A Phantom Awaits You by Flashbeagle
Chapter Eight: Booted to Boot Hill
Note: APAY will be on hiatus for the next two weeks, so after this chapter, you'll get an exclusive interview with Lotte O'Connell sometime next weekend while I fine-tune what I've got of the upcoming chapters.
Nate and Lotte had gotten into their argument that ended up in a near make-out session before Lotte could explain to him about what we found we were upstairs, so after I told them about seeing Melanie, Lotte and I told Nate about Melanie's letter to Roberta, and the fact that Lotte thought Roberta's brother might be the Phantom, though I still thought the evidence pointed towards Mr. Ravenswood.
"Lotte, just because Roberta's brother wanted to marry Melanie doesn't mean he was crazy enough to go all afterlife stalker on her and be the Phantom and kill Lawrence. Larry himself said that none of the other guys who wanted to marry Melanie didn't really care about her personally; they just wanted her money!"
"But it's still a possibility! Look, okay, I know it's going off on a major tangent, but that thing Melanie said about only seeing Roberta's brother as a friend seems to say to me that she knew Roberta's brother liked her as a potential life partner." Lotte reasoned. "What was Roberta's last name again?"
"Hawthorne." I responded. "Which sounds really familiar for some reason."
"Ever read The Scarlet Letter? That's the author's last name."
"No, I mean familiar like…like something I heard recently in relation to Ravenswood Manor. Maybe Larry would know."
Nate nodded. "Good idea. Let's go find Larry!"
As we were walking out to the graveyard to find Lawrence, Nate suddenly got all pale-faced and freaked out.
"Nate, you okay?" I asked.
"G-g-g…" He stammered.
"Nate?" Lotte looked sort of concerned.
"G-g-g-…gaah…gaaah!"
"Nate!" Lotte and I both shouted.
"GHOST!" He screamed at the top of his lungs.
We all looked ahead and when Lotte and I saw what Nate had been screaming about, we screamed equally as loud, because right down from us in the hallway was the Phantom, cackling wildly in our direction
My adrenaline started pumping. I got the chills. I started hyperventilating, and I put my hands over my nose and mouth.
"Oh my God…Oh my God!" I cried.
The Phantom just continued his wicked laughter and stretched a bony hand in our direction.
"Blaaah!" Nate screamed, as he jumped back. "Oh, shit. Oh shit! Look, Mr. Phantom Dude, we're not trying to…to…PLEASE don't kill us!" He begged.
But the Phantom didn't even seem to notice Nate, Lotte and me.
"Come to me, my darling." He said all scarily and forcefully and evilishly.
"Oh my God!" I cried. Those exact same words had been spoken to me earlier this year when-
"Oh gross!" Nate exclaimed.
Suddenly, we could hear Melanie Ravenswood's singing. In an instant she materialized right in front of us.
Lotte stumbled back. Nate jumped back even further. I was frozen in my tracks. I couldn't even move my legs.
Oh God, why do things like this always happen to me?
"Come to me." The Phantom repeated, but it was now clear that he was talking to Melanie.
Melanie looked up at him, but just kept on singing.
"Miss Melanie, there is something you should know." God, that Phantom has a creepy voice! It sort of sounds like the guy who was in all those horror movies…what's his face…I believe he was in House of Wax…did a lot of those Edgar Allan Poe movies that come on around Halloween…oh wait…I know! Vincent Price- voice of Professor Ratigan in The Great Mouse Detective! Ben and I went to go see that movie at the theater!
But um…back to the horrific incident that was taking place before my eyes.
Melanie didn't respond to the Phantom.
"Your darling Mr. James…you still believe he will return, don't you?"
Again no response from the ghost girl.
"I hate to break your heart, but he's does not want to marry you anymore."
Nate suddenly looked really pissed off. "You dirty rotten liar!" He shouted at the Phantom. "Larry still loves Melanie! And he still wants to marry her!" Of course, neither the Phantom nor Melanie seemed to hear a word Nate said.
"He thought, very mistakenly, that you were going to come to him. So he waited for you, and when you never showed, he became angry."
"What a liar." Lotte said.
"Shh! I wanna see where this is going!" I hissed.
The way Melanie wasn't responding to the Phantom had become sort of a running gag.
"My darling, it's time for you to realize that your wedding will never take place unless you are willing to accept another man as your groom."
For some reason, that remark really, really creeped me out.
"What the…" Lotte trailed off.
"I've loved you for so many years, Melanie. I still want to marry you. All these years I've wanted you to agree to marry me!"
"Okay, that's definitely not her father." Nate commented.
"Just what I was thinking." I agreed.
"See? What'd I tell ya?" Lotte grinned.
The ghost of Melanie Ravenswood just sort of faded away, leaving the Phantom alone. In a flash of thunder and lightning, he was gone. As creepy as that would usually be, it was made even creepier by the fact that the weather was really nice, and nowhere near storm conditions.
Nate shook his head. "Whoa."
"I knew it would be a jilted lover!" Lotte exclaimed. "I just had this feeling…in situations like this, the bad guy ALWAYS has the hots for the damsel in distress." She looked down for a moment, like she was thinking about something, and then Lotte looked up really quickly with her eyes gleaming. "I bet it's Roberta Hawthorne's brother! I bet you a million bucks it's Roberta Hawthorne's brother!"
"Well, yeah, but then, what about all the stuff about Mr. Ravenswood? It all added up so perfectly!" I whined. Plus, I came up with that particular theory! I wanna be right about something!
"Maybe it was deliberate. Maybe it was meant to mislead all of us!" Lotte said insightfully.
"You know what?"
"What, Kim?" Nate asked.
"I think we should find Larry. Maybe he'll be able to tell us more about that guy. And plus, I think it's really important that he knows that the Phantom's all lying about him and all."
"Good idea." Lotte agreed.
We sort of quickly exited the house through the back door, followed a pathway, and found ourselves out on Boot Hill.
I shuddered as we passed the first tombstones. They read:
Mary Murphy
1837-1859
"Till death…"
Frank Ballard
1829-1859
"…do us part"
Ma Ballard
1800-1859
"Over my dead body"
"Ugh. Can we make this quick?" I shivered.
"Why?" Nate asked.
"I, I HATE graveyards!" I exclaimed.
"That makes two of us." Lotte shuddered, with a grossed out look on her face.
Some of the graves were sort of interesting.
Jacques Schrillman
Lynched by a couple of music lovers
A wrong note was his end
May 9, 1865
Peg Leg McBrogue
The River Rogue
Walked the Plank
And sank
Red Hot Harry
He got hot
But he was slow
So he got put
Six feet below
These miners were told
About digging too fast
They lost all their gold
In a dynamite blast
B. Arnold
Cold is my bed
But oh, I love it
For colder are my friends above it
Lotte read another one aloud.
Here lies Leadfoot Fred
Danced too slow, and now he's dead
1802-1866
"Guess he got trampled or something." Nate said.
"What?" Lotte asked.
"It said he died because he danced too slow. I was just thinking up a reason why."
"Oh, okay." She nodded.
I read the next two graves next to Leadfoot Fred's one aloud.
Jasper Jones, Loyal Manservant
Died 1866
Kept the Master Happy
Anna Jones, Faithful Chambermaid
Died 1867
Kept the Master HappierI snorted. "Hey, that's funny!"
Nate was looking over at a broken grave next to Anna Jones's.
"Valentine", said the horseman,
"Here lie the remnants of a broken man"Nate scratched his head. "I don't get it."
"Don't feel bad, Nate." I said. "I don't get it either. I mean, okay the thing's broken and then there's the "broken man" thing, but- oh, wait, I get it now!"
"Huh? What?" He asked.
"Valentine was the horse's name! Get it?" Lotte asked.
Nate was plain-faced for a second, like he was trying to figure something out. Then he smiled and laughed.
"Oh, okay. I get it! Makes sense!"
The next grave freaked us all out.
Dakota Dick
Hanged October 17, 1867
Fell to death January 18, 1868
Stabbed December 18, 1868
Poisoned May 21, 1869
He will return"Uh, let's hope he doesn't return any time soon." Lotte said.
"Why can't dead guys just stay dead?" I asked before we moved on.
"Hey! Hey! Look at this one!" Nate laughed. "It's funny!"
Rest in peace,
Barroom Benny
Seems he took one drink too many"Hee hee!" He laughed. "He was a boozer!"
We passed by this one grave, and all of a sudden, Nate got really pale.
"Nate? What is it this time?" I asked, trying to sound calming, because Nate looked like he was in need of a good therapist.
"I…I…hear a heartbeat." He said.
"It's probably just your own." Lotte dismissed, but I could tell she was equally creeped out.
And for the record, I was just as creeped out as they were.
"No. No way. It's…it's…it's not me." Nate said. "I don't know how to describe it, but…it sounds like it's…it's…"
"I know EXACTLY what you're talking about!" I interjected, thinking of poor Emily, the bride in the attic at Gracey Manor.
"You do?" Lotte asked me.
"It's a LONG story." I paused. Wait a second…what's that weird thumping sound?
"I hear it too."
"So do I." Lotte said. "Oh my God. This is way too weird."
The heartbeat got louder.
"I feel like I'm stuck in that Edgar Allan Poe story we read in 8th grade. 'Cept I didn't kill anyone." Nate commented.
"Let's…let's just go find Lawrence." I suggested.
"Good idea." Lotte agreed. "But wait, look. It's Mr. and Mrs. Ravenswood's grave."
Henry Ravenswood, 1795-1860Martha Ravenswood, 1802-1860
Quarreled and fought as man and wife, now silent together beyond this life
We all walked off after that. It didn't take us long to find Lawrence, who was looking through some headstones with drawings of funny looking people on them.
"Larry! Hey Larry!" Nate shouted. "Dude, you are not gonna BELIEVE what just happened to us."
"Um, hello Mr. Nate. Hello Miss Lotte. Hello Miss Kim." Lawrence said politely. "Um, what happened?"
Nate proceeded to tell him all the events that had just happened.
"And anyway," Lotte said, once Nate was done, "What was the name of Roberta Hawthorne's brother?"
"Derek." Lawrence said.
"I KNEW that name sounded familiar!" I exclaimed. "That was the guy Mr. and Mrs. Ravenswood wanted Melanie to marry! It was on one of those old papers I read!"
"But…I don't believe that. Melanie's parents wanted her to marry him because they thought he'd be the next mayor of Thunder Mesa. I know that he did want to marry her, but I don't believe he loved Melanie enough to pursue her in the afterlife. He was one of those men who thought only about money."
"Well, it didn't really seem like love to me. It seemed more like an obsession." I said.
"I can't believe Melanie never told me he proposed to her again." Lawrence said.
"Maybe she thought it would make you mad." Lotte suggested.
"I would've been a bit offended, but I wouldn't have been mad! Well, alright, maybe I WOULD have been mad at him." Lawrence reasoned. "This just gets more twisted by the moment." He shook his head.
"Yeah, you can say that again." Nate said. "But wait…if the Phantom IS this Derek Hawthorne guy, why does he haunt Ravenswood Manor?"
"Larry, were Derek and Roberta killed in the earthquake? And were they at that party here that the Ravenswoods had that night?" Lotte asked.
"They were indeed there. And they were killed." Lawrence nodded. "Their graves are over there." He said, pointing to the left.
As we started to discuss what had happened, the possibility of Derek Hawthorne being the Phantom, we wandered away from Boot Hill. When we looked, up, we found ourselves in a very, very, extremely weird place.
"Oh my God." I said, my voice trailing off.
It was like we were in a cavern. And EVERYWHERE we looked were coffins and decrepit skeletons and cobwebs and a horrible stench floated through the cave.
My stomach flipped. I think I can feel my lunch coming up…oh, man, I'm nauseous! That's how completely disgusting this place is!
A rat squeaked past my foot.
I screamed at the top of my lungs. "Aaaah! Rat! Aaaah!"
"This is so wrong." Lotte said.
As she said that, a skeleton dressed in old-fashioned cowboy get-up stood up, and started to cackle wildly.
All four of us screamed and started freaking out. Oh God…Oh God!! WHY can't these skeleton thingies just leave us alone? WHY??? Oh God, it's disgusting!! It's shaking its hands towards us, with its decayed clothing rustling, wild gray hair and a gross, disgusting smile plastered across its skull. Oh man, now I've really got to retch…
"Oh, yeah, this is way more wrong than I thought!" She panicked.
And if you think Lotte was panicking…you should've seen me. I was jumping and squealing and shivering and shaking and trembling and…
Oh God, GET ME OUT OF HERE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!