Young Storykeeper Volume III

30 | STORYKEEPERS VOLUME III AGE SEVEN | 31
THE SPIRIT OF HOOK HEAD
ARCTIC FRIENDSHIP
It was a cold dark October evening. Felicity,
aged nine, and her parents went to visit
Hook Head Lighthouse. The family arrived
at 4pm and their tour was the last of the day.
The tour started and everyone was
enjoying it. Felicity thought it was really
interesting. Around half way through, she
wanted to go back up to the lighthouse light.
She asked her parents, but they said she had
to stay with the tour group. When Felicity’s
parents weren’t looking, she wandered
upstairs. It was fully dark now but Felicity
was convinced that she knew the way.
Felicity must have taken a wrong turn.
Before she knew it, she was lost and no one
could find her. The tour guide told Felicity’s
parents to stay nearby and they would send
out a search party in the morning. The little
girl’s worried parents did just that. In the
lighthouse, Felicity was frantic. She was
running around as fast as her legs could carry
her. At long last the girl found the lighthouse
door. She thought everything was okay until
she tried to open it, but it was locked. She
cried for hours. It must have been close to
midnight when out of the corner of her eye
she saw a light flashing.
She ran to the closest window. Yes!
There was a boat with glimmering lights.
Felicity screamed and screamed for the boat
to hear her. Felicity even broke the window
with her shoe so the boatman could hear.
Finally the sailor heard the child scream and
climbed up to the broken window. The girl
could only see the outline of the person, but
by now she was so desperate to be rescued
that she didn’t really care who it might be.
Of course the sailor helped the child.
Felicity could still only make out the figure’s
outline. She did notice a strange glow around
her rescuer and also that he seemed to be
wearing very old fashioned clothes, like you
would see in an old movie or a book about
long ago. She finally plucked up the courage
to ask her rescuer his name. He said he
was Bartholomew Cussins and travelled to
the lighthouse every night after midnight.
She sailed with him back to the shore where
he put her on to dry land. As the morning
broke, Felicity was found by her parents and
the search party. She told them the story
of her rescue and the strange sailor who
saved her. The tour guide was astonished,
because he knew that was the name of an
old lighthouse keeper who had drowned in
a boating accident more than one hundred
years before.
Felicity was speechless, she had met
a real ghost. The tour guide explained that
children often were able to see strange
spirits, but that grown-ups couldn’t as
they didn’t believe in such things. Felicity
had been saved by a friendly ghost of the
lighthouse.
Just remember not all ghosts are bad!
Anna Buckley
Co Cork
THE MERMAID LIGHTHOUSE
DREAM
Deep deep down in the ocean there lived
a beautiful mermaid called Charlotte. She
had beautiful yellow hair, a nice rainbow
hairband and lovely purple tail. She had two
best friends - Sheila the dolphin and Cormac
the starfish.
Charlotte was swimming up to the shore
when suddenly she turned into a person.
“Wow! This is awesome!” she said.
She was walking across the beach and
she met two people - one was called Elena
and the other was Matthew. They were
brother and sister.
“Hello, my name is Elena and this is
Matthew, what’s your name?” asked Elena.
“My name is Charlotte.”
“Do you want to walk along the beach
with us?”
“Yes,” said Charlotte.
Off they went walking across the beach.
Then they saw an old boat.
“Let’s turn this old boat into a new
boat,” they said, “and go to a lighthouse
called Ballycotton near here.”
So they gathered up seashells.
Charlotte turned back into a mermaid and
got some seaweed and shiny stones from
underwater and the boat was all done. Off
they went sailing across the sea.
The sea was rough. Charlotte
introduced Elena and Matthew to Cormac
the starfish and Sheila the dolphin.
“Wow,” said Elena and Matthew. “Can
they talk?”
“Yes,” said Charlotte.
So Sheila and Cormac came with them
and they saw lots of fish. After a while they
looked up and saw the lighthouse.
“Yeah, we made it!” they shouted.
So they got off the boat and went inside
and saw a man called James who was really
nice.
“Who are you?” asked everybody.
“My name is James, what are your
names?” he asked.
“My name is Charlotte, and these are
Elena and Matthew. We are friends.”
“Well, would you like me to give you a
tour around the lighthouse?” asked James.
Everybody said yes they would love
that. So they had the tour.
Afterwards they said, “Thank you so
much! We should go home now. Bye bye,
James.”
James said goodbye and they all went
home.
Elena Murphy
Co Down
In the Arctic on a snowy day, two friends
- Sea Otter and Seal - were playing. They
were swimming and splashing when Sea
Otter was tickled by a horn. It was Narwhal,
who tickled them because he wanted their
attention.
“Hey there, sorry for tickling ya,” he
said.
Sea Otter and Seal laughed so hard
their tummies hurt. Then Seal said, “I’ll go
catch some fish!”
Seal jumped out of the water, trying
to catch salmon and saw Snowshoe Hare
staring at him. She was standing on the
edge of a rock.
“Woah! That was a high jump!!” she
said.
Snowshoe Hare tried to jump and fell
into the water. Narwhal caught her and she
held onto the horn on his head.
“Thank you for catching me. I otter
know how to land safely,” she giggled.
They all laughed so hard their tummies
hurt.
These new friends thought it could be
fun to have a sleepover. They had a BIG
decision to make. Would it be underwater
for Narwhal, Seal and Sea Otter or would
it be on land for Snowshoe Hare to join in?
Soon night came and it got dark. The
moon came up, but they could not see each
other. Then they noticed a lighthouse and
they saw the nice bright glow. They each
decided to follow the light. It guided them to
the lighthouse where they found each other!
They were delighted to see each other
again. They decided to have the sleepover
underwater and gave Hare some scuba gear.
“Bunny seeing you here,” said Narwhal.
And they all laughed so hard their
tummies hurt.
Aymara Forde
Vancouver, Canada