Old Ben Brewer was crazy.As crazy as anything. He ate fried dandelions, and after he turned fifty, he never left his house . . . except to go out in the yard to get dandelions. When he died, his ghost stayed behind. I'm telling you, he haunts our attic."

Karen Brewer looked at me with wide eyes."Honest, Kristy. He haunts our attic," she repeated. Karen loves to talk about witches and ghosts. She thinks her next-doorneighbor , old Mrs. Porter, is a witch namedMorbidda Destiny.

Karen's four-year-old brother Andrew turned to me with eyes as round as an owl's. He didn't say a word.

"I think you're scaring your brother," I told Karen.

"No, she's not," whispered Andrew.

I leaned over to him. "Are you sure?" I whispered back.

"No." I could barely hear him.

"I think that's enough talk about ghosts," I said.

"Okay," replied Karen. Her tone of voice implied that it was foolish of me not to arm myself with information about old Ben. "But when you move into our house, you'll wish you knew more about my great-grandfather.Especially if you get a bedroom on the third floor." Karen made "the third floor" sound like Frankenstein's castle.

I couldn't help giving a little shiver. Why was I letting a six-year-old get away with this?

Karen looked at me knowingly.

Karen and Andrew are the children of Watson Brewer, who is engaged to my mother, the divorced Elizabeth Thomas. This means that when they get married, Karen and Andrew will become my little stepsister and stepbrother. It also means that my brothers and I will be moving out of our house on Bradford Court, where we grew up, and into Watson's house.

There are pros and cons to this situation. The pros are that Watson is rich. In fact, he's a millionaire. And his house isn't just a house, it's a mansion. Charlie and Sam, my older brothers, who have shared a room for years,