BOTH AT ONCE
It was not long before there came a recurrence of the strange humming
noise which had so disturbed the girls. It was only a few nights later
that Chet sat up in bed with the joyful feeling that here at last was a
chance to investigate at least one of the ghosts that haunted the
homestead at Cherry Corners.
"Ferd! Teddy! Wake up! What's the matter? Are you dead?" he called
to the boys.
The latter reluctantly opened their eyes and looked at him reproachfully.
"Can't you let a fellow sleep?" Teddy asked. But Chet, with no ceremony
whatever, hauled him bodily out of bed and set him on his feet.
"Don't talk," he ordered. "Run as fast as you can to the roof before
we miss it."
"What are you raving about?" asked Ferd, although both he and Teddy
started obediently toward the attic stairs.
"If you wouldn't talk so much, you could hear it," Chet answered, pushing
up a trap door that led to a small square platform on the roof. "It's
the motor sound the girls heard and that scared them so."
"It is, for a fact!" cried Teddy in a joyful whisper. "And it's coming
right near, fellows, too."
"It's an aeroplane all right," said Ferd, with conviction. "Nothing else
ever made a noise like that."
"Say, what are you doing up there?" a girl's voice hailed them from the
bottom of the steps, and Chet thought he recognized it as Billie's. "Are
you walking in your sleep or have you gone crazy? Come down here quick,
we need you."
"Keep still," Chet yelled back. "We're looking for your aeroplane ghost.
Can't you hear it?"
"Yes. But, oh, Chet," Billie's voice was tremulous, "the piano is playing
itself again. Won't you come down? We're afraid to stay here all alone."
"Great Scott! all the spirits are roaming at once," cried Teddy,
straining his eyes to see through the darkness as the humming of the
motor came nearer.
"There, isn't that it?" cried Ferd, pointing eagerly through the trees
toward a little patch of sky, palely illumined with stars.
"I think I saw it," said Chet, rubbing his eyes impatiently. "It's so
confoundedly dark--"
"Oh, won't you please come down?" wailed Billie's voice from the
spooky depths of the attic. "I'll die of fright if I have to stay here
another minute."
This appeal moved the boys, and they began reluctantly to descend the
ladder, keeping their eyes all the time on the pale patch of sky.
"Where are the others?" asked Teddy, as he reached Billie's side.
"They're down looking for the ghost," answered Billie, as she ran down
the stairs in front of them. "They sent me to get you boys, and I found
you gone. Mrs. Gilligan," she added, with a hysterical giggle, "has the
broom and Laura has the poker."
"Maybe we'd better stop on the way and gather up a few bedposts,"
suggested Ferd, as they took the last flight of stairs on a run and
landed in the lower hall.
"Hello, did you find anything?" sang out Chet, as the girls, looking
scared but valiant, came out to meet them. "Where's Mrs. Gilligan?"
"Inside," said Violet. "There isn't a thing to be seen any more than
there was the other night. I'm absolutely positive now that it must
be a ghost."
"Well, if it is, he's got a sense of humor," said Mrs. Gilligan, rising
from her knees where she had been peering into the corner behind the
piano. "I've heard of all sorts of spirits, but I never heard of one who
insisted upon playing the piano in the dead of night."
"He must have been a musician in his life time," suggested Chet. "That's
the reason he comes and haunts the piano."
"Well, I don't see why he doesn't choose a regular piano to haunt,"
said Billie, feeling irritable because she was very sleepy and had been
very much frightened. "It's bad enough for a live person to play, let
alone a ghost."
"And where could it have gone?" wondered Laura, her eyes big and dark
with excitement. "The minute we heard the noise--I guess we're sort of
listening for it even in our sleep--we jumped up and came down here while
Billie went to call you boys. It was playing almost up to the minute we
came into the room."
"And maybe we weren't afraid to go in!" said Violet, with a shudder. "I
don't know how we ever got the courage."
"Well, you only came because Mrs. Gilligan and I went ahead with the
broom and the poker," sniffed Laura.
"Was it playing when you came down the stairs?" asked Chet, interested.
"And did it stop as soon as you entered the room?"
"Yes," it was Mrs. Gilligan who answered this time. "And it was good for
him he did. I've lost enough sleep through the miserable rascal and I was
just ripe for a tussle."
"I don't blame him for running," said Teddy, with a chuckle.
"But where did he go?" asked Laura again. "We were sure that we'd see
something--goodness knows what--when we turned the corner of the room."
"And all we saw was a--a large amount of nothing at all," added Violet,
wide-eyed.
"Perhaps," suggested Ferd, with a chuckle, "the aeroplane we heard
belonged to him--"
"A ghost's aeroplane," murmured Billie, smothering another
hysterical chuckle.
"And when you girls came in he just soared skyward and went off in it."
"It's funny we never thought of that," said Teddy scornfully.
"Well, I wish we could find out what it is," sighed Billie, as they
started upstairs again. "This staying awake all night isn't very
much fun."
"But isn't it strange," asked Laura, stopping on the landing and looking
back at them, "that both the piano and the motor should start again on
the same night?"
"Yes, it is, rather," said Chet, adding seriously: "I wonder if there
could really be any connection between the two."
"There's no use wondering, that I can see," said Mrs. Gilligan, preparing
to send them off to their respective bedrooms. "I think the best thing we
can do is not to notice them any more. Perhaps the ghosts will get tired,
if they find they don't worry us," this last with a chuckle.
"Well, but they do worry us," said Violet plaintively. "Every time I hear
that piano, I just about die of fright."
"Listen," commanded Billie, and as they listened they heard it
again! The ghost, or whatever it was, was surely making a joke of
them that night!
As soon as the boys could recover from their surprise they tumbled down
the stairs, tripping over each other in their hurry, while the girls
followed more slowly.
But again the noise stopped abruptly, and when they entered the room
there was nothing to be seen or heard.
"Say, this thing is making me mad!" cried Ferd, glaring at the old piano
as though it were the offender. "I don't mind meeting an
honest-to-goodness ghost, but I'll be hanged if I'll let him laugh at
me!"
"I don't see how you're going to help it," said Teddy. "Come on, fellows,
it's pretty nearly morning, and we can decide then what we'll do to catch
Mr. Ghost. I'm so sleepy I'm apt to fall asleep on my feet."
So they went upstairs again, feeling rather miserable and dragged out
with excitement, and crawled into bed.
"If this thing keeps up much longer, I'll just be a wreck, that's all,"
groaned Laura, and almost immediately she fell asleep.
After a little while of staring into the dark, Billie and Violet followed
her example, and once more there was quiet in the old house.
Nothing more disturbed them, but they woke the next morning, tired and
cross and with a decidedly "morning after" feeling.
"I don't want to get up," complained Violet, turning restlessly in bed
and punching her pillow. "I can't get more than one eye open."
"Shall we send for the doctor?" asked Billie, regarding her sleepily.
"That sounds like a serious complaint."
"Humph, I don't need a doctor," grumbled Violet. "I can prescribe for my
case better than he could. What I need is a rest cure."
"So say we all of us," echoed Laura sleepily. "I'm going to take
another nap, girls, and if anybody dares to wake me up, I'll throw my
hair brush at them."
"I'm going to get up," decided Billie. "I'll only get a headache
lying here."
"Well, I hope you enjoy yourself," said Laura, and settled herself in a
still more comfortable position.
While Billie was dressing the two girls fell asleep again, and as
she turned to look at them she almost wished that she had followed
their example.
"But I knew I couldn't sleep," she said, turning away, "and, besides, I'm
getting very hungry."
But when she started down the broad staircase she found that she was the
only one stirring in the house, and a strange, lonesome feeling took
possession of her.
"Ugh," she cried, glancing about her distastefully, "it's the gloomiest
place I ever did see. I'll be glad when we leave it. That is, I would
be," she added wistfully, "if only Chet and I were going with the others
to boarding school."
She wandered into the room where the old piano stood and looked at it
musingly for a few minutes. Then suddenly a thought struck her, and she
clapped her hands gleefully.
"I wonder--" she said, then, remembering an old rat trap that she had
come across several days ago, ran into the pantry to get it. She baited
it with a fresh piece of cheese and set it carefully on the piano.
"Now," she said, standing back and regarding her work with satisfaction,
"we shall see what we shall see!"