“Is the girl inclined to be hysterical?”
“Well, she is easily excited,” I admitted. “Still, I’m worried.”
“Why not drive over to White Falls if it will ease your mind? But don’t go alone, wait a couple of hours and Jack can ride along with you.”
“I’d prefer to start right away,” I said. “Probably Florence will be willing to go with me.”
I lost no time in telephoning Flo, and she agreed to the trip. Florence had told her mother about the Gains family, and Mrs. Radcliff insisted upon sending a box of clothing and groceries with us. I was quite willing to stop at the shed where Mud Cat and his brood had taken refuge, but I regretted the delay.
“Let’s make it as brief as possible,” I told Florence, as the car drew near the Grassy River. “I’m terribly anxious to see Emma.”
When we halted in of the shed, there was no activity about the place.
“Maybe the Gains family has left,” said Florence.
“I’m sure they are around somewhere,” I said.
A line of shirts flapped in the wind between two trees. They had very little in the way of clothes. They wouldn’t have taken off without their laundry.
I tried the horn.
At the sound of Bouncing Betsy’s staccato summons, the Gains family came to life. Jennie and Jed peered around the corner of the shed, while Mud Cat Joe ambled into sight from the direction of the river.
“Well, if it ain’t our young lady friends,” he said. “Jennie! Come on out here! I allows this is a-goin’ to be good news.”
“We have a basket of things for you,” I said. “It’s in the rear compartment. Just a few little knick-knacks we thought you might like.”
Flo stepped from the car and started to get the basket.
“Now then, young lady don’t you go an’ break your back a liftin’ that,” said Mud Cat. “Let me heft it out of there for you.”
Punctuating his words with action, he moved to the rear of the car.
“She’s purty heavy, Jennie,” he said, weighing the basket up and down in his hand. “There’s a lot of store grub here.”
“Thank you kindly,” said Jennie. “We sure get tired o’ catfish day in and out.”
“We brought a box of clothing too,” Florence said.
Mud Cat lifted out the box and gazed at it with delight.
“Look at that there sweater, Jed!” he said. “Now you kin keep warm this winter. You and the young ’uns. It ain’t a goin’ to be so shivery like it was last year.”
“Thank you,” Jed said bashfully. Then, to further manifest his appreciation, the boy offered to show us his most prized possession, his dog.
“Tige’s tied up by the river,” Jed explained. “He’s kind of mean with strangers, but he’s sure a great dog.”
I wanted to get back on the road, but I hated to disappoint the boy, so Flo and I followed him around the shed. Mud Cat Joe and his wife carried the groceries and clothing into the shelter and then followed us down to the river’s edge.
“This here is Tige,” Jed said proudly, unfastening the dog from the willow tree to which he had been tied. “He’s half shepherd and half English bull.”
“What a mixture,” Flo said.
“And that’s our raft of chickens,” Jed announced, pointing to a flat craft likewise tied to the willow tree. “It used to ride along behind The Empress.”
I asked Mud Cat if he had any new clues as to what had become of his missing houseboat.
“No, Mrs. Carter, nary a trace,” Joe replied. “I asked as fer down the river as Newport, but folks sez they ain’t never seen ’er. I got a sneakin’ idea them skunks that stole ’er has done gone and sent ’er to the bottom of the river.”
“What good would that do them?” I asked.
“Maybe they stripped her first and then allowed as how they was in a risky business and might get caught. So, they just let the river into her.”
“Let’s hope not,” said Florence. “I feel somehow that you will recover your houseboat.”
Before Mud Cat Joe could reply, another car drove into the yard. A man got out and ran toward us. It was Glen Conrad. Mr. Conrad seemed oblivious to Flo and me. He addressed himself exclusively to the Gains family as a unit.
“What are you doing on my property?” he shouted.
“I don’t know who you are, stranger,” said Mud Cat Joe, “but I might tell you I ain’t used to havin’ nobody talk to me in them tones.”
“Answer my questions,” Mr. Conrad snapped. “Who gave you the right to occupy these premises?”
“The right any river man has to live in any vacant buildin’ that suits his fancy. And listen, stranger, I’m givin’ you just five minutes to get out.”
“What! You order me off my own property!”
“I sure do, if it is your property.”
Mud Cat tossed his tattered hat on the ground and deliberately rolled up his sleeves. I wondered if Mr. Conrad even owned this property. I guessed that he didn’t. But how he might think to profit by bullying the Gains family, I couldn’t imagine.
“Mr. Conrad,” I said. “I know this family personally. They have had a great deal of misfortune since their houseboat was lost. If you force them from this shed, they’ll have no other place to go.”
“You keep out of this,” Mr. Conrad appeared for the first time to recognize me. “These dirty squatters are moving, and that’s all there is to it!”
“We’re not a-gettin’ out,” Mud Cat announced.
“I’ll show you!” shouted Glen Conrad. “Those squawking chickens are moving downstream right now!”
Drawing a knife from his pocket, he ran to the raft and started hacking at the rope. Before it could be severed, Jed unhooked the leash of his dog and urged: “Get ’im, Tige!”
The dog made a savage dart at Glen Conrad, who, in sudden terror, dropped the knife.
“Look out, stranger,” chuckled Mud Cat Joe. “That there dog is pure pizen!”
Glen Conrad tried to retreat toward his automobile, but the dog stopped him. The badgered man had only one direction to go—toward the river. He took a step backward, shouting to Jed and Joe to call off their dog, or he would have the law on them.
As the man hesitated at the edge of the bank, Tige made another savage rush. He struck hard against Glen Conrad’s legs, toppling him into the raft of chickens. There was a wild fury of feathered panic as the fowl flew in all directions. Glen tried desperately to save himself, but the raft gave a sudden lurch under his weight, and with a great splash he pitched into the muddy waters of the Grassy.
CHAPTER 12
“Hey, you!” Mud Cat shouted. “Guess that will teach you to leave my chicken raft be!”
“Oh, Pop!” Jed shrieked. “Ain’t he funny? He almost set down on the White Rock rooster!”
“The river ain’t wet, is it?” mocked Jennie.
Glen Conrad stood up in the shallow water, spluttering angrily. He shook his fist at the group on shore.
“You’ll pay for this!”
While Jed rounded up the few chickens which had escaped from the wire enclosure on the raft, Mud Cat Joe tied up Tige, so that Glen Conrad could wade ashore.
More outraged than hurt, the man retreated to his car, breathing threats at every step. Even the exhaust of his automobile sounded angry as he drove off down the highway.
“That sure was funny.” Flo chuckled. “It served Mr. Conrad right, too. He had no business trying to cut loose the raft.”
“Maybe we oughtn’t to have sicked the dog on him,” Mud Cat said. “If that feller does own this shed, I reckon we’ll pay a-plenty fer the fun of gettin’ rid of him.”
“Well, landlords do have a way of ousting tenants sometimes,” I said. “He probably will be back.”
“Oh, he’ll be back all right,” said Joe. “And I got a feelin’ he will be a-bringin’ the sheriff along with him.”
“What will you do then?” asked Florence.
“
I don’t know. If I could find The Empress, we’d just climb aboard and wash our hands of this here upstart. But a river man without no houseboat is about as lost as a duck in the desert.”
“Well, if Mr. Conrad makes trouble for you, I may be able to do something about it,” I said. “If he puts you out of the shed, we’ll try to find you another place.”
“That’s mighty kind of you. But I reckon Jennie an’ me and the kids won’t never be satisfied living on the land. We kin only feel at home on the river.”
We said goodbye to the Gains family and drove on toward White Falls. Since I’d antagonized Glen Conrad, I wondered what kind of reception we’d get when we reached our destination.
“I wonder if he really does own that shed?” I said. “I suppose he must, or he wouldn’t have created such a disturbance.”
“How silly to get so excited over a deserted shack. The Gains weren’t doing the place any particular harm.”
“Glen Conrad just has meanness in his blood.”
We reached White Falls and parked in front of Old Mansion. The upstairs shutters were closed, and there was no sign of life. However, Glen Conrad’s battered car stood on the street, so we knew that he had arrived ahead of us.
Flo rang the bell. The door was flung open, and Mrs. Conrad confronted us, her eyes blazing.
“You’re not wanted here. Go away and mind you, don’t come back!”
She started to close the door, but I blocked it with my foot.
“Really, we had nothing to do with your husband’s unfortunate accident,” I said. “Please, may we see Emma just for a moment?”
“No, you cannot.”
“What right do you have to refuse?” I demanded.
Mrs. Conrad’s answer was to slam shut the door, barely missing my foot.
“I’ll ring again,” said Florence. “I’ll hold my finger on the bell until she comes back.”
“No, that would only get Emma into more trouble,” I said.
“It’s not right that she has to work in such a place.”
“I agree with you there, Florence.”
“We have to talk her into returning to Greenville with us.”
“Something has gone wrong here,” I said. “I get the feeling that we wouldn’t have been welcome even if Mr. Conrad hadn’t fallen into the river. Emma knows something, and the Conrads are afraid she’ll tell us!”
“If you believe that, Jane, let’s see her even if we have to break down the house.”
“We might just try the rear door, first” I suggested, “before we commence taking down the house board by board.”
We crept around to the back entrance. The kitchen door was closed. I tried the knob. It was locked.
“Lift me up so that I can peep into the window,” I said. “If Emma is there, I’ll signal her.”
Flo lifted me up, but it was an exercise in futility.
“The kitchen is deserted,” I reported.
“What do you suppose became of Emma?”
“I’m feeling very uneasy. It was so strange the way she broke off our conversation.”
“Yes, and all the talk about mysterious disappearances from room seven,” Florence added. “Wouldn’t it be dreadful if anything had happened to Emma? It would be our fault for bringing her here.”
“Don’t say such a thing, Flo. Emma must be all right.”
“I don’t feel like returning home unless we are certain of it.”
“Neither do I. Let’s try Thom Vhorst. Maybe he knows something.”
The café owner was busy refilling the coffee urn when we walked in. We sat at the counter and ordered two pieces of pie.
“Gettin’ to be regular callers in our town, aren’t you?” Mrs. Vhorst said.
“We came to see our friend next door,” I explained. “Only Mrs. Conrad wouldn’t let us talk with her.”
“You don’t say? Reckon maybe she’s a mite upset this morning.”
“Upset? About what, may I ask?”
“Well,” said Thom Vhorst, vigorously polishing the coffee urn, “I wouldn’t know, but folks say things have been happening in that house.”
“You mean the disappearance?”
“Yes, I reckon maybe Mrs. Conrad is worried for fear the police may come around and ask a few questions.”
“Why don’t you report the matter, Mr. Vhorst?”
“Not me! It’s none of my business. Anyway, I ain’t sure that anything happened—things just look mighty odd.”
I took a bite of pie as I studied the café owner’s reflection in the mirror behind the counter.
“Mr. Vhorst,” I said, “I don’t suppose you noticed a car drive up at Old Mansion yesterday.”
“Gray one, wasn’t it?”
“I imagine so. Mr. Harwood, an acquaintance of my father’s, came here to see the Conrads. He’s a middle-sized middle-aged man with an energetic gait. Yesterday, he was wearing a brown suit.”
“Sure, I saw that fellow go into the mansion, but I never did see him come out.”
“You don’t mean something happened to him!” Flo said.
“No, I’m not sayin’ anything like that. For all I know, he may have driven off during the night. His car set out front till around midnight, after that I went to bed, and when I opened up this morning, the car was gone.”
“What time do you open the café?
“Yesterday, it was just before seven.”
“The man may have left town early,” I suggested, although I didn’t think it very likely.
“Yes, reckon that’s what happened,” Mr. Vhorst said.
“Have you seen anything of our friend Emma?” Flo asked.
“I seen her hanging up a washing not an hour ago.”
“Then I guess nothing too dreadful has happened,” I said when Florence and I were back outside. “Emma must be all right if Mr. Vhorst saw her hanging out washing. As far as Mr. Harwood is concerned, I don’t know what to think.”
“Thom Vhorst distrusts the Conrads so greatly that I judge he’s apt to jump to conclusions,” Flo said. “But he certainly was hinting that Mr. Harwood had disappeared mysteriously.”
“I thought so at first, and then he denied it. I really believe we can’t go much by what Mr. Vhorst does say.”
“We might drop in at the laundry and ask a few questions.”
“No, that fellow Ralph may be a Sheik, but he still gives me the heebie-jeebies,” I said. “I doubt that he would know anything, and if he did, he’d not be likely to tell us.”
We sauntered back to Bouncing Betsy, uncertain of what to do next. I glanced at the upper story of Old Mansion.
“There she is now, Flo!”
Emma was standing by the window of her room, half hidden by the curtain. She was frantically signaling to us.
“What is she trying to tell us?” Florence asked.
“I think she wants us to stay put. I do believe she intends to sneak out of the house and meet us.”
CHAPTER 13
Emma could not be expected to join us in front of the house, so we walked past the laundry, and stationed ourselves behind some bushes where we could watch the front door of Old Mansion. While we waited, a car drove up in front of the laundry. Three men got out. They did not notice us in the bushes and hurried inside.
After a few minutes, the door of Old Mansion opened, but it was not Emma who emerged. Glen Conrad, dressed in a dry suit, closed the gate behind him. With a deep scowl on his face, he walked up the street in our direction. He paused for a moment in front of the laundry, looked up at the windows, and then moved on. He, too, failed to detect our presence.
“I wonder what is keeping Emma?” Florence said. “Perhaps, we misunderstood her signals.”
Just at that moment, we saw Emma come around the corner of the house. I emerged from my hiding place and waved to her. Emma glanced over her shoulder, then ran to us.
“I have only a minute to talk,” she said breathlessly. “Mrs. Conrad mustn’t know that I have slip
ped away from the house.”
“Tell us what has happened, Emma,” I said. “Why did you hang up the receiver this morning when I was talking with you?”
“Because Mrs. Conrad was coming. She warned me that I was to tell you nothing.”
“What did you start to say about Mr. Harwood?”
“It was awful,” Emma said. “He came to Old Mansion yesterday afternoon to inquire about a friend of his, a man named Merriweather.”
“I know,” I said. “Merriweather spent a night at Old Mansion some days ago.”
“Mrs. Conrad claims he didn’t.”
“But I am certain of my facts,” I said Jane. “His name is on the register.”
“It is?” Emma said. “That’s funny because I examined the book myself this morning.”
“And the name wasn’t there? It should have been just above mine.”
“It wasn’t, Jane.”
“Then the Conrads have either erased it or used ink eradicator.”
“They may have. I know Mr. and Mrs. Conrad were terribly upset when Mr. Harwood arrived.”
“What did they tell him?” Flo asked.
“I heard part of the conversation. They tried to convince him that Merriweather hadn’t stayed at the house overnight.”
“Did Mr. Harwood accept their story?”
“He acted suspicious of it. Possibly, that was why he decided to stay all night.”
“Mr. Harwood remained at Old Mansion?” I asked.
“Yes, I’m sure the Conrads didn’t like it very much. They had an argument over which room they would put him in.”
“Not number seven, surely?” I said.
Emma nodded.
“I heard the Conrads discussing it when they thought no one was listening. Glen told his wife: ‘It will serve the inquisitive fool right to sleep in that room. Maybe if he gets a good scare, he won’t be so impertinent!’”
“And Mrs. Conrad’s reply?”
“Oh, she protested, but Glen overruled her. Mr. Harwood’s things were taken up to room seven.”
“And then what happened?” I asked. “Was there a disturbance during the night?”
“I heard a faint cry,” Emma said. “Then a splashing sound as if something had fallen into the river. I can’t explain it, but the strangest feeling went over me—I sensed that some dreadful thing had happened to Mr. Harwood.”
Jane Carter Historical Cozies: Omnibus Edition (Six Mystery Novels) Page 21
