Boney Billy was a friendly skeleton. It was his mission on one occasion to save the boys from a series of ghosts who were trying to get at them. This is what happened:

One day, Erbert and Gerbert took refuge in a strange and mysterious house while trying to escape from Comet Morehouse. To brighten up the room in which they found themselves, the boys lit several candles. However, shortly after they had been lit, the candles began to flicker and go out one by one. No matter how quickly the boys ran around relighting the candles, they soon found themselves in total darkness. At that point something came from the closet, and they could hear footsteps approaching and a low evil chuckle emanating from whatever was in the room with them. They backed to the wall and waited for the unbelievably horrible creature to reach them. Just when they thought that all was lost, a panel in the wall opened and a boney hand pulled both of them out of danger. This how they met Boney Billy and got to know him.

Boney Billy lived in the haunted house. To support himself, however, he was required to hire himself out on a yearly basis to new rich families who felt that they had not arrived socially unless they could proclaim to the world that they had a "skeleton in their closet."