The Black Heart Crypt

Zack was having another very bad dream.

He figured it was because he was sleeping in the basement on a flimsy foldout sofa bed with a metal bar digging into his spine.

Or maybe because of the ice cream sundaes he and Aunt Ginny had whipped up in the kitchen after Malik and Azalea had gone home: Moose Tracks and peppermint ice cream topped with fudge sauce, raw cookie dough (squeezed straight from the tube), a gob of peanut butter, whipped cream, and maraschino cherries. Plus sprinkles.

Yeah. That’d give a guy nightmares.

In the dream, things kept turning into other things. First Zack and Zipper were floating downstream in a big and bouncy bra boat. They each had their own foamy bucket seat lined with frilly lace. But then the bra boat became a double-barrel slingshot, which Zack’s pal Davy, who popped in to say, “Howdy, pardner,” used to make trick shots behind his back, one of which took out a window on Main Street, which was when Grandpa Jim, in his sheriff’s uniform, showed up.

“Zack?” said Grandpa Jim. “Are you awake, champ?”

Zack pried open an eye.

Grandpa Jim was sitting in the battered recliner where Azalea had sat earlier, a chair Zack’s dad had inherited when Grandpa Jim passed away.

“Don’t worry, champ. I’ll be keeping an eye on things.”

“What kind of things?”

“Anything. Everything.”

“What exactly are you talking about, Grandpa?”

“Can’t say.”

“Because of the rules?” Grandpa Jim nodded.

From the other ghosts he’d met, Zack had learned that there were very strict rules governing what ghosts could do or say to help people on the other side of the dirt, and since Grandpa Jim had been the top cop in North Chester when he was alive, he was all about playing by the rules.

“Are you here to protect me from evil spirits?”

Grandpa Jim gave Zack a worried smile that told Zack that, yep, that was exactly why he had popped in so close to Halloween.

“That’s why your sisters are here, too,” said Zack. “All of them. Ginny, Sophie, and Hannah.”

“I know.”

“They’re upstairs if you want to say hello.”

“Already did.”

“Are you here to protect them, too?”

“Those three don’t need me, Zack. Go back to sleep, champ. There’s nothing for you to do. Not tonight, anyway.”

“Tomorrow’s Halloween. Is that when the trouble starts?”

“Can’t say.”

“Because they won’t let you?”

“Because I don’t know what tomorrow might bring. Nobody does.”

“Okay. So what am I supposed to do?”

“Same thing I told you to do that time I took you fishing up at Coulter’s Pond.”

Coulter’s Pond was a lake where everybody said Battling Bob, this bigmouthed bass the size of a whale, lurked just below the surface, waiting to yank unsuspecting fishermen out of their boats.

“Um, you told me to sit down because I was rocking the boat?”

“And after that?”

“You said I should hold on to my fishing rod real tight, just in case Battling Bob was itching for a fight.”

“That’s right, Zack. Be ready and hang on tight.”

And with that, Grandpa Jim Jennings disappeared into the cushions of his favorite chair.