The Longest Halloween, Book Two. Frank Wood

Ellis replied.

      “Hold my spot,” Joel said, jumping to his feet and heading into the kitchen.

      In the next room, the computer sounded. “It’s another instant message,” Dreyfuss said.

      “What does she want now?” Jasper asked, before noting that the message wasn’t from Renee.

      “Ahoy matey,” suddenly appeared in the empty window box. “This be the ghost of one Sebastian Silverbeard.”

      “What the—?” Jasper said.

      “It’s a joke,” Dreyfuss said.

      “This be no joke, matey, but a warning to the both of ye it be,” appeared onscreen.

      “This isn’t very funny,” Jasper said.

      “Exit out,” Dreyfuss said.

      “It won’t let me,” Jasper said.

      “The map be mine and mine alone. Ye’d do best to turn it back in afore I have to come and get it! Ya don’t want that, matey, won’t be very pretty if’n I have to do that.”

      “We don’t want any trouble,” Jasper nervously typed in response to the screen.

      “I shouldn’t think ye would, matey. I’ll send me courier to fetch it up for me in one hour’s time. That be all for now.”

      The instant message window vanished. Jasper and Dreyfuss sped into the kitchen where Joel had just put the pizza in the oven, both talking a mile a minute.

      “Wait a minute! One at a time,” Joel said crossly.

      “I wondered where the Lollipop Guild was,” Ellis said, joining the fracas in the kitchen.

      “Sebastian Silverbeard just text messaged us!” Jasper gasped.

      “Jasper, Mom told you about talking with people you don’t know over the internet!” Joel snapped.

      “You want to get yourself serial killed?” Ellis joined in.

      “What?” Jasper said.

      “Joel, this guy texted us! Jasper tried to exit out but he—he—he wasn’t having it!” Dreyfuss said. “He said he was sending his carter here to pick up the map in an hour!”

      “His courier!” Jasper corrected.

      “Let me see what you two are talking about.” Joel led the way back to the room, followed by the other boys. Sitting at the laptop, he tried to recover the prior instant message.

      “It says that the only text message you’ve gotten in the last hour is from a Renee Atherton,” Joel said.

      “Renee, huh?” Ellis joked. “Little man, you starting your playing young, huh?”

      “Jasper, she’s probably punking you guys,” Joel said.

      “Look!” Dreyfuss shouted. The boys gathered around the laptop’s screen and saw, to their amazement, the Wikipedia entry about Sebastian Silverbeard wiped clean from the bottom up, every line, every image and every citation vanishing right before their eyes.

      “What kind of crazy carrier y’all got up in here?” Ellis said.

      An instant message appeared again. “Remember, matey, one hour!”

      The boys recoiled from the screen violently as the instant message faded out again.

      “Now do you believe me?” Jasper cried, fear in his eyes. “He’s coming for the map!”

      In a moderate-size apartment, not too far away, near the edge of town, sinister smiles spread over the masked faces of the motley crew of pirates who had just finished dressing for the night.

      “There be your address, mateys,” Mitchell Allister said, smiling from behind a small laptop. “All yours, for a simple click on an innocent attachment.”

      “Call Josiah,” one of the pirates said, “tell him we’re on the way!”

      “Rendezvous at the Adeline May!” another voice called out amidst a flurry of activity.

      Plunder at the Franklin Flat

      “But this doesn’t make any sense,” Joel said. “First of all, and it’s a big first, if this pirate was sending text messages, he’d be like a thousand years old; and then second of all, if it’s his treasure … shouldn’t he know where it is?”

      “Not according to the story,” Jasper said.

      “It was Elvira Hanson who hid the chest,” Dreyfuss said, “and her man was the one who drew the map!”

      “Y’all all do realize that y’all are talking as if this whole thing was real or something,” Ellis said, laughing nervously, “as if there’s such things as ghosts!”

      “You need to spend some more time in Portersville, bro,” Jasper said.

      The shrill sound of the smoke alarm blared through the flat. “The pizza!” Joel exclaimed and ran into the kitchen, followed closely by the other boys, who did not want to be left alone with Jasper’s laptop.

      “So let me get this straight,” Ellis said between munches of burnt pepperoni pizza, “the shorties here find an old pirate map that you took to Old Man Grubb, who tells you for sure it is real, and now you’ve got pirate ghosts looking to get that map back from you.”

      “Yeah,” Jasper said.

      “No,” Joel retorted, “it’s a hoax! It’s got to be!”

      “Did that look like a hoax back there?” Dreyfuss asked.

      “Why is this so hard to believe?” Jasper asked. “You know creepy things happen to this family close to Halloween!”

      “Wait, what kind of creepy things?” Ellis asked.

      “I’ll tell you later,” Joel said. “Just be glad you were at your dad’s last Halloween.”

      “What time is it?” Dreyfuss asked.

      “Dreyfuss, it’s been two minutes since the last time you asked what time it is,” Joel snapped.

      “Silverbeard said his carter was coming in an hour,” Dreyfuss said.

      “Courier,” Jasper corrected.

      “Hey Joel, maybe we should call your mom,” Ellis suggested, “or the cops.”

      “And tell them what, El? We’ve got a pirate ghost to report?” Joel said.

      “I’m just trying to be helpful here,” Ellis said, a little embarrassed at being rebuffed so vigorously.

      “I know you were,” Joel immediately softened his tone.

      “I just thought of something,” Dreyfuss offered. “Maybe this is a prank. Renee’s cousin Rhett would do something jerky like this. He’s supposed to be a big time computer hacker.”

      “I don’t see her telling him, Dreyfuss,” Jasper said. “Renee and Rhett don’t even like each other.”

      A knock came at the door.

      “It’s the pirate!” Dreyfuss cried.

      “Oh yeah, Dreyf, like they’ll come knocking at the door,” Jasper said wryly.

      Joel stood and called, “Who’s there?”

      “Hello,” came the muffled voice on the other side of the door, “I’m here for the map.”

      Joel looked through the peephole in the door and spied a man of about medium height