“We’re half-murdered and you quote Latin,” Honey said. “Mart, don’t you have any fear—”
“Of spirits?” Linnie finished the sentence.
“All I said was ‘It is no will-o’-the-wisp I have followed here,’ ” Mart said, “and it isn’t. That old guy is real. He has a pack on his back, too, just like the man Bill Hawkins said he saw. There’s your thief, Trixie, and the arsonist, too.”
“All that is very interesting,” Brian said, “but what was his motive?”
“Who knows? Maybe it was some old feud. I think Slim is mixed up in it with him. Where the heck did he go?”
“Into thin air,” Linnie whimpered, “just like any ghost. It’s the same ghost Mama and I saw when we took the Englishman home after he nearly drowned.”
“It wasn't a ghost,” Jim said, “and I think he was going someplace right now to hide the loot he had in that bag.”
“That loot is probably my ghost fish,” Trixie said, “in the bait bucket. But where did he go?”
“Into some cave, maybe,” Mart said. “Let’s keep our eyes open for him.”
“Let’s keep our eyes wider open for the person who shot that rifle,” Trixie said.
Just then it cracked again.
“It’s someone hunting squirrels,” Linnie said.
“At night?”
“They do, sometimes.”
Trixie was not convinced. “Then explain to me why a number-one coon dog like Jacob wouldn’t flush a squirrel.”
“Didn’t you hear him panting to go after that noise? I still have him by the collar.”
“Don’t let him loose, then, or we’re dead ducks,” Mart said.
Just then Jacob pulled free and dashed off into the woods, wagging his tail expectantly.
“Come back here, Jacob!” Linnie called. “Oh, dear, maybe I’ll never see him again. The ghost will get him!”
“The ‘ghost’ isn’t home now, that’s for sure,” Mart said. “I feel like a cat at a mousehole. Say, Trixie, do you want to take a closer look now that the ‘ghost’ is away?”
“I want to find my fish, but I think the ‘ghost’ is hiding it.”
“Let’s take a look around, anyway,” said Mart eagerly.
“Look out!” Linnie cried. “That big black dog—it’s the ghost’s dog. He’s set it to watch for us. You never can kill him, Mart, or frighten him. Don’t try. A person could throw an ax right through a ghost’s black dog, and it wouldn’t budge.”
“That’s a black dog?” Mart asked. He threw a rock.
It sailed through the air, hit the “black dog,” and ricocheted into a clump of bushes.
“See? You couldn’t kill it!” Linnie wailed. “Please, let’s go back home.”
“Stop teasing her!” Trixie commanded Mart. Then she put her arms around Linnie. “It’s nothing but an old black stump. Turn your head around. You can see it plain as day in the moonlight. Here’s Jacob, too. You didn’t need to worry about him. That man has gone off into the woods; he doesn’t know we’re here. Let’s just take a quick look into his house and see what he’s up to, and then we’ll take the mule trail home.”
Linnie stepped forward bravely after Jim and Brian. “All right, if you say it’s safe,” she told Trixie.
Slowly, single file, the Bob-Whites stole up to the side of the house and stood in the shadow.
Trixie raised herself on tiptoe and peeked through the window, flashing her light. It traveled over the stone fireplace. Strings of pumpkin and wild onion hung from the mantel, drying. Fagots were piled on the hearth below. On the far side of the room, a little cot stood, neatly made up, and beside it were an old kitchen chair and a rickety table with a kerosine lamp.
When Trixie started to draw her light away, she saw something that made her gasp. Just inside the door, off to one side, stood a bait bucket.
“It’s mine!” she cried. “Just look at it! Someone who lives here stole my fish. Maybe Slim lives here. I
never heard anyone say where he does live. I wish I could go in there and get my fish!”
“That’s one thing I won’t help you to do, break into someone’s house,” Jim said positively, “and no other Bob-White will, either.”
“I wasn’t going to break in. I only said I wish I could get my bait bucket. I’ll never see it again if I have to wait till Uncle Andrew gets the sheriff to search this place.”
“And I say it probably isn’t your bait bucket at all,” Mart said. “Everyone around this lake has a bait bucket.” He backed away from the window. “I think it’s a good idea to go home.... There!” he added triumphantly as they went around the house. “You completely forgot what Linnie told you, didn’t you, Trixie? She said she saw that wildcat’s pelt nailed to this cabin, and there it is! Do you think someone who saved your life would be likely to steal from you and set fire to Mrs. Moore’s cabin?”
Trixie hung her head. “I guess not, Mart, but I’m baffled. Say, nobody’s even mentioned the Englishman. Linnie thought he lived here. I saw that dip net and bucket in his boat. Maybe he took my fish.”
“There you go again, guessing,” Brian said, shaking his head. “You’re a dedicated flatfoot, all right. If the , Englishman took your fish—and that’s pretty improbable—then who set the fire? Who fired those shots in the woods just now?”
“There’s only one person mean enough to fit the whole picture,” Trixie answered.
“Right!” Mart said. “We’ll be smart if we leave it to the sheriff from now on.”
Back at the lodge, all was still and dark.
“Thank goodness,” Trixie said, “we didn’t waken Mrs. Moore or Uncle Andrew. Listen! Listen!”
The katydids and frogs were quiet. In the hush, out on the lake below, they could hear the soft and regular splash of oars. The moon shone bright from a cloudless sky, and, as they all watched, a boat slid into its silver path, a lone figure at its oars.
Unexpected Meeting ● 13
IN SPITE OF their expedition into the woods the night before, the Bob-Whites were up early. Trixie, Honey, Linnie, and Mrs. Moore were stirring around in the kitchen when Uncle Andrew came in.
“I guess you didn’t rest any better than I did last night, did you?” he asked. “Most of the night I kept hearing queer noises. I imagined I heard someone moving about the house. I got up once and didn’t see anyone and decided it was just my imagination. Did you hear anything?”
Trixie looked at Honey questioningly before answering him.
“Go ahead,” Honey said. “We agreed before we came downstairs that we should tell Uncle Andrew all about last night. It doesn’t matter, now that it’s all over.”
Uncle Andrew looked puzzled. “What are you talking about?”
So Trixie told him. The boys came into the kitchen while she was talking, looked sheepishly at one another, then interrupted her to add details she had forgotten.
“I told Mama, too,” Linnie said. “She didn’t like it.” Uncle Andrew’s face was red. “I don’t like it, either,” he said emphatically. “I should have know that Trixie wouldn’t rest until she went after that fish. I didn’t think I’d have to sit up all night and watch. I guess I should be glad she didn’t go alone. Trixie, you constantly keep me on pins and needles!”
“I’m sorry,” Trixie said contritely. “I couldn’t stand not knowing what happened to my fish.”
“Now that you’ve been there, you don’t know any more than you did before. I want to get to the bottom of the matter. I’m going to White Hole Springs to talk to Sam Owens. I suppose Slim is a hundred miles away from here by this time. He probably set the fire and skipped. The stranger you saw, man or spirit, doesn’t sound to me like a criminal. The sheriff will throw some light on the matter.”
“If Slim is gone, who fired that rifle?” Trixie asked. “That’s one of the things we must find out. When we do, we’ll know whom you saw out on the lake at midnight last night, too. Are you planning to row across to that cave again today?”
“Oh, I hope so,” Trixie said and looked expectantly at Jim and Brian. “I know we can find all the fish if we just get a chance to look for them without anything else happening.”
“I wish you had a guide to go with you to replace Slim.”
“I honestly think we know more about a cave than Slim does... Bob-WhiteCave, at least. Linnie said she’d go with us if her mother would give her permission. May she, please, Mrs. Moore?”
“I suppose so,” Mrs. Moore said reluctantly. “I wish you’d just content yourselves with going fishing in Ghost River or the lake.”
“With Slim gone, we’ll get along just fine in the cave,” Trixie urged.
“Do you think it’ll be all right?” Mrs. Moore asked Uncle Andrew.
“If Linnie may go, yes. The Bob-Whites have proved themselves pretty reliable in the woods around their home in Sleepyside. Come back before five o’clock, and observe all the rules for spelunking!”
Over in the cave, in the big entrance room, Honey asked, “Do you have your lights? Three kinds for each one of you?”
They all checked and nodded.
“Do you have waterproof matches?”
Trixie held up the plastic envelope to show Honey. “How could we forget? Every time we come into the cave you check and double-check. Have we left a note outside? Have we brought our ropes? Do we have extra carbide for our lamps? Canteens? Chocolate bars?”
Honey looked dismayed. “I didn’t know I was such a bossy person.”
“Heavens, you aren’t, Honey! We’re as grateful as can be. At least, I am. I always get so excited about things that I never remember anything I should do. I couldn’t accomplish anything without you, Honey.”
“Well, now that the Admiration Society has concluded its meeting, shall we explore a little?” Mart asked. He led the way to the tunnel.
As they neared the wall, Trixie cried out, “Why, that’s my bait bucket!”
“It is!” Honey said. “It’s been right here all the time. That makes us look pretty foolish.”
“It makes the bait bucket animated if it’s been here all the time. It didn’t walk over here to the wall. I left it just inside the opening to the cave. Hurry; let’s look inside!” Trixie threw back the lid and saw the ghost fish and crayfish.
“It is my bucket,” she cried delightedly. “I wonder if Slim got scared and brought it back. Do you suppose it was Slim we saw on the lake last night? I’ve never known so many things to happen. I’m almost convinced that there are ghosts. I won’t be separated from that bait bucket again. Here, Mart, see if you can push it ahead of you through the tunnel.”
Mart led the procession. The crawlway was short, and they soon stood in the other room. They had forgotten how beautiful it was and turned their heads about, flashing their carbide lamps on the gleaming stalactites. “Mercy, what happened to them?” Honey cried. “They’re broken off—dozens of them. Who’d do a thing like that?”
Apparently someone had taken a blunt instrument and deliberately knocked off the tips of many of the beautiful calcite formations.
“What a horrible thing to do!” Linnie said. “Some crazy person or somebody very evil did that.”
“It was Slim,” Trixie said positively. “No one else but us knew about this cave or this room. I hope Uncle Andrew gets the sheriff to find him.”
“If it was Slim, it’s sure strange about the bait bucket,” Honey said. “He didn’t have a change of heart and bring back the fish and then come on in here and wreck everything. I’m not too sure we should stay here. I think your uncle would want us to go right back to the lodge.”
“There’s no one here now. Please, Honey, let’s look around and see if we can’t find some more fish while we’re right here on the spot,” Trixie begged. “I just can’t make any sense out of what’s going on.”
“I think Slim is in cahoots with that Englishman,” Mart said. “I think they’ve been out here early this morning before we got here. I think they left the bait bucket here and didn’t think we’d be over here today, after roaming the woods last night. I think it was Slim who shot that rifle last night, and I think he’s working with that Mr. Glendenning.”
“I’m sure it was Slim who fired the gun, but who was the man with the pack on his back? And what did he have in that pack? It wasn’t the bait bucket,” Trixie said.
Mart threw up his hands. “Let’s forget the whole thing and work fast, before they get back. It was right over in this stream that Trix found the fish we do have.”
Mart went down on his haunches and beamed his head lamp into the shallow water.
Trixie peered into the water, got up, went farther along the spring, and crouched again. “That’s strange,” she said. “I can see shadows on the bed of the stream, but I can’t see anything in the water, can you?”
“They’re the shadows of crayfish,” Brian said. “They’re transparent, like the one you have in the bucket. Though you can see right through them, the light doesn’t go through very well, so a shadow is left. There aren’t any fish here. Let’s look farther along the stream.”
Carefully they made their way around the hard flowstone, across wet clay, and over slippery rocks.
“It’s the blackest black in this cave that I ever saw in my life,” Honey said.
Mart laughed. “You can’t see blackness.”
“I wonder. Let’s put out our lamps and find out how dark it would be.”
“Not now!” Trixie said quickly. “Not when we’re trying to find the fish!”
“Just for a little while,” Honey said. “The rest of us would like to try it. That is, I think so. Wouldn’t you?”
“We’ll never have a better chance,” Brian said. “You can imagine you’re a ghost fish, Trixie, and tell us where a bunch of spelunkers could find you.”
Trixie laughed good-naturedly and put out her carbide lamp.
One by one, the others did the same.
The darkness was unbelievable. Not a person could see an inch in front of his face. It was eerie—and also frightening.
“Are we all here?” Honey asked breathlessly.
They laughed aloud to reassure themselves.
“Let’s join hands,” Linnie suggested. “Then we won’t be so scared.”
“Who’s scared?” Mart asked, but he grasped Linnie’s hand and held it hard. His voice echoed and reechoed in the vaulted room.
Somewhere there was a rustling noise, as though a large animal had moved.
The drip-drip of the stalactites boomed as drops fell to waiting pools.
A fragment of limestone broke from the ceiling and dropped with what seemed a deafening crash.
A strange, weird sound came from inside the wall, a scratching sound, then a low moan!
“Was that someone groaning?” Trixie asked with a trembling voice.
A muffled sound answered her, unintelligible but unmistakably human.
“There’s someone besides us in this cave!” Trixie cried and turned on her flashlight.
Other flashlights clicked, illuminating faintly the expanse of wall across the stream.
A deep, low moan came again, then the words “Get me out!”
“Hold it!” Jim answered. “We hear you.”
Hurriedly the Bob-Whites lit their carbide lamps and gathered at the opening from which the voice came.
Trixie, more daring, her light leading her, crawled ahead into the tunnel. Not far from the opening, the passage narrowed sharply, and just ahead of her she saw blue-jeaned legs and the soles of shoes.
“Can you hold on a minute?” she asked.
“Get me out!” the voice cried.
Trixie backed. “There’s a man stuck in there,” she said. “Jim, you’re the strongest. He’ll have to be pulled out.”
So Jim crawled in and tugged. The walls of the tunnel were slimy and wet. Jim pulled and pulled. Brian and Mart pulled at Jim’s feet.
“He’s easing out!” Jim cried. “Don’t jerk my legs off. He�
�s sliding on the wet clay. Get out of the way, Brian, Mart. Here we come!”
The boys inched back through the opening. Then Jim came out, covered with slimy yellow clay.
Then Slim!
The Bob-Whites’ former guide was a sorry sight. His hands and face were masked over with clay through which blood oozed from raw scratches. He sat on the floor, gasping yet snarling, in spite of near exhaustion and suffocation.
“Wait till he gets his breath,” Trixie said. “Then we’ll soon find out what he’s doing in Bob-White Cave.”
Slim muttered angrily.
“And why he broke all the beautiful stalactites,” Honey added indignantly.
“Let’s give him a drink of water before we ask him anything,” Trixie said. She opened her canteen and held it to him.
Slim slapped it to the ground. “Don’t do me no favors!” he said. “Let me out of here!”
“That’s enough of that!” Brian said disgustedly. “You’re nothing but a stupid bully. You must have gone crazy to do all the damage you did around here.”
“Yeah,” Slim agreed slyly, “yeah... that’s what it was. I dropped my candle. It went out. I went nuts in the darkness. I hammered around till I found that hole I got stuck in. You know how it is without any light. I heard you when you put your lights out. What would you do? Bust things up?”
“I hardly think so,” Trixie said thoughtfully, “but I might go crazy and not know what I was doing. Why did you come here? Bob-White Cave is our cave. And why did you decide to bring back my bait bucket that you stole?”
“What bait bucket?” Slim asked, his dirt-encircled eyes darting around. Then, when he saw the bucket with the ghost fish, he got up, cursed, and fiercely kicked it over. The ghost fish and crayfish slithered toward the stream, but Trixie was quick enough to recapture them and give them fresh water.
“That was a rotten, mean thing to do!” Jim said in a cold voice. “We can put you back in that crawl hole, fella. There are three of us.”
“No, you won’t!” Slim cried. “I’d die!”
“It’s about time you realized that.” Jim’s voice was stern. He pointed. “That way out! Start walking!”
The Mystery at Bob-White Cave Page 10
