“And you didn’t believe him?”
Grandma rolled her eyes. “That barracuda would be stuffed and hanging on the wall if it were true.”
“So you think the ghost is making this up and really wants me to tell?” he asked, reaching up and plucking the banana string from her hair.
Grandma Eunice stared him straight in the eyes. “Maybe you should go ask him.”
After thinking it over for about thirty seconds, Malcolm went to the phone and called Dandy. “We’ve got to go back to the school.”
Dandy gasped. “Are you kidding me? Our weekly vocabulary list is longer than the dictionary, and I’m still trying to figure out how to connect the dots on these constellations.”
“We can do our homework together later. Get your bike and meet me on the corner.” Malcolm hung up and began gathering his supplies. He had fishing to do.
CHAPTER EIGHT
IN AND OUT
Malcolm tugged on the school’s front door. Locked. There were lights on, and a few people milled about inside. Finally, a teacher came over and pushed open the door.
“What do you need?” she asked.
“I forgot my homework,” Malcolm fibbed. He couldn’t tell her the truth. How do you explain to a teacher that you really need to make contact with a ghostly fisherman to find out what it is he doesn’t want you to tell? Much too complicated.
“In and out,” the teacher said, holding the door open.
Malcolm and Dandy rushed by her, hurrying through the lobby and down the hall. They ducked into an empty classroom.
“What now?” Dandy wondered. “There are still teachers around.”
Malcolm, busy digging his specter detector out of his backpack, said, “We’ll just have to avoid them.”
He flipped the switch to the On position. Someone passed by the doorway. The boys flattened themselves against the wall.
“Maybe we should’ve come at night,” Dandy suggested. “When all the teachers were gone.”
“That’s when the janitors are here. No way they would let us in.” Malcolm watched the warm-up light on his gadget, then flipped it to Detect.
Bleep, bleep, bleep, bleep, bleep!
It immediately picked up ghost activity.
The boys looked at each other and glanced around the empty classroom. Then . . .
Yip! Yip!
They both jumped with fright.
“Spooky!” Malcolm said softly. “You followed us?”
Yip! Yip! The dog happily bounced around like he was on springs.
“Go home,” Malcolm ordered. “Now!”
Spooky, not the most obedient of ghost pets, raced in and out of Malcolm’s feet. Literally!
“What are we going to do now?” Dandy asked.
“Good question,” Malcolm said. “As long as Spooky’s here the specter detector will bleep. We won’t know if the fisherman is around until he actually appears.”
“Yeah, and I don’t want him sneaking up on me with a big old shark hook or something,” Dandy added.
Spooky continued his hyper play.
“Settle down, boy,” Malcolm warned. “We can’t let anyone see you.”
The boys stood, watching Spooky run in circles and yip at most everything.
“We’ve got to do something,” Malcolm finally said. “The longer we stay here, the better our chances of getting caught.”
Dandy rubbed his head in thought. “If there was just some way to distract him. Like with a Frisbee.”
“Frisbees go right through him,” Malcolm reminded Dandy.
“What we need is a ghost cat,” Dandy said. “That would keep him busy.”
Malcolm nodded. “Or another dog to distract him.”
After a moment, Dandy lit up, giving Malcolm an award-winning grin. “I’ve got an idea.” He pointed to the overhead projector.
Making sure no living person was lurking nearby, Malcolm and Dandy pulled the projector out of the corner and plugged it in. Dandy flipped the switch, causing a large lighted square to appear on the wall.
“Watch this,” he said. Dandy moved his hands in front of the projector, making a doggie shadow puppet. He even added sound effects. “Yip! Yip!” he imitated.
That got Spooky’s attention. Yip! Yip! he barked back.
“Keep him busy,” Malcolm said. “I’ll go see if I can find our ghost.”
“Wait,” Dandy called. “When you leave with the specter detector, Spooky will disappear. I won’t be able to see him.”
Malcolm looked at Spooky, who seemed to be smitten with Dandy’s shadow dog. “As long as you keep that up, he’ll be here. I’m going to go find our fisherman.”
Making sure no one was in the hall, Malcolm slipped out. He aimed the ghost detector into the teachers’ workroom. Nothing. Then he tried the boys’ restroom. Still nothing. Then Malcolm did the bravest thing he’d ever done—he aimed it into the girls’ restroom. Nothing there either.
Malcolm slowly made his way to the library. He passed Mrs. Goolsby’s room. Strangely, she wasn’t there. Malcolm had imagined that she stayed at school late into the night, working on massive piles of lesson plans. Mrs. Goolsby wasn’t there. But someone else was.
In the corner by the American flag, stood the fisherman. On the classroom whiteboard he’d written TELL NO ONE! over and over, like a kid punished for doing something wrong.
Malcolm carefully approached. “H-h-hello,” he muttered.
The fisherman turned toward him. He eyed Malcolm for a moment and then asked, “Can I trust you?”
Malcolm nodded. He wanted to say yes, but his throat felt cottony and dry. He didn’t think he’d ever get used to being able to talk to ghosts. He just kept nodding his head.
“This is extremely important,” the fisherman said.
Malcolm tried to sound brave. “Wh-wh-who are you?”
The fisherman pointed to the words he’d written on the whiteboard. “This is extremely important.”
“Okay,” Malcolm said.
The ghost took a step closer.
“I need—”
“Excuse me!”
Malcolm jumped. He whipped around at the voice. It was the teacher who’d let him in.
“I said in and out,” she nagged. “Let’s get a move on.”
Malcolm glanced over his shoulder. The fisherman had disappeared. He shut off his detector and walked out. After rescuing Dandy, the boys hopped on their bikes and left empty-handed.
CHAPTER NINE
SOLVING ONE PROBLEM, CREATING ANOTHER
Malcolm couldn’t concentrate on his homework. His mind kept drifting back to his brief encounter with the fisherman. Malcolm had learned two things.
1.Dandy can do an incredible shadow puppet.
2.The ghost at school had something extremely important to say.
He had to find out what. But once he found out, would he be able to tell anyone? TELL NO ONE! He went to bed, still pondering what he should do.
The next morning, Malcolm felt like a zombie. He stumbled through his morning routine, which consisted of eating his cereal while avoiding his sister. He had enough problems without listening to hers. He headed out to the bus in a daze.
Mrs. Goolsby’s grating voice woke him with a jolt. “Class,” she started, “I’ve been easy on you until now. But let’s face it, summer vacation is over. We’ve had a couple of days to adjust. It’s time to get back to work.”
Malcolm glanced at Dandy, whose face had turned the color of plaster.
Mrs. Goolsby continued. “I expect the best from this class. That’s why we’re going to do some extra math drills this morning. Please pull out your textbooks and turn to the problems at the end of the chapter. We’ll do a few on the board first. Then you’ll do the rest on your own. And it will be timed!”
Dandy’s face now turned whiter than any ghost they’d encountered.
“Let’s start with the first problem. Malcolm, please come up and work it on the board.”
Malco
lm slipped out of his desk, carrying his math book. He looked at the whiteboard. It was mostly covered with schedules, lesson plans, and quiz dates.
Only one small section was left clean. That was the same section the fisherman had used to write his message. Malcolm slowly picked up a marker. If he snapped a picture of the whiteboard right now, would the messages appear on film? Probably.
He couldn’t be concerned with that. He had a major math problem to solve right now. He could solve the ghost problem later.
Malcolm scribbled the problem on the board. Five hundred and eighty people went to the mall on Saturday. Twice as many people went to the mall on Sunday. How many people went to the mall for the entire weekend?
As he worked the problem, Malcolm couldn’t help but think those 580 people were all clones of his sister, Cocoa, the Mall Queen!
He finished and faced Mrs. Goolsby. She addressed the class. “Do we all agree with Malcolm’s answer?”
Most of the students nodded. A few gave a halfhearted, “Yes.”
“You may take your seat,” Mrs. Goolsby told him.
She didn’t have to tell him twice. He grabbed his textbook and hurried back to his seat.
As he scooted by, something fell from the back of his math book and fluttered to the floor. Mrs. Goolsby bent down to retrieve it.
“You dropped this,” she said, strolling over to Malcolm’s desk. Just before handing it over, she looked at it. It was the picture Malcolm had taken of the fisherman by the marquee.
Mrs. Goolsby’s mouth dropped open, her face went pale, and she fainted on the spot.
CHAPTER TEN
IDENTIFIED
After a huge commotion in the classroom, someone ran for help. Another teacher hurried in and helped Mrs. Goolsby up. She saw the picture again, then bam! fainted a second time. The nurse came in next and helped Mrs. Goolsby out of the room.
“I need to lie down,” Mrs. Goolsby said, holding the back of her hand to her forehead. The nurse tucked the picture into her pocket to hide it from the teacher’s view.
Malcolm waited. Minutes passed. The class sat quietly, as instructed, working the rest of the math problems. Malcolm held his pencil, pretending to work. He knew what was coming.
After minutes that felt like hours, a voice came over the speaker. “Malcolm Stewart please report to Mrs. Bergen’s office.” Mrs. Bergen . . . the principal!
Dandy gave Malcolm a “good luck” look as he walked out.
•••
“Take a seat,” Mrs. Bergen, instructed.
Malcolm sat.
Mrs. Bergen was holding the picture. She glanced at it, then at Malcolm, then back at the photo.
Malcolm wished Dandy was there to back him up. How on earth was he going to explain this? And even more important, why was Mrs. Bergen not rattled at seeing a ghost!
“I understand you’re on the yearbook staff this year,” Mrs. Bergen said, her voice steady.
“Yes,” Malcolm answered.
He remembered his idea to swap Mrs. Bergen’s head with the school mascot. Maybe he should scrap that plan.
“And you brought your camera to school for that reason?” she went on.
“Yes.” Gulp. Malcolm’s throat was so dry it felt like he was swallowing dust.
“While we appreciate your efforts,” she droned, “I may have to call your parents about this.”
Malcolm tried not to look as confused as he felt. Call his parents? Because he took a picture of a ghost?
“I’m aware of all the fancy trick photography programs for computers,” she said. “But Malcolm, what you did to Mrs. Goolsby was a terrible joke. Do you understand that?”
Malcolm shook his head in confusion. He didn’t understand anything!
“Now, I don’t know how you found a photo of him. Frankly, I don’t want to know. But putting her missing husband into a picture, then making sure she saw it—” She stopped speaking and clenched her fists as though to steady her words. “It’s a prank of the cruelest sort.”
What? Malcolm’s brain tried to compute what he was hearing. The fisherman was Mrs. Goolsby’s husband?
“B-but—,” Malcolm sputtered.
Mrs. Bergen raised her palm up like a crossing guard demanding him to halt. “I don’t want to hear it.” She took a deep breath. “You owe Mrs. Goolsby an apology. Follow me.”
Mrs. Bergen rose and motioned for Malcolm to follow. He trudged along behind her. A couple of quick turns led them into the school clinic.
Mrs. Goolsby was lying down holding the photo, an ice pack on her forehead.
Malcolm approached his teacher, his head down. “Mrs. Goolsby, I’m so sorry that picture upset you.”
“I don’t want an apology, Malcolm. I want an explanation. My husband left for a fishing trip five years ago . . . just two days before our wedding anniversary. He never returned. How on earth did you get this picture of him?”
“Mrs. Goolsby,” Malcolm began.
“And how did you know he called me Noonie?”
“Noonie?” Malcolm’s head snapped up. He stared hard at Mrs. Goolsby. He had no idea what she meant.
“Yes. My husband called me Noonie. He nicknamed me that because we first met each other at the college diner right at noon. So, he always spelled it N-O-O-N-E.”
TELL NO ONE! TELL NOONE!
Now Malcolm got it. “I promise, Mrs. Goolsby, I didn’t tamper with that photo. That’s how it came out.”
He had no choice but to tell the truth. He hoped she’d believe him. “I think your husband is trying to tell you something.”
Mrs. Goolsby glanced at the picture, then at Malcolm. She sat up, leaning closer to him.
“What do you think he’s trying to tell me?” she whispered.
“I don’t know. Let’s find out,” Malcolm whispered back.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
HAPPY ANNIVERSARY!
Malcolm went back to the classroom to retrieve his camera. The class was now being led by a substitute teacher.
“Excuse me,” he interrupted, “I need Daniel to come with me.” He held up the camera. “For official school business.”
The sub nodded.
Dandy sheepishly got up from his desk. His face had turned a carsick green.
“I’m in trouble too?” Dandy asked when they reached the hall.
“No, but I may need you to back me up, in case things don’t go as planned.”
“What plan?” Dandy slowed his steps.
“Just come on,” Malcolm said.
Dandy looked even sicker when he saw Mrs. Goolsby waiting for them.
“Follow me,” Malcolm told them.
The three walked out the front door and over to the school’s marquee. Malcolm took a quick picture. He checked the camera to make sure what he needed was there. “We’ll be able to see it better after we upload it to a computer.”
It didn’t take long.
“It’s the fisherman,” Dandy said. “I thought we weren’t supposed to tell. Why are we showing Mrs. Goolsby?”
Malcolm smiled. “Well, it turns out we were supposed to tell a certain Noone.”
“Huh?” Dandy asked.
“I’ll explain later,” Malcolm said. “Now look closely. Do you see what I see?”
The photo clearly showed Mrs. Goolsby’s husband pointing to the marquee. It now read: Noone, I’m sorry I missed our anniversary. Check the pocket of my gray jacket. The one I wore when we were married.
Mrs. Goolsby looked like she may faint a third time. Instead, she excused herself. “You boys go back to class. I think I’ll go home for the day.”
Malcolm took more pictures around school that afternoon. Mostly banners and bulletin boards, anything with writing on it. But they all came out just as they were originally written. No special messages. No fisherman.
The next morning, Malcolm and Dandy heard an odd noise coming from their classroom. They cautiously approached the door. The fisherman ghost may have been friendly before, but mayb
e he had more to say.
When they peeked around the door, they found Mrs. Goolsby humming! She wore a smile as bright as the gleaming diamond necklace around her neck. She brightened even more when she saw Malcolm.
“Malcolm, may I speak to you for a moment?” she asked him.
Malcolm glanced at Dandy. Then he approached Mrs. Goolsby’s desk.
“Thank you,” she whispered, pointing to the necklace. “I found it in my husband’s jacket pocket, along with a lovely anniversary card.”
Malcolm wasn’t sure exactly what to say. “It’s pretty.”
“Yes . . . yes, it is,” she agreed. “I’ll never know what happened to my husband, but at least now I know he loved me. I have you to thank for that.”
Malcolm blushed. Then Mrs. Goolsby let him go back to his desk. He dug in his desk for his math book to get ready for more punishing days of problems.
Malcolm waited for the ruler to snap the class to attention, but that day Mrs. Goolsby waited until after the announcements to begin the lessons.
“I think rather than doing problems,” she began, “today we’ll begin with a math game.”
“A game?” Dandy dared to ask.
“Yes,” Mrs. Goolsby answered, all smiles. “Learning doesn’t always have to be hard work.”
Malcolm pulled out some paper and a pencil. What a difference a ghost can make, he thought. Maybe it would be a great school year after all.
TOP FIFTEEN WAYS TO DETECT A GHOST, SPIRIT, OR POLTERGEIST
From Ghost Detectors Malcolm and Dandy
1.Check for creepy surroundings. Is there a graveyard nearby? Or an area covered in strange shadows? Is there a house that stares at you?
2.Ask people if there are stories about the area. Is there a legend about a haunting? Has anyone else seen a spirit there?
Ghost Detectors Volume 1 Page 8