Mom and Dad decided to move us to this humongous old house near town. It's three stories and a basement and was in desperate need of fixing up. No prob, Dad took care of that. The house, in its heyday, had servants' quarters in the attic. Mom and Dad turned them into apartments that they could rent short term. The apartments were booked full almost as soon as Mom listed them.

We live in a big tourist area, and there are a couple of big sports events every year, golf and tennis. Hordes flood the area, looking for a place to rest their weary heads. This was a way for Mom to stay home. She wanted to start a career as a writer and illustrator, so the money from the rentals would pay the bills. Surprise, there is also a new addition to the family. My baby brother, Tommy, now six months old. Mom says he's cute, but he's kind of round and pink and white. He's the happiest baby, which I guess is easy when you don't have to take out the trash and get fed and bathed and carried everywhere and oohed and aahed over.

We don't rent the apartments during June and July. The tourist business drops off a lot in the hot summers, plus it gives us "family time." My grandparents visit, we go on vacation, and fix up anything that needs fixing. Like the painting. Soon after that the robberies started.

This past summer Mom decided the apartments and kitchen needed repainting. She also said I was old enough to move into the basement room. Actually, we used it as a sort of rec room. Really, she wanted my bedroom for her office/studio. OK with me.

The basement bedroom is cool. The basement has steps leading up to a door that opens to the back yard. Dad warned me not to sneak out or let anyone in, or I'd be back upstairs in a flash. I can play video games without disturbing my family or the renters as long as my schoolwork and chores are done.

The guy who did the painting the first time sent his apprentice, Don. He helped paint the first time, too, so he knew the place. He was 20 now and cool. We'd talk about video games, and school and teachers, and stuff. He seemed to know about everyone local and everything that was happening. I guess painters are on the grapevine.

"Have you been robbed?" I asked him one day.

"Nah," he said. "I don't have much to steal."

"Dad says it must be a gang of thieves. Do you think it's one guy?" I asked him.

Don jumped, smearing paint on his shirt. He blotted the paint on his shirt. "What I think is, one guy working alone, is harder to catch. The more guys, the more likely someone is to get drunk, or brag, or show off spending too much money." He muttered something under his breath. "Painting's hard work, especially in this hot weather."

"Dad says a profitable business is a good start."

"Yeah, Billy, but if I'm sick or want a day off, I got no paid vacation. No benefits. I don't work, I got nothing." He heaved a sigh, and started painting again.

"Maybe you could get a job that pays you good with vacation. Then work this as a side gig. That's why Mom and Dad have the apartments to rent. Dad's job, Mom's getting her career going. The apartments cover expenses until she earns good money. She even hires Sheila and me as models, so we've got allowance and pay." I was quiet for a minute. "But baby Tommy is modeling a lot now. That kid is raking in the money."

Don laughed. "Thanks for the advice. I'm quitting this job soon. I've got something better lined up. Temporary, but profitable." He quit after he finished our painting and left town.

It was as that summer began that the robberies got bad. Several homes in the neighborhood were robbed. We were robbed a couple of times. Dad's wallet was gone. We found it in the yard, with $409 missing. Mom's keys disappeared. Even our guests missed stuff. Mom called what happened to Freda and Lenny a tragedy.

Freda and Lenny booked a week so they could watch the tennis competition. They're both professional coaches, and this was what dad called a "busman's holiday." That means your holiday is like what you do for work. In their case, tennis.

They were also very much in love. Lenny was going to propose to Freda while they were here. He showed Mom and me the ring he'd bought. Mom said it was lovely. Lenny never got to ask Freda and she never saw the lovely ring he bought for her.

Freda came downstairs the third morning, asking if she'd dropped her tennis bracelet (appropriate) down here. We hadn't seen it. She went upstairs, silent and unhappy. They left for the competition, and she was giving Lenny the silent treatment.

Things were a little better when they came home late that night. They were laughing and happy. She'd won grand prize ($100) in a trivia contest at some bar they went to. The next day they went back to the tennis games. They came home early in the evening, and trotted upstairs, hand in hand.

The screaming and yelling started a few minutes later. Freda'd left her winnings and some other money hidden in a pocket of a jacket in her closet. All the cash was all missing. She insisted he'd robbed her and probably took the bracelet, too. We could hear him yelling that he'd given her the bracelet and didn't need to steal it back.

They came downstairs, her pale and crying and him looking like he wanted to. Freda asked Mom if anyone had been to the house. No strangers had come, but she'd been out for a few hours, grocery shopping. Dad tried to calm them down by saying that there had been several robberies lately. No good. She insisted he was the only other person who knew where the money was.

Freda packed and left that night. Lenny left the next day.

The robberies continued. A neighbor who went on vacation came home to find he'd been robbed. Mom said food was disappearing. She'd look at me, and say, 'teen boys have a hollow leg.' But I didn't take any food. The tenants missed stuff. Some cash, a camera, stuff like that.

Dad said cash couldn't be traced. And the other stuff you could pawn. Nothing had turned up the pawnshops, according to the police. They were looking for the items to show up somewhere.

I moved into the basement rec room, sort of. Mom hadn't bought new furniture yet, so I slept on the sofa. My video game stuff was down there, and I kept my games in the closet. My clothes were upstairs in Tommy's closet. He didn't mind. His stuff was in the dresser.

The rec room was great, but there were strange noises. It sounded like rats in the walls, and knocking in the closet. I told Dad and he checked the room and closet out, but there were no signs of rats.

"If the noises bother you, you can move back upstairs."

"No. No, Dad. I like it down here. It's just the noises in the walls and the closet." Dad grinned at me. I didn't want him to think I was afraid of rats, but Dad is cool. He got me a light for the closet and we installed it the next morning. I told him there were noises again last night.

He looked at me. "You're really serious, aren't you?" I nodded. "I'll call an exterminator in the morning. Maybe a possum, or more likely, a raccoon has moved in. OK? In the meantime, don't leave any food around to attract it."

"Sure, Dad, great."

The next day was trash day. After dinner, I hauled several trash cans to the front. One of my chores.

I went to my basement room and played games but I was tired, so I went to bed early. The sofa in the rec room was pretty comfortable, and I had a pillow and a blanket. I put the light on in the closet, pulled the blanket up, and went to sleep.

I woke up to those noises. The raccoon was doing something in the closet. I checked the thin line of light under the door. Something was in there. I could see shadows crossing the light as the raccoon or whatever moved around. The raccoon couldn't turn the knob and open the door, I figured. I'd tell Dad in the morning.

The raccoon knocked around in the closet. I pulled the covers up, trying to get back to sleep, when the light went out.

I nearly wet myself. No way a raccoon or possum could turn off a light. I wanted to get Dad, but for a minute I couldn't move. Then it was too late. The doorknob creaked as someone turned it. I pulled the covers over my head, leaving a slit so I could see in the dim light through the window.

The door opened quietly and a gray shape came out of the closet, leaving the door open. The shape moved noiselessly past my sofa. I held my breath. I was scared he would hear me. The gray shape went up the stairs and into the kitchen. I breathed again.

I heard faint noises in the kitchen. The intruder was getting food from the refrigerator! Someone was living in our house. I got off the sofa quietly and went to the closet. What was he doing in there? He couldn't be living in the closet. It was too small, and we'd have found him.

I looked through the door. Too dark to see anything. I turned on the closet light. The faint light showed a panel had been removed from one wall. That must have been the noises I'd heard. In the wall behind the panel were holes, a kind of ladder where you could put your feet in the holes and climb up and down.

I remembered Mom and Dad were asleep upstairs. Sheila and baby Tommy were in their rooms. I needed to warn Dad and get the police. I started out of the closet to get my cell phone when I heard the man shutting the door to the stairs.

I heard him come down the stairs. I turned off the light. I was trapped! I froze, like a deer in headlights although it was pitch dark. I told myself, UP! No place to go but up!

I felt for the foot holes and climbed up. I had no idea how far it went up or where it ended and I could get out. Or what I'd do if the stranger found me up there, but it was the only way out.

I went up one flight and saw the kitchen through a crack. The moon through the windows showed an empty room. I scrambled up another flight and was between my parents' room and Tommy's. Through a peephole I saw Mom and Dad were asleep. I tried knocking on the wall to wake Dad up, but I didn't dare knock loud. The man was in the closet now. I heard him shut the door, and the wall creaking as he began to climb up.

I practically flew up to the third and last floor. There was a small platform, barely big enough to stand on. I stopped there. Trapped. I was doomed. I heard those noises again which must have been the man putting panel back in place.

I felt around the small platform and felt a handle. I pulled it and a panel about two feet high in the wall slid open to a narrow gap between two walls. The sloping roof meant one end was narrower than the other. I stooped and went into the gap, shutting the panel behind me. The moon through a small window showed a sleeping bag on the floor, and a pile of money(!), a box with jewelry, and other stuff that had gone missing.

I was in the hideout of the robber with his ill-gotten gains and he was coming!

I crawled across the gap to where the roof was higher and stood up. There was no place to hide. If I blocked the panel, he'd realize someone had found him. He might run away, or he might check to see if all of us were sleeping in our beds. When he found I wasn't in bed, I had no idea what he'd do.

I couldn't let him hurt Mom and Dad, or Sheila and Tommy, but I was 14, skinny, unarmed, AND I'd left my cell phone in the rec room. The window. Try the window.

I opened the window and crawled out on the roof. I shut the window as quietly as I could and moved away and hid behind a chimney. I heard the man come in his hideout, and then nothing.

I was trapped on the room. Maybe in the morning Mom and Dad would look for me and I could warn them. In the meantime, I rested against the chimney and waited for the sun to come up.

I woke up stiff and sore, resting against the chimney so I wouldn't roll off the roof. The sun was just up. Dad was an early riser, so I hoped he'd find me soon.

A garbage truck rumbled down the road. The men stopped at each house and dumped trash in the back. The truck roared and grumbled as the trash was compressed into the truck. I waved, but they couldn't see me. I hoped they hadn't collected the trash at my house yet, cause maybe then I could get their attention.

It seemed like hours but was actually three houses before they got to our house. I crawled to the edge of the roof and called to them. They looked around for a while before they saw me up on the roof. The driver got out and came in the yard to talk to me.

"Kid, are you alright?"

"Mister. There's a robber hiding in our house. Please call the police."

"OK, kid. Hold on." He spoke to one of the other men, who pulled out a cell phone and called.

"They'll be here soon. Are your parents inside?"

"Yeah, but don't let the robber know I'm here. He might come after me or hurt my family. Please."

"Sure, sure, but we need to let your parents know. They can get your family out while we wait for the police."

He had a good idea. We had no tenants this week. If my family could get out, they'd be safe. I gave him Dad's number. He spoke to Dad for a long time, but at last Dad came outside in his pajama top and jeans. I told him what was going on and he ran back in the house. A few minutes later he came out carrying Sheila. Mom followed him with Tommy, and I could breathe easily again. My family was safe. Now I had to stay safe from the robber.

A few minutes later the police arrived. Two cops got out of the car and came in the yard. Now we had my parents, my sister and Tommy, still sleeping, the truck driver and his two assistants, and me on the roof. It's a wonder the robber hadn't realized something was going on and run away.

When the cops understood everything, and how to get to the robber, they called for backup. A couple of police put a ladder up to the roof. They climbed up and I climbed. Dad took the other two police in the basement and showed them the ladder in the closet.

Two police went up the ladder from the closet and the robber was trapped between the police on the roof and the police on the little landing. The police arrested the robber living there. The gap was a space between the two apartments that had been sealed off. Don, the former painter, was the robber. He found the ladder to the gap and fixed so he could come and go. This was his big break. A hiding place with no rent, free food, and plenty of places to rob.

The police took him someplace he'd have no rent, and free food. Two out of three.

The stolen items that were found were returned. Mom wrote Lenny, telling him what happened, and that it was all a misunderstanding. Lenny wrote back, saying Freda moved to Texas and was dating another guy. He sent Mom her address to give to the police to return the bracelet. A tragedy, like Mom said, and one Don couldn't be punished for.

Dad closed off the ladder that went to the gap, and opened the gap to make a little more room on the third floor. There haven't been any robberies since.