Ghosts Don't Wear Glasses Read online

  FOR MY MOTHER, WHO LOVED GHOST STORIES. – E. S. F

  TO EVERYONE IN MY FAMILY, INCLUDING THOSE IN THE SPIRIT WORLD. –J. W.

  Text copyright © 2015 by E. S. Farber.

  Illustrations copyright © 2015 by Jessica Warrick.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:

  Farber, Erica, author.

  Ghosts don’t wear glasses / by E. S. Farber; illustrated by Jessica Warrick.

  pages cm. — (Fish Finelli ; book 3)

  Summary: In order to fulfill a bet with Bryce, his nemesis, Fish has to go into the Hannibal W. Royce house, which is said to be haunted by the ghost of a whaling captain, and bring out the whaler’s harpoon, which is supposedly dripping with blood.

  ISBN 978-1-4521-3815-2 (hc)

  ISBN 978-1-4521-5172-4 (epub & mobi)

  1. Haunted houses—Juvenile fiction. 2. Whalers (Persons)—Juvenile fiction. 3. Ghost stories. 4. Bullying—Juvenile fiction. 5. Wagers—Juvenile fiction. 6. Friendship—Juvenile fiction. [1. Haunted houses—Fiction. 2. Whalers (Persons)—Fiction. 3. Ghosts—Fiction. 4. Bullying—Fiction. 5. Wagers—Fiction. 6. Friendship—Fiction.] I. Warrick, Jessica, illustrator. II. Title. III. Title: Ghosts do not wear glasses.

  PZ7.F22275Gj 2015

  813.6—dc23

  [Fic]

  2014047356

  Design by Tara Creehan.

  Typeset in Century Schoolbook.

  Chronicle Books LLC

  680 Second Street

  San Francisco, CA 94107

  Chronicle Books—we see things differently.

  Become part of our community at www.chroniclekids.com.

  A DATE WITH DOOM

  “Once, twice, three—shoot!”

  Roger and T. J. flung out their hands. Roger’s was in a fist. T. J.’s was flat.

  “Paper covers rock!” said T. J. “I win!”

  “You went a split second after me,” said Roger. “Do over.”

  “That’s what you said the last three times,” said T. J.

  It was a hot Wednesday afternoon. We were on our way to the Whooping Hollow One Stop with a wagon full of cans and bottles to recycle. Once we cashed them in, we were going to use the money for ice cream at Toot Sweets.

  “He’s right, Roger,” I said. “It’s your turn to pull. And quit talking. I’m trying to calculate the volume of the wagon, which is a rectangular prism, and multiply it by point-oh-five to figure out how much money we’re going to get.”

  “Fish, it’s vacation, which means no more decimals. Hooray! One more time, Teej, pretty please with chocolate-chip pancakes and cheese fries on top,” said Roger.

  T. J. shrugged.

  “And now for the Spanish version,” said Roger. “Uno, dos, tres—shoot!”

  “Rock smashes scissors!” said T. J. “I win—again.”

  Roger sighed dramatically as he grabbed the wagon handle.

  “What are you going to get?” said T. J. “I’m thinking two scoops of bubble-gum ice cream with sour gummies.”

  “Ew, T. J.! Bubble gum is nasty with sours,” said Roger. “Blueberry Bomb or Pineapple Pizazz are much better.”

  “Reality check, guys,” I said. “There’s not going to be enough money for double scoops with toppings for each of us. Those cost four dollars and fifty cents, which means we need thirteen dollars and fifty cents plus tax. If the volume of the wagon is roughly one hundred and seventy-two cubic inches, that’s not—”

  “Dude, we’ve got hundreds of bottles and cans here,” said Roger as we crossed the railroad tracks onto Main Street. “Fourteen, fifteen bucks, I bet. Your turn.” He thrust the wagon handle into my hand and raced ahead before I could open my mouth.

  T. J. and I caught up with Roger about a block from Toot Sweets. The line was already out the door.

  “Boo!” Micah and Silas King popped out from behind the mailbox between Get Whooped, the surfer shop, and Toot Sweets. They’re twins a year older than we are who run a clam stand on Two Mile Harbor.

  “Hey, dudes,” said Roger, as we all bumped fists. “Clam business slow? Need us to help you out and find some oysters?”

  We had briefly worked for the twins earlier in the summer so we could pay their older brother, Eli, to help us fix up our boat, the Fireball, to get it ready to race in the Captain Kidd Classic.

  “My offer still stands,” said Mi, flipping through a fat wad of dollar bills and counting them under his breath. “You get fifty percent of whatever you catch—oysters or clams.”

  “And I still say seventy-five percent is only fair,” said Roger.

  “It’s a better get-rich-quick scheme than that,” said Mi, tilting his head toward the wagon.

  “This isn’t a get-rich-quick scheme,” said Roger. “We’re recycling, helping to save the planet and the polar bears so their ice caps don’t sink.”

  “You mean melt,” I said. “Due to global warming caused partly by the erosion of the ozone layer as a result of our use of fossil fuels and the carbon—”

  “It’s summer vacation, Great Brain, please,” said Roger.

  “Tell me you’re not in it for the money,” said Mi.

  I laughed. “He got you, Rog, since you’re not getting a double scoop with toppings without it.”

  “Are you guys really going into the one-legged whaler’s haunted house?” asked Si all of a sudden, pushing his glasses back up on his nose. “Even with the doorway crying blood and everything?”

  “What?” I said, my heart beating faster in my chest.

  I had been trying to forget about my dare with Bryce Billings, the bully of Whooping Hollow Elementary who thinks he is the coolest dude ever. We’re supposed to go into that house and bring out the whaler’s bloody harpoon.

  That’s right, his bloody harpoon. It’s a long story, and believe it or not, I made up the dare myself. When I lose my temper, I say stuff that surprises even me.

  “Burt Babinski said he saw the blood himself, dripping right down the front door,” said Si.

  “Hey,” said T. J., pointing to the Whooping Hollow Star newspapers in the kiosk next to the mailbox. “Look!”

  Roger read the headline aloud: “WHOOPING HOLLOW WHALER’S HOUSE FOR SALE.”

  “The Hannibal W. Royce house, built in 1845 by the famous one-legged whaling captain and Whooping Hollow legend, is soon to be for sale,” I read.

  “No wonder the house is crying blood,” said T. J.

  “It’s not like it’s true,” I said. “Doors can’t bleed.”

  “Fish has a point there, Teej,” said Roger. “I mean, we’re talking Burt Babinski. The same individual who claimed that he had been struck by lightning while taking a shower, which is how come he now has X-ray vision.”

  “So, when you going in?” asked Mi, looking up from his wad of cash.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “We have to set the date with Bryce.”

  “A date with doom,” said Si solemnly.

  “I wouldn’t want to be in your shoes,” said Mi.

  “Is that because you’re more of a flip-flop sort of guy?” joked Roger.

  “You know what I mean,” said Mi. “Not that I believe in ghosts, but if I were a ghost, the one-legged whaler’s house is just the kind of creepy place I’d call home.”

  “The legend is that the whaler’s ghost stabs anyone through the heart with his bloody harpoon who dares to enter that house,” said Si, blinking behind his glasses. “’Cause a killer white whale bit his leg off and he’s still mad about it all these hundreds of years later.”

  “You mean a right whale, not a white whale,” I s
aid. “Whalers hunted right whales because they had the most blubber. That’s why they were called right whales. And they weren’t killers. The orca, though it’s known as the killer whale—”

  “Enough with the marine science, O, Great Brainio,” said Roger.

  “I hope Bryce forgets about the dare,” said Si. “For your sake.”

  “Not likely,” said Mi. “Since I heard his dad is the one who is trying to buy the house in the first place.”

  “Like I said, that explains the bleeding,” said T. J., his brow furrowed. “Dr. Ghost B. Gone says that sometimes when an entity gets upset, it acts out in ways the living can see. So I bet the entity is upset that the house is being sold.”

  “Entity?” asked Si.

  “That’s what Dr. Ghost B. Gone calls ghosts,” said T. J. “It’s the technical name.”

  Dr. Ghost B. Gone is T. J.’s favorite TV show. It’s about a crazy ghost hunter who investigates hauntings. T. J.’s also not allowed to watch it, because it’s on at ten o’clock at night and it’s creepy. So he sneaks behind his dad’s recliner while his parents watch the show.

  “It takes a really powerful entity to make a door drip blood,” T. J. said. “That means this ghost is not an orb or poltergeist or streak. I’m afraid to say it sounds like the work of an elemental.”

  “What in the heck is an elemental?” I asked. Not that I believe in ghosts or anything.

  “It’s all mental, if you ask me,” said Roger, twirling his index finger around his right ear.

  “No, it’s not,” said T. J. in the serious voice he uses with teachers and his mom. “There’s lots of proof ghosts exist. An elemental is an entity that can take full physical form. Dr. Ghost B. Gone says you have to be very careful when you deal with one because an elemental can—”

  “It’s elementary, my dear Watson,” Roger said in a fake English accent.

  “An elemental can what?” asked Si, his green eyes bulging like a frog’s behind his glasses.

  Before T. J. could answer, the line began to move and a group of kids came out of Toot Sweets. One of them had slicked-back blond hair and was wearing a Sandstone Country Club rash guard, board shorts, and the gold-rimmed sunglasses I knew only too well. Bryce had gotten them after our first bet. He lost that bet and had to give me his mirrored sunglasses when we found Captain Kidd’s treasure. I could see his trusty sidekick, Trippy, and his new best buddy, True, a boy I didn’t know because he belonged to the club and only lived here in the summer.

  “Incoming!” said Roger.

  I looked away, hoping Bryce wouldn’t see me.

  “Oooh, check out the trash collectors,” said Bryce with a smirk on his face. Behind him, Trippy and True snickered. “Hey, I think I have something for you.”

  Bryce handed Trippy his chocolate ice cream cone and pulled something out of his backpack. It was a not-quite-empty Gatorade bottle. Before I could make a move, he tossed it into the wagon. Blue Gatorade dripped all over the cans.

  “Hey!” I said, my face burning. “Take that back.”

  “Why?” said Bryce. “It’s garbage and you’re collecting garbage, right?”

  Heads turned. Bryce had that effect on people. If we were amphibians in a tropical rain forest, he’d be the bright-yellow poison dart frog, deadly and impossible to miss. I’d be a panther chameleon, changing colors to blend into the background—except for when I lose my temper and open my big mouth, that is.

  “Not yours,” I said, feeling my ears start burning, too, as I grabbed the Gatorade bottle. I wanted to throw it at him, but I just tossed it onto the ground by his feet.

  “Sorry,” said Bryce without sounding sorry at all. “I thought you could use the five cents.” Trippy and True snickered again.

  “How dare you?” I began, my hands balling into fists.

  “Speaking of dares, Mr. ‘I’m so brave I’ll go into the one-legged whaler’s haunted house and bring out his bloody harpoon,’ ” said Bryce in a high-pitched voice, as if he were imitating a girl, “when are you planning to go into the house?”

  More eyes turned our way.

  “Any day now,” I said as Roger and T. J. glanced over at me in surprise.

  SNORT. “It better be, because my dad is going to bulldoze that place soon. Unless you’re too chicken . . .”

  “Bawk! Bawk!” said Trippy, flapping his arms.

  “Bawk! Bawk!” said True, flapping, too.

  “I’m not chicken,” I said, my face turning an even deeper shade of red.

  “You know what they say about that house?” said Bryce, dropping his voice to a loud whisper. “People go in and never come out. The whaler’s ghost stabs them with his bloody harpoon right through the heart and then he puts their bodies in the basement, which is filled with the bones from all the dead people he already stabbed. Remember what happened to that paperboy who didn’t know the house was haunted?”

  A murmur ran through the crowd.

  “He went to deliver the paper and then he was never heard from again. All they found was his bloody baseball cap. He’s down there, too, in that basement, his body slowly turning into a rotting corpse.”

  T. J. and Roger stiffened beside me.

  “That’s just a story,” I said, although it sure was creepy.

  Just then a girl with long black hair pushed her way toward Bryce. She was wearing a wetsuit and holding a vanilla ice cream cone.

  “Ready to go?” she said.

  “Hi, Clementine!” My face got hot again. I bet I was as red as my mom’s cherry Jell-O.

  “Hi, Fish!” She smiled, happy to see me.

  Clementine had won the Captain Kidd Classic boat race. Besides being an excellent mariner, she also happens to be just about the prettiest girl in the world. She hangs out with Bryce because his parents are friends with her dad and they live next door to each other. Even though he’s nasty to me and so many other kids, he’s always real nice to her.

  “You mean ‘Hi, chicken,’ ” said Bryce.

  “I’m not chicken!”

  “Bawk! Bawk!” All three boys flapped their arms.

  A couple of kids laughed.

  “Yeah,” said Roger. “He’s not chicken. He’s going into the one-legged whaler’s haunted house, just like he said.”

  “My father says out with the old, in with the new. He’s going to put up a bunch of luxury condos with a private golf course and a spa.” Bryce’s father wasn’t known as the real estate king for nothing. “Who cares about some old whaler, anyway? He’s dead. He killed some whales. Big deal.”

  “I sure hope you don’t get stabbed by the bloody harpoon, Finelli,” called our friend Two O from farther up the line.

  “Just admit it, loser,” said Bryce. “You’re afraid of the ghost, which is why you haven’t gone in there. And so are your little chicken friends.”

  “Quit calling me a loser.” All eyes were on me, including Clementine’s. “I’m not scared and neither are my friends.”

  “Yeah,” said Roger.

  T. J. was madly chewing his gum, his face pale. Roger elbowed him.

  “Um . . . yeah . . .”

  “We’ve just been waiting for . . .” What, I wondered. Special equipment? Information? The right moment? That was it! The right moment. How had I forgotten? Although it looked like Bryce had forgotten, too.

  “Guts? Since you obviously don’t have any,” said Bryce, high-fiving Trippy.

  “We’ve got plenty of guts,” I said, gritting my teeth. “We’ve just been waiting for the full moon, like you dared me, remember? It was your idea.”

  “Yup,” said Roger.

  “So, the night of the full moon is when we’re going in.”

  “Right,” sneered Bryce. “You’re all talk, chicken!”

  “I am NOT.” How dare Bryce call me a liar? I was about to boil over, like molten lava out of a volcano.

  “I think Saturday night is a full moon,” said Clementine. “I bet that’s when Fish was planning to go into the whal
er’s house. Weren’t you, Fish?”

  I nodded. Saturday night was the night of the full moon. Uncle Norman had asked my dad to go midnight fishing for stripers then. He always says the full moon is the best time to catch them.

  “So, Saturday night it is. We’ll meet you at the one-legged whaler’s at eight o’clock.” I glared at Bryce.

  “Just before moonrise,” said Roger.

  “Be there, or everyone will know the truth,” said Bryce, taking a bite of his cone. He stalked off before I could say another word.

  “BAWK! BAWK!” Trippy and True flapped their arms, laughing as they headed after him.

  Clementine gave me a thumbs-up before she followed.

  “Good luck on your date with doom!” said Mi.

  “You’re going to need it . . . ,” added Si.

  SEE YOU TombMORROW!

  “It’s my turn,” said Roger.

  “It’s still my turn,” said T. J.

  “Come on, Teej,” said Roger. “I can’t help it if my machine is out of service.” He kicked it once.

  I kept feeding cans into my machine, listening to the satisfying clink of nickels, dimes, and quarters collecting in the change return.

  “I know. Let’s shoot for it,” said Roger.

  “Enough with the shooting, Rog,” I said.

  “Let me use your machine, then,” said Roger.

  I was about to tell him to start counting the change when a voice behind us said, “Excuse me. Can you tell me how to get to Raven Hill Road?”

  The three of us whipped around. There was only one place on Raven Hill Road anyone ever went.

  “Are you going to the one-legged whaler’s house?” asked T. J.

  “Is that what they call it?” asked the guy, who had one of those big hiking backpacks with a frame. I noticed he didn’t answer the question.

  “You know, it’s haunted,” T. J. went on.

  The guy shifted the backpack all of a sudden, looking uncomfortable. He was in his early twenties, dressed in jeans and hiking boots. He wore a T-shirt with a picture of a shovel on it that said: Archaeologists Dig It! I smiled. No wonder the guy was uncomfortable. He was an archaeologist—you know, someone who digs up old pieces of pottery and metal and stones and stuff. Archaeologists study history. They believe in facts, not ghosts.