hillside. No one had even missed her; no one had even known she was gone.
But now, after the dream, she knew exactly what she’d done.
She had found Amy, and told her what had happened at the party, told her how mean Jeff Bailey had been to her.
And Amy had gotten revenge.
It hadn’t been she who had killed Jeff; she was sure of it.
If Beth had killed him, she would have remembered it.
So it had to have been Amy who killed him.
Beth reached up and switched out the light.
The darkness no longer frightened her, for now she had a friend. A friend named Amy, who liked the dark.
From now on, Beth wouldn’t be alone anymore. There would be someone to talk to, someone to confide in.
Someone who understood her.
11
The morning was bright and cool, and as Beth came slowly awake, she had a strange feeling of peace. Her nightmare of a few hours earlier was almost forgotten, and she lay comfortably in bed, her eyes closed, planning the day. Maybe she and Peggy Russell—
And then, as always happened on mornings when she woke up feeling happy and relaxed, the feeling of contentment fled.
She remembered where she was.
She wasn’t back home in her bedroom on Cherry Street. She was still at Hilltop.
She was still at Hilltop, and she’d had a bad dream last night, in which she’d seen Jeff Bailey die.
Suddenly a shadow fell across her, and Beth’s eyes snapped open. A few feet away, between her and the window, stood Tracy Sturgess.
“I know what you did,” Tracy said, her voice so low that for a moment Beth wasn’t quite sure she’d spoken at all.
She sat up in bed, and instinctively pulled the covers up around her chest.
Tracy was glaring at her angrily, but there was something in the half-smile on her lips that Beth found even more frightening than the words she had spoken.
“D-did what?” she stammered. The clock on her nightstand told her that it was only seven A.M. “What are you doing here?”
“I know what you did,” Tracy repeated, louder this time. Now the smile widened into a malicious grin. “You killed Jeff, didn’t you? You sneaked into the mill yesterday, and when he came down the stairs, you killed him.”
Beth’s eyes widened. “No—I—”
“I heard you,” Tracy pressed. “Last night, when you were talking to your mother, I was out in the hall. And I heard everything you said!” There was a taunting lilt to her voice now that made Beth cower back against the headboard, clutching the covers even tighter.
“But I didn’t do anything,” she protested. “It was only a dream.”
Tracy’s eyes narrowed. “It wasn’t either a dream. You just made that up to tell your mother. And she’s dumb enough to believe you. But I’m not. And wait’ll I tell my father!”
“Tell him what?” Beth asked.
“That you’re crazy, and you killed Jeff Bailey just because he was teasing you at my party.”
“But I didn’t kill him,” Beth said, her heart suddenly beating harder. “It … it was Amy who killed him.”
Tracy’s lips twisted into a scornful sneer. “Amy? You mean the ghost in the mill you were talking about?”
Beth nodded mutely.
“There’s no such thing as ghosts,” Tracy told her. “All you did was make up a story. But no one’s going to believe you!”
“But it’s true,” Beth suddenly flared. “Amy’s real, and she’s my friend, and all she did was just try to help me. And if you don’t watch out, maybe she’ll kill you, too!”
$$ washed away by her anger. “And you get out of my room.”
“It’s not your room,” Tracy replied. “This is my house, and if I wanted to, I could take this room away from you. You shouldn’t even be on this floor anyway—you should be upstairs where the servants used to live, because that’s all you’re good for.”
“You take that back!” Beth shouted. She was out of the bed now, standing in her pajamas, her fists clenched.
“I won’t take it back!” Tracy shouted. “I hate you, and I hate your mother, and I wish both of you were dead!” Suddenly she threw herself at Beth, her fingers reaching out to grab Beth’s hair.
Beth ducked and tried to twist away, but it was too late. Tracy’s body hurtled into her own, and she fell to the floor with Tracy on top of her. Then she felt Tracy’s hands grabbing at her hair, pulling and jerking at it. With a violent lurch, she managed to roll over, and covered her face with her arms.