CHAPTER XXVII Frightened Screams
Harry tilted the lid of the chest back against the wall, and with bothhands now free was thus able to flash the beams of his torch into thebox, which was what Dorothy also was doing. The double illuminationrevealed other garments in the long narrow box. Henry lifted out the oldContinental soldier uniform--coat, trousers, a hat, and the heavy boots.
"They have been worn recently," he said. "Not much dust on them."
"And the cloak?" asked Dorothy in a tense voice.
"That, also, has very little dust on it," he said, lifting it out.
Then a daring project came into Dorothy's mind.
"I dare you," she said, "to dress up as the old soldier--just the coat,hat, and boots--and walk with me, in masquerade, into the room whereGranny is telling a ghost story. I'll put on the red cloak--and this!"
She reached in and lifted from the chest a white kerchief and a sort oftam-o'-shanter cap.
"Let's be two live ghosts," she proposed. "It will be a fitting end tothe Christmas party, and then--well, you said you thought we were nearthe end of the ghost trail."
"I really believe we are. Somebody has been using these garments tocreate all this ghost atmosphere in the old Hall. Dorothy, I'll take yourdare, and after we have had our fun we will start a new investigation andtry to find out who has been responsible for all this."
"This is going to be good!" murmured the girl, a natural actress, as shethrew the red cloak about her shoulders after adjusting the kerchief asit might have been worn in Colonial days, crossed on her breast. With thecap jauntily askew on her head, she looked very like the reputed ghost ofPatience Howe.
Harry slipped off his shoes, put on the heavy boots, donned the coat andhat, and they were ready. With flashlights held out in front of them toilluminate the dark hall, they started for the lower room whence faintlyfloated up the laughter following Granny Howe's story.
"It's time we started back," whispered Dorothy. "They will miss us inanother moment."
They were near the head of the stairs when, suddenly, the door of a roomopened slightly and a light gleamed through the crack. It was the roomcontaining the mysterious closet from which Jim Danton had so strangelyvanished, to be found in the cellar.
The door opened wider. Then an old woman, an old woman with a wrinkledface and straggling gray hair, looked out. In one hand she held a smallflashlight.
She glared at Harry and Dorothy in their masquerade costumes, and then alook of deadly fear came over her face. She uttered several wild andpiercing screams and turned back into the room, still gibbering andgasping.
A second later there was the sound of something wooden moving inside theroom--a sound followed by a resounding blow, as though the heavy lid of achest had fallen.
Another wild scream and then silence.
"Oh!" gasped Dorothy. "What is it? Who is she?"
"Must be that Viney Tucker, cousin of Granny's," exclaimed Harry. "Butwhat was she doing up here? We must have frightened the wits out of her.And I'm afraid something has happened."
He hurried into the room, followed by Dorothy. The closet door was openand their lights, flashing within it, revealed a square hole in thefloor--a square hole opening into a smooth wooden chute that curveddownward and into the darkness. And from that darkness now came up faintmoans.
"This is awful!" cried Dorothy. "What have we done?"
"We haven't done anything, but I think we have made a big discovery!"said Harry. "This trapdoor explains how Jim got into the cellar and Ithink that's where we'll now find Mrs. Tucker. She has been caught in herown trap!"
By this time the Christmas guests in the room below had come running outwith their flashlights, calling up to know what was going on.
Harry hurried down the stairs, followed by Dorothy.
"The ghosts!" screamed Terry, pointing a trembling finger at them.
"No!" Harry shouted for he wanted to prevent any more hystericaloutbursts. "It's just a little joke Dorothy and I started, but I'm afraidit is far from a joke now."
"What do you mean?" asked Granny Howe in a strained voice. "And where didyou get those clothes?"
"We'll explain it all in a moment," answered Harry. "But just now I thinkwe had better see about your cousin, Mrs. Howe."
"You mean Viney Tucker? What's the matter with her? Who did that awfulscreaming just now?"
"Mrs. Tucker; and I am afraid she has fallen down a secret passage intothe cellar."
"Oh, how terrible!" gasped Arden.
"But what does it all mean?" Sim exclaimed.
"I think," said Harry, "it means the end of the ghosts in the old Hall.Come along, any of you who wish to--if you aren't afraid--but perhapsDick and I----"
"We'll all come!" declared Granny bravely. "Poor Viney! She wouldn'tattend the Christmas party with me. She must have taken a sudden notionand come over by herself--but a secret passage to the cellar--I don'tunderstand!"
"We'll have it all cleared up soon, I think," Harry said. "There must bean inside way into the cellar, isn't there?"
"I'll show you," offered Granny. "It's at the back of the hall, andthere's also one leading out of the old kitchen. The hall way is nearer."
They found Viney Tucker lying in about the same place where Betty haddiscovered Jim Danton. The grim old lady in the black cloak was faintlymoaning. Harry bent over her and made a hasty examination.
"Not badly hurt, I should say," was his verdict. "Just stunned--and verybadly frightened."
"What frightened her?" asked Arden.
"I'm afraid we did," Dorothy confessed.
"What in the world possessed you two to sneak off and put on amasquerading act like this?" asked Sim.
"We'll explain everything in a few minutes," answered Harry. "Just now wemust get Mrs. Tucker upstairs. Here, Dick, you take this awkwardlong-tailed coat," and he slipped off the one that had formerly covered asoldier. "I'll carry Mrs. Tucker."
CHAPTER XXVIII Falling Stones
Picking up the old lady in his arms (and now she appeared to bereviving), Harry Pangborn, preceded by Sim and Betty with flashlightsgleaming to show the way, started for the stairs. The others followed,Arden and Sim bringing up the rear.
Suddenly from behind them sounded a grating, rumbling noise. They turnedin surprise and some fear, just in time to see several stones fall out ofthe old chimney that was part of the fireplace above. The chimney had itsfoundation on the bottom of the cellar.
Out toppled the loose stones, falling with a crash that brought nervousscreams from Terry and Dorothy.
"What happened?" Harry called back, pausing with his burden.
"Looks as if the old place were falling apart," Dick answered. "Thechimney is crumbling. Perhaps we had too hot a fire on the hearth. Iguess we'd better get out of here."
"That chimney will never fall!" declared Granny Howe. "It was built tolast forever, and will, unless it's torn down. There is no danger."
Arden paused to flash her light within an opening revealed by the fallingstones. It was a smooth recess in the great stone chimney, not a roughaperture such as might happen by accident if some of the stones hadmerely crumbled away. It was only the few small outer stones, what,virtually, constituted a door to the hidden chamber, that had toppledaway revealing a secret place.
And a hiding place it was, as Arden discovered a moment later when herlight flashed and gleamed upon a small metal box within.
"Oh, look! Look what I've found!" she cried. "It's a metal chest hiddenaway."
"Bring it upstairs and we'll have a look!" called Harry.
Arden put her hand in and grasped the box. But it resisted her firsteffort to wrench it out.
"I'll help you," offered Dick.
Together they pulled, and the box came forth. It was about a foot long,eight inches in width and about six in depth. It was closed by a heavybrass padlock.
Their f
irst care, on reaching the warm and light room where the Christmasparty had come to such a strange end, was to put Viney down on animprovised couch and give her some hot coffee. She had regained hersenses, but a great fear and wonder seemed to be upon her.
"Have they--have they gone?" she faltered.
"Who?" asked Granny.
"Those real ghosts--the ghosts I used to be myself."
"Viney, have you been up to ghost tricks here in Sycamore Hall?" Granny'svoice was stern.
Viney Tucker looked up, more defiant now. She was rapidly recovering fromher fall, which was not so much of a fall as a slide down a smooth woodenchute. It wasn't the ash-chute, but one forming part of a secret passage,as they learned later.
"Yes," Viney confessed, "I was the ghosts. But I'll never be one again. Idid it to save the Hall for you, Hannah. I remembered the old stories ofNathaniel Greene and Patience Howe. And when I found you were going to becheated out of the money you should have had for the sale of thisproperty I decided to stop it from being demolished if I could. So Isecretly made a red cloak, and from a masquerade costumer in a distantcity I got the Continental soldier's uniform. I hid them away here in thechest. At times I would slip in here and scare the workmen, by pretendingto be either dead Patience on the bed or the tramping soldier, with a redrag around my head and my hat pulled down over my face. It worked, too!"she said, not a little proudly.
"Yes, it worked," admitted Harry. "Especially the screams coming up outof the fireplace. You are a good screamer, Mrs. Tucker."
"I always was," she admitted with a grim smile. "Though I didn't know itwas you in the house that day. I thought it was one of the workmen. But Imeant no harm. I just wanted to delay the tearing down of this place. Iwas always hoping the missing papers would be found."
"Well, I think they have been," Arden said. "Let's open the box that Ifound when the stones fell. I wonder what caused them to fall out andopen the hiding place?"
"It might have been the heat, as Dick suggested. We had a pretty hotfire," said Harry. "Though the concussion of Mrs. Tucker's slide down thechute and the vibration caused by something slamming up in the closet mayhave done the work. At any rate, let's see what the box holds."
A heavy poker served to break the lock, though Betty said it was a shameto destroy such an antique. But they could not wait to get a locksmith.And when the lid was raised, there, covered with much dust, were a numberof legal-appearing documents. Harry glanced hastily through them.
"Well, I think this settles everything," he said. "You won't need theadvantage of any long court delay, Mrs. Howe. These deeds, copies ofwills, and other papers, will easily prove, I think, your title to thisplace, and the money paid for it by the Park Commission can now bereleased to you and your relatives."
"Viney shall have her share!" exclaimed the happy old lady.
"I don't want any, Hannah! I only played ghost for you. I didn't wantanything myself."
"You shall have your share, Viney, and so shall Dick and Betty."
"Oh, how wonderful it all is!" Betty murmured.
"Like a story book!" added Dick.
"And to think," said Arden, "that if it hadn't been for the little prankof Dot and Harry all this would never have been discovered."
"My part as a ghost wouldn't have," said Viney grimly, "for I wasplanning to keep on scaring those men away if I could. I wasn't going togive up until the Hall was so torn apart I couldn't work my tricks anymore. But I didn't know anything about those hidden papers."
"I guess no one did except the foolish man, now long dead, who hid themthere," said Granny. "Oh, why didn't he have sense enough to put them ina bank or give them to a lawyer and then we wouldn't have had all thistrouble!"
"It wasn't really trouble, Granny!" laughed Sim.
"No, we've had a wonderful time!" agreed Terry.
"I suppose you did play tricks in this ghost masquerade, Mrs. Tucker,"Harry said. "But how did you manage to get in and out of the housewithout being seen--especially when there was snow on the ground."
"I went in and out through a secret tunnel that ends here in an old winebin and outside in the smokehouse," Mrs. Tucker said with a smile at thegirls, who had once surprised her in the place where hams and bacon werecured.
"Oh, so you found the old secret passage, did you, Viney?" asked hercousin. "I never could."
"Well, I did!" Once more Viney smiled. "And I kept it secret. There aretwo passages," she went on. "One the tunnel and the other the chute Ifell down just now."
"That's a part of the mystery I don't yet understand," said Arden. "Whydid you come over here tonight? Was it to play a ghost when you knew wewere giving Granny a Christmas party?"
"Oh, no, my dear! I'd never do a thing like that, cross and cranky as Iknow I am. Forgive me--but I've been so worried about Hannah going tolose the inheritance she should have had. I came over here tonight,secretly, as I always come, to save any of you from harm."
"Save us from harm?"
"Yes. I thought some of you might take a notion to roam and wander aroundthe old house. I was afraid you would go in that closet through which aperson who knows the trick can slide down the smooth wooden chute to thecellar. I was afraid lest someone might by accident work the spring ofthe trapdoor and fall. But I was the one who fell.
"You see it's this way. In the old days I suppose it was often necessaryfor those who were enemies of the British king to escape in a hurry. SoSycamore Hall, like many another old Colonial mansion, contained secretpassages. The one from the wine bin to the smokehouse is quite simple.The other is more complicated. The closet has a false bottom. In it is atrapdoor so well fitted into the floor that one not in the secret wouldhave difficulty in finding it. By pressing on a certain place in thewall, the trapdoor opens, a person can jump or slide down the chute,which is curved in such a way that no harm results from its use. Then thetrapdoor closes."
"It didn't close after you slid down tonight," Harry said.
"I realized something was wrong as soon as I pushed the spring," admittedViney. "Before I had hardly time to get into the chute, the trapdoorclosed and struck me a light blow on the head. But it must have sprungopen immediately afterward."
"That's probably what happened to Jim Danton," said Arden. "Only he got asevere blow, and the secret trapdoor remained closed."
"Probably did," admitted Viney. "I wasn't there to see, but very likelythat man accidentally touched the spring and shot down the chute, gettingheavily struck by the trapdoor as he slid down. The wooden chute reallymerges into the ash-chute at the lower end, so that's why they thoughtthis Jim fell down the ash-chute. But he didn't--he went down the secretpassage out of the closet."
"No wonder it seemed like a real mystical disappearance," said Arden.
"Tonight," went on Viney Tucker, "when I feared some of you would roamabout the place, I slipped over here through the tunnel to lock thatcloset door so you couldn't get in. I heard footsteps up here. I lookedout in the hall and saw the two ghosts--ghosts whose parts I had oftenplayed myself. I was so frightened that I screamed and ran back in hereto hide. I couldn't understand it. Then in my fright I touched the hiddenspring and fell down the chute. But the trapdoor, through some defect,closed down on me and then sprang open again. And that ends the mystery.I suppose the tearing down of the Hall can now go on, and the chute andtrapdoor will be destroyed with all the other things. Well, I don't care,now that Hannah will get her money."
"There is no further need for ghosts," said Arden.
"Viney, I don't know what to say to you!" exclaimed Granny. Her face wasserious but not for long. She laughed and added: "What will people thinkwhen all this comes out?"
"There is no need for it to come out," said Harry. "There is no need foranyone except ourselves knowing that Mrs. Tucker was the ghost. As forthe old stories, they will always be told, I suppose--stories ofNathaniel Greene and Patience Howe. But they will gradually die down whenthe Hall is gone. So there is no reason why Mrs. Tucker need be exposed.We can
keep the secret among ourselves."
"I think that would be best," Granny said. "Oh, what a wonderfulChristmas this has been!" and again her eyes were suspiciously bright."Just wonderful! Thank you all, my dear friends. For it was you whobrought all this about. Thank you, so much!"
The fire was dying. The simple little gifts had been presented. Thecandles were spluttering down into the sockets. It was growing cold. Theparty was over.
Granny gave the precious papers to Harry Pangborn to keep for her. Then,when Granny and her cousin, with Betty and Dick, had departed for thelittle cottage, over the moonlit snow, just an hour before it would beChristmas, Arden Blake and her friends left the old Hall.
"There's only one thing I'm still puzzled over," Arden said as theygathered in Sim's house to quiet down a bit. "Of course, I suppose weall, at different times, suspected different persons of playing theghost--for we knew that's what the mystery was--some tricky human. But atone time I heard some talk as I was passing some men in the street, whichmade me think Mr. Ellery might be the guilty one. Mention was made of aman named Nick."
"I think I can explain that," said Harry. "I talked to Dick about it. Itseems that there were some rather valuable fittings, like hand-madelocks, closet hooks and other things, in the Hall that a contractorwould, very likely, save out to sell. Ellery was trying, as the boys say,to double-cross Mr. Callahan and get some of these antiques. Nick was inwith him and once or twice tried his game with some cronies. But theghost scared them away as it did the contractor's honest workmen. So Ithink it's all cleared up now."
"Another mystery ended," sighed Arden Blake. "I wonder if it will be thelast in our lives?"
"I hope not," said Sim.
And Sim's wish came true, as is evidenced in the succeeding volume ofthis series to be called: _Missing at Marshlands_. That will be anotherArden Blake mystery story.
"Well, mystery or no mystery, I think it's time we all went to bed," saidDorothy after much talk.
Harry looked at his watch. He held it up for the girls to see. The hourwas past midnight.
"Merry Christmas!" he cried.
"Merry Christmas!" echoed the girls.
Dorothy, with a characteristic mischievous gleam in her eyes, put a bitof the "mistletoe" in her hair. And then, waving her hand at Harry, sheran upstairs.
"I'll catch you sometime!" laughed Harry.
And then, while faintly from the churches came the peal of the Christmaschimes, the girls said goodnight to their visitor and to one another.
So was solved the secret of Jockey Hollow.
There was no longer any need for Viney Tucker to play the ghost.
Granny Howe removed such of her last belongings as she wanted topreserve, giving some really valuable antiques to the girls and to Ardenthe picture of Patience Howe. Harry asked for and was given the old brassbox in which were found the papers so long lost.
For the papers in the box Arden Blake's eyes had lighted upon in thechimney hole were the very ones needed to prove Granny Howe's claim tothe money. It was not necessary for the Pangborn lawyers or the ParkCommission to engage in any involved proceedings.
The holidays passed all too quickly for Arden and her friends. They wentriding several times again, between Christmas and New Year's and in thatweek work was again started on tearing down the Hall. But no longer didmen rush out yelling that they had seen a dead woman on a bed, and nomore was heard the tramp of the soldier's boots on the stairs.
All the ghosts had vanished. And with them vanished much of VineyTucker's queerness. She let the better side of her nature show itself,and now, when Granny had the girls in for tea, Viney joined them.
Arden and her friends had tea with Granny the day before the holidayseason ended. She thanked them again and again, for it was through theirinstrumentality that everything had happened as it did.
"And to think," murmured Dot as they left Granny's little cottage, "thatwe'll soon be back at Cedar Ridge. Nothing ever happens there!"
"But think of all that did happen!" laughed Arden.
THE END
Transcriber's Notes
--Silently corrected a few typos (but left nonstandard spelling and dialect as is).
--Once corrected the doctor's name from "Blasdell" to "Ramsdell".
--Rearranged front matter to a more-logical streaming order.
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