The Second Girl Detective Megapack: 23 Classic Mystery Novels for Girls

by Julia K. Duncan

  “We might as well go in,” Phyllis said finally.

  Several girls were on the veranda and these viewed with interest the new arrivals.

  “We might as well,” Gale agreed with a sigh. With a traveling bag in either hand she followed Phyllis up the steps and into the building that was to be their home for the next four years.

  CHAPTER II

  A Rescue

  “I am not going to like it!” Janet announced firmly when she met Phyllis and Gale on the campus the next morning after breakfast.

  “You are lucky so far,” Phyllis told her. “The upper classmen in the dormitories haven’t come back for the term yet. We have some of the sorority girls already in the house and do we get looked over!”

  “Where is Carol?” Gale inquired.

  “Gone to get our tennis racquets,” Janet replied. “We are going to take advantage of the empty courts now before the upper classmen get here.”

  “I’ll come along and watch,” Phyllis offered magnanimously.

  “I want to take a walk and explore,” Gale informed them. “I’ll see you at luncheon, Phyl.”

  Classes would not begin for three days yet, but the girls had timed their arrival at Briarhurst for days ahead to become acquainted with the general position of their classes and the dormitories.

  Gale headed in the direction of the lake that lay on the western border of the campus. There had been erected diving boards for the students and canoes were anchored to the shore. Gale watched for several minutes the cavortings of the gay young girls who frolicked in the water, and then continued with her stroll.

  Readers of The Adventure Girls at K Bar O and The Adventure Girls in the Air are already familiar with the six girls from the little town of Marchton. Old friends already know of the desire of the girls to attend Briarhurst College and of the difficulties along that line experienced by Phyllis Elton. Now it seemed their dreams were in a fair way of being fulfilled. All of them, even Phyllis, were actually present at the college and starting out on an entirely new branch of life. They were prepared to study hard and also prepared to face the fun and trials of college life.

  On the grassy bank beneath a low-hanging willow tree Gale sat down to view the water and to think.

  Last night they had been met at the door by a welcoming committee of two Juniors. She remembered her own and Phyllis’ surprise at the odd things which they saw on their journey to their room on the third floor.

  Some delightful soul had christened the staircase the “Golden Stairs,” but whether they led to heaven or not the girls had not yet discovered. On the landing of the second floor was a huge poster which might have been the street sign for a Boulevard proclaiming “Senior Avenue.” On each floor the corridor was named and some of the rooms themselves had names.

  Phyllis and Gale found themselves in “Sunshine Alley” but there was no name tacked upon their door.

  “How come?” Phyllis wanted to know.

  “You have to do something to deserve a name. Then a special committee of sorority girls gets together and selects one for you. For instance, next door to you, you have the champion swimming team of last year’s Freshman class. Their room is named ‘Mermaid Mansion.’ Get the idea?”

  “Also farther up the hall is ‘Harmony Heaven,’” the other upper classman informed them. “That was so named because the girls there are forever quarreling. The name anything but fits them.”

  It was a little confusing to Gale and Phyllis. They could not immediately adapt the terms for the different floors and rooms in the house. At dinner when someone asked them what floor they were on, they innocently said “Third,” and were made to run around the table three times for not using the correct title “Sunshine Alley.”

  For the most part, though, the girls were friendly. The two were shown about with due ceremony and the rules carefully explained. The house mother, Mrs. Grayson, who had charge of the building was most courteous and the girls immediately liked her. Next they met the sorority president, Adele Stevens. They were at once taken under her wing.

  Gale dangled the end of a willow branch in the swirling lake water. The water at this point was flowing rapidly toward a waterfall where it joined a rushing river and went on to the sea.

  This afternoon she had an appointment with the President of the college and then one with the Dean. It was customary for all new students to be thus interviewed, but Gale wondered if they all felt as nervous as she. She had a strong curiosity and yet a reluctance to meet the new Dean. She wanted to see the new authority because the girls had talked about her so much at dinner last night. It seemed the Seniors all sympathized with the bus driver. They were prepared to strongly oppose any new policies installed by Dean Travis. From what Gale and Phyllis had heard, the new Dean’s policies would better things on the campus. At least they appealed favorably to the new Freshmen. Certainly there could be nothing wrong in wanting new laboratories for the Chemistry classes, a new organ for the chapel, stables and horses to teach the girls riding and a few other such things. Why the older students were so set against them Phyllis and Gale could not understand. However, they both agreed, in the privacy of their room, to take neither side until they knew more about things. At any rate, they were only Freshmen and Freshmen were to be seen, not heard.

  Gale was about to turn back to the campus to meet Phyllis for luncheon at the sorority house when she halted. Had that been a voice calling? Faintly another call came across the water. Parting the low thick branches of the willow tree, Gale looked across the lake.

  A canoe was drifting down the center of the lake. It was going more swiftly every moment, caught in the rush of waters leaping on toward the waterfall at the other end. In the canoe was a figure, waving frantically to the shore.

  Either the canoeist had lost her oars or she was so panic-stricken at being caught in the swirling waters that she could not think conclusively or quickly enough to save herself.

  A tree branch had been broken from a tree in a recent storm and now it, too, swirled around in the lake waters. Gale watched breathlessly while the branch bore down on the canoe. She was helpless to aid even though the onslaught would probably upset the canoe. But such was not the case. Instead of toppling the canoe over the boat became entangled in the wet leaves still clinging to the wood and so, locked together, the two moved toward the waterfall.

  Gale started to run swiftly back to where, in the calmer waters, the college girls had been swimming. Someone must rescue that woman in the canoe. Perhaps there would be a motor boat at the diving boards. Another canoe would not be much help. Gale kept close to the shore as she ran, always keeping in view of the canoe. Once she stopped to wave to the tragic figure being swept to destruction. She saw an answering wave and heard a call, but she could not distinguish the words.

  Fortunately she did not have to run all the way back to the swimmers. Hidden close to the mossy bank in a thick growth of shrubbery along the shore was a motor boat. Gale found it with a sense of immeasurable relief. With trembling fingers she untied the anchor rope and jumped into the boat. How thankful she was that she had had ample experience with motor boats back in Marchton! It stood her in good stead now. The motor responded promptly and she turned the nose of the boat out into the lake. She drew speed from the boat and wondered what the owner might say.

  The canoe, still tangled with the dead tree branch, was even closer to the tumbling waters going over the waterfall. Gale was glad the motor boat was a large, sturdy affair. With its powerful motor working rhythmically it should be able to withstand the pull of those rushing waters.

  Flinging a heavy spray back over Gale the boat sped eagerly through the water. It rapidly closed the distance between the drifting canoe and the would-be rescuer. Almost upon the canoe Gale tried to think of the best means of getting the woman safely aboard the motor boat. She certainly could not be transferred from the canoe in the middle of the water. Therefore, the best procedure would be to tow the canoe to shore. But first the tr
ee branch must be disposed of. It might drag both the canoe and the motor boat to the falls.

  “Hang on,” Gale shouted to the figure in the canoe, “we’ll make the shore all right.”

  She ran the motor boat as close as she could to the canoe. The swell of water threatened to upset the smaller craft. Gale shut the motor off. The boat was immediately swept into the current. Grasping a long, heavy boat hook which she found lying on the deck, Gale stepped onto the closed cabinet-like doors which sheltered the engine.

  “Go back—you’ll be killed!” the other figure implored.

  Gale sent the woman a reassuring smile. She had done such crazy stunts on Bruce Latimer’s boat back in Marchton. Now she felt no fear at all for herself, only a fear that she might not be able to push the tree branch far enough away to loosen the canoe. She tied one end of a coil of rope to the anchor bolt on the motor boat and threw it toward the canoe. It fell directly across the small craft. The canoeist grasped it and made it secure.

  Cautiously Gale worked herself farther out to the bow of the boat. She had only a few seconds now in which to loosen the tree branch and restart the motor to save them both. At the first thrust of the boat hook Gale nearly toppled herself into the water. She heard a muffled cry from the woman in the canoe. She regained her posture. She could never do it standing upright. Therefore, she lay down flat on her stomach on the boat. That gave her a freer use of her right arm and less chance of losing her balance. A gigantic push and the branch swept away from the canoe and onward to the destruction of the falls.

  Gale lost no time in making her way back to start the motor. Luckily it started with the first try and the motor boat pulled clear of the swirling waters, dragging behind it the canoe.

  Once on shore Gale tied the motor boat securely to its former position and helped the slender figure from the canoe. The canoeist was a woman older than Gale, but Gale felt immediately that they could be firm friends. She liked the other’s frank smile and clear gray eyes.

  “You are a brave girl!” the woman said when she was safe and her first words of thanks were over. “I might be over the falls now if it were not for you,” she shuddered.

  Gale smiled. “It was a lucky thing someone was here. What happened? Did you go out without any oars?”

  “I know better than to do that,” the woman said. “I was sitting in the canoe farther up along the shore, reading. I often do that. I had no desire to go out on the lake so I left the oars on shore while the boat remained anchored. I must have fallen asleep. The next thing I knew I awoke and I was in the middle of the lake, caught in the rapids.”

  Gale looked at the boat and noted the short bit of rope dangling from its stern.

  “It rather looks as though that rope was cut,” she said, noting the sharpness of its edge as though a knife had severed it.

  “You must never mention that to anyone,” the other said quickly. “Promise me you will never speak such a thought!”

  Gale laughed. “Of course—but why shouldn’t I?”

  “I can’t explain now, but there is a very good reason.” She held out her hand. “I would like to say thank you again. Will you come to see me this afternoon?”

  Gale put her hand into the one offered her. “I’m sorry,” she said regretfully. “You see I am new at the college and I have an appointment with the Dean.”

  A whimsical light came into the gray eyes. “You don’t seem very enthusiastic.”

  “I’m not,” Gale confessed.

  “Have you been listening to the upper classmen?”

  “A little,” Gale said. “But it isn’t that. I’m not prejudiced against her. She may be perfectly all right—it is only that—I’m a little nervous. I guess all Freshmen are. I hope she is nicer than what I hear about her.”

  The other woman laughed. “I hope you find her so. Now I——”

  The patter of running feet interrupted her and a group of girls burst upon them.

  “We saw what happened from up the shore,” one gasped. “Are you all right, Dean Travis?”

  Dean Travis! Gale felt the world whirling around her. This was the new Dean!

  “I am quite all right, thank you,” the Dean was saying composedly.

  A second later she was gone and the other girls with her. Gale was alone and she sank down dejectedly on a tree trunk. For a long time she sat there staring out over the water. Finally she made her way slowly back to the sorority house where Phyllis was waiting for her.

  That afternoon Gale went to the office of the Dean. If she had been nervous this morning before she met the Dean she was ten times more so now. To think of the things she had said! They made her cheeks burn now. How could she have talked so and to the Dean! She sat on the hard outer office chair and thought of all the places she would rather be. She thought of Phyllis and Madge and Valerie swimming in the lake. She thought of Janet and Carol again playing tennis. How she longed to be with them. How she longed to be anywhere where she did not have to face the Dean!

  “You may go in, Miss Howard,” the secretary said.

  Gale stood up and took a deep breath. She covered the distance into the office in little less than a run. She felt she had to go as quickly as possible before she turned and fled out of sheer panic.

  There was another woman with Dean Travis, a woman with brown curly hair and a flashing, whimsical smile, absurdly young to be the school physician, but such Gale found her to be when they were introduced. She stayed to talk with Gale and the Dean for several minutes and the Freshman felt all her self-consciousness and timidity melting away before the warmth of the Doctor’s smile. However, when the Doctor had gone and the Dean was seated behind her desk, Gale in the chair before her, the girl felt her discomfiture returning. After all, this woman was the Dean and she had talked to her and treated her much as she might have Phyllis or Valerie. Hereafter she must remember to treat the Dean with the respect and deference required by the head of the girls’ college.

  “Is your room at the Omega Chi Sorority house satisfactory?” the Dean was asking pleasantly. She tapped a white envelope before her. “I have had a long letter from your former High School teacher, Miss Relso.”

  “Everything is perfect, thank you,” Gale said politely.

  “Your roommate is your friend from home?”

  “Oh, yes.”

  “I hope you are going to like Briarhurst, Miss Howard.”

  “I am sure I shall.”

  “The girls are all pleasant, that is for the most part. Of course there are some who are selfish and like their own way, but one finds them in every walk of life. Briarhurst tries to fit the girls to take a definite place in the world, to help them live the kind of life worth living. We don’t say we fit you to immediately take charge of whatever line of endeavor you go into when your four years here are up. All we try to do is give you the prime essentials for your life—courage, determination, ambition, the desire to play fair and to take gallantly whatever life offers you.” She smiled. “What is the matter, Gale?”

  “Matter?” Gale was surprised out of her respectful silence.

  “You have been sitting there politely listening, but I doubt if a word I’ve said has remained in your memory,” the Dean said humorously.

  “Oh, I assure you, it has,” Gale said hastily.

  “Are you still nervous about meeting—the Dean?” the older woman asked, rising and walking around the desk to Gale’s side.

  Gale also rose. “I’m sorry if I was rude this morning,” she said in embarrassment. “I had no idea——”

  “That I was the Dean?” the other said. “Otherwise you would have let the canoe drift over the falls, is that it? I’m sorry, that was a terrible thing to say,” she continued breathlessly. “Forgive me.” She laid a hand lightly on Gale’s shoulder. “This isn’t the type of interview I usually have with a Freshman.”

  “I gathered that much,” Gale smiled. She continued after a while, rather hesitantly, “You aren’t really worried about—about th
e things the girls are saying, are you?”

  “No,” the Dean smiled, walking to the door with Gale. “Not really worried. Goodbye, my dear, and come to see me often—as a friend, if not in my official capacity.”

  Gale stepped out into the world red with the glow from the setting sun and thought what a grand person Dean Travis was. She had a personality that made one immediately want to be the best sort of person one could. That she would in a short time win all the girls over to her side, Gale did not doubt. She was so pleasant, so easy to approach, so interested in the girls, that they could not resent her for any length of time no matter how much they missed their former Dean.

  A hand touched her arm and she jumped in surprise, so deep in thought had she been.

  “Did I frighten you?” a laughing voice asked.

  Doctor Norcot fell into step beside her. “I waited for you,” she added with a look around.

  Gale saw a few girls across the campus watching her and the Doctor. She hoped they weren’t the Adventure Girls. If such was the case, she would be teased intolerably about already being friends with two such important people as the Dean and the Doctor.

  “I wanted to ask you more about that cut rope.”

  “Cut rope?” Gale repeated, puzzled. “Oh, you mean on the canoe.”

  “Yes. Are you positive it was cut?”

  Gale nodded. “There couldn’t be any doubt about it. You see it was just a new rope. That is, the end that was left was new. It couldn’t have worn through. The edge was straight and not at all frayed. It had been cut,” she said firmly. “Did Dean Travis tell you about it?”

  “Yes. You haven’t told anyone, have you?”

  “No,” Gale said in mystification. “But why shouldn’t I? Anyone who looks at the canoe will be sure to see it.”

  “Freshmen have enough on their minds without adding other people’s troubles,” the Doctor teased. “Good afternoon, Miss Howard.”