NAN'S DISAPPEARANCE
Somewhere on the estate a cock crowed.
Nan stirred sleepily and turned over. The cock crowed triumphantly
again. Nan turned once more and saw that the morning sun was filtering
in through the heavy drapes at the windows. She rubbed her eyes and
stretched. She looked around. Where was she? Then she spied the
ancestral portraits frowning down upon her and she remembered
everything.
So she had slept after all! She remembered vaguely an urge the night
before to stay awake and watch to see that nothing happened. Why, it was
music that had lulled her to sleep! She remembered it now, the faint far
away sound of a bagpipe playing. It had been like a dream, for with the
wind around the castle and the creaking of the old floors, she had been
completely unable to follow the thread of the tune. It had come, died
away, and come again. In trying to follow it, she had fallen asleep at
last.
Now she lay listening. There were no sounds at all to be heard in the
old castle. She got up quietly, slipped into her robe and slippers, and
walked softly over to the windows, careful all the while not to disturb
anyone. She pulled the curtains back and stood looking down on the
castle grounds, seeing them in the daylight for the first time.
The big gray stone building she was in, she could see now, was built on
a pinnacle so that on all sides there were valleys below. She remembered
what Dr. Beulah had said the night before about the old castles. Now she
saw in imagination the leaders of clans in days gone by standing where
she was, watching the approach of the enemy below.
She peopled the towers that she could see with beautiful princesses, the
crumbling walls of the older unused parts of the castle with knights in
armor, singing, talking, laughing, and fighting. She imagined all sorts
of plots and counterplots, and now in the valleys there was grain
growing and cattle grazing! How pretty it looked in the early morning
sunshine! So different than it had seemed the night before!
Now she thought again of the accident on the hill. What had caused it?
Could she learn more by daylight than she had been able to by night? A
bird sang cheerily outside. Another flew across her line of vision.
Everything seemed to be beckoning her to come out and explore. She
turned from the window and dressed hastily. Perhaps she could solve last
night's mystery by going down the hill. Perhaps she could solve it and
set everyone's mind at rest!
She opened the door carefully and walked slowly down the big staircase
into the Great Hall. There James Blake was asleep before the big
fireplace where the embers of last night's fire were still burning. She
saw that his head was bandaged and that he looked tired and worried,
even in sleep. She couldn't know that he had dropped off only a half
hour before from sheer exhaustion. He had spent the few hours remaining
after his talk with Dr. Prescott and his servant in personally watching
to see that nothing further happened.
Now, as he slept, she walked quietly past his back. He stirred and
muttered something. She stopped. He sank back into quiet sleep and she
went on and out, opening the door carefully and closing it the same.
James Blake stirred again and awakened then with a start. He looked
around. "Auld fool!" he muttered. "Sleeping, when ye'd set yourself to
watch those lassies." He got up and walked around the room. Everything
seemed to be all right. Stiff from his night in the chair he stretched,
threw a knotted log of wood on the fire, and then rang for a servant.
"The young lassies upstairs are tired," he said. "See that everything is
kept quiet so they will sleep until late. Before the day is over, they
will be off to Edinburgh." So it was not until hours after she had
slipped through the door, walked down the road past the bushes that had
seemed such a menace the night before, and passed through the gate, that
Nan's disappearance was discovered.
It was Bess who missed her first. Awakening much later than Nan, she lay
for some time enjoying the luxury of the room in which she slept. She
noted every detail of the furnishings and determined that when she
returned to school in the fall, nothing of all this would be lost in the
telling. She half hoped that she would have the opportunity to tell
Linda Riggs. In her mind's eye, she picked out one or two others that
she would like to impress. No one that she knew, she thought with
satisfaction, had ever even seen such a place as this old castle, much
less stayed in one.
The more she thought of it, the grander it seemed. A little feeling of
envy came over her. Why was it that the nice things that happened to Nan
never happened to her? Why couldn't her father or mother have a place
like this? Bess was a thoughtless unappreciative little person at times.
Though her father and mother gave her everything within their means, she
was still dissatisfied. Her hand touched the satin cover that was over
her. As quickly as the feeling of envy had come, it went. She listened
for sounds. Was Nan awake in the next room?
She got up and stuck her head in through the door. The bed was empty!
Was everyone except herself up? She went across the hall to Laura's
room, and found her still sleeping. She looked in the big double room
where Amelia and Grace were. They were sleeping too. So was Rhoda. She
debated once as to whether or not she should look into Dr. Prescott's
apartment. "I don't dare to do that," she decided, "Nan's probably
downstairs waiting for us. Maybe she will come up, if I stay here."
She went back into her own room, and because she was cold, she crawled
back into bed. But then her curiosity as to Nan's whereabouts got the
better of her. Maybe Nan was out exploring! It would be fun to walk
around the castle grounds!
She dressed almost as quickly as Nan had, slipped out quietly too, and
went downstairs.
"Weel, lassie," James Blake greeted her as she entered the big hall.
"Ye're up bright and early this morning."
"But I'm not the first," Bess smiled back, "Where's Nan?"
"Why, the lass is still asleep," he began heartily, and then noting the
puzzled expression on Bess's face, he added, "Isn't she?" A world of
possibilities came to his mind as he asked the question and he repeated
it before Bess could answer. "Tell me quickly, isn't she upstairs? Isn't
she with her other friends, with the school mistress? Isn't she about up
there some place?"
Bess was frightened too now and turned. "I'll ask Dr. Prescott," she
called over her shoulder as she went up the stairs. "Shall I?"
"Aye, lass, and be quick!" Old James Blake followed her half way up the
stairs.
But Dr. Prescott, awake herself in her apartment, heard their voices,
and came out on the landing. "Is there anything wrong?" Before the
question was answered, she knew the response. "Nan's missing!" For a
moment the two older people stood with Bess between them looking
hopelessly into one another's faces. Then they all got busy.
A hurried check of Nan's room showed that what they feared most had not
happened. The young girl had left the apartment of her own accord. She
had not been kidnapped, at least not while in her room. "She's probably
just gone exploring." Bess took the whole thing calmly at first, for she
knew Nan's habits.
"Aye, maybe so," old James Blake agreed, "but 'tis better to have her
here with us. We'll all do our exploring together." With this, he called
the servants and tried to check on Nan's movements. No one had seen her.
A search was organized. Everyone was sent to a different part of the
estate. Old James Blake himself climbed to the top of the highest tower
and looked out over the grounds. He came down sadly.
There was no Nan to be seen or found anyplace.