Read Online The Ghost in Room 11 by Betty Ren Wright - Free Book Online

said to Mr. Beasley, but since she was close to the microphone, everyone heard her. “What in the world happened just then?”
    Mr. Beasley didn’t answer. His face was gray.
    â€œI want to know what happened,” Miss Monahan repeated, sounding frightened. “Tell me!”
    â€œSteam pipe,” Mr. Beasley mumbled.
    He looked as if he were about to faint.

20
    Thumbs up for Miss Whipple
    Matt sat on a swing and waited for the rest of the team to show up. He didn’t mind being alone on the playground—not much, anyway. After all, Miss Whipple didn’t have any reason to be angry with him now. She’d even done him a favor by appearing at the Book Fair. Whether his classmates had seen the ghost or not, they knew something weird had taken place.
    He pushed the swing and thought about all that had happened since those terrifying moments in the gym. One thing he’d learned was that grown-ups didn’t like to admit they’d been wrong. They hated it!
    With the lights back on in the gym, Mr. Beasley had announced in a quivering voice that the Book Fair was over. Students who did not have a book to be signed by Miss Monahan were to go to their classrooms.
    Miss Monahan had sat at a table just outside the gym door, smiling as she signed books. But her handwriting was so shaky, it took a long time for Matt to figure out what she’d written in his book:
    For Matt Barber,
    I still don’t believe in ghosts, but someday
    I may write a book about a haunted school.
    If I do, I’ll put a boy named Matt in the story.
    Mrs. Sanders had scolded the class for making too much noise on the way back to their room. “The Book Fair’s over. It’s time to get busy,” she’d said firmly. She handed out a new list of spelling words and told Matt to keep up the good work.
    Matt’s mother wouldn’t admit anything unusual had happened, either.
    â€œHow was the Book Fair?” his dad asked at dinner last night. “Did everything go smoothly?”
    â€œMerry gave a nice talk,” Matt’s mom replied quickly. “But then a steam pipe burst in the ceiling and the lights went out, and everyone got excited. It was a huge fuss over nothing.”
    â€œA steam pipe put the lights out?” Matt’s dad sounded puzzled.
    â€œWhat about the chalkboard?” Matt demanded. He wondered how his mother could explain that.
    She had just shrugged. “I was so far back I couldn’t see the chalkboard. I did like the list of books Merry talked about, though. They were ones I read when I was a girl.”
    Matt dragged a foot to stop the swing. He scooped up a stone and pitched it across the playground. It landed in the teachers’ parking lot, next to a crumpled piece of paper.
    â€œHey, Barber!” Charlie and Jason came around the corner and waved. Matt waved back and then ambled over to Mr. Beasley’s place in the parking lot. He picked up the paper and smoothed it out.
    FROM THE OFFICE OF THE PRINCIPAL was printed in large letters across the top of the page. Below that were two columns of words in Mr. Beasley’s neat handwriting:
    WELCOME    WELCOME
    WELCOME    WELCOME
    WELCOME    WELCOME
    WELCOME    WELCOME
    WELCOME    WELCOME
    WELCOME    WELCOME
    WELCOME    WELCOME
    WELCOME    WELCOME
    WELCOME    WELCOME
    WELCOME    WELCOME
    Matt grinned and folded the paper. He put it in his jeans pocket. Now he knew there was at least one grown-up who believed the ghost of Healy School was real, even if that person wouldn’t admit it.
    Without turning around to check, Matt made a thumbs-up gesture, just in case Miss Whipple was watching from a window. Then he ran across the playground to join the rest of the team.

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