Mystery at School

by Laura Lee Hope

  “I think this is where Mr. Nelson lives,” Bert observed, stopping before a white frame house three stories high. It was surrounded by a large lawn and an iron fence. A driveway at the side led back to what had evidently been a barn. Now it was a roomy-looking garage.

  “What shall we do now?” Nan asked a little nervously.

  “Ring the front doorbell and ask if Mr. Perry is in,” Bert replied firmly.

  The two children opened the iron gate and walked up the path to the front porch. There was an old-fashionedbell in the middle of the wooden door.

  Bert gave it a twist, and they could hear the loud ring. There was no answer. Bert rang again. Still no one came.

  “I guess the police are right,” Nan remarked. “There’s no one here.”

  “Let’s look around a little before we leave,” Bert suggested.

  The twins circled the house. All the windows were shut tight, and the shades on the second floor were down. The garage doors were closed.

  “Come on, Bert,” Nan said finally. “We’re not learning anything. Let’s go home.”

  The children let themselves out the gate and hurried down the sidewalk. But Nan turned to look back.

  “Bert!” she cried. “There’s someone at that upstairs window!”

  Quickly Bert glanced up. “I don’t see anyone,” he protested.

  “There! Where the window shade is raised.” Nan pointed. “He’s gone now, but I’m sure I saw a man watching us!”

  “That’s queer,” Bert remarked. “If someone’s inside, why didn’t he answer the bell?”

  “I guess he doesn’t want anybody to know he’s there,” Nan said. The twins, puzzled, went on home.

  “We’ll come again,” Bert declared.

  The puppet show had been planned for the next afternoon. When the pupils in Miss Vandermeer’s class returned from lunch the teacher announced that Bert, Nan, Nellie, and Charlie would be excused to make their preparations.

  As they ran down to the same basement room where the pet show had been held, Bert remarked, “The first thing to do is set up the stage.”

  Mr. Carter had put a long table on the platform. Now Nan took a length of dark-green cloth from a big box which she and Bert had carried to school at noon.

  “Dinah hemmed this for us,” she explained to Nellie as the girls began to tack it to the edge of the table. “It will hide us from the audience while we’re working the puppets.”

  Bert and Charlie had fashioned a stage out of cardboard. This they set on the table. Then Bert brought in four little stools from the kindergarten room.

  “We can sit on these,” he suggested. “I don’t think our heads will show above the table.”

  Nan looked around. “Everything is here except the record player. I’ll ask Mr. Carter to get it.”

  She returned in a few minutes followed by the janitor. He put the record player on the edge of the platform and attached the plug to an electric outlet.

  Nan took a record from the box and slipped it on the player. “Mother found this up in the at tic!” she said with a laugh. “It’s really old!”

  “Let’s practice once more,” Nellie suggested, slipping her fingers into the kitten puppet.

  “Okay.” Nan put her index finger in the little tube which Bert had fastened to the Ping-pong ball to represent her ostrich’s long neck. Her middle finger and thumb went into the wings.

  She started the record player and made the ostrich bow low. Just then she heard a groan.

  “My clown puppet isn’t here!” Bert cried.

  “Are you sure?” Nan turned off the record and helped Bert look through the big box. The puppet was gone !

  “I was playing with it early this morning,” Bert suddenly remembered. “I must have forgotten to put it back in the box!”

  “Oh dear!” Nellie exclaimed. “It’s almost time for the show to begin!”

  “I’ll run home and get it,” Bert decided. “You’ll have to entertain the audience until I get back!” He dashed from the room.

  The other three children looked at one another in dismay. What could they do?

  Then Nan had an idea. “Let’s start off with a sing! We can keep that going until Bert gets back!”

  Charlie and Nellie agreed. “You lead it, Nan,” Nellie suggested.

  The ring of the dismissal bell echoed through the building. Then came the sound of doors opening and a rush of footsteps.

  “Here they come!” Charlie cried as the door of the room burst open.

  When the children had taken their seats and the admission price had been collected, Charlie stepped forward. “We’ll begin by singing a few songs,” he announced. “Nan Bobbsey will lead us!”

  “Let’s have a round,” Nan proposed. “The children on the left side of the room will sing ‘Three Blind Mice’ and those on the other side ‘Row, Row, Row Your Boat.’ ”

  The audience entered into the spirit, and soon everyone was singing gaily. Little Teddy Blake could not quite keep up with the others. His piping voice was always a few beats behind!

  “That’s wonderful!” Nan said when the round came to an end. “What shall we sing now?”

  “ ‘Old MacDonald Had a Farm’!” one of the older boys called out.

  This song was a popular one with all the children. They had great fun making all the funny farm noises. Teddy Blake made up for his slowness in the other song by an especially loud oink, oink!

  Just as the list of animals on MacDonald’s farm had been completed, Bert slipped into the room. He held up a package for Nan to see.

  She looked relieved. When the final note of the song had died away, Nan held up her hand.

  “And now,” she announced, “we will have a performance by those world-famed actors, the Lakeport Puppets!”

  CHAPTER XIV

  THE SHOW GOES ON

  “YEA! The Lakeport Puppets!” the children called.

  Nan took her place with the other three on the stools behind the table. The next minute four little figures popped up on the stage.

  There was a clown in his red-and-white suit. A blue-coated policeman with a tiny club came after him. The ostrich had a rhinestone collar, and as her head bobbed the long eyelashes seemed to flutter. The little kitten was white, and around her neck hung a perky blue ribbon with a bell.

  All the puppets made deep bows in response to the applause from the audience. Then the kitten and the ostrich disappeared.

  The policeman turned to the audience. “Do you like puzzles?” he asked in a funny deep voice.

  “Yes Yes!” came the shouted replies.

  The policeman put one little hand up to his mouth and pretended to whisper to the audience. “I’ll ask this clown some and see if he knows the answers!”

  The children giggled.

  “Now, sir,” the policeman said to the clown, shaking his stick, “what has a face but no head, hands but no feet, yet travels all the time and is usually running?”

  The clown put his hands up to his head as if in deep thought. Then a card with the word CLOCK printed on it was raised behind him.

  “Clock!” the children in the audience shouted.

  The clown repeated the word in a squeaky voice.

  “You heard!” the policeman objected and beat the clown on the head with his club.

  The audience shrieked with laughter.

  “I’ll give him another chance,” the policeman said to the children. Turning to the clown, he asked, “When is a boat like a heap of snow?”

  The clown repeated the question in his squeaky voice and again put his hands to his head.

  WHEN IT IS ADRIFT appeared on a card held over his head.

  Once more the audience called out the answer, and the clown repeated it. The policeman seemed to be beside himself with anger. He paced up and down, shaking his stick and muttering.

  Then he stopped and turned to the audience. “Once more!” he said. Facing the clown, he said very slowly, “What animal took the most luggage
into the ark?”

  Again a card was raised behind the clown’s back. This time it said, THE ELEPHANT TOOK A TRUNK.

  When the audience called out the answer, the policeman did not give the clown a chance to speak. He hit him on the head and dragged him from the stage.

  There was loud applause. The clown and the policeman popped up again and bowed deeply. When the clapping died down, they disappeared and two more figures sprang up. They were the ostrich and the kitten.

  “Meow!” the kitten said. The little children in the audience giggled. “My friend Miss Ostrich will sing for you!”

  Bert, who had come out from behind the table and taken a seat in the front row, got up and started the record player. The strains of “Down by the Old Mill Stream” floated out over the audience.

  Nan, working the ostrich puppet, made her move with the music and appear to be singing. On the high notes the ostrich would fling back her head and open her wings wide.

  Danny Rugg, who was seated in the front row, crossed his legs. In doing so, his foot hit the edge of the platform where the record player was. The blow made the needle skip, and part of the song was lost.

  Surprised, Nan forgot for a moment to move the puppet. Someone in the audience laughed. Bert replaced the needle with a frown at Danny.

  But the laughter had given Danny an idea. Once more he kicked the platform; the needle slid over the record, and the song stopped.

  “Please, don’t joggle the platform, Danny,” Bert protested. “You’re spoiling everything!”

  “I can’t help it if your old platform is rickety!” Danny said rudely. “I have to move my feet!”

  Once more Bert set the needle on the record, and the song continued. Then when the singer reached a high note Danny joggled the platform again. The needle slid off, making a screeching sound. But this time Nan picked up the song where it had been stopped and continued in her own voice.

  As the song ended, Mr. Tetlow, who had been watching from the back row, walked up to Danny. “You’re causing a disturbance here,” he said sternly. “I suggest you leave.”

  There was silence as Danny got up and stalked out of the room. Then the ostrich and the kitten put on a little dance which drew loud applause. At the end the clown and the policeman appeared again, and the four little puppets did a bouncing jig before making their bows of farewell.

  When the applause had stopped, Mr. Tetlow stepped to the platform. “I know you will all be interested to know that between the pet show held last week and this puppet performance, the sum of twenty dollars has been raised for the school museum!”

  There were cheers and whistles. Then the principal went on, “I shall appoint a committee of teachers and pupils to select something for our exhibits. But today I want to thank those children who worked so hard to make these two affairs the successes they have been!”

  There was more applause, and then the audience filed from the room.

  “You were awf’ly good puppets!” Flossie said admiringly as she and Freddie joined the older children, who were packing their puppets and the scenery into the big box once more.

  “Thank you, honey,” Nan said, giving her little sister a hug.

  Almost everyone had left the school by the time the puppeteers were ready. “I’ll help carry the box, Bert,” Charlie offered.

  “Okay, take the other end,” Bert directed, and the two boys started toward the Bobbseys’ home. Nan, Nellie, and the small twins followed.

  “I didn’t know ostriches could sing, Nan!” Freddie commented as they walked along.

  “Ostriches stick their heads in the ground and think no one can see them !” Flossie volunteered. “Miss Earle said so!”

  “Like this?” Freddie ran to the soft ground at the side of a low hedge and stood on his head.

  As he stayed there waving his legs in the air, Nan noticed an elderly man down on his knees weeding a flower bed on the other side of the hedge.

  “Be careful, Freddie!” she cautioned. “You’ll fall!”

  “Ggl,” Freddie replied, his face getting redder by the second.

  The next instant he lost his balance and tumbled over the hedge right on top of the man!

  “Oh!” Nan cried, jumping over the hedge and helping Freddie to his feet. “I’m very sorry,” she said to the man. “My little brother didn’t see you there! I hope you’re not hurt!”

  Slowly the man got to his feet. Then he stood still, both hands holding his back. “I guess I’m all right,” he said finally, straightening up. “But,” he added, “it’s rather a surprise to have a small boy land right on your back when you’re weeding your garden!”

  Freddie looked sheepish. “I was being an ostrich and putting my head in the ground. No one was supposed to see me!”

  The man smiled. “Well, I didn’t see you, but you’d better look around before you play ostrich.”

  Freddie promised that he would. Seeing that the man was not hurt, the children resumed their walk. Bert and Charlie were far ahead and had stopped at a corner to wait for the others.

  “Freddie was playing ostrich and fell down!” Flossie reported when they reached the boys.

  At that moment Danny Rugg rode by on his bicycle. He stopped and waited until the children reached him.

  “You think you’re smart because you got old Tetlow to send me out of the room,” he said with a glare at Bert.

  “I had nothing to do with itl” Bert replied. “It was your own fault!”

  “Well, you’ll be sorry!” Danny called as he mounted his bicycle and rode away.

  Bert looked disgusted. “I wonder what he’ll try now!”

  “Don’t pay any attention to him,” Charlie advised. “We can take care of Danny Rugg any day!”

  “Okay! See you tomorrow!” Bert called as Charlie and Nellie turned down at the next street to go to their homes.

  When the twins reached the Bobbseys’ house no one was there. “Where is everbody?” Flossie asked in surprise when their calls brought no response.

  “Mother had to go to a meeting,” Nan replied, “but Dinah should be here.”

  Just then they heard the back door slam.

  They ran to the kitchen. Dinah had evidently just come in. She was puffing and looked worried.

  “What’s the matter?” Nan asked her.

  Dinah replied with another question. “Was Snap at school with you children?”

  “Why, no.”

  “Then I don’t know where he is! He’s been gone all afternoon!”

  CHAPTER XV

  A REWARDING SEARCH

  “SNAP gone!” Flossie wailed. “Oh, do you s’pose that Red Rankin came and took him away?”

  “I don’t know,” Nan replied. Then she turned to Dinah and asked, “When did you last see Snap?”

  Dinah had dropped into a chair and was fanning herself. “He was in the back yard when you all went to school after lunch. Then the next time I looked he wasn’t there. I called and called, but he didn’t come. I been out huntin’ for him. I hoped maybe he’d gone to school to meet you all.”

  “I’m sure he wasn’t at school,” Bert said in a worried tone, “or we’d have seen him.”

  “Let’s scout around the neighborhood,” Nan suggested. “Snap may be playing with some other dogs.”

  Nan and Flossie went in one direction while Bert and Freddie walked the other way. They hurried along the street calling their pet. But there was no answer from the shaggy white dog.

  Finally the discouraged twins met back at the house. “I can’t understand it,” Nan said. “Snap has never run away before!”

  “Maybe he’s gone back to the boathousel” Freddie suddenly cried.

  “That’s a thought, Freddie!” Bert started off on a run. The others followed.

  But when they reached the boathouse, there was no sign of Snap. The blanket still lay in the comer and appeared to be undisturbed.

  Flossie’s eyes filled with tears. “Snap’s gone, and I’ll never see him agai
n!” she cried.

  Nan put an arm around her little sister. “I’m sure Snap will come back,” she said consolingly. “Don’t worry!”

  Sadly the twins walked home. When their parents heard the story of Snap’s disappearance, Mr. Bobbsey telephoned the police and reported the missing dog.

  “If Snap doesn’t come back in a day or two, we’ll put an ad in the paper,” he promised the children.

  They tried to be content with this, but before going to bed, Bert and Nan made another tour of the neighborhood calling their pet. The dog did not come.

  Freddie woke up early the next morning. “I think I hear Snap!” he told himself.

  The little boy quickly put on his robe and slippers and pattered downstairs. Hopefully he pushed open the back door. He was just in time to see a small black dog run out of the yard.

  When he turned around he found Flossie close behind him. “I thought I heard Snap,” he explained.

  “So did I,” his twin said. Freddie told her about the black dog, and the two sadly mounted the stairs again.

  Later that afternoon when school was over, Bert went up to Charlie Mason. He told his chum about Snap’s disappearance.

  “I think I’ll ride around on my bike and look for him. Want to come along?” he asked.

  “Sure!” Charlie agreed. The two boys mounted their bicycles and rode off.

  For an hour they went up one street and down another searching for the white dog. When Bert saw a boy he knew standing on a comer, he stopped and described Snap. “Have you seen a dog like that around here?” he asked.

  “I did see one that sounds like him,” the boy admitted. “But a kid had him on a leash. He went in that house over there.” He pointed down the street.

  Bert looked at the house and frowned. Then he thanked the boy and rejoined Charlie, who had been waiting for him farther up the street.

  Bert told Charlie what the boy had said. “And the house he pointed out is where Jack Westley lives!” he ended angrily.

  “I’ll bet Danny and Jack took Snap I” Charlie exclaimed. “Let’s go get him!”