THE STORM
That shriek was the most fearful and uncanny sound the boys had ever
heard. There was a diabolical malignance about it, like the scream of
some blood-thirsty animal, yet there was no mistaking the fact that it
was uttered by a human being.
As the quavering notes died away, the bare walls of the old house flung
back the echoes so that the shriek seemed to be repeated again and
again, but on a smaller scale.
The boys stared at one another, aghast. For a moment they were
dumbfounded. Then Jerry muttered:
“I’m getting out of here!” and with that, he started for the door.
“Me too!” declared Biff Hooper, and Chet Morton followed him as he
rushed for the doorway.
“What’s the big idea?” asked Frank, standing his ground. “Let’s stay
and find what this is all about.”
Joe, seeing his brother remain where he was, made no move to follow the
others, although it was plain that the weird shriek had unnerved him.
“You can stay,” flung back Jerry. “I’m not. This place is haunted, and
I don’t mean maybe!”
The three boys hastened through the doorway out into the hall and lost
no time in regaining the front yard. Frank and Joe Hardy listened to
their retreating footsteps. Frank shrugged his shoulders.
“I guess it gave them a pretty bad scare,” he said to his brother. “We
may as well go with them.”
“I guess so,” replied Joe, greatly relieved. They were alone in the
gloomy and deserted old house, and as they stepped into the hallway Joe
cast a cautious glance up the stairway. But there was nothing to be
seen. The upper floor was veiled in shadow. The house was in silence
that seemed even heavier than before.
When the two Hardy boys got outside they found the others waiting for
them in the shelter of some trees about a hundred yards from the house.
The three were discussing the strange occurrence in excited tones, and
when the Hardy boys came up to them Jerry said:
“I don’t have to be convinced any further. The place is haunted, sure.
No other way to explain it.”
“There’s not much sense in running away from a sound,” remarked Frank
lightly. “If we had seen something, it might be different. I don’t
believe in ghosts and I’d like to get to the bottom of this. It’s
foolish to run away. Let’s go back.”
Chet Morton and Biff Hooper looked a trifle ashamed of themselves
because of their precipitous flight from the house while the Hardy boys
had remained.
“I got the scare of my life,” Chet confessed. “Just the same, I’m game
to go back if you want to.”
“How about you, Biff?”
Biff Hooper scratched his head reflectively. “I’m none too anxious to
go back in there again,” he admitted. “Not that I’m scared, of course!”
he added hastily. “But I don’t see where we’d learn anything, anyway.”
“Well, Joe and I are going back. That’s settled,” declared Frank. “We
want to get to the bottom of this mystery.”
“Mysteries are your meat!” observed Biff. “Well, when you come to think
of it, this is a good chance for a little detective work.”
He alluded to the fact that the Hardy boys were amateur detectives of
some renown in Bayport. They came by their gift naturally, for their
father, Fenton Hardy, had been for years on the detective staff of the
New York police. Of late years he had been living in Bayport conducting
a private detective service of his own with great success. He was known
from one end of the country to the other as an exceptionally brilliant
investigator.
Frank and Joe Hardy, his sons, were ambitious to follow in their
father’s footsteps, although their mother wished them to prepare
themselves for medicine and the law respectively. But the lure of
Fenton Hardy’s calling was persistent, and the two boys were bent on
proving to their parents that they were capable of becoming first-class
detectives.
They had given proof of this already by helping their father in a small
way on a number of cases, but their first big success had been achieved
when they solved the mystery of a jewel and bond robbery from Tower
Mansion in Bayport. The story of this has been related in the first and
preceding volume of this series, “The Hardy Boys: The Tower Treasure,”
wherein was recounted how the Hardy boys solved the mystery of the
robbery when the Bayport police and even Fenton Hardy himself were
baffled.
“I’d rather tackle a good mystery than eat,” laughed Frank. “And here
is one right to hand. Let’s go back.”
Biff Hooper did not care to seem guilty of cowardice by staying behind
while his companions returned to the house, and he was on the point of
a reluctant consent when the matter was suddenly solved for them all by
a downpour of rain.
Storm clouds had been gathering in the sky for the past hour and there
had been dull rumblings of thunder. Now an uneasy wind stirred the
branches of the trees and rustled dismally among the undergrowth.
There was a spatter of raindrops, and then the storm broke in abrupt
violence. Rain poured down in sheets.
“The motorcycles!” cried Frank.
Turning up their coat collars, the boys ran through the thick grass
until they reached the place where their machines had been parked.
“I saw an old shed near the house,” called out Joe. “We can put the
bikes under cover.”
There was an abandoned wagon shed near the rear of the house, and
toward this refuge the lads trundled the heavy motorcycles. Although
the shed was almost falling to pieces, the roof was still in fairly
good condition and the machines were safe from the downpour.
“Come on,” said Frank, when the motorcycles had been placed under cover.
“Let’s go back into the house.”
He led the way, running across the open space from the shed, through
the driving rain, and Joe followed. The others, after a moment of
hesitation, came after them.
The back door of the house was open and the lads ran up the steps into
the shelter of the building. They were in a room that had evidently
been used as a kitchen, and although rain came in slanting streaks
through the open windows, the glass of which had long since been
shattered, they were at least sheltered from the downpour that had
assumed redoubled violence. The rain drummed on the roof of the old
house and poured from black skies on the near-by wagon shed. Thunder
rolled and rumbled threateningly, and every once in a while a sheet of
lightning tore a band of lurid light across the gloom.
Chet took off his cap, which was drenched, and tried to dry it out. The
others stood by the window, looking out at the terrific downpour.
Then came the second shriek!
It rang out suddenly, at a time when none of the lads was talking and
it was a replica of the first—a quavering, long drawn out yell, that
seemed to freeze the blood in their veins.
No sooner had it died away than there came a terrific clap of thunder,
and then the rain seemed to beat down on the roof of the old house in a
frenzy.
In the gloomy, dusty kitchen, the boys stared at one another.
Frank broke the silence.
“I’m going to find out about this!” he declared firmly, striding over
to the door that led to the interior of the house.
“Me too,” said Joe.
Taking heart by the Hardy boys’ example, the others crowded at their
heels.
Frank flung open the door and strode into the room beyond. It was a
very gloomy chamber, for the one window was boarded up, but when their
eyes became accustomed to the meager light the boys saw that a door on
the far side of the room led into a hallway. It was evidently not the
hallway that they had already been in at the front of the house, but
presumably one that led to a side door.
“Nothing here,” said Frank, “I’d like to find those stairs. That yell
came from the upper part of the house.”
The boys made their way across the room. Outside they could hear the
sweep of the rain and the steady rumblings of the thunder, for the
storm was now at its height. Through the chinks of the boards over the
window they could occasionally see the lurid glare of lightning.
Suddenly there was a blast of wind that seemed to shake the entire
house. A sharp, violent noise immediately behind them made every boy
jump with surprise.
They wheeled about.
The door behind them had been blown shut. Biff Hooper, who was nearest,
grasped the knob and tried to open it. He wrenched and tugged at the
door, but it remained obstinate.
“We’re locked in!” he muttered.
“We can get out, all right,” said Frank. “There must be a door in this
side hall.”
He walked across the room and entered the hallway.
At the same instant a maniacal howl rang through the old house. The
hollow echoes magnified its volume.
A flash of lightning illuminated the startled faces of the five boys.
With one accord they rushed into the hallway. It was a narrow place,
heavy with dust, and their feet thudded heavily on the mouldy flooring.
Crash!
At the far end of the hall they had a glimpse of falling plaster that
fell in a great heap to the floor. A dense cloud of dust arose and
filled the narrow chamber.
“Run for your lives!” yelled Frank.
But no sooner were the words out of his mouth than there came a
ripping, crackling sound from overhead. Immediately above them, a large
part of the ceiling, disturbed no doubt by the vibrations of their
feet as they ran into the hall, had given way. A wide crack that showed
in the plaster quickly became wider, and then, with a terrific roar,
half the hall ceiling came tumbling down upon the lads.
They were buried in dust and lathes and plaster that came upon them in
such an avalanche that they were thrown to the floor. The splintering
of wood and ominous crackling that followed, indicated that more of
the ceiling was about to go, and then came a roar even louder than the
first, as another avalanche of débris rolled down upon them.
Was the Polucca house falling in?