A barber who sneezes down the back of your neck is one thing. But one who loses control of his scissors with every sneeze is another. I didn't know which direction to tremble.

"Aaaaaaaah-Aaaaaaaah-Aaaaaaaah-"

I closed my eyes and cringed against the worst. In a barber chair there's no place to run. They wrap you tight in towels and a plastic covering that somehow drives itchy hair straight underneath and seals it tight against your skin.

"-chooooooooooo!!"

Mr. Breton's scissors shot ahead wildly and chomped shut as his entire body convulsed to the sneeze. A big wad of hair dropped into my lap. My hair.

"I could always come back next week, sir," I volunteered.

"Id's otay, Ritty, he sniffed. "I doaned mind working wid a code."

"Really, it would be no problem for me to come back later," I insisted.

Mr. Breton stopped to honk his nose into a tissue. "I already tode you," he said with a trace of irritation. "Yoe ear is fine. Id's only a liddle nick. Id's hardly bleeding any moe."

Wonderful, Ricky Kidd, I told myself. It's not even 10:00 on a Saturday morning, and already you have a Band-Aid on your left ear and two bald spots above your right ear. How can the day get worse?

Easy.

Mr. Breton had a sneezing fit that left me with a head like a scalded porcupine. And I noticed a newspaper standing open by itself in a waiting chair on the other side of the barber shop. With giggles echoing from behind it. And a teddy bear beside it.

Joel, my six-year-old brother.

I groaned to myself. Hadn't I lost him by doubling back through Mr. McEwan's hedge and parking my bicycle at Mike's house as a decoy?

I'm twelve, but Joel terrifies me. Somehow he appears and disappears like a tiny ghost, and at times I least expect or want him. Just when I've fooled everyone, found a spot to relax, he's there, staring at me with those solemn eyes. I nearly burst my skin with surprise, and when I turn my head for a second, he's gone again. Locked doors and walls don't stop that kid.

Fortunately, he does have one weakness. His teddy bear. Battered brown with gray-white paws and a white button for the left eye and a black button for the right eye. When Joel's asleep, you can have a band playing in his room, or wave a good-smelling hot dog under his nose, and he won't wake up. Wriggle one paw of his teddy bear and he sits up instantly, staring at you with big, accusing eyes.

When I'm mad at Joel, I remind him that teddy bear stuffing is hard to replace. It gets his attention. But I could never hurt the bear because I remember Joel's face the day Old Man Jacobsen's dog snuck away with it. Joel began digging in all the dog's favorite hiding spots with his plastic toy garden shovel. He wouldn't let me help. Even the dog was smart enough to stay out of sight. Joel's face was muddy with tears and dirt by the time he found the teddy bear. Then he gave it to me to wash, and we were both happy.

I wasn't happy, though, to see him sitting there enjoying the massacre of my head. Joel was sitting on his knees in the chair, and his tiny fingers were barely noticeable as he held the pages up, so it did look like the paper stood by itself. Even Mr. Breton jumped to see the paper standing tall and shaking to the rhythm of ghostly giggles.

I lost another patch of hair.

For the rest of the haircut, Joel peeked around the edge of the paper after each sneeze, stared solemnly, then hid behind the paper to giggle again.

I sighed. It was nearly 10:00 already, the time Mrs. McEwan wanted me to stop by her house. Which left no time to lose Joel before I got there.

Mr. Breton sneezed twice more. Gargantuan sneezes. I wondered if wearing a paper bag to school on Monday would be enough to hide the damage.

* * * * * * * *

Mrs. McEwan stared at my hair from her half-open front door. "Oh, it is you, Ricky," she said, then looked past me at Joel.

Then she shook her head slowly. "I can never keep up with the things you kids do for fashion these days."

I didn't care to correct her. Mrs. McEwan had an imperial face under a thick crown of wavy, gray hair. She was a big woman, immaculately dressed in a conservative suit that was highlighted with a diamond necklace, even though it was early on a hot spring Saturday. She had the look of someone who was accustomed to being obeyed, immediately, even by the snobbiest waiter in the ritziest restaurant.

"Thank you so much for stopping by," Mrs. McEwan continued as she motioned for us to step inside her house. "And how nice you are, bringing Joel with you. Most boys your age ignore their younger brothers."

If only I had the choice.

She walked ahead of us. As Joel and I followed slowly, I stared at everything around us.

No matter how many times I'd been in her house -- usually every second or third Saturday to do some odds and ends work, ever since her gardener had quit a year and a half before -- it always amazed me.

Mrs. McEwan is the wealthiest person in our town of Jamesville. Which might not mean much, because Jamesville is a small town, but from what I see and what I've heard, her wealth would set her apart in big cities, too. I've heard Dad talk about her husband, that he died from a heart attack. Mr. McEwan had been a real-estate developer and left her a lot of money plus a good insurance policy.

The McEwan house was a legend in Jamesville. It had been built at the turn of the century by an eccentric& -- which is just a polite word for crazy, as Mrs. McEwan often explained about the house's first owner -- writer who had made a fortune writing old-fashioned books about ghosts and spies.

It was a tall house, three stories high, that reminded me of a castle. Mrs. McEwan said the writer built it to look like that because he was crazy and never really knew if he was in the real world or in his book world where houses were big and creepy and filled with secret passages.

To add to the spookiness, long vines of ivy climbed the sides in all directions. It was set on a huge yard, a sprawling lawn with old, towering oak trees.

Inside, luxurious Persian rugs partly covered gleaming hardwood floors. All the furniture and cabinets too were made from gleaming wood. And magnificent oil paintings and velvet drapes covered the walls from room to room.

Mrs. McEwan continued her regal walk into the dining room.

I entered with Joel. And gasped.

Not at the rows and rows of china on display in a tall cabinet that stretched the length of one wall. Not at the polished silver of tea sets, coffee pourers, and serving utensils stored on a shelf beneath the china. Not at the bronze statues atop the cabinet. Not at a heavy oak dining table that seemed as long as a bus.

I gasped again and grabbed Joel by the back of his collar to hold him back.

Sunlight poured between the heavy velvet drapes of the dining room and spilled and bounced across a sparkling small pile of jewelry set on a cloth in the middle of that oak table.

Yet it wasn't even that casually strewn pile of glittering light that made me gasp. What drew the breath from me was one jewel -- as big as a walnut and a deep fiery red consuming the morning sun -- set beside a small pair of tongs.

"Antique jewelry," Mrs. McEwan announced simply. "It's been a secret of mine for a long time, but now I want to sort it, reinsure it to its proper value, and display it somewhere. Especially now that I've managed to obtain the treasure of my collection. The Jewel of Madagascar."

Joel pulled. I knew he wanted to play with the pretty stones. I kept a firm grip on his collar.

"The Jewel of Madagascar," I repeated with awe. She didn't have to tell me which one it was.

Joel pulled harder. "Is it OK if I send Joel into your kitchen to play with one of your cats?" I asked. If he wasn't distracted soon, he'd find a way to get me in trouble.

Mrs. McEwan nodded.

I pointed Joel in the right direction and whispered softly, "Give them a good scare, will ya?" Knowing, of course, that he wouldn't. He likes cats. I don't. Mrs. McEwan has five cats, all of them fancy purebreds. They're long-haired, fat, lazy, and cautious of me.

Joel was happy to leave the jewels behind for a dumb cat somewhere else. "Such a nice brother you have," Mrs. McEwan smiled. When she smiled, her face warmed considerably.

"My favorite," I said. Joel and I don't have any other brothers or sisters.

I stared at the jewels again.

"I don't know much about these types of collections, Mrs. McEwan, but to my eyes, it seems like quite something."

I moved for a closer look. "This Jewel of Madagascar . . ."

"It's been owned by African kings and queens," she said. "Shrouded by centuries of time and legends of greatness. Go ahead. Pick it up."

I did so. Gently.

It seemed to glow from my fingers.

"I would have used the tongs," she said, smiling.

"Why?"

"First, tell me you don't believe in curses," Mrs. McEwan whispered with a glint in her eye.

"Um, no," I said nervously.

"Good," she replied. "Because this jewel has a tragic past. And the last queen to own it nearly two centuries ago put a curse on anyone who dared to hold the stone."