Free Hangman's Curse by Frank Peretti

particular reason and with no discernible source. Elijah and Elisha were camped out near what used to be Jim Boltz’s locker, studying by the light of small work lamps they wore on their heads. They had to leave the hallway dark because that was how it was “that night.” How long they would have to wait was an open question, but they’d brought sleeping bags just in case.
    Elijah glanced at his watch and spoke in a near whisper. “Nine-fifteen.”
    Elisha extinguished her light and looked up and down the dark hallway. “Jamie said they heard the ghost about nine o’clock.”
    â€œWhere?”
    She nodded toward Jim Boltz’s locker. “Right about here.”
    Elijah raised his head, directing his work lamp upward where it illumined the little hanging man scratched on the locker door. “Well . . . so far he’s been pretty quiet.”
    His backpack was beside him. He reached into it and took out the digital recorder their mother had sent with them. “What do you think?”
    She shrugged, a dark silhouette against a gray patch of light upon the floor. “Now’s as good a time as any.”
    Elijah consulted a piece of paper Mr. Loman had given them when he let them in: the combination to Jim Boltz’s locker. He stood, dialed the combination, and opened the locker door. Then, with double-backed tape, he fastened the little recorder to the inside of the locker’s air vent. He clicked it on, and a tiny red light appeared. “Okay, we’re rolling.” He closed the door and spun the lock.
    The recorder was a highly sensitive device that could record continuously for twenty-four hours. Even if no “ghost” made a sound that night, they still had a backup, an electronic ear listening around the clock. The plan was to replace the memory card with a blank one each day, and then review each day’s recording. Maybe, just maybe, they would record something unusual.
    Elijah rested his back against the locker and went back to his studies. Elisha clicked her light on again and did the same.
    â€œSo what do you think of your humanities class?” she asked.
    Elijah had to chuckle. “Mr. Carlson keeps shooting himself in the foot.”
    She cocked her head and gave him a testing look. “Elijah. You aren’t being difficult, are you?”
    He raised his eyebrows innocently. “What? He was telling us there’s no right or wrong, and I just asked him if that statement was right or wrong, that’s all.”
    She laughed. “You’re going to get us kicked out of here.”
    â€œOhhh?” he asked with mock indignity. “So how are things going in biology?”
    â€œIt’s all coming back to me. I think Mom made it more interesting, but Mr. Harrigan’s really nice . . .” She looked toward the ceiling. “And I hope he stays that way tomorrow. We have to discuss this chapter on evolution.” She opened her biology textbook and showed him a page.
    He whistled in amazement. “The Miller experiment? That’s still in the textbooks?”
    â€œAnd the Ernst Haeckel embryos . . .”
    â€œYou’ve got to be kidding!”
    She showed him the pages to prove it. “ And the whale that evolved from a cow.”
    Elijah saw the diagrams and the paragraphs and had to chuckle. “What are you going to do?”
    â€œWell . . . Mr. Harrigan seems like a nice man. Maybe I can talk to him in private.”
    â€œYeah. Good idea.”
    She looked up and down the hall. “I’m getting sleepy.”
    They closed their textbooks and clicked off their lights, then sat in the dark and the silence. Occasionally, they could hear the low, distant roar of a car passing on the road outside and see the dim reflection of its headlights moving along the wall. A tiny, living thing was moving behind the lockers somewhere. They could hear the faint scratching of its toenails. The furnace kicked