Pam Withers And I’m not crazy about ghosts Not that I believe in ghosts What thirteen-year old guy does So I won’t crawl through dark pipes but I’m not going to let my eleven-year-old sister do this alone Fog’s really thick Chris Caitlin says as we reach the top of the bluff Thick enough we can’t see our house I say glancing down the hill behind us That’s a good thing Means Mom and Dad can’t see us The pipe is dry inside and just big enough to crawl through Originally the pipe was installed to carry water to a power station on the island But no one ever built the station Instead someone built a hospital for children with leprosy The hospital was shut down seventy years ago My grandfather bought the island cheap because of its history He upgraded the pipe just before he died but until recently Dad had never found a use for it We use the land on the peninsula 2
Bungee Jump for a tree farm that doesn’t make much money but the island and the pipe have gone unused for years Suspended fifteen stories above Misty Passage the pipe is encased in crisscrossed steel supports It’s like a high bridge without walkway or railings Mom and Dad won’t let us go near it Like that has ever stopped us We’ve been using the pipe to get to the island for years Caitlin crawls through I crawl along the top like we are doing now (cid:44)(cid:3)(cid:75)(cid:72)(cid:68)(cid:85)(cid:3)(cid:68)(cid:3)(cid:80)(cid:88)(cid:73)(cid:192)(cid:72)(cid:71)(cid:3)(cid:179)(cid:50)(cid:88)(cid:70)(cid:75)(cid:4)(cid:180)(cid:3)(cid:68)(cid:81)(cid:71)(cid:3)(cid:78)(cid:81)(cid:82)(cid:90)(cid:3) Caitlin has hit her head on the boxlike hatch that hangs down from the middle Again Can’t wait for the bungee jump to be built Caitlin says as she emerges from the pipe on the island Me too I agree trying to picture a thick rope dangling from a sparkling new steel platform above the pipe And I get to see a real engineer at work 3
Pam Withers Yeah geek he’ll be asking you for your expertise for sure My sister laughs More important Dad says it’ll bring us real money Mmm The only trouble is I know Dad spent way too much money on the plans the engineer and materials The bungee jump was my idea Caitlin and I got to go on one in Oregon during spring break There was a huge lineup for it and the site was nowhere near as cool as our property It took Dad a while to come around to the notion that a bungee jump could make money on our pipe bridge but he even tually decided to have plans drawn up Then he arranged to hire an engineer contractor to build it That guy will be arriving any day now Hope no one tells the contractor that the island has ghosts I joke Local legend claims that the island is haunted by the ghosts of the leper children who 4
Bungee Jump died there And of the doctor who fell or jumped from the pipe when he got the disease Sometimes I hear creepy noises near the pipe or island We slide down the muddy path toward the ruins of the hospital It’s invisible in the fog I tell myself no spooks are hiding out in the soupy cloud Mrs Dubin says there were fifty children here before the hospital closed I say I run my hands along the mossy top of a tumbledown wall Mrs Dubin is annoying Caitlin says What is she like a hundred My sister doesn’t like the old lady who runs our school library It’s true that she’s moody but she’s usually friendly to me Anyway I like hearing her stories about our hick town in the old days She told me she was born the year the hospital got shut down I say So she’s seventy And she knows a lot about Hospital Island 5
