Kaz reached for the leaf again. But this time he had such a light hold that it fell to the floor before he could even try to transform it.
Grandma Karen groaned.
“Keep trying, Kaz,” Claire said.
Kaz sighed as he picked up the leaf again and held it gently, gently, gently. So gently that it sort of hovered there in the air between his thumb and his second finger. Then he quickly flicked his hand away as he let the leaf go.
Kaz stared in amazement as the leaf turned ghostly!
“You did it!” Claire clapped her hands together. Her mom and Grandma Karen smiled.
“Yay! Kaz!” Little John exclaimed.
Even Beckett looked impressed.
“Now tell him to put it back.” Claire’s mom leaned forward on the bench. “Then ask him to see if he can bring my doll back, too.” She was growing more and more excited.
“He can hear you, Mom,” Claire said. “He’s right here.”
“I don’t know if I can transform it back,” Kaz said as he grabbed the ghostly leaf. “I don’t know how that works.”
“Did Molly tell you how she made things solid again?” Claire asked her mom.
Kaz turned the leaf all around. He tried squeezing it between his thumb and first finger. Wait! Second finger, not first, he said to himself as he switched his hold. And just like that, the leaf turned solid again!
“Looks like he figured it out,” Claire’s mom said.
Kaz turned the leaf ghostly again. Then solid. Then ghostly. Then solid. “I think I’ve got it!” He giggled.
Little John brought the ghost doll over to Kaz. “Go ahead and transform Windy,” he said glumly. “She belongs to Claire’s mom. Not me.”
“Thanks, Little John,” Claire said. “I’ve probably got another doll around somewhere that you can have.”
“Okay,” Little John said.
Kaz squeezed his two thumbs and two second fingers around the doll’s middle.
The doll turned solid, then fell to the floor.
Claire’s mom lunged for it. “Oh, thank you,” she said, looking somewhere between Kaz and Little John. “Thank you! Thank you!”
While Claire and her mom and grandma exclaimed over the doll, Kaz said, “I know what I should transform now.”
Little John perked up. “The envelope in the secret room!”
The ghosts raced to the craft room and sailed through the bookshelf at the back of the room.
Kaz swam over to the envelope and picked it up. He held it with the very tip of his thumb and second finger, then quickly flicked his hand away.
The envelope turned ghostly!
“Aha! Now we can open it and see what’s inside,” Little John cried as he reached for the envelope.
“No.” Kaz snatched it away. “Now we can take it through the wall.” Holding tight to the envelope, Kaz turned and swam through the wall.
Little John groaned.
“Back already?” Claire said as the three ghosts returned to the craft room. Her eyes widened at the envelope in Kaz’s hand. “Is the recipe inside?”
“I don’t know,” Kaz said. “I think you should be the one to open it.” He squeezed the envelope with the tip of his thumb and second finger, and the envelope turned solid and dropped to the floor.
Claire’s mom and Grandma Karen gathered around as Claire picked up the envelope.
“Wow, you even transformed the dust,” Claire said, brushing the dust away with her hand. She slipped her finger under the flap, tore the envelope open, and pulled out two very thin, faded papers that crinkled in her hands.
The top paper was a letter. “It’s kind of hard to read,” Claire said, squinting at it.
Kaz tried to read over her shoulder, but he couldn’t make out the words at all. He’d never seen such strange writing before.
Claire managed to muddle through it. Slowly. “‘August 14, 1928,’” she read. “‘To Whom It May Concern: This is it. This is the recipe for my famous Walters Brew. Since’”—she paused to make out the next word—“‘Emma’? Wait, no! Edna. ‘Since Edna and I have no children, I don’t know who to leave the recipe to. We talked it over and decided to hide it away in this closet and board the closet up. We thought it would be fun to let a future generation discover it.’”
“The secret room was just a closet?” Kaz said. He’d expected something more interesting.
“Sure is a BIG closet,” Beckett said.
“So, what’s in the recipe?” Claire’s mom asked.
Claire turned to the second paper. “Allspice, birch bark, coriander, juniper, ginger, wintergreen, hops, sassafras root.” She wrinkled her nose. “It’s all weird stuff.”
“Like any other soda-pop recipe,” Grandma Karen said.
The next day, Claire and her mom took the recipe to the historical society. Kaz and Little John traveled inside Claire’s water bottle.
“This is it?” Mrs. Roman said eagerly when Claire pulled the papers out of the envelope. “This is the long-lost recipe?” She seemed afraid to even touch the paper.
“We think so. What do you think?” Claire’s mom asked.
“We’ll have our experts look it over, but it looks real to me,” Mrs. Roman said. “Wherever did you find it after all these years?”
Claire bit her lip.
“We found it hidden behind a wall,” Claire’s mother said. Which was the truth, but not the whole truth.
“Oh, you must be doing some work in the library,” Mrs. Roman said with a smile.
“A little,” Claire’s mom said.
“I still don’t get why Claire and her mom don’t want to tell that lady about us,” Little John grumbled. “They never would’ve found that recipe if not for us.”
“I already explained this to you,” Kaz said. “A lot of solids don’t believe in ghosts.”
“That doesn’t mean we don’t exist,” Little John said. “I could glow right now and show her we exist—”
“NO!” Kaz and Claire said at the same time.
“No what, dear?” Mrs. Roman asked Claire.
“Uh . . . ,” Claire said. “No, we’re not doing ‘a little work’ at the library. We’re actually doing a lot of work. We’re just doing it where people can’t see.”
Her mom nodded in agreement.
“Nice save,” Kaz told Claire. He turned to his brother. “It’s better if the solids don’t know too much about us.”
“Okay,” Little John said with disappointment.
On the way back to the library, Claire asked her mom, “Can I help you and Dad with ghost cases from now on? Kaz still wants to find the rest of his family. Who knows? If someone has a ghost in their house, it could be Kaz’s mom or dad or his big brother, Finn.”
“Yes, we’ll tell you about any ghost calls we get from now on,” Claire’s mom promised. “It’s the least I can do to thank your ghost friends for returning my doll. That doll was very special because my grandma made it. It’s the only thing I have that she made.”
“Speaking of grandparents,” Kaz said. “When can you take us to visit our grandparents, Claire? I want to show them my transformation skills.”
“We can do that right now,” Claire said.
“Do what right now?” Claire’s mom asked.
“Take Kaz and Little John to visit their grandparents,” Claire said. “They live at the nursing home with a bunch of other ghosts. Can you drop us off?”
“A bunch of other ghosts?” Claire’s mom’s eyebrows shot up. “Just how many ghosts do you know, Claire?”
Claire laughed. “Oh, Mom. You have no idea!”
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Aurore Damant, The Secret Room
The Secret Room Page 5
