Danger at the Fair by Peg Kehret Read Free Book Online

“Sorry. You have to be eighteen or over.”
    “The Great Sybil told me I could come back without paying.”
    The man put down his paper and looked directly at her. “Aren’t you the kid who was here earlier today?”
    “Yes. I need to see her again.”
    “Sorry. She’s out.”
    Ellen and Caitlin looked at each other. Their eyes agreed:
He’s lying.
    Ellen, with Caitlin right behind her, marched to the door of the trailer and knocked.
    “Hey!” the man called after them. “I told you Sybil isn’t in.”
    The door opened.
    “I am glad you returned,” The Great Sybil said.
    The man stepped out of the booth and hurried toward them. “Sybil,” he said, “I don’t think you should do this.”
    “I have to,” The Great Sybil said. “Please come in, Ellen. And?”
    “This is my friend Caitlin,” Ellen said. “I told her about the automatic writing.”
    “Welcome, Caitlin. Pure one.”
    Caitlin looked questioningly at Ellen as they stepped inside.
    “Caitlin,” explained The Great Sybil, “is from the Greek name Katharos, meaning ‘pure one.’ It honors St. Catherineof Alexandria who escaped martyrdom on a spiked wheel in the fourth century.”
    “No kidding,” said Caitlin.
    “Be seated, please.”
    Ellen sat on the couch, leaving room for Caitlin to sit beside her. The Great Sybil sat on the same chair as before. “Do you wish to try again to contact the spirits?” The Great Sybil asked.
    “Yes. I want to ask who the message is from and when the danger will be.”
    The Great Sybil nodded.
    “You’ll need the paper and pencil again,” Caitlin reminded her.
    Ellen reached in her shoulder bag and removed her notebook and pencil.
    “Maybe you will get a spoken message this time,” Caitlin said to The Great Sybil. “Maybe the spirits will speak to you.”
    “No,” The Great Sybil said. “It is Ellen who will receive any messages.” Ellen wondered why she sounded sad; she had seemed thrilled earlier, when the automatic writing occurred.
    Ellen carried the pencil and notebook to the table and sat opposite The Great Sybil. She kept her hands on the table, with the pencil poised, ready to write. “I’m ready,” she said.
    The Great Sybil dimmed the lights and said the same calming words she had used before, about deep breaths and looking at the sky.
    This time, although Ellen kept her eyes closed, she remained tense. Instead of imagining blue skies and fluffy clouds, Ellen’s mind focused on the pencil she held. She gripped it tightly, expecting it to jolt into a frenzied scribbling.
    “Ellen has a question, loving spirits,” The Great Sybil said.“She needs your help in knowing when the little one will face danger.”
    Nothing happened.
    “We come to you in love,” The Great Sybil said. “We ask you to tell us when to expect the danger.”
    They waited. The pencil remained still.
    “Is the one who sent the message here with us? If you are, please let us know your identity.”
    Nothing. After five minutes of silence that seemed to Ellen more like an hour, they gave up.
    “The spirits do not always choose to answer us,” The Great Sybil said, after Ellen had opened her eyes and the lights were bright again. “Or perhaps they do not always hear our requests. We will have to try another time.”
    As Ellen and Caitlin walked away from The Great Sybil’s trailer, Caitlin said, “If I were you, I would forget all about that so-called message. Before you went in there the first time, I was positive that she was a fake. Then you convinced me that the automatic writing really happened. Now I think it was all a hoax, after all. The reason it didn’t work this time is that I was there, watching.”
    “When it happened, it seemed so real.”
    Caitlin unwrapped a stick of gum and offered half to Ellen. “Maybe so, but it is odd that you would get a message when you were there alone but nothing happened when I was looking. If the whole thing was genuine, why didn’t it happen the second