The Outdoor Girls in a Motor Car/Chapter 21
CHAPTER XXI
THE MISSING GIRL
"Who would ever think we could be frightened here?" asked Mollie.
"Yes, it's quiet enough now," replied Betty. "Not a sign of a ghost."
"Nor flashes of blue fire," added Grace.
"Nor hollow groans," remarked Amy.
The Outdoor Girls, with Mrs. Mackson and Mr. Blackford, had reached the so-called "haunted mansion." The day was a sunny one, perhaps that added to the lack of nervous fears they felt as they stopped the auto, and entered the place. This time they had gone to the mansion proper, having driven through what were once beautiful and extensive grounds. But they had long since fallen into a tangle of weeds and shrubbery.
They had decided to explore the mansion itself first, and go from there to the annex, as it might be called—the former abode of the housekeeper and staff of servants the rich Mr. Kenyon once kept.
During the week that had intervened, the keys of the place had been secured from Mr. Lagg. He was delighted that the girls had finally consented, through a chain of circumstances, to investigate the queer manifestations.
"You'll do better than the boys, I'm sure," said the storekeeper. "Anyhow, they've gone camping. Now find out what that ghost is, and—get it out of there. I have received word from the doctors who want to use the place as a sanitarium, that if I cannot, within a week, deliver them the property with a guarantee that there will be no disturbances, they will take another place."
"We will do all we can," promised Mollie.
They entered the old mansion. Truly it had been a magnificent place in its day, and even now the hand of decay had touched it but lightly. With a few repairs, some decorating, a cutting down of the trees that were too thick about the place, it could be made into a most cheerful sanitarium.
"And it's so big!" cried Grace, as she wandered about the spacious rooms. But she had hold of Amy's arm, it might be noticed, and both girls kept rather near to Mr. Blackford He had come back unsucessful in his search for his sister.
"Yes, it must have been fine here when the place was new," agreed Mollie. "Well, let's go at this search systematically."
"That is the only way," spoke Mr. Blackford. "We might start in at the top and work downward."
They did this, ascending by means of the grand staircase to the second floor, and thence to the third and fourth. The latter contained but few rooms, mostly for storage, it seemed, and it was soon evident that no ghost—of the human kind at least—had been at work here. The dust and grime of years had accumulated in the apartments.
The third floor offered no solution. This was rather larger in extent, and contained many guest-rooms. Some showed evidence of having been beautifully decorated, being paneled in tapestry that now hung in shabby strips—a relic of former beauty.
It was not until the second floor was reached that anything like a promising clue was found. Meanwhile many queer nooks and corners had been explored. Mr. Kenyon had evidently built the house after his own eccentric ideas, for it contained strange rooms, connecting with one another by little, unexpected passages, short flights of stairs, and many winding ways. Some of the rooms might well have been secret ones, so strangely were they tucked away.
But in two apartments on the second floor—two rooms that had evidently been choice guest chambers—the searchers came upon signs which indicated clearly that some one had been in them recently. There was less dust, and in one corner was a pile of bags and rags that seemed to indicate a bed. On the hearth—there were big fireplaces in each room—were ashes that had been hot not many days gone by.
"Tramps!" exclaimed Mr. Blackford. "To my way of thinking tramps have been sleeping here."
"Do you think the ghost was a tramp?" asked Mollie. "The one who caught me?"
"He may have been."
"But why was he all in white?"
"Probably to keep up the illusion. We haven't gotten to the bottom of this yet. Let's keep on."
But aside from the two rooms no others in the big mansion showed signs of habitation. All were gloomy and dust-encumbered. On the first floor nothing was discovered, and the cellar yielded no clues.
"Well, all we have established so far," said Mr. Blackford, "is that someone has been sleeping here. Now let's keep on to the annex, and see if we can establish a connection. It may be that the secret is there."
They found the passage that led from the mansion to the house in which so much had happened to them that stormy night. There was a room in the main house, whence the passage began, and this room, too, showed signs of having been used recently.
And when they came to the place where the girls had dined so unexpectedly they saw unmistakable signs that other meals than the one they had helped themselves to had been eaten there.
"Our friend, the ghost, has been here since," said Mr. Blackford. "Perhaps we shall have to set a trap for him."
They walked on, their footsteps echoing and re-echoing through the silent old house. They were in the annex now, but a search there revealed nothing.
The girls looked at one another, and then at Mr. Blackford. He shook his head.
"I confess I am baffled," he said. "I did hope to find something. But we haven't come across it. If there was a systematic effort to give the impression that this mansion was haunted, there would have been some evidences of it.
"I mean we would have some material evidence. There would have to be some way of producing that bluish light, that groaning sound and the clanking of metal. But, unless the apparatus is more cleverly hidden than I suspect, it isn't here."
"Then the only thing to do is to give it up, and confess ourselves beaten," suggested Betty.
"I don't like to do that," spoke Mollie.
"Well, we can go over the place again," remarked Mr. Blackford slowly, "but I don't see"
He paused abruptly and seemed to be listening. The girls glanced at one another curiously.
Then there sounded through the house a cry as of fear, and it was followed by a heavy fall that jarred the floor.
Mr. Blackford sprang to the door, rushed down the hall, and a moment later cried:
"Girls, come here!"
"Have you—have you found the ghost?" asked Betty.
"No, it's a girl, and she seems to have fainted."
"A—a girl!" faltered Mollie.
They all ran to where Mr. Black ford's voice sounded. It was in the very room where Mollie had been held a prisoner. And there, in the center of the apartment, supported in Mr. Blackford's arms, was a girl. At the sight of her Betty cried:
"It is she! It is she! It is the girl who so strangely ran away from us. The one who fell out of the tree! Carrie Norton!"