THE "CODFISH" AGAIN
It seemed an age while Billie and Laura and Vi stood under the maple
tree before anything happened. It really was only about five minutes.
Then a sound was heard through the darkness. It was the cracking of a
twig.
The girls started, and Billie, drawing some bushes aside, peered out in
the direction of the sound. What she saw made her draw in her breath
sharply and Laura and Vi drew closer, looking over her shoulder.
Ten ghost-like figures were coming quickly toward them across the
moonlight-flooded lawn that surrounded Three Towers Hall.
It looked as though each figure had draped itself from head to foot in a
flowing sheet with places for the eyes and nose and mouth rudely cut
out. The girls, watching in half-frightened silence, were reminded of
the "Ku-Klux Klan" of post Civil War days, which they had seen once or
twice in moving pictures.
"Do you suppose it's the girls dressed up like that?" Laura whispered,
beginning to wish herself back in the security of her dormitory.
"Of course. Who else could it be?" said Billie, trying to make her voice
sound natural when the skin on the back of her neck was beginning to
crawl. "For goodness sake, don't let them think you're scared, whatever
you do," she whispered fiercely, as the first of the white-draped
figures reached the woods. "That's probably just what they're trying to
do."
The leader of the "ghosts," as they had already dubbed them in their
minds, came to a halt just a few feet in front of the chums, and her
followers drew up behind her.
Then they stood there, motionless as the trees around them, looking at
Billie and Laura and Vi through those ghastly white masks until the
girls thought they must scream.
They afterward found out that this was the "silence test," that unless
the girls passed this first test they were unworthy to belong to the
"Ghost Club." And passing the test consisted of doing what the girls
were doing now--although they did not know it--just standing still and
waiting for the head "ghost" to speak.
And finally, when the girls felt that they could no longer stand it but
must dash out of the dark woods and away from the ghostly, motionless
figures, the "head ghost" spoke.
"We have come," it said, "to ask you a question."
There followed another silence, and Billie, not knowing just what was
expected of her, but wishing to be polite, said, rather weakly: "Yes,
ma'am."
For a minute it looked as if the meeting would be broken up, for who
could be dignified and ghostly when addressed as "ma'am"? There was a
giggle from among the ghosts, and one or two of them began to double up
as if with silent laughter. But once again the head ghost lifted its
hand, or what looked more like a wing, under the sheet and her followers
straightened up.
"And that question is," said the head ghost in a voice not quite so
solemn as before: "Do you believe in ghosts?"
This was a poser. The girls never had believed in ghosts, but how could
they say so to this white-clad group. They had either to tell a fib or
offend their visitors. Billie, acting as spokesman, chose the fib.
"We never used to," she said, and for the life of her she could not keep
the laughter out of her voice, "but I think we shall after to-night."
"Ah," said the head ghost softly, and it seemed as if there were a
little stir in the group behind her. "Then come closer for I would ask
you yet one other question."
Obediently the chums came closer,--although they would much rather have
stayed where they were--and the head ghost put her second question.
"Listen," she said solemnly, lowering her voice at least two degrees
more. "Listen well, for it is a matter of great import. Would you be one
of us?"
In the silence that followed the girls could almost hear their hearts
beat. This was the secret society to which every girl in Three Towers
longed to belong, and they, Billie, Laura, Vi, were being asked to join.
The last question of the head ghost could mean nothing else.
They hesitated a moment, too dazed to answer, and the head ghost
repeated its request.
"Would you be one of us?" it asked. "Answer quickly--yes or no?"
Billie took a chance on her chums and took the plunge.
"Yes!" she answered breathlessly.
"Ah, 'tis well," came in solemn tones from the white mask of the leader.
Then she waved her arm toward the white-clad figures behind her and the
latter moved up till they were close to her.
"You understand," said the leader then, "that one cannot change from a
human to a ghost in a minute. There are different stages to be gone
through. Spider!" She lifted her hand again and one of the girls
separated herself from the group and came forward. As she faced the
leader she shivered as if with a chill, raised her hands in the air,
and, still shivering horribly, lowered them to her sides again.
The girls learned afterward that this was only a sort of salute which
every member of the "Ghost Club" was supposed to give its leader.
But here at night, with the wind sighing through the trees, and weird
shadows all about, the thing looked so uncanny that once more the girls
had a wild desire to run away and hide.
"What is it, your Ghostship?" asked the one addressed as Spider, and
although the voice was disguised the girls were sure it belonged to
Connie Danvers. They began to feel more at home.
"Tell these humans," the head ghost ordered, "what they will have to go
through to be initiated into the Ghost Club. Come forward, one at a
time."
"But would it not be better to show them?" asked Spider, and this time
the girls were sure it was Connie.
"Show them, by all means," said the head ghost, and then the girls knew
they were in for it.
They had heard of initiations before and what ridiculous things the
girls and boys who were lucky or unlucky enough to be initiated had to
go through with. But in every case they had heard of the clubs and
fraternities had been human ones. The initiation into a ghost club was
sure to be much worse.
The leader of the ghost club raised her hand again, and three girls
sprang forward from the group behind her. Before the girls knew what was
happening to them they found their hands pinned behind them while huge
sheets were flung over their heads.
The girls that were doing all this to them tied something that felt like
ropes around their waists, pulled the sheets into shape and the girls
found to their great relief that there were eye and nose and mouth holes
similar to those in the strange robes worn by the ghosts themselves.
After that they went through strange and weird experiences that they
remembered in their dreams for a long time afterward.
They were taught the "shiver salute," bandages were tied over their
eyes, or rather eye holes, and queer, slimy crawly things were pressed
into their hands.
They were forced to swallow things that felt like particularly fat and
squirmy worms. It was no wonder that the stomachs of the girls
threatened to turn inside out. Several times they were on the point of
revolt, but always they choked back protests and did as they were told.
For to have come so near being members of the secret society of Three
Towers and then to lose out at the last minute because they had not
nerve enough to go through with the initiation, would have been real
tragedy. So they gritted their teeth and went ahead.
At last it was over, the bandages were taken off their eyes, and they
were led before the head ghost to take the final oath of allegiance when
a strange thing happened.
Billie, happening to glance through the trees to the bright patch of
lawn beyond, uttered a startled cry. For across that bright patch of
lawn a man was running, crouched and furtive.
"Girls!" she cried, forgetting the club, forgetting everything but this
new and startling fact. "Look! Quick! Here, through the trees!"
They crowded behind her, stirred by the note of excitement in her voice,
straining their eyes in the direction she had pointed out.
The man was just about to enter the shelter of the woods when the
snapping of a twig under Laura's foot caused him to stop and look about
him, startled.
In that brief second the moon shone full upon his face, and with a start
of sheer amazement Billie recognized him.
"It's the 'Codfish'!" she cried. "Girls, it's the 'Codfish'!"
"The Codfish?" they repeated in excitement, and Laura shook her arm
wildly.
"Billie, are you sure?" she asked, then gave a gasp of amazement and
dismay.
For Billie, forgetting how ridiculous she must look in her ghostly garb,
had started in pursuit.
"She's crazy!" cried the "head ghost," speaking this time in the voice
of Rose Belser. "Some one go after her quick and get her back. Suppose
one of the Pickles should see her from the house!"
But before she could finish Laura was racing like mad after her chum.
Billie had stopped at the edge of the woods and was listening for some
sound that might tell her in what direction the man had disappeared.
Laura grasped the sheet that enfolded Billie and tugged at it wildly.
"Billie, come back, come back!" she cried. "We may be seen from the
house any minute."
"But it was the 'Codfish,'" cried Billie wildly. "If I only had a--a
gun, or something!"
"Yes, but you haven't, and he probably has." Laura was dancing with
impatience, glancing now over her shoulder at the dark woods, now toward
the house, standing out boldly in the moonlight. "Billie, for goodness
sake, don't be so crazy. We can't do anything!"
So Billie at last allowed herself to be dragged away. They found the
"ghosts" talking excitedly about what had happened. And every once in a
while a girl would glance nervously over her shoulder into the dark
shadows of the woods.
"Goodness, he must be a regular robber," Connie said in an excited
whisper.
"And to think it's Billie's 'Codfish', the man who stole her trunk!"
said another. "I'm scared to death!"
"D-don't you t-think we'd better go back?" asked Vi, her teeth
chattering.
"I guess so," agreed Connie, looking fearfully about her. "He may be in
the woods now. He may even be listening to what we say!"
This was enough for the girls. Without even a backward glance they
scurried across the lawn like so many little white phantoms and in at
the side door of Three Towers Hall.