A FRESH DISCOVERY.
Saturday had come round again, and as the children started for school
that morning not one of them guessed what an eventful day it was going
to prove. Meeting in the road outside the Pines on their return, they
passed together through the gate, and along the drive.
[Illustration]
"Hooray!" exclaimed Guy, swinging his bundle of books round and round at
the end of the strap. "No more work till Monday! I thought I should have
been kept in for Caesar to-day, but I just happened to get an easy bit
with words I knew."
"It's a wonder you ever know anything," remarked Ida, who was rather
fond of reproving other people. "You are always drawing, or cutting up
pen-holders with your knife, or doing something of that kind, when you
ought to be preparing your work. Elsie's getting just the same. She sat
staring at the wall all yesterday evening, and the consequence was that
this morning she got both lessons returned. She's getting such a little
funk, too, that she won't go up to bed alone, but waits on the stairs
till I come."
"Oh, what a cram!" exclaimed Elsie, rather feebly.
"It's not a cram," returned her sister. "You know it's perfectly true,
and you look under the bed too, expecting to find a hidden robber, I
suppose."
In a playful manner Brian caught hold of Elsie by the back of the neck,
much in the same way as he might have done a small boy at the Grammar
School, but with perhaps a lighter touch.
"Come, what's the matter with you?" he asked. "You never used to be
afraid of the dark; you were as bold as brass. What have you done?
Murdered somebody?"
"No," answered Elsie, laughing. "I'm only--only a bit silly."
She looked up with a smile as she spoke. No one ever doubted Brian's
pluck, and the fact that he did not think her a coward encouraged Elsie
to be brave. Brian knew that something really had frightened the child
on the previous Thursday evening, but he had not mentioned the matter to
any one except Mrs. Ormond, for which Elsie was in her heart devoutly
thankful to him, as she knew what a "roasting" she would receive from
Ida and Guy if once they got hold of the story.
But though Brian forbore to tell what he knew, or even to question her
further, yet the incident had been constantly in his mind. He wondered
greatly what could have been the cause of his cousin's alarm, and why
she should refuse to explain this when hitherto he had always been in
her confidence. On Friday, without saying anything to anybody, Brian
made a careful examination of the tool-house, hoping to find some clue
to the mystery; but his search proved fruitless.
There was nothing in the place calculated to alarm the most timorous of
mortals; and as the boy glanced round he saw simply just what he had
seen there many times before--the grindstone, Uncle Roger's box, some
gardening tools, and sticks for rose-trees and other plants, a quantity
of matting stuff which had been wrapped round some plants and shrubs
when they came from a nursery, some old hampers, and a short wooden
bench on which the new boy, Henry, cleaned the knives and boots. There
was certainly nothing here to cause any one to drop a lamp and run
screaming into the house.
Still, Brian was not satisfied. He was perhaps rather pleased to think
that there was some mystery connected with the tool-house; it was like
trying to solve a very interesting puzzle.
"If only I had a clever detective here, like Sherlock Holmes!" he said
to himself. "I suppose he'd just look round and find some clue which
would explain the whole matter. I must confess I can't see anything. Now
_that's_ what began it all," he continued, as his eye rested on the
grindstone. "I believe Elsie really did hear some one turning that
stone, and it's my opinion that he, or she, whoever it might have been,
was grinding the carving-knife; but there the story stops short, and
doesn't seem to go any further. Besides, that doesn't explain what
frightened Elsie the other evening. I wish she'd tell me, but I'm afraid
she won't."
Brian went over and began carelessly working the grindstone with his
left foot on the treadle. "I know what I'll do," he thought. "Each night
I'll come out and tie the crank of this thing to the stand with a piece
of thin black cotton; then I shall soon find out if any one comes and
works here at night, for if they do, the thread will be broken in the
morning."
Without saying anything to the others, he slipped out on Friday evening
and set his trap; but when he went to examine it on the following
morning the cotton was still unbroken, though it snapped at once the
moment he pressed down the treadle. Nothing daunted by his failure,
Brian made up his mind to try the same thing several nights running, and
with this determination had hurried away to join his cousins as they
started for school.
"Where's father?" inquired Ida, as the family assembled at the
dinner-table.
"He's gone to Ashvale on business," answered Mrs. Ormond. "He won't be
back before this evening."
"There's no football this afternoon, is there, Brian?" asked Guy.
[Illustration: THE AIR PISTOL]
"No practice game," was the answer. "There's a second-eleven match, but
I don't think I shall go to the field. It's too cold to stand doing
nothing."
"Then look here," continued Guy, "I'll tell you what well do; we'll
make a target, and try my air-pistol. I know where there's a piece of
board that'll do, and we can mark it out with rings and a bull's-eye
with your compasses."
"By the way, Guy," said Mrs. Ormond suddenly, "I knew there was something
I wanted to speak to you about. You remember the cork that was inside
Uncle Roger's box? Well, I've found where it came from."
There was an exclamation of interest from the two girls as they raised
their heads to listen.
"Have you, mother?"
"Yes," said Mrs. Ormond, with a half-smile on her face. "It came out of
cook's methylated spirit bottle. You may remember that some little time
ago she found it standing empty."
"But how could the cork have got into the box?" cried Ida.
"It seems to me," answered her mother, "that it must have been dropped
by accident into the chest by the person who emptied the bottle, and
therefore that same person must have been helping us when we opened the
box."
"I know what you're driving at, mother," exclaimed Guy. "You think I
used the spirit, and I've told you heaps of times I didn't. How does
cook know it's the same cork? There may be hundreds of corks exactly the
same size, and you couldn't tell one from another."
"There was no mistaking this one for another," was the answer. "It had
once been stuck in a bottle of red ink, and the end was stained."
"Well, I don't know anything about it," said Guy. "Perhaps," he
continued, struck with a bright idea--"perhaps father cribbed the spirit
to fill that thing he lights his pipes and cigars with, and he may have
dropped the cork into the box. You'd better ask him when he comes home."
There was a laugh, in which Mrs. Ormond joined. "I don't think your
father is the culprit," she answered.--"Of course, if Guy says he hasn't
touched the bottle, we must believe him.--Ida, did you or Elsie use the
spirit for anything?"
Both girls shook their heads, and Brian also declared himself innocent.
"It's a rum thing how it came to be inside the chest," he remarked.
"It's just like a conjuring trick."
"It certainly seems very funny," replied his aunt; "but, like most
conjuring tricks, I dare say the explanation would be very simple if it
were ever given."
Guy was impatient to test the power and accuracy of his birthday
present. He painted a bull's-eye on a piece of board, with rings
numbered 1, 2, 3, each about two inches wide, and then the question
was to find a suitable place for practice.
"It's a beastly cold wind outside," he said; "I know what we'll do.
We'll hang it up in the tool-house. Come on, Ida and Elsie; we'll all
have a try."
[Illustration: IDA]
The elder sister responded readily, but Elsie hung back, made some
excuse, and went off in another direction.
"What a little noodle she's becoming!" remarked Ida to Brian, as Guy
proceeded to hang up the target. "I believe, for some reason or other,
she's taken it into her head to be afraid to go inside this tool-house.
She won't go near it, not even in broad daylight."
"Let's go and bring her," suggested Guy.
"Oh, I shouldn't," answered Brian. "You'll never cure her that way. The
best thing is to leave her alone, and take no notice. She'll get over it
in time."
The air-pistol was great fun. Ida proved as good a shot as either of the
boys, and it was difficult to decide which could lay claim to being the
best marksman of the three.
"We'll have six shots each, firing in turn," said Guy. "Ida shall begin,
and I'll put down the scores on this bit of paper."
The contest was an exciting one. Ida, unfortunately, missed the target
twice, and so got behind the others, but Brian and Guy were so close
together that it remained for the last shot to show which had won the
first place. Brian fired, and the little steel dart struck close to the
bull's-eye.
"Now, then!" cried Guy, reloading the pistol. "I must take extra good
aim this time and get a bull. Oh, bother!"
He had been standing looking at the target as he spoke, and holding the
pistol with the muzzle pointing upwards. Incautiously his finger had
tightened on the trigger, with the result that the little weapon suddenly
went off.
"O Guy, you should be more careful!" exclaimed Ida. "You might have hurt
somebody."
"Hang it all!" muttered her brother. "Now I've lost the dart."
"There it is," said Brian--"straight over your head."
He pointed as he spoke to a little red tuft that showed the dart was
firmly embedded in one of the beams which supported the roof.
"Good business!" cried Guy. "We'll soon have it down. Ida, drag over
that old chest, and if Brian will stand on it with me hoisted on to his
shoulders, I believe I can reach it right enough."
The experiment was tried, but the beam was still just out of reach of
Guy's hand.
"I'll tell you what we can do," he said; "turn the chest up on end, and
that'll make it higher."
As Guy moved the box into the required position there was an audible
rustle and bump.
"Hullo, there's something inside!" he exclaimed.
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