Ghosts of Government House Page 6

  “Yesterday,” said J.J.

  “Have you seen him today?” Sam asked, looking over the balustrade to see if Jocko was on the chandeliers below them.

  “Glad to say I haven’t,” said Sheldon firmly. “He’s smelly and gets into the cupboards and all kinds of things.”

  “What about the dog?” asked Sam. There had to be an explanation for the one in the photograph.

  “Shaun?” Sheldon jerked back in surprise. “He’s around here somewhere, usually with Thomas, my roommate.”

  “So how come you’re here?” Sam ventured to change the subject.

  “Why do you think?” Sheldon waved his bandaged hands, pointing to his head then the wheelchair. “A little injury thanks to someone not knowing the war was over. Doesn’t heal overnight you know.”

  “What war?” Sam asked, remembering that Government House had once been a rehabilitation centre for war veterans. When Sheldon’s face tightened with sudden anger, she wished she’d kept quiet.

  “I’ll forgive your disrespect because you’re young and probably don’t know any better,” he said disdainfully. “But don’t ever let any of the other fifty-nine World War Two convalescents hear you ask that or they’ll be thoroughly offended—and after all they did to fight for this country too.”

  Sam blushed. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to insult you or anybody else.”

  “We truly didn’t know,” added J.J.

  Sheldon snorted again. “What are they teaching you in school these days?”

  “If it’s not rude to ask, would you tell us a little more about how you came to be here?” asked Sam softly.

  “I’ll not go into details. They’re too unpleasant to repeat.” Sheldon pounded one hand on a wheelchair arm. “But I will tell you I was at one of the last battles when a bomb exploded after the ceasefire was declared.”

  Sam gulped, waiting for him to go on. J.J. held very still. Thunder rumbled overhead. The skylight darkened even more.

  “Some of my best friends are buried in the Rimini Gurkha War Cemetery in Italy. I was one of the lucky ones—if you can call this lucky.” Sheldon indicated his injuries.

  “How long have you been here?” J.J. wanted to know.

  “Six months,” Sheldon said.

  “Uh, when did you come exactly?” asked Sam uneasily.

  “March 1946.” Sheldon scowled. “Where’d you come from, not knowing nothing from anything?”

  “Guess we’ve lived a sheltered life,” J.J. mumbled.

  “Where is your home?” asked Sam.

  Sheldon sputtered. “Here, of course!”

  “No, I mean when you leave here. What about your family?” Sam said.

  Sheldon’s face fell. Suddenly, he began to fade.

  “Wait!” Sam called. “We only wanted to be friendly and know a little more about you.”

  But they stared into empty space.

  At that moment, Grandma Louise stuck her head into the hall. Sam and J.J. scrambled to join her and Gabe as they entered the third guest bedroom.

  “These ghosts don’t seem to know they’re, well, ghosts,” J.J. whispered to Sam as they came up behind Gabe.

  “Your plans backfiring?” Gabe smirked at them.

  “Let’s just say the ghosts aren’t exactly cooperating,” Sam said defensively. She glanced about for signs of Jocko or the other ghosts as they wandered through the bedrooms and then back into the centre hall.

  When they pointed the shimmering mirror out to Gabe, he guffawed. “Yeah, like I’m going to believe some supernatural force is at work here. Woo, I’m so scared.”

  A brilliant flash of lightning exploded, followed immediately by a loud crack of thunder. Black storm clouds blocked the skylight overhead.

  All the lights went out. Sam screamed.

  Grandma Louise gathered Sam, J.J. and Gabe to her. “Someone will be here momentarily, I’m sure,” she said.

  “They’re already here.” J.J.’s voice wobbled as she pointed.

  Sam looked. The ghostly figure was hidden in the shadows at the top of the stairs, faint at first, so that she couldn’t make out any features. Sam felt goosebumps pucker her arms. “Who are you?” she asked, trembling.

  “Stop fooling around,” Gabe hissed at her.

  Sam jabbed him in the ribs. “Shhh!”

  Grandma Louise gripped Gabe’s arm and indicated for him to keep quiet.

  “I think it might be Howie,” Sam whispered as the shape became more solid.

  The figure slowly materialized into a Chinese man dressed in a white shirt, black pants and a long chef’s apron. He wore slippers on his feet.

  “You’re Mr. Cheun Lee, aren’t you?” Sam asked breathlessly.

  He gave her a slight smile. Thunder roared.

  Sam bowed to him. “It’s an honour to meet you.”

  Beside her, J.J. bowed as well. “Hello, Mr. Lee,” she said.

  In the semi-darkness, Gabe’s face was scornful. However, Grandma Louise was watching with avid curiosity. Obviously neither of them could see Mr. Lee.

  “Why do you stay in this house?” Sam asked the ghost.

  “Not speak English well,” Cheun Lee said, and turned to go.

  “Wait,” said Sam. She pointed to him and swung her arms to indicate the whole place. “Why do you stay here?” she repeated.

  “Good place,” he answered simply.

  “No, I mean now that you have passed on. Why do you stay?”

  He didn’t seem to understand. Somehow, Sam didn’t have the heart to explain he had died or to let him know he was a ghost—especially if he took offence and disappeared as the others had. How could she coax him to stay a little longer? “Do you have any family here?” she asked.

  J.J. pantomimed what she meant, putting her arm through Gabe’s as if they were a couple, rocking a baby and pointing to him.

  Cheun Lee smiled faintly and nodded.

  “You’re married?” Sam interpreted.

  He nodded again. Then he pointed back and forth to J.J. and Gabe, holding up one finger for each.

  “You have a girl and a boy?” Sam confirmed.

  He nodded again, indicating their height with his hand as he pointed to J.J. and Gabe again.

  J.J. broke in, “Where’s your family?”

  He waved his hand to indicate far away. “Guangzhou, China,” he answered. His face turned bleak. “I go now. I cook.” He turned away.

  “One more question, please,” said Sam. “Do you move things in the house?” She pointed to the statue on the halfway landing and indicated turning it around to face the wall. J.J. pretended to move something from one place to another.

  The man’s face looked puzzled. “I cook,” he said, in his limited English. “Don’t make trouble.”

  “Do you know Sheldon and Ben?” J.J. prompted. She gestured Sheldon rolling his wheelchair and Ben rocking on the horse.

  Cheun Lee shook his head.

  “What about Robbie, the baby?” Sam added, cradling her arms to demonstrate.

  “No.”

  “The monkey, Jocko?”

  J.J. did an imitation of a monkey with her arms. “Eee-eee-eee.”

  Cheun Lee looked startled and backed away from them. “I go now.”

  “Thank you,” Sam sighed, bowing.

  “Good-bye.” J.J. bobbed beside her.

  Cheun Lee gave them a little bow and shuffled off— going straight through the closed door again.

  Sam and J.J. stared after him.

  Gabe gave a hollow laugh. “All that acting—you’re going to lots of trouble to make me believe in ghosts. It’s not going to work.”

  “I guess that didn’t go so well,” said Grandma Louise.

  Sam shook her head. “He can’t speak much English.”

  “A
nd I don’t think he realizes he’s passed on either,” said J.J.

  “I don’t think he’s the one causing all the trouble here,” said Sam. “He seems too quiet.”

  “Are you two ever wacko,” Gabe scoffed. “I know who’s going to be staying home for two weeks. Yay—I won’t have to watch out for you.”

  Grandma Louise raised an eyebrow at him. “They’re not pretending,” she said.

  “Cripes,” said Gabe. “Don’t tell me they’ve got you swayed too, Gran?”

  “I happen to believe them,” said Grandma Louise. She gazed off and continued, “Sometimes I’ve felt your granddad around me. And maybe he is.”

  J.J. shuffled her feet. “I wish I could feel my mom near me,” she said. “I really miss her.”

  “I’m sure you’ll be able to in time.” Grandma Louise patted her hand fondly.

  Gabe’s mouth fell open. “As if. Have you all gone crazy?”

  A low rumble of thunder sounded. The lights flickered but didn’t come back on.

  “Being in this house has made all of you see things that aren’t there.” Gabe turned away but whirled back to face them as his cap was yanked from his back pocket. He glared at Sam and J.J. “Give it back!”

  Sam held out her empty hands.

  “Turn around,” he ordered.

  Obediently, Sam and J.J. pirouetted so Gabe could see they had nothing behind their backs.

  He swung around to Grandma Louise, who also did a slow rotation with her palms up.

  “Well, then where’s my hat?” he demanded.

  Sam pointed. Gabe’s cap—or rather its fluorescent lettering, which was all they could see clearly of it in the gloom—was sailing in mid-air.

  Gabe jumped to grab it as it soared out of reach above the balustrade and into the middle of the centre well. It landed momentarily, then swung out over the chandeliers that hung below them.

  “Jocko?” guessed Grandma Louise.

  “Yep,” said J.J.

  Sam giggled as she watched the monkey sway back and forth with the cap in one paw, then leap to the next chandelier. “Jocko’s the monkey,” she explained to Gabe, who stood in shock, watching his cap fly back and forth in the air.

  All of a sudden a child’s voice called from the opposite side of the centre well. “Jocko, bring it here.”

  “Ben, you’re back!” Sam said happily.

  The boy grinned at them. “I’ll try to get the hat back from Jocko—but you may have to pretend you don’t want it anymore.”

  “Not a problem,” said Sam.

  Ben called the monkey several times but was ignored.

  At a nod from Ben, Sam said, “Everyone, turn your back on the centre well.”

  “Is this another one of your tricks?” Gabe asked suspiciously as J.J. and Grandma Louise obeyed.

  “You want your ball cap back, don’t you?” asked Sam.

  “Yeah.”

  “Then pretend you don’t,” said Sam.

  “What?”

  “Just do it,” J.J. commanded.

  Gabe turned reluctantly but peeked over his shoulder.

  “Good monkey,” came Ben’s voice. “Good Jocko.”

  Gabe’s cap fall to the floor below.

  Beneath them, Robin yelled. “Yikes! Who did that?”

  They’d forgotten about her, down on the first floor. Gabe started to snigger when he saw Robin’s shocked white face looking up at them.

  Sam poked him. “Uh, sorry, Gabe dropped his cap.”

  “I did not,” Gabe declared. “Someone took it.” He glared at the girls.

  Grandma Louise’s face was contorted in mirth. Sam clapped her hand tight over her mouth, trying not to giggle. Suddenly they all exploded at once and couldn’t stop laughing.

  “We’re sorry, Robin,” Grandma Louise said sheepishly. “We’re not laughing at you.”

  Suddenly, the lights came back on.

  “Yahoo!” said Gabe, rushing down the staircase to retrieve his cap.

  chapter eight

  sam and J.J. chatted with Ben upstairs while Grandma Louise looked on.

  “You do understand that you’ve passed on, don’t you?” Sam asked gently.

  With a glum smile, Ben said, “Yes. I do now. I wondered why hardly anyone ever noticed me when all these strange people kept walking through the house.”

  “Others noticed you?” asked J.J.

  “Once in a while, but no one ever talked to me before. You were the first. The others all seemed scared of me.” Ben looked sad again. “Now that I know I’m a ghost, I understand why they were frightened.”

  “What made you realize you were a ghost?” asked Sam.

  “Besides you telling me, you mean?”

  “Yes.”

  “Because of what happened last night. I’d never gone any place outside of Government House before.”

  “You only visited here a few times according to the history books, if you are who I think you are,” said a soft voice behind them.

  “What?” Sam jumped. She’d been so absorbed in their conversation that she hadn’t heard Robin come up the stairs.

  “You can see him?” J.J. yelped.

  “Mmm-hmm. I thought I saw or heard the voices of other ghosts too,” said Robin. “But I was terrified, so I pretended I didn’t until I saw you actually talking to Ben.”

  “They’re really quite harmless,” said J.J.

  “Well, except for Jocko maybe,” said Ben with a grin. “He gets into everything.”

  “There are others too, including Sheldon and Cheun Lee,” said Sam. She explained who they were as Gabe reached the top of the stairs, cap in hand. He shook his head in disbelief.

  “I don’t know those people,” said Ben. “I just see Jocko. And Robbie and Madeleine of course.”

  “Madeleine?” asked J.J. faintly.

  “My governess,” Ben answered. “She’s smashing!”

  “How long have you been able to see Jocko?” asked Sam.

  “As long as I’ve been here,” said Ben. “Even before I, uh, passed on. I saw him as soon as we came for our first visit. We’ve always had such great fun together.”

  “Strange that you could see him right away,” Sam said.

  “Not really,” said Grandma Louise. “Remember I said that children are usually sensitive to ghosts and other psychic phenomena, just like you and J.J.?”

  “How come Gabe doesn’t see them then?” asked Sam.

  “He’s lost his trust in believing,” said Grandma Louise.

  Gabe looked uneasily at his gran.

  “Don’t worry, it’ll come back to you.” Grandma Louise patted his hand. “It’s already started to—you saw Cheun Lee downstairs, right?”

  “That man was real. And I know ghosts aren’t.” Gabe stepped back and looked at everyone suspiciously. “Why are all of you trying so hard to make me believe in them? And how’d you do that trick with my hat? I didn’t see any wires or anything.”

  Sam shook her head, exasperated. J.J. rolled her eyes.

  “Nobody did anything, Gabe,” said Grandma Louise gently.

  “If you say so.” He stuck his hands in his pockets and began whistling nonchalantly. Then he wandered away from them.

  “How can we prove to him about all the ghosts here?” asked J.J. in frustration.

  “You can’t, dear,” Grandma Louise replied. “He has to discover them himself.”

  “Coming back to the ghosts we know are here,” said Sam. “It’s obvious Sheldon can see Shaun, because the dog lived here with the veterans. But how can Sheldon see Jocko, when he’s from a different time?”

  “Sheldon didn’t see Jocko until yesterday,” J.J. reminded her.

  “Not until you both did,” said Grandma Louise. “I suspect your taking notice of She
ldon somehow triggered his being able to connect to the spirit world. Up until then he didn’t realize he’d passed on.”

  “Then how come he can’t see Cheun Lee and vice versa?” asked J.J.

  “And they can’t see Ben and his baby brother and governess, or any of the others,” Sam added.

  “That’s a good question,” said Gran.

  Robin had been silently watching the exchange. Now she spoke up. “Maybe it’s because they lived in different parts of the house at different times, sometimes decades apart. And remember that the house was also renovated for different purposes,” she suggested.

  “I wondered about the different times but I forgot about the changes to the house,” said J.J.

  “They also live in their own worlds, not looking beyond their personal circumstances,” said Grandma Louise thoughtfully.

  “That’s true,” said Sam. “Ben’s group is together all the time.”

  “So they’re not lonely like Cheun Lee and Sheldon,” said J.J.

  “We’re not lonely,” Ben piped up. “But I wouldn’t mind meeting the others. It would be nice to talk to someone else sometimes.”

  “How can we help them meet?” asked Sam.

  “Don’t look at me,” said Gabe, returning. “I still think you’re all a little bonkers—but hey, I’m willing to go along with the game.”

  “So what’s it going to take?” asked Sam, grinning at her brother.

  “Give him time to get used to the idea,” said Grandma Louise. “It’s not every day a guy sees his cap floating around without any obvious reason.”

  Gabe gave Grandma Louise a pained look. “I’ll find the wires,” he insisted. He seemed more relaxed now. “Were you in on it, Robin? Operating levers from the floor below or something?”

  Robin laughed. “No way,” she said. “I was by the door waiting until the lights came back on.”

  Crash! Rumble, rumble, ping, ping.

  Everyone looked around in surprise.

  “Where did that come from?” Robin’s face blanched.

  Sam’s heart pounded. She clutched J.J.’s hand and scooted closer to Grandma Louise.

  Robin started down the stairs.

  “I’m coming with you.” Curious, Sam felt a surge of courage. She crept down the staircase, clutching the railing to keep her knees from buckling. She could feel J.J. hanging on to her. What would they find this time?