The Halloween Hoax (4 page)

“You mean a
mad
scientist,” George joked.

The girls giggled as a tune began to play: “Get up, get grooooovy! With Dr. Funk-n-Stine!”

Nancy, Bess, and George read as much as they could about Dr. Funk-n-Stine. He used to have his own science show on TV. The name of the show was
Dr. Funk-n-Stine's Groovy Mad Lab
. It always had lots of commercials for
Baxter's Licorice Gum. The show ran from 1975 to 1979.

“It says Dr. Funk-n-Stine was very sad when his show ended,” George said. “As he left the TV station, he promised he'd be back someday.”

“What happened to him?” said Bess.

George leaned forward to read on. “It says he went to the Great Beyond,” she told the others.

“What's the Great Beyond?” Nancy asked.

“I think it's a nice way of saying he died,” George explained.

The girls were silent. Until Bess shouted, “That's it! That's it! Dudley's studio is being haunted by the ghost of Dr. Funk-n-Stine!”

“What?” cried Nancy.

Bess ran to her pink backpack on Nancy's bed. She pulled out a gadget that looked like two cups attached to a headband. “We have to go back to the studio so I can try out my new Spirit Sounds,” she declared. “Maybe I'll hear the ghost of Dr. Funk-n-Stine.”

Nancy didn't think the studio was haunted
by Dr. Funk-n-Stine—or any ghost. But she did want to find the real reason for Dudley's goofed experiments once and for all!

“Okay,” she said. “But how will we get into the studio this time?”

George pointed to Nancy's dragon costume hanging behind her door. “We can pretend we're trick-or-treating!”

“Halloween isn't until Tuesday,” Nancy pointed out.

“We'll say we want to get a head start!” said George.

“What do you think, Nancy?” Bess asked.

Nancy smiled. She couldn't wait to wear her dragon costume again—even with the yucky green stain!

“I still don't think we'll find any ghosts,” Nancy admitted. “But a head start on Halloween is pretty cool!”

Bess and George ran home to put on their costumes. When they returned to Nancy's house, Mr. Drew drove the girls to the TV station.

“Remember,” Mr. Drew told them. “No eating tons of candy before Halloween.”

“We're not going for candy, Daddy,” said Nancy. “We're going for clues.”

Mr. Drew parked in front of WRIV-TV. As the girls climbed out of the car, he said, “I'll be in the hardware store down the block. Wait for me in front of the station in twenty minutes.”

Each girl held her own trick-or-treat bag. Bess secretly carried her Spirit Sounds inside hers. They filed into the TV station and shouted, “Trick or treat!”

A different guard sat behind the desk that day. Her nameplate read ROSALIE VITALE.

“You're a bit early, girls,” Rosalie said.

“We want to get a head start,” Bess blurted out. “Before the best treats are gone!”

“Good idea.” Rosalie chuckled. “I see we have a dragon, a ballerina, and the Tin Man from
The Wizard of Oz
.”

“I'm actually a robot,” said George.

Rosalie pointed to a glass jar on her desk.
“Help yourselves to some candy, kids,” she said. “Don't be shy.”

The girls stared at the candy jar. They needed to get
inside
the TV station.

“Um,” Nancy said slowly, “do you have a . . . candy machine in the back?”

“We only eat granola bars,” Bess added. “Maybe there's some in your candy machine—”

“In the back,” George put in.

“Picky, picky, picky.” Rosalie sighed.

A boy with blond hair ran past the desk and down the hall. It was Kirby Kessler!

“Kirby, wait up!” Nancy called.

Kirby stopped and turned around. “What?” he asked.

“Um—can you sign my sneaker?” George asked quickly.

“You want
my
autograph?” gasped Kirby. He whipped out a pen and smiled. “Sure—come on over!”

“Go ahead.” Rosalie waved them through.

The girls ran straight to Kirby. George stuck
out her foot and said, “You can make it out to George, please.”

“Isn't George a boy's name?” Kirby asked.

“It's really Georgia,” Bess said, smiling. “But she hates being called by her full name.”

George nudged Bess with her elbow.

“When I have my own TV show, I'm going to sign a ton of autographs,” Kirby told the girls as he signed George's sneaker.

Nancy nodded. Kirby
was
funny enough to have his own show someday. But then she noticed something else about Kirby: His face was covered with gray smudges.

“What happened to your face, Kirby?” Nancy asked.

Kirby's hand flew up to his cheek. “Uh . . . I'm going trick-or-treating too,” he said. “As a chimney sweep!”

Kirby dropped the pen into his pocket. Then he ran down the hall and around the corner.

“At least we got into the station,” George said.

Nancy, Bess, and George hurried toward
Dudley's studio. People in the hall stopped to smile at their costumes. One woman dropped wrapped candies into their bags.

When no one was watching, the girls slipped into Dudley's studio. There was nobody inside. But something wasn't right. . . .

“Are we in the right place?” asked George.

Nancy looked around. They were in a science lab. But this one was covered with cobwebs. Its shelves were stocked with glass jars filled with eyeballs, snakes, and vampire fangs. There was even a skull with glowing red eyes!

“This doesn't look like Dudley's set,” exclaimed Bess.

“No,” Nancy said with a gulp. “It looks like Dr. Funk-n-Stine's Groovy Mad Lab!”

Fright in the Night

Nancy jumped as a fake spider dropped onto her shoulder. She still didn't believe in ghosts . . . not really.

George's tin cans clanked as she walked around the studio. “What's that?” she asked, pointing to a tall, oval-shaped case. A face on the lid was painted in gold.

“I think it's a sar-co-pha-gus,” Nancy said, pronouncing the word carefully. “They built them in ancient Egypt to hold mummies.”

“How do you know?” asked Bess.

“I saw one in a museum once,” Nancy replied.

“I smell licorice,” George said, wrinkling her nose.

“Baxter's Licorice Gum!” Bess gasped. “Those were the commercials on Dr. Funk-n-Stine's old TV show!”

“Smells are a sign of ghosts,” George said. “I read that on the computer too.”

Bess pulled her Spirit Sounds from her trick-or-treat bag and slipped them over her ears. “I think I hear music,” she said.

Nancy and George heard it too.

“Get up . . . get grooovy! With Dr. Funk-n-Stine!”

“It's the Dr. Funk-n-Stine show tune!” Bess cried. “Let's get out of here!”

Bess stuffed her Spirit Sounds back into her trick-or-treat bag. Then the girls charged toward the door. Nancy stopped running when she heard footsteps out in the hall.

“Someone's coming!” she hissed. “Hide!”

The girls scurried around the studio looking for a place to hide. George raced to the sarcophagus and yanked open the lid. She
shrieked as a mummy wrapped in bandages tumbled on top of her.

“I want my mummy—I mean mommy!” George screamed as she pushed the mummy off.

The girls burst out of the studio. They ran past Valerie, Dudley's producer, standing outside the door.

“What were you doing in there?” Valerie demanded.

“Trick or treat!” Bess shouted as they kept running.

The girls clutched their trick-or-treat bags as they raced outside.

“Not only did Dr. Funk-n-Stine come back,” George said, catching her breath, “he brought his whole show, too!”

“Now do you believe in ghosts, Nancy?” Bess asked.

Nancy didn't answer. As they waited for Mr. Drew to pick them up, she filled in her Ghosts column with the latest clues. Her No Ghosts column was totally blank.

Maybe Bess and George are right,
Nancy thought.
Maybe there are such things as ghosts.

For the rest of the day Nancy couldn't think about anything else. As her dad tucked her into bed, she asked, “Daddy, do you believe in ghosts?”

“Only on Halloween,” Mr. Drew answered. “Why?”

Nancy sat straight up. She explained all the
weird things the Clue Crew had found in Dudley's studio—the music, the footprint, the licorice smell, and the spinning compass.

“Was there a lot of electrical equipment in the studio?” Mr. Drew asked. “Cables and wires on the floor?”

“Yes,” Nancy said.

“That might explain the compass,” Mr. Drew said. “Compasses pick up energy from surrounding power sources.”

“You think?” Nancy asked excitedly. She felt a little relieved.

“Pretty sure,” Mr. Drew said. He leaned over and kissed Nancy good night. Before he closed the door, Nancy's Labrador puppy, Chocolate Chip, slipped into the room.

“You don't have to guard my bed, Chip.” Nancy giggled. “I'm not that scared anymore.”

Nancy felt better as she switched off her lamp. If electricity made the compass needle spin, there had to an explanation for all those other things too.

She was about to snuggle under her quilt when she spotted something across her room—something green and glowing in the dark!

Chip on the Case

Nancy gasped. What could be green and glowing in her bedroom?

Her hand trembled as she reached for her lamp. When she switched on the light, the green glow was gone. In its place was her dragon costume, still hanging behind the door.

Chip padded after Nancy as she walked over to her dragon costume. As she picked up the tail, something clicked in her mind.

“The
green stain
was glowing, Chip,” Nancy said with relief. “The one I got from Dudley's witch's brew puddle.”

Nancy remembered that Dudley used glow-in-the-dark paint in his experiment. Suddenly she remembered something else—the glowing green footprints in Dudley's studio.