Free The Haunted Mask II by R. L. Stine

“They are real, living faces. The man in the cape
tried to make them good-looking. But something went wrong. They all came out ugly. As ugly as the one you’re wearing.”
    “But, Carly Beth—” I started.
    She raised a hand to hush me. “The caped man calls the faces The Unloved. No
one wants them because they turned out so ugly. They are The Unloved. They’re
alive. And they attach themselves to anyone who comes near enough.”
    “But how do I get it off?” I cried impatiently. I raised my hands and tugged
at my rutted, scabby cheeks. “I can’t spend the rest of my life like this. What
can I do?”
    Carly Beth jumped up and began pacing back and forth in front of Sabrina and
me. Sabrina unwrapped a Milky Way bar and began chewing it, watching Carly Beth
pace.
    “The same thing happened to me last Halloween,” Carly Beth said. “I had
chosen a really ugly mask. It was so scary. It attached itself to my head. And
then it turned me evil.”
    “And what did you do?” I cried, leaning forward on my cane.
    “I went back to the party store. I found the man in the cape. He told me
there was only one way to get rid of the mask. It could only be done with a
symbol of love.”
    “Huh?” I gaped at her. I didn’t understand.
    “I had to find a symbol of love,” Carly Beth continued. “At first, I didn’t
know what the man meant. I didn’t know what to do. But then I remembered something my mom had
made for me.”
    “What?” I demanded eagerly. “What was it?”
    “It was that head,” Sabrina chimed in, her mouth bulging with chocolate.
    “My mom had sculpted a head of me,” Carly Beth said. “It looked just like me.
You’ve seen it. Mom sculpted it because she loves me. It was a symbol of love.”
    Carly Beth dropped back down beside me. “I placed Mom’s sculpted head over
The Unloved face. And The Unloved disappeared. The ugly face slipped right off.”
    “Great!” I cried happily. “Go get it. Hurry!”
    “Huh?” Carly Beth stared at me, confused.
    “Go get the sculpted head,” I begged. “I’ve got to get this thing off me!”
    Carly Beth shook her head. “You don’t get it, Steve. You can’t use my symbol of love. It will only work for me. You have to find your own symbol of love.”
    “But maybe it won’t work for Steve’s mask,” Sabrina interrupted. “Maybe each
mask is different.”
    “Give me a break, Sabrina,” I muttered angrily. “It’s got to work! Don’t you
understand? It’s got to!”
    “You have to find your own symbol of love,” Carly Beth repeated. “Can you
think of one, Steve?”
    I stared back at her, thinking hard. I thought. And thought. Symbol of love… symbol of love… No. I couldn’t think of anything. Not a single thing.
And then an idea popped into my mind.

 
 
24
     
     
    I leaned on the cane and tried to pull myself up from the couch. But my
feeble arms gave way, and I fell back into the cushion.
    “You’ve got to help me get home,” I told Carly Beth. “I thought of a symbol
of love. It’s at my house.”
    “Okay. Let’s go!” she replied.
    “But what about the kids coming over here?” Sabrina asked, swallowing a chunk
of Milky Way. “What about the party?”
    “You stay here and greet them,” Carly Beth told her. “If Steve really can
find a symbol of love at his house—and if it works—we’ll be right back.”
    “It’ll work,” I said. “I know it will.”
    But I had my fingers crossed. Which made it even harder to climb up from the
couch.
    Carly Beth saw me struggling. She took both my hands and pulled me to my
feet. “Yuck! What are those things moving around in your ears?” she cried, making a disgusted
face.
    “Spiders,” I said quietly.
    She swallowed hard. “I sure hope you find something that works.”
    “Me too,” I murmured as she guided me to the door.
    Carly Beth turned back into the living room. “Don’t eat all the chocolate
while we’re gone,” she called to Sabrina.
    “It’s only