The Green Ghost (2 page)

The more the snow flew, the farther away Christmas seemed to be.

Kaye asked another question instead. “Where are we?”

But Dad didn’t like that question, either. “We’re in the middle of blasted nowhere,” he snapped.

Mom reached back to touch Kaye’s knee.
The touch was a kind of apology for Daddy’s being cross. He wasn’t usually cross.

“We’re out in the country,” Mom said. She spoke with careful cheer. Not that it helped much. Kaye could tell that her mother was working really hard to be cheerful.

Anyway, out in the country
was
the middle of nowhere. Wasn’t it?

Kaye peered out the side window. There was nothing out there but darkness. Darkness and bits of flying white. There was no town. No lights. No sign that anybody else in the world was near.

They hadn’t met another car for a long time. Probably everyone had gotten wherever they were going. Everyone except them.

The radio had talked all day about the big storm coming. Her dad had said they
would make it to Gran’s before it got too bad. But here they were.

The wind bumped against the side of the car, rocking it.

“Charles!” Mom cried in a small, breathless voice. As if Dad had made the wind. She leaned forward harder.

Kaye’s father didn’t answer. He just hung on to the steering wheel.

The wind bumped them again. Bump! Bump! Two sharp blows made the car shudder.

Mom didn’t say anything this time. But she held on to the door.

BUMP!

The wind hit the car again. This time it slid them across the icy road. Dad turned the steering wheel. They just kept sliding.

Then there was another kind of bump.
This was the bump of the tire hitting something on the edge of the road.

And they were sliding back across the road again. The car slid, and it turned, too … like some kind of carnival ride.

It would have been fun if it hadn’t been so scary.

Mom said, “Oh!” It was just the smallest sound. She let go of the door, and her hands flew to cover her mouth. She seemed to want to stop more sounds from coming out.

Dad kept turning the wheel. And the car paid no attention at all.

They slid and spun. First they spun until
they were facing backward. Then they spun until they faced front again. Front didn’t look much different from back.

In the headlights the snow kept coming at them. It sped toward them like millions of white bullets.

The car made another turn, but partway through it went bump again. And bump! And BUMP!

Now the car was sliding down a small, steep hill. And suddenly everything stopped.

Everything except the snow. It kept flying. And the wind kept moaning.

All else was silent.

For a moment, they sat perfectly still. There was nothing to see except flying snow.

Then Kaye’s parents turned to look at
her. They turned at the same time. Their heads could have been pulled by the same string.

“Are you all right?” they asked in one voice.

When Kaye opened her mouth to answer, no sound came out. She nodded instead.

Mom looked at Dad. “Where are we?” she asked.

“Out in the country,” he answered. “In the middle of blasted nowhere.”

And then, strange as it might seem, they both laughed.

“I
t’s not so bad,” Dad said. “We’ll get out of here. Just hold tight.” He put the car in reverse and pressed the gas pedal.

The wheels spun. The car settled more deeply into the ditch.

He tried again, more gently this time. The car didn’t move.

He tried rocking, forward, back, forward, back. Nothing. They weren’t going anywhere.

Mom was quiet. But her hands were clenched into fists.

Kaye looked down. Her hands were fists, too.

“Well,” Dad said at last. “I’d better get out and have a look.”

When he opened his door, the wind roared more loudly. When he stepped out, the storm swallowed him.

Kaye’s teeth began to chatter. She wasn’t cold exactly. At least she didn’t think she was. She was just-Dad jerked the door open and tumbled back in. He had snow everywhere. He even had snow in his eyebrows!

“We’re well and truly stuck,” he said. “We won’t get out of here without a tow.”

“What will we do?” Mom asked.

Kaye waited. What
would
they do?

Mom was waiting, too. Dad didn’t answer.

And that was when Kaye saw it. A small, pale face appeared at her window. No … it wasn’t a face. It was just a light. A lighted face?

That didn’t make sense.

But there it was again. A pale face floated outside her window.

“Look!” Kaye said.

Her parents both turned to look.

“What?” Dad asked.

“Can’t you see?” Kaye asked. “It’s a …” At the last instant she decided not to say “face.” What face would be out here in the storm? “It’s a light,” she said instead.

“I can’t see any light,” her dad said.

“I can’t, either,” her mom said.

The light bobbed outside her window
again. It seemed to be calling to her.

“There!” Kaye put her hand against the window. If the glass hadn’t been in the way, she could have touched it. “It’s right there!”

And before her parents could say again that there was no light, she pushed the door open. When she had it open just a bit, the wind yanked it wide. She tumbled out. For an instant, the driving snow blinded her.

When she could make out the light again, it was farther away.

It might have been the moon, except it was much too close for the moon.

It might have been a face, except it was too bright for any face.

Kaye moved toward it.

“Kaye!” her mother cried. “Get back in the car!”

“Now!” her father ordered.

The light—or the face, whatever it was—called to her. Not with a voice. The only “voice” she could hear was the wind’s. Still, the light called as clearly as if it had said, “Come!”

“But I see a light!” Kaye tossed the words back over her shoulder.

“What light?” her father demanded. He was out of the car now.

“It’s there,” she said. “Right over there.” And she started toward it again.

She felt her father grab at her jacket, but she pulled away.

“Kaye!” her mother called.

Kaye watched the light. She could almost touch it. And then she couldn’t.

It must not have been as close as it seemed. It couldn’t be far, though.

She began to run.

She heard her parents stumbling after her. The snow was deep. The wind howled. The wind unwound the scarf from her neck and flung it away.

Kaye paid no attention. She just kept going.

Someone was calling her.

“I
wanna go, Lillian.” Elsa jumped up and down. Her dark curls bobbed with each jump. “I wanna go! Pretty please?”

Lillian shook her head at her three-year-old sister. She
always
wanted to go where Lillian went.

“You can’t, Elsa,” she said. “I’m going to get our Christmas tree. And I have to go a long, long way … deep into the woods.”

“You don’t need to go far, Lillian,” Mama said. She opened the oven door, and the kitchen filled with the warm smell of bread. “You know Papa always gets our trees from behind the barn.”

Lillian sighed. “I know, Mama. But I want—”

“See, Lilly. See!” Elsa interrupted. “We don’t need to go far!” She was jumping again.

Lillian spoke over Elsa’s bouncing head. “Those old junipers don’t even smell good,” she said. “And they’re prickly. Last year, by the time we had it decorated, my arms were all in a rash.”

Lillian’s mother tipped a crusty loaf out of its pan. Her cheeks were flushed from the heat of the oven. “I don’t know why you insist on going, anyway, Lilly. Your papa always gets a tree for us. You know he does.”

“But I want a
pretty
tree,” Lillian cried. She loved her papa, of course. He was the best papa in the world. But he didn’t seem to care about pretty … except when he’d picked Mama, of course.

Her mother sighed. “If you must go, then take Elsa with you. She needs some fresh air. She hasn’t been outside the house this livelong day.”

Lillian opened her mouth to object, but stopped herself. Mama looked tired.

“All right,” she said. If she had to take someone, she would rather have taken her little brother. Isaac was six, not such a baby. But he was out in the barn, helping Papa with chores. And Elsa was the one Mama needed rest from.

“Come on, Elsa,” Lillian said. She put on a cheerful voice. “Get your coat.”

Elsa dashed to get it down from its peg.

“Now don’t go far,” Mama warned. “It’s cold out there and getting colder. And it will be dark soon.”

“We won’t,” Lillian promised.
Just far enough
, she said to herself. But she wrapped Elsa’s scarf extra tight.

Elsa sprang out the door and ran ahead of Lillian. She stopped when they reached the unappealing gray junipers.

“Not these,” Lillian told her. “Don’t you want a
pretty
tree?”