Chapter I: HAD looked forward to a swim that afternoon but Hamish’s request that

we keep an eye on the house next door forced us reluctantly to abandon the plan. Hamish might be a bit theatrical at times but there was no denying the fact that the Captain had a strange visitor and that, for whatever reason, he had appeared most unwilling to make us acquainted with the gentleman. So there did seem some sense in the idea that we keep our eyes peeled for what went on in our neighbor’s domain.

But as the long afternoon wore away, it seemed evident that nothing at all was going on. The smoke had long since died away from the chimney and, though the back door still remained fast closed, there was no sign of activity within.

I had been, I will confess, a little surprised that Eve had given Hamish her promise to say nothing to Aunt Cal about the mysterious guest next door. For Eve, though she could never be called in the least goody goody, has nevertheless rather strict ideas about honor and all that. She knew that the police were searching for Bangs and yet she was keeping silent.

“Eve,” I said at last. She had given up the pretense of sewing and was lying in the fragrant shadow of the syringa bush, her eyes on the drifting foamy clouds. “Eve, why did you agree not to tell Aunt Cal?”

“Why,” she frowned a little, “I only agreed to keep it dark till tomorrow.”

“But why did you agree at all?” I insisted. “It wasn’t because of that buried treasure stuff—because he might lead us to that?”

“No, it wasn’t that.”

“Then what was it?” I demanded caught by something evasive in her tone. “What was the reason?”

“Oh, well, I suppose I might as well tell you! You heard what Hamish said, didn’t you, about Bangs—that his real name might be something else?”

“Of course, but what of it? Suppose his name is Jones or Brown, what’s that got to do with it?”

“Hasn’t it ever occurred to you, Sandy,” she said slowly, “that it’s rather strange that this man has the key to Craven House and—well, that he knows his way about inside it so well that he was able to hide from the police the night they searched for him? Doesn’t that strike you as rather peculiar?”

“Eve, what are you driving at?” I cried.

“Well, suppose—just suppose—that Bangs, instead of being someone who could give Aunt Cal news of Carter Craven, suppose he was—was Carter himself!”

“Carter Craven! Oh, Eve, it couldn’t be! Why, he’s supposed to be dead, isn’t he? And—oh, besides—why this man is just a little sawed-off, bald headed rascal!”

“Well, you’ve got to remember that Carter was nothing more than a good-for-nothing—Aunt Cal practically said so.”

“He might be a good-for-nothing,” I retorted, “but that doesn’t make him a common thief. Besides,” I added firmly, “I don’t believe Aunt Cal could ever have been fond of a man with bowlegs!”

“What have his legs got to do with it, I’d like to know?”

“Well you know what I mean—he just isn’t the type to be Carter Craven!” And yet as I uttered the words a horrible doubt had begun to assail me. Suppose Eve was right, suppose this skulking vendor of fake hair lotions should turn out to be the long missing son of Craven House, well where did that put us? So far as we were concerned, of course, it didn’t really matter except that it made everything seem rather sordid. But Aunt Cal, how would she feel to find her own cousin facing a charge for petty thievery? Was that why Eve had promised to keep still?

“You want him to escape then?” I demanded. “On account of Aunt Cal?”

“Well wouldn’t it be the best thing that could happen?” she returned. “It isn’t of course as if they hadn’t recovered the car.”

“But the treasure—that letter—those measurements? If he goes—we’ll never know.”

She shrugged. “What does that matter compared with Aunt Cal’s pride? As things are she can think of Carter as having died peacefully in some foreign country. Of course there’s the little matter of the will—still nothing ever has been proved. Whereas this crime of stealing—everyone would know if Carter was charged with that!”

I sighed. I felt terribly disillusioned. “I don’t believe he is Carter!” I repeated stubbornly. “Carter was an adventurer—wild, restless, perhaps—but big in his way like the old Captain, his father.”

“In short a kind of romantic, story book hero!” retorted Eve cruelly, “wavy raven locks and fiery piercing eye and all that!”

“And straight legs!” I added. “Well, we’ll wait and see!”

After supper Miss Rose Blossom appeared to discuss Civic Betterment plans with Aunt Cal and the two were closeted in the front parlor for the rest of the evening. Things could not have turned out better for us. Just as dusk was beginning to fall we heard a low whistle from the bushes by the front fence and going out, found Hamish crouched behind them. “Where is she?” he whispered.

“In the parlor with the windows shut so you don’t need to whisper,” I said. “And by the way, if it’s not too much to ask, I’d like to know what you expect to do in case this—this creature next door does try to escape?”

“I’ll follow him of course,” he said still speaking in a guarded undertone as if he imagined there was some hidden listener behind the next bush. “If he’s who I think he won’t be leaving these parts till he’s got hold of what he’s after!”

“You mean you’d follow him if he went out to Craven House tonight?” I demanded. “Does Hattie May know?”

“Never mind Hattie May,” he retorted shortly. “I’ve got to see this thing through and I’m not going to have any interference from girls, d’you hear?”

Eve giggled. “Well do try to keep away from wells and things, won’t you? And I do hope you won’t catch your death of cold out here in the damp yard.”

“I’ve got my raincoat,” he said. “Now all you’ve got to do is to scram—see—and keep your mouths shut!”

“Absolutely,” Eve said. “Good luck—see you in the morning!”

It did seem funny going to bed with Hamish hiding out there in the bushes. Would he really stick it out, I wondered? Sometimes there seemed more to Hamish than appeared on the surface. Eve poked back the curtains after she had blown out the light. “See anything of him?” I asked.

“Not even a shadow! Wonder what Aunt Cal would think if she knew that the house was guarded!”

Darkness and quiet descended then. Soon Eve’s even breathing told me that she was asleep. For awhile I lay wondering some more about Captain Trout’s visitor, coming finally to the common-sense view that he was just what the Captain himself had stated—a ship’s cook, perhaps temporarily out of a job. Having reached this conclusion, I fell comfortably asleep.

The next thing I was conscious of was a footstep in the hall outside the bedroom door. My first startled thought was of the cook. Then I heard the steps descending the stairs, soft but firm. Aunt Cal, of course. But the dark square of the window told me that it couldn’t be morning yet—why was she going downstairs in the middle of the night? What prompted her?

I was wide awake at once. What had happened? Had I missed something? I slipped out of bed and to the open bedroom door. The reflection of a light was on the wall, coming from the hall below. I stole to the top of the stairs. I could hear the key turning in the front door—something very special must be up, I thought. I couldn’t just stand there and listen, I’d got to know.

I flew back to the bedroom, got into my dressing gown and slippers. Eve had not stirred. A minute later I was following Aunt Cal out onto the narrow front stoop. She had set the lamp down on the little stand in the hall and the light from it streamed out. She turned and saw me as I started down the steps. “What is the matter?” I whispered.

Instead of the rebuke I had looked for, she said indignantly, “There’s a tramp asleep behind the hedge! I don’t know what this town is coming to!”

“B-but how do you know?” I stammered. “I mean maybe you just imagined it—the shadows, you know—and—and all——”

“Sandra, you’d better go back to bed,” she returned severely. “I do not require any advice or assistance.”

“No, of course not,” I returned hastily. “I just meant that things are deceptive at night. And even if it is a tramp,” I went on desperately, “wouldn’t it be better to wait till morning? At least it would be safer.”

She was not listening to me. She had now advanced firmly halfway across the little front yard toward the hedge. “Why on earth couldn’t Hamish have stayed out of sight?” I thought, “and what had moved my aunt to look out of the window in the middle of the night anyway!”

Aunt Cal reached the hedge and peered over it. “Come out of there,” she ordered loudly, “or I shall have you arrested for trespassing.”

There was no answer. She advanced along the hedge, she was approaching the clump of bushes where we had last seen Hamish. I held my breath. If only I could do something to prevent the revelation that was impending! I wished Eve were there, she might have had an inspiration.

Aunt Cal had reached the bushes. She had picked up a stick and now began poking at them fiercely. “Come out of there!” she repeated. “Or I shall call the police!”

All of a sudden my eyes, which had been vainly trying to pierce the shadows, were attracted upward. In the house beyond the hedge a light had winked on. It was in the little upper window facing our way. Aunt Cal saw it too for she paused momentarily in her poking.

And while our attention was thus distracted, a figure hurtled from between the bushes and the hedge and plunged headlong through the latter and on across Captain Trout’s back yard, a rubber coat flapping about its ankles as it ran. “There! What’d I tell you!” Aunt Cal exclaimed. “The miserable loafer!”

We watched the figure disappear into the darkness. “Tomorrow,” said my aunt, “I shall make a complaint. Come, you must go back to bed at once, you’ll catch your death on this wet grass.”

“Yes, Aunt Cal,” I said meekly, and followed her back into the house. And without further ado I presently found myself back in my own room again with the door, by special admonition of Aunt Cal, locked on the inside.

But the light in Captain Trout’s upstairs window still winked across the grass and now and then, I could see it blink as if a figure stepped between it and the window. Perhaps the cook had had another chill, I thought with an inward chuckle, and had demanded still more blankets! Well anyway Hamish had got safely away. Then, suddenly as it had come, the light winked out.

“What’re you looking at?” Eve stirred sleepily.

“Nothing,” I began and stopped. Someone was coming out of the house next door—a short figure in white duck trousers, dark coat and visored cap. The Captain? Where on earth could he be going at this ungodly hour?

Eve was beside me, I could hear her catch her breath. “It’s him!” she said.

“You mean the Captain?” I asked, puzzled at her intensity.

“Of course not. Can’t you see the way he walks and—and his legs!”

“You mean it’s the cook all togged up like that?”

“Disguised of course. We might have expected something like this. I suppose Hamish is asleep by now.”

“No,” I said, “I don’t think so. The last I saw him he was hoofing it across Captain Trout’s back yard in the general direction of the sea.” And I told her what had happened.

“Why on earth didn’t you wake me?” she said when I had finished. “To think I should have missed it all! Do you think Aunt Cal suspects anything?”

“I don’t think so. Where d’you suppose he’s going, Eve—the cook, I mean?”

“Back to sea, very likely.”

“Then that’ll be the end—of everything. And we’ll never know who he was or what he wanted!”

Eve yawned. “Well that’s apt to be the way things peter out in real life, you know,” she said. “The villains just walk out of the picture.”

“And the noble man hunter takes to his heels!” I sighed.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

XXIII

A Belated Visit

HATTIE MAY came over early next morning. She was in a frightful temper and declared she was going to take the next train back to Mason’s Cove and leave Hamish to his fate.

“What’s he done now?” I inquired. “No more run-ins with the police, I hope?”

“So far as I’m concerned,” she stated, “he could languish in a foul dungeon before I would lift a finger to extrapate him!”

“Extricate, I expect you mean,” I said. “But what has he done?”

She flung herself into Aunt Cal’s rocker on the back porch and began to rock violently. “He locked me in my room, that’s what he did!”

“Locked you in your room? But whatever for?”

“You’ll have to ask him that! It was last night. As soon as I was convinced he actually meant to carry out his crazy plan of watching that house, I told him he shouldn’t go one step without me.”

“Yes, well? I suppose he didn’t take to the notion?”

“My dear, he just shut up like a clam. And all during supper I couldn’t get a single solitary civil word out of him. It made me awfully embarrassed, sitting at the table with the other people all chatting away and him acting like that! Never once opening his mouth except to shovel in food.”

“Disgusting!” I agreed.

“Well right after supper I went upstairs to get me a heavy sweater because I knew if I’d got to sit up all night out in your yard I’d need it. Well I was rummaging in the closet when I heard the door close very softly and locked from the outside! Can you imagine! The ingrate had followed me upstairs, waited till my back was turned and then turned the key.”

“But how did you get out?” I asked, stifling a desire to giggle. “Did the ingrate return?”

“I suppose he must have,” she answered indifferently. “The door was unlocked this morning. He didn’t appear at breakfast so I suppose he’s asleep.”

“I know how you must feel, Hattie May,” said Eve sympathetically. “But I suppose Hamish felt that what he had to do was a man’s job——”

“Man’s job!” she interrupted, with a scornful snort.

“Well he felt that girls around would sort of gum things up. He sent us packing in pretty short order.”

“Then he came?” she asked with curiosity. “Did anything happen?”

I told her about Aunt Cal’s interruption of the vigil and then about the departure of the mysterious stranger from the house next door.

“My goodness,” she exclaimed when I had finished. “Then there is something to it. The man’s a crook or he wouldn’t sneak off like that in the dead of night. I certainly am glad Hamish wasn’t there to see him, though. Why he might have been trailing the man yet, he might even have followed him onto a ship and gone to sea!”

“Well, you know persistence is a fine quality,” I remarked.

“Oh, yes, it’s all very well for you to stand up for him but you didn’t spend the night under lock and key. I kept waking up and thinking what I would do if there was a fire, and I thought how Hamish would feel when he gazed at my charred body!”

“Oh, well, there wasn’t any fire and you spent a comfortable night in bed instead of on the damp ground,” Eve said soothingly.

Hattie May seemed to be thinking. “I do think it’s a crime that a man like that should be allowed to escape,” she said at last. “I wonder if Hamish knows about it?”

“Well, since you’re not on speaking terms with him,” I giggled, “I don’t see how you’re going to find out. Besides if you’re leaving on the afternoon train——”

“Oh, I suppose I’d better stick around,” Hattie May said. “We can’t be sure that the fellow has gone back to sea and—there’s the key!”

But for all Hattie May’s sticking around, no more was seen of Captain Trout’s mysterious visitor. Aunt Cal reported to the local constable that a tramp attempted to pass the night in her yard and the following evening we saw a uniformed figure peering over our hedge just after dusk. But apparently discouraged by his failure to round up anything more criminal than Daisy June chasing fireflies, he soon abandoned the pursuit and retired—we guessed—along with other respectable citizens to the shelter of his own roof.

So much for the tramp! As for Captain Trout—whom Hattie May now dubbed our perfidious neighbor—nothing much was to be got out of him. A guarded reference on Eve’s part to his late guest elicited merely the statement that he, the Captain, couldn’t stomach so much fried food and had sent the fellow packing.

It was one day after dinner, the following week, that Aunt Cal, who had spent the morning baking, said she had made a little spice cake for Mrs. Viner. “I was expecting to take it out to her this afternoon,” she remarked, “but Rose has called a meeting of the Civic Betterment to see about those folks burning rubbish in the lot beyond the millpond. Of course the cake will keep——”

“Oh, do let us take it out, Aunt Cal?” I begged. “We’d just love to.”

“I don’t know about that,” she shook her head doubtfully. “After what happened to my dandelion wine——”

“Oh, please don’t hold that up against us,” Eve pleaded. “You must admit the circumstances that time were unusual. Hamish isn’t likely to fall into another well—at least I hope not!”

No one can resist Eve for long. And so in the end, Aunt Cal packed the cake in a basket and entrusted it to our keeping. “Tell Mrs. Viner I’ll be out to see her in a few days,” she said. “That is, if you see her!” she added dryly.

I took the basket. “Aunt Cal,” I said, “this day will vindicate our reputation, you can depend upon it!” I blew a kiss toward her as I opened the door.

“Well, if you take my advice,” she sent a parting shot after us, “you won’t make any stops on the way.”

We decided to walk down the shore road and call for Hattie May. She had been so disappointed at our failure to take her to Millport on Michael’s affair that we were anxious not to seem to slight her again. “But I’m not at all sure she’ll be good for the invalid,” Eve remarked. “She’s quite as likely as not to tell her she’s looking poorly or start talking about some lovely funeral she went to!”

We found her alone. “I’ve just finished a letter to Mother,” she said, “and I guess Hamish’ll be hearing from Dad before long!”

“You don’t mean he’s still acting strangely?”

“My dear, I scarcely see him at all except at meals and he won’t tell me a solitary thing!”

We caught the two o’clock bus from the square and at a little before three were opening the gate of the big stone house which Aunt Cal had described to us. Somewhat to my relief, we found the invalid much improved and sitting out in the sun. She welcomed us cordially and I guessed that she was pleased enough to have some one new to talk to. We chattered on, telling her about school, about Hamish’s fall into the well and about our discovery of the statue of Circe at the bottom of it.

“Dear me,” she exclaimed, “what a terrible experience for the poor boy. I wonder that he retained his reason, I’m sure I shouldn’t have!”

“I’m not a bit sure that he has,” Hattie May said feelingly, “at least not all of it. The way he acts!”

We laughed and Mrs. Viner said, “I remember so well when the old Captain—as we used to call him—first set up those statues in his garden. My, what a lot of talk it made!”

“You knew Aunt Cal when she was a girl, I suppose?” I said.

“Oh, dear, yes, we went to school together. At the old district school that was torn down when they put the state road through.”

“Did you know my uncle, Tom Poole, too?” I asked.

“Yes. Cal and Tom were married the year before the old Captain died. When she came back from the West, I hoped I would have her for a neighbor but—well, things turned out differently,” she added discreetly.

We talked on till suddenly Eve jumped up. “We were cautioned the other time we started to call on you not to stay more than ten minutes,” she said, “and not to talk any nonsense. I’m afraid we’ve broken both rules.”

“The idea!” Mrs. Viner laughed. “You mustn’t take your Aunt too seriously.”

“But we really must go now,” I agreed. “You see our reputation is at stake today. Aunt Cal doesn’t really trust us out of her sight any more.”

“Cal’s bark is a lot worse than her bite,” Mrs. Viner returned. “And you’re to tell her from me that I’m feeling much better for your visit.”

A short distance beyond Mrs. Viner’s gate, Eve stopped suddenly. “If there was any other way to go home,” she said, “I’d be in favor of taking it.”

“Well there isn’t,” I retorted. “And if you find that old house so enticing that you can’t even walk by it, it’s just too bad! For my part I wouldn’t care if I never saw it again.”

“Just the same let’s—well, let’s rest a minute,” she said. “Here on the wall.”

“Rest? Gracious we’ve just started!”

Eve sat down. “I just happened to think,” she said carelessly, “that it’s about time for Michael to come along.”

“Huh!” I retorted. “I’ll bet you’ve been planning to wait for him all the afternoon. I think you’re a shameless hussy!”

Hattie May giggled. “I don’t see why we shouldn’t wait for him,” she said. “If he has his wagon he’ll give us a lift.”

“Yes, and if he’s on his bicycle, he’ll wave his hand and go sailing by. And we’ll miss the bus!”

We were still arguing when the faint rattle of a wagon fell on our ears and a moment later, Michael’s blue shirt and brown head appeared above the brow of the hill. “Hello,” he called as he drew alongside of us, “waiting for some one?”

“Just resting,” Eve told him with a twinkle.

“Don’t want a lift then?” he grinned.

“Well perhaps we might—what d’you think, girls?”

But Hattie May was already in the front seat and Eve and I climbed into the rear as we had done that first day when we had fairly to beg for a ride.

“Anything new in the mystery line?” Michael inquired with a slap of the reins.

“Well,” said Eve between jolts, “your friend Captain Trout has been harboring a visitor—a kind of cooking recluse, if you know what I mean. But he left in the dead of night arrayed in white trousers and a visored cap.”

Michael did not seem greatly impressed by these revelations. “The Captain knows a lot of seafaring birds,” he said. “Very likely the fellow blew in between sailings.”

“Then you don’t think it was Bangs?” I asked.

“How should I know. But there’s something else you might be interested in—somebody’s been digging up that old garden again.”

------------------------------------------------------------------------

XXIV

It Fits!

AT these words my heart sank. “There goes all our good resolutions and promises!” I thought. For of course I knew that we’d never go straight home now!

“Digging up the garden!” cried Eve. “How d’you know?”

“I saw it this morning when I stopped to have a look for my flashlight which I mislaid the night I was—ah—pinched! The door was locked, and I couldn’t get into the house. On my way out I noticed that somebody’d been at work in the garden in a new place.”

“Then that creature hasn’t left the country at all,” Hattie May cried. “It’s just as I suspected, he’s still after the treasure!”

We were approaching the house. “Want to stop and have a look?” Michael inquired teasingly. “Might pick up a clue—collar button or whatnot! Don’t you think?”

“Oh, no, I don’t think we’d better,” I began hurriedly, though I knew as I said it that it was useless.

“Of course we must stop,” Hattie May declared. “Hamish would never forgive me if I neglected a single clue!”

“We-ll,” said Eve doubtfully, “I don’t suppose it would really do any harm just to run in for a minute. So long as we don’t have to catch the bus,” she glanced doubtfully at me.

I shrugged. “Do just as you like,” I said, “but don’t expect me to explain things to Aunt Cal!”

“Leave Aunt Cal to me!” Eve laughed lightly and began to climb down from the wagon. Without enthusiasm I followed her and once more found myself making my way over the wall, across the yard toward the tangled garden. It was getting to be a habit, I reflected. It almost seemed as if some unknown force kept drawing us back to the old house and its secrets.

Michael pointed out the place where a new hole had been dug nearby where we had discovered the first one, and apparently hastily filled in again. Could it be that Bangs had returned?

“You’d hardly think he’d dare hang around,” Eve said thoughtfully.

“It just shows how badly he wants that treasure,” Hattie May cried. “He’s willing to take any risk.”

“Wish I could think of a way to get my flashlight,” Michael said, glancing toward the house. “I think I’ll just have a try at those cellar windows on a chance,” he added. “Be right back.”

“They’re all nailed fast,” Eve called after him. But he strode on.

We sat down on the edge of the fountain. The statue of Circe still lay where we had left it, reclining in the leaf strewn bowl. Hattie May began poking with a stick in the newly filled hole. Several minutes went by and Michael did not return. “He must have got in after all,” Eve said, glancing a little apprehensively I thought, toward the thick growth of bushes that obscured our view of the rear of the house.

As she spoke our attention was caught by the sound of a car coming up the hill. Automobiles passed that way so seldom that we all jumped up instinctively. To our surprise it appeared to be slowing down in front of the house. Then suddenly I recognized Miss Blossom’s little coupe and saw that lady’s ample bulk at the wheel. A woman beside her was leaning over and peering out.

I groaned as I looked. “Aunt Cal! If that isn’t just our luck!”

Hattie May giggled. “Look, the fat lady is waving!”

“Come on,” Eve started for the wall. “I’ll explain everything satisfactorily to Aunt Cal.”

We climbed back over the wall. Miss Blossom beamed upon us. “We’re out joy riding,” she explained. “I told Cal she needed a little relaxation from her responsibilities. We’ve been doing forty miles an hour before we struck the hill!”

“We thought,” Aunt Cal remarked pointedly, “that we might meet you coming home!”

“Oh,” I said confusedly, “we are—I mean we’re going on directly—we’re just waiting for Michael.”

But Aunt Cal did not seem to be listening to my halting excuses. Instead, I saw that her eyes—and her thoughts with them, I guessed—had strayed beyond me toward the house dreaming there in the soft sunset light.

“My, how sweet it smells!” exclaimed Miss Blossom. “I wonder if those tea roses are still blooming? Do you remember them, Cal? They were the sweetest ones I ever knew! What d’you say we take a peek around?”

Aunt Cal seemed to come back with a start. “Get out if you wish, Rose,” she said. “I hardly think I care to do so.”

“Oh, come on,” Miss Blossom urged. “Stretch your legs a little.” She began, as she spoke, lowering her massive bulk onto the running board. We gave her a hand over the wall, though she was surprisingly agile for one of her size. The tall grass fell away before her as at the advance of a steam roller. “My,” she exclaimed, “what a jungle!” She turned again, “Come on, Cal,” she urged.

Aunt Cal seemed to hesitate. And then I saw that she, too, was getting out of the car. We came, all five of us, back to the garden. Michael was still absent. Miss Blossom sank panting on the edge of the fountain. “My land! It’s just a crime to let a place run down like this!” she commented. “’Member the time we went wading in this fountain, Cal?”

But Aunt Cal, if she remembered, did not say so. She was standing erect, gazing about her. And it was not so much sorrow at the sight of the neglect and decay that I read in her face as regret for something that is past and gone forever.

Suddenly Michael came advancing toward us. “Hullo, there,” Miss Blossom called. “Is the house unlocked? Could we go inside?”

To my amazement Michael nodded. “Yes,” he said, “it’s unlocked.”

“But I thought you said,” Eve began and then stopped.

“Good!” said Miss Blossom. “Then we can take a look around.”

“Oh, no, Rose!” Aunt Cal spoke up sharply. “Not inside!”

“But why not?” returned the other matter-of-factly. “If the agent’s so careless as to leave the place unlocked, he couldn’t object to our going in. I’d just love to see how the old place looks—I hear it’s just about as Carter left it.”

“It isn’t much to see,” Michael remarked. “Just a musty old place.”

“Michael Gilpatrick,” Miss Blossom demanded accusingly, “is there some reason why you don’t want us to go in. Out with it—what mischief have you been up to?”

Michael’s brown face reddened at the memory of last Saturday night. “I only went after my flashlight,” he said a trifle lamely. “I left it somewhere around——”

Miss Blossom jumped up spryly. “Well, anyway, I’m going in,” she declared. “Come on, Cal, don’t be sentimental!”

I got up too. I found myself suddenly sharing Miss Blossom’s curiosity. Eve and Hattie May followed us and, as we reached the door, I saw Aunt Cal and Michael reluctantly bringing up the rear. Aunt Cal wore a strange expression as if some inner force were compelling her against her will.

Miss Blossom pushed open the door and advanced into the kitchen. “My,” she snorted, “what a stuffy place! What this house needs is a good airing and”—she glanced sharply around—“a good scrubbing with strong soap and plenty of elbow grease. Look at that range, Cal!”

But Aunt Cal did not look at the range. She was staring ahead at the open door and at the wide hall beyond it. It was as if she expected to see someone advancing out of the shadows.

Then Hattie May’s high-pitched voice broke in. “Listen,” she said, “what’s that noise!”

“I don’t hear anything,” I said. “And I guess you don’t either, it’s just your imagination.”

“But I did, I tell you. There! There it is again!”

For an instant we all stood listening. And sure enough, there was something, a gentle tapping noise coming from far down the hall. “My land, the place is haunted!” Miss Blossom giggled nervously. “Oh, girls, I’m scared!”

Eve looked at Michael. “Do you know what it is?” she demanded.

He shook his head. “No, but I think it’s time I found out!” He walked toward the open hall door as he spoke.

To my amazement, Aunt Cal hurried after him. She was just behind him as he put out his hand for the handle of the parlor door. “Be careful, Cal!” Miss Blossom called in a whisper. “I wouldn’t——”

Aunt Cal paid no heed. And as Michael opened the door she advanced with him across the threshold. From where we stood in the middle of the hall we heard a startled exclamation. Then suddenly, like a breath of fresh air, came Michael’s clear ringing voice breaking from surprise into laughter. “Hamish! What on earth——?”

We all crowded forward. In the middle of the shuttered parlor stood Hamish, looking very much like a small boy caught stealing jam. His face was flushed, his shirt rumpled and I noticed a filigree of cobweb clinging to his hair. “Just a little private investigating I been doin’,” he offered the explanation sullenly as we all clustered wonderingly about him. “But of course,” he added petulantly, “I can’t get anywhere with a lot of folks bustin’ in on me!”

“Hamish Lewis, what are you doing in this house?” Hattie May demanded shrilly. “Look at your shirt and that tear in your trousers!”

Hamish regarded his sister coldly. “All a girl thinks about is clothes,” he muttered.

I was scarcely listening to this interchange. Ever since I had entered the room I had been conscious of something which had not been there before. This was a curious odor, a heavy, sweet aromatic smell. A smell which reminded me of the East and vaguely, too, of something else, that awakened a hazy memory.

“Mercy, what smells so funny!” Miss Blossom was sniffing the air.

“Guess you mean that jar that got spilled.” Hamish, still with a highly injured air, pointed to where a small bronze jar lay overturned in front of the fireplace. “I moved that cabinet a little,” he added, “and that jar fell out and spilled. It had that funny smelling stuff inside.”

Aunt Cal went over to where the jar lay and, stooping, began gathering up the scattering of dried brown particles and stuffing them back. “It’s the jar of myrrh,” she murmured, “that Uncle Judd brought back from Arabia.”

It was then that I suddenly found myself saying a thing for which I was totally unable to account. The words seemed to come out of themselves, almost as if another person had spoken them. “The cabinet,” I said, “doesn’t belong there anyway.” And I added inconsequentially, “It’s right in the way of the cupboard.”

“Cupboard?” Eve looked at me strangely. And Hattie May said, “I don’t see any cupboard. What on earth are you talking about?”

“The cupboard there by the fireplace,” I insisted.

“Sandy,” said Eve anxiously, “what’s the matter with you? There isn’t any cupboard. You can see that.”

“Yes there is,” I returned positively. “It’s where they kept the china duck.”

Of course they were all staring at me now as if they thought I had become light-headed. “It’s very close in here,” I heard Miss Blossom murmur. “Don’t any of these windows open?” And Eve asked, “Do you feel all right, Sandy?”

Then Aunt Cal said a surprising thing. “I do seem to recall a cupboard there at the right of the fireplace,” she said slowly. “I had forgotten it entirely,” she looked at me oddly. “I can’t think how you knew,” she added.

Hamish, saying nothing, now walked over to the fireplace and began feeling along the pink rosebud wallpaper which edged it. Suddenly he began to tear at it. “Sufferin’ sunfish! I b’lieve you’re right, Sandy! I believe there is a cupboard there—see, there’s the edge of the door! And me lookin’ in the chimney!”

“Looking for what?” Eve demanded. But Hamish did not answer her. He was too busy tearing away strip after strip of the rosebuds. We all gathered around to watch. Nobody seemed to care at all that the wallpaper was being ruined.

As for me, my heart was beating strangely as the outline of the cupboard came into view. Inch by inch it was revealed. But how had I known?

At last the paper was all off and we were gazing at a good sized door set in the wall about four feet above the floor. There was no handle or knob, that had evidently been removed when the paper was put on. Hamish took out his knife and thrust it into the keyhole. “Locked,” he announced.

“Well don’t that just beat all!” Miss Blossom cried. “How long do you calculate it’s been covered up, Cal?”

Aunt Cal shook her head. “It must have been done after Uncle Judd died,” she said. “I remember hearing that Carter had some of the rooms papered before he went away.”

Miss Blossom nodded. “Like as not the paper hanger did it himself without consulting anybody. If it was that Jed Button from Millport I wouldn’t put it past him! I remember the time he did ma’s room——”

But no one seemed to be listening to Miss Blossom. We were all intent on watching Michael as he tinkered with the lock. “Guess it’s no use botherin’ with it,” Hamish remarked. “I guess it’s getting pretty late.” He took out his watch.

Michael looked at him suspiciously and went on tinkering. Then suddenly Eve gave a gasp. “Why,” she cried, “the key! Where’s the key? The one we found in the tobacco tin?”

“Why of course,” almost screamed Hattie May. “Why didn’t we think of it before? Hamish, you’re the one who took it! Where is it?” Then accusingly, “You’ve been keeping it back on purpose, you wanted to wait till we were gone!”

To this accusation Hamish’s only answer was a shrug and a sigh as he plunged his hand into his trousers’ pocket and drew out the key. With a grin Michael took it and thrust it into the keyhole. There was a click and Hattie May gave another scream. “It fits!” she cried. “It fits!”

But the lock was rusty and the key refused to turn. “Needs oiling,” Michael remarked.

“There’s an oil can in my car,” Miss Blossom suggested. “We’ve just got to get this cupboard open before we go! Like as not we’ll find the family skeleton in it or something!” she added with a laughing glance toward Aunt Cal. Aunt Cal did not say a word.

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XXV

Gopher