by Christine Collier -
Calla Rose Martin was a fifth grade wannabe mystery writer. She had a new pink journal filled with hundreds of empty lined pages. She titled her spiral bound mystery book, A Dark and Stormy Night.
Calla had a school break and was spending a week with her grandmother at her beautiful old house on Lavender Hill. There were lace curtains in every window. Calla always stayed in the guestroom on the second floor. This room had an oak bed with a colorful quilt, vanity with an oval mirror, and a matching dresser. The most amazing thing about this bedroom, however, was its access to the third floor attic.
What looked like a normal closet door was really the entrance to the attic. Behind the door, steps led to a full third story attic filled with antiques and treasures from long ago.
Calla loved this room! Boxes filled with old books, jewelry, and clothes were everywhere. It was the perfect place to play dress up or any game imaginable.
On the first day of her visit, Grandma read some of the mysteries Calla had in her journal. “You’re a very talented girl,” Grandma said, as she smiled at Calla. “I used to write poetry years ago.”
Calla gazed at her lovely grandmother. “Did you ever have a mystery happen to you?”
Grandma thought for awhile. “Years ago when your mother was a teenager, your grandfather gave me a beautiful gold locket with a picture of our four children inside. The back of the locket was engraved with their names and the date I received it. I misplaced it and searched for months but never saw it again. I still think its somewhere in this house. How I’d love to find it!”
That evening Calla was snuggled in bed, reading her newest mystery, Behind a Foggy Window. She was wrapped inside the quilt, fixed just the way she liked it, when she heard a very strange noise overhead in the attic followed by a loud thump. She jumped out of bed and ran to the attic door. She slowly opened it, then switched on the lights in the stairway. Nothing seemed unusual as she quietly climbed the steps. At the top, she switched on the attic lights. Everything looked normal except the old shade at the attic window was crooked and hanging half way off its rod. Calla shrugged, climbed back down the stairs and crawled into bed. She fixed the quilt just the way she liked it again and drifted off to sleep.
Two nights later Calla was in a very deep sleep after a busy shopping day with her grandmother. Suddenly, a deafening clap of thunder awakened her as lightning lit the sky! Rain beat against her window with a mighty force. The dial on her clock glowed 3:00 a.m. A crashing sound jolted her upright! It came from the attic.
Creeping upstairs to the room at the top of the stairs in the middle of a storm-ravaged night was not something Calla wanted to do. However, there were bizarre noises coming from the attic. She opened the door, turned on the lights, and slowly started her scary journey. Another clash of thunder made her quiver. The lights flickered and dimmed and then went out. She was stuck in a dark stairwell, and her entire body was trembling. Calla looked ahead to the top of the stairs and saw two golden, glowing eyes staring back at her! She gasped.
Terrified, Calla slowly backed down the steps and ran out of the guestroom to her grandmother’s room below. “Grandma, I just heard a terrible noise and I saw glowing eyes in the attic!”
