“Hey! George! Come on up,” he said in a whisper. “There ain't nothing up here. I want to go up in the attic.”
Bony wouldn't go. Swatty had to come down and talk to him like a Dutch uncle and tell him what he thought of him, and then he blubbered while we were helping him up the stairs. He said it was all right for us to go up because if anything—he didn't say a ghost, because he was afraid to, but that was what he meant—jumped out at us we could run, but he couldn't because his ankle was sprained. But we got him up all right.
We got him up and I stayed with him at the head of the stairs, and Swatty went and opened the attic stair door. He opened it, and then he stood there a second. Even where I was I could hear it. It was like a groan—like a long, sick sort of groan—and it was from up there in the attic. I turned so stiff and cold I couldn't open or shut my lips. I couldn't breathe. I was like ice, numb and cold all over except my hair pulled upward all over my head. A ghost could have come and put its cold hand on me and I couldn't have moved.
“Oh! Oh—!” came that long moan from up in the attic. Bony stood up, and his ankle gave way and he fell down the stairs—all the way to the bottom.
He stayed there, just calling out, “Swatty, Swatty!” over and over.
It was dark there now, dead dark. All at once I screamed. Something had touched me on the arm.
“Aw, shut up!” Swatty said, because it was Swatty that had touched me. “Shut up and don't be a baby! I've got to go up there, and you've got to go up with me.”
“Why?”
“Because I don't want to go up there alone,” he said. “That's why if you want to know.”
“What do you want to go up for, anyway?”