My Family and Other Ghosts

by Lou Kuenzler

  “If only Grandpa Digby was here,” muttered Ivy as she stormed across the reception hall. But Ash had been right all along. The old ghost couldn’t be trusted. He had raised their hopes and that wasn’t fair. Not now that Dad believed he really could be a hotel chef. Not now that she had fallen head-over-heels in love with Grange Grange too. Ivy adored living at the spooky hotel, where there was never a dull moment and she couldn’t bear the thought of returning to their boring old life ever again. Even Ash was coming round to the place. She watched him smile shyly as he whistled for Misty and the spook dog came bounding to his heels.

  “If Grandpa Digby’s not coming, then it’s up to us,” she said, calling over her shoulder to him. “We’ll have to be the ones to take action!”

  “Pardon?” said Ash, putting his hand to his ear.

  Ivy wasn’t surprised he couldn’t hear her. The banging in the pipes had grown louder than ever.

  BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

  “Just listen to this place.” Ivy groaned. “The Smiths were right. It deserves minus five stars. It’s falling down around us.” She loved Grave Grange just the way it was, but she knew they were going to have to make big changes to survive.

  “Take the library,” she said, waving her hand towards the door. “Half the books in there are so old they’re written in Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs, for goodness’ sake. There’s probably a haunted mummy’s tomb in the wall behind the bookcase somewhere.”

  “The library…” said Ash, but Ivy carried on.

  “As for the ballroom…” She spun around and pointed to the room next door. “It’s so old and dusty in there I don’t think anyone’s actually danced since Harold the Headless Huntsman’s tenth birthday party!” “The library,” said Ash again. “And ballroom … right beside it. I think you might be on to something, Ivy.”

  But she ignored him (as usual). Whatever he was muttering about, he seemed to have missed the point – and she was finding it hard enough to concentrate herself with all that banging in the pipes.

  “Guests don’t like cobwebs and creaky doors,” she hollered in Ash’s ear. “Guests like hotels with swirly doors … and saunas … and spas. The sort of places you see on the Internet. The sort of places which get five shiny stars for every review on STAY-WELL-AWAY.COM. That’s the sort of place we’ve got to turn Grave Grange into.”

  BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! The walls sounded like they were going to crack in half, the thumping sound was so loud.

  “First things first,” yelled Ivy. “We have to get those pipes mended.”

  “But it’s not the pipes,” Ash hollered back. “Mr Smith said so.” There was a pause in the banging and Ash spoke quickly. “He may be a mean person, Ivy, and a horrible guest, who writes dreadful reviews, but he is a good plumber. I looked him up on PERFECT-PLUMBERS.COM. He really has had a hundred per cent satisfaction.”

  The banging started again. Boom! Boom!

  Boom!

  “If Mr Smith says it is not the pipes,” shouted Ash. “Then it’s not the pipes.”

  “So what is making that awful noise, then, clever-clogs?” said Ivy, shaking her head.

  But Ash didn’t seem to be listening. He was ignoring her!

  “Shhh!” He threw himself flat on the floor (which Misty seemed to think was some sort of hilarious game for spooky dogs; she was trying to ghost-lick his face with her shadowy tongue.)

  “Sit!” said Ash firmly. Then he pressed his ear against the rumbling wall.

  “You’re asking the wrong question, Ivy,” he said in his most irritating pay-attention-to-the-details voice. “It’s not what is making this noise. It’s who?”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE: KNOCK, KNOCK! WHO’S THERE?

  Knock, Knock!

  “Who’s there?” Ash took off his beloved baseball cap and pressed his head flat against the thick wall of the reception hall. He rapped his knuckles hard against the cold stone. “Knock twice if you can hear me.”

  Knock! Knock!

  A clear reply came back.

  “Ivy, fetch a glass,” said Ash. He remembered reading somewhere that if you press an empty glass against a wall you can hear through to the other side.

  But, before Ivy could move, the Gory Glove had taken it upon itself to up-end the ink well from the reception desk, splashing green ink all over the floor.

  “Er … thank you,” said Ash, taking the mucky pot from the Gory Glove’s fingers.

  “Hello? Can you hear me?” he said, pressing the pot closer to the wall. “Is that you in there?”

  “Who?” said Ivy, crouching beside him.

  “Grandpa Digby, of course!” said Ash. He’d realized the minute Ivy had started going on about the dusty old books in the library and the old ballroom right next door. “Don’t you remember? He told us how he’d once got stuck in the walls here for six whole weeks. I can’t believe it’s taken us so long. The same thing must have happened on the night of the storm. He must have got wedged inside the wall when he was trying to get back into the reception hall.”

  Sure enough, they heard a loud groan and a wheezing sound.

  “Ash, you found him! You found Grandpa Digby,” cheered Ivy. “You really are a hero.”

  “Excuse me,” bellowed the old ghost’s spooky voice from deep inside the wall. “Aren’t you going to get me out of here, then?”

  “That’s easy!” said Ash, surprised at his own confidence. He had already thought about this. He’d noticed how the ink which the Gory Glove had splashed on the ground was trickling away through a tiny crack between the base of the wall and the floor.

  “Grandpa Digby?” he said boldly. “Remember how you said you were an excellent slider? Well, I think I may have found you a teeny-tiny gap…”

  Ash began to tap on the wall again.

  “Follow this sound, Grandpa Digby,” he said. “And we’ll have you out of there in no time.”

  Grandpa Digby said three things as he squeezed through the tiny crack.

  One:

  Two: !!!!!!!

  Three (And worst of all): @@@@@@@!

  But all of them are far too rude to print.

  Yet, in five minutes flat, (very flat – it really was a tight squeeze) Grandpa Digby had slid through the gap and was floating beside them in the hall.

  “Hello,” said Ash shyly.

  “Grandpa Digby!” Ivy cheered.

  Misty raised her foggy hackles and barked at the old ghost in surprise.

  “Amazing! Well done for getting me out of there, lad!” said Grandpa Digby, patting Ash on the head.

  “Brrr!” Ash shivered. He still hadn’t put his cap back on, and he leapt backwards as he felt a ghostly chill, like a jolt of freezing electricity, run through him.

  He wondered if he would ever quite get used to being around ghosts.

  “Whoops!” said Grandpa Digby. “Sorry about that. Being dead plays havoc with your circulation.” He blew on his fingers as if trying to warm them up.

  “Don’t worry. It’s just nice to have you back,” said Ash – and he really meant it. Things were going to be so much easier now Grandpa Digby was here to help.

  But he was surprised to see the old ghost frowning at him as he reached down to pick up his cap and pull it back on.

  “Don’t bother with that old thing. I like your new look much better,” said Grandpa Digby. “I can see your face.”

  Ash glanced up.

  “Whoa!” He caught sight of himself in the old cracked mirror above the reception desk. His hair was sticking up in crazy spikes and it had a bright green streak right down the middle, where the ink had come off his fingers.

  “Very edgy! It suits you,” chuckled Grandpa Digby.

  “Yes!” Ash grinned. Then he tossed his cap away as if he was Miriam, throwing an unwanted candlestick across the room. Misty bounded after it. “I like my new style too!” he said.

  It certainly made him look much braver, even if he didn’t feel (totally) brave inside. Not quite yet.

  CHAPTER
TWENTY-FOUR: THE CLOCK STRUCK TWELVE

  The clock struck twelve – BONG!

  “Midnight,” said Ivy. But she wasn’t tired.

  She was excited. They had agreed to meet Grandpa Digby in the library. Now he was back, everything was going to be all right. He would know what to do about the Smiths’ terrible review on STAY-WELL-AWAY.COM. He would help them save Grave Grange. After all, it had been Grandpa Digby’s idea to persuade Dad to come and work here in the first place.

  “Ah, there you are, young nippers,” he said, sliding out from a gap behind the grandfather clock.

  (Perhaps that was why they were called grandfather clocks, Ivy thought. Because grandfathers could hide behind them.)

  “Agh!” said Ash, leaping with surprise. Ivy giggled. Poor Ash never could seem to get used to the shock of ghosts appearing out of thin air. She hadn’t even flinched.

  “Apologies for the late hour,” said Grandpa Digby, as Ivy and Ash sat down in a pair of huge leather armchairs. “I thought it might be best to meet after your dad and the old Grey Ladies had gone to bed. It’s sometimes best if we ghosts don’t show ourselves.”

  “But that’s what I don’t understand,” said Ivy. “You’ve shown yourself to us. The others have too. The Contessa. Headless Harold, the Gory Glove … all of them.” She pointed to Misty who, loyal as ever, had followed Ash into the library and was lying in a huge, foggy heap at his feet.

  “That’s because we’ve made an exception for you two nippers. I told my spooky pals we needed your help,” said Grandpa Digby.

  “Funny way of showing it,” muttered Ash.

  But Ivy was still confused.

  “That doesn’t make sense,” she said. “The ghosts appeared when the Smiths arrived too. Mirabelle started throwing things. The Contessa was singing. There was pretty much spooky mayhem.”

  “Mayhem?” Grandpa Digby chuckled mischievously. “Sounds marvellous.”

  “No!” said Ivy, surprising herself at how cross she sounded. “It wasn’t marvellous. It’s ruined everything.” She was usually the first one to love a bit of mayhem and madness – but not now. Not if it meant they would have to close the hotel. “The Smiths have written a terrible review,” she explained. “And—”

  Grandpa Digby held up a foggy hand.

  “Tell me,” he said. “Did these silly Smith people actually see any of my ghostly friends?”

  “Well, no…” Ivy thought about it. “I suppose not. Mirabelle was invisible when she was throwing things. And the Contessa was singing through the walls. There was the Salmon…”

  “Nobody ever pays any attention to him, poor old fish,” said Grandpa Digby.

  Ivy nodded. “Harold the Headless Huntsman appeared – but only briefly. The Smiths might have caught a glimpse, but nothing more than that.”

  “Excellent!” Grandpa Digby chortled with delight. “A wee glimpse does so add to the fun.”

  “Fun?” cried Ivy. Why wasn’t Grandpa Digby taking this seriously? “The Grave Grange ghosts might as well have sat on our guests’ knees in broad daylight and pinched their noses,” she said. “It may only have been a glimpse or two, but the Smiths still guessed that the hotel is haunted.”

  “Although in their review they said they weren’t silly enough to believe in ghosts,” added Ash.

  “Pah! Even better! Dunderheaded doubters!” said Grandpa Digby. “Your silly stuck-up Smith guests saw just enough to make them wonder. Things moved in a strange way. They heard peculiar sounds. Shivers ran down their spines. There was mystery and eeriness.” He chuckled. “We ghosts live for mystery and eeriness … well, maybe not live exactly, but you get the point.”

  “Is that what the Contessa was singing about?” asked Ash. “When she said that ghosts need an audience or they flicker and fade.”

  Ivy remembered how cross Ash had been when he’d heard that. He’d accused the ghosts of showing off. And he had been right.

  “Without anyone to believe in us … or to wonder at least … ghosts are nothing but pale spirits who vanish like steam,” said Grandpa Digby, melting away behind the clock again as if to prove his point.

  “Wait!” said Ivy. “Come back.” She stormed up to the clock and shouted through the crack. “Are you saying that you persuaded us to come to the hotel just so you and the other ghosts could scare the guests?” She felt as if Grandpa Digby had tricked them – their move here been nothing but a spooky joke. “You turned our whole lives upside down, all so that the Grave Grange ghosts can haunt people!”

  “No … not entirely.” Grandpa Digby slid out from behind the clock looking sheepish. “There are three main reasons why I invited you to come and live at our hotel…”

  These are the three reasons Grandpa Digby gave:

  One: Grandpa Digby had never had the chance to get to know his grandchildren before he died (on the very same day that they were born). Bringing them to the hotel offered the perfect chance to get to know them now.

  Two: Grandpa Digby knew that his son (Ivy and Ash’s dad) had always longed for the opportunity to be a chef with his own restaurant. Where better to be a chef than in a large hotel?

  Three: (Just as the twins had guessed) Grave Grange was their ancestral home. There had been members of the Graves family living at Grave Grange ever since the time of their distant relative (the now headless) Sir Harold Graves nearly four hundred years ago.

  Grandpa Digby, hadn’t lived here himself while he was alive, of course. He had lived in a flat above a chip shop … but, restless in his grave, his spirit had been drawn to Grave Grange and he had been haunting it ever since. Now he wanted his son and grandchildren to have the chance to enjoy it while they were still actually alive.

  “Oh dear!” said Ivy. Those were wonderful reasons. She couldn’t deny it. She was desperate to get to know Grandpa Digby better. She longed for Dad to be happy, living his dream as a chef. And she was especially excited to learn that she was a Graves of Grave Grange … their grand “ancestral” home.

  “But it’s just not going to work.” She sighed. “You want us to bring guests here so that you can haunt them. But if you haunt our guests they’ll run away screaming in terror and won’t ever come back – then they’ll write dreadful reviews like the Smiths did and we won’t earn any money and we’ll have to close down the hotel.”

  “Nonsense. I don’t think it’s as bad as all that!” said Grandpa Digby.

  But Ivy knew she was right.

  “Either our family will have to leave Grave Grange, or the ghosts will have to go,” she said firmly.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE: GARLIC?

  “Garlic?” Ash was confused. “What do you want garlic for, Ivy? It’s the middle of the night.”

  They had just left Grandpa Digby in the library, and both the old spook and Ivy had been in very bad moods by the time the meeting was over.

  Now Ivy was turning Dad’s kitchen cupboards inside out in a desperate search for garlic.

  “How about this?” said Ash, trying to be helpful and holding up an onion instead. “Will this do?”

  “No, it will not!” Ivy snapped.

  “Whoa! Sorry.” Ash stepped back, almost putting his foot right through Misty, who was close by his heels as always. “There’s some, if it’s so important,” he said, pointing to a string of garlic he had just spotted hanging from the pantry door. “What do you want it for, anyway? You’re not going to get all experimental and start baking garlic cupcakes or something, are you? We’ve got enough of that with Dad.” Ash wrinkled his nose and laughed, trying to lighten the tone.

  But Ivy wasn’t laughing.

  She grabbed the string of garlic and stormed out of the kitchen door.

  “Come on, we’d better follow,” said Ash, calling softly to Misty.

  He had a horrible feeling that they were heading towards trouble… BIG trouble.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX: BAD DOG! SHOO!

  “Bad dog! Shoo!” Ivy came to a stop in the middle of the reception hall and s
pun around to face Ash. She waved the string of garlic at Misty who was still trotting by his heels. The dog seemed to follow Ash everywhere now.

  “Go away!” she said again. “Go away! Bad dog! Shoo!” She shook the garlic under the spooky hound’s long, drooling nose.

  Misty’s shadowy tail instantly drooped between her legs and her big worried eyes stared up at Ivy in surprise.

  “Stop it!” Ash gasped, leaping between the two of them. “Leave Misty alone. What’s she ever done to you?”

  “Driven everyone away from here with her eerie howling, that’s what,” said Ivy. “You heard Grandpa Digby. He said the Grave Grange ghosts just want to cause trouble and haunt our guests.”

  “That’s not exactly what he said,” answered Ash carefully.

  But Ivy knew she had to stay firm. “If our family is going to have any chance of making a success of this hotel then Misty will have to leave,” she said. “All the ghosts will have to go! Every single spook who is haunting Grave Grange.”

  “Wait! I’m sure we can all work something out,” said Ash, holding up his arms to protect Misty.

  But Ivy shook the string of garlic again. She was fairly certain that waving garlic was what you were supposed to do to get rid of ghosts.

  “That means you too,” she said, breaking off a whole bulb of the stinky stuff and putting it on top of the spooky salmon’s glass case.

  “And you!” She waved the string furiously at the Gory Glove, who was perched on the edge of the reception desk swinging its fingers. “You’ll all have to go. Every single ghost at Grave Grange. You’ll just have to find somewhere new to haunt.”

  “But…” Ash seemed momentarily lost for words. He crouched down beside the cowering ghost hound and stroked Misty’s shadowy ears. “We can’t do that, Ivy.”

  “We have to.” Ivy felt her lip wobble. She didn’t want to be mean. She certainly didn’t want to upset pale, gentle Misty … or even the cold, dead fish and the Gory Glove. But she had no choice. “Listen,” she said. “Can you hear that?”