Rift in the Clouds
Harry helped himself to another cigarette before he answered the barrage
of inquiries.
“As nearly as I could tell,” said the ghost-hunter, “the scream came from
the room of the mysterious closet. At least, it sounded so to me. As I
say, I was in the room where the old four-poster bed was.”
“Where the workman said he saw the dead body,” interposed Arden.
“Exactly. Well, I left that room on the jump, you may be sure, when I
heard that terrible yell. I knew it hadn’t come from the room where I
was, and I headed for the closet room, as we’ll call it.”
The girls nodded their heads understandingly but did not interrupt.
“But there was nothing there,” young Pangborn said. “Not a thing that
could have screamed. There was nothing there. Absolutely!”
“Whatever did you do?” asked Terry, her eyes brighter. Really, this was
all so eerily interesting that she almost forgot the pain of her bandaged
ankle.
“I just looked around,” was the answer. “That horrible scream seemed to
be still echoing through the big bare room, and to me it seemed to come
up out of the ash-chute of the fireplace.”
“That’s what one of Jim’s companions said,” remarked Sim. “He said it
sounded like a dying cat, and he dropped a brick down.”
“If this was a cat it must have been a mountain lion,” said Harry,
seriously enough. “I’ve hunted them, and those catamounts do yell, groan,
or scream in a most unearthly fashion at times. But there are none within
many miles of here, unless one has escaped from a menagerie. Of course,
that’s possible.”
“Do you think,” asked Dot, examining one of her pink nails, “that it
could be an animal who has been responsible for all the demonstrations?”
“What a fade-out for our ghosts!” murmured Sim.
“Not to be thought of!” declared Arden.
“I did have the idea of an animal for a moment,” was the young man’s
answer. “But not after I investigated. I looked down the old ash-chute
and even threw some pieces of bricks down. There was no come-back. Then I
made another search of the old house, even going down cellar and looking
at the bottom of the chute, where, you say, Jim was found.”
Arden nodded in confirmation.
“There was nothing there,” went on the narrator, “not even a wild animal
smell, which is very characteristic, I assure you. So I went outside and
had a look around. I got positive evidence, then, that no one but myself
had entered the house.”
“How did you prove that?” pursued Terry.
“By the footprints in the snow. Or, rather, by a lack of footprints. The
only marks were those I had made in entering and those Terry and Arden
left, but they did not come near the house. So I knew that there was no
one in the house with me.”
“And yet you heard that terrible yell!” whispered Terry.
“Yes, I heard it. There was no mistake about it.”
“What is your explanation?” asked Arden after a rather long pause.
Harry laughed, shrugged his shoulders, crushed his cigarette out on the
tray Dot had brought him, and said:
“I haven’t any! I’m as much up in the air as you girls are.”
They were rather wide-eyed at hearing this.
“Of course,” he went on, “this yell is the only manifestation that has
come to me. I understand you girls have both seen and heard things.”
“No.” Arden shook her head. “We were never really in the house when
anything actually happened. We would arrive on the scene after the men
had run out, yelling that they had either seen or heard something. What
they heard, so they said, was a scream like the one you describe. Also
there was the sound of heavily booted feet tramping on the stairs. And I
think one man said he saw what he thought was a soldier in one of the
rooms. Then there was the figure on the bed. But we never saw either of
those.”
“And the last thing that happened,” said Sim, “I mean just before what
you heard this afternoon, Harry, was the disappearance of Jim and his
subsequent discovery in the cellar.”
“He said something hit him on the head,” suggested Dot.
“Oh, yes, so he did,” Arden recalled.
“Then,” stated the young man, “we have three sorts of ghostly
demonstrations: visible, audible, and manual, I might say, to describe
the assault on Mr. Jim. It’s very odd. I can’t account for it. I was
sure, after I heard that scream, that some prank-loving chap had slipped
into the house after me and was practising his college yell. But the snow
told a different story.”
They were silent a little while, and then Arden, in rather a small voice,
asked:
“What are you going to do next, Harry?”
“I don’t know. What do you want me to do?”
“Well, we’d like to have you help us find that ghost, if it’s only to
satisfy ourselves that there’s no such thing,” said Sim.
“And we want to help Granny Howe,” suggested Terry. “It seems pathetic
that her Sycamore Hall, or what she claims is her ancestors’ manor house
and ought to be hers, must be torn down, taken away, and she and the two
grandchildren get nothing for it.”
“Yes,” admitted Mr. Pangborn. “Pass that, and I shall have something to
say on it in a moment. But can I do anything else to help you? I’ll say
now, in between times of laying out the bird sanctuary, I’m going to keep
after the ghost.”
“There’s one other thing,” Arden said. “About Jim Danton’s family. They
are in want and he was hurt while working for that contractor.”
“Oh, yes, I was going to tell you about that,” Harry went on. “As I was
coming away, after my unsuccessful, mysterious-voice hunt, I met Mr.
Callahan. I had in mind what you told me last night about this Jim, and I
spoke about him. Callahan says he will see that he gets workman’s
compensation all the while he is ill. The contractor carries insurance.”
“That’s fine,” exclaimed Arden. “Well, outside of finding the ghost,
which perhaps we can’t do, and helping Granny—which seems impossible——”
“Perhaps not quite as impossible as you think,” interrupted the
bird-sanctuary man with a smile, asking pardon for his interruption. “I
talked with my friend Dr. Thandu over the telephone after I left here
last night. I spoke of this case, the old ancestral hall being torn down
and no compensation being paid to the evident heirs, Granny, Dick, and
Betty.
“Dr. Thandu said it was a very complicated case. It appears when the
state took over Jockey Hollow for a park Mrs. Howe and her grandchildren
lived in the Hall. She had lived there many years and always supposed it
was her property. But when, under the law known as the right of eminent
domain, the state took it to make a Revolutionary memorial park, Mrs.
Howe could produce no papers proving her claim. She never had occasion to
use them, she said, and had no idea where they might be. She surmised
that her father or grandfather had put them away, but a diligent search
failed to reveal them.
“Well, the state waited a long time, and then, as she could show no legal
title, they asked her to move, which she did, as they were soon going to
start tearing down the place. However, Dr. Thandu and his fellow
commissioners did all they could. They had the Hall appraised and the
money was paid into court. It is there now, and whoever can prove title
to Sycamore Hall will get that money.”
“It should go to Granny Howe, and possibly some of it to her cousin
Viney,” declared Arden, “and to Betty and Dick. Why doesn’t the state or
Dr. Thandu or somebody give it to them? It’s doing no good where it is
now!” Arden was indignant.
“Granted,” said Harry. “But here is the point. Suppose the state paid
this sequestered money to Granny Howe and her kin. Then, some time later,
suppose the real heirs appeared with the legal papers and showed that the
Hall was theirs. The state would have to pay all over again.”
“I suppose they couldn’t do that,” agreed Sim a little sadly.
“That’s why they have to be so careful,” went on Mr. Pangborn. “It is a
complicated matter. The state doesn’t want to cheat Granny, nor does it
want to be cheated itself. But there is a rift in the clouds.”
“Where?” asked Terry.
“Dr. Thandu is willing and will urge that the whole case be reopened. The
Park Commission lawyers will go over it all again and take the matter to
court, seeing if it is possible, even without the missing papers, to pay
Mrs. Howe. And I may add that I am going to have my late grandfather’s
lawyers—the ones who posted that reward circular about me,” he said with
a smile to Arden—“I’m going to have them look into the case for Mrs.
Howe. They are clever fellows. So perhaps it may all come right after
all.”
“Oh, I do hope so!” cried Arden. “And in this connection I’ve just had
the most wonderful thought. I must tell you before I forget it. This is
going to be a happy Christmas for Granny Howe. Now, this is my plan.”
But before Arden could continue, there came a knock at the door.