“_Look! Look!” he cried. “That’s what I was wantin’ to find._”
(_Page 101_) (_The Phantom Yacht_)
THE
PHANTOM YACHT
_By_ CAROL NORTON
Author of
“Bobs, A Girl Detective,” “The Seven Sleuths’ Club,” etc.
A. L. BURT COMPANY
Publishers New York
Printed in U. S. A.
MYSTERY _and_ ADVENTURE SERIES _for_ GIRLS
12 TO 16 YEARS OF AGE
The Phantom Yacht, by Carol Norton.
Bobs, A Girl Detective, by Carol Norton.
The Seven Sleuths’ Club, by Carol Norton.
The Phantom Treasure, by Harriet Pyne Grove.
The Secret of Steeple Rocks, by Harriet Pyne Grove.
Copyright, 1928
By A. L. BURT COMPANY
CONTENTS
I. Friends Parted 3
II. Banishing Ghosts 13
III. A Lost Mother 21
IV. Seaward Bound 30
V. A New Experience 42
VI. A Light in the Dark 49
VII. The Phantom Yacht 56
VIII. What Happened 64
IX. A Mysterious Message 73
X. Sounds in the Loft 82
XI. A Querulous Old Aunt 88
XII. A Bleached Skeleton 96
XIII. Belling the Ghost 106
XIV. A Punt Ride 112
XV. A Gloomy Swamp 117
XVI. Out in the Dark 121
XVII. More Mysteries 127
XVIII. An Airplane Sighted 133
XIX. Two Boys Investigate 139
XX. One Mystery Solved 149
XXI. A channel in the Swamp 160
XXII. The Old Ruin at Midnight 170
XXIII. Letters of Importance 183
XXIV. A Surprising Revelation 193
XXV. Puzzled Again 205
XXVI. A Clue to the Old Ruin Mystery 214
XXVII. Ransacking the Old Ruin 224
XXVIII. The Best Surprise of All 239
THE PHANTOM YACHT
CHAPTER I.
FRIENDS PARTED
The face of Dories Moore was as dismal as the day was bright. It was
Indian summer and the maple trees under which she was hurrying were
joyfully arrayed in red and gold, while crimson, yellow and purple
flowers nodded at her from the gardens that she passed with unseeing
eyes. She was almost blinded with tears; her scarlet tam was awry, as
though she had put it on hurriedly, and her sweater coat, of the same
cheerful hue, was unbuttoned and flapping as she fairly ran down the
village street. In her hand was a note which had been the cause of the
tears and the haste. On it were a few penciled words:
“Dori dear, we are leaving sooner than we expected. I’m sending this to
you by little Johnnie-next-door. Do come right over and say good-bye to
someone who loves you best of all.
“Your sister-friend,
“Nann.”
At a large old colonial house at the edge of the town, just where the
meadows began, the girl turned in at a lilac-guarded gate and hurried up
the neatly graveled walk. Her eyes were again brimming with tears as she
glanced up at the curtainless windows that looked as dismal and deserted
as she felt. Hurrying up the steps, she lifted the quaintly carved old
iron knocker and shuddered as she heard the sound echoing uncannily
through the big unfurnished rooms. Her sensitive mouth quivered when she
heard the sound of running feet on bare floors and when the door was
flung open by another girl of about the same age, Dori leaped in and,
throwing her arms about her friend, she burst into tears.
“Why, Dories! Dear, dear Dori, don’t cry so hard.” There were sudden
tears in the warm brown eyes of Nann Sibbett, as for a moment she held
her friend tenderly close.
“One might think that I was going a million miles away.” She tried to
speak cheerfully. “Boston isn’t so very far from Elmwood and some day,
soon, I am sure that you will be coming to visit me.”
An April-like smile flickered tremulously on the lips of the younger girl
as she stepped back and straightened her tam. “Well, that is something to
look forward to,” she confessed. “It will be a little strip of silver
lining to as black a cloud as ever came into my life. Of course,” Dories
amended, “losing father was terrible, but I was too young to know the
loneliness of it, and being poor when we should be rich is awfully hard.
Sometimes I feel so rebellious, O, nobody knows how rebellious I feel.
But losing one’s money is nothing compared to losing one’s only friend.”
The other girl, who was taller by half a head, actually laughed. “Why,
Dories Moore, here you talk as though you would not have a single friend
left when I have moved away. There isn’t a girl at High who hasn’t been
green with envy because I have had the good fortune to be your best
friend ever since we were in kindergarten, and just as soon as I’m out of
town they’ll be swarming around you, each one aspiring to be your pal.”
There was a scornful curl on the sensitive lips of the listener. “As
though I would let anyone have your place, Nann Sibbett. Never, never,
never, not if I live to be a thousand years old.” Then with an appealing
upward glance, “But you’ll probably like some city girl heaps better than
you ever did me. I suppose you’ll forget all about me soon.”
“Silly!” Nann exclaimed brightly, giving her friend an impulsive hug.
“Don’t you remember when you were eleven and I was twelve, we had a
ceremony out in the meadow under the twin elms and we vowed, just as
solemnly as we knew how, that we would be adopted sisters and that real
born sisters could not be closer.”
Dories nodded, smiling again at the pleasant recollection. “Do you know,
Nann,” she put in, “I sort of feel that we were intended to be sisters
some way. It was such a strange coincidence that our birthdays happened
to fall on the same day, the third of September.”
“Maybe if they hadn’t,” Nann chimed in, “you and I wouldn’t have been
best friends at all, for, don’t you remember, way back in kindergarten
days, you were so shy you didn’t make friends with anyone, and when Miss
Sally wanted to find a seat for you that very first morning, she chose me
because it was our birthday. After that, since I was a year older, I felt
that I ought to look out for you just as a big sister really should.”
Dories nodded, then as she glanced into the bare library, in the wide
doorway of which they were standing, she said dismally, “O, Nann, what
good times we’ve had in this room. I can almost see now when we were very
little girls curled up on that window seat near the fireplace studying
our first primer, and on and on until last June when we were cramming for
our sophomore finals.”
“I know.” Nann looked wistfully toward the corner which Dories had
indicated. “I don’t believe we will either of us know how to study
alone.” Then, fearing that tears would come again, she caught her
friend’s hand as she exclaimed, “Dories dear, this room is too full of
ghosts of our past. Let’s go out in the garden. Dad had to go to the bank
to finish up some business, and I had to stay here to see that the last
load of furniture got off safely. It left just before you came. We’re
going to store it for a time and live in a very fine hotel in Boston.
Won’t that be a lark for a change?”
Dories spoke bitterly, “Well, for one thing I _am_ thankful, and that is
that your father didn’t lose his money the way my father did, though how
it happened I never knew and mother never told me.”
“Maybe it will all come back some time in a manner just as mysterious,”
her friend said cheerfully as she led her down the steps around the
house. Neither of the girls spoke of Nann’s dear mother, who had so
recently died, and whose passing had made life in the old house
unendurable to the daughter and her father, but they were both thinking
of her as they wandered into the garden which she had so loved. Nann
slipped an arm about her friend as she paused to look at the blossoms.
“Autumn flowers are always so bright and cheerful, aren’t they, Dori?”
She was determined to change the younger girl’s dismal trend of thought.
“That bed of scarlet salvia over by the evergreen hedge seems to be just
rejoicing about something, and the asters, of almost every color, look as
though they were dressed for a party. They’re happy, if we aren’t.”
“Stupid things!” Dories said petulantly. “They don’t know or care because
you, who have tended and watered and loved them, are going away forever
and ever.”
“Yes, they do know,” Nann said, smiling a bit tremulously, “for last
night when I came out to give them a drink, I told them all about it, but
they’re just trying to make the best of it. They know it’s as hard for me
to go away from my old home as it is for them to have me go, but they’re
trying to make it easier for me, I guess.”
Dories flashed a quick glance up at her companion. Then, impulsively,
“Oh, Nann, how selfish I always am! Of course it’s hard for you to leave
your old home and go among strangers. Here all the time I’ve just been
thinking how _hard_ it is for _me_ to have you go.” Then, making a little
bow toward the bed of radiant asters, the girl of many moods called to
them: “You’re setting a good example, you little plant folk in your
bright blossom tams. From now on I’ll be just as cheerful as ever I can.”
Smiling up at her companion, Dories exclaimed, “And all this time I’ve
had some news that I haven’t told you.” Answering verbally her friend’s
questioning look, she hurried on, “I’m going away myself for the month of
October. At least I suppose I am, and that’s one of the things that has
made me so dismally blue.” Nann stopped in the garden path which they had
been slowly circling and gazed into the pretty face of her friend, hardly
knowing whether to congratulate or condole. Instead of doing either, she
queried, “But why are you so dismal about it, Dori? I’ve often heard you
say that you did wish you could see something of the world beyond
Elmwood?”
“I know it and I still should wish it if you were going with me, but this
journey is anything but pleasant to anticipate.”
“Do tell me about it. I’m consumed with curiosity.” Nann drew her friend
to a garden seat and sat with an arm holding her close. “Now start at the
beginning. _Who_ are you going with, where and why?” The question, simple
as it seemed, brought tears with a rush to the violet-blue eyes of the
younger girl, but remembering her recent resolve, she sat up
ramrod-straight as she replied, making her mouth into as hard a line as
she could. “The one I am going with is an old crab of a great-aunt whom I
have never seen. I’m ever so sure she is a crab, although my angel mother
always smooths over that part of her nature when she’s telling me about
her. She’s rich as Crœsus, if that fabled person really was rich. I’m
never very sure about those things.”
Nann laughed. “He was! You’re safe in your comparison. But he got much of
his money by taking it away from other people with the cruel taxes he
levied.”
“Oh, well, of course my Great Aunt Jane isn’t so terribly rich,” Dories
modified, “but Mother said she had plenty for every comfort and luxury,
and what’s more, Mums _did_ agree with _me_ when I said that she must be
queer. That is, Mother said that even my father, who was Great-Aunt
Jane’s own nephew, couldn’t understand her ways.” Then, with eyes
solemn-wide, the narrator continued: “Nann Sibbett, as I’ve often told
you, I don’t understand in the least what became of our inheritance. If
Mother knows, she won’t tell, but I’m suspicious of that crabby old Aunt
Jane. I think she has it. There now, that’s what I think.”
Nann was interested and said so. “But, Dori dear, you’ve sidetracked. You
began by saying that you were going somewhere. I take it that your
Great-Aunt Jane has invited you to go somewhere with her. Is that right?”
“It is!” the other girl said glumly. “But, believe me, I don’t look
forward to the excursion with any great pleasure.” Then she hurried on.
“Think of it, Nann, that awful old lady has actually requested that I
spend the whole dismal month of October with her down on the beach at
some lonely isolated place called Siquaw Point.”
But if Dories expected sympathy, she was disappointed. “Oh, Dori!” was
the excited exclamation that she heard, “I know about Siquaw Point. An
aunt of mine went there one summer, and she just raved about the rocky
cliffs, the sand dunes and the sea. I’d love it, I know, even in the
middle of winter, and, dear, sometimes October is a beautiful month. You
may have a wonderful time.”
But Dories refused to see any hope of happiness ahead. “The Garden of
Eden would be a dismal place to me if I had to be alone in it with my
Great-Aunt Jane.”
Nann laughed, then hearing a siren calling from the front, she sprang up,
held out both hands to her friend as she exclaimed, “There’s my
chauffeur-dad waiting to bear me stationward, but, dear, I’ve thought of
one thing that will help some. To get to Siquaw Point you will have to go
through Boston. If you’ll let me know the day and the hour I’ll be at the
station to speed you on your way.”
How the younger girl’s face brightened. “Nann, darling,” she exclaimed,
“will you truly? Then that will give me a chance to see you again in just
a few weeks, maybe only two, for its nearly October now.”
“Righto!” was the cheerful reply. “There’s that siren again. I must go.
Will you come and say good-bye to Dad?”
But the other girl shook her head, her eyes brimming with tears. “I’d
rather not now. You tell him for me. I’m going home across lots. I don’t
want anyone to see how near I am to crying.” As she spoke two tears
splashed down her cheeks. Nann caught her in a close embrace. “Dear, dear
sister-friend,” she said, “I’m going to be just as lonely as you are.”
Then, stooping, she picked an aster and held it out, saying brightly,
“This golden aster wants to go with you to tell you that we’re going to
be as cheerful as we can, come what may. See you next month, Dori, sure
as sure.”
Nann turned at the corner of the house to wave, and then Dories walked
slowly across lots thinking over the conversation she had had with her
dearly loved friend. She paused a moment under the twin elms where, in
the long ago, they had vowed to be loyal as any two sisters could be.
Then, with a deep sigh, she went on to the cosy brown house under other
spreading elms that she called home.