An Alarm
That same evening an extraordinary thing happened. It was the custom for
glasses of milk, dishes of stewed fruit, and plates of bread and butter
to be placed on the table in the dining-hall about eight o'clock. This
was done as usual, but when the girls arrived for supper they found a
large proportion of the bread and butter had vanished. At first the
suspicion fell on Spot, the fox-terrier, but the cook pleaded an alibi
on his behalf, proving that he had been in the kitchen the whole time;
also, the rifled plates were in the middle of the table, so no dog could
have purloined their contents without knocking over glasses, or
disturbing spoons and forks.
"I'm afraid it's a two-legged dog," said Miss Harding gravely. "The
French window was open, and it would be easy for anyone to walk in and
help himself. I'm glad nothing more valuable was taken. I wish Miss
Birks were here! It's most unfortunate it should happen on the very
evening she's away."
The incident gave cause for serious apprehension. Miss Harding made a
most careful round of the house before bedtime, to see that all bolts
and shutters were well secured. Though she would not betray her alarm to
the girls, she was afraid that a burglary might be committed during the
night. Both she and Mademoiselle kept awake till dawn, listening for
suspicious footsteps on the gravel outside. All was as usual, however,
in the morning; there were no evidences of attempts to force locks or
windows, and no trace of the mysterious thief who had taken the bread
and butter. Mademoiselle reported indeed that she had again heard the
curious sounds which for some nights past had disturbed her. She had
risen and patrolled the house, and had come to the unmistakable
conclusion that they issued from the barred room. The closed chamber was
as much a riddle to teachers as to girls, so Miss Harding merely shook
her head, and recommended Mademoiselle to tell her experiences to Miss
Birks as soon as the Principal returned.
At five o'clock that afternoon Elyned Hughes came running downstairs
with a white, scared face. She solemnly averred that, when passing the
door of the mysterious room, she had heard extraordinary noises within.
"It was exactly like somebody moving about and frying sausages. I
smelled them too!" she declared.
The report was in part confirmed by several other girls, who pledged
their word that they heard stealthy movements when they listened at the
barred door.
"Are you absolutely certain, or is it only mice?" queried Gerda. "We've
so often fancied things."
"Mice don't clink cans, and strike matches, and clear their throats!"
retorted Rhoda.
"But you may have thought it sounded like that."
"I couldn't be mistaken."
"Somebody's there, beyond a doubt," said Agnes.
"Perhaps it's a ghost?" queried Elyned.
"It's nothing supernatural this time, I'll undertake to say--whatever
may have made the noises before."
"It ought to be enquired into," declared Doris. "Miss Birks ought to
insist on having the bars taken down, and seeing what's going on."
"Oh, no, no! It's best to leave things as they are."
Gerda was looking white and upset and spoke almost hysterically.
"Do you expect the ghost to bolt in amongst us the moment the door is
unlocked?" mocked Rhoda.
"No, of course, I'm not so silly! But it's often better to let well
alone."
"Mrs. Trevellyan is still away, so Miss Birks couldn't ask her to have
the bars taken down now," volunteered Betty Scott.
"So she is," exclaimed Gerda, with an air of relief.
"Ah! You're afraid of the ghost," repeated Rhoda. "I'm more inclined
towards the burglar theory. In the circumstances, I think Miss Birks
would be quite justified in making an investigation, even without Mrs.
Trevellyan's permission."
"I shouldn't wonder myself if Miss Birks called in the police," said
Betty Scott.
The girls were in a ferment of excitement over the affair. Deirdre and
Dulcie felt that in view of yesterday's discovery they had a strong clue
to the mystery. They hesitated as to whether they ought at once to tell
Miss Harding, but, as Miss Birks was expected home within an hour or
two, they decided it was better to wait till they could deliver their
news at head-quarters.
Gerda, during the whole day, had been very abstracted and peculiar in
her manner. She was nervous, starting at every sound, and seemed so
preoccupied with her own thoughts that she often took no notice when
spoken to.
"What's wrong with the Sphinx?" commented Deirdre. "She's absolutely
obsessed."
"Yes, I can't make her out. She's disturbed in her mind. That's easy
enough to see. There's something queer going on in this school. I hope
she's not mixed up in it."
"We'd decidedly better watch her. After all that's happened before, one
can't trust her in the least. Until Miss Birks is safely back in the
house I feel we oughtn't to let Gerda out of our sight. Who knows what
she may be going to do, or whom she's in league with?"
Coupled with the mysterious happenings of last night and to-day, Gerda's
palpable uneasiness gave strong grounds for suspicion. The chums watched
her like a couple of detectives. They were determined to warn Miss Birks
directly on her return. Meanwhile nothing their room-mate did must
escape their notice. They were to perform a duet at the musical
examination, therefore they had the extreme felicity of doing their
practising together. For the same half-hour Gerda was due at the
instrument in the next room. They waited to begin until they heard the
first bars of her "Arabesque". At the same moment came from the hall the
sounds of the bustle occasioned by Miss Birks's arrival home. Deirdre
and Dulcie looked at one another in much relief.
"She'll just be downstairs again by the time we've finished practising,
and then we'll go straight and tell her," they agreed.
I am afraid neither in the least gave her mind to the piano.
Mademoiselle, had she been near, would have been highly irate at the
wrong notes and other faults that marred the beauty of their mazurka.
Both girls were playing with an ear for the "Arabesque" on the other
side of the wall.
"She's stopped!" exclaimed Dulcie, pausing in the middle of a bar. "Now,
what's that for, I should like to know? I don't trust you, Miss Gerda
Thorwaldson."
But Deirdre was already at the window.
"Look! look!" she gasped. "Gerda's off somewhere!"
The window of the adjacent room was a French one, and the girls could
see their schoolfellow open it gently and steal cautiously out on to the
lawn. She glanced round to see if she were observed, then ran off in the
direction of the kitchen-garden. In a moment the chums had thrown up the
sash of their window and followed her. All their old suspicions of her
had revived in full force; they were certain she was in league with
somebody, and for no good purpose, and they were determined that at last
they would unmask her and expose her duplicity. They had spared her
before, but this time they intended to act, and act promptly too.
Gerda opened the gate of the kitchen-garden as confidently as if she
were not transgressing a rule, and rushed away between the strawberry
beds. Pilfering was evidently not her object, for she never even looked
at the fruit, but kept straight on towards the end where the
horse-radish grew. Keeping her well within sight, the chums went swiftly
but cautiously after. She stood for a moment on the piece of waste
ground that bounded the cliff, looked carefully round--her pursuers were
hidden behind a tree--then plunged down the side of the rock and out of
sight. Deirdre and Dulcie each drew a long breath. The conclusion was
certain. Without doubt she must be going to pay a visit to the cave
which communicated with the mysterious chamber. Whom did she expect to
find there?
"To me there's only one course open," declared Deirdre solemnly. "We
must go straight to Miss Birks and tell her this very instant."
The Principal, disturbed in the midst of changing her travelling
costume, listened with amazement to her insistent pupils' excited
account.
"This must be investigated immediately," she declared. "Dulcie, fetch a
candle and matches, and you must both accompany me to this cave. You say
Gerda has gone on there alone?"
Miss Birks took the affair gravely. She appeared very much concerned,
even alarmed. She hurried off at once with the girls to the
kitchen-garden.
They led the way down the narrow staircase cut in the cliff, and across
the beach and over the rocks. At the entrance to the cave they both
uttered a sharp exclamation, for Gerda stood there in an attitude of
hesitation, as if unable to make up her mind whether to enter or no. She
turned red, and white, and then red again to the tips of her ears when
she saw that she was discovered, but she offered no explanation of her
presence there. She did not even speak.
"Girls," said Miss Birks, "I think it is highly desirable and necessary
that we should follow this passage into the room which I am told is
beyond. Deirdre, you go first, with this candle, then Dulcie--Gerda,
give me your candle, and walk just in front of me."
Policing the three in the rear, the Principal gave nobody an opportunity
to escape. She had her own reasons for her conduct, which at present she
did not choose to explain. With a hand on Gerda's shoulder, she forced
that unwilling explorer along, and she urged an occasional caution on
Deirdre. They had reached the cavern, and now, opening the small inner
door, flashed their candles into the room. The result was startling.
On the bed reclined a figure, which, at sight of the light, sprang up
with the cry of a hare in a trap--a man, unkempt, ragged, and dirty,
bearing the impress of tramp written plainly upon his haggard, unshaven
countenance. He darted wildly forward, gazed up at the strangers
regarding him, then threw himself on a chair, and buried his face in his
hands.
Gerda gave a long sigh of supreme relief. It was evidently not at all
what she had expected to see.
"I'm done!" whimpered the tramp. "Send for the bobbies if you like. I'll
go quiet."
"You must first tell me what you are doing here," said Miss Birks,
stepping down into the room. "Then I can decide whether or no it is
necessary to call in the police. Who are you? And where do you come
from?"
"I knowed this passage when I was a boy," was the whining reply. "We
used to dare each other to go up it, but the door at the end was firm
shut. Then when I come back, down on my luck, and without a penny in my
pocket to pay for a lodging, I thought I'd at least spend a night there
under cover. I'd a bit of candle and a few matches, so I found my way
along easy, and there! if the door at the end wasn't broke open, and the
place waitin' all ready for me--bed, kettle, cooking-stove, frying-pan,
cup and saucer, and all the rest of it, just as if someone 'ad put 'em
there a purpose. I wasn't long in takin' possession, and I've lived here
five days, and done nobody no harm. I didn't take nothing from the house
either, except a bit of bread and butter last night when I felt
starving. T'other days I'd found a job on the quay, and was able to buy
myself victuals."
"Did you cook sausages?" quavered Dulcie, with intense interest.
"Aye, I'd earned a bit this morning to buy 'em with. Don't know who set
up a stove here, but it come in handy for me, all filled ready with oil,
too."
"But you know you've no right here," said Miss Birks severely.
"No, mum," reverting to his original whine. "I know that, but I'm a poor
man, and I've been unfortunate. I came back to my native place looking
for a bit of work. I've bin half over the world since I left it."
"If you're a Pontperran man, somebody ought to be able to vouch for you.
What's your name?"
"Abel Galsworthy."
Then Gerda sprang forward with intense, irrepressible excitement on her
face.
"Not Abel Galsworthy who was at one time under-gardener at the Castle?"
she queried eagerly.
"The same--at your service, miss."
"And you were dismissed for--for----"
"For borrowing a matter of a few pears, that made a little disagreement
betwixt me and the head gardener. I swore I'd try another line of life,
and I shipped as a fireman on board a steamer bound for America, and
worked my way over the continent to California. I didn't get on with the
Yankees, so I took a turn to Australia, but that didn't suit me no
better, and after I'd knocked about till I was tired of it, I come
home."
"Do you remember that when you were at the Castle you witnessed a paper
that the old Squire signed?"
"Aye, I remember it as if it was yesterday. Me and Jim Robinson, the
under-groom, was the witnesses, but Jim's been gone this many a year."
"Should you know your own handwriting again? Could you swear to it?"
"I'd take my Bible oath afore a judge and jury, if need be."
"Then--oh! thank Heaven I have pieced the broken link of my chain!"
cried Gerda. "Oh! can I really clear my father's name at last, and wipe
the stain from the honour of the Trevellyans?"
"What does she mean?" asked Dulcie. "I don't understand!"
"It's all a jig-saw puzzle to me!" said Deirdre. "What does Gerda know
about the Castle, and the old Squire, and a paper? And what has she to
do with the honour of the Trevellyans?"
"I guessed the riddle long ago," smiled Miss Birks, laying a friendly
hand on Gerda's arm. "The likeness to Ronnie was enough to tell me that
she was his sister."