Who Stole Halloween? by Martha Freeman

you’ve studied about ghosts?”
    â€œYou
may
.” Professor Popp nodded.
    â€œWhy do they come back?” I asked. “I mean, not everybody who dies becomes a ghost, right? If they did, we’d be bumping into ghosts every minute.”
    â€œMost cultures believe that the shade, or ghost, has some unfinished work to attend to,” Professor Popp said. “Often the deceased person has been accused of something unfairly, and its ghost seeks justice.”
    I thought about that. “So if a ghost was haunting somebody, then maybe the somebody should help the ghost out,” I said.
    Professor Popp wanted to know if I had something particular in mind, so I explained about Mr. Blanco and the Harvey house.
    â€œHave you noticed a pattern to the ghostly appearances?” Professor Popp asked me.
    â€œCome to think of it,” I said, “it kind ofseems like they happen when people are talking about the ghost story.”
    â€œThen perhaps,” Professor Popp said, “there’s something in the story that the ghost doesn’t like.”
    Yasmeen stacked my plate on top of her plate and Jeremiah’s plate on top of mine. “So if that’s true, it means Mr. Harvey
didn’t
murder his wife,” she said. “And his ghost won’t settle down until he’s proved innocent.”
    â€œI thought you didn’t believe in ghosts,” I said.
    â€œOf course I don’t,” Yasmeen said. “But if there were ghosts, which there aren’t, that would be the logical conclusion.”

Chapter Twenty-five

    After Yasmeen and I were done in the kitchen, there was time to take a look at the old black book and the newspapers from Mr. Blanco. In the family room Professor Popp was sitting on the sofa reading a yellow sheet of writing paper.
    â€œI hope you don’t mind.” He looked up at us. “I was curious and opened this old ledger book. When I did, the stationery fluttered out. The handwriting is faded, but it seems to be a page from a
billet-doux
.”
    â€œA what?” I said.
    â€œOh, Daddy, how
romantic
!” Yasmeen said. “Let me see!”
    Professor Popp handed her the paper. “
Billet-doux
is French for ‘sweet note,’ ” he told me. “In English, a love letter. Where did you get all this?”
    I told him, and he nodded. “It’s a ledger book, quite a useful document for a historian.” I didn’t understand, so he explained that a careful man like Mr. Harvey would have written an entry for everything he bought and everything he earned in a ledger book. Professor Popp flipped through several pages. There were entries for lots of different purchases—big amounts for stuff like bricks and lumber, small amounts for flour, lamp oil, and ink.
    â€œAre you sure this was Mr. Harvey’s book?” I asked.
    Professor Popp turned to the inside front cover. There, in spidery black writing, were the words: “Gilmore Samuel Harvey, July 1, 1877–”
    â€œThere’s no ending date,” I said.
    â€œI noticed that, too,” said Professor Popp. “Apparently his work was interrupted.”
    â€œWhat’s the last entry?” I asked.
    We paged through till we found it: On October28, 1879, Samuel Harvey had purchased a “traveling portmanteau” from R. J. McClanahan’s store for3.50.
    â€œWhat’s a portmanteau?” I asked.
    â€œSuitcase,” Yasmeen said, without looking up from the page she was reading.
    â€œI guess he never got to use it,” I said. “He died on October thirty-first—I’ve seen his grave.”
    Yasmeen sighed a huge sigh, and when I looked at her face, it had this gross, dreamy expression. Usually I can forget that Yasmeen’s a girl, but sometimes it is hard.
    â€œThis is so romantic!” she said. “Should I read it to you?”
    â€œNo,” I said.
    â€œOh, come on,” she