The Rival Campers Ashore; or, The Mystery of the Mill

by Ruel Perley Smith

  CHAPTER XV

  A HUNT THROUGH THE MILL

  "Say, Henry, guess what I'm going to do," said John Ellison, as he metHenry Burns in the road leading from Benton, a few days following thereturn from camp.

  Henry Burns, leaning on the paddle he was carrying, looked at his friendfor a moment and then answered, with surprising assurance, "You're goingto work for Witham."

  John Ellison stared at his friend in amazement.

  "You ought to be a fortune-teller," he exclaimed. "You can't have heardabout it, because I haven't told anybody--not even the folks at home.How'd you know?"

  "I didn't," replied Henry Burns, smiling at the other's evidentsurprise. "I only guessed. I knew by the way you looked that it wassomething unusual; and I know what you're thinking of all the time; it'sabout those papers. So I've been thinking what I'd do, if I wanted achance to look for them, and I said to myself that I'd try to go to workin the mill, and keep my eyes open."

  "Well, you've hit it," responded John Ellison. "I know he needs a man,and I'm big enough to do the work. Say, come on in with me to-morrow,will you? I hate to go ask Old Witham for work. You don't mind. Come inand see what he says."

  "I'll do it," replied Henry Burns. "I'll meet you at the foot of thehill to-morrow forenoon at ten o'clock. Perhaps he'll hire me, too."

  "You! you don't have to work," exclaimed John Ellison.

  "No, but I will, if he'll take me," said Henry Burns. "I'll stay until Iget one good chance to go through the mill, and then I'll leave."

  "You're a brick," said John Ellison. "I'm going to tell mother about thescheme now. She won't like it, either. She'd feel bad to have me go towork there for somebody else, when we ought to be running it ourselves.Where are you going--canoeing?"

  "Yes; come along?" replied Henry Burns. But John Ellison was too full ofhis plan to admit of sport, and they separated, with the agreement tomeet on the following day.

  John Ellison was correct in his surmise that Mrs. Ellison would opposehis intention to work for Colonel Witham. Indeed, Mrs. Ellison wouldn'thear of it at all, at first. It seemed to her a disgrace, almost, to askfavour at the hands of one who, she firmly believed, had somehow trickedthem out of their own. But John Ellison was firm.

  It would be only for a little time, at most; only that he might, atopportune moments, look about in hope of making some discovery.

  "But what can it possibly accomplish?" urged Mrs. Ellison. "Lawyer Esteshas had the mill searched a dozen times, and there has been nothingfound. How can you expect to find anything? Colonel Witham wouldn't giveyou the chance, anyway. He's always around the mill now, and he's beenover it a hundred times, himself, I dare say. Remember how we've seenhis light there night after night?"

  But John Ellison was not to be convinced nor thwarted. "I want to huntfor myself," he insisted. "You kept it from me, before, when the lawyershad the searches made."

  "I know it," sighed Mrs. Ellison. "I hated to tell you that we were indanger of losing the mill."

  "Well, I'm going," declared John Ellison, and Mrs. Ellison gavereluctant consent.

  Still, she might have saved herself the trouble of objecting, and letColonel Witham settle the matter--which he did, summarily.

  It was warm, and miller Witham, uncomfortable at all times in summersultriness, was doubly so in the hot, dusty atmosphere of the mill. Thedust from the meal settled on his perspiring face and distressed him;the dull grinding of the huge stones and the whirr of the shaftings anddrums somehow did not sound in his ears so agreeably as he had oncefancied they would. There was something oppressive about the place--orsomething in the air that caused him an unexplainable uneasiness--and hestood in the doorway, looking unhappy and out of sorts.

  He saw two boys come briskly down the road from the Ellison farm andturn up the main road in the direction of the mill. As they approached,he recognized them, and retired within the doorway. To his surprise,they entered.

  "Well, what is it?" he demanded shortly as John Ellison and Henry Burnsstood confronting him. "What do you want? I won't have boys around themill, you know. Always in the way, and I'm busy here."

  "Why, you see," replied John Ellison, turning colour a bit but speakingfirmly, "we don't want to bother you nor get in the way; but I--I wantto get some work to do. I'm big enough and strong enough to work, now,and I heard you wanted a man. I came to see if you wouldn't hire me."

  Colonel Witham's face was a study. Taken all by surprise, he seemed toknow scarcely what to say. He shifted uneasily and the drops ofperspiration rolled from his forehead. He mopped his face with a big,red handkerchief, and looked shiftily from one boyish face to the other.

  "Why, I did say I wanted help," he admitted; "but,"--and he glanced atthe youth who had spoken,--"I didn't say I wanted a boy. No, you won'tdo."

  "Why, I'm big enough to do the haying," urged John Ellison. "You've gotthe mill now. You might give me a job, I think."

  Possibly some thought of this kind might have found fleeting lodgment inthe colonel's brain; of Jim Ellison, who used to sit at the desk in thecorner; of the son that now asked him for work. Then a crafty,suspicious light came into his eyes, and he glanced quickly at JohnEllison's companion.

  "What do you want here, Henry Burns?" he demanded. "I had you in myhotel at Samoset Bay once, and you brought me bad luck. You get out. Idon't want you around here. Get out, I say."

  He moved threateningly toward Henry Burns, and the boy, seeing it wasuseless to try to remain, stepped outside.

  "No, I don't want you, either," said Colonel Witham, turning abruptlynow to John Ellison. "No boys around this mill. I don't care if yourfather did own it. You can't work here. I've no place for you."

  Despite his blustering and almost threatening manner, however, ColonelWitham did not offer to thrust John Ellison from the mill. He seemed onthe point of doing it, but something stopped him. He couldn't have toldwhat. But he merely repeated his refusal, and turned away.

  It was only boyish impulse on John Ellison's part, and an innocentpurchaser of the mill would have laughed at him; but he stepped nearerto Colonel Witham and said, earnestly, "You'll have to let me in heresome day, Colonel Witham. The mill isn't yours, and you know it." And headded, quickly, as the thought occurred to him, "Perhaps thefortune-teller you saw at the circus will tell me more than she toldyou. Perhaps she'll tell me where the papers are."

  For a moment Colonel Witham's heavy face turned deathly pale, and heleaned for support against one of the beams of the mill. Then the colourcame back into his face with a rush, and he stamped angrily on thefloor.

  "Confound you!" he cried. "You clear out, too. I don't know anythingabout your fortune-tellers, and I don't care. I've got no time to foolaway with boys. Now get out."

  John Ellison walked slowly to the door, leaving the colonel mopping hisface and turning alternately white and red; and as he stepped outsideColonel Witham dropped into a chair.

  Then, as the boys went on together up the hill to the Ellison farm,Colonel Witham, recovering in a measure from the shock he had received,arose from his chair, somewhat unsteady on his legs, and began, for thehundredth and more time, a weary, fruitless search of the old mill, fromthe garret to the very surface of the water flowing under it.

  And as Colonel Witham groped here and there, in dusty corners, hemuttered, "What on earth did he mean? The fortune-teller--how could heknow of that? There's witchcraft at work somewhere. But there aren't anypapers in this mill. I know it. I know it. I know it."

  And still he kept up his search until it was long past the time forshutting down.

  Three days after this, Lawyer Estes was talking to John Ellison at thefarmhouse.

  "Well, I've run down your witch," he said, smiling; "and there isn'tanything to be made out of her. I've been clear to the fair-grounds atNewbury to see her. She's a shrewd one; didn't take her long to see thatsomething was up. Sized me up for a lawyer, I guess, and shut up tighterthan a clam. I told her what I knew, but she swore Tim Reardon wasmistak
en.

  "Those people have a fear of getting mixed up with the courts; naturallysuspicious, I suppose. She declared she had said that the man she talkedwith asked about some letters he had lost, himself; and that was all sheknew about it. No use in my talking, either. I didn't get anything moreout of her. We're right where we were before."

  "Well, I'm going to get into that mill and look around, just the same,"exclaimed John Ellison. "I'll do it some way."

  "Then you'll be committing trespass," said Lawyer Estes, cautiously.

  "I don't care," insisted the boy. "I won't be doing any harm. I'm notgoing to touch anything that isn't ours. But I'm going to look."

  "Then don't tell me about it," said the lawyer. "I couldn't be a partyto a proceeding like that."

  "No, but I know who will," said John Ellison. "It's Henry Burns. Hewon't be afraid of looking through an old mill at night--and he'll knowa way to do it, too."

  John Ellison tramped into town, that afternoon, and hunted up hisfriend.

  "Why, of course," responded Henry Burns; "it's easy. Jack and I'll gowith you. It won't do any harm, just to walk through a mill." And headded, laughing, "You know we've been in there once before. Remember thenight we told you of?"

  John Ellison looked serious.

  "Yes," he replied, "and there was something queer about that, too,wasn't there? You said father went through the mill, upstairs and down,just the same as Witham does often now."

  "He did, sure enough," said Henry Burns, thoughtfully. "I wish I'd knownwhat trouble was coming some day; I'd have tried to follow him. Well,we'll go through all right--but what about Witham?"

  "That's just what I've been thinking," said John Ellison.

  "Well," replied Henry Burns, after some moments' reflection, "leave itto me. I'll fix that part of it. And supposing the worst should happenand he catch us all in there, what could he do? We'll get Jack and Tomand Bob--yes, and Tim, too; he's got sharp eyes. Witham can't lick usall. If he catches us, we'll just have to get out. He wouldn't make anytrouble; he knows what people think about him and the mill."

  So John Ellison left it to Henry Burns; and the latter set about hisplans in his own peculiar and individual way. The scheme had only to bementioned to Jack and the others, to meet with their approval. They wereready for anything that Henry Burns might suggest. The idea that a nightsearch, of premises which had already been hunted over scores of timesby daylight, did not offer much hope of success, had little weight withthem. If Henry Burns led, they would follow.

  The night finally selected by Henry Burns and John Ellison would havemade a gloomy companion picture to the one when Harvey and Henry Burnsfirst made their entry into the mill, under the guidance of BessThornton, except that it did not rain. Henry Burns and John Ellison hadnoted the favourable signs of the weather all afternoon; how the heavyclouds were gathering; how the gusts whipped the dust into littlewhirlwinds and blew flaws upon the surface of the stream; how the waningdaylight went dim earlier than usual; and they had voted it favourablefor the enterprise.

  Wherefore, there appeared on the surface of Mill stream, not long aftersundown, two canoes that held, respectively, Henry Burns and Harvey andTim Reardon, and Tom Harris and Bob White. These two canoes, not racingnow, but going along side by side in friendly manner, sped quietly andswiftly upstream in the direction of the Ellison dam. Then, arrivingwithin sight of it, they waited on the water silently for a time, untiltwo figures crept along the shore and hailed them. These were John andJames Ellison.

  "It's all right," said John Ellison, in answer to an inquiry; "Witham'sat home, and the place is deserted. And who do you suppose is on watchup near the Half Way House, to let us know if Witham comes out? BessThornton. I let her in on the secret, because I knew she'd help. Sheknows what Old Witham is."

  "Have you got it?" inquired Henry Burns, mysteriously.

  "Sure," responded John Ellison. "It's up close by the mill. Come on."

  They paddled up close to the white foam that ran from the foot of thedam, where the falling water of the stream struck the basin below, andturned the canoes inshore. There, up the bank, John Ellison produced themysterious object of Henry Burns's inquiry. It proved to be an oldwash-boiler.

  Harvey and the others eyed it with astonishment.

  "What are you going to do with that old thing?" asked Harvey. "Thisisn't Fourth of July."

  "That's my fiddle," replied Henry Burns, coolly. "I've got the string inmy pocket."

  With which reply, he took hold of one handle of the wash-boiler and JohnEllison the other; and they proceeded up the bank. The others followed,grinning.

  "Play us a tune," suggested young Tim.

  "Not unless I have to," replied Henry Burns. "You may hear it, andperhaps you won't."

  All was desolate and deserted, as they made a circuit of thesurroundings of the mill. It certainly offered no attractions tovisitors, after nightfall. The crazy old structure, unpainted andblackened with age, made a dark, dismal picture against the dull sky.The water fell with a monotonous roar over the dam; the cold dripping ofwater sounded within the shell of the mill. The wind, by fits andstarts, rattled loose boards and set stray shingles tattooing here andthere. Dust blew down from the roadway.

  "He'll not be out to-night," remarked Harvey, as they looked up the roadin the direction of the Half Way House.

  "You can't tell," replied John Ellison. "We've seen the light in heresome nights that were as bad as this. What say, shall we go in?"

  They followed his lead, around by the way Henry Burns and Harvey hadonce before entered, and, one by one, went in through the window. Thenthey paused, huddled on a plank, while John Ellison scratched a matchand lighted a sputtering lantern, the wick of which had become dampened.Across the planking they picked their way, and entered the main room onthe first floor.

  Then Henry Burns and John Ellison made another trip and brought in HenryBurns's "fiddle," greatly to the amusement of the others.

  "That goes on the top floor," said Henry Burns, and they ascended thetwo flights of stairs with it, depositing it upside down, in a corner ofthe garret that was boarded up as a separate room, or large closet. ThenHenry Burns, producing from his pocket a piece of closely woven cottonrope, skilfully tossed one end over a beam above his head; seized theend as it fell, quickly tied a running knot and hauled it snug. Therope, made fast thus at one end to the beam, drew taut as he pulled downon it.

  "That's the fiddle-string, eh Jack?" laughed Henry Burns. "We've made ahorse-fiddle before now, haven't we? that rope's got so much resin on itthat it squeaks if you just look at it."

  He passed the free end of the resined rope through a hole in the bottomof the upturned wash-boiler, and knotted it so it would not pull outagain.

  "Now where's the fiddle-bow, John?" he asked.

  John Ellison forthwith produced a long bent bow of alder, strung withpieces of tied horse-hair.

  "Listen," said Henry Burns; and he drew the bow gently across theresined rope. The sound that issued forth--the combined agony of thevibrating wash-boiler and the shrill squeak of the rope--was one hardlyto be described. It was like a wail of some unworldly creature, endingwith a shuddering twang that grated even on the nerves of Henry Burns'scompanions. Then Henry Burns laid the bow aside and was ready for thesearch.

  "That sounds nice on Fourth of July night," he remarked, "but not inhere. Let's see what we can find, John."

  They lighted two more lanterns that they had brought and began theirsearch. Strangely enough, however, the possibilities that had seemed soreal to John Ellison, as he had gazed day by day upon the old mill heknew so well, seemed to vanish now that he was within. He had thoughtof a hundred and one odd corners where he would search; but now theyoffered obviously so little chance of secreting anything that he felthis hopes begin to wane.

  Still, they went at it earnestly and thoroughly. Through the garret,with their lanterns lighted, they hunted; lifting aside boxes andbarrels; opening dingy closets; peering into long unused bins
. Hoppersthat had been once a part of the mill's equipment, but which had beendisplaced by others, were carefully examined; even the rafters overheadwere scrutinized, lest some overlooked box might be found hiddenthereon.

  They went to the floor below, where the great grinding stones were; andwhere a tangle of belting and shaftings half filled one room. There werehiding places a-plenty here; but not one of them yielded anything. Then,on the main floor, where there was a great safe hidden in one corner,and the desk. Here they were on forbidden ground. The property wasclearly Witham's, and they would not touch that. They could only searchabout the nooks and corners, and sound the boards for secrethiding-places.

  So on, up and down, in and out; even through the outer room of the mill,where all was rough and unfinished, and only a plank thrown across hereand there to walk on. There were places enough where a box or packagemight be hidden--but where nothing was.

  Yet they continued industriously, and were so absorbed in their searchthat they failed to notice that Little Tim had vanished, until Harveycalled to him for something, and he was nowhere to be found.

  They were half frightened for a moment, fearing lest he had slipped andfallen somewhere; but Harvey laughed at their fears.

  "You can't hurt that little monkey," he said. "He can swim like a fish,and he's a regular cat on climbing. No, he's up to some trick or other."

  They were aware of this presently--and just a bit startled--at the soundof a low whistle coming from the outer mill; then Tim Reardon darted infrom the darkness, into the circle of lanterns.

  "He's coming!" he gasped. "I just met Bess Thornton up the road. Cracky,how I did run! Look out the window; you'll see his lantern. Better turnours down, quick."

  They lost no time in following this advice; then crept to the windowthat looked on the road and peered out. The swinging and swaying of alantern could be seen, indistinctly in the distance. Colonel Witham wascoming. The boys sped quickly up two flights of stairs into the garret.

  What should bring Colonel Witham, night after night, to the old mill,where he had hunted long and fruitlessly? He, himself, could hardly havetold. Possibly he felt somehow a sense as of security; that, so long ashe was there, there could be nobody else on hand, to search; that he wasguarding his property--against, he knew not what. And, if ever thethought came to him, that perhaps it had been better for his peace ofmind never to have come into possession of the old mill at all, why, hedid not allow his mind to dwell upon it. That usually set him tohunting.

  Now the door opened, and Colonel Witham stepped within the mill. And forall his being there voluntarily, one might have seen by the pallor ofhis face that he was half afraid. There, in the shadow, just beyond therim of his own lantern light, was the desk where Jim Ellison used tosit--and sneer at him. Did Colonel Witham recall that? Perhaps. Helifted the lantern and let the light fall on the spot. The place wascertainly empty.

  For all the relief of that, Colonel Witham uttered a cry very much likea frightened man, the next moment. Then he was angry, as he felt thegoose-flesh prickling all over him. The sharp night wind had slammed thelittle door leading to the outer mill, with a bang, and the noise hadechoed through all the rooms.

  There was nothing in that to be afraid of, and Colonel Witham seatedhimself in a chair by the desk, with the lantern beside him on thefloor. Now that he was here, he scarce knew why he had come.

  What was that? Was that a foot-fall on some floor above? Colonel Withamsat bolt upright in his seat and listened. He took out his handkerchiefand mopped his brow. Then he was angry with himself again. He wascertainly nervous to-night.

  Nervous indeed; for he came out of his chair with a bound, as the windsuddenly swooped down on the old mill, shrieked past one corner, with acry that was almost like a voice, and went on up the stream, cracklingthe dead branches of trees and moaning through the pines.

  Colonel Witham started for the door. It was no use; nature was againsthim--conspiring to fill him with alarm. He was foolish to have come. Hewould go back to the inn.

  But then his natural stubbornness asserted itself. Should a wild nightdrive him out of his own mill--when the law couldn't? He turnedresolutely and went slowly back. Nor did he pause on the main floor, butstarted up the first flight of stairs.

  Another shriek of the wind, that rattled the loose window panes on thefloor above, as though by a hundred unseen hands. The colonel croucheddown on the stairs for a moment--and then, oh, what a hideous sound wasthat!

  Somewhere, from the vague spaces of the upper part of the mill, therewas wafted down to him such a noise as he had never heard; it squeakedand it thrummed; it moaned deep, and it wailed with an unearthly,piercing sound. There was the sorrow and the agony of a thousand voicesin it. It blended now with the wind, and added to the cry of that; againit rose above the wind, and pierced the colonel's very soul.

  Colonel Witham, clutching his lantern with desperation, fairly slid downthe stairs, his legs wabbling weakly as he tried to stay himself. Helanded in a heap at the foot. Then, rising with a mighty effort, he fledfrom the mill, up the road to the Half Way House.

  Some moments later, seven boys, shaking with laughter, emerged from thegarret room and resumed their search.

  Colonel Witham had heard the strains of Henry Burns's horse-fiddle.