Madison Johns - Agnes Barton Paranormal 01 - Haunted Hijinks Read Online Free PDF Page A

something fierce. “I want out of here.”
    “Eleanor Mason. Come here now and quit being such a big baby. There are no such things as ghosts.”
    “Then how did the door slam shut, and how is it now locked?”
    “Cross breeze, probably. You know old mansions like this have plenty of drafts. Since you can’t go out, you might as well join me upstairs, unless you want to wait for a ghost to get you down here.”
    The ghost laughed and gave Eleanor a nudge. Eleanor whirled, racing to my side. “I felt something touch me,” El said with tears swimming in her eyes.
    “Not to worry. Even if this place is haunted, I won’t let them hurt you. I promise.”
    “Your promises might not be so good if we both meet our end here, but I’ll go upstairs to check it out since you refuse to leave.”
    I grabbed the banister and climbed the stairs slowly so as not to lose my footing since it was darker on the stairs than it was downstairs. When I reached the second floor, I yanked my cell phone out, but right before I was able to power on the flashlight tool, the lights flickered on. I froze for a moment until my ghostly companion joined us. The ghost was starting to make me feel at ease with her presence. She sure was less scary than seeing another ghost.
    “Hey, Eleanor. So you saw the ghost go up the stairs?”
    “Yes. You did too, right?”
    “Yes, but is that the only ghost you saw?”
    Eleanor gripped my arm in a death-like grip. “You mean there’s more?”
    “I’m not sure just yet, I was just checking. This mansion could be filled with them from the amount of murders that have happened here, and those are the only ones we know about.” I turned to the right and headed down the corridor. “Let’s see. There was Herman Butler and the handyman.”
    “Don’t forget Mildred Winfree,” Eleanor added. “The thing is, there might be more that we never heard about in the past. We should do some research on the mansion. It’s a mighty unlucky place.”
    “Exactly.” I tried not looking at the portraits of the Butler descendants that hung side by side on the walls of the corridor. Why, the eyes seemed to almost follow us as we walked. I shook my head. Stop it, Agnes, you’re losing it .
    I stopped at the end of the hall and went into the first room, ignoring the squeak of the door when it opened. I scanned the boxes stacked in the room. “Looks like just a storage room,” I said. I made my way back into the hallway and we searched the next room that was a bedroom. Each room had the same ornate, Elizabethan antique four-poster bed with tapestry. The colors ranged from green to deep burgundy, colors that were used during the same period. “Sara Knoxville certainly has gone all out turning this into a bed and breakfast that will awe the visitors.”
    “I wonder. I guess we’ll have to ask her when she gets here. I can’t imagine that she was able to furnish the place so elaborately. It would cost quite a bit to stay at this place and most folks in East Tawas don’t have that kind of money.”
    “Tourists might. I wonder if she plans to tell anyone about the dark history of the place. It might keep the place packed.”
    “What?” Eleanor choked out. “Who’d want to sleep in a murder mansion?”
    “Not us, but there are many people who are into that sort of thing. If they advertised the place was haunted it would even pack up more.”
    “I don’t know this Sara Knoxville yet, but I can’t image anyone trying to take advantage of that kind of history. Besides, it’s not a proven fact that the mansion is haunted at all.”
    At least Eleanor was on the same page with me. “Exactly. Let’s check that last door and we can leave, since I don’t see anything of much interest here.”
    When we went into the last room at the opposite side of the corridor, there were containers of makeup on the dresser, and the closet door was opened a crack. I went over there and checked out the inside of the closet. At first, I