ‘Well, do they ever haunt anything … inside
houses?’
    Now Harmony looked confused. ‘Like what?’
    ‘Well, like this portrait for instance?
Nanna brought it down from the loft and put it up in the hall. Last night it
wasn’t just glowing though; I’m pretty sure those voices I heard were actually
coming out of the portrait.’
    Harmony’s eyes opened wide and her mouth
dropped open.
    ‘You have a haunted portrait? That’s so cool !’
    ‘Really?’
    ‘Does your Nanna know about this?’
    ‘Nanna wears hearing aids, and …’
    ‘Yeah, I noticed.’
    Jessie smiled as she continued, ‘Well she
takes them out at night so she doesn’t hear anything.’
    ‘Wow. What a blast!’
    ‘But what am I going to do about it?’
    ‘Why would you need to do anything about
it?’
    ‘Well, they’re keeping me awake at night.’
    ‘Mmm,’ Harmony said, her mouth twisted in
thought. ‘I don’t know what you can do about it. Ghosts pretty well have
a mind of their own.’
     
    After
sandwiches and an apple Harmony walked Jessie back to Nanna’s. While Jessie had
played with the computer Harmony had repainted her nails, a very dark shade of
brown. Her eyes were so dark, Jessie wondered now long it took her to apply her
makeup every morning, and how many bottles of nail polish she owned.
    ‘Are you going
to do anything? About the portrait I mean?’ Harmony asked.
    ‘I’m going to
listen really well tonight. I want to hear what they’re saying.’
    ‘Are you sure
you want to?’
    ‘Why not?’
    ‘Well, not all
ghosts are good you know.’ Harmony raised an eyebrow and her eyes seemed to
become even darker. ‘Some are downright evil.’
    Jessie
flinched.
    ‘Well,’
Harmony said brightly, ‘I’ll see you tomorrow I guess.’
    Evil? Jessie
couldn’t imagine her great-grandparents were evil, but the thought worried her
anyway.
    Later that
night as she lay in bed, she heard the woman’s voice again. She slipped out of
bed and tiptoed across to the door. Remembering that last night the voices had
stopped as soon as she coughed she had purposely left her door wide open so
there would be no risk of her making any noise as she went out into the hall.
    The lady was
speaking as she rounded the corner, one slow step, and then another. Jessie could
see the portrait glowing. Then the lady stopped talking.
    Jessie moaned
inwardly. She hadn’t made a noise at all, she was sure of it. Why had the woman
stopped?
    But then the
man spoke. Jessie backed herself up against the wall, stood perfectly still and
listened.
    ‘Mother, it was an
accident.’
    ‘My son, you must
report what happened to the