Show FLOYD G GIBBONS iBBONs a Adventurers Adventurers' Club ClubA uA A Girl and amZ a Ghost By FLOYD GIBBONS Famous Headline A AND ND Im I'm certainly glad you didn't drop dead Mary Greene the night a ghost walked right into your bedroom Pull up your chairs a little cJ closer ser boys and girls turn the light down low and listen to Marys Mary's true ghost story It is worth listening listening- to When Mary moved out to a farm she W was 8 In Just the sort of a mood that ghosts like Her lIer school work had hail made her nervous and sickly and her ber parents decided that she needed a rest and fresh air So they they packed her off in n April 1 25 to a farm owned by friends Now Mary always has had a horror of ghost stories and It was wu ghost stories that this thle farmer doted on Mary says his bedtime bed bed- time stories always told of 01 weird happenings at of midnight shrouded figures with clanking chains chains of of f ghostly faces peering Into windows windows weird weird cries footsteps and unexplained thump Ing Ings on walls One night Wary Iary says after a particularly raising hair series of horror horror horror hor hor- stories storie she climbed the tile wooden wOlden stairs to her bedroom with more or vr less fear and trembling She was nervous and lay slet sleeplessly In bed watching the moonbeams throw ghostly patterns on the floor toor The rest test of the family had bad gone to sleep long since The Night Was a Deathly Quiet One The night was one of those Intensely quiet ones peculiar to the coun coon try Not a breath of air stirred and the leaves on the tr trees tree es in the yard might have been painted for all the noise they ma made e Once Onee In la tile tie dis distance tance a tar far off far off ll train whistled and the screaming note as It died down made the silence all the more Impressive It I I The grandfather clock downstairs b began gan to strike strike Its Its slow Ilow sonorous notes sounded to the girlin girl In bed like Ilke the mournful peal Ing of a church tolling toiling bell tolling the service for the dead I She counted tite tha strokes carefully At eleven she held her breath and hoped It would be the thelast last And as she listened hoping neal against st hope that the hour she dreaded would not strike a dog howled In the distance The Witching Hour Brings Horror to Mary She shivered and drew the bedclothes over her lIer head hlad And as all she the did the did the clock struck TWELVE Mary says the last notes of midnight i l i In the Moonlight She Saw a Figure In White had hardly died before she heard other sounds that brought her heart bean Into lato her mouth In abject terror I Each Kach ach sound seem seemed to the Ute terror terror-strick en girl more horrible than the other Stealthy footsteps were coming up the stairs Chains clanked dismally and In the silence of that awful night she heard plainly the thump thump thump th of a heavy object being dragged through the silent allent house And the awful sounds were soon upstairs She heard them coming toward her room She sat up stiffly In bed and wet her lips lips dry dry from horror resolved horror resolved to cry out Finally words came but the weak squeaky voice sounded strange and unlike her own there The Intruder Was Silent as a Ghost Silence The noises stopped but as the terror stricken terror girl listened she was sure she could hear something breathing just outside her door The door was closed but unlocked and as she ahe stared her heart almost topped stopped beating The door moved Mary Mary now beside herself tried to scream She opened wide her mouth but no sound lound came from her parched throat Stiff and rigid rigid her her bulging eyes staring In terror she he waited forthe forthe for forthe the the worst wont And It was not long In coming Tier Her door slowly opened opened opened-In In the bright moonlight she saw a figure shrouded In white white and and as she sat there too tense even to faint taint the thing approached her bed I Visitor From the Grave Is Too Much for Mary danger often do and do-and- and She took a deep breath breath ns as persons In great horrible as It Is to relate relate Into Into her nostrils came the overpowering odor of the grave The sickening stench of death Wow I That was the straw that broke the camels camel's back And It ft Is all that Mar Mary remembers But she knows she he must have screamed creamed because a scream cream brought the th farmer into her room roem on the run with a shotgun that hadn't been off the wall since Armistice day ibe he mla minute te th the farmer sniffed the I ghost 1 mean the goat goat he he knew what had bad happened That pet goat billy of ot his bis had gone and pulled his stake and dragging stake and chain after him bad had come right into the bouse house Mary Says Ghosts Still Get Her Goat And not only that that that- that Billy Billy had pulled one of his old tricks tricks robbing robbing his soiled back trailed one oae of ot Mas Ma's nice the clothes line line and and there on clean sheets bed-sheets 1 I But that Isn't what got Marys Mary's goat What burned her up who left the concerned about was wal that the farmer seemed more back door open than thal he was wal about her nearly dying of fright I 1 ends her interesting letter fetter I 1 dont don't dislike goats any more Mary hate bate them And that goes for tor me me too Mary ary Id I'd rather smell a 8 ghost any day 0 y C 8 |