Free Comes the Blind Fury by John Saul Page A

knows. Nobody’s even sure if she’s really here or not.”
    “Have you ever seen her?”
    “No,” Sally said, with a hesitation so slight that Michelle wasn’t certain she’d even heard it.
    A few minutes later the two girls slammed through the back door into the immense kitchen, where June was kneading a loaf of bread. “You two hungry?” she asked.
    “Uh-huh.”
    “There’re cookies in the jar, and milk’s in the refrigerator. Wash your hands first, though. Both of you.” June turned back to her dough, ignoring the look of exasperation that passed between Michelle and Sally at the reminder of the childhood they were becoming eager to leave behind. Yet neither of them considered the possibility of ignoring the order. In a moment, June heard the tap running in the kitchen sink.
    “We’ll be up in my room,” Michelle said as she poured two glasses of milk and heaped a plate with cookies.
    “Just don’t get crumbs all over everything,” June said placidly, knowing they were again rolling their eyes at each other.
    “Is your mother like that, too?” Michelle asked as they went upstairs.
    “Worse,” Sally said. “Mine still makes me eat in the kitchen.”
    “What can you do?” Michelle sighed, not expecting an answer. She led Sally into her room and closed the door. Sally threw herself on the bed.
    “I love this house,” she exclaimed. “And this room, and the furniture, and—” Her voice stopped suddenly as her eyes fell on the doll that lay on the window seat.
    “What’s that?” she breathed. “Is it new? How come I haven’t seen it before?”
    “It was right there last time you were here,” Michelle replied. Sally got up and went across the room.
    “Michelle, it looks ancient!”
    “It is, I guess,” Michelle agreed. “I found it in the closet when we moved in. It was up on a shelf, way at the back.”
    Sally picked up the doll, examining it carefully.
    “She’s beautiful,” she said softly. “What’s her name?”
    “Amanda.”
    Sally’s eyes widened, and she stared at Michelle.
    “Amanda? Why did you name her that?”
    “I don’t know. I just wanted an old-fashioned name, and Amanda sort of—well, came to me, I guess.”
    “That’s weird,” Sally said. She could feel goosebumps forming on her skin. “That’s the name of the ghost.”
    “What?” Michelle asked. It didn’t make sense.
    “That’s the name of the ghost,” Sally repeated. “It’s on one of the gravestones. Come on, I’ll show you.”

CHAPTER 5
    Sally led the way as the girls left the path and started toward the collapsing fence around the cemetery.
    It was a tiny plot, no more than fifty feet square, and the graves had a forgotten look to them. Many of the headstones had been pushed over, or fallen, and most of those still upright had an unstable appearance, as if they were only waiting for a good storm to give up their lonely vigils over the dead. A lightning-scarred oak tree, long dead, stood skeletally in the center of the plot, its branches reaching forlornly toward the sky. It was a grim place, and Michelle was hesitant to enter.
    “Be careful,” Sally warned Michelle. “There’s nails sticking up, and you can’t see them through the weeds.”
    “Doesn’t anybody take care of this place?” Michelle asked. “The graveyards in Boston never look like this.”
    “I don’t think anybody cares anymore,” Sally answered her. “Uncle Joe says he isn’t even going to be buried here—he says being buried’s a waste of time and just takes up a lot of ground that could be used for other things. Once he even threatened to take out all the gravestones and let the whole place grow wild.”
    Michelle paused, and looked around her. “He might as well have,” she observed. “This place is creepy.”
    Sally avoided the tangle of vines and weeds as she moved through the graveyard. “Wait’ll you see what’s over here.”
    Michelle was about to follow her when her eyes suddenly fell on one