Free Christina's Ghost by Betty Ren Wright

right behind her. At the top of the steps he grabbed her hand, and they jumped off the porch together.
    â€œAround the back,” Uncle Ralph panted. “Head for the car.”
    Chris felt as if she were running through a swamp that sucked at her feet and held her back. “Can’t—can’t run!” she gasped.
    Uncle Ralph pulled her along. “Yes you can,” he said. “Just make sure you hang on to that envelope, sport.”
    They reached the car. Uncle Ralph swung open thedoor on the driver’s side and threw Chris across the seat. Then he jumped in after her and slammed the door. The keys were in the ignition. There was a heart-stopping moment when the motor stuttered, quit, then roared to life.
    â€œThat’s my good old baby,” Uncle Ralph muttered. “That’s my girl!”
    He swung the car around so that the headlights rested full on the house. Curtains and draperies billowed furiously at every window. Lights flicked on and off, all over the house. Then the back door flew open, and the towering figure of the attic ghost was silhouetted in the headlights’ beam.
    â€œHe’s coming!” Chris screamed. “He’s coming after us!”
    Uncle Ralph pulled hard on the wheel, and the car shot into the narrow, winding road that led to the highway. The trees formed a tunnel around them, and as the car bounced through it, the branches ahead seemed to bend down. Something struck the roof a sharp blow.
    â€œHe’s trying to stop us,” Chris cried. “What are we going to do?”
    Uncle Ralph clutched the steering wheel like a race-car driver. “Hang on, sport,” he said through clenched teeth. “This is still Dixon’s territory. Do you have that envelope?”
    Chris held up the strip of glassine.
    â€œGood. Don’t wrinkle it.”
    â€œWrinkle it!” Chris exclaimed. “I can hardly hold it, I’m shaking so hard.”
    â€œThen put it in the glove compartment, and go ahead and shake,” Uncle Ralph snapped. He winced as a branch scraped across the windshield. “We’re almost back to civilization.”
    As he said it, they shot out onto the highway. A semitrailer truck swerved around them with startled blasts of the horn.
    â€œCool it, bub,” Uncle Ralph said. He raced after the truck. Other cars were coming toward them now, their lights reassuring in the forest dark. Far ahead, the lights of a woodland motel twinkled.
    â€œWe’re okay!” Uncle Ralph said. “We’ve made it!” But Chris noticed that he didn’t slow down. Not until the gas stations, bait shops, and small shingled houses of Clearwater began flying past did he take his foot off the gas.
    â€œThere’s a little coffee shop right smack in the middle of town,” he said. “We’ll go there.”
    Good
, Chris thought. Ghosts didn’t show themselves in coffee shops, did they?
    When they parked in front of the little restaurant, Chris discovered that her knees were still trembling. She shook as she removed the envelope from the glove compartment, followed Uncle Ralph into the restaurantand settled in a high-backed booth. She laid the glassine envelope in the middle of the table and stared at it.
    Across from her, Uncle Ralph wiped his face with his handkerchief. He took deep breaths, like a swimmer coming up for air. “You want to open that thing, Christina?” he asked. “You deserve to. You’re the one who got it away from—from
him
.”
    Chris shuddered. She glanced out at the street, where tourists strolled, eating ice-cream cones and enjoying the soft summer night. She would have liked to be one of them. Walking down Clearwater’s main street eating an ice-cream cone was all the adventure she’d ever want again.
    â€œWe’ll do that tomorrow,” Uncle Ralph said, once again seeming to read her mind. “Open that envelope, will you?”
    Chris