The Underground Ghosts #10--A Super Special

by Dori Hillestad Butler

The bus made a wide turn into an underground passageway. It continued through a narrow concrete tunnel, which eventually led to a large underground platform. A sign on the wall said WESTLAKE CENTER.

  “Are we getting off here?” Claire asked Maddie as the bus slowed to a stop. A bunch of people around them stood up.

  “No. Next stop,” Maddie replied.

  The bus lurched forward, picking up speed as it moved into another tunnel. Just then, two ghostly figures, a man and a woman, passed through the front of the bus.

  “Who are they?” Kaz asked as the other ghosts sailed over Claire’s head.

  Claire turned all the way around in her seat and stared.

  Little John passed through Claire’s water bottle. “Hello?” he called to the other ghosts.

  “Get back in here, Little John,” Kaz ordered. “Claire and Maddie are getting off at the next stop.”

  Little John exp-a-a-a-a-a-nded to full size and followed the other ghosts.

  “LITTLE JOHN!” Kaz yelled. He passed through the bottle and hurried after his brother.

  The bus stopped at another underground platform. The girls stood up and started making their way down the aisle. Claire glanced nervously over her shoulder as the other ghosts passed through the back of the bus.

  “No! Come back, ghosts!” Little John cried, hovering in place.

  “Hurry, Little John,” Kaz said. “We have to get back in the bottle.” Claire was already at the front of the bus.

  “Go on, girls,” the bus driver said. “I’ve got a schedule to keep.”

  Maddie gave Claire a nudge, and the girls stepped off the bus, leaving Kaz and Little John behind.

  Not knowing what to do, Kaz grabbed Little John’s suspenders and pulled him up through the top of the bus just before it sped away.

  “Oh, good. Now we can find those other ghosts,” Little John said, looking all around.

  But the other ghosts were gone.

  “We need to find Claire,” Kaz said. He scanned the platform. He didn’t see Claire anywhere in the crowd.

  Fortunately, he heard her: “Kaz? Where are you, Kaz?”

  “Where are you, Claire?” Kaz called back.

  “Over here. By the wall,” Claire replied.

  Kaz grabbed Little John’s hand and followed Claire’s voice.

  “There they are!” Little John pointed at two girls who were leaning against the wall.

  Kaz and Little John dived down and passed through the side of Claire’s water bottle.

  “Oh, good!” Claire said. She hugged her bottle as though she were hugging the ghosts.

  “I take it your ghost friends are back?” Maddie said.

  “Yes,” Claire said.

  But even though they were safe inside Claire’s water bottle, Kaz’s heart went Thump! Thump! Thump! Thump! “You can’t go swimming off like that, Little John,” he cried.

  “I just wanted to meet those other ghosts,” Little John said.

  “We have to stick with Claire,” Kaz said. “We don’t want to get lost in Seattle.”

  “You’re not being very fun, Kaz,” Little John grumbled.

  “And you’re not being very careful,” Kaz said.

  What were Mom and Pops thinking when they said Little John could come to Seattle with him and Claire? Little John was an accident waiting to happen.

  Is that the library?” Little John asked from inside Claire’s water bottle. The Seattle Public Library didn’t look like any other building the ghosts had ever seen before. It was all glass, and parts of it stuck out in weird shapes and angles.

  “Must be,” Kaz said as Claire and Maddie went inside. “Wow. This place is huge!”

  There was a bright yellow escalator in front of them. Three elevators slightly to the left. A long checkout desk to the right. And rows of bookshelves beyond the checkout desk.

  Kaz also noticed a strange machine that carried books from the outside book drop, up some sort of conveyor belt that disappeared through an opening in the ceiling.

  “Does Andrea still work here?” Claire asked Maddie as they walked over to the elevators. “She was my favorite librarian.”

  “Andrea is everyone’s favorite librarian,” Maddie said. “You want to go say hi to her before we visit the ghost?”

  Claire nodded eagerly.

  “Okay. We can find out if any more kids have signed up for the Halloween party while we’re there, too,” Maddie said.

  The girls walked past a table where a lady security guard sat watching three computer screens, then continued around a glass wall that said CHILDREN’S CENTER in purple letters.

  “Wow! Look at all the books,” Kaz said. There were more books in this room than there were in their whole library back home.

  “Look at all the toys!” Little John stared at a large play area behind a desk where two librarians sat. A group of solid boys and girls played at a table with a large train set. Others were spread out around the floor with puzzles and blocks. Parents and grandparents sat on benches around them.

  Before Kaz could stop him, Little John passed through the bottle. He exp-a-a-a-a-a-nded, then wafted over to the play area.

  “Now what are you doing?” Kaz asked. He passed through the bottle and exp-a-a-a-a-a-nded, too.

  “Just looking around,” Little John replied.

  Kaz drifted up above the desk, where he could keep an eye on Little John and on Claire and Maddie.

  “Hi, Andrea,” Claire said to the dark-haired librarian at the desk.

  The librarian looked up. “Oh my goodness!” she said with a big smile. She turned to the other librarian. “Do you know who this is, Lynette?”

  “No,” the other librarian said, barely looking up from her magazine.

  “This is Claire Kendall,” Andrea said. “She always attended our programs, but she moved away a year or so ago. Are you back, Claire?”

  “Just for a visit,” Claire said. “I’ll be here for the Halloween party!”

  “Oh good,” Andrea said.

  Lynette scowled. “We’ve never had an overnight party in the library before,” she said, turning the page in her magazine. “I don’t know why we need to have one now.”

  Andrea looked surprised. “Because it’s fun for the kids,” she said. “Wouldn’t you have enjoyed spending the night in the library when you were a kid?”

  “Not really,” Lynette said.

  “Do we have enough people signed up for the party?” Maddie asked.

  “I think so.” Andrea rifled through some papers on her desk, found the one she wanted, and pulled it out. “We’ve got fifteen kids signed up. That’s not a lot, but it’s enough. The party’s still three days away. Maybe we’ll get a few more signed up by then.”

  “Yay!” Claire and Maddie slapped high fives.

  “Guess that means I’ll be working Friday night,” Lynette grumbled.

  “Don’t pay any attention to Lynette,” Maddie whispered as she led Claire away from the desk. “I don’t know why she’s a children’s librarian. I don’t think she likes kids very much. Let’s go find the ghost.”

  “Little John?” Kaz called as Claire and Maddie headed for the door. “We’re leaving.”

  “I don’t want to,” Little John said, his eyes focused on a solid girl who was driving a train around the track. She had long dark braids, and she looked like she was around his age.

  “You can’t stay here by yourself,” Kaz said, hands on his hips.

  “Can . . . I . . . play . . . with . . . you . . . ?” Little John wailed at the girl with the braids.

  Kaz gasped. “Little John! You did not just wail at that solid girl!”

  Claire stopped in the doorway. She motioned for Maddie to stop, too. All the other solid children looked around. They couldn’t see Little John, but they could hear him
.

  “I’m . . . right . . . here . . . ,” Little John wailed some more. Then he started to glow.

  “Little John!” Kaz cried. Now all the solid people could see his brother, too. If they were looking.

  Claire and Maddie walked back over. “That’s—” Maddie gasped. She pointed at Little John, but Claire grabbed Maddie’s finger and made her stop pointing.

  The girl with the braids grinned at Little John.

  A boy who was building a tower on the floor screamed. His tower crashed to the floor as he scrambled to his feet and ran over to his mother.

  “What’s the matter, Jackson?” the mom asked. She held a baby in one arm and hugged Jackson with the other. She hadn’t noticed Little John. Neither had any of the other adults.

  Little John stopped glowing.

  “I saw a ghost!” Jackson said.

  “I don’t see anything,” Jackson’s mom said, patting his back.

  “Don’t be scared,” Claire said, walking over to Jackson.

  “I heard something,” said one of the other moms. “Someone said, ‘I’m right here.’” She turned and frowned. “Quinn, was that you? Are you trying to scare little kids again?”

  A boy in a striped shirt came out from behind one of the bookshelves. “No!” he said. He held a stack of chapter books in his hands.

  “It’s gone now,” said the girl with the braids. “But Jackson’s telling the truth. There was a ghost. I saw it, too.”

  “So did I,” said another girl. “It was a boy and he was all blue, except you could see through him.”

  Kaz glared at Little John. Claire glanced at her ghost friends, unsure of what to do.

  Little John shrank. “I just wanted to play with those kids,” he said in a small voice.

  “I don’t know what you saw, but I promise you there are no ghosts in this library,” Andrea said firmly from the desk.

  “That’s not a promise I would make,” Lynette said in a mysterious voice.

  “I heard there’s a ghost on the fifth floor that cries,” said a girl around Claire’s age.

  “I saw a ghost on the third floor once,” said a light-haired boy. “He had chains and he was rattling them in people’s faces.”

  “Really?” Maddie asked.

  “I came here at night once to hear an author, and there was a ghost in the auditorium,” said the first girl. “It flicked the lights and it made the microphone screech and it said in a really scary voice, ‘Everyone . . . go . . . home.’”

  A girl in a yellow sundress ran to the desk. “I changed my mind,” she told Andrea. “I don’t want to sign up for the Halloween party. I don’t want to spend the night in a haunted library.”

  Two other kids ran over, too. “We don’t, either,” they said.

  “Hold on,” Maddie said to the kids. “You don’t have to worry about ghosts. This is my cousin, Claire.” She put her arm around Claire. “She can see and talk to ghosts!”

  Claire looked a little alarmed as everyone in the children’s center stared at her.

  “She’s going to go talk to the library ghost and get it to leave,” Maddie went on. “You don’t have to be afraid to come to the Halloween party. Right, Claire?”

  “Right,” Claire said uneasily.

  “I don’t know,” Lynette said. “If a ghost doesn’t want to leave, I doubt there’s anything a little girl like her can do to make it go away.”

  Did you hear that?” Claire sputtered as the girls walked over to the elevators. “That other librarian called me a little girl!”

  Kaz and Little John hurried to catch up.

  “Like I said, I don’t know why Lynette is a children’s librarian,” Maddie said. “She’s good with books and technology, but she’s not so good with kids. I think she’s scared of kids.”

  Claire looked doubtful. “Grown-ups aren’t scared of kids,” she said.

  “Some of them are,” Maddie said.

  The elevator doors opened, and Claire and Maddie stepped inside. Kaz and Little John followed them in.

  “Which floor?” Claire asked.

  “Fifth. That’s where the dumbwaiter is,” Maddie said. She reached around Claire and pushed the button. The doors closed, and the elevator started rising.

  “Wow. There are eleven floors in this library,” Little John said, staring at all the elevator buttons.

  “That’s a lot of floors,” Kaz said. He wondered what was on all those floors.

  The elevator stopped on the fifth floor. The doors opened, and everyone got out.

  “Where’s the dumbwaiter?” Claire asked.

  There was a railing in front of them. Beyond the railing was a huge wall of light blue diamond-shaped windows.

  “Over here,” Maddie said. She led Claire and the ghosts around the corner.

  There were no bookshelves on this floor. Just lots of people working at computers.

  “This is it,” Maddie said. She stopped in front of a tall pillar that had a metal door in the middle. The door was closed.

  Claire put her ear to the door. “I don’t hear anything,” she said.

  “Just wait,” Maddie said. “You will.”

  The girls and the ghosts watched the door and waited for something to happen.

  “The ghost is going to start crying any second now,” Maddie said, shifting her weight from one foot to the other.

  They waited some more.

  Finally, Little John said, “What are we waiting for? Let’s go in there and talk to the ghost.”

  “Oh, that’s a good idea,” Claire said.

  “What’s a good idea?” Maddie asked.

  “Little John wants to go inside the dumbwaiter and talk to the ghost,” Claire told Maddie.

  “I don’t know if we should barge in uninvited,” Kaz said. “Let’s just talk to it from out here.” He wafted over to the door. “Hello? Is anyone in there?”

  No one answered.

  “We’re ghosts, too,” Little John said. “Any ghost in there will be happy to see us.” He shrank a little so he’d fit inside the compartment, then plunged headfirst through the door.

  Kaz wasn’t so sure the ghost would be happy to see them. But he shrank and followed his brother, anyway.

  There were two shelves inside the dumbwaiter. Kaz and Little John checked both shelves. There was nothing on either one. No books. No other ghosts. Nothing.

  “Maybe the ghost isn’t home right now,” Little John said. “Should we wait?”

  “Nah,” Kaz said. “Let’s go report back to Claire.” They passed through the door and exp-a-a-a-a-a-nded.

  “There’s no ghost in there,” Little John announced.

  “They said there isn’t a ghost in there,” Claire told Maddie.

  “There has to be,” Maddie said, staring at the pillar. “People hear it crying in there all the time.”

  “Maybe it left,” Claire said with a shrug.

  “Maybe,” Maddie said. But it didn’t sound like she believed that.

  “Or maybe it’s not a real ghost,” Kaz said. “Maybe it’s just someone pretending to be a ghost to make people think the library is haunted when it’s really not.”

  “Solid people like to do that sort of thing,” Little John said.

  “Especially around Halloween,” Kaz added. He felt bad that Maddie couldn’t hear what he and Little John were saying. But if they wailed, then everyone in the library would hear them.

  “Let’s search the rest of the library,” Maddie said. “Maybe it found a new place to hang out.” She led Claire past the computers and over to a tall, narrow escalator. Behind the escalator was a staircase that led down into a strange red tunnel. Kaz hoped they weren’t going down there.

  “Should we split up?” Claire asked. “We could cover more ground in less time.”


  “Well, I can’t see ghosts like you can,” Maddie reminded Claire.

  “I don’t mean you and I should split up. I mean Kaz, Little John, and I should split up,” Claire said.

  “What?” Kaz cried. He didn’t like that idea. He didn’t like it at all.

  “I know there are places in the library that we can’t search,” Claire said to Maddie. “But Kaz and Little John can because no one will see them.”

  “Yeah, like the second floor,” Maddie said. “That’s where people who work here sort books. We can’t go there. We can’t go in the offices on the third floor or the eleventh floor, either. You have to be a librarian to get into any of those places.”

  “I want to search the special places where only librarians can go!” Little John exclaimed.

  “Okay, Little John. Look over there, past the railing.” Claire pointed across the room. “See how there aren’t any walls over there? That part of the library is open from the third floor all the way to the top. If you swim to the top, you should be able to pass through the windows and go into the offices on the eleventh floor.”

  “Have him search the ninth and tenth floors, too,” Maddie said. “You and I can search the book spiral. And your other ghost friend can go down there.” She pointed down the stairs. The stairs that led into the strange red tunnel.

  “Down there?” Kaz cried.

  “He can search the fourth, third, second, and first floors,” Maddie said. “Tell him to pay extra attention to the second floor, since we can’t go there.”

  “He can hear you,” Claire said.

  “Meet you back in the children’s center,” Little John said, swimming away.

  “Okay,” Claire said.

  “Wait! What’s down there?” Kaz asked. He peered down at the tunnel.

  “That’s the fourth floor. It’s just meeting rooms. No big deal,” Claire said. She stepped onto the narrow escalator.

  No big deal, huh, Kaz thought. Claire wouldn’t lie to him. So he took a deep breath and floated slowly down the stairs.

  The fourth floor was creepy. There were no outside windows. Not where Kaz was, anyway. No bookshelves, either. Just a narrow, dimly lit hallway that circled the floor. The walls, floor, and ceiling were all painted a deep, dark red.