The houseboat was not large. It consisted of a sort of large shed, with windows, doors, and a flat roof perched on what had once been a scow. There was a narrow space running all around the house part, between it and a low rail. There was a small float at one end to which a rowboat was made fast. From the float a cleated plank gave access to the lower deck of the boat, if a deck it could be called. There was also a short flight of rather rickety steps at the stern by which the girls had come aboard. The houseboat had once been painted green, but little of the original color remained.
“Will you follow me?” Dimitri Uzlov requested, opening a sagging door which led into the rear part of the houseboat. “This is where I do my work.”
The girls saw that the interior of the craft consisted of really but one large room, divided by heavy hanging curtains into two apartments. The one they had entered did the double duty of a sleeping and working space, for there was a cot in one corner. On a table gleamed a bright brass samovar with some dishes about it. There was an easel and on a chair near it brushes in pots, tubes of paint, and a much-smeared palette. The curtained-off part was the kitchen.
“I am finishing a marine for a client,” the artist said, indicating the half-finished canvas on the easel.
Arden and her chums noticed several canvases stacked together near one wall, and standing beside a window was another easel with a picture on it. But what the subject of this picture was could not be seen, for it was covered with a sheet.
“Oh, how lovely it is here!” Arden exclaimed. “To have a place all your own to do just as you please in and no need to worry about neighbors looking in your windows!”
“At least I am sufficiently isolated here,” the Russian agreed. “The houseboat is hard to come at. I always loved marshlands. That is one reason I was attracted to this boat, old and shabby as it is.”
“It’s wonderful, I think,” murmured Sim.
“But a little lonesome,” suggested Terry.
“I came here for lonesomeness—as one reason,” Mr. Uzlov said.
Arden glanced at the exposed picture showing a stormy ocean with sea gulls fighting the wind. Dimitri smiled understanding as she said:
“It is lovely!”
The artist seemed to be losing some of his reluctance.
Arden walked over toward the other painting—the one covered with a sheet. She wondered what it could be.
“What is this?” she asked, extending a hand as though to lift the covering. “Is it your masterpiece?”
Instantly the young man’s face clouded.
“Please—that—do not touch it—please! It is—unfinished. I cannot show it to you. I am sorry!”
His first words had been hurried—stiff—exclamatory. The girls at once sensed a change in his manner. But his last word had been almost pleading. Even then it seemed as if his friendliness, which had been so pronounced on the arrival of his visitors, was now as covered as was the picture.
Arden drew back as if hurt.
“I didn’t mean to be curious,” she faltered. “I’m sorry!” Even her words sounded empty of meaning.
Another change came over the face of Dimitri Uzlov.
“You will be so good as to pardon me for my seeming ill haste,” he murmured. “But that picture—no—it must not be seen—yet.”
Matters were becoming a little strained and awkward, but Terry went into the breach cleverly by saying:
“We had better be going. It must be nearly lunch time. Mother will be expecting us. Thank you for your help, Mr. Uzlov, and for letting us see your houseboat.”
He did not try to stop them, nor did he express regret at their sudden departure, but simply said good-bye and then watched them pull away in the waiting rowboat.
“Queerest person I ever met,” Terry began. “One minute all sunshine and gladness, and the next, all worked up because Arden asked about his old picture.”
“I wouldn’t have touched it, anyway,” Arden replied. “I was just trying to show a little interest. My goodness! Who would want to live in such a messy place? No one but the sort they call—artists!”
“I wonder what the hidden picture was?” Sim asked curiously. “Perhaps he’s a spy, making maps of the coast and inlet.”
“Now who said they refused to get mixed up in another mystery?” Terry jeered. “Well, let’s go home, I’m hungry.”
“So am I, but I would like to know what was on that easel,” Sim remarked as Terry pulled with strong strokes back to “Buckingham Palace.”
By afternoon the sun was warmer, and the girls, dressed in bathing suits, were lying on the caressing sand of the little beach not far from the house. They had spread their beach coats out beneath them and were sprawled in favorable attitudes to acquire the all-important tan. At intervals one of the girls sat up and coated herself liberally with cocoanut oil. They did not seem to feel exactly like talking, as the sun made them deliciously lazy. Perhaps they were thinking of their adventure at school when, as told in the first volume of this series,The Orchard Secret, many surprising things happened. Or they may have been letting their minds wander to more surprising occurrences, as told in theMystery of Jockey Hollow.
Sim, Arden, and Terry had been chums and schoolmates ever since they first began to acquire knowledge in Vincent Prep, and their friendship and loyalty continued until the present time, when they were just finishing their freshman year at Cedar Ridge, the well-known college for girls at Morrisville. This small city was not very distant from Pentville, where the three lived.
As Sim sat up to apply the oil again, she saw a dark object bobbing up and down far out on the ocean.
“Look, girls,” she cried, “does that look like someone to you, or is it just a log?”
“Where?” Arden asked, squinting at the bright water toward which Sim pointed, and then they were left in no doubt, for the bobbing dark spot began to swim. With long, sure strokes it came nearer to them, and they could see the white foam where the thrashing feet churned it up in perfect timing.
“Some swimmer,” Sim said admiringly. “Wonderful form. I wonder who it is?”
“We’ll soon see,” Arden replied, and Terry nodded in agreement.
The figure was making rapid time, and as it neared the beach, waited for just the right minute and then coasted in on a blue-and-white breaker.
The girls watched while the swimmer crawled a stroke then sprang upright and shook off water like a happy young animal.
“Why, it’s the girl who looked in at the window last night,” Terry exclaimed. “She can swim, can’t she?”
The girl saw them suddenly and was about to run up the beach and away when she hesitated. Sim saw an old gray sweater on the sand near them. It obviously belonged to the swimmer, and she would have to come quite near them to get it.
Sim smiled at her as she looked at them in an almost frightened way.
“You swim beautifully,” Sim remarked to relieve the shy girl. “Did you learn in the ocean?”
“Yeah,” she drawled, stooping for her sweater. “I learned in the ocean.” That was all she said.
“Do you live here, at Oceanedge?” Arden asked next.
“Not right here,” replied the swimmer. “I live on the other side of the bay with my father, but I come here to swim.” After such a long speech she again seemed ready to run away.
“We live up there,” Terry volunteered, indicating the house, the roof of which could be seen above low pines. “We’re just here for the summer. Do you live here all year?”
“Yes, I’m a native,” their new friend went on in a rather bitter tone. “I live, if you can call it that, with my father. He’s a crabber and a worn crab himself. What’s that oil for?” Arden was dabbing a bit on a rather red arm.
“To make us tan; want some?” asked Sim kindly.
The girl gave a little laugh. “My father would tan me if he caught me using anything like that. He says I’m so homely now, there’s no use making me worse.”
“Oh, but you’re a marvelous swimmer. I wish you’d swim with me some day,” said the sympathetic Sim. “What’s your name? Mine is Bernice Westover, but everyone calls me Sim,” she finished affably.
“Melissa Clayton,” the girl answered. “That’s a pretty thing.” She indicated a brilliantly painted wooden bracelet on Sim’s arm, the kind sponsored by the large department stores as being just the thing for beach wear because, perhaps, you couldn’t forget you had it on.
“Do you like it? You may have it,” Sim replied and slipped it off her arm. “Here, I’ve got lots of things like these, and you might like to have this.”
“Oh, can I really? I’d love it! I’ve never had a pretty thing like this in my whole life. My father thinks such things are no good and only give me wrong ideas. But I’ll take care of it always.” Melissa took the bracelet and slipped it on her tanned muscular arm, looking at it pathetically.
She wore an old, dark-blue jersey bathing suit, a little too large for her, and a white canvas belt. She had no bathing cap on, and her wet hair was beginning to curl a little as it dried in the sun. She looked at the wooden bracelet as though it were as precious as a diamond circlet, turning it around and around to admire it. A slow smile spread over her tanned face.
“Do you go to school here in the winter, Melissa?” Arden asked. This wild creature who swam like a sea nymph and smiled at a cheap wooden bracelet was something different and “terribly interesting,” in Arden’s opinion.
“I did go to school, but my father took me out last year when I turned fourteen; said I’d be getting ideas. So I don’t go any more,” Melissa replied, her white teeth gleaming and sparkling in her darkened face.
“But what do you do all winter when it’s cold and there’s no crabbing?” Sim inquired. “We’re asking you an awful lot of questions; do you mind?”
“No, I don’t mind. I don’t very often get a chance to talk to anybody. Pa never says a word, hardly,” the girl went on.
Arden, Terry, and Sim watched her sympathetically as she stood first on one foot then on the other in a nervous way, smoothing out the sand beneath her feet. They had never met a girl like her, and pitied her at once when they learned of her lonely life. But, sorry as they were, they realized that there was something about her that was different, a hint of a mind not as keenly alert as theirs. She was so slow to respond to their advances.
“Why did you run away the other night in the storm?” Terry bravely asked. “We wanted you to come in.”
“I was afraid. I just wanted to look at you all in the nice bright room, but when you saw me——”
“Melissa!” thundered a voice behind them.
They all started and turned. A shabbily dressed man was standing back of them on the sand. They had not heard his footsteps. Had he purposely crept up on Melissa?
“What are you doing there?” he asked roughly.
“Nothing, Pa—I was just swimmin’.” Melissa seemed to swerve visibly, and she looked nervously down at the bracelet Sim had given her.
“What’s that you got? Haven’t I told you not to take things?”
“I didn’t take it, Pa. She gave it to me. I never even asked.”
“Give it back, right away, and come along home! You’ve been fooling around here long enough. Quick, now!”
Melissa’s childish blue eyes pleaded to be allowed to keep the bracelet, but her father, reading her thought, stepped forward and pulled it from her arm.
“Here, miss—I don’t allow Melissa to take things,” the gruff man growled.
“Oh—but it’s nothing,” faltered Sim. “Please——”
Clayton ignored her entirely, as he did Arden and Terry. They might not have been there, for all the attention they were given. Their attempt at helping Melissa went for naught.
Melissa pulled the gray sweater on over her still wet bathing suit and, smiling ruefully, followed her father, who had begun plodding up the beach. She did not look back but plodded along herself, trying to keep up with his big steps but, apparently, not intending to walk beside him.
The girls watched the retreating figures. Clayton was talking earnestly, now and then flinging out a hand in gesture and turning to shake his fist at his daughter, watching her closely as he tramped on.
“What a mean man!” Sim exclaimed, fingering the returned bracelet. “That poor child must have a rotten time.”
“He certainly was a gruff old fellow,” Arden agreed. “But did it strike you there was anything strange about that girl?”
“Only that she seemed so awfully scared. Like a kitten or stray dog. And I imagine she wanted to make friends,” Terry replied.
“I hope that man is kind to her. I hate people to be unhappy,” Sim remarked. “I’d better not begin to pity her, or I won’t enjoy myself, and I so want to do that.” She smiled appreciatingly at Terry, and then, taking the cork from the bottle of cocoanut oil, coated her pink skin again before starting for another dip.
The water was too cold for a long swim, perhaps because of the violent storm of the night before, and the girls did not stay in long. Sim, who loved swimming above all other sports, had to come out reluctantly, as she, too, felt cold. They dried themselves and raced back to the house to dress.
It was late afternoon when they were finally dressed and sitting once more on the porch of “Buckingham Palace.”
“It’s lovely here, Terry,” Arden remarked looking dreamily at the ocean.
“I hope you won’t get tired of it. As you know by now, there’s really nothing to do. Swimming, rowing, walking, and fishing if you care for it. But no country clubs. One movie that’s better left alone, and a tiny village,” Terry explained at length.
“Oh, but you’re forgetting our Russian friend and the wild girl of the swamps.”
Sim spoke up. “Not to mention the hard-hearted father and the ferocious wolfhoundandthe swimming. Don’t you worry, we won’t be bored. What I like best is the complete absence of mystery.” This was so pointed, the remark made a good joke.
“How about your theory that Dimitri is a spy and that Melissa is a kidnaped heiress?” Arden asked Sim, who was lazily swaying on the porch swing.
“Well, I do think he’s queer, and I may be right after all. It’s not natural for a man as young as he is to want to be alone unless he’s hiding something from somebody,” Sim insisted.
“Perhaps he is. But I find Melissa more interesting. Seemed to me that man she called ‘Pa’ had hypnotized her. And how mean of him not to let her keep the bracelet,” Terry remarked. “Just plain mean!”
As if that brought up different theories in each mind, their conversation dragged. The swim and the row in the morning left them feeling pleasantly weary and completely satisfied. Healthy fatigue was the real answer.
Sim moved back and forth in the rustic swing, while Terry and Arden gazed dreamily out to sea, where the dying sun turned white clouds to pink and painted the water a deep blue in the miracle of sunset.
They never even realized that a car was coming rapidly down the road behind the house, raising billows of sandy dust, until it stopped with screeching brakes at the back gate of Terry’s house.
“Who’s that?” Sim asked, as Sim would.
“I haven’t the least idea, little one,” Terry answered. “Unless it’s some more spies or kidnapers.”
“Let’s go see,” Arden suggested. “May we?”
But they were saved the trouble, for a woman was striding up the sand-edged path to the porch. She was dressed in black satin with a huge silver fox scarf, and glittering earrings showed beneath a small satin turban. She had dark eyes, and her lips were a scarlet gash. The girls waited apprehensively.
“I beg your par-r-don,” the woman began. “Have you a houseboat around here? He calls it—” she fumbled in a handbag and taking out a paper looked at it closely—“he calls itMerry Jane. Can you tell me how to reach it?”
“There is a houseboat down the bay, if that’s the one you mean,” Terry answered. “It is, I imagine, the only one around here.”
“No other houseboats?” the caller asked, showing white even teeth, pretty in spite of the carmined lips.
“No, only this one,” Terry told her. “But I didn’t know it had a name.”
“Then that must be it, my dear. Can you tell me how to reach it?”
“You’ll have to go back through the village, then along a swampy road to the edge of the bay. The road is rather bad because of the rain last night.”
“Through the village? Is there no other way? I did not understand one had to go through the village,” the woman remarked vaguely.
“Unless you go by boat. I don’t know of any other way of getting there,” Terry answered.
The woman seemed to be considering. She tapped her hand impatiently on the letter she had taken from her purse, and looked around her as though trying to get her bearings and to make some decision.
“But how can I get a boat? It is very important that I get over there. I don’t suppose—I would be glad to pay you—if—— Could you take me over? Have you a boat?” the dark woman asked abruptly.
“Yes,” answered Terry. “I could take you over, and of course I’d be glad to do it.”
“Can we go at once?” the woman asked nervously.
“I guess so,” Terry replied. “Tell Mother I’ll be right back, will you, Arden? I won’t be long.”
“Of course, Terry. But don’t you want——” Arden asked in a meaning, unfinished way.
For answer Terry turned aside from their strange caller and winked understandingly at Arden and Sim. Arden did not press her point further, but nodded her head and said no more. Both were thinking: “Now for another adventure!”
Terry quickly went for the oars and, with the dark flashy woman following, made for the rowboat. The passenger got in gracefully despite her extremely high-heeled shoes and sat in the stern while Terry pushed off.
“There it is, down there.” Terry pointed to the moored boat where Dimitri lived.
“That?” her passenger asked incredulously. “That—thatthing? Dimitri is an odd one. Fancy him living there!” she sneered openly.
Terry maintained an embarrassed silence and rowed more vigorously. They soon reached the side of the houseboat, and at the sound of the oars Tania appeared on the narrow little deck, barking furiously.
“Dimitri! Dimitri!” the woman called. “Have you still got that beast? Tie her up. I’m coming aboard.”
Dimitri, in answer to the call, opened the door and came outside. He looked almost shocked as he saw Terry and her queer passenger, and for a minute seemed awe-struck. Then he smiled at Terry, for it was impossible to be heard above Tania’s wild barking. He shrugged his shoulders and grasping Tania by the collar had literally to pull the huge dog away from the edge of the boat.
Terry came closer and grasped the side of the houseboat that the woman had spoken of asMerry Jane. She waited until Dimitri returned without Tania. He leaned down and, holding the woman by the hand, assisted her to climb aboard. Then, turning to Terry, smiling queerly, remarked:
“I don’t know whether to thank you, my friend, or——”
Terry’s eyes opened wide in astonishment.
“Dimitri,” the woman said between shut teeth. “What do you mean?”
“Nothing, nothing. Come inside, Olga,” he replied, and nodded to Terry as he held open the door for his apparently uninvited guest.
Terry knew at once she had no place in this strange little drama and prepared to leave. From the houseboat came the sound of a feminine voice raised in anger. But Terry could not understand the words beyond a pleading “Dimitri.”
She rowed quickly away, back to safer if not saner surroundings.
Terry bent to the oars, pulling hard and taking long strokes with the blades just missing the water. She could row with quite some skill when she particularly wanted to, and now she could scarcely wait to get back to tell Sim and Arden what had happened.
As she reached the little dock where they tied up their boat, she looked around and saw Arden and Sim inspecting the flashy green roadster which the woman “Olga” had left parked near their back door. Terry put her finger to her lips and whistled shrilly. Arden and Sim at once came running to meet her.
“What happened, Terry?—surely something?” Arden asked, climbing into the boat. Sim followed, and all three settled down to talk on the quiet water’s edge.
“Yes, lots!” Terry exclaimed. “He was furious when he saw her, and Tania was wild.”
“Who was furious—what about?” Sim wanted to know.
“Dimitri, stupid,” Terry went on. “When he saw whom I had in the boat I never saw a man look so mad.”
“What did he do?” Arden asked with great interest and hopeful expectancy.
“Oh, he was polite enough in a cold way,” Terry told them with a show of relish. “He tied up Tania and said he didn’t know whether or not to thank me. I heard him call her ‘Olga.’ When I left they were jabbering away as though they were mad at each other. Talking Russian, I guess,” Terry said rapidly. The sudden appearance of the spectacular woman had given them more excitement than mere words might explain.
“Why do you suppose she didn’t want to go through the village?” Sim inquired cannily.
“It looks to me as if she didn’t want to be seen,” Arden ventured.
“She seemed to know the artist pretty well,” Terry resumed. “She spoke as if it was queer that he should live in the houseboat.”
“Let’s go back to the house, the mosquitoes are beginning to bite,” Sim said, slapping her stockingless leg. “We can talk better there, anyway. Our voices might carry over the water.”
They all agreed this was a good plan and scrambled out of the boat. Terry tied it up and took the oars, and they went back to the porch.
It was almost dusk now, and the bay was hardly rippled by a land breeze that carried the annoying little mosquitoes with it. The porch offered the most comfortable place, screened in and commodiously furnished. Once there, the girls got ready for a “good talk,” and presently Terry’s mother joined them.
“I wouldn’t make too much out of this,” she warned. “You girls will become gossips if you don’t be careful,” she laughed.
“But, Mother,” Terry insisted, “he was so mad, and Tania was quite wild with rage. There must be something wrong about it.”
“Tania is a nervous dog, she barks at everyone,” Mrs. Landry remarked.
“She knows us now. I don’t think she’d bark at us ever again,” Terry decided rather triumphantly.
As though to prove this assertion, at that very moment Tania came bounding up the path. Her beautiful silky fur was coated with mud from the marsh, and water was dripping from her as the dog pranced along. She reached the screen door and gave a little “woof,” asking to come in.
Arden got up and opened the door. At once Tania, in high spirits, planted her muddy feet on Arden’s shoulders and licked her face. Arden staggered backward from the weight of the dog and stumbled over a chair. Tania could not keep on her own feet, and the two went down with a mighty bump. In the scramble Tania again playfully licked Arden’s face in the most reassuring if not the most dignified way.
Terry and Sim were laughing so hard they could do nothing to help, and Arden rolled over and buried her face in her hands. It was so sudden and so funny.
“Tania!” called Mrs. Landry sharply. “Stop it! Come here at once!”
At the sound of her name, Tania looked up and walked with her usual dignity to Terry’s mother, obediently resting her head in the woman’s lap. Mrs. Landry rubbed the silky ears and gently scolded the dog, while Arden scrambled to her feet and attempted to brush off the mud.
“See, Mother,” Terry said as she stopped laughing. “I told you she knew us.”
At that Terry reached out a hand to pet the animal and then exclaimed in surprise: “Look! Tania has a note under her collar!”
Quickly Terry pulled it out and began to read.
“It’s from Dimitri,” she announced as her chums waited to hear. “He wants to know if we can go back and get his guest, as his boat has sprung a leak and he can’t use it. Oh, Mother, may we go?”
“You’ll have to, I guess, since you took her over there,” said Mrs. Landry somewhat reluctantly. “But not all of you. With Tania and your queer lady passenger the boat would be too crowded. Just two of you should go, I think.”
“Oh, Mother, can’t we all go?” Terry begged, reasoning that she, as the best rower, must necessarily go, and hating to leave one of her chums at home.
“No, I think it would be too crowded. I’d worry. Why don’t you toss a coin and decide which one is to go with you?” Mrs. Landry suggested. She always worked with the girls, never against them.
Terry dashed into the house and, coming out, cried: “Heads Arden goes—tails Sim does.” She flipped the coin into the air and caught it on the back of one hand, cleverly, covering it for a moment with her other hand. Then she announced: “You win, Arden. It’s too bad, Sim dear. But you can take care of Mother, and we’ll come back just as soon as we can and tell you every little thing; won’t we, Arden?”
“Oh, surely!”
As was natural, perhaps, Terry and Arden were too excited to notice whether or not Sim minded very much being thus left behind. The two hurried down to the rowboat with Tania trotting after them. The dog curled up on the broad stern seat, and Arden sat near her to restrain her if necessary. But there was no need. Tania seemed very much accustomed to boats and hardly stirred.
Terry rowed quickly in the direction of theMerry Jane. From her position Arden could see Dimitri and his somewhat mysterious guest out on the narrow, railed walk that extended all around the house part of the boat. The Russian was obviously waiting for those whom he had summoned by the note on his dog’s collar. The woman Olga was talking to him rapidly, as Terry and Arden could hear. They noticed, as they drew nearer, that her face seemed paler than before, and her eyes were flaming. Dimitri looked quizzically at the approaching boat, and when they pulled alongside he quickly grasped Tania by the collar. The dog was transformed, suddenly, from the dignified white animal who had sat so quietly in the boat, to a raging, snarling beast. Dimitri hustled her on the houseboat and made her secure somewhere inside. He reappeared almost at once and said to Terry and Arden:
“It is most kind of you to do this. I do not like to be such a nuisance, but I promise you it shall not happen again.” The girls thought he seemed too cross even to talk to them.
He motioned to Olga, who jumped lightly into the boat.
“Good-bye, Dimitri,” she said clearly. “You have won this time, but it is not the end, by any means.”
“Au’voir, then, Olga, till we meet again. I hope it will not be—too soon,” he said, totally ignoring all politeness and smiling, the girls thought, bitterly.
“Thank you, comrade,” he said to Terry. “Will you take her back now? She is driving to New York tonight.”
Though he spoke to Terry, his remark almost seemed like an order to the dark woman, an order delivered in such a tone that it would seem foolhardy to overlook it. So Terry nodded her sandy head, and Arden said, “Good-bye,” almost inaudibly. Then they started back once more to Terry’s landing.
When they were out of earshot the woman apparently regained some of her composure; at least, she did not seem so angry.
“You know Dimitri, then?” she asked in an attempt to be pleasant.
“We gave him some candles one night, and he lent us an oar once,” Arden answered. “We don’t see him very often.”
“No, and you won’t,” the woman added. “He is a queer one. Did he ever show you any of his things? Any jewels, maybe?”
“Only some pictures. Why?” Arden asked frankly.
“I just wondered. Of course, he is very fond of his pictures and that dog of his,” she went on. “The largest picture. Did you see it?”
Arden shook her head.
“Oh, well,” Olga shrugged her shoulders and adjusted her silver fox scarf. “He won’t bother you again, I’m sure,” and she smiled to herself.
They reached “Buckingham Palace,” and Olga stepped out. With a perfunctory “thank you” she hurried to her car. There was Melissa Clayton gazing at it in raptures. Running her fingers over the shining fenders and pushing the upholstery to test its softness, Melissa was enchanted.
As Terry and Arden watched, they could see Olga speak to Melissa. The girl answered, her face wreathed in smiles. Then, as Olga spoke again, Melissa hurried around to the side away from the steering wheel and got in the car, shutting the door after her.
Olga, settling herself, started the motor, reversed the car on the narrow sandy road, and turned back the way she had come, with Melissa beside her.
For a moment the girls were speechless.
Melissa going off in the strange woman’s car!
“Well, what do you think of that?” Terry exclaimed as Arden and she, still in the boat at the little dock, watched Melissa get into Olga’s car and drive away.
“Suppose she kidnaps little Melissa?” Arden facetiously suggested. “We must tell Sim. I wonder where she is.”
“Sim! We’re back!” Terry called. “Where are you?”
“Here,” Sim answered from inside the house. “I was writing a letter. Come on up to my room and tell me all about it.”
Arden and Terry, each carrying an oar, almost ran from the dock to the house, and Sim, who could not wait for them to come up to her room, met them at the door.
“Tell me all about it! I’m sure something exciting happened. I can tell by your faces,” Sim exclaimed quickly.
“First, we’ll tell you about the lovers’ quarrel,” Terry joked. “And iftheyare lovers——”
“They are not,” flatly declared Arden. “More like partners in crime——”
“Hey, there!” warned Sim, “no crime in this. Go ahead, children. What happened?”
“Well, he was mad as hops when we got there,” began Terry.
“And she was, too,” Arden added.
“He practically said he hoped he’d never see her again,” Terry resumed.
“She was positivelylividwhen she got in the boat, and then she calmed down and tried to be nice to us,” Arden took up the tale.
“He called me ‘comrade.’ Wasn’t that sweet?” Terry wanted to know.
“I can’t figure it out at all,” Sim confessed. “And from the window I saw Melissa Clayton get in the gay car—imagine that! Melissa’s been hanging around here all the time you were away. She walked around the house once, and then I saw her peek in the kitchen window.”
“What can she want, I wonder?” Arden mused. “She’s a peculiar girl. Hope she isn’t in any trouble with that sour old dad of hers.”
“Looks to me as though we’ve dropped right into the middle of another mystery,” Terry announced, nodding her head wisely. “Maybe there are always mysteries, but onlywise girlsreally discover them.”
“Oh, Terry!” Sim exclaimed woefully. “I did so want to be lazy this summer. Mysteries are terribly wearing.”
“Well, you can be as lazy as you want to be, but for my part I’m in this mystery up to my ears already, and I find it thrilling,” Terry announced firmly.
Dinner that night was a somewhat hectic meal, for no one had a chance to finish a sentence about the mysterious Olga and the departure of Melissa before someone else would break in with the announcement of a new theory.
Ida, the maid, did her serving wide-eyed with amazement. She was not a girl to be easily frightened, but she possessed a great deal of natural curiosity. Despite Mrs. Landry’s efforts to shift the conversation into other channels, the names Dimitri, Olga, and Melissa popped up constantly.
Eventually the little house was quiet, with its occupants settled down for the night. Sim and Arden in one room and Terry alone in her own.
Sim and Arden literally talked themselves to sleep, but Terry lay awake for a long time listening to the lap of the waves on the shore and the chirp of the crickets and grasshoppers in the sedges.
It seemed as if Terry had just gone to sleep when she was awakened by a sound somewhere in the house. She listened. It was a barely perceptible squeak, as if a window were being pushed up very gently. She started, then sat upright. Yes, there it was again. Then, without waiting for robe or slippers, she jumped out of bed and ran down the short hall to Sim and Arden.
“Arden! Sim!” she called. “Wake up!”
“H-m-m?” grunted Sim sleepily.
“Someone’s trying to get in!” Terry whispered hoarsely.
Arden was awake instantly. “Where, Terry?” she murmured.
“Downstairs, I guess. Sh-h-h! Listen!” Terry put a warning finger to her lips.
Sim was sitting up now, and the three girls were as quiet as statues in the eerie moonlight streaming in the open window.
“There it is again! Did you hear it? Just a tiny squeak,” Terry asked.
“It seems to be coming from the dining room. Had we better call your mother?” Arden asked in a low voice.
They listened again, with hearts pounding and eyes questioning. What could it be? Or rather who could it be? Down at Oceanedge it was customary not to lock doors, and windows were usually left wide open. But Mrs. Landry, being city-bred, could never get out of the habit of locking up for the night. Whoever it was, seemed deliberately trying to force up a window, and it sounded as if the hands were slipping on the glass.
“Can you light the downstairs lights from up here, Terry?” asked Arden. “Don’t you think it would be a good idea to show them we’re awake?”
“Yes, of course, Arden,” Terry quickly replied. “I should have thought of that before. I’ll turn on the hall lights downstairs and give them an alarm!”
She slipped softly out into the hall and pushed a button. With a little snap the lights flashed on. Then silently the alarmists waited with apprehension. What should the next move be?
The sound was not heard again, and the girls in Sim’s room breathed a little easier.
“Do you think—they’re gone?” Sim whispered.
“I don’t hear anything; do you?” Arden asked.
“S-sh-h-h!” Terry hissed, and she went to the window.
The scene below was flooded with moonlight. The sandy stretch, so clear and unbroken, could not possibly hide a marauder. Terry was hoping to see the intruder make a dash for the safety of the garage shadow.
“Look!” she whispered to the girls. “It’s a woman!”
Arden and Sim dashed to the window just in time to witness the flight of someone, who, they did not know, in the bright moonlight. The figure was oddly distorted both by the light and the height from which they were looking.
“Who?” Arden asked cryptically.
Terry shrugged in reply. The figure ran swiftly and was almost instantly lost to sight in the shadow of the garage.
“There’s nothing we can do now,” Terry remarked. “And there’s no use waking Mother. She’d only worry.”
“Perhaps we had better tell Chief Reilly in the morning,” Arden suggested. “Isn’t it something new, having burglars around here?”
“I never heard of one before. I didn’t think they ever came down here,” Terry remarked. They were still looking out toward the garage.
“But this could hardly have been an ordinary prowler,” Sim reminded them. “We may as well go back to bed. She surely won’t come back, whoever she was.”
“I’ll leave the lights on downstairs. We must try to get some sleep,” Terry said, her stifled yawn entirely agreeing.
“Want to come in here?” invited Arden to Terry, who roomed alone.
“Oh—I don’t know. I’m not afraid,” Terry answered a little ruefully. “But since you suggested it, yes, I guess I will. Move over, Sim.”
After all, three girls might be better than one for almost any midnight alarm.
Smiling to herself in the darkness, Sim pushed over in the twin bed so that Terry could get in. Even at that, neither one would have very much space, and Sim was amused to think that Terry, the trenchant, should feel like spending the rest of the night with her rather than alone in her own bed.
“I’ll see that Rufus Reilly hears about this,” remarked Terry, burrowing under the covers. “The idea of disturbing honest peace-loving people in the middle of the night! What Oceanedge is coming to, I don’t know.”
“Who’s Rufus Reilly?” asked Arden.
“He’s the police force,” Terry replied. “He owns the only garage in the village and Dimitri’s houseboat too.”
“Quite a factor in the life of the community, isn’t he?” Sim murmured sleepily.
“Don’t make fun of him, Sim,” Terry rebuked. “He’s a very important man. He says so himself.”