Read Minerva Clark Gives Up the Ghost for Free Online

big.”
    He reached again into the pocket of his trench coat and pulled out a key. It seemed odd to me that it wasn’t on a key chain. The burned front door was locked with a shiny silver hasp and padlock.
    Inside, the grocery smelled like a campfire. I remembered Angus telling me about his Grams, who had died in the apartment upstairs. I breathed through my mouth; I didn’t want to smell anything
at all
that reminded me of what happened to her. I tried not to think about it. I tried to be interested in the piles of debris. On top of one of them was a half-burned box of Lucky Charms. In the back of the grocery, I saw where the entire ceiling had collapsed.
    Now that I was here, I remembered it from Cryptkeeper Ron’s Tour of Haunted Portland. Cryptkeeper Ron was a local weirdo my dad’s age who owned a bunch of auto dealerships and was always running for mayor. He broke out his Tour of Haunted Portland every Halloween, advertising like mad on cheesy cable stations.
    As I walked around, I realized I didn’t know the first thing about finding an arsonist. I thought about what Kevin had said, that fire consumes its own evidence. Why did that sound so creepy?
    â€œHow did you say the fire started?” I asked.
    â€œDidn’t,” said Angus Paine. “The investigators are saying the gas main broke sometime during the night and the grocery store filled up with gas—then when the electric motor for the world-famous walk-in freezer kicked in, the gas caught fire. The freezer and the gas line are, like, ancient. Of course, I have my own ideas.”
    I turned and looked at him standing by the door, his hands thrust deep in his trench-coat pockets. He’d been checking me check out the damage. There was something about the tone of his voice. He was lying. Or something.
    I opened one of the freezer’s thick glass doors. Cans of soda and plastic bottles of sports drinks sat in their neat rows. This is where the ghost was supposed to live. Even though the electricity hadn’t been on since the fire, the air inside was cold.
    â€œSo does the ghost still live here?” I asked.
    â€œ
Kikimora
. She’s a Kikimora. We don’t know.”
    â€œShe has a name?” I asked.
    â€œHer name is actually Louise,” he said. “I thought they mentioned that on the tour. A Kikimora is a type of ghost, an entity that inhabits a house and is usually pretty happy and helpful unless someone tries to get rid of her.”
    â€œHuh,” I said.
    â€œYou think I’m a dork,” Angus said suddenly.
    At that moment, a man appeared in the doorway. He carried a clipboard. The light was behind him, so I couldn’t see the expression on his face. He was shorter than me, dressed all businessman in a suit and tie, even though it had to have been about a hundred degrees out.
    â€œWhat’s going on here?” he said. His voice was the deep voice of a boss, but it was flat, sort of robotic sounding.
    â€œDeputy Chief Huntington! How are you this fine day?” Angus stuck his hand out for a big grown-up handshake. He released his lopsided grin, phony polite. “This is my good friend Minerva. She’s into fires. Interested in fires, I mean. I was just showing her what happened.”
    â€œInterested in fires?” said Chief Huntington.
    â€œWell, you know,” said Angus. “She likes fire. I mean, likes looking at fires! At the damage fires do, I mean.” He hit himself on the side of the head, as if he were trying to knock the goofiness out.
    â€œI don’t, actually,” said Deputy Chief Huntington. “Your folks know you’re poking around here?”
    â€œCome on, Minerva,” said Angus suddenly. He stalked out without answering, his trench coat billowing behind him, Zorro-like, geeky but dramatic.
    â€œAre you investigating the arson?” I asked Deputy Chief Huntington. I think he had a glass eye or a dead eye or something,