A Grave Mistake Read Online Free Page B

where can we find this relic?”
    Ezra’s thin, ghostly lips pressed together. “Well, I can’t say where it is now. I don’t leave the graveyard here, and I know there’s been some changes since my time. But be that as it may, I provided a clue before I left this world.”
    “Okay.” Celeste was starting to feel impatient with the ghost’s vague talk and wondered if senility ran in the family. “What’s the clue?”
    “Why, it’s in the center,” Ezra pointed toward the middle of the graveyard. “The most important part of the graveyard, of course.”
    Celeste glanced in that direction. All she saw was rows of gravestones. “Could you be more specific?”
    “Specific? You want me to spell it out?” Ezra glanced at his wrist. “I’d love to but I don’t have time. I gotta get to the poker game. The boys are waiting, though I do wish we had a fourth. Anyway, you girls should be smart enough to figure it out, and if you can’t, then maybe you aren’t the ones it should be entrusted to.”
    And with that, he turned and walked off toward the now-empty chest tomb poker table, his ghost fading with each passing step. When he was almost invisible, he turned back and said, “Oh, I almost forgot. Don’t make a grave mistake.”
    Celeste could hear the echo of his laughter as he slowly faded into thin air.
    “What is it?” Jolene asked. The others respected Celeste’s unusual gift of talking to ghosts and had learned that when it looked like she was talking to no one, it usually meant she was talking to the departed. They’d learned to be quiet and let her do her thing.
    “I’m not sure. I might have just talked to a senile ghost, but he seemed like he knew we were looking for a relic and he pointed me this way.” Celeste pointed her finger in the direction Ezra had indicated.
    Jolene and Celeste started in that direction with Morgan and Fiona following. The center of the graveyard was easy to find. It had stones back to back in a square with a large black obelisk in the middle, about fifteen feet from the trunk of the big, old oak.
    “What are we supposed to be looking for?” Fiona asked.
    “That’s the problem. My ghost friend was very vague.” Celeste bent down to inspect one of the gravestones. “Maybe it's one of these epitaphs.”
    “They are fascinating,” Jolene said from behind one of the old stones. “Like this one. We must all die, there is no doubt. Your glass is running, mine is out .”
    “How about this one,” Fiona chimed in. “ Thou lovely child in parents hope, in early years cut down. Companion now of the ghastly group, that lie beneath the ground. ”
    Morgan made a face. “Those are depressing. I don’t see a clue in either of them. Do you guys?”
    They shook their heads, then Morgan added, “Did your ghost give you anything more specific? I mean, we could be looking at these graves all day and not find a thing.”
    Celeste shrugged. “He just said it was the most important part of the graveyard and not to make a grave mistake.”
    “Don’t make a grave mistake?” Jolene repeated. “Thaddeus said that, too. He said his great-grandfather used to say it.”
    “That’s who my ghost was, I think.” Celeste looked down at gravestone of Ezra Finch. He would have been just old enough to be Thaddeus’ great-grandfather.”
    The others came to stand beside her. “Looks like he’s got a snappy saying on his, too,” Fiona said. “When two become one, the healing’s begun. In my favorite place under the sun .” She moved closer to the stone, squinting at the bottom. "This line is harder to read … Look to the west, I can finally rest ."
    “That makes sense he would talk about healing,” Celeste said. “He was quite proud he was one of the early Maine pharmacists and said people came from all over for his medicines, as they had powerful healing properties.”
    “Like Morgan,” Fiona pointed out.
    “Yeah. Maybe he had paranormal powers, too,” Morgan