The Secret of Smith’s Hill

Chapter 9: Words and Letters

The story so far: The book Mom found turns out to be a Revolutionary War diary–and the twins have found tumbled bottles under the kitchen sink spelling out “FS.”

“But FS doesn’t spell anything,” James said after a few minutes. “It’s just accidental.”

Kelly shook her head. “It’s not, James. Look at the way Sphinx acted. And you know as well as I do that bottles don’t just arrange themselves into letters.” She tore a piece of paper off Mom’s shoppinglist pad, wrote down everything strange that had happened so far, and showed it to James:

Crash - nothing seen Crash - dishes broken–Cory and Sphinx upset

Stone with 782 on it found in dirt dug from cellar hole Old horseshoe found near cellar hole–Clementine upset Damaged truck tires Tapping sounds–maybe SS? Cory’s blocks spelling out LEEAPSHEPLEM Crash in kitchen last night– bottles under sink today spelling out FS–Sphinx upset

James frowned. “I don’t see what the stone and the horseshoe have to do with the other things. But part of that funny long word looks sort of like ‘HELP’.”

“Ohmigosh!” Kelly snatched the paper away from him. “You’re right. HELPEM, actually. Maybe that’s HELP THEM?”

“Or,” James said, “HELP ME, if you reverse the last two letters.”

“James, I really hate to admit it, but that’s the second time since we’ve moved that you’ve almost been a genius.”

James shrugged, but he took the paper back and stared at the word LEEAPSHEPLEM. “I wonder if LEEAPS means anything. Looks like LEAPS, but not quite.”

Kelly had been scribbling on a fresh piece of paper. “PLEASE!” she said suddenly.

“Please what?”

“No, not that kind of please. LEEAPS is PLEASE, scrambled. So,” she added, “I bet our poltergeist is saying ‘Please help me.’ Darn! I wish we’d written down the other letters.”

“Me, too. But I think one batch was almost all consonants and the other was almost all vowels.”

Kelly frowned. “Yeah, you’re right,” she said. “But maybe combined and rearranged they’d have spelled something. Let’s leave Cory’s blocks out tonight. Maybe whatever it is will spell something else.” She turned back to her paper. “What about FS, though? And SS? They don’t spell anything.”

“Maybe they stand for something,” James suggested.

“Initials!” Kelly shouted. “Maybe they’re the poltergeist’s initials. Or two poltergeists’.”

James looked uncomfortable with that idea. “I want to believe you’re right that no one’s been breaking in from the outside,” he said slowly. “But we’ve still got to approach this scientifically.”

“How about we stay up tonight and watch Cory’s blocks?”

“Okay,” said James. “But meanwhile, maybe we should look around in the house more. Just in case there’s someone–well, just in case. We haven’t even been up in the attic, for instance, or–”

There was a sudden shout from outside, and a moment later Dad’s voice called, “Kelly! James! Where are you?”

Kelly and James ran outside, to where Dad, Sam, and the other construction people were staring down at the left-hand corner of the foundation.

“Do you know anything about this?” Dad pointed at a big hole in the cement. There were sticks and dirt in the hole.

“No,” Kelly and James said in unison.

“Someone sure must’ve done this,” Sam said grimly. “It’s a good thing we saw it before it dried.” He scooped out the debris and beckoned for the truck to repair the hole.

“It’s like whatever it is doesn’t like the foundation,” Kelly whispered to James when the men had moved away again. “Maybe we should look outside again, since this was outside.”

“Inside first,” James said firmly. “After all, there may not be any connection between this and the blocks and stuff.” He grinned. “Maybe this was a squirrel,” he added as they walked away.

“Or a poltergeist,” Kelly said stubbornly, “trying to tell us something.”

James clapped his hand to his head dramatically. “Read my lips: poltergeists don’t exist! It’s got to be something else.” He took off at a run toward the house and made a bee-line for the attic stairs.

The attic was dark except for a little light coming through two small windows, and it smelled of mouse droppings. It also looked completely empty.

“Well, there’s nothing here, said James. “Let’s go explore the cellar instead. Maybe .... What?”

Kelly had just spotted something on the floor. “Wait a sec,” she said, stooping to pick it up.

Then she gasped, and held it out to James.

It was a very old, tarnished silver locket. And engraved on it were the letters FS. To be continued Monday May 7 Next Time: A Long Night