Ned shook his head. “I’m afraid we won’t be able to get that idea across, Fatty. There’s something going on out there that we don’t understand; something that somebody is afraid we’ll get wise to. That letter to Sam and the ‘ghost’ he saw at his window were attempts to scare him away from the place. This paper nailed to the door is the next step and is meant forus. They succeeded in frightening Sam away; now the question is, are we going to quit?”
“Not on your life!” yelped Dick Somers, whose wrath had been steadily rising during this discussion. “We’ve put a lot of money and hard work into this scheme of ours and I say stick it out!”
“If they’ll be satisfied with trying to scare us with letters and ghost stuff, why we’ll be able to stay with ’em until we’ve got our money back anyhow,” said Beals, cautiously. “The dance crowd is looking for almost anything in the spook line and they will stand for quite a bit of it, but what worries me is the possibility that if ghosts don’t drive us out, something else may be tried—some rough stuff, you know.”
“You don’t suppose old Coleson may have a hand in it after all,” ventured Wat Sanford.
“Coleson? Not a chance!” declared Rogers, positively. “Coleson’s dead.”
“Well, er—even if he is dead,” persisted Sanford, uneasily, “what if—”
“Cut it out, Wat! Use yourbean,” drawled Dave Wilbur. “As for me,” he continued, “I’m voting to keep the dances going till I get paid for all the hard work I did out there,” and Dave yawned wearily at the recollection of his labors.
“It would be a shame if we had to quit now. Everybody is talking about our ghost dances, and there will be a big crowd out there next time,” volunteered Jim Tapley.
“We may have a fight on our hands,” began Ned Blake, “but I’d rather fight than run, any time! As I see it, we’ve got to find out who it is that we are up against; what their game is; and why they think we are interfering with it.”
“Rather a large order, as a starter,” remarked Dick. “However, it sounds interesting. What’s your plan, Ned?”
“We ought to keep guard over that house night and day for a while,” was the quick reply. “Quite likelyweare being closely watched, and it would be a good plan for us to do some watching. Two of us can take grub and blankets and camp there for twenty-four hours, or till relieved by the next two.”
“That sounds reasonable. Who’ll volunteer to be the first sentry?” asked Dick.
“We’ll draw lots,” decided Ned.
This was done and the short straws were found to be held by Charlie Rogers and Tommy Beals.
“All right, Fatty! We’re it!” exclaimed Rogers. “The sooner we start the better. Get plenty of grub and blankets and bring that big hammock of yours; it will come in handy!”
The two left for home at once to procure the necessary supplies, and that afternoon Dave Wilbur deposited them and their belongings on the porch of the Coleson house.
“Any last request you want to send back to the folks at home?” grinned Dave, as he backed the car around and headed for town.
“Yeah, tell ’em to have a steak and onions ready for me at six tomorrow night,” sighed Beals. “It’s going to be hungry work hanging around out here!”
“I wish we hadn’t floored over this opening into the cellar. I’d like to get a look down below,” said Rogers, thumping the solid oak with the heel of his shoe.
“Not for me!” decided Beals emphatically. “I’m for minding my own business and I recommend that policy to you, Red, but if you’re curious, you can hunt for an outside entrance to the cellar. I should think there must be one somewhere.”
Acting on this suggestion, Rogers searched diligently among the debris that lay along the foundation of the house, but without success. The heavy granite wall showed no opening and the masonry which sealed the mouth of the old mine-shaft was undisturbed.
“Come on in and eat!” summoned Beals.
Reluctantly, Rogers gave up his search and rejoined his companion, who was already making steady inroads upon the baked beans, bread and pickles that comprised the evening meal. Supper over, the two sat before an open window, watching the colors fade from the quiet surface of the lake.
“I suppose we’ll have to take turns with the sentry stuff,” remarked Rogers, as darkness at last settled down upon the landscape. “I’ll stand watch till midnight and then you can take your turn for a couple of hours.”
To this arrangement, Beals readily agreed, and climbing into the hammock, which had been strung across a corner of the room, he was soon asleep.
For a while, Charlie Rogers sat, chin in hand, staring out into the deepening dusk. Along the northern horizon distant lightning was flashing and from this quarter heavy clouds swept up the sky, blotting out the stars and reducing the moon to a dim disc, which paled and faded behind the thickening canopy. Sounds of night life came to the ears of the watcher. Somewhere off to his left a giant bullfrog bellowed hollowly for a “jug-o-rum.” A night-hawk swooped past the window with a startling whirr of wings. From the woods on the far side of the house an owl hooted lonesomely.
Rogers got up, stretched, and glanced hopefully at the illuminated face of his watch. “Only ten-thirty!” he muttered. “Gee! This is a tedious job! I thought it must be nearly midnight!”
Returning to the window, he pillowed his head upon his folded arms and listened to the soothing splash of the little waves which a rising wind was sending upon the pebbly shore of the lake. His breathing became longer and more regular; his body sagged forward upon the sill. Once again came the hoot of an owl from the woods beyond the house and this time the cry was answered from a point closer at hand. It was the dull ache in his arms that finally brought Charlie Rogers to his senses. Again he consulted his watch.
“Quarter past one!” he gasped. “Great Scott! I must have—”
He paused in mid-thought and listened with every nerve a-tingle. Was he dreaming or had he really heard something? His pounding pulses were ticking off the seconds in his brain. Yes, there it was again! A metallic clink or rattle accompanied by a dull thud—faint but distinct.
Backing away from the window, Rogers crossed the room with noiseless steps.
“Wake up, Fatty! Wake up!” he gasped. “There’s something doing outside!”
Beals was up in an instant and together they crept back to the window. The waves were breaking upon the beach now with a steady surge, but above their murmur a strange fluttering sound, not unlike the flapping of huge wings, came to the four straining ears.
“It’s outside at the other end of the house!” breathed Rogers in a scared whisper.
“It’s up to us to find out what it is,” replied Beals, and crossing the room with Rogers at his heels, he noiselessly opened the front door.
A vivid flash of lightning, followed a moment later by the jarring rumble of thunder, greeted the boys as they traversed the porch and crept down the steps. Keeping close to the wall of the building, they made their way cautiously toward the end of the house and peered past the corner.
The lightning flash had been succeeded by a pitchy blackness which their straining eyes could not penetrate, but the strange flapping sound had increased with their approach and the clinking rattle, as of metal upon metal, came at irregular intervals.
“Lie low and wait for the next flash of lightning!” whispered Beals close to his companion’s ear.
Crouched against the wall of the house they waited breathlessly. One—two—three minutes passed, and then once more the white glare of lightning blazed forth.
Brief as was the flash, it afforded the boys an instantaneous glimpse of something that struck them dumb with amazement. Extending from the end of the house to the edge of the woods, a distance of more than one hundred feet, stretched a grayish something. It was not unlike a layer of mist or smoke; and seemingly knee-deep in its billowing, heaving folds, a bent, misshapen figure, like a gigantic hunchback, stood outlined against the grayness beneath. It was but a fleeting glimpse, for instantly the scene was blotted out and with the splintering crash of quick thunder there came a pelting rush of rain.
“Beat it!” gasped Beals, and together the frightened boys raced for the door, and plunging into the shelter of the house, they shut and locked the heavy oak barrier behind them.
When Ned Blake and Dick Somers arrived at the Coleson house the next afternoon, they listened to a tale beside which Sam’s story was colorless by comparison. Dave Wilbur, who had brought the relief guard in his convenient flivver, was inclined to be skeptical.
“Use your bean!” he urged, as Beals and Rogers set forth the details of their terrifying experience. “You two are getting as loony as Sam! You probably heard something that scared you and then imagined you saw a whole lot in one flash of lightning!”
“I’ll bet you five dollars that you don’t dare stay here alone tonight!” rasped Charlie Rogers, wrathfully.
“Can’t do it,” drawled Dave. “I’ve got half a day’s work to do yet before sundown. Hop in here now, you bewitched watchmen! Let’s get going!”
Left to themselves, Ned and Dick carefully examined the ground where had occurred the alleged ghostly happenings so vividly described by Beals and Rogers.
“It’s mighty funny that if there actually was somebody out here between the house and the woods, he or she or it didn’t leave a single track of any kind,” mused Ned as he surveyed the open space with puzzled eyes. “Here’s over thirty yards of sand from the house to the hard ground near the woods and not a mark on it, except our own tracks!”
“Well, if the same thing happens again tonight, we’ll try to have a better look at it than Red and Fatty could get in one flash of lightning,” declared Dick. “I’m hoping it stays clear after the moon comes up.”
Dick’s wish was granted only in part, however, for after climbing above the line of trees, the moon was covered much of the time by drifting clouds, through which it peeped at infrequent intervals. The boys had decided to pass the night outside the house, as this would allow them to observe a much more extensive part of the premises than could be seen from inside. The spot selected for their sentry post was a thicket of oak, from which they had an unobstructed view of the stretch of sand between the end of the house and the woods. At intervals one or the other crept from this leafy covert and scouted entirely around the building, moving with caution and scanning every possible approach to the house. Returning from one of these rounds, Dick reported the lights of a vessel out upon the lake.
“Let’s take a look at her,” suggested Ned, and together they walked down to the beach.
The vessel seemed to be moving in a southwesterly direction, and they could see the ruddy gleam of her port light.
“She’s some freight boat making for Cleveland,” guessed Dick, but even as he spoke, the green starboard light flashed into view and it was evident that the boat had altered her course and headed in shore.
For a time the boys watched the strange craft as it drew steadily nearer, when suddenly her lights winked out, leaving her a black hulk which loomed dimly in the darkness.
“Well, what the deuce doesthatmean! What is she up to now?” exclaimed Dick.
As if in reply to his question, a long, thin finger of light reached out from the vessel’s bow and played along the shore, not twenty yards from where the boys stood.
“Down! Quick! Don’t let ’em see us!” cried Ned, flinging himself flat upon the sand.
Dick dropped beside him and together they watched with fascinated gaze the small circle of light as it crept toward them along the ground. Nearer and still nearer it came, but just as it seemed about to settle upon them the spot lifted suddenly and touched instead the wall of the house, which it slowly swept from end to end.
“That’s the light we saw Saturday night,” whispered Dick. “A searchlight that shot through the window when you opened the shutter!”
“Yes, and I think I know what they are searching for,” replied Ned in the same low tone. “Look!” and seizing Dick’s arm he pointed to the white mark now clearly illuminated as the circle of light came to rest upon the chimney of the house.
“The ranges!” Dick’s voice rasped in his throat. “She’s picking up the old range marks!”
In a moment the top of the tall whitened stake at the water’s edge was touched by the thin beam of light and it was evident that the mysterious craft was creeping shoreward in line with stake and chimney. And now there occurred something that brought a gasp of astonishment from the two watchers lying prone and motionless upon the sand. A hundred yards or more from shore and just ahead of the oncoming vessel, the quiet surface of the water was suddenly agitated into ripples which silvered as the moon poured its rays through a great ragged break in the clouds and disclosed a small dark shape that seemed to rise from the depths and float upon the surface. Instantly the searchlight was extinguished and the darkened vessel drifting slowly shoreward came to a stop beside the floating object.
“That thing is a marking buoy,” muttered Ned under his breath. “Now we’ll see what’s going on here!”
In this, however, the boys were doomed to disappointment. Heavy clouds again blotted out the moon, and although the watchers crept to the water’s edge, they could see nothing except the dark hull of the vessel as it lay motionless.
“They’re probably coming ashore in a small boat. Be ready to run if they land near us,” warned Ned.
But no boat was lowered from the mysterious stranger and, except for an occasional faint splash, no sound reached the eager ears on shore. An hour passed and then it was seen that the vessel was in motion. Gradually her dark form grew dimmer till it melted from sight amid the shadows that lay black upon the broad lake. Again for a brief moment the clouds parted and the brilliant moonlight whitened the sands and tipped the tiny ripples with its radiance. Every rock and bush along shore stood revealed with startling distinctness, but on the silvered surface of the lake nothing was to be seen. The buoy—if such it was—had vanished.
“I suppose that boat took it away,” suggested Dick.
“Possibly, but I’m not sure,” replied Ned. “We saw it appear and maybe sometime we’ll find out where it came from and where it went. There doesn’t seem to be anything that we can do here. Let’s get back to the house; it’s almost two o’clock.”
Retracing their steps, the boys had reached the scrub oak when they halted with one accord and stared through the leafy screen.
“What did you think you saw?” demanded Ned, sharply.
“Why, why, it might have been a firefly,” stammered Dick, “but just for an instant I fancied it was a—”
“You thought maybe it was the tail light of an automobile going into that old wood-road,” interrupted Ned, grimly. “That’s what you thought—and I guess maybe you were right.”
“Can we follow it?” asked Dick.
Ned shook his head. “There’s no use chasing out there in the dark. Even if it was an auto, we’d have no chance of catching up with it. We’d best try to get a little sleep and wait for daylight.”
Rolling themselves in their blankets, the boys lay for a long time, talking over the exciting events that had transpired since they first began work on the Coleson house. Instead of clearing up, the situation was growing more and more complicated, and after racking their brains in fruitless efforts to solve the puzzle, they at last fell asleep.
The sun shining through the oak leaves above his head roused Ned Blake, and sitting up, he looked at his watch. It was nearly nine o’clock.
“Wake up, Dick!” he cried, pulling the blanket from his companion’s shoulders. “It’s late! We ought to have been on the job hours ago!”
Dick struggled to his feet, rubbing the sleep from his eyes, and followed Ned, who was hurrying through the bushes in the direction of the old wood-road. Quickly but thoroughly the boys examined every foot of ground between the entrance to the road and the house. Broken weeds and crushed leaves showed where some vehicle had passed along the stony way, but not until the boys were close to the house did they come upon an unmistakable sign. On the hard earth amid the scrub oaks, a black splotch caught Ned’s eye.
“Here’s where an auto was standing only a few hours ago,” he declared positively. “This is oil that dripped from the gears.”
“It’s oil sure enough,” agreed Dick, poking at the black mass with a stick, “but isn’t it possible that it came from one of the cars that were out here Saturday night?”
“If it had been here since Saturday night, that heavy thunder shower would have washed it into the ground,” objected Ned. “No, this is fresh oil and we know there was no car here up to midnight.”
“Which means it was run in here while we were watching that boat down on the shore,” growled Dick, disgustedly. “What rotten luck!”
“Yes, one of us should have kept watch up here,” admitted Ned. “We lost a good chance to get a look at our mysterious visitors, but we’ll know better next time.”
Dave Wilbur, chief of transportation, was not expected till afternoon, but he appeared soon after eleven o ’clock. And he came alone.
“Wat Sanford and Jim Tapley are drafted for tonight’s guard duty, but Wat funked the job and Jim won’t come without him,” explained Dave. “Wat’s naturally superstitious anyhow and Red and Fatty have fed him up with that bedtime story of theirs, till he’s so jumpy he’d see Coleson or Coleson’s great-grandmother if you hollered boo at him!”
“Well, he’d have seen something queerer than any of the Coleson family, if he’d been here last night,” declared Dick, proceeding to give an account of the night’s happenings.
“So while you two were watching some tub out on the lake, a car ran in here and out again,” remarked Wilbur dryly. “Well, ‘when the cat’s away, the mice’ll play,’ but take my advice,” he continued more seriously, “no matter what you saw—or what youthoughtyou saw—don’t say a word to the boys about it. If Wat gets another jolt, he may refuse to come out here Saturday night, and a jazz orchestra without a trap-drummer would be about as jazzy as a church picnic. Tip off Red and Fatty if you like, but make ’em lay off Wat Sanford with their ghost stuff.”
As there was nothing to be accomplished by remaining longer at the house, it was decided to return to town without delay. Charlie Rogers and Tommy Beals were waiting in the Wilbur yard when the three drove in.
“Did you fellows see anything out there last night?” asked Rogers eagerly, as he and Tommy followed the car into the garage.
Ned paused to close the garage doors against possible intrusion and then proceeded with a more or less detailed account of what had occurred.
“Then you didn’t get a sight of that—that creature; that big, shapeless, humpbacked-looking thing that Red and I saw standing between the end of the house and the woods?” asked Beals.
“Oh, you needn’t look so darned wise, Dave!” snapped Charlie Rogers, his peppery temper flaring at sight of Wilbur’s ill-concealed grin. “Fatty and I saw it—even if it was only for an instant. If Ned and Dick had stayed up at the house, they might have seen it also!”
“That is quite possible,” interposed Ned, quickly, “and although we didn’t actually catch sight of a person or anything that looked like one, we saw enough to make us sure that there’s something mighty queer going on out there. We’ve got to find out what it is, but until wedosolve the mystery, let’s not say much about it—especially to Wat or Jim.”
“You talk about solving the mystery,” began Tommy, doubtfully. “Have you got any idea, Ned?”
“No, I haven’t,” admitted Ned, “but I’d like to investigate that old wood-road. We might stumble onto something.”
“How about it, Dave? Will you run us out there?” asked Rogers, who was eager to begin the proposed search.
“Sure thing,” grinned Wilbur. “I’d like nothing better than to get a look at some of this ghost stuff with my own eyes.”
Hardly an hour had elapsed since its previous trip when the patient flivver was again coughing its way up the drive to the Coleson house. Neither Wat Sanford nor Jim Tapley had been asked to join in the exploration of the old road, because, as Dave Wilbur expressed it, Wat and Jim were jumpy enough already.
“Let’s scout around a little before we tackle the road,” suggested Ned. “Red and Fatty can have another look out there between the end of the house and the woods while Dick and I go over the ground down toward the beach. Do you want to come with us, Weary?”
“Nope. ‘Too many cooks spoil the broth,’” drawled Dave. “I’ll stick around and make sure this humpbacked spook doesn’t carry off the flivver,” he added with a grin, as he lolled back comfortably and allowed his long legs to dangle over the side of the car.
Charlie Rogers glared angrily at the scoffer. “Here’s hoping he carries it off—and you with it!” he growled.
“Don’t let him get your goat, Red,” urged Tommy, as he seized Rogers’ arm and hurried him out of ear-shot of Wilbur’s irritating chuckle.
For half an hour the boys searched every foot of ground in the vicinity of the house without finding anything new.
“I guess this is about enough,” declared Ned. “There’s nothing to be learned here. Now let’s start at this end of the old road and trace it back as far as it goes. Four of us can walk ahead and Dave can follow with the car.”
For perhaps two miles the boys threaded the grass-grown track, which was so overgrown in places that the small trees and bushes swept both sides of the car, as it crept along behind the party on foot. There was ample evidence of the recent passage of some vehicle in the broken twigs and stripped leaves along the way, and whenever the grassy surface gave place to sand, the marks of rubber tires were plainly visible.
“Here’s where Ned and Fatty and I struck into this road the other day,” exclaimed Dick, pointing to a clump of crooked birches which he recognized as marking the spot.
“You’re right,” agreed Ned. “From now on, we’ll be traveling over new ground and we must keep our eyes open. Let’s go slow and cut out the talking.”
Half a mile farther, Ned, who was in the lead, halted suddenly and dropped to his knees.
“What is it?” whispered Dick, who was close behind.
“Some kind of a clearing,” was the cautious reply. “There’s a pile of slabs and I can see a shanty. Lie low, fellows, while I sneak up for a closer look,” and creeping silently away to one side, Ned disappeared amid the thick undergrowth.
For ten minutes the boys lay motionless; then a low whistle brought them peering over the pile of slabs to see Ned standing before the shack.
“What do you make of it?” asked Rogers, as they hurried forward to join Ned, who was looking in at the partly open door of the hut.
“It’s nothing but a shanty the wood-cutters used when they cut the timber off this tract about ten years ago,” declared Wilbur, who had driven up and halted at the door.
“I guess you’re right, Dave,” replied Ned, “but let’s see what’s inside,” and pushing the door wide open, he stepped in, closely followed by the others.
The cabin was oblong in shape, being about fifteen feet long by eight or nine feet wide. At one end were two bunks built against the wall. In the middle of the room stood a rough table of slabs and in a corner was a rusty stove propped up with bricks in lieu of missing legs. Dick lifted a rust-eaten lid and peered into the fire-box.
“Ashes,” he remarked. “Cold ashes.”
“Which proves simply that there’s been no fire here for the last few hours,” asserted Rogers. “That bunk looks as if it may have been slept in recently but I’ll admit it’s only guess work.”
Ned had been glancing about the shanty, his keen eyes taking in every detail. All at once he bent low and peered closely at something on the floor beside the table.
“What have you found, Ned?” asked Tommy Beals, and at his words the other boys crowded around.
“Keep back!” warned Ned. “Don’t disturb them.”
“Don’t disturbwhat?” demanded Rogers. “I can’t see anything—unless you mean those black ants!”
“That’s just what I do mean,” answered Ned. “Ants don’t act that way without some reason,” and he pointed to a straggling column of the insects, which were emerging from a crack in the floor, advancing to a spot beneath the table, and hurrying back again to the crack as though time were a matter of supreme importance to them.
“They’ve got a nest somewhere under the floor,” remarked Tommy. “Look! They’re carrying their eggs in their mouths!”
Ned was on hands and knees poking with the blade of his jack-knife among the hurrying ants at the head of the column. “That was a good guess of yours, Fatty,” he laughed, “only it happens that in this particular case what they’re carrying isn’t eggs.”
“What is it then?” demanded Beals.
“Bread crumbs,” was the quick reply, “and there’s more of ’em on the table.”
It needed but a moment’s investigation to confirm Ned’s statement.
“Somebody ate a meal here awhile ago—that’s quite evident,” declared Dick, excitedly.
“Yes, and not so very long ago either,” supplemented Rogers. “This hustling bunch of ants would carry away half a loaf of bread in a few hours.”
“Well, supposing somebody did eat here—or supposing they slept in that bunk Red is so keen about. What business is it of ours? Where’s the proof of any connection between them and our affair at Coleson’s?” demanded Dave Wilbur. “I’m going to take a snooze in the car till you ghost-getters find something more exciting than a rusty stove, a tumbledown bunk and a flock of black ants!” and with these words, he lounged out of the door.
“I guess maybe Weary’s more than half right,” admitted Beals, ruefully. “Confound him though; I wish we’d had him out at Coleson’s that night!”
“I’ll say so!” growled Rogers.
Reluctantly the boys left the shack, but as they passed the corner of the building, Dick halted and began to read aloud: “‘All persons are hereby warned against starting fires in any and all forest lands under penalty of—’” Dick paused in his reading. “That’s a fire-warden’s poster,” he remarked with a jerk of his ever ready thumb toward a placard tacked upon the side of the shanty. “The ranger has been here—maybe it was he who left the crumbs.”
“Nothing doing!” declared Rogers. “That paper has been there a month, easy. Don’t you think so, Ned?”
Ned Blake did not answer. He was looking fixedly at the poster from the lower corner of which a sizable scrap had been torn, thus interfering with Dick’s reading, as has been noted. A long moment Ned stared, then reaching into an inside pocket, he brought forth a fragment of paper which he carefully unfolded. Three strides brought him to the cabin where with a quick movement he placed his piece of paper against the torn corner of the fire warning. The ragged edges fitted together perfectly. “You wanted some proof awhile ago, Dave,” he said quietly. “Take a look at this, will you?”
Wilbur descended languidly from the car and joined the group at Ned’s elbow. “Sure it fits,” he drawled as he glanced at the fragment of paper under Ned’s thumb. “It fits perfectly—but what of it?”
Without a word Ned turned the scrap in his fingers and displayed the words scrawled upon its reverse side. Over his shoulder the boys read them eagerly.
“I don’t want company here.“E. C.”
“I don’t want company here.
“E. C.”
“Zowie!” yelped Dick Somers. “That’s the very paper we found tacked on the front door of the Coleson house!”
“Gosh a’mighty!” wheezed Tommy Beals. “Let’s dig out o’ here! I don’t like it!”
Charlie Rogers could not restrain a furtive glance over his shoulder at the half-open door of the shanty and even Dave Wilbur’s scoffing was silenced for the moment.
“I’ll have to admit that this doesn’t explain much,” began Ned, as he replaced the fragment of paper in his pocket. “In fact, it raises more questions than it answers, but at least we can be reasonably sure that one or more of our nightly visitors has been making some use of this old shack and also of this old road. Now let’s see if we can findwhatuse.”
With interest roused to a high pitch, the boys resumed their exploration of the wood-road, scanning every tuft of grass and every broken bush as they passed. After leaving the shanty, the road surface had become more sandy and the marks of rubber tires more frequent as well as more distinct, until at length they formed a clearly defined track in which the ribbed pattern of the tires showed plainly.
“We’re coming to the end of the road!” exclaimed Rogers, pointing to a wall of solid green that blocked the way some thirty yards ahead.
The boys had halted to consider this surprising fact, when an exclamation from Dave Wilbur drew all eyes in his direction. The lanky youth had dismounted from his car and now stood staring wide-eyed at the roadway immediately before him.
“What’s the matter, Weary?” gibed Rogers, a bit maliciously. “Doyousee a ghost?”
“The tracks!” blurted Wilbur. “Where are the tire tracks? They’ve disappeared!”
It was true. From the point where the boys stood, to the wall of foliage that apparently marked the end of the road not a tire mark showed upon the smooth, firm surface of the ground. As if actuated by a common impulse, all eyes turned back along the road. Yes, the marks were there plainly enough, but at a point almost beneath their feet the tracks ceased as abruptly as if the mysterious car had suddenly left the earth like an airplane.
Dave Wilbur was the first to speak. “Fellows,” he began in a tone quite different from his customary lazy drawl, “I’llcrawfish. I said I wanted to see some of this ghost stuff that you’ve been telling about. I’ll admit I thought it was bunk, but now I’m satisfied that ghost, or no ghost, there’s some darned funny business going on here!”
“If this is the end of the road, I suppose we’ll have to turn round and go back the way we came,” observed Tommy Beals with a nervous glance along the back track.
“Maybe so, but first I’d like to have a closer look at what’s ahead,” suggested Ned, and moving forward, he approached the barricade of living green that merged with the foliage of a giant oak. In a moment he was shouting for the others to join him, and as they hurried to do so, Ned parted the curtain of thick growing creepers to disclose the smooth surface of the main highway not twenty feet beyond.
“Here’s the answer to at least a part of the riddle,” cried Dick. “Come ahead with the car, Dave,” and as the flivver shot forward the boys pulled the vines aside sufficiently to allow the car to force its way past and gain the road beyond.
“Whoever uses that old wood-road has certainly hit upon a clever scheme to hide the entrance!” exclaimed Rogers, as he looked back at the vines that twined upward about the big oak and hung like a great curtain from one of its horizontal limbs. “If I hadn’t seen it done, I’d never believe a car could enter or leave this place.”
“Yes, but thetracks!” insisted Dave. “The screen of vines is simple enough, but how can a car pass in or out and leave no tracks?Mycar left tracks,” and Dave pointed to the faint marks left by the wheels of the flivver upon the twenty-foot width of hard ground between the edge of the macadam road and the barrier of vines.
“That’s just one more question we can’t answer—yet,” replied Ned. “I move we go home now and get together tomorrow morning. Perhaps by then some of us may have doped out an explanation.”
The meeting held next morning in Dave Wilbur’s garage was a strictly private affair. Neither Wat Sanford nor Jim Tapley was informed of it for the reason that neither of them could have offered anything as a result of personal observation or of actual experience.
“Well, Ned, did you dope out anything after sleeping on it?” asked Tommy Beals, after Ned Blake had called the meeting to order.
“Can’t say I did,” admitted the latter a bit ruefully. “The more I think of it the more puzzling it becomes. About the only thing I could do was to make a list of such facts as we are certain of so far. Maybe this won’t do any good, but, on the other hand, it may give us something to start from. Shall I read it?”
“Shoot!” grinned Dick. “That’s what Professor Simmons calls the ‘scientific method of approach to a subject’—get your facts all lined up and then make ’em tell their own story.”
“Sure, that’s fine—if the facts will tell a story that we’re not too dumb to understand,” grumbled Rogers, “but go to it, Ned. Let’s hear the worst.”
“Here’s how the thing lines up in my mind,” began Ned, producing a slip of paper to which he referred from time to time. “First off, we get the idea of using the Coleson house and we go out there and break into it. We don’t find any sign that anybody has been around the place recently. Next we get a lease of the property and start work on it. This was on June thirtieth. On July sixth somebody writes a letter to Sam, warning him to keep away from the Coleson house.”
“Yes, and of course that meant for us to lay off as well as Sam,” declared Beals.
“Well, we didn’t heed that warning,” resumed Ned, “and next came that light that jiggered along the wall, and a few hours later Sam gets scared out of his wits and off the job by what he thinks was a ghost at his window.”
“Something was there—that’s a cinch,” interrupted Dick. “That foot track under the bushes was no dream!”
“No, it wasn’t,” replied Ned, “and neither was that painted stake, nor the repainted mark on the chimney of the house.”
“Nor that scrap of paper we found tacked to Coleson’s front door,” added Tommy.
“All of those things are down on the list of known facts,” answered Ned, “and it seems they must have some connection with each other, but from then on, the case isn’t so clear. Red and Fatty heard strange noises at the house and are certain that somebody or something was at work outside. As to what they actually saw in one flash of lightning, we’ll leave out of the question—for the present.”
“Yeah, leave it out,” muttered Tommy. “I’ll admit it ain’t scientific—but all the same I’ll never forget it!”
“Me neither!” growled Rogers. “A black, humpbacked thing half-way between the house and the woods. Something that didn’t leave any tracks!”
“Go on, Ned,” interrupted Dave Wilbur. “What comes next?”
“Well,” resumed Ned, “Dick and I saw a vessel pick up those ranges with a searchlight, and we think that accounts for the strange light that appeared on the wall Saturday night; also we know that the boat came fairly close to the beach and lay there almost an hour, although nobody came ashore from her. Even allowing for a lot of imagination, we are sure we saw a queer thing like a buoy that rose out of the lake and later disappeared—somewhere. Shortly afterward we fancied we saw a red light at the end of the old road, and from what we learned yesterday, I’m quite positive we were right in calling it the tail light of an automobile.”
“There’s not much doubt of that,” agreed Dave, “also you’ve proved that there’s some connection between the shack in the woods and some of the things that have been happening out at Coleson’s.”
“Somebody is using the old wood-road and has taken a lot of pains to conceal the fact,” continued Ned. “I guess this about concludes the list of things we actually know—up to date. I’ll have to admit that all of ’em taken together don’t help us a whole lot when it comes to solving the puzzle.”
“Do you think we ought to report the whole thing to the police?” asked Tommy, doubtfully.
“Police! Not on your life!” yelped Dick. “Once it got known that the cops were hunting for somebody out there, we’d never get anybody for the dances. Right now a lot of the crowd are getting a big kick out of the idea that the place is haunted and the rest believe thatweare pulling off a few ghost stunts for their amusement—either way it’s going big. But a bunch of cops snooping around would kill it and leave us flat.”
“I think Dick is right,” agreed Ned. “We’ve got to work the thing out for ourselves—at least till we’ve made sure of our ground. We’re certain that something is going on out there and that it is being kept awfully close. Nobody is ever seen coming or going, yet we know such coming and going is actually taking place. Just what connection—if any—this has with the phony ghost stuff we can’t be sure of.”
“You can’t make Sam believe it’s phony,” murmured Tommy Beals.
“No, nor Wat Sanford either,” added Dave Wilbur. “He’s naturally more or less of an ‘Alice in Wonderland’ anyhow, and ever since Red and Fatty sprung that bedtime story about the hunchback, Wat has had the jim-jams regular.”
“Well, I guess we’re all pretty brave—in the daytime,” remarked Dick. “The question is what are we going to do about it all?”