‘Well…it is just four days until Halloween and we still do not have a good scare planned for the Holiday,’ Billy B. said with some minor exasperation. ‘I think another Hayride is just what we need to create a fun mood for the Holiday celebration,’ Chet noted. ”You know we did a Hayride a couple of years ago and I became somewhat disorientated when we went through the haunted house,’ Jane added. ‘Yes I recall that event but I believe that it was three years ago,’ Darryl said. ‘All the better then…it seems that it is high time to bring back the Hayride,’ Neva J. chuckled…

‘I love the chilly air and the smell of hot chocolate and cider,’ Jane smiled as she climbed onto the wagon. ‘A freeze is a forecast for tonight…and it will be quite a ride before we reach our destination which is the Haunted House near Raliegh, Neva J. smiled as she sipped her infused hot chocolate. ‘I like the addition of the black cat,’ Chet said with a grin. ‘Billy B., how did you get the idea for the Shadow to ride with us on the Hayride,’ Darryl inquired. ‘Not my doing…I thought that it was an optical illusion…or a small hidden light shining on a black piece of cardboard,’ Billy B. answered. ‘There really is no rational reason for the Shadow’s mysterious appearance…Eldorado history says that it appears as a warning of impending doom,’ Chet explained.

Shadow stayed perfectly still…neither moving nor disappearing. Soon our group of Halloween Adventurers was at the Victorian Haunted House near Raliegh. As Billy B. and Jane and Chet and Darryl and Neva J. gingerly dismounted from the Hayride they looked to see if Shadow followed them into the House. It did not…but it appeared to take off the Stove Pipe Hat that it was wearing and place it on the wooden driver’s seat next to the reins used to steer the horses.

This Haunted House is the scariest I have been in,’ Jane exclaimed. ‘The House is much as it has been for 150 years,’ said the strange-looking tour guide. He was dressed all in black and had extremely angular features. He spoke little and primarily gestured when it was time to move to the next room. The original owners of the House had lost their children in a Halloween Hayride when the Horses had been spooked and the wagon turned over and the hay caught on fire from the candles that they were using for light. There had been 5 children lost in the fire and the grief had been so overwhelming that their mother and father had died of broken hearts shortly thereafter.

‘Look…in the corner of the sitting room…it is the Shadow,’ Chet said. ‘Shadow appears to be following us throughout the House as I have seen it in every room that we have entered,’ Neva J. announced with a curious wink.

The tour Guide gave each of the five visitors a Milky Way candy bar and a Snickers. When Jane smiled at him he grinned and winked. As Darryl began to climb onto the Hayride with a small candle for light…Shadow jumped up and blew it out…before returning to his place beside the Hayride driver…