The Secret Room, 16th Chapter

"And then she ran off?"
"Yeah, I think she was crying."
"Crying?"
It was breakfast time again, and Will was relating to Jimmy and Jan what Stella had told him last night.
"But..." Jimmy looked rather frustrated. "Why did you call off the whole thing last night?"
"Yeah, that sure was weird, you suddenly waking us up and asking us to go back to our rooms."
"Guys, I'm not so sure whether we should continue anymore," Will lowered his face. "I mean, there really must be something terrible about that room if Stella keeps warning us away like that."
"You know what? That's the problem. The more she keeps telling us not to, the more we want to." said Jimmy.
"But if they really wanted us to not go in, wouldn't it be better for them to not talk about it at all? I mean, there's this saying that goes, 'The forbidden fruit tastes the sweetest.' " said Jan as the other two mouthed along to her cliche.
"So what you're trying to say is that they're purposely tempting us to the Secret Room?"
"I don't know, you tell me."
Will thought about it for a moment. She did have a point there. Mrs. Banks, Stella and everyone else was just making too big a fuss of the room that it couldn't possibly contain anything that could live up to the hype. Treasure? Superhero hide-out? Ghosts? These were the most far-fetched ideas he could cook up, and still they didn't sound terribly exciting.
He looked around the hall at nothing in particular, rather stumped.
"Hey Jan, did you hear the news?" Melissa her roommate sat at their table. "One of the lady workers was found dead this morning."
Their jaws dropped wide open.
"Stella?"
"Uh-huh, I think that's her."
"Rubbish!" Mrs. Banks appeared from out of nowhere, almost making Will choke. "Stella has just stopped working here. We'll find a replacement for her shortly."
"And as for you three," her piercing eyes narrowed at them. "Make sure I don't catch you doing anything you shouldn't be doing."