Mollie screamed. The others, adding their startled voices to hers, beheld the white figure catch the frightened girl by the arm, and thrust her into the room. Then the door was slammed shut, a key turned in the lock, while the white figure turned and fled down the passage, as a flash of lightning threw its ghostly outlines into weird relief, and a crash of thunder followed.
CHAPTER XVII
CONSTERNATION
The other girls and Mrs. Mackson stood spellbound for the moment, and then their senses came back to them, and they realized the need of acting at once.
"Mollie! Mollie!" cried Betty. "Where are you? What happened?"
She started back down the hall, but Grace caught her.
"Don't—don't!" Grace pleaded.
"But I must—I shall—Mollie—some one Has taken her—thrust her into that room!"
"Yes—it was the ghost—I saw it!" Grace fairly screamed, "and they'll get you!"
"I don't care if they do! We must go to Mollie. Come, girls, to the rescue!" cried Betty, resolutely.
"But let us get some one to help us first!" insisted Amy. "We ought not to face that—that thing alone!" and she gasped, so rapidly was her heart beating.
"We're not alone!" insisted Betty. "There are four of us, to one—one man."
"How do you know he was a man?" demanded Grace.
"Didn't I hear him speak? It was a man's voice. Some man, for purposes of his own, is masquerading as a ghost, and he probably tried to frighten Mollie and the rest of us to keep up the reputation of the mansion for being haunted. If none of you are going back, I'll go alone!"
Betty started down the hallway, and her example was one of the things needed to infuse courage into the others. Not that Cousin Jane especially needed it, for she had already made up her mind, as had Betty, that something must be done, and that soon.
"Of course we must rescue Mollie!" the chaperone declared, emphatically. "Anyhow, that fellow ran away, after locking her in the room. Come back there."
Rather timidly, it must be confessed, they advanced until they stood before a door. There were several along the hall, opening into various rooms, apparently.
"It was here," said Betty.
"No, this one," declared Mrs. Mackson, indicating another opposite.
Betty turned to Grace and Amy.
"I was too frightened to look," admitted Grace.
"And I didn't see," confessed Amy.
"Well, there's one way to prove it—we'll call," spoke Betty. She raised her voice and cried:
"Mollie! Mollie! Don't be frightened. We haven't deserted you! In which room are you?"
They paused, waiting for what they expected would be a tear-choked answer, but none came.
"Mollie! Mollie!" cried Betty again, her tones trembling now.
Anxiously they waited, but there was no response.
"She isn't there!" gasped Amy. "Oh, Betty!" and she began to cry.
"Hush!" cautioned Mrs. Mackson. "Probably the poor child has fainted, and can't hear us. It's enough to make any one faint. But I'm sure this is the room," and she indicated the one she had pointed out. "We must break down the door and get her."
Not expecting the door to open, she turned the knob, but, to her surprise, the portal swung back, creaking on rusty hinges.
"The light—quick!" the chaperone called to Betty.
The remaining lantern from the auto—one being with Mollie—was flashed into the apartment. It took but a glance to show that it was empty.
"I thought it was this one," said Betty, trying to keep her voice from trembling, as she moved to the door she had insisted was the right one.
She tried half a dozen times. The door was locked.
"She's in—there!" gasped Grace.
Again Betty called aloud, repeating Mollie's name over and over again, but there was no answer.
"Oh—oh, what can have happened?" faltered Amy. "Poor Mollie!"
"At least we know that it was perfectly natural what happened—however mean and unjust it was," declared Betty. "We have to do with natural forces, and——"
Through the old house there once more sounded that mournful groan, chilling the very blood of the girls, and causing them to cling together. Several times were the groans repeated, and then there shone, as if from a distance, a bluish light, and there came the clank of metal.
"Quiet!" commanded Betty. "Mollie, are you in there?"
The storm had, in a measure, ceased now, and the only sounds from without was the falling of the rain.
"That—that couldn't have been thunder or lightning," said Betty, with a puzzled air.
"It was the wind—that is still blowing," insisted Mrs. Mackson. "Don't be frightened, girls. We must get Mollie out of that room. She has certainly fainted, and when she comes to she will be horribly frightened if we are not with her. Try the door again, Betty."
Betty did so, but it would not give.
"We must break it down!" decided the chaperone, resolutely. "Is there anything we can use?"
"There's a chair in that other room," said Amy, indicating the apartment they had looked in, only to find it untenanted. "We might use that."
"The very thing!" declared Mrs. Mackson. "We'll get it!"
She started for the other room, followed by the others, when Grace cried:
"Hark!"
They listened.
"The sound of carriage wheels out in the road. And I heard a man's voice speak to his horse."
"Maybe it's the—one who caught Mollie, and he's taking her away," faltered Grace, who seemed to have a faculty of suggesting unpleasant possibilities at the wrong time.
"Then we must stop him!" cried Betty. She turned toward the front door, but a short distance away. The others hurried on after her and saw, out in the road, the dim outlines of a carriage. There was a driving-light on the dashboard, and by its gleam the girls could make out the dark form of a man alighting.
"At least he's not—a ghost!" whispered Amy.
"Help! Oh, please help us!" screamed Grace.
"Hello, there! What's the trouble?" asked a pleasant voice. "I'll be with you in a minute. Whoa there, Jack, old man! Don't get uneasy. Show your light, please, so I can see where you are."
Betty flashed her lantern, and in its rays a man came up the weed-grown path. The girls were almost crying for sheer relief.
CHAPTER XVIII
THE PRISONER
Mollie tumbled in a heap on the floor of the room, into which the white-robed figure had thrust her. She gasped once or twice, for her breath had grown short, not alone from fright—though she admitted that she was terribly scared—but from the rough treatment she had received. Then, as she endeavored to get to her feet in the darkness—for her lantern had fallen from her hand and been extinguished—she fainted, and fell back. Her heavy mass of hair, uncoiled and loose, served as a cushion, and so saved her as she crashed backward.
This much of Mrs. Mackson's theory was correct. Mollie could not answer the frantic calls of her chums, for she was insensible.
How long she remained in this condition she could not afterward tell, but it could not have been for long, since she was strong and healthy, and it was merely a case of overwrought nerves, and a severe mental shock, which did not amount to anything serious.
Poor Mollie heard the ringing of innumerable bells as if from some land beyond the clouds. Queer lights, even in the darkness, seemed to dance before her closed eyes. She felt a pressure, a sense of suffocation—this was the stagnant blood resuming its circulation.
Then consciousness returned so suddenly that it was painful. Mollie raised herself by leaning on her hands and murmured:
"Where am I? What happened? That figure in white—oh, and the girls—Betty—Grace—Amy!" she cried.
But none answered her, for by this time the others were outside watching that very welcome man approach.
Mollie waited, and then, as her thoughts arranged themselves in order in her brain, she began to plan what to do for herself.
"In the first place," she reasoned, "I am not seriously hurt. That fellow, whoever he was, just thrust me into this room. And it was no ghost, either," she went on, as she felt her arm, which she was sure had been bruised by the grasp of the mysterious one. "I'd better make a light, I think. Then I can see where I am. Oh, but what can have happened to the others? I hope he didn't get them, too!"
The thought was terrifying. She dismissed it.
Mollie was a practical girl, as must needs be one who drives an auto. She had pockets—a woeful lack with many—and matches.
It was the work of but a few seconds to set aglow the extinguished lantern, and how Mollie blessed the thought that had prompted taking both side lights with them. Otherwise she would have had to remain in the gloom. The lantern had not broken in the fall, and soon a cheerful glow made the room less gloomy, though it was a large apartment, and there were many flickering shadows, while the corners seemed in total darkness.
"But there's nothing there—can't be," decided Mollie, as she rose to her feet. "I just won't let myself be frightened."
Flashing the light about the room, the girl-prisoner made it out to be a large apartment, void of anything save a few broken sticks of furniture, and a litter of papers. The paper on the walls was mildewed and hanging in strips. There was a damp and musty smell in the place, but—joy of joys to Mollie—no rat holes. The floor was solid, and she could see no openings where the creatures might get in.
"So far—so good," she said aloud, and the sound of her own voice, in a measure, reassured her.
"I wonder had I better call again?" she thought. "Yes, it will be best."
And so she sent out a ringing cry for her chums. But the room had thick walls—the door was a solid one, and, as Betty, Amy, Grace and Mrs. Mackson were having a surprising time of their own just then, they did not hear the appeal.
"I'll have to depend on myself," thought Mollie. "Well, I can do it, I think!"
She paused a moment to gather her thoughts together, and, being a girl of method and order, she began at the beginning.
"In the first place, let me think how I got here," she mused. "Something in white grabbed me, and thrust me here. It was a very human touch—depart the ghost theory. I believe, after all, that Mr. Lagg was right—it is some one trying to make out that this place is haunted in order to get it for a lower price. The food supply proves that, I think.
"Anyhow, here I am—pushed in by some man masquerading as a ghost. That much is certain. And what was it he said, as he caught hold of me—'So you have come back!' That is all I remember. This would seem to indicate that I had been here before, and that he was either expecting me, or wanting me.
"A case of mistaken identity, at all events, for I never should have come back, had I been here before, and that I was never here before is positive. Come, Mollie, we are getting on in this deduction business. Some one mistook me for some one else, and that shows that it is not really me who is wanted. That's good.
"Then, if that's the case, the sooner the mistake is discovered, and rectified, so much the better. I shall be released as soon as that queer man in the winding sheet discovers his error.
"And he ought to do it soon, for he seemed very anxious to get me back, and doubtless he will soon come to find out why I—or the person I am supposed to be—went away."
Then Mollie had another idea. She reasoned this out as she flashed the rays of the lamp about the bare apartment.
"But why should I wait for that man to come back?" she asked herself. "There might be trouble when he discovers that I am not the person he thinks me. He may be angry. And, though doubtless Betty and the others will do all they can for me, I had better see if I can help myself.
"Oh, isn't it all queer? The folks at home will never believe it when we tell them."
Mollie went quickly over the different happenings of the night, and tried to figure out a reason for the various ghostly manifestations. That they were the work of some one endeavoring to depreciate the value of the property, she was certain.
"That man may have hired some girl who looks like me to help him," she thought, "and she may have become afraid, or worried, and left. Then I have to blunder in here, and in the dark he takes her for me. I'm sure that's it."
Then came a change of mood.
"But what is the use of speculating and guessing about it?" Mollie mused. "I had much better see if there is a way out. Oh, joy! A window—two of them!"
She approached the casements, realizing that as she was on the ground floor the sills could not be very high from earth. But though she saw that the catches on the frames were broken, and though she managed to raise one sash, it was with a jolt of disappointment that she saw the windows were heavily barred.
"A regular prison!" gasped Mollie. "This must have been a most peculiar house—barred windows. No wonder people shun it. Ugh! It gives me the creeps."
She flashed her lamp on the wooden sill, into which the iron rods were screwed. Then a wave of hope came into her heart. She saw rotting wood and rusting iron. She pushed on one bar. It gave slightly.
"I can force them out, I'm sure!" she exclaimed aloud. "Oh, for something to use!"
Her light shone around the room—on a pile of broken chairs. She ran and grasped the leg of one. It was heavy and solid.
Mollie placed it between two of the bars, and pried. She was strong, and it did not take all of her muscle to force the ends of the rods from the rotting wood of the sill. A child might have done it. In a moment she had a space sufficiently wide to enable her to get out.
And then she heard a sound out in the road. It was a carriage being driven rapidly.
"Perhaps that man went for some vehicle in which to take me away!" thought the girl, aghast. "I had better not go out! What shall I do? My light! I must put it out, or he'll see me," and she turned the flame of the lantern down, leaving herself in darkness.
CHAPTER XIX
MYSTIFIED
"What can I do for you? What seems to be the trouble?" inquired the man whom Betty and the others had hailed as they rushed to the door of the strange house, and peered out into the darkness.
"We're in a haunted mansion, and the ghost has taken Mollie away!" cried Grace, hysterically. "Please make him give her up. Oh, please do!"
But Betty paid no heed to her chum. Instead she exclaimed:
"Mr. Blackford! It's Mr. Blackford—the man who lost the five hundred dollar bill!"
"What!" cried Amy.
"I certainly am that same Mr. Blackford," answered the young man, "and if these aren't the Outdoor Girls, I miss my guess!"
"That's who we are—all but one of us," spoke Betty. "Oh, it's true. Some one has Mollie a prisoner here! We tried to open the door, but it's locked. Will you come and help us try to batter it down?"
"I certainly will. But what are you doing here? Are you camping?"
"Camping in a haunted house? I guess not!" exclaimed Grace. "The idea! Oh, but it's good to have—a man!"
"Thank you!" laughed Mr. Blackford, who, it will be remembered, was so fortunate as to recover his lost money through the efforts of our heroines, as told in the first volume of this series.
"You—you aren't afraid; are you?" asked Amy.
"Afraid of what?"
"The ghost!"
"Ghost!" and he laughed heartily.
"Well, there really have been some strange goings-on here," said Betty, standing in the doorway with her chums. She looked out at the weather. It was not raining much now, and the thunder and lightning had about ceased.
"Suppose you explain," proposed Mr. Blackford. "I happened to be in this part of the country looking after some of my business interests. I was delayed longer at one place than I expected to be, and got caught in the storm. When I came past this house I thought I would see if I could not be accommodated over night, for my horse was tired and needed stabling. Instead I——"
"You are appealed to to help lay a ghost and find a missing girl," broke in Betty. "But, oh, the last is most important! Please come and get Mollie out!"
"Yes, I guess that is the most important. You can tell me about it later. But I surely was astonished to meet you girls again—glad of it, though. Now for the prisoner. Lead the way, Miss Nelson."
Flashing her lantern, the other girls keeping at her side, and Cousin Jane bringing up in the rear, Betty advanced to the locked door. Mr. Blackford tried the knob, and then called:
"Stand back, whoever is in there. I'm going to burst this door open!"
Grace cried out.
"Quiet!" commanded Betty. "It is the only way."
Mr. Blackford placed his shoulder down near the lock. There was a cracking and splintering of wood, and the door suddenly flew open with a crash.
"Mollie! Mollie!" cried Betty, as she flashed the rays of her lamp inside.
But the room was empty! Mystified, the girls, their chaperone and Mr. Blackford, stared about it. No Mollie was there!
"But I'm sure she was thrust into this room by that figure in white," declared Betty. "We all saw it."
"Are you sure?" asked Mr. Blackford, slowly.
"Positive. She was put in this room for some unknown purpose, and she can't have gotten out, for we have been in the hall all the while, and the door was locked."
"There is the window," said Mr. Blackford, as he took the lantern from Betty. Walking over to the casement he uttered an exclamation, as he saw the bent bars.
"This explains it!" he cried. "She has escaped!"
"Or else the—the ghost—came in here and took her away," faltered Amy.
"Well, we'll have a look about outside," suggested the young man. "There may be marks that will aid us, especially as the ground is soft now."
They all went outside. The rain was but a mere drizzle now. The fury of the storm had passed, and the night was becoming calm. The old house, and the mansion beyond it, which could now be seen dimly back of a fringe of trees, was silent and seemingly deserted, even by the ghost. There were no more queer blue flames, no more hollow groans and clanking noises.
"I didn't think to look and see if the other auto lamp was in that room where poor Mollie was," said Grace. "Did you?"
"Yes," spoke Betty. "I looked. It was gone."
"We had better not all go under that window at once," suggested Mr. Blackford, as they neared the casement with the bent bars. "Let me go alone, with the light, and I'll see if I can make out any footprints."
Carefully he examined, and then he gave a joyful exclamation.
"It's all right!" he cried. "There are the marks of but one person's shoes, and they are your friend's, I'm sure—for they are small. It plainly shows where she let herself down out of the window."
"Oh, how glad I am!" cried Betty. "But where is she now? Can you tell which way she went?"
"Only for a short distance," answered Mr. Blackford, as he flashed the rays of the lamp to and fro. "Then comes grass, and I am not sufficiently good on the trail to track a person over grass. However, we are sure of one thing—that she got out of the room herself, and ran off. She was not carried away."
"That is everything," murmured Grace. "Oh, what a relief!"
"But where can she be now?" asked Betty, in bewilderment. "Why did she not come back to us?"
"Probably she thought you, too, had left the place," suggested Mr. Blackford. "We must make further search. But suppose you tell me all that happened. I am interested in this—ghost."
The girls told all that had occurred—told it in gasps—by exclamations—by "fits and starts," as Betty expressed it. At first Mr. Blackford was amused—then he was more interested—finally he was impressed.
"I don't like this," he said, when he had been informed of the failure of Mr. Lagg to dispose of the property because of the "ghostly" manifestations. "It looks to me as though some trick was being perpetrated here. Possibly something more than a trick. There may be crimes contemplated. The authorities should be notified.
"Of course I don't believe in ghosts—neither do you—and, from what you say, it must have been a very human one who caught Miss Billette. But she is our most important consideration now. We must find her! We must search outside, for clearly she is not in the house, though it will do no harm to take another look."
"Go back there!" cried Grace, aghast.
"Why not?" asked Betty, coolly. "You forget we have a man with us now."
"Certainly we'll go back there and look," spoke Mrs. Mackson, in business-like tones. "Though I don't believe Mollie would go back, unless it was to look for us. And how can she have gone in without us seeing her?"
"There may be many entrances to an old, rambling place like this," said Mr. Blackford. "It will do no harm to look about in it again, and then we can search up and down the road."
Rather gingerly the girls entered the old house again. The light was flashed in all the rooms downstairs, but the girls balked at going to the upper floors, though Mr. Blackford proposed it.
"Mollie would not go up there," said Betty, positively.
"Perhaps not," admitted Mr. Blackford.
"I think we ought to go back to where we left the auto," said Mrs. Mackson. "That would be the most likely place for Mollie to go."
"I agree with you!" exclaimed the young man, quickly. "We'll go to the stalled auto."
As they were leaving the place there burst upon them a shrill, weird cry, like that of some animal, and it was followed by that deep groan that vibrated through the vacant rooms.
"The ghost! The ghost!" cried Grace, clutching Mr. Blackford's arm.
CHAPTER XX
SEEKING THE GHOST
They all stood still for a moment. The eerie noises gradually died away, and then they all became conscious of a strong smell of sulphur.
"What is that?" asked Betty, in an awed whisper. She was more impressed than she had been.
"Smells as if some one had lighted old-fashioned brimstone matches," answered Mr. Blackford.
"And it isn't the lightning, now," spoke Amy, looking at Mrs. Mackson. "It's the—ghost."
"A very material ghost, in my opinion," said the young man, who had so providentially come along. "I'm going to find out who it is."
He started toward the passage that led to the mansion.
"Don't you dare leave us here alone!" cried Betty, half tragically. Mr. Blackford looked at her a moment, and then added quietly:
"Well, perhaps it will be better to postpone the investigation. And there is your missing friend. But I would like to know who has an object in doing this. I think Mr. Lagg would like to know, also."
Once more the mysterious house was in silence, and with a last look around at the mildewed walls, the girls and Mrs. Mackson preceded Mr. Blackford out of it.
"I'll get your secret yet!" exclaimed the young man, as he turned to look at the strange habitation. "Now, where did you leave the auto?"
Fortunately, Betty had a good sense of direction and could lead the way, flashing her lamp at intervals. Mr. Blackford had proposed that some of the girls wait while he drove one of them to the stalled car in his carriage, it holding but two. But the girls refused to consider this, wishing to stay together.
"And, too," said Betty, "we might miss poor Mollie on the way."
"That is so," he had agreed. So they tramped along the muddy road, making the turn on to the main highway, and then, when Betty was about to remark that they must be near the car, Grace cried out.
"Oh, what is it now?" demanded Betty, a trifle sharply, for her nerves were fast giving way under the strain, though the Little Captain had good nerves, ordinarily.
"There's a light!" exclaimed Grace.
"Yes; and it's at the auto!" added Amy. "Oh, girls——"
"Perhaps it is Mollie," suggested Mrs. Mackson. "Call to her."
"Mollie! Mollie!" Betty cried, shrilly, and the others joined in with a school call.
"Oh, are you there?" came back the answering hail. "Oh, I am so glad."
"That's Mollie!" said Betty, in great relief. "We are united again," and presently the girls were clasping the lost one in their arms, and, let the truth be told—weeping over her for very joy.
"But of all things—to see you!" exclaimed Mollie, to Mr. Blackford, as she fastened her auto lamp on the bracket.
"Yes, and I was surprised to find your friends. But how did you get here?"
Mollie told how she had come to her senses, and had lighted the lamp she had with her. Then, when she was about to escape through the barred window she had heard the sound of a carriage approaching.
"That was mine," said Mr. Blackford.
"If I had known it I would not have been so frightened," remarked Mollie. "As it was, I put out my lamp, and then, when no one came for me, I decided to jump out. It was not far to the ground. Then I ran, and at first did not know what to do. Then I decided to try and find my auto. I must have blundered into the road, but I got here at last. I was going to hide in the car, and I wanted to leave some sort of a light on it so no one would run into it in the dark."
"But didn't you hear us talking and calling?" asked Amy.
"No," answered Mollie. "You see the room is some distance from the front of the house. And I was too frightened to know what I was doing. Besides, I fainted, at first, you know. And I thought you girls would run when—when you saw that white thing that grabbed me. I was disappointed when you were not at the auto here."
"What was—what was it that grabbed you?" faltered Amy, in awed tones.
"You needn't be so mysterious about it," laughed Mollie. She could laugh now—the strain was over. "It was a man who grabbed me, I'm certain of that. And a man I have seen before!"
"Seen before!" cried Betty. "What do you mean? Who was he?"
"I don't know. But what I do know is that he had a queer scar on the hand that grabbed me. And somewhere—I can't recall now, I'm in such a flutter—I've seen that man and his scar before."
"Try to think," urged Mr. Blackford. "We must get at the bottom of this outrage, and if you can give us a clue it will help a lot."
"I can't think now," protested Mollie, weakly. "Maybe it will come to me later. Oh, what a night! If only our auto would work we could get to—some place."
"Suppose you let me have a look," suggested Mr. Blackford. "I know something of the mechanism of a car."
"Oh, if you can only get this one to—mote!" sighed Mollie.
Mr. Blackford proved that he did know considerable about a car, for he soon discovered that the trouble was a simple disarrangement of the ignition system.
"There!" he exclaimed, when, by the light of a held-up lantern, he had made the necessary adjustment. "We will see if it won't go. Of course you can't use the self-starter, since your storage battery is out of order, but we can crank up in the old-fashioned way."
"The car generates its own current when it is running," said Mollie. "But to-day I have been running on an extra battery, as something seemed to be the matter with the other one. T must have it looked to."
Mr. Blackford whirled the crank, and at once there sounded the welcome throb of the powerful motor.
"Oh, joy!" cried Betty. "Now we can go!"
The auto was indeed in running order again.
"What are your plans?" asked the young man.
"We'll go on to Wendell City, the next town, and stop there for the night," said Mollie. "We are very damp and miserable, and need rest, and——"
"Food!" said Grace. "That little lunch we had was not very substantial."
"There were no chocolates for Grace," spoke Amy.
"I think I will drive on to the next town also, since it has stopped raining," went on Mr. Blackford. "I will see you in the morning, and we'll talk over this business some more. I want to lay that ghost if we can. You'll get to the town ahead of me in your car."
"And we'll see you at the Lafayette House," suggested Mollie. "We are going to stop there."
Four weary and much exhausted girls, and a rather used-up chaperone, were soon enjoying the comforts of the hotel. They had 'phoned on ahead for rooms that morning, but the proprietor had about given them up. However, it was only eleven o'clock.
"Wouldn't you think it was—next day?" asked Betty, as she noted the time.
"A great deal happened in a short space," said Mrs. Mackson. "Oh, but it is good to be in a house again."
"One that isn't haunted," added Grace.
Morning, as Betty put it, "dawned clear and bright," and with it came refreshment to the Outdoor Girls. They almost forgot the terrors of the night, and when Mr. Blackford met them in the parlor, he having arrived about an hour after they did, he found a very different set of young ladies.
"Well, are you ready for the ghost hunt?" he asked, with a smile.
"I am!" declared Mollie. "I think that ought to be investigated. The authorities should be notified, not so much for what happened to me—to all of us—as because of what might happen to others. Then there's poor Mr. Lagg—he'll lose what money he put into that property if the value goes down because of the ghosts. I say let's try to discover the secret."
"I'm with you!" exclaimed Betty, and Amy and Grace gave rather halting assents. Mrs. Mackson gamely agreed to do as the rest did.
"I did hope I could go with you to-day," said Mr. Blackford, "but I have received a telegram that calls me away. I wonder if you could postpone it?"
"Of course!" exclaimed Betty. "There is no great hurry, and besides, I think we will all be the better for a rest. Is your business prospering, Mr. Blackford?"
"Yes, indeed, thanks to the way you girls helped me out by finding my five hundred dollar bill. But this is not business. I don't mind telling you that I am seeking for a long-lost relative—a sister—and I have engaged a firm of private detectives to look for her. They just sent me word that they are on the track of a person who may be the one I have been looking for so long. So, under the circumstances——"
"Oh, of course, go by all means!" exclaimed Mollie. "We can meet you later, anywhere you say."
"Then suppose we meet here, say a week from to-day, and try for the ghost secret. By that time I may have found my sister, or have suffered another disappointment—and there have been many of late," and he sighed.
The week that followed was a busy one for the Outdoor Girls. Mollie had her car put in perfect order, and they toured over many miles of splendid country. They had minor happenings and adventures, but nothing of moment, if we except a few punctures and a blowout. Oh, yes, they did run over a dog, breaking the creature's leg. But it was the dog's fault, and Mollie steered out of the way so quickly that she nearly sent the auto into a tree.
At the appointed time Mr. Blackford was at the hotel.
"Well, are you ready to go ghost-hunting?" he asked.
"We are!" cried Mollie, and once more they set off for the "haunted mansion," determined to discover its secret if at all possible.
"I wonder what we'll find?" said Betty, as the car raced on.
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 unsuccessful 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. Blackford'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!"
CHAPTER XXII
A SWINDLED FARMER
Surprise at Betty's exclamation held her companions silent for a moment, and then Mollie cried:
"Are you sure, Betty? Are you sure? Can it be possible that we have found her again?"
"Of course I'm sure!" declared Betty, as she advanced to assist Mr. Blackford in caring for the girl, who lay white and senseless in his arms. "You'll be sure, too, as soon as you take a good look at her. Isn't that hair evidence enough?" and she let some of the girl's luxurious tresses, that had come unbound, slip through her fingers. "And see her face—and there's the scar she got when she fell from the tree. Of course it's the same girl!"
"I believe it is," murmured Grace. "But how came she here?"
"Another one of the mysteries to be explained," said Amy. "But hadn't we better see first if we can revive her?"
"An excellent idea," declared Mrs. Mackson. "If one of you will get some water, I'll use my smelling salts on her. And we must loosen her collar. It seems too tight."
Mr. Blackford had turned over the care of the girl to the others. He hurried to a spring they had discovered in the yard of the old house, and presently handed in a tin of water.
The strange girl opened her eyes, looked about in fear, and then, seeing herself surrounded by the friendly faces of our girls, on her own countenance there came a look of relief.
"What—what happened?" she gasped. "Oh, I remember. I fainted. I heard someone in the house, and I thought it was—I thought he was coming for me. Oh, he isn't here; is he?"
"We don't know who you mean," said Mollie, gently.
"My—the man who calls himself my guardian, but who has used me very cruelly," she said. "I ran away from him, and then I learned that there might be a way to escape him forever. I came back to get certain papers—but I heard noises in the old house, and——"
"I guess we made the noises," said Betty, with a smile. "We were looking for a—ghost!"
"A ghost!" cried the strange girl, starting up.
"There! I am sorry I said that!" exclaimed Betty, who thought, too late, of the effect it might have on the overwrought nerves of the stranger. "But really there isn't any ghost, you know."
The girl smiled weakly.
"Take some more water," urged Mrs. Mackson. "And smell these ammonia salts."
"I'll go get some of that cold chocolate in the vacuum bottle," volunteered Grace.
"No, please," said the girl. "I shall be all right presently. I can go on. I didn't find the papers I wanted. I was sure he had hidden them here."
"We hope you won't go until you have told us a little something about yourself," said Betty, with an inviting smile. "We don't want to pry into your private affairs," she went on, "but we would like to help you. And please don't disappear so mysteriously again. You are the girl who fell out of the branches of a tree; aren't you?"
"Yes," and she smiled faintly, "I am Carrie Norton. I knew you as soon as I saw you all again. Oh, please don't think harshly of me, but I have been so worried I did not know what I was doing. I have always regretted repaying your kindness so shabbily, but really——"
"Now don't worry a bit about that!" broke in Mollie. "Just rest yourself, and when you feel able, tell us all you wish to, and we'll do all we can for you. Do you feel better?"
"Oh, yes, much. I am not given to fainting. It was just fright that made me call out when I heard the noise you made, and then I went over—all got black before me. Oh, I am feeling stronger every minute."
She proved it by getting up, and the girls helped her arrange her dress, dusting it for her, and aiding her in coiling up her heavy hair.
"What lovely braids you have," observed Grace.
"Do you think so? They have made trouble enough for me."
"I suppose so much hair must be inconvenient in warm weather, but most of us would be willing to put up with it," spoke Amy.
"I didn't mean it that way. I will tell you soon. But I ought to be going."
"Then come with us," invited Betty. "We have plenty of room in the car, and we can take you to your friends, to a hotel, or anywhere you like to."
"And we can take you to our homes," added Mollie. "We have not far to go, and, as we are only touring for pleasure, we have no schedule to upset. Come with us. We have finished our ghost hunt."
"Then let us get away from here before my guardian happens to come back," suggested the girl. "I will explain all I can to you, though it is rather complicated."
"Would you mind explaining first," asked Betty with a smile, "why you were up that tree? We have all puzzled over that so much."
"I went up there to hide from my guardian, or the man who calls himself such," said the girl. "I suppose it seems strange, but really that was the only thing I could think of. And it was not hard to get up, for the branches were low. You see I had just run away from him, from this very house, when he brought me here, and said that it was to be our home."
"This place your home!" exclaimed Mollie. "Why I thought Mr. Lagg had bought it."
"I don't know Mr. Lagg," said the strange girl, with a shake of her head. "But I'll explain in sections, as it were. My name is Carrie Norton, and my guardian is Samuel Clark. At least, that is his right name. He goes by several, according to the nature of the business he is in."
"He must be a queer sort of man to change his name," suggested Mr. Blackford, who had rejoined the girls.
"He is queer," agreed Carrie Norton, "and not altogether honest, I fear. To be brief, when my parents died, several years ago, he assumed charge of me. He had been associated with my father in business, and he said the will provided that he was to be my guardian. I was too grief-stricken to question that, but I was shocked when, instead of having a comfortable fortune, as I supposed, there was little or nothing, and Mr. Clark said I must go about the country with him, helping him sell goods. He was a sort of commercial traveler, dealing in different things at different times."
"Yes," said the girls.
"Finally we came to this section, and one day he came to this house. He said he owned it, and that we were to live here. I saw that it was deserted, and I made up my mind I would not stay. The very next day, when he was making preparations to remain over night, I ran away. Oh, I was so lonely. I did not care what became of me. Then I thought I saw him coming down the road after me, and I went up in the tree.
"Perhaps I was foolish, but I scarcely knew what I was doing. I guess I must have fallen asleep, for I was in a comfortable position, and I had lost much rest of late. Then I heard an auto horn—I thought all sorts of things—I awoke with a start, and fell out."
"Then our auto did not strike you?" asked Mollie.
"No, I was just stunned by the fall. When I woke up, and found myself in that farm house bedroom, I did not know what to think. One idea possessed me, that I must get away—that I would not go back to him—my guardian. So I slipped away, and I have been wandering about ever since. I managed to get enough office work to help support me, for I am a business college graduate and I had a little money of my own with me. Sometimes I stopped at hotels, and again at boarding houses. My one idea was to keep away from that man."
"And you dropped part of a letter; did you not?" asked Grace. "The day you ran from the farm house."
"Yes," Carrie admitted. "I had written one I intended leaving for—for that man. Then I decided not to and I tore it up just before I got out of the window. I suppose I must have dropped a piece. It was a letter saying I would never come back to Shadow Valley."
"How did you happen to come back here?" asked Mollie. "We were certainly puzzled at your sudden departure."
"A little while ago," resumed Carrie, "I read something in a paper referring to my case. It was a legal notice asking for news of my whereabouts, and saying I would hear of something to my advantage by calling on certain lawyers with papers to prove my identity. At first I feared this was a trap on the part of my guardian, but I inquired and learned that the law firm was a reputable one. There is a Mr. Allen Washburn connected with it."
"In Deepdale?" cried Betty, her cheeks flaming.
"Yes. But how did you know?" asked Carrie.
"Oh, I am—slightly acquainted with Mr. Washburn," said Betty, hesitatingly.
"Slightly—is good," murmured Grace.
"So I decided I would go see those lawyers," went on Carrie. "But first I wanted the papers. My guardian had them, but I recalled that the day we came here he placed them on the mantle in this room. I came back to get them, but they were gone, and then I heard a noise—I fainted—and, well, here I am, and you are here too, I see."
"It is quite a mystery," said Betty. "Now, I have this to propose. You come home, with us, and we will take you to Mr. Washburn, or have him come to see you. Perhaps he can dispense with the papers."
"Oh, I hope so!" Carrie cried. "If only I could have a new guardian, I might be happy."
"Well, let's start on the road to happiness," said Mr. Blackford, with a smile. "We haven't found the ghost, but perhaps it is just as well."
"Did you ever see any queer manifestations while you were here?" asked Mollie of the girl.
"I was here only part of one day," she said. "I am glad it was not dark—I should have been afraid. Oh, it must have been terrible for you to have been caught by—by that man!" she said to Mollie. "Who could he have been?"
"I am just wondering if it could have been your guardian," said Mollie, a strange look on her face. "He said something about me having 'come back.' Girls, I'm sure that was it!" she cried. "He took me for Carrie, with my long hair——"
"We are coming on!" cried Mr. Blackford. "We will soon have this mystery solved."
"What sort of a looking man was the one who caught you?" asked Carrie.
"I could not see—he had on long white garments."
"Well, let us get under way. The lawyers will be the best ones to settle this affair," resumed Mr. Blackford, as he started for the waiting auto.
They left the strange mansion behind. Whether it was "haunted" or not they had failed to establish. But they had gotten on the trail of another mystery.
It was while autoing toward the town of Franklin, on their way to Deepdale, that the girls saw on the road a farmer standing beside a carriage with a broken axle. The man was ruefully contemplating the damage.
"Can we help you any?" asked Mollie, as she stopped her car. Mollie was always glad to help people.
"Wa'al," said the man slowly, "if you had a new axle it would be a help. But I know you haven't. What riles me most though, is that the rascal will get away from me."
"Are you after some one?" asked Mr. Blackford, catching at the man's words.
"Yes, I am; after as slick a swindler as has been around these parts in a long time. He done me out of a bunch of money not long ago, and only a little while ago I got word that the same man is peddling stuff in Franklin. I hitched up, as soon as I could, intending to go to Franklin and have him arrested. But this pesky axle had to break, and now I can't go on. It's the only rig I have, too. I heard that the fellow intends to go out on the noon train. Then I may never hear of him again."
"Can't you telephone?" asked Mr. Blackford.
"There's no 'phones around here, and if I did it would be hard work to hold him. There'd have to be a warrant, and I'd have to swear to a complaint. My mere word over the wire wouldn't be enough, I'm afraid. And it's near noon now. I don't know what to do."
Ruefully he gazed at his disabled carriage.
"I have it!" cried Mollie. "Come in the auto with us. We have room for one more, with a little crowding. We can get you there before noon, and perhaps you can have the man arrested."
"Good!" cried the swindled farmer. "I'll do it!"
CHAPTER XXIII
"THAT'S THE MAN!"
"What will you do with your horse and carriage?" asked Mr. Blackford, when the girls had made different seating arrangements to accommodate Mr. Bailey, the farmer. "It won't do to leave it on the road; will it?"
"No, I'll have to fix that some way. We can't very well take it along with us. But here comes Jim Bates. He'll look after my nag for me. Hi, Jim!" he called as a man came driving past in a dilapidated wagon, drawn by a bony horse, "Jim, jest look after my outfit; will you? Maybe you can leave it in Pierce's barn until I come back. That isn't far. Pierce is away, but his wife will let you, I guess."
"Where you goin'?" asked Jim. His horse had stopped of its own accord, it seemed.
"Goin' in to Franklin."
"In that there machine?"
"Yep."
"Gittin' sort of stylish; ain't ye?"
"Mebbe. But I had an accident, and these young ladies was kind enough to offer me a lift."
"In a hurry?"
"I sure am. I'm after that swindler. Heard he was in Franklin."
"Git out! Feller that sold you the interest in that patent soap?"
"Yep. That's how I was swindled," he explained to our friends. "This faker come along with a wonderful soap. It would take the spots out of everything—even the sun, he said. It did do good work when he manipulated it. Well, I was foolish enough to give up some of my hard-earned savings for the secret of how to make the soap. I bought the stuff he told me, but the soap was a failure. He swindled me. Now I'm after him."
"I hope you catch him," said Jim. "Go along in the buzz-wagon. I'll look after your rig until you git back. Good-luck!"
They started off, the farmer going into details of how he had been swindled. He was very thankful for the unexpected "lift" given him, and declared that he would not have known what to do had not the auto come along.
"We are only too glad to help you," said Mollie.