“Now what have I done?” she asked herself as the whole tower shuddered and sighed. A moan came from the great storage tank overhead. Not only the fountain, but the tower, too, seemed to be haunted.
The whispering and moaning continued for less than a minute. The silence that followed let Judy breathe again. The electric motor was still.
“I did it!” she thought with sudden elation. But was shutting off the motor enough? “If this is an electric pump then it probably pumps water into that big storage tank overhead,” she reasoned, “and if the tank is still full it will continue to pour water into the tunnel until it empties itself, and that may be too late!”
Judy was seized with the fear that already it was too late to save Dick Hartwell. But Horace could swim. He might keep himself from drowning until he reached the entrance under the cupids, but he could never dive through the cascade as she had done. Somehow, she must turn off the fountain.
“Is this the right valve?” she wondered.
She had discovered a number of pipes leading down from the tank. Pipes always confused her. Several of them had valves that she could turn. None of the valves were marked. A mistake might be costly, but indecision was worse. Judy began turning off all the valves she could find, one after the other.
“That ought to do it.” In the excitement of turning the valves she had forgotten her cold and discomfort. Now she was eager to get out of the gloomy tower and into the sunshine. But just as she was about to leave she discovered still another pipe ending in a plunger marked: DRAIN.
“That’s it!” she cried, and her voice echoed back to confirm her feeling that now she had made the tunnel safe for her brother and the poor, hurt prisoner, Dick Hartwell. “This must drain the pool,” she reasoned as she lifted the plunger. “Now they’ll be—safe!”
After it was done she sank against the stone wall exhausted, but still with the feeling that there was something urgent that she had to do.
“I must go back to the fountain and help Horace,” she told herself, but she was too weak to make the effort. Her eyes closed, but in another moment they flew open. Someone was shaking her roughly by the shoulder and shouting, “What’s the big idea, you? You’ve shut off all the water in the house! What’re you doing here, anyway?”
“The water? The house?” Judy tried to collect her thoughts, but all she could think of was the fountain with the water still pouring into the tunnel out of the broken pipe. She was there again, shivering in the icy cold water. But it didn’t matter any more. All she could say was, “I’m cold. Go away! Let me sleep!”
CHAPTER XIX
Falco
The man shook her again. Judy stared at him, recognizing him as Falco, the gangster who had warned her to keep away from the estate he and his thieving friends seemed to have taken over. Fortunately, he did not recognize her in her torn slacks and soggy sweater. Her clinging, wet hair probably didn’t look the same color as it had the day before.
“Did you say…I turned off the water in the house?” she questioned dazedly.
“Yes, and everywhere else! Now beat it before you do any more damage. Wait! What did you want, anyway?” he asked menacingly.
“I’ve been in the water, as you can see,” Judy replied. “Weren’t you pretty sure there was somebody down underneath the fountain when you turned it on? Or weren’t you the one who turned it on?”
“Me?” He seemed surprised. “Why would I do a thing like that?”
“I’m asking you. Why would you?” Judy retorted. “You might have drowned me. Or were you trying to drown someone?”
“I’m surprised,” he said, smiling slyly, “that you could think such a thing. If anyone gets drowned down there it will be a most unfortunate accident. Of course,” he added, “we have been bothered by prowlers lately. People get curious about a place like this. It’s not always healthy for them. But I guess you found out that much.”
“I didn’t find out nearly as much as I’d like to,” declared Judy, the heat of her anger warming her a little. “Were you trying to drown somebody? We were down under it when the water was turned on. I thought we were trapped at first, but I managed to get through the cascade and turn all these valves. I didn’t mean to shut off the water at the house,” she hurried on to explain. “I only meant to turn off the fountain.”
“You turned it off all right,” he told her, “but you wasted your time. We like it on!”
With that he began turning one of the valves, but Judy caught his hand and bent it behind him, crying hysterically as she held it in a tight grip, “No! No! You mustn’t turn it on! You did it before, but I won’t let you do it again. I’ll hold both your hands and yell if you try it!”
“No, you won’t! I’ll do the yelling. Edith!” he shouted as he tried unsuccessfully to shake Judy off and turn the valve. The same determination that had carried her through the water was giving her almost savage strength.
“Get her away!” Falco shouted to a dark-haired woman who now came running through the half-open door and stopped abruptly, an amused expression coming over her face. “What’s the matter with you?” he cried. “Edith! Don’t just stand there. Grab her!”
“Oh-oh, so it’s you again,” the newcomer said, staring at Judy. “Mister,” she added, sneering at Falco, “I think you’re in trouble. Way in!”
“What do you mean I’m in trouble?”
The valve forgotten, Falco whirled on the dark woman and demanded an explanation. Judy had to release his hands, but she still kept close watch to make sure he did not turn on the fountain. Now she knew which valve was the right one. Whatever it cost her, she intended to make sure it was not turned. Falco was paying little attention to her now. His anger was directed elsewhere.
“This little hobo wouldn’t have jumped me if I’d had my gun,” he said furiously to the woman called Edith.
“What happened to it?” she asked. “Did the big bad G-man take it away from you?”
Peter did it! This thought cheered Judy in spite of her predicament. If Peter suspected the Brandt estate was being used as a gang hideout, he’d be back.
Falco’s voice rose angrily. “Think I need a gun to take care of her? I’ll stop her—”
“Unless she stops you first,” the woman informed him. “She and her brother came to the house this morning. Said they wanted to interview someone. I didn’t see them, but I heard them talking to Stanley. She wanted to meet someone of importance. Well, she’s met the great Falco. He’s someone of importance. Anyway, he thinks so.”
“None of your cracks,” the gang leader warned. “Is this true?” he demanded, turning to Judy. “Were you and your brother at the house this morning?”
“We were,” she replied fearlessly, “and so were the police.”
“They had a search warrant,” the woman put in. “I told them to go ahead and search the house. Naturally, they didn’t find anything. We’re friends of the Brandts, living in their house while they’re on vacation. It was as simple as that.”
“What about the fountain?” Falco demanded.
“They didn’t go near it. They only searched the tower. I showed them around myself when I saw them heading for it. And while I was there with them I turned on the fountain.”
“You turned it on?” cried Judy, unable to control her feelings any longer. “Then you’re to blame for what happened!”
“What did happen?” asked Falco.
“Nothing,” replied the woman, who, Judy realized, must be Mrs. Cubberling. “They thanked me and drove away.”
“Then why do you say I’m in trouble?”
“Because of her!” Mrs. Cubberling pointed a finger at Judy.
“I can take care of her—easy. But first I want to hear her side of the story. She hasn’t told me why she came here.”
“Today or yesterday?” asked Judy, trying to confuse him.
“What if I was?” asked Judy, glad that he had not noticed Lorraine when she ducked. Suddenly Judy became aware of the seriousness of her situation.
“Speak up!” the gang leader barked. “Why did you come here? And I do mean today. I want the truth.”
“You’ll get it,” Judy said quietly, her hand still on the valve to keep him from turning it. “It’s exactly the way she told you. I came with my brother to get a story. He has a weekly column in the Farringdon Daily Herald. It’s called ‘Meet Your Neighbor,’ and we decided that you were a neighbor the public might like to meet. We wanted an interview. That was all. We were going to ask about your business, your hobbies—things like that.”
“Go ahead, Falco! Tell her your hobbies.” Edith Cubberling laughed mockingly. “You have a lot of them.”
“I haven’t time to listen,” Judy said hurriedly, not liking the ugly tone of voice the woman was using. “I have to go back to the fountain—”
“Oh, no, you don’t!” said Mrs. Cubberling, her stocky frame blocking the doorway.
“She has to go back!” Falco tipped back his head and laughed. “Did you hear that, Edith? She’s half drowned and shivering with cold, but she has to go back to the fountain!”
Judy was still guarding the valve when the woman sprang forward with the ferocity of a tiger and pushed her away from it.
“This will teach you not to go poking around where you’re not wanted,” she snarled as she struck Judy sharply across the cheek.
The blow was so unexpected that it knocked Judy off her feet and sent her spinning into a corner where she lay helpless.
“That’ll hold you for a while,” the gang leader told her. “Come on, Edith! We have to take care of her brother if the water hasn’t already done it.”
CHAPTER XX
A Passing Shadow
“Wait!” cried Judy. Anything, she thought, to thwart their deadly plans. She knew now that her strength was not enough, but if she could only give Horace more time, keep this evil pair away from the fountain—“They mustn’t know they’ve hurt me,” she told herself. “I’ll keep on talking. I’ll keep on stalling them. But, please God, let help come soon!”
Already exhausted and chilled to the bone, Judy had scarcely felt the vicious blow. From sheer fatigue she was unable to pick herself up from where she had fallen, but there were other ways to stop them.
“There’s something I ought to tell you,” she called, hoping to, at least, delay them and give Horace a chance to escape and drag Dick Hartwell to safety while the fountain was still turned off.
“She has something to tell us. Don’t you want to hear it?” Edith Cubberling asked.
“If it’s something about the fountain, we already know it,” Falco informed her.
“Yes, and so does she. I could have told Roger Banning she’d find out there was a fountain on the estate. He said she was asking about it yesterday.”
“I suppose he was just fool enough to tell her!”
“He didn’t need to tell me where it was,” Judy spoke up bravely. “I remembered. I was here once before with my grandparents and heard it speak.”
“The fountain—spoke?”
Now at last she had them interested.
“Yes,” she replied, trying a desperate bit of strategy. “Surely you know it’s haunted!”
“Haunted? What rubbish is this?” demanded Mrs. Cubberling.
“But it really is.” Judy did not need to pretend the effective shiver that accompanied this statement. “We heard moans coming from it and found out that it speaks whenever anyone is trapped under it. I know, because I heard it speak in my brother’s voice.”
“Did you hear any other voices?” Falco wanted to know.
“I did hear moans,” Judy answered guardedly. “Or didn’t I tell you? Of course, you wouldn’t know anything about the poor, dying man we found imprisoned under the fountain.”
“You—found him?” Falco had stopped dead still to listen.
“She’s talking nonsense,” Mrs. Cubberling said in an offhand way. “Come on. Let’s get going!”
“Wait! I want to hear this. The girl may have something to tell us, at that,” Falco said.
“The man looked very miserable,” Judy went on significantly. “He was wearing ragged clothes, and he had a heavy black beard.”
“You—saw him?” they both gasped.
“Of course,” replied Judy. “He was right there on the cot. My brother and I both saw him. It wasn’t a pretty sight.”
Falco and Mrs. Cubberling exchanged glances.
“Did he talk at all?” Falco asked.
“He moaned. I told you that. We heard him moaning and thought the fountain was haunted. That’s how we happened to explore it.”
“You explored it all right. Now we’ll explore it ourselves and find out how you got in there!”
“But I can tell you. We got in through the door!”
They both stared at Judy as if she were a spirit. Falco was the first to recover himself. He turned on his companion. “Did you leave that door unlocked?”
“No,” Mrs. Cubberling snapped. “You must have.”
“Maybe he unlocked it himself.” Falco laughed unpleasantly and added, “I told you we’d been bothered by prowlers. Is it our fault what happens to them?”
“I think what happened to this man was your fault,” replied Judy. She was about to mention the beating and then thought better of it. After all, she was just stalling until help came. It would be better to mention something they didn’t already know. There was that broken water pipe, for instance. “Of course,” she added, “it wasn’t entirely your fault. Part of it was accidental. One of the pipes broke and poured water into the room—”
“Which room?” they both interrupted.
“The room where we found the prisoner,” Judy answered. “We broke the pipe by accident when we rammed in the door.”
“You rammed it in? You—you—” Falco was stuttering in his anger. “What about the other door?”
“Oh!” said Judy as if she had just remembered it. “That’s right. There was another door.”
“Did you go in that room, too?” He looked ready to kill her if she had. Judy couldn’t help wondering what secret that other door was hiding.
“We didn’t bother with it,” she replied truthfully. “There wasn’t time. The water was pouring in. I managed to escape, but my poor brother is still down there with that dead man.”
Falco gasped. “Dead man, did you say?”
It flashed across Judy’s mind that it might be safer for Falco to think Dick Hartwell was dead. He mustn’t know Dick had talked. She thought of his story, now in Horace’s pocket, and her brother’s words, “I can keep his head above water if it comes to that.”
“He’s dead now,” she replied in a hoarse whisper. Her voice was leaving her. She couldn’t keep talking much longer. What she had told them could easily be the truth. She coughed painfully and added, “My brother probably is dead by now, too, but I guess that doesn’t matter to you. The contents of that room down there is all that matters, isn’t it?”
“What do you know about the contents of that room?” snarled Mrs. Cubberling. She turned to Falco and said almost triumphantly, “See? I told you you’re in trouble!”
“Answer her!” Falco commanded Judy.
Judy tried to answer, but only a croak came out. Finally she managed to tell them she knew nothing. It was true. She had been making wild guesses. She had guessed, by the way they were acting, that the contents of the locked room meant mor
e to them than human lives. Now there was nothing she could say to stop them from going back there to protect their treasure.
“Please, Horace, if you escape, go the other way!” Judy whispered.
“What’s she saying, Edith? I can’t hear her.”
“No wonder,” the woman answered. “She’s so hoarse now she can’t speak above a whisper.”
Falco gave an evil chuckle. Judy saw Mrs. Cubberling looking at him as if she might be seeing him for the first time.
“I don’t believe they’d ram in one door without having a try at the other,” he continued, “but she could be telling the truth.”
“Some people do. I’d nearly forgotten.” The woman’s voice sounded almost wistful. It changed abruptly as she added, “I suppose you’re going to ask me to get the truth out of her?”
“Not now! Keep it quiet!” he warned. “I think I hear someone outside. It could be the police.”
Judy hoped it was.
“If it is the police, it’s your own fault!” Mrs. Cubberling snarled at Falco. “I told you one of these days they’d catch up with you. Today may very well be the day. You’ve bungled this job from start to finish!”
“But you’re in it, too—”
“I’d have the satisfaction,” she interrupted, “of seeing you get yours, and I’d be as free in prison as I am in this gang working for you. I’m through, as of this minute!”
“What do you mean you’re through?”
“I mean I’m through—fed up—finished! I’ve done all the dangerous work for you and my husband long enough. Maybe I’d like someone who’d take care of me for a change. Maybe I’d like to wear some of those precious rubies and diamonds—”
“Quiet!” commanded Falco. “Someone’s coming!”
A figure passed the door on a run, but Judy saw only his shadow. Mrs. Cubberling rushed over to one of the peepholes in the tower.
“Know him?” asked Falco.
“No, but I’ll bet this girl does. He’s in a big hurry, and he’s on his way to the fountain. We’d better follow him.”
“It won’t do you any good to yell,” the gang leader warned Judy as they started off. “Someone’s sure to get hurt if you do.”
The Third Girl Detective Page 25
