CHAPTER THREE

But actually, as it turned out, the drive wasn’t that bad. Once they got off the interstate, heading up toward the country, it seemed like they were entering another world. The long, wide stretches of car-crowded highway soon changed to narrow, twisted roads which ran through heavy woodlands and past huge, open fields of cut cornstalks and still more fields of waving, shimmering grass. They even passed a lake and several swamps. Kevin loved getting out of town and up into the country like this, especially when it was the middle of autumn. The air was clean and fresh and cool, and the sun seemed to make everything brighter.

“I’ve never seen anything like this in my whole life,” Jimmy said, gazing out the window in complete astonishment. “This is great.”

“Yeah, I know,” Kevin agreed. “I love coming up here.”

“What’s the big deal?” Becky objected. “Just a bunch of chopped-down cornfields and ugly swamps, and a lot of trees with hardly any leaves left on them. So what.” Then she went back to reading one of her dumb romance novels.

“We’re almost there, kids,” Mr. Bennell announced.

“So you say there’s some good fishing up this way?” Mr. Grimaldi asked.

“Not good fishing, great fishing,” Kevin’s father answered his friend. “Striped bass, lake trout, and perch like you wouldn’t believe.”

“How long has your sister owned the place?”

“Oh, years and years. She’s always loved it up here. And it’s a shame too.”

“What do you mean?” Mr. Grimaldi asked.

“Well, business has dropped over the years,” Kevin’s father said. “Things are getting pretty run down, Carolyn can’t afford to have the property properly maintained anymore. Each year, somehow, she manages to hang on, but it looks like she’ll probably go bust soon.”

Kevin’s ears perked up. He wasn’t quite sure what they were talking about, but it didn’t sound good. “Hey, Dad, what’s that mean?” he asked. “Going bust?”

Mr. Bennell seemed to duck the question. “Never you mind about that, Kevin,” he said. “We’ll talk about it later when I’ve got more time.”

Figures, Kevin thought. That’s what adults said whenever they didn’t want to talk about something.

“It means she’s going broke,” Becky said. “It means she doesn’t have enough money to run the lodge anymore, and she’ll have to close it down, stupid.”

“Becky, stop calling you brother stupid,” Mr. Bennell ordered.

Kevin discreetly stuck his tongue out at his sister. Then he turned to Jimmy. “And just wait till you see the bluffs.”

“Bluffs? What’s that?” Jimmy asked.

“They’re like cliffs. At the end of my aunt’s land, they’re these great bluffs overlooking the ocean. You can see the waves and everything. And the bluffs catch all the great wind, so we’ll have some really super kite flying.”

“Yeah,” Becky cut in, grimacing, “and while you guys are flying kites, all I get to do is sit around the lodge with weird old Aunt Carolyn.”

Before Kevin could comment, though, his father said, “Hey, kids. We’re here.”

“All right!” Kevin exclaimed.

They pulled into the entrance of the lodge, which was at the end of a long, gravel road that cut through the woods.

“This is something!” Jimmy remarked, staring through the side window. “What a place!”

“I told you it was cool,” Kevin said.

The lodge was a great, three-story, cedar-shingled building with a high, peaked roof. Sheets of sprawling, green ivy could be seen crawling up the sides of several old, brick chimneys and fallen leaves of every color lay all around the lot. The building itself sat back in a small dell, surrounded by the dense forest.

“It looks like a haunted house, doesn’t it?” Kevin commented, enthused.

“Yeah,” Jimmy replied. “It’s creepy.”

“It looks like a dump, is what it looks like,” Becky threw in her own opinion, smirking.

“Becky, don’t call your aunt’s house a dump,” Mr. Bennell said, turning the steering wheel around. A small gravel court wound around the front of the lodge, and that’s where Kevin’s father parked the station wagon. They all got out of the car, while the two adults opened the tailgate and began taking out their pieces of luggage.

Kevin stood in the middle of the court, looking up. Despite the bright morning sun, the lodge sat in darkness, shaded by all the high, heavily branched trees. Bright red and yellow leaves were falling right this minute, like giant, slow snowflakes. The windows of the lodge seemed small and odd.

And very dark.

“You’re right, Jimmy whispered. “It looks just like a haunted house. I’ll bet it’s got ghosts and everything.”

Then, very slowly, a long, high creaking sound could be heard that sent a prickly chill up Kevin’s back, and that’s when he noticed the large wooden front door opening very, very slowly.

creeeeeeeeeeeeak—

Kevin knew it was his imagination, but for a moment it almost seemed as if the door were opening all by itself.