CHAPTER XIV

A Forced Entrance

Horace was right. There was no ring, no notch, nothing on the drain cover except a few crisscross ridges and the name of the manufacturer in an oblong box. It was what Judy used to call a skunk box when she was a little girl in Roulsville before the flood. If you stepped on one of them you were a skunk. But now the skunk box was no longer funny. Someone, evidently, had stepped on the drain cover.

“Did you, Horace?” Judy asked.

“Did I what?”

“Step on that skunk box?”

He knew what she meant. “I guess I did,” he admitted. “I didn’t want anyone else to trip over it the way you did. I guess I stepped on it too hard. It would take a crowbar to pry it up.”

He tried working around the edge of it with his jackknife. The drain cover was slippery now that it was wet. Judy helped, prying and pushing as the water splashed down from the fountain above, getting deeper and deeper all the time. It was up to her ankles before Horace remembered having seen some lumber stacked up against the wall somewhere above the tunnel.

“If we could work a plank under the edge of that drain cover to give us leverage—” he began, but Judy had another idea.

“Why not the door? If we rammed the door to that locked room with a beam we could get in there and turn off the water before it gets any deeper. Then we could try opening the drain.”

“Good idea!” agreed Horace.

First they called to the prisoner. “The drain is covered! The tunnel will be flooded if you don’t turn off the fountain.”

There was no answer.

Suddenly they both realized that they didn’t know for sure that the man beyond the locked door had turned on the fountain. It had been a guess and they could have guessed wrong. Why didn’t the man answer? Already the water was seeping in under the door. Judy banged on it, calling and shouting.

“Are you Dick Hartwell? Please, whoever you are, answer! We want to get out of here and bring help. Do you know how to turn off the fountain?”

There was a little pause. Then came the answer.

“Outside ... the tower!”

“Oh, no!” exclaimed Judy. “Then we are trapped unless— Is there some way to get outside from in there?” she called.

“No ... no way.” The man was evidently growing weaker. “If you really ... want to ... help me,” he began and then broke off with a moan.

“We do want to help. Oh, Horace! We have to,” cried Judy. “All three of us will be drowned if we don’t get out of here!”

Horace’s reply was reassuring. “Not if we succeed in opening that drain.”

Another moan from behind the door spurred them to action. Horace brought a beam to push against one side of the drain cover while Judy pried up the other edge with a plank. At last it yielded to their tugging, and the water rushed and gurgled down the open drain.

The sound cheered Judy less than she had thought it would. “We’re no longer in immediate danger of being drowned,” she told Horace, “but you can still hear that running water in the pipes overhead. What are we supposed to do? Just wait here until they turn it off?”

“I don’t like waiting any better than you do,” her brother replied, “but I don’t know what else we can do. It gives me the chills just to listen to that water. I don’t trust those rusty pipes.”

“You mean they might leak?”

“Some of them are already leaking,” declared Horace. “But as long as the drain is in good working order I guess we don’t have to worry too much. The next thing to do is get dry. My feet are wet, and I’m cold all over.”

“You are shivering. Come on back to that furnace,” Judy suggested, “before you catch your death of cold.”

She knew, from experience, that Horace caught cold more easily than she did. But her feet were wet, too. For a little while they stood close to the heat of the furnace, drying themselves and wondering how long it would be before anyone turned off the fountain.

“Maybe they leave it on all day and turn it off at night,” Horace commented.

“No, they turn it on and off whenever they feel like it,” Judy said. “When we were here yesterday it was off in the daytime and then went on just when it began to get dark. There’s no rhyme or reason to it unless—”

“Unless what?” asked Horace.

Judy had been afraid to say what she was thinking.

“Unless someone reallyistrying to drown us. If the fountain is controlled from the tower, that dark man who warned me to keep away from here might be the one who turned it on. If he saw us he knows we suspect something.”

“It’s news, too,” lamented Horace, “but now it’s too late for today’s paper. It’ll be in tomorrow, though. You’ll see!”

“By tomorrow we’ll know a lot more than we do today,” Judy encouraged him. “We’ll know who that prisoner is, and why he’s down here. Horace, do you think he really is Dick Hartwell? Do you suppose he still wants us to go away?”

“Ask him,” Horace suggested. “He should be willing to tell us who he is.”

Again Judy rapped on the locked door only to hear nothing but the echo of her tapping and that unearthly rushing sound overhead.

“There is a leak,” Horace told her, squinting upwards. “I knew there must be. The water would be up to our necks by now if we hadn’t succeeded in opening that drain.”

“Cheerful thought!” commented Judy.

She rapped on the door again—gently at first and then a little louder.

“Please answer us,” she and Horace both begged.

A long, gasping moan finally came from behind the locked door.

“Are you hurt?” asked Judy. “Are you Dick Hartwell, Roger Banning’s friend?”

“He’s—no friend. He did it,” was the confused reply.

“Now we’re getting somewhere,” Horace whispered. “He is willing to talk.”

Judy was not so sure. “Did what?” she asked. “Did Roger Banning hurt you?”

“The time ... what time is it?”

“He must be delirious,” Horace whispered. “He doesn’t understand what you said.”

“What time is it?” the voice from behind the door was asking again.

Horace told him the exact time, adding that his watch was accurate. “I checked it with my car radio this morning.”

“What day?”

“It’s Tuesday, the third of December.”

This simple statement was greeted with a moan of despair. “Eleven o’clock ... Tuesday ... the very day ... the very hour!”

“Is something timed?” asked Judy, thinking that the fountain might be turned off and on by some sort of a timing device.

This sudden hope was soon dashed. The noise overhead continued the same as before except that now there was added to it a steady dripping sound from the leaky pipes. First it was in one place and then in another. Judy tried not to listen to it, but she couldn’t help the feeling of panic that was mounting inside her. Horace was outwardly calm.

“What difference does it make what time it is?” Horace called.

“Too late....” was the only reply.

“Too late for what?” asked Judy. “Surely we can still do something.”

“Report,” came the voice, fainter now. “Parole officer ... eleven today. Now they’ll send me ... back....”

At last Judy understood.

“YouareDick Hartwell, aren’t you?” she asked. “You wanted to report to your parole officer, but someone shut you down here so you couldn’t. Is that it?”

The answer was barely more than a sigh.

“Who did it?” asked Horace. “Was it the work of a gang of jewel thieves? I suppose they were afraid that you would report their activities, too?”

“No,” the prisoner said. “They wanted....”

“Yes?” Horace prompted him.

Judy heard a gasp as if the man had tried to say something but hadn’t breath enough left to make himself heard. He moaned, but that was all.

“It’s no use, Horace,” she told her brother. “He’s too weak to talk.”

“What do you say, sis?” he asked. “Shall I bring that beam? The least we can do is smash our way in there and make the poor guy comfortable.”

“You could try it,” agreed Judy. “But you’ll need a bigger beam than the one we used to open the drain.”

“This will do.”

The beam Horace found was so big he could hardly lift it. But together he and Judy managed to bring it. Holding the big beam between them, they both shouted, “Keep back, Dick Hartwell! We’re coming through the door!”

A Broken Water Pipe

Judy hesitated only a minute. Somehow, she felt she and Horace ought to have Dick’s permission before they did anything as drastic as breaking down the door to his prison.

“Is it all right?” she called, but there was no answer.

They waited a moment more. The beam was ready, but was the prisoner ready to meet their onslaught? When there was no sound other than the rushing of water overhead and the constantdrip,dripfrom the leaky pipes, they shouted a second warning.

“Keep away from the door!”

With this they rushed ahead, but on the first try they succeeded only in cracking a lower door panel.A moan from inside told them the prisoner had been disturbed by the commotion. But still he said nothing in answer to their calls.

A second assault brought forth more moans. Judy became worried. “Let’s not try that again, Horace,” she pleaded. “If he’s fallen against the door we could really hurt him. There must be a better way.”

“If there is,” her brother said, “I’m sure I can’t think of it. We won’t hurt him if he keeps back—”

“But can he? I’m afraid he may have fainted. The floor is all wet from those dripping pipes. If he’s fallen face down in the water—”

“We have to get him out,” Horace finished. “We agree on that.”

“But not by hurting him.” Judy’s suspicions of the prisoner were forgotten. She was all sympathy now. She called gently, “We’re sorry, Dick! We didn’t mean to frighten you. We were just trying to get in and help—”

“Help!”

The cry sounded so faint and far away that it puzzled Judy.

“Was that only an echo?” she asked.

Horace did not answer. He was examining the crack in the lower panel. Presently he stood up, flashlight in hand.

“You may be right, sis,” he said. “There may be a better way. Watch this.”

Horace placed the flat of his hand against the cracked door panel and pushed with all his might. Judy heard a crack as a piece of the panel gave way and left a narrow opening through which her brother beamed his flashlight.

“Horrors!” he exclaimed. “I didn’t think it was that bad. I hope we’re not too late.”

“Is he Dick Hartwell?”

“Take a look for yourself,” he suggested, moving away from the opening. “He’s in pretty bad shape, whoever he is. Dick’s young, but this man looks old. Or is he? It’s hard to tell under all that brush.”

Judy couldn’t be sure of the man’s identity either. She peered through the opening in the door panel while Horace held the flashlight. There was no window in the cell-like room. There was no light at all, not even a candle. A small table, one chair and a cot in the corner were its only furnishings. Across the uncovered springs of the cot the man was sprawled, his bearded face turned toward the wall. His clothing was in tatters. He lay there motionless.

“Maybe he was telling the truth. Maybe he is dying,” Judy whispered.

“Get hold of the beam and we’ll smash the other door panel,” Horace said urgently. “We can’t hurt him if he stays over there in the corner, and maybe we can still help him. Ready?”

“I’m ready, Horace!”

He lay there motionless

“Let her go!”

This time they rammed the beam against the door with such force that both panels shattered and the beam went up like one end of a seesaw. It banged one of the pipes, and water began to pour out of it in a steady stream. Horace stared at it, his face turning pale.

“Now what have we done?” gasped Judy. “We tried to help, but just look what we’ve done! The tunnel will surely be flooded now!”

“The drain—will take care of it.” Horace spoke jerkily and without conviction. Judy could tell that he feared the worst.

The water from the broken pipe did seem to be running toward the drain. It was icy cold. Judy wet her handkerchief in it and hurried over to the cot where the prisoner lay. She placed the handkerchief on his forehead, wiping away the beads of cold perspiration that stood there.

“He is Dick Hartwell,” she told Horace.

Her brother was about to follow her through the opening they had broken in the door, but she called to him, “Warm your coat to wrap around him. Take it over to the furnace and get it good and warm. He’s in shock, I think. Poor Dick! What have they done to you?”

She took his hand and found it cold. He seemed to have collapsed, perhaps from fear when the water pipe burst. The thing to do was to revive him quickly. Judy began to rub his hands, trying to start the circulation. His breath came in shallow gasps. She could scarcely feel his pulse.

“Hurry, Horace!” she called.

But Horace was already there with the warm coat. Judy threw her own coat on top of it.

“Dick! Dick!” she called. “Wake up! You have to wake up and help us. The water is pouring in here. We have to get you out!”

The man let out a long, gasping breath and opened his eyes. Judy’s face must have looked like the face of an angel as the beam from Horace’s flashlight fell upon it. “Where am I?” Dick asked. “Is this heaven?”

“It is not!” Horace had to laugh in spite of their predicament. “My sister says it’s too far down. Is there a way out—besides that hole under the cupids, I mean? How did you get in?”

“They ... pushed me.”

“Into the fountain, you mean? We heard you moaning and thought it must be haunted. How long have you been here?” asked Judy.

“Days.” Evidently Dick didn’t remember how many, but Judy could imagine how long it must have seemed. He had been without food or any other comfort. This much he told them in a hoarse, whispery voice. It was hard to make out what he said.

“Who locked you in?” questioned Horace.

“Roger. You know him. He’s ... no friend ... made me ... lose job. Told them ... my record. That ... fixed me ... gave me ... no peace ... anywhere. Now ... too late!”

Talking seemed to be too much of an effort, and he broke off here, looking beseechingly at Judy.

“It’s all right, Dick. We understand. You don’t have to tell us any more.”

“But I want to,” he protested in a louder tone. “They made me ... sign papers. When I ... refused ... they beat me up.... Bad shape. Can’t walk.”

“We’ll get you out of here somehow,” Horace promised. “Who did it? Roger and Cubby?”

Dick nodded. After taking another deep breath, he added, “and Falco. He’s ... boss. He made me ... copy signatures ... important men.”

“Can you remember any of the names you copied?”

Dick did remember a few of them. He whispered them in such a low tone that Horace had to lean close to him in order to hear. Judy heard only the water.

“It’s rising!” she exclaimed. “The drain isn’t carrying it away as fast as it comes in. I didn’t think it would. I—”

She stopped. Horace wasn’t listening. He was busy taking notes, getting Dick’s story down in black and white. He had his flashlight propped up on the table. But Judy, flashing hers in the direction of the broken water pipe, saw the flood he seemed to be ignoring.

“What’s the matter with you?” she cried. “Didn’t you hear me? How can you sit there with your little black notebook when water is pouring in all around us? No story is that important!”

“This one is,” replied Horace. He calmly removed a piece of chocolate from his pocket, unwrapped it, and handed it to the man on the cot. “Eat it slowly,” he urged. “It will give you strength. You say they brought food, but wouldn’t give it to you. Then what happened?”

A Frantic Appeal

Dick Hartwell finished the bit of chocolate before he answered. Now he wanted to talk. He spoke as if he were unaware of any present danger. All that he was telling Horace was in the past.

“They ... beat ... me ... Falco ... inhuman ... no pity. If he wants anything ... he gets it ... no matter who’s hurt. It’s whathewants. The great Falco!” Dick’s voice, weak at first, was stronger now, in derision of the gang leader. “He has no use ... for weaklings. He says I’m a weak sister!”

“Once I was called weak,” Horace told him. “The boys at the newspaper office nicknamed me Sister, but I made them change their minds.”

“I guess we all ... have weak moments.”

“I’m having one right now,” confessed Judy. “I’m scared, and I don’t care who knows it. Maybe there’s an exit to the other room. If we broke down that door—”

“No use,” Dick said. “I saw ... inside. Things stored there. They ... showed me ... papers—”

“The ones you signed?”

“Yes ... and more. I gave in to them ... at first ... before I knew ... what they were up to. When I refused ... to sign any more names ... they beat me. Now they will drown me. I don’t care. I want to die.”

“Well, I don’t,” declared Judy, “and I don’t want you to die, either, Dick Hartwell. You’re young. You have a good life ahead of you—”

“Not now,” he interrupted. “Not ... any more.”

“You do if you go straight. But first we have to get you away from this man, Falco,” Judy told him. “He’s the dark man, isn’t he? He warned me to keep away from here, but I’m not afraid of him. Peter won’t let him hurt me. You remember Peter Dobbs, don’t you?”

“Yes,” he said, as if it didn’t matter any more. “I ... remember.”

“We’re married now. I guess you knew that. Peter was here last night with another man. They’ll come back—”

“To take me to prison? No! I’d rather die here.... Forget me. Save yourselves. Get outside....”

“Is there a way outside? Is there?” asked Judy eagerly.

But Dick said he knew of no other door out of the tunnel. He knew of no openings at all except the chimney to the furnace and the space under the cupids. He had been pushed in between them and down into the tunnel when the fountain was off.

“Have to turn it off,” was all he could advise.

“But you say it’s turned off from the tower?”

“That’s right ... get outside ... to the tower.”

“We can’t,” Horace protested. “Can’t you see how impossible it is? There’s no way out of here except through the water, and the force of it would knock us unconscious.”

“Then we’ll all ... drown,” the imprisoned man gasped and fell back on the cot as if he wished it would soon be over.

“We won’t drown if I can help it,” declared Judy. “We’ll haunt the fountain ourselves. We’ll yell until somebody comes and shuts it off!”

“It won’t work,” Horace predicted. “Nobody will hear us except those thugs, and they’ll just laugh and let us drown.”

“Blackberry’s out there. He may hear us.”

“You’re right, sis!” exclaimed Horace. “He may be able to find another opening.”

“Is Blackberry ... a dog?” Dick asked from the cot. “A dog ... might dig ... to meet you. Shovel ... out there ... by the furnace. Watch it, though! Roof might ... cave in. Better ... to drown.”

“Well, if it’s a choice of ways to die,” Horace said grimly, “I think I’d rather die digging.”

“So would I,” agreed Judy, “but aren’t we being a little too morbid? Peter wouldn’t let us drown. Dad wouldn’t—”

“But they don’tknow!”

“That’s what I mean,” insisted Judy. “We’ll have to get help. If we call loud enoughsomeonemay hear us.”

“She’s right,” agreed Dick. “Got to ... take ... chance. Funny, though. Your dog ... didn’t bark.”

“Blackberry isn’t a dog,” Judy explained. “He’s a cat.”

“No good ... calling him then.”

Judy feared Dick was right. Already she could see the water backing up, filling the low places in the uneven cement floor. Soon it would spread to the corner where Dick’s cot was. It would creep under the cot and finally over it. Judy shuddered as she thought of what would happen after that.

“There has to be a way out,” she told Horace as they started toward the furnace, wading in water over their ankles. “We’ll be back,” she called reassuringly to Dick Hartwell.

He seemed not to care whether they came back or not. “Forget ... about me,” he replied. “Save yourselves ... if you can.”

Judy and Horace looked at each other in the dimming light from her flash.

“We couldn’t do that, could we, sis?”

“No,” she replied. “It’s Dad’s business to save lives, and so I guess it’s our business to get Dick to him. We’ll be back.”

The water swirling about them became warmer as they neared the furnace. They heard it sizzle against the hot iron. Before long there would be neither light nor heat in the tunnel. The water would rise to the level of the open grate and put out the fire. The batteries in their flashlights would wear out. Horace had left his with Dick Hartwell. Now Judy used hers to look for the shovel.

“I see it!” she exclaimed at last. “It’s there in the coal bin. I’m going to climb up on the coal and look around. There must be a coal chute.”

Finally, standing on top of the piled-up coal, Judy discovered a tiny shutter that slid open and let in a little daylight. It was about the width of the shovel and only a few inches high.

“Even Blackberry couldn’t squeeze through that,” she told Horace.

Just the same they both called, “Here, kitty! Kitty! Kitty!” in their most coaxing tones.

Soon the cat peered in at them and yowled in what Judy called his asking voice. “Open it a little wider,” he seemed to be saying.

“We can’t! Oh, Blackberry! Help us!” cried Judy. “Somebody please hear us! Help! Help!”

“We’ll have to keep calling from time to time.” Horace spoke as if her frantic cry had been just plain common sense. “What do you see outside?” he asked.

“Nothing much except cement. Oh dear! I hoped we’d be under the garden.”

Horace climbed up and looked out. He had a good sense of direction. “We must be under the outer wall of the pool,” he said. “That’s about where Blackberry was sitting. No doubt he jumped down in a hurry when the fountain went on. This tunnel seems to go around it and then underneath the main fountain. I’m afraid the shovel won’t be much of a help, sis. We can’t widen the coal chute without cracking the cement and letting in more water.”

“I guess you’re right,” Judy admitted. “And it’s probably reinforced with something so we couldn’t get through anyway. But maybe we can send Blackberry—”

“That’s an idea!” Horace interrupted. “I’ll write a note while you collar him. It should be easy. He’s trying to get in.”

While Judy struggled to get hold of the cat, Horace tore a page from his notebook and scribbled a hasty message. Judy read it without comment, fastened it to Blackberry’s collar, and sent him off. The note said:

SEND HELP! CALL PETER DOBBS AND DR. BOLTON.DICK HARTWELL, MY SISTER JUDY, AND I ARETRAPPED UNDER FOUNTAIN ON BRANDT ESTATE. INDANGER OF DROWNING. HURRY OR WE MAY NOTGET OUT OF HERE ALIVE.

SEND HELP! CALL PETER DOBBS AND DR. BOLTON.

DICK HARTWELL, MY SISTER JUDY, AND I ARE

TRAPPED UNDER FOUNTAIN ON BRANDT ESTATE. IN

DANGER OF DROWNING. HURRY OR WE MAY NOT

GET OUT OF HERE ALIVE.

HORACE BOLTON

A Daring Attempt

Judy hoped Blackberry would head straight for the main road where he would be apt to find someone who might read the note attached to his collar. Time was of the utmost importance. Horace must feel, as she did, that it was rapidly running out.

“This story is burning a hole in my pocket,” he said now. “I’vegotto get it to theHerald. Well, at least we’re trying—”

“Trying what?” cried Judy. “We’re just standing here on the coal pile doing nothing. I don’t call that trying.”

“Maybe not,” Horace said, “but it is serving. ‘He also serves who only stands and waits.’”

“You and your quotations! Maybe it is serving, but I don’t like it. Maybe you like the thought of someone finding a big story in your pocket after you’re dead, but I like the thought of being alive a lot better—even with empty pockets. Why is your story so important, anyway?” asked Judy. “What, exactly, did Dick Hartwell tell you?”

“He told me plenty,” replied Horace. “Enough to convict the whole Falco gang of extortion as well as robbery. His story should solve Lorraine’s problem—”

“Bother Lorraine!” exclaimed Judy. “If it hadn’t been for her and her childish idea that she could wish away her troubles in the fountain we might not have come here—”

“And Dick Hartwell might not have been found.”

Judy hadn’t thought of that. But what was the good of finding him if there was no way to help him? Blackberry was, as Dick had pointed out, only a cat. The note attached to his collar might be lost or disregarded, probably the latter. Even if he delivered it to the right people it might be much too late. As for Lorraine’s problem, Judy announced that, whatever it was, it couldn’t compare with the problem of life and death that she and Horace and Dick were facing here inside the tunnel with the water rising.

“Perhaps not,” Horace admitted, “but it is pretty serious. Dick told me that one of the signatures he forged was that of Arthur Farringdon-Pett!”

“It was!” This information really surprised Judy. “That would mean trouble for him, wouldn’t it? I suppose Dick was forced to copy it?”

“Yes, it was one of the first names Falco gave him,” Horace explained. “He didn’t think it was too serious until he learned how it was being used. It wasn’t on a bond or anything of value, Dick told me. It was only on a sales contract.”

“I see. And how was it being used?”

“Dick didn’t say. Shall we go back and ask him?”

“We did promise to come back.”

Judy knew they had to keep that promise before the water rose much higher. It continued to pour in from the broken pipes. Apparently whoever had turned it on had no intention of shutting it off. Dick had said the fountain was controlled from the tower.

“Horace,” Judy suddenly remembered, “you didn’t mention the tower in your note.”

“I didn’t think of it,” he admitted.

“That’s all right,” Judy told him. “I didn’t think of it either until just now. Whoever finds the note will figure out something. I hope Blackberry doesn’t go back to the Brandt house with it. Oh, Horace! Suppose he goes back to that room where we found him and just sits there staring at those fish!”

“They should remind him of us. Seriously,” Horace pointed out, “he is only a cat. We can’t expect him to have human intelligence.”

“We have it. We know the fountain is turned off from the tower. If we could get out there—”

“We can’t, sis. There’s no use thinking about it.”

“I’d like to see it once more, anyway,” Judy said. “I’d like to stand up there behind those cupids and look out at the back of the waterfall. I’d like to make a wish or say a prayer or something before we go back to where Dick is. Please, Horace!”

“Well, okay,” he agreed. “I’ll boost you up there if you think it will do any good. You might yell for help once more while you’re at it. Maybe we can still make ourselves heard.”

“We can try. Even if the crooks hear us, it’s better than nobody.”

Horace wasn’t so sure of that.

“But anyway,” he said, “you’ll be safer up there than down here. The water is getting deeper all the time.”

Judy climbed down from the coal pile and waded bravely into the water with Horace following close behind her. They were surprised to find the water almost warm.

“You see what does it,” Horace pointed out as they passed the furnace.

Judy heard it sputter as if protesting against the water that was pouring into it through the eye-like grate. It came out warm, but that wouldn’t last long for the fire would soon be out. Then, thought Judywith a shudder, cold and darkness would descend upon them. The water would creep up, unseen, until it covered them....

“Oh, Horace!” she cried, clinging to him. “I can’t bear to think of what will happen. It’s colder now—and so swift!”

The drain, they saw as they approached it, was still clear. Water rushed down it in a whirlpool. It was all they could do to keep their footing. But finally they were past the worst of it. Daylight came in faintly from the opening overhead.

“Lift me, Horace!” Judy said at last. She had to raise her voice above the roaring noise from the fountain which was now directly above them. “Do you think anyone can hear me if I stand up there behind the cupids and call for help?” she shouted.

Horace doubted it and told her so.

“Down here there’s an echo, but up there your voice would be drowned out by the roar of the fountain. It’s haunted all right. I never expect to hear anything more frightening than that roaring water above us.”

“It scares me, too,” Judy admitted, “but not as much as the water from that broken pipe. If you lift me up we might yell together, me from up there and you from down here. Then, if nobody hears us, there’s one more thing I might try. You won’t stop me, will you?”

“That depends on what you have in mind,” Horace told her. “You’re the only sister I have. Don’t try anything impossible.”

“I won’t,” Judy promised, “not if I’m sure I can’t make it. But I’m a pretty strong swimmer. I think I can dive through that cascade and get to the rim. Now lift me up!”

“No!” Horace protested. “It’s too dangerous. What if you don’t make it? The fountain will knock the breath out of you and suck you under.”

“I don’t think so,” Judy said. “Besides, I’m so cold now that being a little colder won’t matter, and I’m already soaking wet. Please, Horace, I’ll have to try it.”

“I don’t like it a bit,” Horace said. “But what can I do? I’ll look after Dick Hartwell and keep his head above water if it comes to that. He wouldn’t make the effort to save himself.”

“No,” Judy answered, “I suppose he wouldn’t.”

Suddenly she threw her arms around her brother’s neck and kissed him.

“Cut it out!” he exclaimed. “This isn’t a last farewell. Go ahead, climb up on my shoulder. I’m getting used to it by now. When you see the water you may change your mind—”

“And yell for help!” Judy finished. “I think we ought to yell, anyway, don’t you?”

Horace needed no urging. He waited until Judy was standing behind the cupids with the waterfall all around her. Then, while she called, “Help! Help! Help!” from her high perch, he joined in from below. They both shouted and called until they were hoarse, but nobody answered.

“Is it because nobody hears us or because nobody cares?” Judy wondered.

Then, suddenly, she remembered what her grandmother had once told her. “There’s always Someone who cares.” This thought renewed the determined spirit within her.

“Go back!” she called down to her brother. “I’ll yell to you as soon as I’m safe. Oh, Horace! It will be harder for you waiting down there with the water pouring in than it will be for me going through it.”

“Pick yourself up fast,” he shouted. “Get to the edge of the pool and then yell good and loud. I’ll be listening!”

“I will! I’ll make it. I’m sure I will.”

Judy kicked off her wet shoes and threw them to test the force of the water. They immediately disappeared in the foam. Now she was not so sure.

“Suppose it does knock me out,” she thought with a shiver. She had left her coat behind to cover Dick Hartwell. For a moment she stood there in her sweater and slacks, hesitating. Then, hurling herself forward with all her strength, she plunged into the fountain.

The Haunted Tower

What happened immediately after her daring plunge into the roaring water Judy never knew. She held her breath as it struck her full force and sucked her under. Blackness and a heavy weight closed over her.

A moment later she was fighting, struggling and kicking, not knowing which way was up. The water seemed to be knocking her about as if she were a rag doll. She felt no pain when her body slapped against something hard and was then washed away from it.

“The base of the fountain!” she thought.

That meant she was through the worst of it. She could see nothing, but she could feel the hard cement base the next time the force of the water threwher against it. Doubling herself up and then giving a tremendous push away from it, she was again at the mercy of the foaming spray. Fighting, fighting, she came at last to the surface of the water and gulped a breath of fresh air.

“How did I get way out here?” she wondered, opening her eyes and blinking in the unexpected sunshine. To her surprise, she was already halfway across the pool that surrounded the main fountain. She had been fighting and thrashing around in the water without realizing that she was swimming. Now it seemed too much of an effort. She still had to pass the stone lions.

“They’re roaring at me,” she thought unreasonably.

She tried to swim around the cold shower from the lion’s mouth, but now the roaring noise grew louder, and she realized it must be inside her own head.

“I’m hurt! I can’t swim another stroke!” one part of her seemed to be saying.

But another part of her mind kept urging, “You must swim! You must get help! Horace and Dick Hartwell are still down there in the tunnel with the water pouring in! You must hurry, hurry and turn off the fountain!”

The sight of the tower encouraged her. It did not seem so far away. Once she was out of the water she had only to run a short distance and turn whatever had to be turned.

“How will I know?” she wondered.

The sickening thought came to her that she knew nothing of pipes and valves and would have no idea what to turn. It made her feel weak. “It’s no use,” she told herself. “I won’t know!”

“You must know! Hurry, hurry!” the second voice inside her persisted until finally she struck out with a few long strokes that took her quickly to the edge of the pool. Pulling herself up with a final, determined effort, she cupped her hands and shouted hoarsely, “I made it, Horace! I’m—all—right!”

But was she? It had hurt her to call. It even hurt to breathe. She had held her breath for so long that now it was easier not to let it out. A great weight seemed to be sitting on her chest. Her whole body was stiff and numb with cold. Her torn clothing seemed to be plastered to it. She shook herself like a wet puppy and tilted her head first one way and then another to get rid of the roaring in her ears. Hearing no answer to her call, she called again.

“This is Judy! I got through! Can you hear me down there? Are you all right?”

Still she could hear nothing but the roaring of the fountain with its stone lions glaring angrily at her and spitting out foam.

“I got through it!” she cried, her voice cracking with the effort. “Can you hear me?”

“Hear you!” sounded faint and far away as if it came from the fountain itself.

“The spirit!” whispered Judy. It gave her a shivery feeling of excitement. The fountain, in spite of its terrors, was still beautiful. It was hard to imagine Horace trapped under it. “That must be his voice,” she told herself. “I know who the spirit is this time, but who was it the other time so long ago?”

She couldn’t just sit beside the pool wondering. Pulling herself to her feet, she found it hurt her to stand. And yet she must hurry to the tower and turn off the water before it was too late.

“Is Dick all right?” she shouted, and the shout came back like an echo.

“All—right!”

Was it an echo? Judy did not know and decided not to take time to find out. Time was precious. She couldn’t waste it, and yet, oh, how it hurt her when she tried to walk! It felt as if she had icicles attached to her body instead of legs. And yet she must move them. She must make herself do it.

“Hurry! Hurry!” she whispered as if the words were enough to speed her along the path to the tower. She ran stiffly with a limp that grew worse as she neared the tall stone edifice.

“It mustn’t be locked!” she cried. “That would be too cruel.”

She found the lock broken and the great door sagging on rusty hinges that creaked as she opened it. Inside there was nothing except a great, gloomy round room that looked as if it had been built on purpose to house witches and owls and bats. She even fancied she could hear them fluttering. It reminded her of a giant bell tower only, instead of a bell, she looked up to see a huge tank supported by steel girders.

Was the thing she had to turn up there? The tank could be reached by narrow, wooden steps that wound up and up until, near the top, there was only a ladder.

“This is the end!” thought Judy. “I can never climb it.”

But would it be necessary to climb all the way up to the tank in order to turn off the fountain? A steady, whispering noise drew her attention to what looked like an electric motor with a switch above it. Not at all sure what would happen, she reached up and turned off the switch.

“Now what have I done?” she asked herself as the whole tower shuddered and sighed. A moan came from the great storage tank overhead. Not only the fountain, but the tower, too, seemed to be haunted.

The whispering and moaning continued for less than a minute. The silence that followed let Judy breathe again. The electric motor was still.

“I did it!” she thought with sudden elation. But was shutting off the motor enough? “If this is an electric pump then it probably pumps water into that big storage tank overhead,” she reasoned, “and if the tank is still full it will continue to pour water into the tunnel until it empties itself, and that may be too late!”

Judy was seized with the fear that already it was too late to save Dick Hartwell. But Horace could swim. He might keep himself from drowning until he reached the entrance under the cupids, but he could never dive through the cascade as she had done. Somehow, she must turn off the fountain.

“Is this the right valve?” she wondered.

She had discovered a number of pipes leading down from the tank. Pipes always confused her. Several of them had valves that she could turn. None of the valves were marked. A mistake might be costly, but indecision was worse. Judy began turning off all the valves she could find, one after the other.

“That ought to do it.” In the excitement of turning the valves she had forgotten her cold and discomfort. Now she was eager to get out of the gloomy tower and into the sunshine. But just as she was about to leave she discovered still another pipe ending in a plunger marked:DRAIN.

“That’s it!” she cried, and her voice echoed back to confirm her feeling that now she had made the tunnel safe for her brother and the poor, hurt prisoner, Dick Hartwell. “This must drain the pool,” she reasoned as she lifted the plunger. “Now they’ll be—safe!”

After it was done she sank against the stone wall exhausted, but still with the feeling that there was something urgent that she had to do.

“I must go back to the fountain and help Horace,” she told herself, but she was too weak to make the effort. Her eyes closed, but in another moment they flew open. Someone was shaking her roughly by the shoulder and shouting, “What’s the big idea, you? You’ve shut off all the water in the house! What’re you doing here, anyway?”

“The water? The house?” Judy tried to collect her thoughts, but all she could think of was the fountain with the water still pouring into the tunnel out of the broken pipe. She was there again, shivering in the icy cold water. But it didn’t matter any more. All she could say was, “I’m cold. Go away! Let me sleep!”

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