They all whipped around. The stairwell was empty.
Coco said, “Was that—is that Mrs. Wilson’s bird clock?”
Ollie shook her head. “No.”
“How do you know?” asked Brian.
“It only chimes on the hour,” said Ollie. Her stomach felt hollow with fear.
“Then what—” whispered Coco. All three were staring up the stairs. Then they heard a laugh. A child’s soft giggle. It seemed to come from everywhere. An icy wind whipped through the lobby. It felt suddenly to Ollie that every stuffed animal there was staring at them. She could see a lot of teeth.
Brian muttered, “The bear is on its hind legs now. Wasn’t it—?
”
“What’s happening?” whispered Coco. The whistling came again, broke into a thin, tuneless sound. Stopped. There was a silence. The lobby was colder than ever. The giggle became a child’s frightened wail, and the sound of small, hurrying feet.
Suddenly Coco gasped and pointed. The second-floor landing wasn’t empty. A girl stood there. A girl in a long white nightgown. Her face was gray-white; her nose was black. Her eyes were frozen open, huge and unblinking.
They could see the darkness of the hallway behind her. Through her. She raised a hand. Her fingers were black with frostbite. Her lips moved. They didn’t hear anything, but Ollie thought she recognized the words:
Don’t listen.
Then more footsteps came racing up behind her. The girl shot a panicked look over her shoulder and disappeared.
Next second, they saw Mr. Voland, sprinting down the stairs, wild-eyed. He’d lost his glasses. He took the stairs two at a time, skidded to a halt in the center of the lobby, and bent over, elbows on his knees, shivering.
Ollie, Brian, and Coco went and crowded around him. “Mr. Voland,” said Ollie. “Mr. Voland, what happened? Did you see her? The girl?”
Mr. Voland dragged in a deep breath and stood up. He was as pale as the snowstorm outside. He stared up the stairwell. Then, slowly, he lifted his hand, pulled down his sleeve. There were white marks on his arm. Like early frostbite.
“What girl? No. I found her,” he said grimly. “Mother Hemlock. I think we’re in trouble.”
6
MR. VOLAND DIDN’T have time to say any more. Mrs. Wilson came bustling in, her arms full of firewood. “Goodness,” she said brightly. “Look at you three just standing in the lobby. Tired of ghost hunting already?”
They all stared at her, and none of them said anything. Mrs. Wilson dropped her armful of sticks next to the cold fireplace. She knelt down in front of it. “Well, here goes nothing,” she said. She pulled out a book of matches, struck one, and lit the tinder. A little curl of smoke came up. It flared and went dead.
“Allow me,” said Mr. Voland. He knelt beside Mrs. Wilson. Coco noticed that his hands were shaking.
What had he seen upstairs? Coco wondered.
He did manage to light the tinder again, despite the shakes. He blew on it. Coco had seen Ollie’s dad expertly start a lot of fires. She could see that Mr. Voland knew what he was doing. This time the tinder caught, and after a minute, the smaller sticks. Soon Mr. Voland had a small fire going. He stood up, dusting off his knees. He still looked afraid.
Coco sighed with relief herself. The fire felt like a little victory against the shadows, against the intense cold, against—whatever was upstairs. She felt grateful Mr. Voland was there, even if he was a little strange. She reached out and warmed her hands.
“Thank you, Don,” said Mrs. Wilson stiffly. “Do you mind keeping the fire going for a bit? I have a lot to do.”
“Don’t mention it,” said Mr. Voland. “Of course I will.”
Mrs. Wilson hurried off.
“Why are we in trouble?” Ollie asked Mr. Voland. He was staring into the fireplace, watching the slow dance of the flames.
“Mr. Voland, what happened upstairs?” Coco asked.
Mr. Voland shrugged and answered them both, never taking his eyes off the fire. “Most ghosts—they just sort of exist. They’re not people. More like the memory of a person. A piece of the past, stuck in the present. But sometimes—occasionally—they are more. Those ghosts don’t just exist, they act. They want something. That’s when they’re dangerous, when they want something.”