Evil Whispers

by Goingback, Owl

  Grabbing her green backpack from under her bed, she placed the photo and book inside the bag and then hurried across the room. With backpack in one hand and the cabin key in the other, she stepped outside, making sure to lock the front door behind her. Running to the back side of the campground, she followed the nature trail to the lagoon.

  The lagoon was just as spooky now as it was the day before. It was a place of strained silence in an otherwise peaceful forest. The water was just as dark as when Krissy previously saw it, the strange wooden staff still standing by the water’s edge.

  Krissy stepped into the open and stopped, listening carefully. A few moments passed, but no voice spoke to her.

  “Are you here?” she asked, her voice almost a whisper. There was a stirring in the branches above her and in the grass at her feet. It was as though the wind blew, but Krissy felt no wind.

  Krissssy, you have come back. The voice of her special friend was soothing. It touched her mind with the liquid fluidness of warm, running water.

  “Of course I came back, silly.” Krissy laughed. “I said I would be back, didn’t I?”

  I thought you would not return.

  “Not return? Why? We’re friends. Right?”

  Ssspecial friends.

  “I caught a fish this morning. A bass. A really big one. I brought a picture of my fish. Want to see it?” She removed her backpack and took out the picture, holding it out for her friend to see. As she held up the picture, Krissy suddenly realized that she didn’t know which way to turn so her friend could see the photograph.

  “Where are you? Can you see my picture?”

  I can see it.

  “Good. It’s a big fish. Right?” A frown tugged at the little girl’s mouth. She looked around, but saw only the lagoon and the forest. “Why can’t I see you? I want to see what you look like.”

  That is not possible.

  “Why not? We’re special friends. Right? Then, why can’t I see you?”

  You will see me, little one. But not now.

  “When?”

  Soon. Very soon.

  “I won’t be here very long. We’re only here on vacation. Will I get to see you before we leave?”

  Yesss....

  “Good.” Krissy’s spirit brightened a little bit.

  I have a gift for you, little one.

  “A gift? For me?”

  Yesss. A Ssspecial gift for a ssspecial little girl.

  A troubled thought crossed Krissy’s mind. “How can you give me a gift if I don’t know where you are?”

  Like me, the gift is hidden. You must look for it. I will tell you where to find it.

  “Like a treasure hunt,” she said, excited.

  Yesss, like a treasure hunt. A very ssspecial treasure.

  The voice told her that the gift was hidden on the little island in the middle of the lagoon and that she would have to wade through the dark water to get to it. At first Krissy was afraid, but her special friend assured her that the water was not deep and that she would be safe.

  “Are you sure?” Krissy asked, standing at the water’s edge.

  Yesss....

  What about snakes and alligators?

  They will not bother you, little one. I will protect you.

  “Are you sure?”

  Yesss....

  Krissy didn’t like the idea of wading through the lagoon, not knowing how deep the water was or what might be hiding in it. But her special friend said that it was safe and that he would protect her. Not wanting to upset her invisible friend and still wanting the gift, Krissy decided to do as she was told. Removing her shoes and socks, she slowly stepped into the black water.

  A tremor of fear passed through her body as her bare feet sank into the mud. She knew there must be snakes beneath the water. Just had to be snakes. Hundreds of them. Maybe even thousands. She wanted to jump back out of the water, but she felt compelled to continue on. It was almost as if she were being gently pushed by a pair of invisible hands.

  The level of the water rose higher as she slowly waded across the lagoon. Up to her knees, past her thighs, and finally up to her waist. She thought about swimming, but didn’t like that idea any better than she did wading through the water. She was afraid to swim, afraid her splashing might attract the attention of unwanted alligators. Big alligators with long, sharp teeth. Hungry alligators that might consider a ten-year-old girl to be the perfect afternoon snack.

  She finally reached the island, where there grew an ancient cypress tree. Grabbing onto an exposed root, Krissy pulled herself out of the water. “Okay, I’m here. I made it. Where’s my gift?”

  Look around, little one....

  Krissy looked around, but didn’t see a present of any kind. “Where? I don’t see anything.”

  Beneath your feet, Krisssy. See the roots that grow into the water? There. Between the roots.

  Krissy looked down, but still didn’t see anything.

  “Where? There’s nothing here.”

  Dig.

  What?

  You have to dig for you gift.

  Krissy was beginning to like the treasure hunt less and less. What kind of gift did you have to dig for? A thought popped into her head, causing her to smile. Maybe this was a real treasure hunt, and what she had to dig for was real buried treasure. Her father had told her that pirates used to live in Florida, so maybe her special friend was telling her where treasure was buried: gold coins, silver, jewelry. That would be a nice gift. A very nice gift.

  Following the instructions of a voice only she could hear, Krissy dug in the soft earth between the roots of the cypress tree. She only dug a few inches before discovering something, but what she found did not glint of gold or silver. Instead it looked like a flat stick, about six inches in length, yellowed with age.

  She put the yellowed object aside and dug deeper. A few minutes later she found a similar object, and then another. Krissy stopped digging after she found a fourth object.

  “Where’s my gift?” She asked, a little angry. “You said I would find it here.”

  You have found your gift, little one.

  Krissy picked up one of the objects and brushed it off, realizing what it was. “This? This is my gift? This is just an old bone. What kind of gift is that?”

  A ssspecial gift, little one. The bones are magical, and will bring you good luck. But you must keep them safe, and you must not let anyone see them.

  Krissy turned over the bone to examine it. “Magical? Are you sure?”

  Yesss...Magical. Ssspecial. They have lots of power. But it is a gift for you only. No one else must know about them.

  “Then they’re a secret,” Krissy said.

  Yesss, a secret. Your sssecret. Our sssecret. You must tell no one, or the magic will go away.

  Krissy remembered she had been given a similar secret the day before, but she had told her parents about her new, special friend. But this time she would keep her secret. “I won’t tell anyone.”

  Good. Very good...

  Gathering up the magical bones, Krissy waded back across the lagoon. She wasn’t as scared this time as she was before, for she knew her special friend was watching over her. She also had the magical bones to protect her and bring her luck, magical objects like those in the children’s fantasy stories her mother read to her at bedtime. No one she knew had anything that was really magical. Not even her parents.

  Climbing out of the water, she tried to clean her feet off on the grass but failed. Even a handful of leaves didn’t get all the mud out from between her toes. Giving up in frustration, she pulled her white socks back on over her still-muddy feet and then slipped on her shoes.

  Once dressed she wiped off the magical bones and carefully placed them in her backpack. She asked her special friend if he wanted to read a story with her. When he didn’t answer, she knew that he was gone. Placing the book on the ground as a gift for her new friend, she slowly walked back to camp. Had she looked back, she would have seen the pages of the b
ook turn slowly though no wind blew.

  Chapter Seven

  Mary Sanders had loved to travel in her younger days. As the wife of a career navy man, she had practically traveled all over the world. She had lived in Spain for four years, and Greece, Italy, and Japan for two years each. Her home was adorned with memories of the places she had traveled and the people she had met: tapestries and glass clowns from Venice, a matador’s cape from the Rastro in Madrid, alabaster statues from Athens, even a real samurai sword from Japan that Ross had smuggled out of the country.

  Now that Ross was retired from the military, and now that they owned a business together, she no longer got to travel. The world now came to her, in the form of vacationing customers from all over the United States. Even from Europe. They came to Mary with hopes of finding a quiet little getaway they could call their own, bringing with them stories and customs of other places.

  If it weren’t for the customers, Mary might have grown bored with life along the lazy Wekiva River. The river no longer brought joy to her heart as it once had. After all, you could only look at the same river for so long. After nearly twenty years, the raccoons, gators, and eagles all looked the same. Even the fishermen and canoeist had the same look to them.

  Still, she loved her customers, each and every one of them, and did all that she could to make them happy. So when Robert and Janet Patterson came knocking at her restaurant’s back door, wanting to cook up a mess of fish they had caught, Mary was more than happy to oblige them.

  Grabbing a couple of extra white aprons from the closet, she led the couple into the kitchen and gave them a stove to cook their fish on. She could have cooked the fish herself, but she knew that people often liked to do their own cooking when it came to fresh-caught fish. The Patterson’s were no exception. Soon they were both laughing like happy school children as they filleted and battered their prize bass. Mary couldn’t help but laugh too, especially when Janet applied some of the batter to the end of her husband’s nose.

  Leaving the young couple to their cooking, Mary decided to step out back to have a quick cigarette. She usually didn’t get a chance to smoke during the daytime, what with preparing the lunch menu, cleaning up the mess, and then getting ready for the dinnertime crowd. But the lunch crowd had already left, and most of the cleaning was done, so she had an hour or so before she had to start worrying about dinner.

  Grabbing a cigarette and her lighter, she went out the back door and walked around to the side of the building. She didn’t like to smoke a cigarette anywhere near the back door, afraid the smoke might drift into the kitchen. Food and the smell of cigarette smoke didn’t go good together, especially to those who were nonsmokers. Mary also made sure to wash her hands with soap and water after having a cigarette. She even kept a bottle of mouthwash in the kitchen’s tiny bathroom, which she used after each and every time she lighted up.

  Walking around the side of the building, Mary came upon Krissy Patterson. The little girl stood with her back to Mary, a green backpack sitting on the ground beside her. She had unrolled the garden hose that normally hung from a bracket on the side of the building and was using the water to clean something that she held in her left hand.

  Mary couldn’t see what the girl was cleaning, but found it bad manners to use someone’s hose without first asking permission. Not that it was a serious crime or anything. They had a deep well, so water was free. Still, she could have asked first.

  “What have you got there, darling?” Mary asked, stepping closer. She tried to get a better look at the object Krissy was cleaning, but the little girl quickly hid it in her backpack.

  “Nothing,” Krissy answered. She turned around to look at Mary, but didn’t smile. In fact she looked nervous, as if she had just been caught doing something she shouldn’t.

  “Nothing?” Mary asked, suspicious. “It sure looks like you’ve been doing an awful lot of work for nothing.”

  “It’s nothing,” Krissy repeated.

  Mary put on a smile. She wanted to know what was in the backpack, but she didn’t want to frighten the girl. Krissy might only have been cleaning a shiny rock, a pebble she found while walking along the nature trail or canoeing. Kids were all the time collecting stuff: rocks, shells, leaves. One of their former tenants had a son who collected bugs, of all things. He kept jars filled with all kinds of nasty creepy-crawlers: palmetto bugs, caterpillars, worms, spiders.

  “If you show me what you’ve got, I’ll help you clean it,” Mary offered, using her nicest voice.

  “That’s okay,” Krissy said, making no attempt to reach back into her bag. “It doesn’t need cleaning.”

  The smile slipped off of Mary’s face. Whatever Krissy Patterson had in her green backpack, she definitely didn’t want Mary to see it. While rocks, shells, and bugs were of no importance, there were other things a child could gather that would definitely be cause for alarm.

  Birds of prey, and even songbirds, were protected in the state of Florida, and there were stiff penalties for collecting their feathers. If Krissy had a eagle feather or two in her possession she could get into serious trouble, despite the fact that eagles nested all along the Wekiva River and their feathers were easy to find. Only Native Americans were legally allowed to possess eagle feathers, and they had better have several forms of identification to prove their heritage.

  Many species of turtles were also protected in Florida. If Krissy had a baby gopher turtle in that backpack of hers she could get into big trouble with the fish and game people. Baby turtles were cute, but when they were protected by the state you had better leave them alone.

  There was another possibility: maybe Krissy had something in her backpack that she had stolen. Maybe she had swiped something from one of the other cabins or from someone’s vehicle. It would not be the first time something had been stolen from a cabin. Nor would it be the last.

  A lot of tourists who came to the fish camp on vacation felt safe. Sometimes too safe. They often left their wallets, watches, and other valuables lying out in plain sight while they enjoyed a day of fishing or canoeing. Sometimes they didn’t even bother to lock their doors. Of course, a locked door wouldn’t be much of a deterrent to a determined thief. The screened windows of the cabins were locked with a simple hook, easily opened with a knife or flat-bladed screwdriver.

  Maybe she had taken something from the bait and tackle shop. There were all kinds of items in there that might attract a child’s interest, items that would be easy to steal when Ross wasn’t looking.

  Heaven knows, Ross was a good man, but he sometimes spent too much time talking with the customers, and not enough time keeping an eye on the store. It wouldn’t be hard to pocket an item or two while he wasn’t looking. Shoot, it wouldn’t be hard to sneak off with something when he was looking.

  “Krissy, are you hiding something in your backpack?” Mary asked, now determined to see what the little girl was cleaning.

  The little girl shook her head.

  “Krissy, I don’t think you’re telling me the truth. I think maybe you ought to open up your backpack and show me what you have.”

  “No,” Krissy said, clutching her backpack even tighter.

  “And why not?”

  “Because it’s a present.”

  “A what?”

  “A present.”

  “A present from whom?” Mary asked.

  “A present from my secret friend.”

  Mary forced a smile, not entirely believing what she was being told. “I like presents. Why don’t you show me yours?”

  Krissy shook her head. “I can’t show you.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because it’s a secret, that’s why.”

  Still suspicious, Mary said, “I think you should show me you’re present. I won’t tell anyone what I saw.”

  Again Krissy shook her head. “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because you’re not my mother, so I don’t have to show you anything.”


  The woman was taken back by Krissy’s tone of voice. She was definitely hiding something in that green backpack of hers, something she didn’t want Mary to see.

  Mary took a step forward, causing the little girl to take a step back. She was about to demand that Krissy show her what was in the backpack, but she was interrupted when her dog, Patch, came romping around the side of the building.

  The black Labrador loved children and was probably looking for a playmate, but when he got close to Krissy he stopped suddenly and started to growl. The growl started deep in his throat and grew louder. He looked directly at the girl and bared his teeth, the hair along the ridge of his back standing straight up.

  Krissy turned to look at the dog, her eyes going wide with fear. She had petted the dog on several occasions, had even played with him, and was obviously frightened by his sudden threatening posture.

  Mary looked from Krissy to her dog, momentarily forgetting about the little girl’s backpack and what it might contain. Patch loved children. He was something of a big baby himself. She didn’t remember him ever growling at a child, yet here he was, growling, looking like he was about to attack.

  A fearful thought flashed through Mary’s mind. If her dog bit the girl there would be big, big trouble. The police would be called, and maybe even the newspapers. There would be doctor bills, newspaper articles, police reports, and maybe even a lawsuit. It would hurt their business in more ways than one.

  “Patch, what are you doing? Stop that!” Mary yelled at her dog, but to no avail. Not only did he not stop growling, he didn’t even look her way when she yelled. That had never happened before. All it usually took was a firm word to make Patch drop his head and cower in fear.

  “Patch, you quit that. I mean it.”

  The black Labrador ignored her. His growling grew louder, more threatening. But instead of advancing toward the little girl, he started to slowly back up.

  “You stupid dog. What in the Sam hell is wrong with you?”