DEDUCTION
Emerson knew that scouts were always called out whenever any one was
lost. He wondered whether they had investigated the neighborhood of the
circus. Though he had not been included in their organized search, there
was no harm in his thinking about the affair and forming theories as he
went along. No one could “guy” him or interfere with him in that purely
academic pastime.
He had never before been brought so close to a possible tragedy. He felt
the excitement, the thrill of it, though the door had been so heedlessly
slammed in his face. Poor Emerson’s adventures were mostly in his mind
where no one could see them—and make fun of them. It was not a bad sort
of mind.
As he hurried along with his funny, prim walk, he decided that the
“public authorities” had certainly not failed to consider the perils
which accompany a visiting circus. They would certainly investigate that
field of major importance, leaving the less important field to the
scouts. There was, as he saw it, an affinity between scouts and woods,
and the woods would naturally be the scene of their quest. He wondered
if there were any particular reason for supposing that little Margie
Garrison had gone into the woods. He assumed that the scouts knew what
they were about....
As he took his lonely way homeward, he did not put himself out of sorts
by any feeling of resentment toward these scouts whose organization he
had consented, and really desired, to join. He was quite without malice.
Pee-wee would be disappointed and he was sorry for that. But even
Pee-wee must see....
So this gentlemanly young pedestrian indulged in a little mental
investigation all his own. He did not know that scouts were supposed to
be strong on this sort of thing, deducing and the like. For some
incomprehensible reason Pee-wee had neglected to tell him that.
He eliminated the circus and the woods as being in competent,
experienced hands, and let his thoughts wander to the school, which was
the field where he shone. There, indeed, was his happy hunting ground,
where he collected not stalking photos but lead pencils.
Idly, he did not know exactly why, he recalled all the events of the day
in school. Thoughts came to him, were considered, forgotten. If little
Margie Garrison had been disappointed at not seeing the parade (Pee-wee
and Irene were evidently the only pupils in Bridgeboro who had seen it)
why then might she not have wandered to the circus grounds after school?
Well, the police, at all events, had looked after that end of it. Well,
then, where did little Margie go? And why?
As Emerson thought these thoughts and pondered on them a great hubbub of
searching and calling and meeting and separating and planning and
replanning was going on in the woods. Oh, if she were there they would
find her, these scouts!
But why would she have gone there? She must have first walked more than
a mile along the road. So Emerson Skybrow, alias Arabella, worked too,
in his own way, all by himself.
The last he had seen of little Margie was in the assembly room that
morning, and as he recalled the fact, a very vivid picture was presented
to his mind. She had sat two or three rows in front of him across the
aisle. She was always conspicuous by her red hair.
The occasion had been one of those hurried musterings ordered by gongs
in the several class rooms, which usually heralded the appearance at
school of some minor celebrity or state educational official. These
horrible occurrences came like thunder-showers and were soon over. All
classes were herded into the assembly room, the principal introduced
“Some one whom you will all be glad of the opportunity to hear,” the
speaker spoke, the pupils became restless, the principal asked for a
vote of thanks, the student body joined in an unanimous lie, filed back
to their class rooms, and the agony was over till the next minor
celebrity hit Bridgeboro. Emerson was probably the only one who liked
these frantic mobilizations for no cause whatever.
On the morning of this memorable day the occasion had been the visit of
a “distinguished English botanist,” Miss Flowerberry, of Oxford or some
place or other, who was visiting in Bridgeboro. She discoursed upon the
English ivy which she said spread over the ancient ruins of England like
a coverlet of green. She explained the romantic attachment between
ancient ruins and ivy, and said that it was on such picturesque
memorials of the past that the ivy clings....
How vividly now poor Emerson recalled a most trifling thing which had
happened. He had seen Margie Garrison turn and whisper to a girl who sat
behind her. It seemed as if something the lady had said gave her an
inspiration which, in the full flush of the idea, she had communicated
to the girl behind her.
It was all so trifling and insignificant that he had given no more
thought to it than he would have given to a fly buzzing about the
assembly room. But now, one thought producing another, his mind reverted
to it. Something had been said which caught the quick interest of a
languid listener who had thought enough about it to whisper it to
another.
Well, what of it? Nothing except that on the road between Bridgeboro and
Little Valley was the old Van Dorian ruin, subject of many a kodak
snap-shot, spooky, romantic, ivy-covered.
Might it have been that which Margie Garrison whispered to the girl
behind her? “Oh, I know where there’s lots of it—Van Dorian’s ruin.” She
might have said something like that.
Was anybody looking after the Van Dorian, ruin?