Ghost Hunt: Chilling Tales of the Unknown (23 page)

Mr. Johnston answered, “Nothing much. Just some stuff I’ve been meaning to throw out.”

“Could any of the items in the boxes be Helen’s?” Jason picked up on Grant’s thought.

“Let me see,” Miranda’s father said. He lifted a flap on one of the boxes. “Yes, I think some of this was my mother’s.”

“Do you think what she’s looking for is in there?” Lyssa asked.

“Let’s look, Daddy,” Miranda said.

After nearly an hour of searching, Miranda and her dad found several things that belonged to Grandma Helen. But nothing that seemed valuable or important.

Then Miranda’s dad reached way down deep into one of the boxes and found an old cigar box. “I think this may be what my mother is looking for,” he said. He cradled the box in his hands.

“I remember seeing this box when I was a little boy,” Mr. Johnston continued. “I think it belonged to my father. You see, I never knew my father. He died right after I was born. My mom never married again. She wore her wedding ring until the day she died.”

He let out a whoosh of air. “But she used to talk about another ring. She said it wasn’t very valuable. Dad won it in a game at a carnival. But Mom always had a soft spot for that ring. It was my father’s first gift to her.

“Maybe that ring is what she wants,” he said. “I think it’s in this box.”

“Open it, Daddy,” Miranda said. Her eyes were bright and shining.

Carefully, Mr. Johnston lifted the top of the cigar box. He flipped back the lid.

“Let me see,” Miranda demanded. “Is it there? Are you right?”

“It’s there,” her father said. Lyssa saw that he had tears in his eyes. Mrs. Johnston went to stand beside her family. Mr. Johnston took the ring out of the box and held it up. The tiny stone flashed, just once, as it caught the basement light.

“It’s beautiful,” Mrs. Johnston said softly. “But I think your mom was wrong about one thing. That ring
is
valuable.”

“Yes, you’re right.” Mr. Johnston put an arm around his wife’s shoulders. Miranda stood between them, leaning against her parents’ legs. “It’s valuable to Mom. So valuable she didn’t want to leave it behind.”

“So what do we do now?” Mrs. Johnston asked.

“Well,” Mr. Johnston answered, “I have an idea.”

When he told everyone what it was, Miranda smiled.

Two days later, Lyssa stood in a graveyard.

The entire TAPS team, including Bethany Lane, joined the Johnston family at Helen Johnston’s graveside.

Grandma Helen’s grave was underneath a big maple tree. The tree’s leaves rustled in the late-afternoon breeze.

It’s pretty here,
Lyssa thought.
Peaceful.

“I’m glad you convinced the caretaker to let you do this,” Bethany said.

“I’m glad too,” said Mr. Johnston. “This feels right, somehow.”

“Things still quiet at home?” Lyssa asked him.

Mr. Johnston nodded. “Things have been quiet ever since we found the ring. I’m certain this is what my mother has been looking for.”

He turned to Miranda. “All set, sweetheart?”

Miranda nodded.

“Then let’s do this,” her father said.

He and Miranda got down on their hands and knees. At the base of Helen’s headstone was a hole about the size of a quarter. Not very big around, but deep.

The Johnston family wanted to give the ring back to Grandma Helen.

Mr. Johnston placed the cigar box beside his mother’s gravestone. He opened the box and let Miranda take out the ring. It was wrapped in sparkly pink tissue paper.

“Go ahead, honey,” Mr. Johnston said.

Biting her lower lip in concentration, Miranda leaned over and dropped the ring into the hole.

“There you go, Grandma Helen. We’re giving you your ring,” she said. “Now you can rest.”

“Yes. Rest in peace,” Lyssa said.

by
Jason Hawes and
Grant Wilson

Introduction

H
ave you ever walked down a dark hallway all alone but had the feeling that someone was there with you? Someone you couldn’t see? Have you heard voices in the night coming from your own closet? Or have you seen something you can’t explain—a flash of light or a shadow that comes from nowhere?

If you’ve had experiences like these or if you are interested in finding out for yourself if the paranormal is real…

THIS
GHOST HUNT
GUIDE IS FOR YOU.

The Ghost Hunt Guide has tons of information and tips that we have picked up in our T.A.P.S. investigations. The Guide shares our best advice and our methods, and it explains the tools we use. You can be a ghost hunter, too! It doesn’t always take the high-tech gadgets that we use on television.

Are you ready to find out how? As we always say: Let’s rock and roll!

—JASON HAWES AND GRANT WILSON

T
he very first thing we do before any investigation is to get permission from the person who owns the house or location. You should also get permission from your parent or guardian before any Ghost Hunt, so they can make sure the place is safe for you to investigate in the dark.

They call us Ghost Hunters, but eight times out of ten, we don’t find ghosts. Most of the time we find logical reasons for the strange sounds and unusual sightings people report. And that’s fine with us.

Of course, it is exciting when we
do
find evidence of the paranormal. How do we do it? We have a secret method.
When we investigate a site, we try to prove that the place is NOT haunted.
We try to find logical reasons for the spooky things people tell us about the house we’re investigating.

If someone feels a cold draft in a room without a window, we look for a loose wall panel that lets the cold air in.

If someone reports banging in the night, we examine the pipes. Old pipes often make banging sounds.

We call these reports of noises and visions the
claims
. And when we can prove that the claims are not paranormal, we say we have
debunked the claims
.

We always start out by trying to debunk the claims. We want to be absolutely sure that we have looked at every logical explanation. Then we can say that something paranormal is going on. We want to be scientific and examine the evidence. As Jason once said:

“If you set out to prove a haunting, anything will seem like evidence. If you set out to
disprove
it, you’ll end up with only those things you can’t explain away.”

Every T.A.P.S. investigation follows the same steps:

1.   The Interview

2.   The Sweep

3.   Setting up the Command Center and the Equipment

4.   Collecting Evidence

5.   Research

6.   Analyzing the Evidence

7.   Conclusions

Follow us, and we’ll take you through it step by step.

Y
our friend Dana says she and her sister, Jen, hear sounds at night. And sometimes when Dana wakes up, some of the objects in her room have been moved. Great! You’re ready to investigate her house, right? No, not yet.

First you have to get more information about what she has seen and heard. You have to find out more about the claims, and we do this by asking a lot of questions. You have to get the complete story. This is what we call the interview.

Here are some of the questions you might want to ask Dana and Jen:

•   When was the first time you heard these sounds?

•   Where exactly were you?

•   What did you hear?

•   Did you both hear the same thing?

•   Did you recognize any words?

•   What did you do?

•   Did you call anyone else into the room?

•   Did they hear anything?

•   Did it sound like a human voice?

•   Did the voice sound like a man or a woman? Or did it sound like a child?

•   Did you talk to the spirit? What did you say?

•   Did it react to anything you said or did?

•   When did you first notice that an object in your room was moved?

•   What was it?

•   Does this happen every night?

•   Are the same objects moved? Or do they change?