Read Coffin Hollow and Other Ghost Tales for Free Online Page A

year in high school I worked part-time in the local movie theater. I ran the projector and swept the place out at night. I had not worked there quite three months when I witnessed a most frightening sight. I was alone in the theater and had finished my work. I was about to walk down the aisle and check the fire exit to make sure it was locked, when something passed behind the screen, carrying what seemed to be a lantern. I stopped dead still and watched the figure walk across the stage and disappear on the other side. I was too frightened to follow, so I made my way cautiously to the ticket booth and telephoned the police. I then called my employer and reported an apparent burglar. She told me to wait outside until she got there.
    I had been outside only a few minutes when the police arrived. I again explained what I had seen and they proceeded to search the entire theater. Their search brought no results and they even hinted that maybe I had just thought I’d seen something. As they started to leave I asked them if they had checked the rear door. They said the rear door was locked. The theater is housed in one of the oldest buildings in Ravenswood, and the doors can only be locked from the inside, unless you have a key. I had the only key to the rear exit in my pocket.
    When my employer arrived, I told her that the police had searched the place and found nothing. I also told her that the rear door had been locked at the time I saw the burglar. She didn’t seem a bit surprised and told me she believed my story of what I had seen. Her attitude toward the situation seemed strange to me, and I asked her if she was worried about the person who was now locked inside the theater. She told me she wasn’t, because the same person had been there for thirty years.
    I had always considered my employer a level-headed woman and her statement confused me completely. It was at this point that she began relating to me the story of Ravenswood’s “Last Lodge.” She started out by telling me that I was not the first person who had sighted the figure in the theater. Many of her workers had seen him in the past.
    Many years ago there was a lodge hall in Ravenswood on the second floor of the building adjoining the theater. The full history of the lodge was not known because the membership and its activities were shrouded in secrecy. The biggest mystery seemed to center around the initiation ceremonies. Prospective members were expected to stay all night in the attic of the lodge. It is not certain exactly what went on during the night, but it is known that many men refused to stay in their confinement for the full length of time. There was even an attempt to evict the group, but their lease was legal and binding.
    The order came to an abrupt end when the building was gutted by fire one night during an initiation. All the members escaped but one. The man in the attic, where the fire is believed to have originated, was not found. No legal proceedings could be brought against the group or its leaders, because of lack of evidence. The building has since been restored but the lodge has never again held a meeting.
    I asked my employer if she believed the figure I had seen to be the man lost in the fire. She told me she was sure of it. She explained that before the fire, the buildings had been connected, instead of being separated as they now were by a brick wall. She also told me that there were still a few passages that connected the buildings. I asked her if she had ever seen the figure herself, and a look of pain came over her face. She said she had — many times. I asked her if she believed it to be a ghost. She said that she did.
    I thought for a moment that she was out of her mind. I had always thought of her as a smart business woman. Now she seemed to be acting like a superstitious old fool. I didn’t believe a word she had told me.
    When I got home that night I asked my father if a lodge had really existed in