“I wouldn’t depend on it,” Lorraine said as they turned up the narrow road to the Brandt estate.
“Watch out!” Judy suddenly exclaimed. “There’s another car coming.”
As Lois swerved to avoid the oncoming car, Lorraine ducked her head. She kept herself hidden behind Judy until the car had passed. The man driving it was a stranger to Judy, but she would remember his hypnotic, dark eyes and swarthy complexion for a long time. The soft brown hat he was wearing covered most of his hair.
“What’s the matter with you two?” asked Lois when the car had passed. “Aren’t you a little old for playing hide and seek?”
“I wasn’t—playing. Let’s not go up there,” Lorraine begged. “I don’t think the Brandts live there any more.”
“Maybe not, but we can pretend we think they do, can’t we?” Judy replied a little uncertainly.
She was beginning to suspect that Lorraine knew more about the Brandt estate than she was telling.
Lois kept on driving along the narrow, gravelly road. Soon there were more evergreens and a hedge of rhododendrons to be seen. They looked very green next to the leafless trees in the woods beyond. The sky was gray with white clouds being driven across it by the wind.
“There’s the tower!” Lorraine exclaimed. “I can see it over to the left. It looks like something out of Grimm’s Fairy Tales, doesn’t it?”
“It looks grim all right,” agreed Judy. “I wonder what it is.”
“I suppose it’s nothing but an old water tower. It would be fun to explore it, though,” Lois said. “But if there are new people living here they’ll never give us permission.”
“We might explore it without permission,” Judy suggested daringly. “Come on!” she urged her friends as Lois parked the car in a cleared place beside the road. “Who’s going to stop us? And who wants to explore a gloomy old tower, anyway? Let’s look for the fountain.”
“Do you think we should?” Lorraine asked. “It won’t be enchanted. I told you—”
“You told us very little,” Lois reminded her. “If you know anything about the people who live here now, I think you ought to let us know. Otherwise, I’m afraid we won’t be very welcome.”
“I don’t think they’ll welcome us, anyway. I do know who they are,” Lorraine admitted. “You remember Roger Banning from school, don’t you? I’ve seen him around here. His family must have acquired sudden wealth, or else he’s just working on the estate.”
“Then you’ve been here lately? Why didn’t you tell me?” asked Lois. “We always used to go places together.”
“It wasn’t important,” Lorraine replied evasively. “I was just out for a drive.”
“You plutocrats!” laughed Judy. “Each with a car of your own. You’re not interested in Roger Banning, are you, Lois? I’m sure you can do better than that. I did know him slightly, but not from school. The boys and girls were separated and went to different high schools by the time we moved to Farringdon. I remember his pal, Dick Hartwell, a lot better. He was in our young people’s group at church.”
“Sh!” Lois cautioned her. “Nice people no longer mention Dick Hartwell’s name. He’s doing time.”
“For what?” asked Judy.
Like Peter, her FBI husband, she preferred facts to gossip.
“Forgery, I guess. He stole some checkbooks from his father’s desk and forged the names of a lot of important business people. I think he forged some legal documents, too. Anyway, he went to the Federal Penitentiary. It was all in the papers,” Lorraine told her.
Now Judy did remember. It was something she would have preferred to forget. She liked to think she was a good judge of character, and she had taken Dick Hartwell for a quiet, refined boy who would never stoop to crime.
“I don’t see what all this has to do with the fountain,” Lois said impatiently. “Are we going to look for it, or aren’t we?”
“Of course we are. That’s what we came for. I just like to know what a tiger looks like before he springs at me,” Judy explained.
“You seem to think there’s danger in this expedition of ours, don’t you?” asked Lorraine.
“I don’t know what to think. You’re the one who seems to know the answers, but you’re not telling. Hiding your face back there gave you away. You’ve seen that character who drove down this road and, for some reason, you were afraid he would see you. Why, Lorraine? Why didn’t you want to be recognized?”
Lorraine hesitated a moment and then replied evasively, “People don’t generally enter private estates without an invitation. That’s all.”
“I’d better turn the car around,” Lois decided, “in case we have to leave in a hurry. I don’t expect we’ll encounter any tigers, but we may be accused of trespassing.”
“I’m sure we will be,” announced Judy as two dark-coated figures strode down the road toward them. “You drove right by a NO TRESPASSING sign, and this isn’t a welcoming committee coming to meet us!”
CHAPTER IV
Unwelcome Visitors
“Oh dear! I wasn’t quite quick enough,” Lois complained as she gave the steering wheel another turn.
Judy and Lorraine had gotten out of the car to direct her as she turned the car around. Now it refused to budge, spattering mud as the wheels spun. The two men came nearer, shouting and waving their arms.
All at once Judy recognized one of them as Roger Banning. His light hair emphasized the angry flush that covered his face.
“What are you girls doing here?” he demanded. “Can’t you read?”
Lois had an answer for that. She spoke fearlessly in spite of her predicament.
“You should know, Roger. You went to school with us. I should think you’d help instead of yelling at us. One little push on the back of the car ought to do it. Please!”
“Go ahead, help her,” the huskier man said.
With that Roger and the other man almost lifted the car back on the road where it was soon turned in the other direction. Lois smiled sweetly as she thanked them.
“Are you friends of the Brandts?” she asked.
“That’s not the point,” Roger Banning retorted. “You and your girl friends are trespassing on private property.”
“I can explain why we came here if you’ll listen,” Judy put in quietly. “When we started on this trip we thought the Brandts still lived here. Lois knows Helen Brandt from school. We thought she’d be glad to show us around the estate.”
“You did, eh? Well, nobody gets shown around this estate. Now get going!”
“Wait a minute. Don’t hurry us.” Judy’s voice was still quiet. “What, exactly, is your objection to showing people around?”
“It ain’t a showplace,” the other man objected.
“It was when the Brandts lived here. We didn’t know they’d sold the estate.”
“They haven’t,” was the reply. “They went to Florida for the winter and leased it to us. Why don’t you drop in for a call after they get back?”
“Watch it, Cubby,” Roger Banning warned him. “I wouldn’t be handing out any invitations if I were you. I recognize this girl now. She’s Judy Bolton, or was, before she married that smart young lawyer, Peter Dobbs. Her brother’s that pasty-faced newspaper reporter they call the hero of the Roulsville flood. Dr. Bolton’s on the staff at Farringdon Hospital and that’s where these kids will wind up if you let—”
“Watch it yourself,” the heavy-set young man called Cubby interrupted.
They both glared at her, waiting for her to explain herself further. But what could she say? Her wide gray eyes must have told them she was baffled.
Lorraine was not saying a word. As she shielded her face with her hands she looked like a poor, frightened bird trying to hide under its own wing.
“She’s really in trouble,” thought Judy, “and these men know some
thing about it.”
Determined to find out something herself, she faced them unflinchingly. It was Lois who finally apologized for the intrusion, explaining that she had been a guest of the Brandts several times and felt sure they wouldn’t mind if she and her friends had just one more look at the fountain.
“Fountain! What fountain?” Roger Banning laughed derisively. “There’s no fountain on the estate and never has been. You girls have taken the wrong road if you’re looking for a fountain.”
“I don’t think we have,” Lois told him calmly.
“What about the tower?” asked Judy. “We noticed what looks like a water tower over there in the woods. Isn’t it used to store water for the fountain?”
“It is no longer in use. Now will you leave?”
“I think we’d better,” Lorraine whispered, pulling Judy toward the car.
It seemed the only thing to do. The two young men who had made up what Judy called the “unwelcoming committee” watched them as they drove off down the road. When they were nearly to the main highway Lois laughed and said, “If they think they’ve scared us away they’re greatly mistaken. I’ll hide the car the way Lorraine suggested. It wasn’t such a bad idea after all.”
Judy helped her find a secluded place just beyond the entrance to the estate. Apparently people had picnicked there in the summertime. A big evergreen tree with branches dipping to the ground hid the car from view while the girls planned their next strategy.
“We’ll find that fountain if it’s the last thing we do,” declared Judy. “The idea of telling us it doesn’t exist! You girls both saw it, didn’t you?”
“That—that was years ago,” Lorraine said. “They—they could have torn it down or something.”
“I don’t believe they did. We just drove past the path without seeing it,” Lois declared.
“It will be easier to find if we walk back. Let’s do it,” Judy suggested. “We should have walked up to the estate in the first place. Then they wouldn’t have heard us coming.”
“But suppose they see us?” Lorraine objected, holding back.
“They won’t bite—if you mean those two overgrown schoolboys,” Judy said. “Anyway, I don’t believe they have any more right on the estate than we have. They weren’t necessarily telling the truth about it. Do you know the other one, Lois?”
“Cubby? No, I’m afraid I don’t.”
“What about the third character, the one who passed us in the car?”
“I never saw him before,” declared Lois. “Did you, Lorraine?”
Her silence was answer enough. She had seen him before, but she was afraid to say so. If he lived on the estate, Judy decided it might be a good idea for them to do their exploring before he returned.
“I wouldn’t care to have him catch us, would you?” she questioned.
Lorraine finally agreed to Judy’s plan, and they started back up the narrow road. They had not walked far when they came to the sign that Lois had chosen to ignore the first time.
NO TRESPASSING, it warned them in big black letters. ALL PERSONS ARE FORBIDDEN TO ENTER THESE PREMISES UNDER PENALTY OF THE LAW.
“We can’t walk right past it,” Lorraine objected as they stopped to read the sign.
“I don’t see why not. We drove right past it,” Lois returned with a defiant toss of her head. “Who cares about their old sign, anyway? I’m sure the Brandts wouldn’t forbid us to come here. They may even thank us for it.”
These puzzling words only partially convinced Lorraine. But Judy was beginning to enjoy the adventure. She studied the NO TRESPASSING sign a moment more and then began to laugh.
“It says ALL PERSONS,” she told her friends as they walked deliberately past it, searching for the path to the fountain. “Who is permitted to enter, I wonder—ghosts?”
“Spirits, maybe, like the one that spoke to you,” Lois said with a shiver.
“Then the fountain wouldn’t be enchanted at all. It would be haunted,” declared Lorraine.
And suddenly she held back, afraid.
CHAPTER V
Forbidden Ground
“Come on, Lorraine,” urged Lois. “We were only joking. You know there’s really no such thing as a haunted fountain. And perhaps they really have torn it down.”
“I haven’t been here since that day I came with my grandparents, but we won’t find out by just standing here,” declared Judy. “I think those men had some reason for telling us the fountain didn’t exist, and I mean to find out what it was. I should have brought Blackberry along. He was my excuse for exploring the ruined castle. I was supposed to be looking for my cat.”
“What did you do with him?” Lois questioned.
“Blackberry?” Judy gave a little gasp. “I am careless! I do believe I left him shut in the attic, but Peter will rescue him when he comes home.”
“We may need him to rescue us if those men find out what we’re up to. What time do you expect him?” Lorraine wanted to know.
“He said he might be late and suggested that I spend the night with Mother and Dad,” replied Judy. “I didn’t ask him why. You know Peter doesn’t want me to get myself involved in any of his cases. I don’t even know what sort of assignments he has any more. The Bureau is so secret about it.”
“Well, we can be secret about this investigation, too. How do we know those men aren’t criminals hiding out here while the Brandts are away?” asked Lois.
“Roger Banning isn’t a criminal,” Lorraine objected.
“His pal, Dick Hartwell, was. Remember?”
“Wasn’t there something in the paper about him being out on parole?” asked Lorraine. “I don’t think we should label him a criminal if he is. Probably he has a good job and is no more inclined toward crime than we are. After all, we are trespassing.”
“I don’t care if we are,” Lois said recklessly as they trudged on.
It seemed a long way uphill to the part of the estate where Judy felt sure the path branched off and led toward the fountain.
“Watch for it! We don’t want to miss it. Maybe we ought to look for it on the other side of that hedge,” she suggested.
“How can we?” asked Lois.
“We’ll go back to where the hedge begins,” declared Judy. “It’s the only way.”
“We’ll be all afternoon finding it,” complained Lorraine. “Maybe the fountain isn’t haunted, but it is creepy here in the woods. You know, Judy, I’ve missed most of your shivery adventures. I wouldn’t be so interested in this one if it didn’t directly concern me.”
Judy didn’t see how, but she was curious. She waited until they were well concealed behind the hedge. It was safer, just in case someone did drive up the road. Then she turned to Lorraine and said as casually as she could, “That’s so. Lois did say you had a problem. What is it, Lorraine? Don’t you want to tell me about it?”
Apparently she didn’t. Nobody spoke for a minute. Then Lois said, “She won’t even tell me. I just know something is wrong from the way she acts.”
“I didn’t say anything was,” Lorraine protested.
“You did say something about not being able to trust Arthur,” Judy reminded her. “Do you still want to turn back the clock so that things will be the way they were before you quarreled?”
“We didn’t quarrel,” Lorraine retorted quickly.
“Maybe you should,” Judy began. “Peter and I do occasionally. Dad says it’s good for us. He says it clears the air, and we do love each other all the more after we make up. If you’d tell Arthur about this problem—”
“Please,” Lorraine stopped her. “Can’t you see the way it is? If I could tell him or anyone else about it, then it wouldn’t be a problem. I just want to believe in things the way I did when I was a little girl. I mean impossible things like wishes coming true.”
“But they do
come true if you work at it. Mine did,” Judy reassured her.
Lorraine started to say something more, but broke off suddenly as Lois stumbled into what she felt sure must be the path.
“You were right, Judy!” she cried excitedly. “They’ve concealed it on purpose. We couldn’t possibly have seen it from the road. There isn’t a break in the hedge.”
The path didn’t look very much as Judy remembered it, but she agreed that it might not have been used recently.
“Anyway,” she said, “it’s going in the right direction. We should pass the tower and then come to a rock garden with statues—what’s this?”
A fence with barbed wire running from post to post was directly across the path.
“Shall we crawl under it?” asked Lois.
“We might climb over it,” Judy suggested. “The wires seem loose. I’ll hold them down.”
“Wait! They’re electric!”
The warning from Lois came just too late. Without noticing the white insulators attached to it, Judy had put her hand on the top wire. Quickly she drew back with a sharp cry of pain.
“Don’t touch those wires!” she warned Lorraine. “I guess they mean that sign back there. This fence is charged with electricity. It gave me quite a shock.”
“I burned my hand—almost,” Lois corrected herself as she looked and saw no burn. “It felt like it, but I guess those wires aren’t really deadly.”
“I hope not.” Lorraine turned to Judy and asked a little plaintively, “What do we do now?”
“I have an idea,” Judy replied, looking around for a forked stick. When she had found one of just the right size she was able to hold back the wires without receiving any more electric shocks. As soon as Lois and Lorraine had crawled under the fence, she gave them the stick to hold for her.
“Now,” she announced, standing erect and brushing herself off, “we’re really on forbidden ground.”
All three girls followed the path beyond the fence. White statues, like white ghosts, loomed up in unexpected places. Over to the left was the tower. Lois glanced at it and then shivered.
“It gives me the creeps,” she confessed. “Do you think somebody could be up there watching us?”
The Third Girl Detective Page 18