14. Edith's Scary Walk Home

We don’t know why it is, but it seems to be the case that some big brothers like to tease their little sisters. This was how it was with Edith. She had big brothers who just thought it was so funny to make her feel uncomfortable.

Edith had gotten to that age that she had a job. It was the kind of job that she didn’t live where she worked, but came home at night. On this occasion she was coming home from work and walking along the lane to her home. It was the time of year when it got dark earlier, and being rather out in the country, there wasn’t such a thing as street lighting, particularly on Gilver Lane, which was like an unpaved roadway.

There were homes along only part of the lane, and along the other part there were just bushes, trees, and farmers’ fields. What Edith didn’t know was that her brothers had decided to play a trick on her. They wanted to give her a real scare. They took with them an old kettle and a rope and hid in the bushes along the lane where they knew she would walk.

By the time she went by them it was getting dark. They had quietly put the rope through the handle of the old kettle then put the kettle in the middle of the lane a little distance behind her. They stretched the rope across the lane with each of them holding one end of it, then they used the rope to move the kettle just a little bit so that it made a kind of muffled clanking noise.

Edith wondered if she had heard something unusual and looked behind her but she couldn’t see anyone in the dim light. Thinking it was nothing she walked on. The boys caused the kettle to rattle a little more. Edith looked around again, and didn’t see anyone, but she started walking faster. Her brothers followed her and stayed out of sight but every minute or so they would rattle the kettle a little louder.

It definitely sounded as if someone was out there in the dark and was following her, getting closer and closer. She thought it might be someone coming to get her! Then the clanking sounded louder and much closer! She broke into a frightened run and without looking back she ran all the way home as fast as she could go!

 Laughter must have rocked the place when the brothers arrived back at the house and showed the family and Edith, disheveled and still panting, that after all it was just an old kettle on a rope, and not a monster trying to kidnap her!