AWAITING THE GHOST
“Wasn’t it silly of me to go off that way?”
“Do you feel all right now?”
“Let her smell of the ammonia again.”
“No, thank you, Marie. It’s too strong. The salts are better,” spoke
Natalie protestingly. She was sitting up on a cot in the tent, while the
boys clustered at the flap outside, and the girls and Mrs. Bonnell
gathered around her. The first aid work had ended successfully when
Natalie opened her eyes after her swoon.
“I don’t understand how I fainted,” she said feebly. “I never did such a
thing before.”
“It was the pain,” said Mabel. “Blake carried you in splendidly,
though.”
“Oh, did he _carry_ me?” and a dull red suffused the olive-like tint of
Natalie’s cheeks.
“Of course!” exclaimed Mrs. Bonnell. “Why not? It was the most sensible
thing to do under the circumstances. How is the ankle?”
“It pains considerably.”
“We must try hot and cold compresses. Marie, put the kettle on the oil
stove at once. Boys, you clear out of here. We can look after her
now—much obliged to you though. You might bring a couple of pails of
water, if you don’t mind, before you go.”
“Here’s your hat—what’s your hurry,” murmured Phil half sarcastically.
“After all we did—to be thrown out this way!” wailed Jack.
“And we haven’t heard what happened!” added Blake. “Let Nat tell us the
story of her life, and then we’ll go.”
“There isn’t really much to tell,” she answered. “I got a sudden notion
in my head that I wanted to go to the old mill. I thought I would have
time to row over and back before supper. So I just slipped away in the
small canoe, and got to the place all right.”
“Weren’t you afraid?” asked Mabel.
“What of?”
“The ghost!”
“There wasn’t any when I was there,” went on pretty
breath-of-the-pine-tree, as she leaned back on some pillows Mabel had
put on the cot for her.
“I just thought I’d look around and see if I could discover what it was
that looked like a face at the window that day I saw it. I started up
the rickety old stairs, and I turned on my ankle and slipped down.
“Oh, dear! but it hurt. I tried to get up and I couldn’t and I didn’t
know how long I’d have to stay there. I called for help, but the place
was deserted since the old hermit moved out. Oh, I didn’t know what to
do.”
“And weren’t you afraid—horribly afraid?” asked Marie.
“Not first along, I wasn’t. I didn’t imagine what could harm me. But I
was afraid lest I should have to stay there all night. I knew I could
never stand that.”
“Did you hear any—ghostly noises?” asked Mabel, and involuntarily she
looked over her shoulder.
“Not at first,” answered Natalie, and there was an obvious reluctance in
her manner.
“Then you _did_ hear something!” exclaimed Jack, who was watching her
closely.
“Well, it sounded like some one crying, or moaning, I couldn’t tell
which. Then I heard what seemed like some one tramping around in the
room overhead.”
“Rats!” exclaimed Jack with such suddenness that all the girls jumped,
and Marie screamed.
“I think they were pigeons,” went on Natalie, “and what sounded like
moaning was the cooing. When I had reasoned that out I felt better. Then
I called for help again, and no one answered for ever so long.”
“You poor child,” murmured Mrs. Bonnell. “Did some one finally come?”
“Yes; Reuben did.”
“Good boy for you, Reuben!” exclaimed Blake, who stood near the farm
lad. “I’ll make it all right with you.”
“Huh! I didn’t do it for pay!” he protested.
“Of course not. You didn’t know that you were entertaining an angel
unawares; did you?”
Natalie was continuing her story.
“Reuben answered me, after a bit,” she said. “I was never so glad to see
any one in all my whole life as I was to see Reuben. I’ll never forget
his kindness.”
“’Twasn’t nothin’!” he protested.
“Yes, it was!” insisted Natalie. “He came in, helped me to get up, and
then, by leaning on his shoulder, I managed to get down to the lake. He
had his boat there, and I got in that, as I thought I could rest better
than in the canoe.”
“We towed that back,” put in Reuben. “I tied it down on shore.”
“And so here I am,” resumed Natalie. “Oh, I do hope I’m not going to be
laid up.”
“If those boys will leave I’ll attend to your sprain,” said Mrs. Bonnell
significantly, and the young men took the hint and left. With the
application of cloths alternately wrung out of hot and cold water,
Natalie’s ankle was soon much easier. It was not a bad sprain, as
sprains go, and the Guardian assured her she would be out again in a
couple of days.
Then Natalie had to tell the story all over again, with repetitions of
certain parts, while, on their own behalf, the Camp Fire Girls related
how they had instituted one search, and were about to start another when
the missing one came back.
As for the boys they could be heard discussing the affair in loud voices
as the two parties went to their several camps.
“I wonder what’s in that old mill, anyhow?” ventured Jack.
“It must be something,” declared Blake. “I dare you fellows to come over
with me and ‘lay the ghost,’ as they call it.”
“I’ll go!” offered Phil. “It’s a long row, though, and it’s late.”
“The lateness is so much the better,” declared Blake. “Ghosts never
perambulate until near midnight, anyhow. How is it—will you fellows go?”
“Not for ours,” declared Charlie Taylor, one of the crowd from the lower
camp. “Maybe in the morning we might consider it. Anyhow, this is the
closed season for ghosts.”
“You’re afraid!” jeered Blake.
“Now, don’t let’s think of tackling it to-night,” suggested Jack. “I’ll
go there to-morrow with any one—or two.”
“You can’t see ghosts in the day-time!” declared Blake, as if he were an
authority on spirits.
“Who said we would look for them in daylight,” returned Jack. “We can go
to the mill to-morrow afternoon, and wait until it gets dark. We can
take our lunch with us.”
“That sounds good,” declared Phil. “I’m in on that.”
“Well, if you want to do it that way, I’m willing,” assented Blake.
“Probably all we’ll find, though, is some tramp sleeping in the shack.
Very well, we’ll lay the ghost to-morrow.”
“And we won’t tell the girls about it until we solve the mystery,” added
Phil.
“That’s what,” added Jack.
But the next day it rained, so they postponed their ghost-hunting
expedition. There was nothing much to do, though, so in the afternoon
the boys donned old garments, and went over to the Point, through the
drizzle, for some supplies, shopping for the girls at the same time.
Natalie’s ankle was better, it was reported, and the following day she
could hobble about a bit.
“But I’m going to sit still and do bead work for a while,” she said when
the boys came to call, and she showed where, on a hand loom, she was
working a Camp Fire device for a bead head-band—her emblem of a pine
tree being made in a conventional design. The other girls were also
busy.
“Then you’re not going to the mill again?” asked Jack.
“No, indeed!”
Late that afternoon, giving out some excuse to the girls not to see them
that evening, the three chums, having packed a basket of lunch, with
some candles for light, some bags to use for cushions, set off for the
old mill. They intended to pass the night there to prove or disprove
that any one—whether of this earth or some other—was in the ancient
structure.