Claudia and the Lighthouse Ghost

  Contents

  Title Page

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Acknowledgment

  About the Author

  Also Available

  Copyright

  “Ho-o-o-neee, I’m ho-o-ome!” I called out.

  It was a perfect imitation of Ricky Ricardo. Well, as perfect as a thirteen-year-old girl can make it. I even impressed myself.

  I closed the front door behind me and waited for the reaction.

  My friend Abby Stevenson and I had been working on a routine from an I Love Lucy rerun. We’d just been baby-sitting for the seven Barrett/DeWitt kids that afternoon, and we’d had them in hysterics.

  I could hear my parents upstairs. (Lucky me. My mom is sometimes back from work at five o’clock on Fridays, but Dad only rarely makes it home early.) Their voices were muffled, so I figured they were in their bedroom.

  Time for the Ricky laugh. I closed up my throat and made a sound like a seal’s bark: “HA! HA! HA! HA!” You would have thought Desi Arnaz was there in the Kishi living room.

  Click. I heard my parents’ door open. “Hello, Claudia Lynn,” my mom called out.

  My older sister, Janine, appeared at the top of the stairs, wearing headphones. “Did you bring a dog home?” she asked.

  “Nope,” I said. “It’s just me. Can you tell who I was imitat —?”

  “Then will you please stop yapping?” Janine barged on. “I’m listening to my astrophysics lecture.”

  Uh-huh. Right.

  How many kids do you know with high-school-age sisters who take astrophysics? I’ll bet you can count them on the fingers of one elbow.

  It’s not easy living with a genius. My sister takes courses at a local college, for fun. I happen to think her idea of fun is seriously twisted.

  Now, I love Janine dearly, but we do not have a lot in common. For one thing, when teachers see her IQ score, they go weak in the knees.

  Actually, they go weak in the knees when they see mine, too. But for a different reason.

  I wouldn’t know astrophysics from AstroTurf. And I couldn’t begin to spell either one of them. Mention history and I start to droop. I used to think algebra was a type of lingerie.

  Which is why I, at age thirteen, am the oldest seventh-grader at Stoneybrook Middle School in Stoneybrook, Connecticut. Yes, I should be in eighth grade, but I was sent back.

  My parents, needless to say, were not pleased about that. (I wasn’t too thrilled, either.) They’re pretty brainy themselves. Dad’s an investment banker and Mom’s a librarian. They both believe in High Achievement and Proper Education. Of course, they worship Janine.

  Me they tolerate. They try very hard to see me for who I really am. But I do wish they’d stop wearing masks when we’re together in public.

  Just kidding.

  What am I really like? I’m Japanese-American, for starters. Actually, you could tell a lot about me from the way I looked that day: I was wearing a white high-collared dentist’s shirt and a loose-fitting Chinese silk jacket, cinched at the waist by a bright-orange scarf, over tight black flared pants. My hair was gathered on top of my head with an orange bandanna.

  I know, you think I’m demented. But trust me, it looked great. Anyone can copy an outfit from a model in Seventeen, but it takes talent to make a funky cool outfit out of stuff from thrift stores and yard sales.

  That’s how I look at life — creating something wild and beautiful from unexpected sources.

  Maybe that’s why I don’t do well in school. In math, for instance, I love to make interesting shapes out of the numbers and symbols. I kind of lose track of the problem. I’m much happier in front of an easel or a lump of clay or a box full of beads and string. Art is my number one passion. Painting, sculpting, drawing, jewelry making — I love them all.

  My other main passion is eating. Not just any food, though. It has to be absolutely horrible for your health. If sugar were flammable, my bedroom would be a major fire hazard. My parents forbid unhealthy eating, so I hide candy bars in my socks, bags of pretzels in my shoe boxes, cookies among my art supplies. (I also hide Nancy Drew books, because Mom and Dad think I should read only textbooks and Serious Literature.)

  Believe it or not, I did once have a real soulmate in the Kishi family — my grandmother, Mimi. She really understood me. I’ve missed her terribly since she died, and I keep her picture on my bedroom wall for inspiration.

  Mimi would have cracked up at my Ricky imitation.

  Oh, well.

  Snack time. I was definitely in a Yodels mood. I tromped upstairs and into my room. Flinging my backpack onto the bed, I reached into my night table drawer and took out a fresh, unopened box of Yodels.

  My clock read 5:10. In twenty minutes, my friends from the Baby-sitters Club would be coming over for a meeting (more about them later). I had just enough time to relax, eat, and do some homework. (Well, think about doing some homework, anyway.)

  “Can’t they take a suite in a hotel?” my mother’s voice filtered in from down the hall.

  “I couldn’t very well ask them that, Rioko,” my dad said. “Maybe they can’t afford the rates. The point is, they’re our friends, and they need a place to stay. Why are you so resistant?”

  “I just don’t think it’s prudent, John.”

  I started giggling. I don’t know why. I guess because “prudent” reminded me of “prunes.” Anyway, I nearly choked on my Yodel.

  “Prudent?” my dad repeated. “You’re worried about what the people in town will think of us?”

  “No, I meant on their part, John. I wonder if it’s wise of them to come back to Stoneybrook. People still remember what happened at the lighthouse.”

  “Oh, come now. You and I know Alex didn’t do anything wrong.”

  I stopped coughing.

  What were they talking about?

  The lighthouse? The old, graffiti-covered Stoneybrook lighthouse?

  How weird. If Stoneybrook had a Most Ignored Building award, it would definitely go to that lighthouse. I guess boats used it in ancient times, but it had been boarded up for as long as I could remember. Kids say it’s haunted, which I don’t believe, of course. But the place definitely looks creepy, standing at the edge of an old jetty in the Sound, surrounded by a razor-wire fence.

  Knowing my dad, whatever “happened” at the lighthouse probably had something to do with real estate or the stock market.

  “Alex took the whole thing badly,” Dad was saying. “His life has never been the same. Ever since the incident, his business ventures have all soured.”

  Hmmm. Alex must have been some crooked businessman. Some stock embezzler.

  But why would my dad, the most conservative, law-abiding man in history, be friends with someone like that?

  And why would he invite him to stay with us?

  “If we say yes, where will we put them?” Mom was asking. “The kids aren’t babies anymore. Little Stevie must be a teenager by now. Not to mention Caryn and Laura …”

  Hold everything.

  What a blast from the past. I knew who they were talking about. Caryn and Laura Hatt were these two little girls who used to live in Stoneybrook. They moved away when I was four or so, so I couldn’t remember them too well. They had an older brother named Stevie. His two front teeth were
missing and he used to call himself “Thtevie.”

  I also remember their dad, Mr. Hatt. He was cool. He used to tell us his first name was Cat-in-the. Was he Alex? (Rats, I had really believed him.)

  “It’ll just be for a little while,” Dad said. “We should make them feel welcome in the community. When I think of the way they were driven out of town —”

  “They weren’t driven out,” Mom replied. “They moved of their own free will.”

  I was standing against my half-open door, my ear pressed to the crack. Dying to hear more.

  Just then the door swung open, smacking me against the wall.

  “Yeow!” I cried out.

  Janine barged into my room. “Have you seen my headband?”

  “Have you heard of knocking?”

  “The door was open.”

  “Janine, do you remember the Hatt family?” I blurted out.

  Janine was now snooping around the room. “Sure. Mr. Hatt was Dad’s friend.”

  “Really? Did he have anything to do with that old lighthouse?’

  “He owned it,” Janine replied.

  “Yuck,” I said. “Who’d want to own that disgusting place?”

  “He owned a big chunk of waterfront property, I think. Dad helped him with some investments. Now, I know I wore it in here yesterday …”

  “Listen, Janine, I heard Mom and Dad —”

  “Did I take it off when I was using your phone?” Janine began rummaging through some art supplies, which lay in a heap on the floor.

  “Janine, leave those alone! Your headband isn’t here!”

  “Well, if you’d keep your room neater —”

  “If you wouldn’t be so absentminded! Besides, what’s the difference? You don’t need a headband to listen to astroturfics.”

  “Physics. And I’m finished with that. I believe I’ve calculated the arrival time of the Veehoff Comet, which, in case you haven’t heard, will be in eleven days.”

  “Congrats.” Haven’t heard? Everyone in Stoneybrook was talking about the comet. I was already tired of it.

  “We still haven’t figured out if it’ll hit,” Janine continued. “Anyway, Jerry’s coming over later and we’re going to the movies.”

  That’s another thing. Do you know what’s worse than having a genius sister who makes you feel dumb and whom your parents love more than you?

  Having a genius sister who makes you feel dumb and whom your parents love more than you, who has a boyfriend!

  Grrrrr.

  Not to be conceited or anything, but I’m talented, interesting, funny, and pretty. But do I have a boyfriend? Nooooo.

  “Janine, I wish I could help you, but I was in the middle of cleaning up my room for the BSC meeting, and —”

  “Can you lend me one?” Janine interrupted. “A headband, I mean. Nothing too, you know …”

  “Funky?” I picked up a wide red headband with pairs of dice printed on it. “This one’s pretty conservative.”

  Janine gave me a Look. “No solids?”

  My clock read 5:25. Yikes. My friends were going to be arriving in five minutes. “What time is he coming?”

  “Ten after eight, and Jerry’s always on time.”

  “Ten after eight? You have three hours!”

  “Two hours and forty-five minutes. But I have to do a calculus proof and begin building my three-dimensional enantiomer models for organic chemistry —”

  “But it’s Friday, Janine!”

  “The best time to get a head start.” Janine was pacing back and forth now, biting her fingernails. “Boys make everything so complicated.”

  “Uh-huh, I know what you mean.” My clock clicked to 5:26. I began straightening up all the supplies Janine had knocked over.

  “No, you don’t. Sometimes I wish I’d never gotten involved with him.”

  So break up, I didn’t say. “Yup. Uh, Janine? The BSC meeting’s about to start. So would you —”

  “Maybe a hat would work,” Janine mused.

  “Janiiiine! Go!”

  “Okay, okay.”

  As she walked out, I could hear my parents, still arguing about the Hatts.

  But I couldn’t pay attention anymore. I was picking up wrappers and bottle caps and empty paint tubes.

  My room was a sty. I had four minutes to make it gorgeous. Four minutes before the Friday meeting of the Baby-sitters Club.

  “Is it true,” asked Stacey McGill, “that if the Veehoff Comet comes too close to Earth, people start turning into werewolves?”

  “I heard it was vampires,” Mallory Pike said.

  “That’s how it got its name.” Abby Stevenson rose from the carpet, baring her teeth and talking in a Dracula accent. “Veehoff comet, vee hoff fool moon, and zo tonight vee hoff to sock your blod! Nyahh hahaha!”

  Jessi Ramsey pretended to cower in fright. “Eeek!”

  “That reminds me.” I hopped off my bed and reached under it to pull out a box of chocolates. “Cherry creams!”

  “Gross, Claudia,” said Kristy Thomas. She pulled off the lid and grabbed three chocolates.

  Abby took two. “The selection around here is going downhill.”

  “Yecchhh,” Jessi said. “Could you pass them this way?”

  Mallory reached for them, too. “Do you have caramels?”

  “I’ll check,” I muttered.

  Some gratitude.

  As I rummaged through my closet, Mary Anne Spier said, “Last night, when I sat for Marilyn and Carolyn Arnold, they kept running over to the window to look for the comet.”

  “It’s not supposed to come until the week after next,” Kristy said.

  Mary Anne laughed. “I tried to tell them, but they kept saying, ‘How do you know?’ ”

  “Comet feeeeever,” Jessi sang. “Becca talks about it all the time, too.”

  “So do my brothers and sisters,” Mallory said.

  Stacey shrugged. “Hey, I don’t blame them. How often does a comet like this come around?”

  “Every seventy-one and a half years,” Mary Anne replied. “We’ll be in rockers for the next sighting.”

  “Janine’s astrofistics class is trying to predict whether it’ll hit the earth and wipe us all out,” I said, pulling a candy box from among my hats. “Caramels?”

  Mallory looked dismayed. “Don’t scare me, Claudia.”

  “I thought you wanted caramels,” I said.

  “I meant the comet,” Mallory replied.

  “Astrofistics?” Abby murmured.

  “Are we really in danger?” Jessi asked.

  “Nahhhh,” I said. “I just used some Comet in the bathroom. That stuff’ll probably burn up in the atmosphere.”

  “Claudiaaaa,” Stacey groaned.

  “I have it!” Kristy piped up. “I have a great idea! On the night the Veehoff Comet appears, we can have a comet party for all our charges.”

  “Yyyyyes!” Abby exclaimed.

  “Will we need a telescope?” Mary Anne asked.

  “Janine has one,” I volunteered.

  “Don’t even think about it!” Janine called from her room.

  “First things first,” Kristy said. “All in favor?”

  “Ayyyyyye!”

  It was a good idea. Which wasn’t surprising, coming from Kristy. She’s full of them.

  Actually, if it weren’t for one of her ideas, the Baby-sitters Club wouldn’t exist.

  It’s kind of a cool story. I’ll start at the beginning.

  First, there was a Big Bang. Soon the earth and comets were formed. Then, one day, Kristy’s mom was having trouble finding a sitter. So Kristy invented the Baby-sitters Club.

  Okay, I left out a few details, but that’s close enough. Kristy figured Stoneybrook would benefit from having a group of baby-sitters who met regularly at one central place. Then parents could reach several eager, reliable sitters with one convenient phone call.

  The BSC started with only Kristy, Mary Anne, Stacey, and me, but we quickly grew to seven (ten
, if you include our two associates and one honorary member).

  Kristy set up the club like a business. Talk about organized. We pay dues, we write about each and every job in a notebook (which we all read regularly), and we have officers with special duties.

  Our meetings are on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, from five-thirty to six. During those times, our clients call to request sitters.

  What happens if they call during other times? They reach me, usually when I’m having a cow over my homework.

  You see, my bedroom is the one-and-only official BSC headquarters, mainly because I’m the only member with her own private phone line.

  Which makes me the club’s host, head custodian, junk food caterer, and off-hours switchboard operator. All these duties are combined under one title: vice-president.

  Kristy, naturally, is president. She runs the meetings, plans our events, dreams up advertising schemes, and makes us all feel horrible and guilty if we’re late for anything.

  As you can imagine, she’s loud, smart, and full of energy. She’s also short (barely five feet), athletic, and very casual. Super casual. Kristy is to fashion the way I am to astrophysics. Won’t go near it. We practically have to force her into a dress for school dances.

  Kristy’s mind is very kid-centered. She always knows exactly what kids want. Take the comet party. No one but Kristy could have thought of that. Not long ago, when she realized that many of our younger charges wanted to play softball, Kristy organized a team for them. It’s called Kristy’s Krushers, and they play all the time during nice weather. Kristy even designed perfect antiboredom devices for us to take to jobs on rainy days. They’re called Kid-Kits — boxes filled with old toys, games, and odds and ends. They don’t sound like much, but kids adore them.

  Kristy used to live across the street from me, with her parents and three brothers (Charlie’s now seventeen, Sam’s fifteen, and David Michael’s seven). But just after David Michael was born, Kristy’s life really changed. Her dad abandoned the family — walked out and never came back. Mrs. Thomas had to scramble to make a living and support four kids.

  Things aren’t quite so chaotic anymore. Mrs. Thomas remarried, to a divorced guy named Watson Brewer, who just happens to be a gazillionaire. Just like that — zoom! — Kristy was living in a mansion in Stoneybrook’s chichi neighborhood.