Terry Deary is renowned for creating and sustaining atmospheres of haunting and menace - and he is at his best in this creepy new story.

Laura Lund's family is rich - her dad won the lottery.

Tommy Pickford's family is poor; but he and Laura are good friends and look out for each other always.

Now, it's deep mid-winter and as a special treat, the children of Meek Street Primary are having a concert starring The Great Marvello, a magician who used to be famous.

Mysteriously, Tommy's ticket is handed to him one foggy night.

Someone appears from nowhere - just a set of footsteps in the fog...The concert is thrilling: the best trick is when Marvello seems to make Laura disappear.

But soon Tommy finds that she has disappeared. In fact, she's been kidnapped by Marvello for her family's money.

When he sets out to rescue her, Tommy finds that he too becomes a prisoner of the sinister - and unpredictable -