The Ringing of the Bell

         "I heard it again last night," he told his supervisor. He wrung his hands together nervously.
         "Don't be srupid," the fat man scorned Burt. He shook his head in annoyance, his jowls shaking with the movement.
         "But Sir," Burt protested. He'd heard it with his own ears for two nights. A lonely shrilling bell, ringing out across the desolate graveyard. When he had first heard it he was startled, creeped out by the jangling. He thought someone was playing tricks on him. But when he heard it on the second night, the chimes beginning at exactly the same time, he had began to think into it more deeply. The next day he'd told his supervisor, a big burly man who sat on his posterior far too much and ate heartily. The man laughed it off, eaving Burt away with the flick of his sausage fingers.
         Burt found himself facing only irritation the second time he brought it up, the boss not even willing to give him to time of day.
         As he left the dark panelled office, closing the door to his boss and the stuffy odour encased within, he sighed. He knew he had to tell someone, someone who would listen.

         "Grave Girl, we have a mission for you," the Chief Inspector's voice drawled down the phone, gruff as always.
         "Go on," she urged him.
         With a sigh he continued, "A man named Burt Reynolds came to the station last night. He's a gravedgger in Old Saint's Cemetart. He told me, he has heard a bell ringing."
         "A bell?" Grave Girl repeated.
         "Yes, a bell." He hated having to ask for help. "He said it is in the graveyard and begins ringing on precisely the stroke of midnight."
         "And your men found nothing?"
         He took a deep breath, calming himself. "No they did not. They went last night at half past eleven and stayed for an hour, not hearing a noise the whole time."
         "Okay," she said simply.
         "Does that mean you'll go?"
         "I'll be there tonight," she told him hanging up the phone. She glanced at the clock noting it was approaching evening.
         Time to get ready.

         She paced the graveyard as the night grew steadily darker, the sun fading fast as the moon approached illuminating the word epitaphs with its eerie white glow. She kept to the shadows, hiding behind the trees in the corner of the cemetary listening intently. She could feel the cool breeze against her legs, embraced it as it wrapped against her legs. Her eyes were alert beneath her mask.
         Tinkle tinkle tinkle.
         There! her head darted in the direction the bell had rung. It sounded faint as it shrilled into the deathly silent night. She cocked her head. It rang again, for a little longer. She began to follow the low sounds of the jangling metal, her footsteps falling softly onto the wet dirt.
         Tinkle tinkle tinkle.
         She was getting closer, the sound of the bell ringing in her ears as she approached.
         Tinkle tinkle tinkle.
         She was almost on it, the shrill noise louder to her already honed senses.
         Tinkle tinkle tinkle.
         It rang. She was on top of it.
         In disbelief she glared down at the dirt below her feet. She was standing on a grave. The ringing was coming from below.
         In a flash she had her cell out and had dialled the Chief Inspector. He answered on the third ring with a voice that made her think he'd been sleeping.
         "Hello?" he drawled.
         "Inspector, I've found it," she told him simply down the phone.
         "Found what? Who is this?" his confusion spilled into the conversation.
         "Grave Girl."
         "Oh yes. You've found it, the bell?" he repeated.
         "Yes. Bring your men down here, with shovels."
         "With shovels?" he questioned.
         Grave Girl hung up the phone.
         Minutes later three sets of flashing lights came flinging around the corner. Seven men including the Inspector climbed out and hurried over to where Grave Girl was standing.
         "Well?" he asked her, his voice gruff. His moustache twitched.
         She pointed to her feet.
         "In there?" he was beginning to shake his head.
         "Yes."
         "I don't hear anything."
         "I do," she told him simply, stepping backward.
         She kept his gaze, watched him, until finally he set his men off to work.
         Within the hour they hit the coffin with a dull thud. After the noise finished reverberating they all heard a scream, shrill but faint, coming from within the tomb.
         "Get it up!" the Inspector yelled to his men as he flung himself backwards. With great difficulty, the six police men managed to manouvere the coffin from its resting place to the dirt above.
         The Inspector himself was the one who opened the lid. Inside lay a woman, her eyes wide and full of terror, her voice hoarse. In her hand she held a small silver bell.
         "My God!" he whispered to himself as he ushered his men to lift her from her final bed and shroud her in blankets, dialling for an ambulance.
         He turned to thank Grave Girl. She was gone.