“There’s some rope beside that tree,” said Porter, motioning with his head. “Go get it.”
I did as he told me. Then he directed Chris to stand against the tree, while I tied her up.
“Not taking any chances, are you?” I said.
Porter shook his head. “I’ve waited too long for this moment.”
“Is that why you’ve been coming here all these years?” I asked.
“It’s a family tradition,” said Porter.
“Hanging around graveyards?” I asked. It was a smart-mouth thing to say. But I figured I couldn’t get in any more trouble than I was already.
Porter smiled. I suppose it’s easy to be tolerant when you’re the one holding the gun. “Not hanging around cemeteries,” he said. “Looking for Captain Gray’s treasure.”
Ah-ha! I thought. Here’s where things start to fall into place.
“How long has this been going on?” asked Chris.
Porter shrugged. “Personally, about thirty years. But my family’s been at it, off and on, for nearly a hundred and twenty-five.”
When I heard that, things didn’t just fall into place; they came together with a crash like two speeding cars having a head-on collision.
I looked at Porter. He stood in the center of the clearing, bathed in moonlight, his face smiling happily. If it hadn’t been for the gun in his hand he would have looked almost angelic.
“The man who killed Captain Gray was an ancestor of yours, wasn’t he?” I asked.
Porter nodded.
“Doesn’t that embarrass you?” asked Chris.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” said Porter. “We were at war. Johnny Gray was an enemy agent.”
“Was your ancestor a soldier?” I asked.
“What difference does that make?” he snapped.
It seemed to me that it made a big difference; from the way Captain Gray’s diary read, whoever had killed him was more interested in the treasure than in doing his patriotic duty. But I decided it wasn’t necessarily a good idea to mention that right then.
“All right. Now you go over there and sit down,” said Porter as I finished tying Chris to the tree. He waved his gun to the right. I did as he told me.
“The thing is,” he said as he went to the tree to check my knots, “even though my ancestor couldn’t find the treasure, he knew it was here. So every year he brought his family for a vacation, and while they played, he tried to figure out where the treasure was. Poor old codger. He never thought to look in the captain’s grave. After he died it was just a game with most of the family. They came here every year for their vacation, and talked about the treasure. But no one did much of anything about it. Until me. I was the first one in a long time to take it seriously. But even after I stole the diary today, I couldn’t figure out where it was. So tell me—how did you figure it out?”
I wasn’t particularly eager to tell him. On the other hand, he did have a gun.
“It was something we saw at the Samson Carter museum that started putting it together for me,” I said. “They had a map with Captain Gray’s name written on the top. Then we found a letter on the back of Captain Gray’s picture that indicated his friends had used the map to locate the captain’s grave when they decided to put on the headstone.”
“So what?”
“Well, that made some sense, until I started putting together the dates on the letter and the diary. Then I realized that the map must have been the one that Captain Gray had made to show Samson where the treasure was. Samson left the map with his family, figuring he would come back and get the treasure later. But then he was killed in Virginia. His family didn’t know about the treasure. When Captain Gray’s friends contacted them, they remembered a map with Captain Gray’s name on it, and assumed it showed where he was buried. When I realized their mistake, I figured all we had to do was dig around the headstone, and we would find the treasure.”
“Very clever,” said Porter, stepping up to the tree. He looked down at the rope and made a clucking sound. “Nice try, Nine,” he said. “Now come back here and tie this right. And remember—next time I won’t be so understanding.”
I sighed. Even while I was tying those fake knots I had figured Porter would probably check them. But I also figured it couldn’t hurt to try.
“Sorry,” I whispered to Chris as I retied the knots. And I was sorry. Having her get loose had been my only hope. Now I was very frightened. It didn’t look as if there was any way out of this mess. A cold chill passed over me as I remembered the view from the edge of the falls.
“OK,” said Porter, “back where you were.” He motioned with his gun again. Then he bent down to pick up the box.
Suddenly a terrible howling ripped through the clearing. The hair on the back of my neck rose up, and I felt a wave of prickles skitter from my shoulders down to my toes.
Porter stood up so fast it seemed as if someone had grabbed him by the hair and yanked him to his feet. He had the box in one hand, the gun in the other.
Then Captain Gray shimmered into view. But this was not the sweet, sorrowful ghost that Chris and I had come to know. This was a new Captain Gray, an angry, vengeful spirit whose tormented howling seemed to shred the night.
Porter’s eyes went wide with terror. “D-d-don’t!” he stammered. “Get away! Stay back!”
He fired two shots directly at the ghost. Nothing happened.
The misty form of Captain Gray continued to move forward. His angry howls grew louder. I couldn’t see his face. From the look of terror in Porter’s eyes, I was just as glad.
Suddenly the ghost raised his hands and reached out for Porter.
“Get back!” screamed the man. “Get back!”
But it was Porter who stepped back. As he did, his foot went over the edge of the hole. He threw his hands upward. But it was too late. His balance was gone. He grabbed at the air, trying to save himself from falling. The gun went flying off to his right. The metal box flipped off to the left. The rusted latch gave way, and a shower of jewels went cascading through the moonlight.
Porter landed on his back in the hole we had dug. He rolled over and crawled forward, trying to scramble out.
Captain Gray’s tombstone, already unstable because of the hole I had made underneath it, tottered and tipped forward.
Porter screamed once. Then everything was silent.
The stillness was so intense it was as if the night itself was holding its breath. After a while I realized I had been holding mine. I let it out, and as if on a signal, the breeze began to whisper through the clearing once again.
The owl cried once and then was silent.
Captain Gray turned in our direction. All the anger and ferocity I had sensed before was gone. As he had done that night in our room, he tipped his hat and bowed. He blew us a kiss, then faded into the night.
I untied Chris. Together, holding hands, we walked across the graveyard and peered down into the hole. It was filled from side to side, with the monument erected to Captain Gray.
But the body underneath the stone belonged to Porter Markson.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
The Handwriting on the Wall
The pile of jewels in the middle of the table blazed like a fire. Its flames weren’t just red and yellow, either, but green and blue and purple and a lot of other colors as well. I stared at it, thinking it was the kind of thing you might get to see once in a lifetime, and then only if you were lucky.
“Amazing!” said Baltimore. He thrust his stubby hands into the pile of jewels and let them run through his fingers in multicolored streams.
With the exception of Porter, everyone we had met that first day at the Quackadoodle was gathered in the dining room to examine the treasure and hear our story.
Arnie and Meg were sitting side by side. As usual, they were holding hands. They looked so sweet that I felt embarrassed about ever having suspected them. I reminded myself that a good detective has to examine all the alternatives. My father was si
tting beside them. Mona stood behind him, resting a hand on his shoulder. Peter and Dieter and Martha and Isabella were standing in a knot to my right. Gloria was beside Baltimore. Her eyes seemed small and hard, and they glittered like jewels themselves, but without any of the warmth of the stones.
“Now tell us all about how you girls figured this out,” Meg said. She squeezed Arnie’s hand. “Isn’t this thrilling, dear?” she whispered.
I glanced at my father. He nodded, so I launched into the story, ghost and all, right up to the point where I put together the information from the diary and the map and the letter on the back of Captain Gray’s picture to come up with my idea about where the treasure was hidden.
“It didn’t seem that likely that they would have made a map of where they buried Captain Gray,” I said. “You put a marker on the grave, but you don’t bother to make a map. And it didn’t really make sense to me that they would have buried him way up in the woods like that. But I knew from the diary that Captain Gray had been planning to make a map, and it seemed likely that he would have passed it on to Samson Carter. Once I had figured that out, I realized that the map Captain Gray’s friends had used to place his headstone didn’t show the grave at all, but where the treasure was buried.”
“But how did Porter know what you were up to?” asked Meg.
I was silent for a minute, thinking of the ambulance that had come, and remembering the men walking out of the woods carrying a stretcher with the still form of Porter Markson beneath a white sheet. He had been planning on killing us. Yet it was hard to forget the funny little man who told jokes and played the piano.
While I was brooding, Chris picked up the story. “The way we figure it, Porter suspected we knew something from the beginning—partly because Mr. Tanleven had the plans to the inn.” She turned to my father. “I don’t think he really believed you were here to do a renovation, Mr. T. He thought Baltimore had hired you to find the treasure!”
“So it was Porter who stole the blueprints,” Mona said.
“Of course,” Chris said. “Remember that first night at dinner, when he told us he usually stayed in Mr. T’s room? Our guess is he had used the room so often he had his own key. It was easy for him to get in without any fuss.”
“He really thought I was after the treasure?” said my father with a chuckle.
I picked up the story. “He sure did. But you weren’t the only one he was suspicious of. He was worried about Arnie and Meg, too.”
The Coleman’s looked astonished. Then Arnie laughed. “I’ve got it,” he said. “It’s because we were always going out into the woods with our shovels.”
Chris nodded. “He was afraid you had found some clue he didn’t know about. Anyway, once he found out about the diary, he was convinced Nine and I knew where the treasure was. He was still awake, studying the diary for the clue, when we went out to get the treasure. He saw us through his window and decided to follow us.”
“But how did he know about the diary to begin with?” asked my father. “You two didn’t tell anyone you had found it.” I could tell from the tone in his voice he was a little hurt about that. I thought about explaining that he was too tied up with Mona to listen to our problems, but decided we should save that discussion for later. Besides, I wasn’t sure that was entirely true. I liked doing this kind of stuff on my own. At least, I do as long as Chris is with me. So maybe I wouldn’t have told him, anyway.
Baltimore saved me from having to answer by stepping in with a confession of his own. “I told him,” he said, blushing fiercely.
Chris and I looked at him. Our faces must have shown how betrayed we felt, because he rushed on to make an explanation.
“I know it was wrong,” he said. “But the two of you were so cute with your little games and your mysterious packages, that I couldn’t resist opening it to see what was inside.”
Cute! Yuck. Now I was really upset with Baltimore.
He shook his head. “Bad, bad Baltimore. I really shouldn’t have done that. Then I made things worse by telling Porter about the diary. I only did it because I knew how interested he was in the history of the inn.”
He touched the lump on his head ruefully. “I think you’ll agree that I paid dearly for my sins. I had no idea Porter’s interest in the Quackadoodle was such a greedy one.”
“I’m confused about the ghost,” said Meg. “I thought ghosts were bound to a specific place—like the inn. How could he pop up at the cemetery like that.”
This time Mona stepped in with an answer. “Different things hold different ghosts,” she said. “Captain Gray’s ghost was tied to the fate of the treasure. Beyond that, he had accepted an obligation to the girls by seeking their help, which he pretty clearly did, even without speaking a word. So when they were in danger, he was able to come to their aid.”
“But why us? How come he never asked anyone for help before?” asked Chris.
“How do you know he didn’t?” said Mona. “Maybe he tried, but everyone else was too frightened. Maybe he gave up after a while. That would explain why there were a lot of stories about people seeing the ghost a long time ago, but fewer and fewer as the years went on. From what you’ve said, he didn’t expect the two of you to see him. I think that your experience with the Woman in White probably made you more sensitive to seeing ghosts.”
My father groaned. “Oh, great. Does that mean the two of them are going to go on seeing ghosts for the rest of their lives?”
Mona laughed. “I couldn’t begin to say, Henry. But I wouldn’t worry about it too much. The girls seem to handle themselves rather well.”
My father rolled his eyes. “There’s a difference between living through something and handling it well.”
“The thing that I don’t understand,” continued Mona, “is who the treasure belongs to. Is it Baltimore’s, because it was on his property? Or does it belong to the girls, since they found it?”
“Neither,” said Isabella. She shook her head. Little things—a tremor in her hand, the way she forced herself to take a deep breath before she spoke—made me think this was hard for her. She was a quiet person, and she was trying to be very strong now.
“What are you talking about?” asked Gloria. There was ice in her voice.
Isabella took another deep breath. “The treasure belongs to the Samson Carter Institute. It’s the college Samson Carter was starting when he was killed.”
Chris and I had read about the college. It was one of the reasons that Samson Carter had made his last trip to the South. He was coming back from the first meeting of the board of directors when he was killed.
“Mr. Carter’s will left everything he had to the college,” continued Isabella, “including something he called the Quackadoodle Treasure. Only until now, no one knew what the Quackadoodle Treasure was.”
She looked around apologetically. “I teach at Samson Carter. I believe in the school. It’s an important place. I applied for work here because the college is almost bankrupt, and I hoped I might be able to locate the treasure somehow. It seemed like a long shot. But it also seemed to be our only chance.”
“That’s very touching,” said Gloria. “But just because Samson Carter left your school the treasure in his will doesn’t mean that it’s yours. I don’t see that it was his to give.”
“According to Mr. Carter, Captain Gray gave him the treasure in his own will.”
“Has anyone ever seen that will?” asked Gloria.
Isabella shook her head. Tears formed in the corners of her eyes. She could see the future of her school in the fiery pile of jewels on the table. In her heart she believed it belonged to the institute. But she had no way to prove it.
Everyone started talking at once.
It was a sticky situation. The school needed the money. Baltimore needed the money. We needed the money, for that matter, since we were going to be broke if Baltimore couldn’t pay my father.
It would have been nice to just let things rest; as finders of the trea
sure Chris and I would certainly get a big share of it. But I figured we had an obligation to Captain Gray to see that the money went where he wanted it to go. Besides, if I was right, it would come out sooner or later anyway.
So I opened my big mouth. “I think I know where Captain Gray’s will is,” I said.
No one heard me. They were all talking too loud. I tried again, at the top of my lungs. That shut everyone up.
“Where is it?” my father asked.
I told them what we had read in the book about Captain Gray’s death. Then I took them into the kitchen. Dieter started squawking as soon as we headed for the door, but Gloria told him to shut up.
I had my father take the patch off the hole he had made in the wall.
Baltimore brought a flashlight. By shining it in at the right angle, he was able to read the words that Captain Gray had scrawled on the wall with a piece of charcoal a hundred and twenty-five years ago. The words he had pointed to the day Chris and I saw him sitting there. The words he had written in the hour of his death.
I, Jonathan Gray, being of sound mind but dying body, and having no living relatives, do hereby bequeath all my worldly goods to the godliest man I have ever had the privilege to meet, Samson Carter. This shall include, as the law allows, the jewels that I have carried into this state, which were given to wage war, but with the grace of God may be used to teach peace.
May God rest my soul.
Captain Jonathan Gray
June 14, 1863
In the hour of his death.
Baltimore turned around. “Well,” he said softly. “That’s that.”
Everyone was very quiet.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
The Glory Road
That night Chris and I put on our best dresses and went down to the dining room for the dance. Baltimore and Peter had rearranged things earlier in the day, to clear the center of the room for dancing. As we entered I saw a row of chairs against the right wall. To our left were several linen-covered tables, piled high with heaping trays of goodies Dieter had whipped up for the event. The table closest to us held an enormous punch bowl filled with clear red liquid. A small band had set up their instruments near the doors that led out onto the porch.
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