Ann Martin - Stacey And The Mystery Of Stoneybrook

drew. Karen's just telling stories again. Listen, you guys. How about if I make a big bowl of popcorn and we play a game or two of Chutes and Ladders?"

"Popcorn! Yea!" said David Michael. "Can we play the Name Game while you make it?"

Kristy sighed. The Name Game gets tiresome fast, but the kids love it. "Okay. Who's first?"

"Me!"

"I am!"

"No, me!"

They all yelled at once. Kristy should have known better. She stalled for time, opening and closing cupboards and setting up the popper. "Okay, let's do Emily first. Then she can decide who's next. Ready? Here goes." And Kristy started to sing:

"Emily Emily bo bemily Bananafana fo femily Me mi mo memily Emily!"

Karen joined in, and so did David Michael. Andrew got some of the words right, but he got stuck on the "bananafana" part and just kept doing it over and over.

"Who's next, Emily?" Kristy asked. Emily pointed to Karen, who's a favorite of hers. They all sang, Karen loudest of all.

"Karen Karen bo baren Banana/ana fo faren Me mi mo maren Karen!"

The Name Game continued as Kristy made the popcorn. Running out of names didn't stop them: They just went around the kitchen, singing about everything they saw:

"Toaster toaster bo boaster Bananafana fo foaster Me mi mo moaster Toaster!"

Things got pretty silly for awhile. When the popcorn was done they trooped into the living room to play Chutes and Ladders. The game wasn't half over when Karen started up again.

"I heard Ben Brewer walking around last night. His footsteps went up and down, up and down. He was pacing. He was restless. Finally he stopped and sat down. I heard the bed creak. Then he took off his boots. The first

one dropped. Boom. Then the second."

And just as she said ,”second,” there was a huge clap of thunder. Everybody jumped, and Karen shrieked and leapt into Kristy's lap. She'd even scared herself that time. Her Ben Brewer stories are about the ghost who supposedly lives on the third floor. (Proof? Boo-Boo won't go above the second floor. Animals are sensitive to ghostly presences, according to Karen.) Karen's stories are mostly old hat by now. But the storm's timing had sure contributed to the drama of this one.

Thunder was really booming then, and the yard outside was lit up by lightning. It was pouring. Kristy had all four kids piled into her lap, and they just sat and hugged each other and watched the storm. Finally the thunder and lightning moved on, though the wind and rain didn't seem to let up much.

"Okay, time for bed, you guys," Kristy said. "David Michael, Andrew, and Karen, brush your teeth and get your pajamas on. I'll put Emily Michelle down and then come and read to all of you."

Kristy knew that the kids were a little spooked, but it had gotten late while .they waited for the storm to pass, so she figured they'd be sleepy.

No such luck. She read five chapters of Ozma of Oz (they were going through all the Oz books, since they'd just seen the movie), and everyone was still wide awake. Then she sang some lullabies with them. "All the Pretty Little Ponies" was Karen's favorite. The Ghostbusters song, "Who Ya Gonna Call" was David Michael's. Finally Kristy tucked them all in, sleepy or not, and told them it was bedtime. She went downstairs and sat on the couch to read.

"Kristee-e-e-e-e, I need a drink of wa-a-a-a-ter." That was David Michael. He was in a whiny mood. Kristy brought the water, and he made her stay while he drank it. She waited, then dosed the door to his room almost all the way and went back downstairs.

"Kristy?"

Karen was standing at the door of the living room. "I can hear Ben again," she said. "He's walking around."

"It's just the wind," said Kristy. "Go back to bed, Karen."

Then Emily called, and of course Andrew wanted a drink, too. Kristy thought they'd never go to sleep. But finally the house was quiet. Quiet, that is, except for the wind rattling the shutters outside.

Kristy found that she couldn't concentrate on her book. In fact, she couldn't stop thinking about the old house and the experiences Charlotte and I had there.

She wandered into the kitchen and ate the last handful of popcorn. She washed out the bowl. She opened the refrigerator door, looked inside, and closed it without having any idea of what she'd seen in there. Then she tiptoed upstairs to check on her brothers and sisters. Everybody was fast asleep. Kristy figured that that was a good thing, except that all of a sudden she felt kind of lonely. (I think she was at what my mom would call "loose ends.")

Finally, Kristy ended up downstairs in the library. (That's right. Watson's mansion is so big that there's a whole room just for his books.) The library at Watson's is a cozy place, with big red leather armchairs, lamps that look like they're made out of stained glass, and, of course, hundreds — maybe thousands — of books.

Kristy looked around and spotted a big carton in the corner. She remembered Watson telling her that he'd just bought some old books at an 'estate sale. She also remembered him saying that some of the books were about

the history of Stoneybrook. She was hoping that maybe she could find something out about that old house!

She pulled a couple of books out of the box and took a look at them. They were kind of dusty, and they smelled like they'd been in someone's basement for awhile. The covers were cracked and the edges of the pages were yellowed. She opened one of them. Right away she spotted the name Brewer. Wow! Watson's family really had lived in Stoneybrook for a long time.

She kept reading, just standing there by the cardboard box. There were other names she recognized, and places, too. Of course, there was no record of her old neighborhood: That whole area had just been woods and farmland at one time. But she found a chapter on the building of the library, and one on what the great blizzard of '88 had done to Stoneybrook. (That actually sounded kind of fun — people could walk out onto the snow from their second-story windows!)

Kristy took an armload of books over to one . of the armchairs. She switched on a lamp, made herself comfortable, and settled in to read. The storm still blew outside, making the doors shake. Rain splattered against the windows. But Kristy was lost in "Olde Stoneybrooke."

She couldn't find a thing about the old house, though. She skimmed through each of the books, looking for information on the turreted mansion. Then she went back and paged through each one again. There was absolutely nothing.

She was about to give up when a crumbly piece of paper fell out of the book she was holding. She unfolded it carefully, but even so, it ripped a little along the crease. It was very, very old. It was a map.

It looked hand-drawn, and the locations were all hand-lettered. She turned it this way and that, trying to figure out how it related to the town she knew. It was a very early map of Stoneybrook. Only a scattering of houses were shown, along with a bank and a church. The church was still there, and so was . . . the house itself. Kristy had finally located "our" old house. At first she couldn't quite make out the writing in the area in and around the house. What did it say?

"Oh, my lord," said Kristy out loud. (That's one of Claud's favorite expressions, and we've all picked it up.)

From what she could see on this incredibly

old map, Kristy figured out that the entire town of Stoneybrook had been built over ancient burial grounds. And "our" house was built on — oh, my lord — the most sacred spot of all!