Nine o'clock Friday couldn't come fast enough, especially when Aunt Gertrude confined Joe to his room except for chores. He wasn't even allowed to go outside to shovel snow. Schoolwork went quick, even the English assignments — no teacher was assigning much homework the weekend before Christmas, after all — and even scribbling notes back and forth with Kris through the windows wasn't much fun.

Frank came home, but Joe barely listened to Frank's explanation of his homework. All through dinner, Aunt Gertrude kept reminding Joe to slow down and chew, until Frank finally shoved the back of Joe's head, sending him nose-first into the spaghetti to the sound of Aunt Gertrude's "Frank!"

"Take it easy," Frank said, as Joe spluttered and wiped sauce off his face; Dad was hiding a grin. "We're not going anywhere until nine, and we have to wait for Charlie and Tag and Sharon, too."

But at eight-thirty, Charlie surprised them — he came over, with Kris and Sharon in tow.

"Look!" The moment she cleared the front door, Kris wiggled out of her backpack and pulled out a black Pentax case. "Shimá's letting us use her good camera. I mean…um…Charlie's using it, but we can shoot the ghost!"

"Lucky," Joe muttered. "All I've got is that Instamatic."

"Well, for thieves, you just need to catch their face," Charlie said. "That's good for that. These two have to worry about getting a good, clear shot that people can't say was faked."

"We can swap cameras midway through, Joe," Kris offered. "We've got tons of film."

"Fast film," Sharon added. "Mr. Hopper said it's the stuff they use for sports pictures."

At that, Joe cheered up, though he noticed that Dad was hiding another smile. But Frank had spotted something else in Kris's backpack.

"What's all that, Tag?" Frank pulled the pack over. "Salt? Nails?"

Kris reddened. "Um. For the brown man. I mean…um…stuff that's supposed to be good against fairies, if they're mean."

"Iron nails and a horseshoe from the Mortons," Sharon said. "And salt, and holy water from St. Leonard's, and real mistletoe."

"Candy canes, too," Kris said seriously. "And Hershey bars. That other stuff's just in case."

"Hershey bars?" Joe said incredulously. "You're saying elves like chocolate?"

"Click did," Kris said, then reddened again. "Um…but you don't remember that. They think it's royal food. Little brownies like that almost never get the good stuff."

Joe rolled his eyes. Kris claimed that the kidnapping last year had been because of fairies living on Morton's farm. Joe couldn't remember anything about it, but from the way Dad talked, Joe, Frank, and Kris had all been drugged. Frank said the drugs had likely messed with Kris's memory, and times like this, Joe totally believed that.

"I think," Charlie broke in, "that we'd better head over there so we can get the layout before we settle in. But first, I have something very serious to explain." He pulled out his gun from the holster.

Joe stared. He hadn't even noticed it until Charlie had it in front of them.

Charlie wasn't smiling now. "Now I know your dad was NYPD, so maybe you've had this talk already. But I'm making sure. This is not a toy. It is a weapon. It is for killing people. I've only got it in case of a life-or-death emergency." Charlie glanced at Kris. "All of you know what I mean. And I want to make this very, very clear. I'm the only person to touch it. Anyone breaking that rule will be immediately sent home and you'll be lucky if you see the light of day before New Year's. Is that clear?"

Behind Charlie, Dad was nodding; Sharon had gone wide-eyed again. "Yes, sir," Joe said, a beat behind Frank and Kris.

Charlie nodded. "I don't want to scare you, but I am trying to scare you. And right along with that, if any of you notice anything that you think might be that cockroach, don't wait to be sure. You yell for me, keep yelling, and get to the phone and call the cops if you can do so safely. If not, you run. Get out of the store and run to the nearest police car —"

"The police station's right across Town Center from the store," Frank said.

"Then run there," Charlie said, "or hide if you can't."

"Goodness." Aunt Gertrude looked from Dad to Charlie and back. "If you think there's that much danger, Fenton, then they shouldn't go at all!"

Dad shook his head. "No, Gert. Not at the bookstore, anyway. He's just being cautious."

"Like my old sergeant says, Most Glorious Pot Roast Woman, what's planned for never happens," Charlie said. "I'd much rather have a lot of false alarms than you kids hurt because you think you'll look stupid if you yell over nothing. Understood?"

Everyone nodded.

Now Charlie grinned. "Okay, then. Let's load up. I can't wait to see this place."

Fifteen minutes later, they were pulling into the small parking lot that Bell Book and Candle shared with Hopper's Drugstore. Frank and Joe had decided it would look weird if they all went in as a group, so Kris and Charlie headed in first, Kris with her backpack, Sharon a moment later, and then Frank and Joe last. As usual, before they'd even reached the checkout counter to say hi to Mrs. Bell, Frank had accumulated another stack of books — three of which Joe had already gotten him for Christmas.

Smiling, Mrs. Bell shook her head as she spotted them. "Put your pack in the storeroom," she said quietly, as she took the books from Frank and placed them with the others. "Martha and the others know you'll be here. Ted's giving Charlie a tour."

Ted was one of the seasonal clerks, though "seasonal" in Mrs. Bell's case usually meant "whenever I need an extra hand at all odd times". Joe grinned back at her, then let Frank lead him back.

"I want to get a look at the kid's section," Frank said.

"Oh, come on," Joe said. "You don't believe Tina about the brown man, do you?"

Frank shook his head. "Not like Tag does. But it's kinda weird that Tina's talking about an elf giving her stuff when stuff's been disappearing. And this is a really old house, Joe. One of the first in Bayport."

Trust Frank to know that. "So?"

"Well…maybe there's secret rooms," Frank said. "Or tunnels! The Underground Railroad went through Boston. And Bayport dates back to the Revolutionary War, so who knows what's in some of these old houses?"

"Mice," Joe said matter-of-factly. "Cockroaches. And lots of books."

"Ghosts," said Kris, behind him, and Joe turned, grinning, as Frank dropped their back pack into the store room.

"Don't forget elves," Joe said, then mock-cowered at Kris's glare. "Okay, okay, brownies. Though why a bunch of Girl Scouts would want to hang out here…"

"We're here," Kris said.

"My point."

"Come on," Frank said. "I want to double-check the whole place so we can get settled before they close."

"Me and Sharon'll be on second floor," Kris said. "Back where they have all the boring books. That's where Mrs. Bell says a lot of folks see stuff."

Frank frowned. "That's not good. I mean, if you get in trouble, we might not hear you all the way back there. These old houses are pretty solid."

"We heard the door bells up there," Kris said.

"And she can scream really loud." Joe grinned into Kris's glare.

Now Frank grinned, too. "Gotcha. C'mon. Kid's section first."

Kris followed them downstairs to the refurbished basement. No self-respecting sixth-grader wanted to be caught in the kid's section, but Joe loved it anyway: warm and colorful without being baby-ish, thick soft green carpet that your feet sunk into, and many built-in nooks and cubbyholes that looked like rabbit burrows and tree-holes, stuffed with pillows where you could curl up and read. But he was here to solve a mystery. Frank took the left, Joe took the right, both of them circling the outer edge of the section and checking the walls, shelves, and cubby-holes.

As he passed the pre-school shelves, Joe spotted Kris. Her head cocked, she was staring at the ceiling, then her gaze moved across the ceiling, the shelves, the floor, and towards one of the tree-hole nooks.

"What are you doing?" Joe said.

She startled. "Um. Nothing. Just checking."

Probably trying to see the elf. Joe shook his head and continued on. He'd seen in movies and TV how people always searched for hidden rooms, but knocking on the shelves didn't sound any different from regular wood, and it earned him weird looks from the kids and parents who were down here. As far as Joe could tell, there weren't any big mysterious books he could tug on to open up the wall, either. He grabbed the edges of some of the shelving at random, but it all seemed solid enough; nothing suddenly swung out or creaked or wiggled as if held in place by a latch-hook at the back.

"If there is a secret room here, I'm not seeing it," Frank said finally, as he met Joe back at the sunken center area filled with bean bags.

"That's why it's a secret," Joe said, and ducked Frank's mock-punch.

"You could ask Mrs. Bell," Kris said; she'd settled into a pile of three beanbags. "She'd have the plans and stuff from when she rebuilt all this, right?"

Joe and Frank looked at each other.

"Um…it's not detective-ish enough?" Kris said.

"I was just about to do that," Frank said airily. "You're thinking like a real detective, Tag." He started up the stairs, Joe at his heels, then rounded on Joe when they were out of Kris's earshot. "Not. One. Word."

Joe gave Frank his best too-innocent look.

"Head upstairs," Frank said. "See if there's anything in the crawlspace. That's usually where anything hidden gets built in, basement or attic. I'll get the plans from Mrs. Bell."

"Sure," Joe said, grinning. "Anything you say." He waited until Frank was at the counter, then headed back down to the kids section. Kris had been looking for something, and Joe didn't think there'd be an elf in the ceiling.

Kris still sat in the beanbags, talking with two little red-head kids and holding open a gold-leafed fairy tale book; the kids looked familiar, but Joe couldn't place them. One of the kids was shaking his head as Kris pointed at something in the book, and as Joe got closer, he heard, "Uh-uh, not like that."

"He's lots bigger," said the other red-head. "He wears stuff like Daddy does for parades."

Kris looked up, saw Joe, then gave the red-heads a couple candy-canes. "Here," she said, looking around as if to make sure the adults weren't listening, and the kids both giggled. "Give these to him if you see him, okay?" Then she handed the first red-head the book, and the kids giggled again and settled into the bean bags as Kris got to her feet.

"The brown man?" Joe wasn't sure if he was joking or not.

Kris nodded, then dragged Joe out of earshot. "If Tina's making it up, then she's not alone," she said in a low voice. "That's the Robinson twins — Perry's kid sisters."

"Oh." Joe and Frank had helped Perry that summer with the whole Applegate treasure thing, but Joe hadn't paid much attention to the girls. But then Joe stopped. "You mean they've seen a little brown man, too?"

"They saw something." Kris made a face at Joe's eye-roll. "Oh, come on, big brother, I'm not that bad. But that's the weird thing — they said he's not little. I showed 'em pictures of brownies, and they said he's nothing like that."

If other kids were seeing something…how hard would it be to fake something like that? "What were you looking at in the ceiling?"

"Wiring," Kris said.

Ooookay. That was odd. Joe just looked at her.

"Lack of it, I mean. Bad wiring. Um…like all the old stuff your dad found when he re-did the garage. I mean, it doesn't look exposed or like it's been chewed on." Kris looked back up at the ceiling. "I'll have Charlie look at it. He said he studied that stuff in college."

What this had to do with anything — ghost, fairies, or thief — Joe had no idea. Probably best not to ask. "C'mon, Frank wants us to check the crawlspace."

Frank hadn't really included Kris in that, but given what had been going on, Joe wasn't about to leave Kris alone.

But Kris didn't seem to mind and followed Joe upstairs. As they threaded their way through the second floor maze of interconnecting rooms and hallways and converted closets and step-stairs and nooks and open cupboards, Kris suddenly stopped. "Joe!"

Joe looked back at that stage-whisper; they'd just passed the Romance section. Huddled at the back corner in a narrow gap between shelves, heads hunched together over a cheap paperback with a dewy-eyed nurse on the cover — Angie and Iola.

Iola happened to look up and saw Joe. Blushing, she elbowed Angie, nodded towards Joe, and started giggling. Angie smirked, then pulled Iola further back and around the shelves.

Great. Well, they wouldn't be here long. Hopefully Iola wouldn't try to weasel in on his and Frank's mystery, like she had with Applegate's treasure. "Ignore them. We're here for important stuff."

But Kris kept staring towards them, until Joe tugged on her arm and pulled her towards the back stairs to third floor: a narrow, steep staircase that creaked and groaned with every step, the walls over the handrails covered with Casablanca posters. The third floor was really the old attic of the original house, converted into something comfortable with more book sections.

"But what are they doing here?" Kris whispered.

"Christmas shopping, just like everyone else," Joe pointed out as they climbed the creaky stairs. No self-respecting thief would dare use these stairs; they made too much noise unless you knew the pattern. Still, if the thief was getting in after-hours, they wouldn't care how much noise they made. "C'mon, Tag, forget 'em." Joe led the way through the maze of shelves and nooks and hallways on third floor, trying to remember where he'd seen the attic access panel. "I wish we'd found Iola's prints on my locker. I mean, she's Chet's sister and everything, but she's still a brat. She's not as bad as Angie, though," Joe added. He had to be fair, after all.

"She's not," Kris said. Joe looked at her in surprise, and Kris reddened. "Um…she was doing a cake for the party on Saturday. Um, because…um…I mean, since it's my birthday and because of what happened last year."

Not that Joe would be there, anyway, now that he was grounded. Then something else occurred to him. "You know who my Secret Santa is."

Kris just looked at him…then stuck her tongue out. "Not telling."

"It's a her. You wrote that in the window notes. And you knew my Santa didn't see anything, but you didn't talk to anyone before you punched Angie…" No, wait, that wasn't right, they'd been in the lab taking care of the Christmas Rose — Sharon had Kris, Joe knew that, and the only other her there… "Iola!"

It all fit, the way Chet had acted, all that. Not that Joe was really surprised, the way he'd heard Iola begging folks for his name. But still, Kris could've warned him.

"It's up there." Kris pointed towards a nook tucked away behind the cramped bookshelves of the International Travel section.

Joe glanced up at the access panel and the white-painted wall-ladder (chained with a yellow sign stating "EMPLOYEES ONLY") going up to it. "Tag…"

"I want to check the attic, too." Kris headed for the ladder. "Charlie told us about things that make people think there's ghosts — like bad wiring and drafts and loose window frames and all that and Sharon's checking the windows but I wanna see if anything's up there."

"Tag…"

She was already halfway up. "You coming or not?"

Girls! "You're being a snot, you know that?" Joe hauled himself up after her. "A evil little icky snot."

"You haven't checked the crawlspace yet?" Frank had just come around the corner of the Travel section.

Joe sighed.

Frank waited for Joe and Kris to get most of the way up the ladder, then followed. "I saw Angie here. I really hope you two aren't planning anything."

Older Brother was conveniently forgetting to mention Iola. Not that Joe was fooled. "You're both snots," Joe said. "Both of you. Big and little."

"Ignore him," Kris said, looking back down at Frank as she pushed the access hatch open and scrambled up. "He's being silly."

"Get moving, Joe," Frank said, "before any of the customers see us."

Not likely, not back in this little cubbyhole. Joe scrambled up after Kris into the cob-webby crawlspace crammed with musty boxes and unused decorations for the rest of the year. His nose itched from the dust; he shivered. It was cold up here; thick pink insulation had been laid all over the floor, with wood planks laid across that for storage and access, but wind still whistled through the gable vents. The small bit of light through those vents wasn't enough to see anything but shadows, but Joe heard Kris fumbling, then the tiny click of a pull cord, and then there was light from a bare bulb swinging overhead.

"No one would be up here." Joe gave his brother a hand up, then sneezed. "Look at all this. They'd've left footprints and tracked dust everywhere."

"Someone has," Kris said, over by a stack of boxes near the far vent, and pointed at the floor.

Dust tracks. They didn't look suspicious, though; Joe had to admit that. They looked as if boxes had been dragged across the boards, and several smudged prints tracked all through the space, mostly to the ladder and back to the various stacks. No secret passages, no tunnels, no hidden rooms, nothing suspicious. There weren't any walls blocking sections off or weird bookshelves or mysterious cupboards.

"Mrs. Bell didn't have the floor plans," Frank said. "I should've thought of it before — the library has all that stuff on all the old houses here. She did say the renovators took a lot of pictures before they started changing everything. For the Historical Society."

"We've been kind of busy," Joe reminded him, as he pulled the access hatch back open so they could go back down. "Tag?"

"Yeah." Kris sounded disappointed. "There's a lot of draft through those vents, but I don't know if that's causing it. For the ghost, I mean. Um…to make spooky sounds."

Frank looked interested. "There wouldn't have to be much. Our place creaks a lot when it's windy. Dad says it's just the way old houses are."

"Maybe." Kris didn't sound convinced.

"Tag, are you actually trying to prove a ghost doesn't exist?" Joe said, grinning.

"Don't tell Sharon," Kris said.

"Who's up there?" someone called up the ladder, then Martha poked her head up through the hatch. "Oh, you three. Come on down. We're getting ready to lock up. Charlie's in Occult with Sharon, waiting on you guys."

They threaded their way back through the third floor and down to second, then through the rest of the cramped, narrow halls, divided rooms, and cubbies crammed with bookshelves. Every so often, Joe grabbed a random shelf and pulled at it, trying to wiggle it to see if anything was hidden there, but nothing did. The shelves were all solid, thick, varnished wood.

It just wasn't right. Old ancient house, tons of bookshelves, all these narrow passageways, spooky attic, basement — there had to be some secret room or hidden passage somewhere. Everyone knew that about old houses!

"There you are," Charlie said, over the sound of the vacuum cleaner running from first floor. "Just waiting on your surveillance orders, Frank."

Frank blinked, then straightened. Joe sighed; Charlie sounded completely serious, but it would've been nice to have a little bit of recognition as second-in-command.

"We're back where the ghost is," Kris said to Charlie. "That way."

Charlie nodded. "You and Sharon go on back. I'll join you in bit."

"I don't know if it's a good idea, Tag being all the way back there," Frank said, when Kris and Sharon were out of earshot. "She said she could hear us from first floor, but…"

"I hear you," Charlie said. "But look at it this way. How would a thief be getting in here?"

"Doors or windows," Joe said. "Or through a storm cellar — someone broke into Tony's house that way."

"Oh," Frank said. "And all the doors are first floor. A thief wouldn't use the front door, because it's in plain sight of the cops. So that'd leave the back. So if we're down here, we'd see 'em."

"Or if we're right by the banister over the cash register," Joe said. "That'd be better, 'cause then we can look at almost the whole first floor from up here and we'd see him before he'd see us."

"Exactly," Charlie said. "And I did check the windows back there. All latched on the inside, and the lower sashes don't open enough for that cockroach to get through. He didn't strike me as the sneaky climbing type, though."

Frank looked thoughtful. "Thinking about it…after what you said, Charlie, back at our house, I mean…it might be best if Joe and I stayed up here by the bannister, and you're down on first floor."

"That cuts you off from the exits," Charlie said.

Frank shook his head. "Me and Joe know this place really well. And Tag does, too. It's really confusing, if you're not used to it."

"Chet gets lost in here all the time," Joe said.

"If the thief or that…um…cockroach come after us," Frank went on, "we can scatter and hide up here and double back and get out once he's confused."

"Or go out the windows," Joe said. "I could squeeze through, I bet."

Charlie was nodding again. "Good plan. Now I did promise the girls that I'd help them, too, and honestly…" His mouth quirked, "…I really am interested in ghosts."

"The stories I've heard," Joe offered, "he's all over the store, not just back there."

"And I don't want to be stuck in one place all night," Frank said. "I want to go over the place better, now that everyone's gone and we don't have to worry about bothering customers. Especially the basement. Something about the layout down there just seemed off."

"Take candy canes with you," Joe said, and ducked Frank's mock-swing.

"What I meant," Frank said, annoyed, "is that Mrs. Bell said nothing's been forced open, so she didn't think it was someone getting in after hours."

"You think there's a secret room or something?" Charlie said, eyebrow raised.

"No," Frank said slowly. "I mean…I don't know. But…what I just said, about me and Joe hiding in here. Someone could be doing that. I didn't think to check how well the staff looks for people before closing."

"But they'd know the place better than we would," Joe said.

"Maybe," Frank said. But he didn't sound sure.

Now Charlie broke into a grin. "Now that's what I call thinking, kiddo." He gripped Frank's and Joe's shoulders. "You two ever think of going into the Air Force, let me know, all right? We need all the brains we can get."