Present day….

  April arrived back at her one bedroom flat. Her parents no longer lived in Eden Vale. When she had moved to the city to study at university three years ago they had sold the house and moved across the country to live on the coast. Sarah, Thomas and Mia had all moved to the city as well, but she kept in contact with them through Facebook. Kaitlin had also left and was now playing professional basketball somewhere. Only Cody remained in the town.

  When April finished her accounting degree she was able to land a job at the only accounting firm in Eden Vale, so she moved back to the town she loved, the town she had grown up in. Never in her wildest dreams had she thought the mountain would come back to haunt her. What could she do? Pretend she hadn’t seen it again? She had to talk to someone about it. April made up her mind. During her lunch break tomorrow she would go and see Cody.

  At one o’clock she met Cody in a café on the main street. He ordered a burger while April ordered a healthy salad roll.

  He gave her a hug. “It’s so good to see you again,” he smiled at her, “How is your new job?”

  “Very busy, but I like it. What about you?”

  “Well unlike you I stayed here in town and studied for my real estate degree online. Now I’m selling houses and rural properties for a living. It’s fun.”

  They made small talk for a couple of minutes, then April got down to business.

  “Cody, I want to talk about the mountain.”

  “His expression turned serious, “April, I thought we agreed never to talk about it again.”

  “I know we did, but….”

  “But what?”

  “Last night I was working late at the office and as I was leaving at eleven o’clock I looked out the window and I saw the lights.”

  “From the mountain?”

  She nodded, “Just like before.”

  Cody stared at her. “So the ghost lights are back. Well let them be back. What can we do anyway? There’s no way we are going back up that mountain again, not after what happened last time.”

  But….”|

  “No,” Cody help up his hand, “Sorry April, but the subject is closed. Now let’s talk about something else.”

  That night April drove to a hill on the outskirts of the town that had a view to the mountains. At eleven o’clock the lights appeared again.

  She drove home deep in thought. Something was happening up there that was causing the lights to appear again. But what could she do?

  The following evening after she arrived from work she was surprised when she opened her personal emails to read an intriguing message.

  She read the email, then read it again. Wow! This could explain the mystery of the lights. She had to tell Cody. She picked up her phone and called him.

  Cody answered sounding tired. “Hi April, what’s up?

  “Cody I got an email from Jeff Goldman, you know the guy who climbed the mountain a few months before we did? He’s found some more information about the Bergens.”

  “April, I told you yesterday you need to let this go. It ended eight years ago. Forget about the Bergens and forget about the mountain.”

  “No, this is important. Let me read it to you.”

  Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

  He sighed, “All right, read it out. I’m listening.”

  April stared at her laptop screen and started reading. “Dear April, remember me, Jeff Goldman? You asked me many years ago to tell you about the time my wife and I climbed Mount Despair. I never thought any more about it until I was doing some history research in a library in the city a few days ago. I came across a dusty old manuscript titled ‘Memoirs of Carl Friedman, Eden Vale, 1885’. The name of the town caught my attention so I glanced through it. Then I remembered how you asked me about lights you seen flashing on the mountain. I think you will find this very interesting. I’ve scanned in several relevant paragraphs of the document. Carl Friedman worked as a farm labourer at the same farm Bergen worked at and they had become good friends. Anyway read the scanned attachment and see what you think.”

  April paused.

  “Okay, now I’m interested,” Cody said, “Keep reading.”

  She took a breath and continued. “I helped Hans and his wife pack all their belongings along with tools and supplies, and they headed off into the mountains to the north of the settlement. I didn’t see him again for three months when he came to the farm to get more tools and supplies. He told me they were building a cabin halfway up Mount Despair where they had a view of the town. He said he could even see our cottage on this farm. He said life was hard, but they were determined to make it work. But then he asked me to do something for him. He said if they ever got into any serious trouble and they needed help he would flash his lantern at ten o’clock at night. He said the lantern had a blue glass in it so I would be looking for a blue light. He knew I would be able to see it from our cabin on the farm. Four lots of two flashes would mean ‘help, please come.’

  I tried to remember to look out the window every night at ten o’clock but I never saw any lights flashing from the mountain, although there was a time when my wife became very ill, and we spent several weeks at the hospital in Mansfield. That was a few months before the search party went looking for the Bergens on the mountain in 1878. I have described that incident elsewhere in this manuscript. But of course it was possible that Hans had been flashing his distress signal during that time we were away with no one to see it.”

  “Jeff Goldman then makes a note that time zones in this part of the state back then were one hour earlier than they are today, so ten o’clock back in 1878 would be equivalent to eleven o’clock nowadays.”

  April paused again, “Well, what do you think?”

  “Four lots of two flashes,” Cody repeated, “So is that what you saw last night?”

  “Yes,” April answered, “the exact same sequence we saw eight years ago.”

  “It was a call for help,” Cody muttered, “A call that was never answered, then Bergen and his family disappeared.”

  “Yes,” April said, “And as far fetched as it sounds I think the ghost of Bergen is still up there on the mountain flashing his distress light. Maybe if someone answered it they could somehow find out what happened to that family and bring closure to this ‘haunting’ of the mountain.”

  There was a long pause at the other end of the line. Finally Cody spoke, “So you want us to go back up there again, back up the mountain.”