All The Lovely Bad Ones

That afternoon, Travis and Corey relax by the pool. Ira chats with Grandmother, telling her that Miss Duvall and Chester are both frauds. He also tells her that most exorcisms don’t work because the people conducting them don’t take the time to get to know the spirits. The ghost children are still playful, swinging from the chandelier and frightening some of the new guests. After dinner, Grandmother asks Mrs. Brewster to call Tracy to invite her back to the inn. With the new busload of guests, Grandmother needs as much help as she can get. Later that night, the shadow children play in the yard as Travis, Corey, Seth, and Caleb begin digging for Miss Ada’s coffin. They eventually uncover her coffin and find her skeleton holding a rusty iron box. Caleb hands the box back to Travis, telling him to write down all the names and numbers of those who died. Seth and Ira begin covering the coffin back up with dirt. Inside, Travis opens the box and finds the book. He begins copying all 67 names in the book, along with their ages, death dates, and burial numbers. Travis does not fall asleep until after three in the morning.

In the morning, Travis and Corey give the account book to Grandmother. They set off to the mason to find out how much it will cost to purchase 67 gravestones. The mason offers to reduce his price for a single large stone memorial of pale pink marble; that way, those who were lost can be remembered and memorialized forever. Grandmother then takes them to the county historical society to give the account book to the head archivist. The head archivist reveals that she is descended from Caleb’s family; “his eyes and his dimple passing down and down and down from one Perkins to another” (177). Back at the inn, the siblings tell the children about the large stone memorial. Travis tells them that the county historical society will ensure that the book gets published for all to read about the Jaggs’ misdeeds. Content for now, the ghost children disappear into the night.

Miss Ada appears in Travis’s room and traps him, demanding her ledger back.

Miss Ada possesses Travis, forcing her gaze on him. In her eyes, Travis sees every mistake he’s made, every mean and hateful act he has committed. He begins to see himself as Miss Ada sees him, as “a loathsome boy, despicable, unloved, pitiful and weak, stupid and selfish” (183). Miss Ada yanks Travis and Corey out the window and to the grove, despite their begging. Miss Ada’s grip on Travis grows stronger, and she begins to convince him that he has nothing to live for, that he deserves to be punished. Miss Ada compels Travis to hang himself from the same tree where she ended her own life. Travis is only able to throw off Miss Ada’s compulsion to protect Corey; he realizes that if he dies, she will too.

The ghost children appear to help the siblings, pulling Travis higher up into the tree. The ghost children tell Miss Ada that she cannot hurt them unless they let her. They slowly drive her down the tree, dancing in a circle around her, singing for her to “go home to your ditch, scratch your itch, you’ll never be rich!” (188). Their lack of fear scares Miss Ada and they demand an apology from her. She refuses to give it, but Caleb asks her, “if you weren’t sorry […] then why did you kill yourself?” (190). In the darkness, a figure of a man appears. Miss Ada is convinced that it is her brother, but everyone else can feel the evil emanating from him. The children all try to convince her not to go, to save herself by apologizing, but she refuses to change her ways. The figure is the devil, and he drags her down to Hell, despite her attempts to beg for mercy and trade Travis and Corey’s lives for her own. Miss Ada is gone for good.

A week after Miss Ada is exorcised, the stone monument arrives. Tracy is back at the inn, and Grandmother doesn’t want to tell her anything that might scare her off again. The ghost children appear and watch the masons setting the stone monument onto the land. The shadow children begin calling out their names and those of their family on the stone. Mrs. Brewster walks out of the inn and tells Seth to tell his mother that “the Brewsters kept their word to look after you, generation to generation” (198). The ghost children say they will wait till dark before leaving so that the stars can guide them home. Later that night, the children return one last time to say goodbye to everyone. Ira gives Grandmother the money that Mr. Jaggs tried to steal from the poor farm, a total of 20 five-dollar gold coins. Grandmother says that she will donate the money to a good cause, back to the poor from which it was originally stolen. Seth makes her promise to keep just a single coin for herself. The ghost children begin drifting away into the night sky. A shooting star shoots across the dark sky, and everyone knows that the lovely bad ones have finally gone home.