The Seven Sleuths'' Club

  CHAPTER XVIII. A MYSTERY TO SOLVE

  "Meeting is called to order!" Merry turned to beckon the girl, who,feeling rather like an intruder, had seated herself some distance fromthe others. "Gerry, come over and sit in Jack's favorite easy chair,"their hostess said. "Then you'll be in the circle with the rest of us."

  Geraldine was conscious of the slight flush which she always felt in hercheeks when Jack's name was mentioned, but she gladly joined the others,sinking into the luxurious depths of a softly upholstered cosy-comfortchair.

  "You'll have to say interesting things to keep me awake," she laughinglywarned them as she snuggled down in it.

  "Don't worry about _this_ meeting not being interesting. It's going to bea thriller," the president announced. Whereupon the members all sat upready to ask a chorus of questions, but Merry pounded on the table beforeher with her improvised gavel, an ornamented paper-cutter, as she saidimperatively: "Silence, if you please! We will now have the roll call.Sleuth Rose, are you present?"

  A laughing response: "I am!"

  And so on until each had been called. Geraldine was very much awake."Madame President," she burst in, "if I'm not too much out of order, willyou please tell me _why_ you call these pretty maidens by such a terriblename? Sleuths! Ohoo!" she shuddered. "I thought sleuths were long, lank,stealthy creatures who steal around slums and underworld places trying tofind criminals."

  "Well, perhaps some sleuths do," Merry acknowledged, "but _we_ aren'tquite that desperate."

  Then Peg put in: "O, I say, Merry, have a heart; don't mystify Gerry anylonger. Begin at the beginning and tell her what our club has stood forin the past, and what it will accomplish in the future."

  "How can I reveal what nobody knows?" their president inquired. However,she turned to Geraldine and told how the seven girls who always walkedback and forth to school together had formed a clique, which at firstthey had named Sunnyside Club with "Spread Sunshine" for a motto. "OurSaint Gertrude's suggestion, you may be sure," Rose interjected.

  "Well, we _did_ do a great deal to make the children up in the orphanagehappy," Betty Byrd championed as though feeling that the absent memberwas in some way being maligned.

  Bertha Angel agreed with her emphatically: "Of course we did, little one,and we intend to keep it up. Being sleuths won't in any way keep us fromdoing good deeds."

  "But what is there to be sleuthing about in this sleepy little town ofSunnyside?" Geraldine wanted to know. "And why do you want to do it ifthere is?"

  "O, we don't really," Rose told her. "It's sort of like taking a dare.The boys have a club which they call 'C. D. C.,' and they're terriblysecret about it. They have a mysterious meeting-place, and since we girlsaren't allowed to roam about nights unless our brothers are along toprotect us, we never can find out where they meet. We sort of thought itmight be in the old Walsley ruin on the East Lake Road. That's why weasked them to take us there Saturday after that robbery. We thought ifthat _was_ their secret meeting-place, they would have it fitted up likea clubroom some way, and then of course they wouldn't want us to visitit. But when they said 'sure thing,' they'd take us if we wanted to go,why then we were convinced that's _not_ where they hold their secretmeetings."

  Peggy interrupted with: "Maybe _you_ were convinced, old dear, but I was_not_. You say we can't go up the East Lake Road at night when the boyshold their meetings. Of course we can't, but what's to hinder us fromgoing up there alone some time in the daylight. If that old man whokilled himself haunts the place at all, it wouldn't be while the sun isshining."

  "Ugh!" Gerry said with a shudder. "Now I believe you _are_ sleuths.Wanting to visit a haunted house! But tell me, what kind of a club is the'C. D. C.'?"

  "It's a detective club, and we, that is, Merry, figured out, by puttingtwo and two together, that it means 'Conan Doyle Club.' Jack shut her ina closet one day, and before she could let him know she was there, sheheard enough to know that he and his friends have tried to find somemystery to solve in Sunnyside, and have decided that there isn't one, andso they take turns making up mysteries. They read them at these secretmeetings and let the others try to figure out clues."

  "Is that why you girls started to be sleuths?" Gerry wanted to know.

  Bertha nodded. "Merry heard one of the boys say that an uncle of his inNew York, who is a lawyer, had written about a famous girl detective, andthe others scoffed at the very idea. They said they couldn't imagine_girls_ ever solving a mystery, not if they were all like girls inSunnyside. So, you see, _that_ was sort of a dare, and we made up ourmind we would _find_ a mystery and solve it, and then crow about it; butthe joke is, we haven't found a mystery!"

  Merry continued with: "Peggy and Doris were a committee of two to findone, and they were to make their report last Saturday, but----"

  "But nothing," Peg interrupted, "you know we were so busy planning thatimpromptu skating party out at the Drexel Lodge we didn't have time tocall a meeting."

  "Well, if we had called one," the president persisted, "you girlswouldn't have had a mystery to present."

  "Wouldn't we, though?" Peg's eyes fairly glistened. "Doris, _now_ is thepsychological moment, as Miss Preen would say, for springing our find."

  The girls, except Geraldine, gasped. She was yet too mystified to realizethe importance of the announcement. They watched Doris, who unstrappedher school books and drew from her history a clipping from a newspaper."This is from the Dorchester _Chronicle_," she announced, "and itcertainly sounds mysterious to Peg and me." She looked around at them,deliberately, tantalizing.

  "Oh, for goodness sakes, do hurry and read it," Bertha Angel urged.

  "Peg, you read it. You can do it full justice." Doris passed it over toher fellow-committeeman, who pretended to study it leisurely.

  "Peg, if you don't hurry and tell us, we'll mob you." Bertha stood up andseized a pillow from the window seat, holding it threateningly. "Be calm,Sister Sleuth," Peg said. Then she held the small scrap of paper close toa window as the short afternoon was drawing to a close. "It is headed,'Information wanted.' A man owning a cattle ranch in Arizona has writtenthe _Chronicle_ asking that the following letter be given publicity:

  "'Dear Sirs:

  "'My young and pretty sister, Myra, was sent East to be educated. Ourparents wanted to get her away from a ne'er-do-well gambler she had metin Douglas. He followed her East and married her. We never heard from heragain, but believe she settled in some small community near Dorchester. Iam running the ranch, but half of it belongs to Myra, and, as I believeif she is living she must be in need, I want to find her.

  "'(Signed) Caleb K. Cornwall.'"

  Peg looked up triumphantly. "There! What do you think of _that_ for amystery?"

  Merry acknowledged that it _was_ a mystery, of course, but why think thepretty young Myra settled in Sunnyside? "There are at least six smallvillages within a radius of forty miles," she reminded them.

  "Oh, of course, maybe it isn't our town, _but_, also, _maybe_ it is." Pegwas not going to let them lose sight of whatever value there was in the"find" she and Doris had made.

  "Oh, how provoking, here come Jack and Alfred! Now we'll have to adjournjust when the meeting is most interesting. Ssh! Don't let them hear ustalking about it. Let's meet here again tomorrow afternoon." Merry saidhurriedly.

  "But you won't want _me_ to come, will you?" Geraldine asked, very muchhoping that they would say that they _did_ want her. Nor was shedisappointed.

  "Why, of course we do, Gerry." Then Merry exclaimed self-rebukingly: "How_stupid_ of me! I started to tell in school that Gertrude wanted us toinvite _you_ to take her place in the 'S. S. C.' for the rest of thewinter, while she is away, but I remember now, the gong rang, then Iforgot and sort of thought I _had_ told you."

  Then Peg asked: "You'd like to be Sleuth Gerry, wouldn't you?"

  How the older girl's eyes were glowing! "I'd like it more than anythingthat has ever ha
ppened in my life," she answered them. Then Merry put afinger on her lips and nodded toward the hall door. Doris, taking thehint, exclaimed: "And those dear little orphans will be simply delightedto have a Valentine party. We can fix things up so prettily. I dothink----"

  The door had opened and Jack sang out: "Our Sunnyside Spreaders, Iobserve, are holding one of their most commendable meetings. Unlike the'C. D. C.'s,' they have no secrets to hide." He winked at Alfred, wholaughed so understandingly that the observers were led to believe thatGeraldine's brother had also been admitted to the boys' club. Nor werethey wrong.

  "How did you like your first day in our country school?" Jack asked Gerryas he crossed to where she sat by the fire and stooped over the blaze towarm his hands.

  "O, I loved it!" that maiden frankly confessed; then acknowledged, "It'sreally nicer in lots of ways than the Dorchester Seminary." Then sherose. "We'd better be going, Brother," she began when the telephonewhirred. Merry turned from it to say that the Colonel was in town andwould call for them in five minutes.

  "Well, we'll be over tomorrow to plan that Valentine party for theorphans," Peg called as the girls trooped away. Then the Colonel's sleighbells were heard coming up the drive. Just before she left, Geraldinedrew Merry to one side to say in a low voice: "Tell the girls how _very_grateful I am to them for having taken me in after I had been sounforgivably horrid."

  Merry gave her friend's hand a loving squeeze. "I think _we_ are the onesto ask forgiveness for the prank we played," she said; then impulsivelyadded: "Let's be _sister-friends_, shall we?"

  Gerry felt the tell-tale flush in her cheeks, but Alfred was calling, "Dohurry, Sister. This isn't good-bye forever." And so laughingly theyparted.