Free The Ghost of Gruesome High by Larry Parr Page B

bothered me so much! But for a moment I didn’t think I’d get a chance to ask my next question. At the mention of Mr. Bell’s name, Mayor Thompson’s face changed. He looked scared! Then he put on a steely face and his voice lost all last vestiges of politically-correct good-humor.
    “I don’t think that name rings any bells,” he said, and then smiled at his own lame joke. “Now if you children will excuse me,” he said, standing up, “I’m afraid that’s all the time I have right now.”
    My friends all stood up, preparing to leave. But I stayed right where I was. I looked Mayor Thompson right in the eye and said: “Mr. Bell was a known alcoholic. No one in town would give him a job. But you gave him a job. You hired a known alcoholic as a security guard. That’s a very important job to give to someone with a drinking problem, don’t you agree? I was wondering why you did that.”
    The Mayor didn’t bother to answer my question directly. He stomped to the door of his office and opened it. “Robert!” he yelled. “Please see these children out. And have my car brought around!” He gave the orders in a very firm voice, what I would call an angry voice. He then walked out of the office without looking back or saying another word to us.  
    The Mayor’s assistant walked into the room. “I think it’s time for you kids to be getting home,” he said. He didn’t say it unkindly. But it was obvious he wasn’t giving us any other options.
    My friends didn’t say a word until we were in the elevator and the doors had closed. The moment the car started to move, everyone started talking at once. I couldn’t understand what they were saying, but phrases like “Are you nuts?” and “What the hell were you doing?” and “How could you be so rude?” were repeated more than once. I let them vent. By the time the elevator had reached the ground floor and we had walked out of the lobby and were back outside, they had finally exhausted themselves.
    It was then that I spoke. “Don’t you guys get it yet?” I asked very calmly and matter-of-factly. “Mayor Thompson is a crook. And maybe worse!”

 
    Chapter 15
     
    Questions and more questions
    My friends all thought I was crazy, and the more I tried to explain my theories, the crazier they thought I was—and the crazier I knew I was sounding.
    I was still just making up too many details. They all sounded believable to me— at least when I said them in my head—but when I said them out loud they sounded fishy even to me.
    Somehow I knew Mayor Thompson was mixed up in this ghost thing. Maybe he even was the ghost. I was just sure that everything was somehow connected to the robbery of Thompson’s Coin & Jewelry—but given that as a starting point, I had no trouble coming up with half a dozen different theories that fit all the pieces together. And none of them rang quite true, even to me.
    The problem was, I decided, I just didn’t have enough pieces of the puzzle yet. I needed more solid information.  
    Like I said, all my friends thought I was crazy, and Jason seemed mad at me for some reason—I’ll never understand boys, even if I live to be thirty—so I decided to spend my lunch hour on Friday in the school library, doing a little ghost research.
    Libraries weren’t exactly as unfamiliar to me as the dark side of the moon, or anything like that, but I have to admit I hadn’t really spent all that much time in our school library. When I walked in the librarian—I think her name is Mrs. Winslow—looked at me over the tops of her big, thick bifocal glasses. I got the impression she wasn’t very happy to see me. But then I quickly got the impression she wasn’t really glad to see any kids in the library.  
    Nevertheless I did my best to put a friendly smile on my face and walked up to her big built-in dark wooden desk. “Excuse me,” I said in my best library voice, “but do you have any books or magazine or newspaper articles on the