All The Lovely Bad Ones

Seth and the other ghost children wake Travis up in the middle of the night. Travis follows the ghost children out into the hallway, where he finds Corey waiting there for him. They head into the lounge, where the TV is already on with another vision from the past playing on the screen. They watch as Caleb’s mother attempts to nurse her baby girl. To her horror, she discovers that the baby is already dead. Caleb’s mother and father both die from the cold as well. The children reveal that all their families died in the poor farm. Images of gaunt people lining up for food, freezing in the cold, and working through terrible weather flash on screen. In contrast, Mr. Jaggs and Miss Ada, having pocketed the money for themselves, continue to live in wealth and gorge themselves on lavish meals while the people they should be caring for starve. Miss Ada’s secret account book details not only how much money they have hidden away, but also the names of everyone who died on the poor farm and their manner of death.

The ghost children show the siblings how they were whacked with their canes and punished for stealing food. Joseph, Miss Ada’s helper, locked the children out in the cold upon her instruction when they refused to tell her with whom they shared the stolen food. The boys die as a result. Miss Ada, Joseph, and Mr. Jaggs panic upon finding their bodies in the morning. The county inspector is to visit that afternoon. Joseph buries the children, marking each grave with a stone and scratching numbers onto them. The vision fades, and Travis and Corey realize that those numbered stones are the same as those that they found in the backyard.

The ghost children appear in front of the siblings, telling them about how they scared Joseph off the property years ago. They tell Travis and Corey about how Miss Ada affects them now, how she “brings back all the hurt of being alive” with just a single look (125). Miss Ada makes them feel every painful thing they felt when they were alive in a single moment, all the grief and hurt and hunger that they once experience. The children confess that though sometimes it’s fun to wake up from their sleep, they have slowly grown tired of coming back to the living world. Amidst their conversation, the ghost of Miss Ada swoops into the room, screaming for the children to behave. Corey tries to get the ghost woman to leave the children alone. Miss Ada threatens Corey and Travis before she chases the ghost children back out of the house. Miss Ada promises that she will deal with Corey and Travis later.

The next morning after a sleepless night, Grandmother takes Travis and Corey out to town to run some errands. They go to a secondhand bookstore, where its owner talks with the siblings about the ghosts. He believes in ghosts as much as they do. He warns them to stay away from the ghosts lest they end up in more trouble. After, Grandmother buys them new clothes, and Corey accidentally lets slip that they have become friends with the inn’s ghosts. Grandmother orders them not to speak about ghosts any longer. They head back to the inn.

Corey and Travis go on a walk back at the inn. Travis is adamant that he is not afraid of the ghosts. They go to the ghost children and ask them what they need to go back to sleep. Caleb and Seth ask for “proper headstones” for everyone who has been buried in unmarked graves on the inn’s property. The children tell them that they don’t know the names of the people who died. The only one who has a marked grave is Ada Jaggs, who has an inscription that says, “A WICKED HEART IS ITS OWN REWARD” (138). The children influenced the person who carved the inscription to choose that phrase. Caleb tells Travis and Corey that they need to find Miss Ada’s ledger in order to give everyone a proper burial. The children tell the siblings that Miss Ada used to keep the book beneath the floorboards in her room. Desperate to find it, Travis and Corey break into the room that used to belong to Miss Ada while the guests staying in that room are out playing tennis. Despite their best efforts, they find nothing in the room. They manage not to get caught as the ghost children scare the two ladies off by tickling them and bumping things off the walls. The two women check out of the inn after complaining to Grandmother. Travis and Corey are subsequently blamed for the pranks.

Grandmother confronts Travis and Corey about the complaints from the inn’s guests. They try and convince her that the ghost children are responsible for driving them away, but Grandmother refuses to even consider that possibility. Grandmother tells them that she is going to call Travis and Corey’s parents right away, but as she goes to do so, a stapler floats into the air right in front of her face. The radio changes music, the doors and windows open and close on their own, and the printer begins printing blank paper. It takes all these unexplainable events to finally convince Grandmother that the inn is haunted. When she realizes this, she puts her head down on her arms and closes her eyes. Grandmother now believes in ghosts and thus can see the ghost children just as well as Travis and Corey can.

The children tell Grandmother what they need to go back to sleep. On top of finding Miss Ada’s account book and getting proper grave markers for everyone buried on the property, the children now want them to exorcise Miss Ada as well. Mrs. Brewster arrives and tells Grandmother that she and her family have been taking care of Seth’s spirit for generations. Seth is technically Mrs. Brewster’s “great-great-great-grandfather’s nephew” (151). After dinner, they discuss what to do about the ghosts. Corey and Travis must be the ones to put the ghosts to rest, as they are the ones who woke them up in the first place. Caleb promises to help them; they decide on getting the first two things done before finding a way to exorcise Miss Ada.