by Lois Duncan
The Gordons’ house was ablaze with lights, upstairs and down. Every room seemed to have lights in it. Jerry’s voice could still be heard shouting something about “Red’s ghost! He’s come back to get me!” Other voices, the soft mother tones, the lower father ones, floated across the lawn from the bedroom window.
Bruce got to his feet, clutching the projector.
“This is Dad’s,” he said. “And the cord —” He felt for the place where the electric cord fitted through the metal casing.
“Come on,” Tim urged him. “We’ve got to run, Bruce!”
He whirled and broke away into the darkness with Bruce on his heels. Just as they rounded the corner of Aunt Alice’s house, the door of the Gordons’ house swung open.
Mr. Gordon stepped out and flicked a switch that turned on floodlights, illuminating the whole backyard.
“Now we’ll see what this monkey business is all about,” he said loudly. His voice carried clearly across the night to the four children who stood, panting in the shadows of Aunt Alice’s rosebushes.
“We made it,” Andi gasped. “He didn’t see us.” There was a note of triumph in her voice.
“No, he didn’t see us,” Bruce said quietly, “but there’s something else that he will see. The cord’s been ripped out of the projector, and it’s still attached to the extension cord, and that’s in the outlet in the wall of the Gordons’ house.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Thanksgiving Day passed quietly. It was a strange, still sort of day with the sky clear and blue and the cold of almost-winter settled over everything.
Debbie left for home soon after breakfast in order to share the holiday with her own family. The Walkers and Aunt Alice went to church and came home for the traditional turkey dinner. Then Mr. Walker brought in some wood, and they sat together in front of the fireplace to enjoy the first fire of the season. There was no sound from the hotel.
“Preston must have settled down at last,” Andi whispered to Bruce in one of the few private moments they had together. “He looked really at home there when I sneaked over this morning to take the dogs their breakfast.”
“Everything’s too quiet,” Bruce said uneasily. “It’s like the stillness before a thunderstorm. It’s a getting-ready sort of feeling.”
His stomach felt sick and queasy under its load of turkey and dressing.
“The projector cord is gone out of the outlet. I looked over there after church. It won’t be long now before Jerry brings his father over here, and they’ll talk to Dad, and the whole story will be out.”
“I don’t think so,” Andi said confidently. “Just having the cord won’t tell them where it came from. They’ll guess how the ghost trick worked, but they won’t know who did it. If they do come over, all we’ll have to do is act like we don’t know what they’re talking about.”
“The projector’s smashed,” Bruce reminded her grimly. “Do you think Dad’s not going to notice that? Especially when the cord’s torn out of it and a matching cord has turned up in the Gordons’ wall?”
“Stop worrying, Bruce. It’s Thanksgiving. We have lots of things to be thankful for.” Andi would not be depressed. “The scheme worked perfectly. Just hearing Jerry scream — wasn’t that worth anything? ‘Help! A ghost! A ghost!’” She giggled at the memory. “And Dad’s going to be working right here in Elmwood. Think how cool that is. We’ll be close enough to keep up the hotel. Imagine if we’d had to move again halfway across the country. What would we have done with the dogs?”
“I guess you’re right,” Bruce said, and he tried to feel thankful. But the cold, waiting feeling remained inside him. All the rest of the day he fought it, but by nightfall it was still there as solid as ever. Something — and not a good something — was going to happen.
When the “something” did occur, it was the next morning. Andi knew about it first. The doorbell rang just as she was carrying her cereal bowl to the kitchen.
“It’s probably the man from the real-estate agency,” said Mrs. Walker, drying her hands on a dish towel. “When I talked with him on Wednesday, he said he’d be over first thing this morning, but I didn’t know it would be quite this early.”
“You mean we’re going to look at houses?” Andi asked her.
“We certainly are,” her mother said happily. “Aunt Alice is a wonderful, kind, good, generous person, but, oh, Andi, you can’t imagine how happy I’ll be to have a house of our own again!”
The man from the agency was named Mr. Crabtree. He was short and bald with a black mustache and a precise, decided manner.
“Let’s see if I have your requirements correct,” he said in a businesslike voice as he drew a sheet of paper from his briefcase. “You want a living room and a family room with a fireplace. At least three bedrooms. A big backyard with trees and plantings.”
“That’s right,” Mrs. Walker said. “And if possible we’d like it in this neighborhood. I’d hate to make the children change schools again.”
Mr. Crabtree frowned. “Well, that makes things a bit more difficult. Most of the houses I had listed for you to look at are in other school districts. There’s one, though, the Brower place, which might be just what you’re looking for. Would you like to see it now?”
“Yes, indeed,” Mrs. Walker said eagerly. “I’ll get my coat. Can we take your car? My husband has ours at work.”
“We won’t need to drive,” Mr. Crabtree said. “It’s right down the street.”
“It’s what?” Andi felt a sudden chill sweep over her. “Oh, Mom, no — we don’t want that house! It’s old. It’s shabby. The yard’s all overgrown.”
“Houses can be painted,” Mrs. Walker said comfortably, “and grass can be cut, and I like old houses. They have a nice, lived-in feeling to them. Besides, how convenient it would be to live close to Aunt Alice! We could visit her every day, and she’d never feel lonely again.”
“Mom, no. Please. Let’s not go over there!” Andi was almost weeping.
Her mother regarded her with bewilderment. “Of course, I’m going over there. Why shouldn’t I? Really, Andi, this isn’t at all like you. Don’t you want to come with me? You’ve never seen the inside of that house, either.”
“I don’t — you can’t!” Andi whirled and went tearing down the hall. “Bruce! Bruce! Where are you? Bruce, the thing you were scared of — it’s happened!”
Bruce was in the den, trying to study. He glanced up when his sister came rushing in. One look at her face was enough to drain the color from his own.
“What is it? What’s happened?” He was out of his chair in a minute. “Who was that at the door? Mr. Gordon and Jerry?”
“No, worse. Much worse.” Andi could hardly get the words out. “A real-estate agent’s here, and he’s taking Mom to look at houses, and the first house they’re going to look at is our house! The dogs’ house! The hotel!”
“Oh, no!” Bruce was down the hall and out the door like a bullet.
By the time he had reached the sidewalk, he knew it was too late. His mother and Mr. Crabtree were already standing on the front steps of the hotel, and Aunt Alice was with them. Mr. Crabtree was fitting a key into the lock.
“It’s a roomy house,” he was saying. “Just the number of rooms you are looking for. The people who owned it had to leave suddenly. I think their son had some sort of emotional problem and couldn’t adjust here.”
“Mom!” Bruce shouted, and his mother turned to wave at him.
“Come with us, dear,” she called cheerily. “We may be getting our first look at our new home!”
“It’s too late, Bruce.” Andi echoed his own thoughts as she caught up with him. “It’s too late to do anything now except pray.”
Shoulder to shoulder, like prisoners going to face a firing squad, they followed their mother and Mr. Crabtree into the familiar brown house.
The moment they were in the hallway, Aunt Alice started sneezing.
“How odd!” she said. “If I didn’t kn
ow better, I’d think there was animal hair around here someplace. I feel just the way I do when — when — when — atchooooo!”
“Bless you,” said Mrs. Walker. “Perhaps it’s dust. Although it does look clean, doesn’t it, for having sat empty for so many months?”
“This is the living room,” Mr. Crabtree was saying. “Hardwood floors, you’ll notice. The master bedroom is on the first floor also. If you’ll just follow me —” With quick, efficient steps, he led the way down the hall toward the pink bedroom.
“I can’t watch,” Andi breathed. “Oh, Bruce, I just can’t!”
She shut her eyes tightly.
A shriek split the air. “There’s something in there!” Aunt Alice screamed. “It’s — it’s — atchoooo! It’s a dog!”
“It’s two dogs!” Mrs. Walker cried, as Friday and MacTavish shot past her and came racing down the hall to Bruce and Andi.
“How incredible! How could they have gotten in here?” Mr. Crabtree blinked his eyes in amazement.
“It seems impossible —”
From the floor above them, a deep, melodious voice broke into a howl. It rose higher and higher in a mournful beagle wail.
“That’s the sound we heard the other day!” Mrs. Walker exclaimed. “It’s coming from upstairs!” She started briskly down the hall.
“Wait, wait, Mrs. Walker! Don’t go up there alone.” Mr. Crabtree came hurrying after her. “Let me go first. It might be something dangerous.” Pressing his way past her, he started up the stairway.
Andi choked back a sob. “They’re going to find Preston!”
“And Tiffany’s pups.” Bruce’s face was strained and white. “But they haven’t found Red yet. I’m going back to the family room and see if I can get him out through the window. I’ll hide him somewhere, even if I have to run away with him. They can’t find him and give him back to Jerry — they just can’t!”
Turning quickly, he ran down the hall toward the back of the house. At that moment, another scream broke forth from Aunt Alice. Preston, followed by the five joyful Bulldales, came tearing down the stairs to greet their company.
“Dear heaven!” Mrs. Walker gasped, clutching at the railing to keep from being knocked over as the string of dogs shot past her. “Why, it’s — it’s like a — a zoo!”
“Believe me, Mrs. Walker, Mrs. Scudder —” Mr. Crabtree appeared at the top of the stairs. His mustache was twitching nervously. “Believe me, ladies, I had no idea. I still have no idea. This has never happened before. Never at any house on our list.”
“Atchoooo! Atchoooo! Atchoooo!” Aunt Alice leaned weakly against the wall, helpless with sneezing. Her eyes were watering so hard that great tears rolled down her round cheeks.
“You poor dear!” Mrs. Walker rushed over to put an arm around the elderly lady. “Here, let me help you! Andi, come take her other arm! We have to get her outside!”
“Here, Aunt Alice! Lean on me!” A little frightened by the violence of her aunt’s attack, Andi helped to steer the wheezing woman down the hall to the front door.
She really is allergic, she thought. She wasn’t just making it up. No wonder she didn’t want Bebe to stay with us.
They stepped through the doorway into the fresh chill air, and Aunt Alice drew a shaky breath and wiped at her teary eyes.
“That was dreadful!” she gasped. “Just dreadful! All those animals! How did they get in there?”
“I don’t know, dear,” Mrs. Walker said. “Mr. Crabtree will find out.”
“Indeed I will,” Mr. Crabtree told them. Not only his mustache, but his whole face, was twitching with outrage. He pulled his cell phone out of his coat pocket. “I’ll call the pound. They’ll send a wagon for those beasts.”
“You can’t do that!” Andi burst out wretchedly. “You can’t let them be dragged off and put to sleep! They’re nice dogs. They couldn’t help being where they were and having Aunt Alice allergic to them.”
“Of course they couldn’t help it,” Mrs. Walker said. “Nobody’s blaming the poor animals. They have no homes and nobody to take care of them. I’m sure they were eager for any shelter they could find.”
“But they do have a home! They are taken care of!” Andi cried. “Delaney Belanger owns Preston, and I own Friday, and Tim sort of owns MacTavish, now that he’s gotten used to him. Tiffany owns the Bulldales, and Bruce —” She stopped herself before she got to Bruce. “They’re our dogs, all of them! They can’t be lugged off to the pound!”
“You and Bruce and Tim —” Mrs. Walker repeated in confusion.
“And Debbie, too. She’s a partner.” Andi was really crying now.
“What exactly is it that you’re trying to tell me?” Her mother’s voice was low and controlled. “I want the truth, not one of your stories. Are you children responsible for this menagerie? Have you been keeping eight dogs here in this house?”
“I think the count is nine,” a man’s voice said quietly. “Look who I found headed down the street as I was on my way home to lunch.”
Blinking back her tears, Andi saw Mr. Gordon coming toward them along the sidewalk, and Bruce and Red Rover were with him.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
It took Mr. Walker exactly ten minutes to get home from work after Mrs. Walker called him. Since his office was normally a twenty-minute drive away, it seemed to the children that the only way he could have made the trip so quickly was to have flown.
He still seemed to be flying as he leaped out of his car and strode up the walk and into Aunt Alice’s house. His face was grim as he glanced about at the little group assembled in the living room.
“What in the world has been going on here?”
“You’d better ask your son and daughter that question,” Mrs. Walker said as calmly as she could. “It seems they have turned the vacant house down the street into a dog hotel. There are nine dogs there now; at least, there were at last count. One of them happens to be the Gordons’ long-lost Irish setter.”
“A dog hotel.” Mr. Walker repeated the words as though they had been spoken in a foreign language. He turned to Bruce, who was seated forlornly on the end of the sofa. “What is all this about, son? I think you’d better come up with an explanation.”
“Well …” Bruce said slowly. How exactly had it all started? “I guess the beginning was with Friday.”
“Friday is mine,” Andi said. “At least, I was the one who found her. She ran in the night it was raining while you were dripping on the carpet, and she had puppies upstairs in the sewing-room closet.”
“She had puppies here?” Aunt Alice gave a startled gasp. “There were a dog and puppies right here in this house?”
“We got them out as fast as we could,” Andi said. “We didn’t want to start you sneezing. And then when Bruce found out about the vacant house and that Jerry Gordon had knocked out the windows —”
“He what?” Mr. Gordon, who was seated in the armchair by the window, straightened up with a jerk. He was a big man and handsome like Jerry, but there was a look of kindness in his face that could not be found on Jerry’s. “My son, Jerry, broke windows? Why wasn’t I informed?”
“I didn’t think you’d believe it,” Bruce told him. “Tim Kelly said you never believe anything bad about Jerry. But the windows were out, and the house was empty, and when Red ran away and we found him —”
“And he was hurt and scared,” Andi said, “and he loved Bruce —”
“— and then Andi and Debbie came home with MacTavish —”
“— and the Bulldales were going to be drowned —”
Once they were started, they could not stop themselves. The story had been building within them for so long. Now out it came, pouring like a stream rushing down a mountain. By the time they were finished, Andi was crying again and Bruce was biting his lip to keep it from quivering.
“Preston, the beagle, was our only paying guest,” he ended. “Delaney Belanger’s father is paying five dollars a day for us to keep him. We needed
that money. The food costs have been quite high.”
“I imagine they have been,” Mr. Walker said wryly. “This sounds like a pretty expensive enterprise. Nine dogs is hardly a small family.”
“It’s more than just food,” Andi said. Now that things were out in the open, it seemed that he might as well know the worst. “We have to pay to have your projector repaired. It’s smashed, and the cord’s gone out of it.”
“That cord was from your father’s projector?” Mr. Gordon asked her. A light of understanding came into his eyes. “Things are beginning to fall into place now. You wouldn’t happen to have a color slide of Red Rover anywhere around, would you?”
“Yes, sir,” Bruce said miserably. “It’s in my jacket pocket.”
“Bruce is a wonderful photographer,” Andi said. “The picture looks just like Red.”
“Jerry thought so, too,” Mr. Gordon said shortly.
“The thing, as I see it,” broke in Mr. Crabtree, “is that this is a clear case of breaking and entering, of damage and vandalism —”
“I hardly think that,” said Aunt Alice. She spoke in a businesslike manner, very unlike her usual nervous flutter. “The children did not break, they merely entered. The breaking had already been accomplished. As for damage and vandalism, I certainly didn’t see signs of any. The inside of the house was clean and in excellent repair.”
“That is hardly the point,” Mr. Crabtree said coldly. “As I see it —”
“A house standing open with no panes in the windows is an open invitation to children,” Aunt Alice continued as if she had not heard him. “It is what is legally termed ‘an attractive nuisance’ and is the owner’s and Realtor’s responsibility. The only possible charge that might stand up in court is trespassing.”
She paused. Then, seeing the confusion on Mr. Crabtree’s face, she continued in a gentler tone. “My husband was a private detective, and I worked with him and ran his office for many years. We had many fascinating cases and were in court a number of times. I have a good fund of legal knowledge.”