Read Online The Ghost and Mrs. Hobbs by Cynthia DeFelice - Free Book Online

said Allie. She racked her brain, trying to think of when the fire—if there had been a fire—might have taken place. “I guess I’d better go back twenty years or so,” she said, feeling daunted by the prospect of looking through so many old newspapers.
    But Mrs. Harris was smiling. “You’re in luck,” she said. “Several years ago we got a grant to create an index for
The Seneca Times
. It will tell us the days when items about fires appeared. But it would help if you could be even more specific. Do you have any other details that might focus the search so you don’t have to look at every article about a fire?”
    â€œI have a person’s name,” said Allie.
    Mrs. Harris smiled. “Terrific. What is it?”
    â€œHobbs,” said Allie.
    â€œHmmm. That rings a faint bell. Let’s see . . .”
    Using the index to find articles about fires that also mentioned the name Hobbs, Allie and Mrs. Harris worked quickly. They found several entries forHobbs that weren’t about fires, and Allie said she wanted to see those articles as well. Soon she was seated at the microfilm reader browsing through old issues of
The Seneca Times
.
    Some of the Hobbs articles were not about
her
Hobbs, but one, dated April 2, 1981, was an announcement of the March 30 marriage of Evelyn Murdoch and Clifford Hobbs. Allie realized she hadn’t known Mrs. Hobbs’s first name until now. The “E” in E. M. Hobbs was for Evelyn. It was such a pretty, feminine,
normal
name. Allie had trouble connecting it with the horrifying figure of Mrs. Hobbs.
    Eagerly Allie read on. The wedding had been a private ceremony. No mention was made of ushers or bridesmaids or flowers, but there was a small, smudgy photograph of the newlyweds, and Allie studied it with fascination.
    If she hadn’t seen the accompanying words in black and white, she’d never have believed that the pretty young woman smiling into the camera was the feared cafeteria lady known as the Snapping Turtle. In a lace-collared dress with pearl earrings and a pearl necklace, Evelyn Hobbs was the picture of a blissful bride. One hand held a bouquet; the other was nestled in the hand of her husband. Clifford, while not dashingly handsome, appeared kind and cheerful and solid, and he was beaming at the camerawith the look of a man who couldn’t believe his good luck.
    Allie spent a long time studying the photo, trying to reconcile that Mrs. Hobbs with the one she’d run from in terror the day before.
    Finally, she moved on to the next article mentioning the name Evelyn Hobbs. In the October 2, 1981, edition of the paper, Allie came upon an announcement of the birth of Thomas Spencer Hobbs, son of Evelyn and Clifford Hobbs.
    Her amazement then turned to horror as she read of the deaths of Clifford and Thomas Hobbs in a fire at their home at 1228 Armstrong Street on November 7, just a month after the baby’s birth. Also dead from smoke inhalation was a visitor, John Walker.
    As she read the name John Walker, a jolt of what felt almost like electricity passed through Allie’s body. She had been right! John Walker, her ghost,
had
died in a fire. The same fire that had killed Mrs. Hobbs’s husband and son.
    With a mounting feeling of dread, Allie traced the story as it unfolded over the days that followed. The fire was under investigation. First, the fire chief said that the circumstances surrounding its origin were “suspicious.” Upon further investigation, he announced that the fire had definitely been the work of an arsonist.
    Mrs. Hobbs, mother and wife of two of the deceased, had been at a meeting of the women’s auxiliary of her church at the time of the fire. Upon returning to find her house in flames, she had entered the burning building in an attempt to save her husband and infant. After receiving severe burns and suffering from smoke inhalation, she was rescued by