Mary Anne and the Haunted Bookstore Read online

  Annabel Lee was my first thought, but I didn’t say anything.

  Mr. Cates, Ms. Spark, and Professor Kingsolver headed for the stairs and I hurried after them.

  “Mr. Cates! Hi, I’m Kim Simon from The Stoneybrook News. We had an appointment to talk about the opening of your store.” A woman of medium height, with short hair and glasses, waited in the front room of the store. A big canvas bag was slung over her shoulder.

  “That’s right. In all the excitement, I’d forgotten. It’s nice to meet you,” said Mr. Cates.

  “I think I’ll run along,” said Professor Kingsolver, “but you’ve certainly given me much food for thought. I’ll talk to you about it after I do some research.”

  “What with the ghost and the grave and everything else, it’s no wonder we forgot,” said Ms. Spark.

  Ms. Simon looked up.

  “Cillia,” said Mr. Cates, a note of warning in his voice. Then, to the reporter, he said, “This is Cillia Spark. She’s a bookstore designer. And this is Mary Anne Spier, who is helping us prepare for the opening. Sometimes she baby-sits, sometimes she packs boxes….”

  “And sometimes she hears strange heartbeats,” Ms. Spark added.

  “Aren’t you one of the members of the Babysitters Club?” Ms. Simon asked. I nodded. “I’ve heard about you guys. You’ve solved some mysteries here in Stoneybrook, haven’t you?”

  I nodded again.

  “Mysteries? You didn’t mention that, Mary Anne,” Ms. Spark said.

  “It never came up,” I answered. My cheeks felt hot and I knew I was turning red.

  “Our own Dupin,” said Mr. Cates.

  “What was that you said about a ghost and a grave?” Ms. Simon turned the conversation back to the store.

  “We had quite an interesting occurrence here today,” said Ms. Spark. She explained about the workman seeing the “ghost” and finding the grave.

  “Could I see it? Maybe take a picture?” Ms. Simon asked.

  “It’s too silly,” said Mr. Cates. “That’s not what I want people to think about when they hear Poe and Co.”

  “It would give me an interesting angle for the story,” said Ms. Simon.

  “Maybe we should tell her about the bookshelf and finding the cat trapped behind the wall,” said Ms. Spark, in a low but audible voice.

  Mr. Cates shook his head and frowned at Ms. Spark.

  “What?” Ms. Simon asked.

  “There have been several interesting … occurrences since we started working on the store,” said Mr. Cates. “But I’d like to talk about some things we have planned for the future.”

  “One of the things I’d like to know more about is Edgar Allan Poe’s connection to the house,” said Ms. Simon.

  “Then you’d definitely be interested in the,” Ms. Spark paused, glancing at Mr. Cates, “occurrences. They all have a Poe connection.”

  Ms. Simon turned away from Mr. Cates. “Tell me about the occurrences.”

  Since I was supposed to be working, I thought I should find something to do. Papers were scattered all over the counter. I could straighten them while I listened.

  “One night Mary Anne, our Dupin, was waiting for a delivery, and she heard the beating of a heart. Now, there’s a Poe story called ‘The Tell-Tale Heart,’ ” began Ms. Spark.

  “I know it well,” said Ms. Simon, writing in her notebook.

  Mr. Cates leaned against the wall and watched as Ms. Spark talked to the reporter.

  “Then we discovered the word nevermore carved into one of the shelves of this bookcase,” said Ms. Spark, walking to the case and pointing at the carving.

  “ ‘The Raven,’ ” said Ms. Simon.

  “And this fireplace mantel has a raven motif,” said Ms. Spark, gesturing toward it. “It was original. We didn’t add it. One of Gable’s descendants claims that this is what inspired Poe’s poem.”

  “Or did he steal the poem from Gable?” Ms. Simon asked.

  “No one ever accused him of stealing anything,” said Mr. Cates.

  “But I’ve heard the rumors,” said Ms. Simon. “Also a rumor that he killed Mr. Gable because he was jealous of him, or because Gable threatened to expose him for stealing some of his writings.”

  “Those are all just rumors,” said Ms. Spark.

  “And I shall treat them as such. They’re fairly well known around Stoneybrook,” Ms. Simon said.

  If it was all so well known, why hadn’t I heard about any of it until now?

  “And don’t forget about Pluto,” said Ms. Spark.

  “Pluto, as in ‘The Black Cat’?” asked Ms. Simon.

  “You know your Poe!” said Ms. Spark.

  “I did a little research for the article,” said Ms. Simon.

  “Anyway, one day Mary Anne was in Benson Dalton Gable’s office, and she heard a cat behind the wall. It was Pluto. He’d crawled back there when the old walls were ripped out and didn’t crawl out before the new walls were nailed in place.”

  “Great stuff!” said Ms. Simon. “Let me take a few pictures and I’ll have a dynamite story here.”

  Ms. Simon insisted that I be in the picture with the bookshelf, since I’d discovered the word nevermore. When she was finished taking photographs, Mr. Cates said I might as well go home. We weren’t going to accomplish anything that day anyway. It was almost time for the BSC meeting, so I headed straight for Claudia’s.

  “Kristy, can we please play some softball?” asked Karen. “I want to be good this season and I need practice.”

  “We all need practice to work out the winter kinks, but there’s no way we can play inside,” Kristy replied, rolling her softball under the sofa.

  “But it’s a softball,” said David Michael. “Why can’t we practice grounders at least?”

  “Not inside,” Kristy said again, looking at Jessi.

  “Let’s … read a book. What would you like to hear, Gillian?” Jessi asked.

  The kids groaned.

  “All we’ve done for the last million years is read books,” said Becca.

  Tom and Gillian sat side by side on the sofa. Tom looked everyplace but at the rest of the kids.

  “Shall we play a game?” offered Kristy. “Suggestions welcome.”

  “Tennis,” said Becca.

  “That’s an outside game,” Kristy said. “I was thinking of a board game.”

  The kids groaned again.

  “Just let us watch TV,” said David Michael.

  “No way,” said Kristy.

  “We could race,” said Karen. “We could have different kinds of races, like a crawling race or a worm race or a relay race.”

  Kristy thought for a minute. “Races could be inside activities. Let’s start with a crawling race, okay?”

  “Line up over here,” Jessi said, taking a position at one side of the room.

  Kristy moved some of the furniture out of the way. Tom and Gillian remained on the couch.

  “Come on, guys. Line up with the rest of the kids,” she said to them.

  “No way,” said Tom.

  “Gillian?” said Kristy.

  Gillian looked at Tom, hesitated for a moment, then scooted off the couch and took a place at the end of the row.

  “This will be a crawling race, on your hands and knees,” Kristy explained. “Jessi will give you the signal to go, then I’ll be here at the finish line to see who wins. And my decision is final.”

  “Everybody down, get set, GO!” Jessi said.

  The kids shot off. Soon Andrew was ahead. David Michael moved at a steady angle, into Karen’s path.

  “David Michael! You are in my way. Did Andrew tell you to do that so he could win? You are cheating!” she said.

  “I am not cheating. I was trying to go straight,” David Michael protested.

  “Andrew is the winner!” Kristy proclaimed.

  “Only because he cheated,” Karen mumbled.

  “I did not cheat. You were not even close to me,” said Andrew.

  “
I would have been if David Michael hadn’t blocked my way. I was starting to catch up when he ran into me,” said Karen.

  “Andrew is the winner,” Kristy repeated.

  “I don’t want to race anymore,” said Karen.

  “I have another idea,” said Kristy. “What about hide-and-seek?”

  “Andrew has to be ‘it,’ since he cheated to win the race,” said Karen.

  “I don’t mind,” said Andrew.

  “Tom, come play this time,” said Kristy.

  “Can we hide anyplace at all in this big house?” Tom asked.

  “Stay on the first floor,” said Kristy.

  Andrew covered his eyes and started counting. The kids spread out. “Ready or not, here I come!” Andrew yelled.

  He ran to the closet in the hall and opened the door. Becca popped out, giggling, and raced him to home base on the sofa, but Andrew tagged her first. Then David Michael crawled out from under a table and dashed for base, but Andrew tagged him too.

  Kristy saw Karen crawling toward the sofa from behind the kitchen door.

  “I see you!” Andrew yelled, tripping on the rug trying to reach her. This set off a storm of giggles from the girls.

  “Free!” Karen yelled, touching home base.

  “Two more,” said Kristy.

  Andrew wandered into the living room, the dining room, and through to the kitchen. “I don’t see them,” he said.

  “Look harder,” said Jessi.

  Tom and Gillian popped out from behind the television when Andrew started out the door the second time. Andrew turned and dived for the sofa.

  “Tie!” said Kristy.

  “What is going on in here?” Watson Brewer asked, coming as far as the door and no farther.

  “Hide-and-seek,” said Kristy.

  “Come play with us, Daddy,” said Karen. “You can be ‘it.’ ”

  “I’d like to, but I’m working,” Watson said.

  “Please, Daddy,” said Andrew.

  He shook his head.

  “Sorry we were so loud, Watson,” said Kristy.

  “That’s okay. It sounded like a party out here, and I needed a break.” Watson turned and left.

  “A party,” said Kristy. “That’s what we need to pull us out of this slump. A festival would be even better — a Rainy Day Festival.”

  “I’d rather have a Sunny Day Festival,” said Karen.

  “We’ll have sunny-day activities,” said Kristy. “Who can think of some?”

  “Everybody has to wear sunglasses,” Jessi suggested.

  “Good idea,” said Kristy. She scrambled to find a piece of paper and a pencil. “We can have it this Saturday in our garage. We can do outside stuff in there if the weather is still bad, and not have to worry about the noise and everything.”

  “Sandcastles,” said Gillian softly.

  “Great idea! We could use sand from Emily Michelle’s sandbox. That’s a great sunny-day activity.” Kristy added it to the list.

  “Rainbows,” said Becca. “We could paint rainbows.”

  “Maybe use colored chalk,” Jessi suggested.

  “Let’s have a parade,” said Andrew.

  “And dances,” said Karen.

  “Games,” put in David Michael.

  “These are great ideas!” Kristy said. “You guys need to make invitations for everybody. We can make them in the shape of sunbursts. Let me find the art supplies. Do you know where they are, Karen?”

  “I will go look,” she offered.

  “Is anyone hungry?” Kristy asked. “I could make a snack while we’re waiting for Karen to find the art supplies.”

  “I’ll help you,” said Tom.

  “Thanks,” replied Kristy. In the kitchen she found a stack of paper cups and handed Tom a bottle of juice.

  “Who was that man who came in awhile ago?” Tom asked.

  “That’s Watson. He’s Karen and Andrew’s dad, and he’s married to my mom, so he’s my stepfather.” Kristy found some cookies and napkins. “My dad left us when David Michael was a baby.”

  Tom looked up, and juice overflowed the cup he was filling.

  Kristy used a napkin to wipe up the spill.

  “What did your mom do to make him leave?” Tom asked.

  “She didn’t make him leave.”

  “What did you do? Or David Michael?”

  “We didn’t do anything either. No one made him leave. He decided he didn’t want to be here anymore and he just left.”

  Tom poured the juice more carefully now. “Does he write you letters? How often does he come visit?”

  “Not very often,” Kristy said. “And sometimes I’m mad at him for not being here. I think he still loves us, but I also think he’s missing out on a lot. We have our mom, though, and now Watson, so we’re pretty lucky. But it’s hard.”

  “Yeah,” said Tom softly. “You know what? Sometimes I think my dad married my mom just because her name is Annabel Lee. He likes Edgar Allan Poe a lot.”

  “Your mom’s name is Annabel Lee?” Kristy asked.

  “She doesn’t like it much,” said Tom. “But she’d be perfect in the bookstore now, with that name. Except, I think my dad likes Ms. Spark. And if he does, Mom may never come back.”

  “Ms. Spark is pretty nice, and she and your dad have a lot in common. It won’t be her fault if your mom doesn’t come back,” Kristy tried to explain.

  “It’s so hard,” Tom said.

  Kristy told me later that she thought he sounded as if he wanted to cry.

  “Hey,” Kristy said, “whenever you have questions about any of this stuff, you can ask me. I’m the resident expert on parents who leave.”

  Tom actually smiled at Kristy then.

  * * *

  “I think Tom finally felt as if he and Gillian weren’t the only kids in the whole world whose mom or dad has left,” Kristy said at the BSC meeting.

  “And for the rest of the afternoon he was much more pleasant,” added Jessi.

  “Annabel Lee is his mother’s name? Then the note I found must have been from her,” I said.

  “What note?” asked Kristy.

  “I found a note on the floor signed Annabel Lee, and I gave it to Mr. Cates. He asked me not to mention it to Ms. Spark. I guess because it was from his wife.”

  Our conversation returned to the festival, and I tried to concentrate on the plans, but I kept imagining everyone’s response when I told them about the ghost.

  “Maybe the festival is what we need to make the sun come out,” said Mal.

  “The kids were excited about the idea,” said Kristy, “and once we started making invitations, they didn’t fight once.”

  “Then it was worth it,” said Mal.

  “Who worked at the Gable house today?” asked Jessi.

  My cue, finally. “I did,” I said. “But I didn’t actually work. Things came pretty much to a standstill after one of the workmen saw a ghost in the basement. At least, he thought he saw a ghost.”

  “What!” said Stacey.

  “I can’t believe it,” said Claudia.

  “I thought the house was haunted,” said Abby.

  “Why didn’t you tell us first thing?” Kristy asked.

  “You were already discussing the festival and —”

  “Tell us now,” Stacey insisted.

  “That’s one reason Mr. Cates asked you to take the kids out of the store,” I said to Kristy.

  “I thought it was for more than a change of scene. Mr. Cates looked kind of shaky when I came by,” Kristy said.

  “Anyway, when the workman looked around to see where the ghost had come from — he thought it was a joke — he found a slab of rock with an inscription carved on it, and the words are from Poe. Mr. Cates thinks it might be Benson Dalton Gable’s grave,” I said slowly.

  My friends shrieked.

  “That’s gross,” said Mal.

  “Scary,” said Stacey, a smile playing around the corners of her lips.

  “Things
are a little tense over there. Mr. Cates is worried that when the store finally opens, no one will come because of the ghost.”

  “How will they know?” asked Mal.

  “A reporter from The Stoneybrook News came by to write a story about the bookstore. Ms. Spark mentioned the ghost — and everything else that’s happened so far too. So the reporter’s going to write about that instead,” I went on.

  “I was beginning to think, after talking to Tom, that he and Gillian had come up with all these things to scare off Ms. Spark. But I doubt Tom and Gillian could create a ghost, or plant a tombstone, without some help,” said Kristy.

  “If they aren’t the real things,” said Stacey.

  “Professor Kingsolver was also at the store this afternoon,” I said. “Did you find out anything else about her?” I asked Claudia.

  “Janine said she doesn’t know her because she teaches English, not math or science,” Claudia replied.

  “I talked to Ms. Belcher about her. She says that Professor Kingsolver thinks Poe might have murdered Gable over a manuscript,” I said. Everyone had moved into a tight little circle by now.

  “Alex said sort of the same thing,” said Stacey. “Remember? He didn’t come right out with it, but he hinted that Poe might have had something to do with Gable’s death.”

  “And I asked my brothers about Alex Gable,” said Kristy. “Charlie said he went to a Halloween party at the Gable house once, and it was scary then too. He also said that he’d heard Alex say he planned to fix up the house someday and live in it. He wanted to turn it into a little museum or something, dedicated to Benson Dalton Gable.”

  “So Alex can’t have been too happy when his father sold the place,” I said.

  “I guess not,” said Kristy. “But the question is whether he’s unhappy enough to try to run off the new owners.”

  “Professor Kingsolver is so superstitious, she doesn’t really seem like the type to come up with a scheme like this either,” said Mal. “I can’t imagine her even touching a black cat. But she does keep coming around.”

  “The construction workers are unhappy too,” I said. “I overheard one of them say that he wishes they’d torn the house down and built new ones in its place. Come to think of it, it was the same guy who saw the ghost and who put up the drywall, trapping Pluto.

  “I wish Dawn were here. She loves ghosts and ghostly things,” I said.