CHAPTER SEVEN
SHHHHHHHHHHH
The lab was completely empty, but all the computers were turned on. If anyone had been here and said “Shhhhhhhhhh,” then they were gone now.
Desmond sighed like he was upset there weren’t any ghosts around.
“Well,” he said, “we better get started on that assignment.”
“Finally,” I told him. Doing our homework probably wouldn’t be as much fun as reading, but at least I wouldn’t be scared.
We sat at the computers and started looking up information about the library.
“Check this out,” Desmond said. I looked over and saw a photo from a newspaper. In the black-and-white picture, a man was cutting a ribbon on the new library building in front of a crowd of people.
“Wow, that’s an old picture,” I said, noticing that it was faded. One woman in the crowd looked almost see-through. “Let’s print it out and use it in our report.”
Desmond went to save the picture when all the computers in the room turned off. Then the whole room went completely dark.
A chill ran through my body. It felt like the temperature in the room dropped, and goose bumps sprung up on the back of my neck.
Desmond shivered too. “Interesting” was all he said.
“Do you mean ‘interesting’ like you turned everything off from your computer?” I asked.
“No,” Desmond said. “ ‘Interesting’ like I don’t think we’re alone.”
I did not want to hear that.
Suddenly, all the computers turned back on. In the darkness, we could hear typing, and whoever was typing was doing it really fast. Like really, really, really fast.
Plus, they were typing the same thing on every single computer. At the same time.
It was just one very long word: Shhhhhhhhhh.
Something really ghosty was going on, and I didn’t want to stick around to figure it out.
This time I was the one to grab Desmond, and I pulled him out of that computer lab faster than a 10G network.
As far as I was concerned, Ghost Patrol was over and out!
We hadn’t even gone ten feet when we bumped into someone.
Someone as thin as a piece of cardboard.
Well, actually, it was a piece of cardboard. It was a life-size cutout of some grown-up dude wearing a hat and a fancy suit. I slammed on the brakes, and Desmond tripped over me and landed on the floor.
“Are you both okay?” Mrs. Shoosh asked us. She didn’t even say anything about us running in the library.
Desmond had a huge smile on his face. He pointed to the cutout. “Whoa, that’s the famous scary story author Damon Chilling. He’s my favorite writer!”
“Then you should stick around,” Mrs. Shoosh said. “He’s going to be stopping by in an hour to read from his new kids’ book.”
As another person waved for Mrs. Shoosh’s help, Desmond turned to me. “C’mon, Andres. It’s up to us to stop that ghost. We can’t let it ruin Damon Chilling’s reading!”
CHAPTER EIGHT
GHOST TRAPS
Desmond and I headed for the map room next. I wasn’t sure what he was up to, but when Desmond Cole is hunting ghosts, nothing will stop him.
Desmond searched through a bunch of maps until he found the one he was looking for.
He took it out and unrolled it. It was a map of the library.
“Here,” Desmond said, pointing to the kids’ section. “This is where Damon Chilling is going to read today.”
“But what can you do to stop the ghost?” I asked.
Desmond pointed to another room on the second level. “The question is, what can we do to stop the ghost. And the answer is simple. We set up a ghost trap. Right here.”
“Um, did you say ghost trap?” I could feel fluttering inside my stomach.
Ever since I’d moved to Kersville, I had seen my share of ghosts, and they never seemed easy to trap. They seemed to be able to get out of anything!
“Trust me,” Desmond said. “I know ghosts.”
I nodded. He was right. He did know a whole lot about ghosts. A lot more than I did, that was for sure. But what was a ghost trap?
Desmond rolled up the map and put it back on the shelf. “Listen. Ghosts haunt places because they want something. They don’t do it just for fun.”
“Makes sense,” I said.
“If a ghost haunts a doughnut shop, it’s probably because he likes doughnuts,” Desmond said.
If I were a ghost, I would haunt the arcade. That would be awesome!
“I bet this ghost loves books,” Desmond continued. “So, let’s give her some books!”
We ran to the area that Desmond had pointed out on the map. “We are going to build a book fort,” Desmond said. “That will be the perfect ghost trap!”
A half hour later, Desmond and I had built a book fort to end all book forts. It was amazing! We must have used every book from at least four shelves.
Mrs. Shoosh seemed to be really cool, but I was seriously worried about what she’d say when she saw this. It would take her forever to put all these books back where they belonged.
“Don’t worry, Andres,” Desmond said. “We’ll fix everything when we’re done.” Sometimes it felt like he could read my mind.
“Cool,” I said, and started to feel a little better.
That is until the ghost showed up.
CHAPTER NINE
CHILLING?
Here’s the thing about ghost traps. Sometimes things go wrong.
And this was one of those times!
On one hand, Desmond was right. The ghost did show up. She floated right into the room and headed straight for the book fort.
Desmond and I hid, waiting for her to see all those books and start reading.
But on the other hand, Desmond was wrong. He thought the library ghost must be interested in books, but she wasn’t. She floated right past them.
And headed straight for us!
That’s how Desmond and I ended up in our current situation.
As the ghost got closer and closer, I shook and shook in my hiding place behind those huge cookbooks.
But Desmond was trying to be a superhero. “Tell us what you want!” he demanded as the ghost hovered over us.
I covered my eyes, but through my fingers I could see the ghost’s green face. With her glasses perched low on her nose, she pointed directly at Desmond and let out a loud “SHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!”
It was so loud and so strong, wind whipped up and started blowing. It blew so hard, I thought it was going to blow the hair right off my head!
The good thing was that her shush was so powerful, it blew most of the books right back onto the shelves.
The bad thing was that without the books, Desmond and I had no fortress and no ghost trap. So we backed up against a wall as the ghost loomed over us.
Finally, she whispered in a raspy voice, “What time is Chilling?”
“Chilling?” Was that some kind of scary ghost term? What did it mean?
“Do you mean the Damon Chilling reading?” Desmond asked her. “His reading starts in a little while.”
“Oh, I can’t wait,” the ghost said, and she actually smiled. “I’m a big fan of his work!”
“Me too!” Desmond agreed.
I couldn’t believe it. Desmond Cole just made friends with another ghost!
The ghost sighed. “I’ve had trouble reading books lately. The words are so blurry! So now I have to listen to people read if I want to enjoy books.” She pointed to both of us. “But I can’t hear them read with loud people like you in the library.”
Desmond thought for a minute while I just stood there trying to stop my teeth from chattering.
Suddenly, he picked up a book from the table and held it out. “Can you hold this for me?”
The ghost reached out to take the book, but her ghost hand missed it by a mile.
“Hmm,” Desmond said. “Just like I thought.”
That was whe
n Desmond got that look in his eyes. I knew what that meant.
Desmond had an idea.
CHAPTER TEN
GREEN, LOUD ETHEL
It turns out, the Scary Library Shusher is actually named Ethel, and she’s kind of nice, once you get over the green color . . . and all that loud shushing.
It was Desmond who figured out Ethel’s problem. Her glasses were old. Like really, really old!
They were so old that they didn’t help her see anymore. She was having a hard time reading.
So we called Zax, the ghost who lives in my basement. He could fix anything. I should know. That ghost has fixed just about everything in my house . . . even if it wasn’t broken!
Zax came to the library to fix Ethel’s glasses. She was so happy that she gave him a tight hug, one ghost to another. “Now I can see every word,” she exclaimed. “And I won’t have to shush anyone again. I felt so rude doing that.”
In the lost and found, Desmond found a hat and a jacket for Ethel to wear. And we got her to the Damon Chilling reading just in time. His book had tons of chills and thrills.
When he was done, Ethel cheered the loudest, and I think she surprised everyone there—even Chilling!
To thank us for our help, Ethel stuck around to give Desmond and me a hand with our report. That ghost knew everything about the library. In fact, she told us she was there when the library first opened.
Desmond and I looked at each other, completely surprised.
“Wait a minute,” Desmond said, and found the newspaper photo we had saved on the computer.
“That’s you!” I said, pointing to the part of the picture I thought was faded. Now that I looked closely, it was the outline of a woman. A ghost.
It was Ethel!
“It was an exciting day,” Ethel said, and she laughed. “Even way back then, I loved books. And thanks to you two and Zax, I can read again!”
“Tell us more about the library, Ethel,” Desmond said, getting ready to take notes.
“Yeah, tell us everything,” I added, smiling.
It had been a wild day, but with Ethel’s help, we were going to totally ace our report.
I guess it’s true what they say. . . .
It helps to have friendly ghosts in haunted places!
About the Author and Illustrator
Andres Miedoso is still afraid of everything as a grown-up, even after all his adventures with Desmond Cole. He lives in New York City with his family, and he remains very close friends with Desmond but returns to Kersville only when he’s needed.
Victor Rivas was born and raised in Vigo, Spain, and he lives outside of Barcelona. He has been a freelance illustrator for thirty years, illustrating children’s and teen books, concept art for multimedia and animation, and comics.
Visit us at simonandschuster.com/kids
Authors.SimonandSchuster.com/Andres-Miedoso
Authors.SimonandSchuster.com/Victor-Rivas
Little Simon
Simon & Schuster, New York
This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
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First Little Simon paperback edition September 2018
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This book has been cataloged with the Library of Congress.
ISBN 978-1-5344-2691-7 (paperback)
ISBN 978-1-5344-2692-4 (hardcover)
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The Scary Library Shusher Page 2