CHAPTER 2

Haunted

“Look out!” Amal shouted. She threw her arms around Wilson and knocked him out of the way.

Clementine grabbed Raining by the wrist and pulled him toward the wall. All four friends dropped onto their bellies. Around them, other guests screamed and ran.

The Quetzalcoatlus crashed to the ground, smashing the Allosaurus to pieces. Bits of fake bone flew in every direction. All the guests ducked and covered their faces. Little kids cried and held on tight to their grown-ups.

Wilson could feel Amal’s arms around him, and he didn’t budge till all the noise and shouting was over. It seemed like it went on forever.

A booming voice suddenly cut through the quiet, “Is everyone okay?” It was Lev, the museum’s chief of security. “Is anyone hurt?”

Amal stood up, and Wilson got to his feet as well. He took a deep, relieved breath. His friends were all right by him and okay. All the museum visitors were standing in a wide circle around the wreckage. Everyone studied the rubble nervously.

“It looks like everyone is okay,” Clemetine said.

“If a little shaken up,” said Lev. He put a hand on Wilson’s shoulder. “You all right, Wilson?”

Wilson nodded. Then he ducked around Lev and stepped toward the middle of the chamber.

“Don’t get too close, please,” said Lev. “We don’t know if it’s safe yet. I don’t want anyone getting hurt — especially one of you kids.”

“I know,” said Wilson. “I’m being careful.”

Lev stayed right behind Wilson and put a hand on his shoulder as Wilson stepped up to the wreckage. He crouched down beside it to inspect it. His three friends gathered around the burly security man as well.

“They’re both ruined,” Wilson said sadly.

Lev pulled off his hat and scratched his head, clicking his tongue. “This has really gotten out of hand,” he said.

Wilson stood and looked up at Lev. “What do you mean?” he asked. “What’s gotten out of hand?”

“You mean you haven’t heard?” Lev said. He leaned down to speak quietly to the kids, but a few other museum guests, clearly curious about how the disaster had happened, crept up closer to eavesdrop. “It’s the ghosts.”

Wilson squinted up at the security guard. “Ghosts?” he repeated. “Are you serious?”

Lev nodded. “I can’t believe your mom didn’t mention it to you yet,” he whispered. He looked around at the other kids. “None of you have heard about this?”

Raining, Amal, and Clementine all shook their heads.

“Well,” Lev whispered, “I don’t want this to get around too much, especially to the customers, but — ”

“Oh, I think it’s too late for that,” a woman behind him interrupted. She had two small children with her in a double stroller. “That’s exactly why I came down this morning.”

“Huh?” said Lev.

A few other visitors standing nearby nodded eagerly. “We all heard about the haunting,” said a man visiting with a large group of adults. “We came down to check it out for ourselves.”

Lev stood up straight and put his fists on his hips. “I guess word’s gotten out,” he said, shaking his head ruefully.

“How about you let us in on it?” said Amal.

“Yeah,” said Clementine. “I love ghost stories.”

Wilson rolled his eyes. Clementine was always falling for hokey stuff like ghosts and superstitions and mind readers. To Wilson, it was all just silly stories covering up the scientific truth. Still, he wanted to hear what had been happening at the museum — and why everyone seemed to be so convinced that the place was haunted.

“It all started last week,” Lev told them. “I think it was Wednesday. First the model Velociraptor walked to the cafeteria.”

“You saw it walking?!” said Amal, eyes wide.

Lev shook his head. “No,” he said. “No one actually saw it walking. But it was in its usual spot on Tuesday night. When I unlocked the cafeteria on Wednesday morning, it was there, standing in line at the cash register.”

Then it probably didn’t walk there on its own, Wilson thought.

“What else?” Clementine asked, leaning closer.

“When I was locking up on Wednesday night, the lights on the third floor, the ones across the courtyard from here, flickered on and off for a few minutes,” Lev said. “It sure spooked me.”

The security guard gestured toward the huge windows that looked out on the courtyard. Past the models of mammoths and saber-tooth cats and giant sloths, Wilson could see the office, laboratory, and archives area of the museum. Most guests never went to those areas of course, but Wilson had seen it all — his mom had showed him around on his first visit.

“Anyone could have done that,” Amal said, crossing her arms.

Wilson was glad she was skeptical of Lev’s ghost talk too. At least I’m not the only one, he thought.

“I thought that too, but there’s no one else in the museum at that hour,” Lev said. “It’s just me and the security staff.”

“Hmm . . .” said Amal.

Wilson still wasn’t convinced. “Anything else?” he asked. “So far, all this stuff can be pretty easily explained.”

“Maybe,” said Lev. “But I’m not finished. On Friday morning, Nancy from the cleaning staff and I were the first people here. The sun was hardly up. I unlocked the door, and we both saw it.”

“Saw what?” Clementine asked breathlessly. She leaned forward, clearly excited about a good ghost sighting.

Lev’s eyes went wide. “A huge, shadowy figure,” he said. “It looked like it had wings as big as an airplane! And it was floating straight toward us, right in this room!”

“Um,” said Wilson, “wasn’t that the Quetzalcoatlus? The one that just came crashing down?”

Lev shook his head. “That wasn’t installed until Sunday afternoon,” he said. “They put it up when the pterosaur exhibit was being set up.”

“I bet it’s the angry spirit of a long-dead pterodactyl,” said Clementine, her eyes wide and her voice pitched with excitement. “She’s probably back to haunt the museum because they stole the bones of her children!”

Wilson resisted the urge to laugh at Clementine’s crazy suggestion. “You actually saw a huge flying animal?” he asked Lev.

“Well . . . no,” Lev admitted. “We saw its shadow, though.” He pointed at the curved wall over the entrance to the ichthyosaur wing, where a giant banner now hung announcing the new pterosaur exhibit. “Right there. It took up the whole wall, so it must have come from something pretty huge.”

“Or it was a huge ghost,” Clementine said. “Ghosts could look like shadows, I bet.”

Lev nodded eagerly.

Wilson was glad when the silly ghost talk was interrupted by a stern shout: “Everyone back away from the area, please!”

Mr. Collini, the museum’s director, stomped into the room. He shoved past curious bystanders and came to a stop in front of Lev. “How did this happen?” he demanded.

“All the cables snapped,” Lev said, shaking his head. “Practically at the same time.”

“Hmm,” said Mr. Collini. He stepped carefully into the rubble and found one of the cables that had been holding up the Quetzalcoatlus. “How could that have happened?”

Mr. Collini pulled the length of cable till he found its end. Wilson caught a glimpse. The end looked too neat to have snapped.

“Isn’t it obvious?” said Lev. “The ghosts.”

Mr. Collini sighed and stood back up. He dug the velvet rope and metal posts, some of which had fallen over, from beneath the mess of model bones. Lev helped him set the barrier back up around the wreckage.

While they worked, Wilson took the opportunity to whisper to his friends. “Did you see the end of the cable? It was clean, not frayed.”

“Like someone cut it?” Clementine asked.

Wilson nodded. “Exactly.”

“So either there’s a ghost in the museum with a pair of cable clippers in its pocket,” said Amal, “or this wasn’t the work of any ghost at all.”