Good Girls Lie(11)
“Not another ‘I won’t graduate’ legend?”
“Oh, no. The arboretum is haunted.”
“Haunted. A path? Ludicrous.”
“Seriously. It cuts through the woods, and a girl was murdered there.”
“How horrible. When?”
“Ten years ago. That’s when Dean Westhaven—the current Dean Westhaven, I mean—took over from her mother. It’s why she’s so young. She was only twenty-five when it happened. The board sent Westhaven the elder packing over the bad PR. The student, Ellie Robertson, she was the heir to some massive New England fortune, I don’t remember whose. Her dad has serious pull and, after the whole incident, got the dean removed.”
“The incident? That’s a mild word for a murder.”
“The school’s verbiage. They’re always in publicity mode. Ellie had been complaining to anyone who would listen, the dean, school security, teachers, about a townie who was stalking her and the dean didn’t do anything about it. One night, late, the guy followed her home from the laundry and killed her behind the dorms. Raped her, too. There are varying stories about the damage he did to her face, but supposedly, he carved out her eyes and took them home with him. They found them on his mantel. Really freaky shit.”
An intense shiver goes down my spine. “I’ll say.”
“So seriously, you never walk the arboretum path alone. Even if it’s not haunted, it’s creepy and not safe. It’s outside the walls.” This last is said with such earnestness I simply nod.
“Outside the walls equals not safe alone. Got it.”
“And stay out of the attics. They’re totally haunted. Supposedly, one of the secret societies found several sets of infants’ bones up there a few years ago, in between the ceiling and the wall. I don’t know what they were doing there.”
“The society?”
“The bones. They were probably the children of some of the girls who lived here, stillborns and the like. You’d think they’d bury them, the graveyard is actually pretty cool.”
“Brilliant. Haunted attics with infant bones in the walls. This sounds like a stellar place.”
“Well, Goode is old, and when you get old, you get weird. Oh, I almost forgot, be careful in the tunnels.”
“The tunnels?”
“There was an Underground Railroad through here. You know what that is, right?”
“Vaguely. To do with slavery, yes?”
“We were a safe haven from the plantations down South to the free North. Pretty cool. The grounds are littered with tunnels and old cottages, but they’re totally off-limits. They’re dangerous, and most of them have collapsed in on themselves.”
“Where would I find one?”
“I don’t know, actually. I’ve only been told to stay away.”
The deep, resonating peal of a very old bell shudders through the building, making me jump nearly out of my skin.
Piper intones, “For whom the bell tolls.... Don’t worry, Ash. You’ll get used to it. Even when the hauntings happen, the bells toll and chase away the ghosts. They don’t like the noise.”
She smiles, and I feel a spark of hope. She might be a friend, eventually.
“I can’t imagine why not. It’s unbelievably loud.”
“It’s really not to chase away ghosts. It’s so we never try to use not hearing the bell as an excuse for being late.”
“Right. Brilliant.”
Camille sticks her head in the door. “Are you two coming? You heard the bells, we’re going to be late. Ash, why haven’t you changed yet? Hurry! I don’t want JPs on my first day!”
“JPs?”
“Judicial points. It’s like demerits. Get five and you’re stuck in Saturday school. Hurry!”
Mum’s voice rings in my head. Pride goeth before the fall...
“Hey, Piper? Thanks for the warning, and the offer of the dress. I would appreciate borrowing it. But just for today, until I get some of my own.”
“Sure thing,” Piper says, handing it over. I run back to the room, strip, and throw the dress over my head, careful to make sure the price tag is tucked into the collar. I fully intend to hand it back after dinner, though I should probably have it cleaned. The trainers I’m wearing will not do. I have a pair of black flats tucked away in my bag, shoved into the shafts of my beat-up Dr. Martens. I dig through the bag; the boots are at the bottom. The second dong of the bell shakes the building, and by the third, I’m out in the hall, fully clothed, gowned, and shod, and we are racing down the stairs with the rest of the stragglers, out the back of Main Hall toward the chapel.
9
THE CONVOCATION
The chapel is, like most things at Goode, undernamed. It is more like a cathedral with its sandy stone exterior and stained glass windows, the roofline soaring a hundred feet into the air. The remains of two hundred young women push and shove their way into the chapel, chattering loudly, robes flowing behind them. One last toll of the bell, the ring dying into the early evening air, which still shimmers with heat, and we are all inside the nave and hurrying into our seats.
Inside it is a bit darker, but not much. The energy in the air is palpable, the noise deafening, not hushed and respectful. The rafters are so high the echoes reverberate. Voices call and shout, girls squeal with laughter. Trying to remember the class color schemes, I stick close to Camille, Piper, and Vanessa, grateful for their presence, especially when Becca Curtis notices me.