The Hanging Hill

27

Meghan and Zack clomped down the stairs.

“Did you know that the hill this theater is built on used to be called Hangman’s Hill?”

Zack froze. “What?”

“In the olden days, public hangings were spectacles. People would come from miles around to see a good execution.”

“Unh-hunh.”

“This hill was the perfect spot to put on a show because you could see the gallows for about a mile in any direction!”

“Whattaya know.” Zack tried to laugh. “Henh-henh-henh.”

“You feeling okay?”

“Yeah.”

“You don’t sound so hot.”

“Motel vending machine food for dinner last night. Chili.”

“Oh. Come on.”

They started descending the steps again.

“Anyway,” said Meghan, “my mom’s a history buff. Whenever we’re on the road or on location, she researches everything she can about the place we’re going to. That’s why they call this the Hanging Hill Playhouse. Well, first it was the Hanging Hill Publick House.”

“Right,” said Zack. That was as far back as Judy’s theater history lesson had gone yesterday. She’d never made it all the way back to ye olde scaffold-and-noose days.

“My mom’s heading back to the library today to learn more.”

Zack thought about asking Meghan’s mom if she knew of any Pilgrims who had dangled from the gallows on Hangman’s Hill. Maybe they’d hanged juggling girls, too. Zack couldn’t figure out why anybody would do that. Mimes, maybe. But not jugglers.

As they marched down the steps, the hard rubber heels of their running shoes thudded against the metal treads. The deep ringing sound reverberated off the stairwell walls.

“Sounds like bells, hunh?” said Meghan.

“Yeah,” said Zack. “Church bells.”

“I think theaters are a lot like churches,” said Meghan.

“Because of all the pageantry and costumes and stuff?”

“That plus the big emotions trapped inside both buildings. In churches, you have the joy of weddings, the sadness of funerals.”

“And in a theater,” said Zack, “you have comedies and tragedies.”

“Exactly. The walls soak it all up. I figure that’s why so many churchyards and theaters are haunted.”

Zack froze again. This time in midstep. “What?”

“A lot of theaters attract ghosts, Zack. Every playhouse I’ve ever worked in had at least one.”

“Really?”

“Sure. There was this theater where the balcony seats kept folding down all by themselves because a bunch of ghosts wanted to see our show.”

“Unh-hunh.”

They started walking down the steps again.

“There’s this theater in Ohio that’s haunted by a wealthy woman whose husband shot her when he found out she had, like, a major crush on the show’s leading man. You can still see her up in the balcony, waiting for her handsome hero to make his next entrance, which, of course, he never does, so she just sits there and sighs forlornly.”

They clunked down to the second floor.

“Meghan,” said Zack tentatively, “do you really believe in ghosts? Do you really see them?”

“Well, duh. Don’t you?”

“What about this theater? Is it haunted?”

“Uh, I think so.” She pointed down the steps. “That girl down there? Come on. She has to be a ghost. Nobody would wear a dress like that unless they were dead.”

Zack whipped around just in time to see the little girl disappear.

This time she was juggling bowling pins.