Manly Wade Wellman - Novel 1947

by The Sleuth Patrol (v1. 1)

  “Let me ask something,” said Doc. “Sherlock, you claim to have learned something from how Ranny Ollinger won those two events from us this morning. You promised to tell us. So tell, or were you only shadowboxing?”

  “I’ve got time and privacy to tell you now,” said Sherlock. “First of all, Max had a bright idea about gaining time on the undressing part of his event, but he lost anyway.”

  “Only because Ranny’s related to the fish family,” said Max. “He simply outswam me. I couldn’t do anything about the swimming end of the business, Ranny was too far out of my class.”

  “And I’m out of his class, a little, in shot-putting,” rejoined Sherlock. “I mean, all things being equal, I can put the shot farther than he can. But Ranny smarted me out of that event, too, remember? He succeeded in

  smarting me out of it, though Max failed to smart him out of the undress-swim race. Ranny pretended to be weaker than he really is on the second try, so as to make me get overconfident and slack off on the third, and after I’d made a half-baked effort, he stepped in and put all he had back of the shot, and pulled victory out of the bag.”

  “Which adds up to what where the haunted house is concerned?” demanded Doc.

  “Think of it like this: We’ll have a sort of series of tests against the ghost, or what we call the ghost, at that house. Our first trial was last night, when we got surprised.”

  “Now, be honest,” urged Max. “We got scared, but plenty.”

  “All right, we got scared. Anyway, we ran. Suppose we show up again tonight.”

  “That will just be history repeating itself,” replied Doc. “We won’t mystify the ghost a bit. Probably he’s been waiting for another spying expedition against him.”

  “He had a peaceful night of it after we ran away last night,” said Sherlock. “If he sees visitors again tonight, and they run, he’ll count on another quiet night. Like me, underestimating Ranny.”

  “He’ll be thinking the truth if he thinks I’ve run away,” said Max candidly.

  “All right, Max, you run,” agreed Sherlock. “Both you and Doc. That’s part of my plan. As I say, he’ll think we got scared off again. But me, I’m going to stay there, out of his sight and hearing, and—”

  “You won’t stay if I can prevent it, you double-dipped dope,” Max began to argue heatedly. “It’s too big a risk.”

  “But you can’t prevent it,” replied Sherlock. “I’m bigger than you, and I’m your Patrol Leader, and I’m the chief of this detective syndicate we seem to have formed. Now, here’s my thought about how we’ll work things at the house. We move together as far as the entrance to the private lane at the road’s edge. From there I go ahead alone.”

  “Our hero!” chuckled Max. “You can have that assignment.”

  “And you two give me five minutes’ start, just like at hare and hounds. Doc, I think you have an illuminated dial on your wrist watch.”

  “Right,” and Doc held out his chubby forearm to show. “My uncle brought it back from the army, and gave it to me for a souvenir.”

  “Then time me, and give me five minutes’ start. And when the five minutes are up, come on after me, both of you together.”

  “I was afraid of that,” said Max, gloomy again.

  “I say come on after me,” repeated Sherlock. “And do just about what we did last night. In other words, come close to the front porch. When you’re there, start making a noise.”

  “What kind of noise?” asked Doc.

  “Any kind, but make it loud. Hoot like owls, howl like dogs, sing like crickets.”

  “The cricket act will be easy for me,” volunteered Max. “The crickets sing by rubbing their hind legs together. My hind legs are rubbing together, all right. My knees are knocking, anyway.”

  “And what about when someone comes out to see who’s responsible for the serenade?” Doc wanted to know.

  “Run like crazy,” Sherlock bade him.

  “Need you tell us to do that?” said Max.

  “Probably not,” replied Sherlock. “Now, I’ll sound like a Scoutmaster. Is everything clear? Yes? Do either of you have questions ? No ? All right, we’re through talking. Let’s start walking.”

  They started, in single file on the side of the road where the trees were thickest and the shadows darkest. Sherlock led, Doc was close at his heels, and Max brought up the rear. Their soft shoes made little or no sound in the earth at the roadside, and Sherlock’s insistence that there be no talking was taken as an order to be obeyed rigidly.

  But the wood itself, to right and left, seemed strangely full of noise. Some night bird twittered, and it sounded like the snarl of a large and angry beast. Up ahead of them something scuttled away with a rattle of twigs and leaves. Perhaps it was a rabbit or a squirrel, but to the nervous ears of the three night adventurers it seemed something as big, and perhaps as dangerous, as a grizzly bear. At one point, where the road dipped low through an area of swampy ground, a pallid something bobbed into view ahead of them, and the three stopped abruptly and stared. Sherlock shrank back against Doc, and Max tried to make himself small and unseen behind the two larger boys. The pallid thing was shapeless, or was it taking on a shape, grotesque and horrible? Sherlock stooped quickly, caught up a stone at his feet, and hurled it viciously. The stone sang right through the thing that barred their way, and Sherlock breathed deeply and with relief. The frightening apparition had been only a stray tag of mist from the swamp vapors that condensed in the growing cool of the night.

  Sherlock lifted his cork-blackened hand to signal a continuation of the march, and hoped that the hand did not tremble, but he knew that it did.

  Still quiet, still nervous, still imagining every stir or whisper around them to be a dark danger, the three Scouts approached the point where the trail led off to the house. Gaining that point, they came close together. Sherlock peered at the smudged faces of his companions; they were solemn in the dimness, and their eyes looked wide and scared. He smiled to reassure them, his teeth flashing rather fiercely in his own cork-smeared face.

  To be sure that they understood, he caught Doc by the wrist, tapped the illuminated dial of the watch and then held up his hand with all five fingers spread and pointing upward. Finally he clasped his two hands together, boxer fashion, in a gesture of determination and comradeship, and moved away along the trail.

  As on the night before, he found the stones underfoot loose and shaky. He picked his way with caution, followed the trail around a bend and out of sight of Doc and Max. For a moment he thought of how much comfort their nearness had given him, and wondered if his own departure caused them to turn jumpy. At least they had each other. He hoped that Max would refrain from talking, and that neither would falter or hesitate at following and making the commotion on schedule.

  Again he came into the hollow with its trees, and the moonlight revealed the strange outline of the house beyond. Sherlock moistened his dry lips with a tongue that was itself almost dry. Just now, that house seemed to be a living thing, gigantic and powerful, that crouched and waited for a careless prey to venture close. He reached the trees, but decided not to move in the darkness they created. He skirted them, came to a curving side trail that was partially grown up with weeds and grass. Several steps more he ventured, setting down a foot heel first to bear his weight, then lowering sole and toe with deliberate care to avoid stirring vegetation or breaking twigs, then moving up his other foot in the same manner. There was enough moonlight on the trail to show him the way ahead; it would also be enough, he realized, to show any possible watcher his own moving shape. After advancing several yards, Sherlock lowered himself to hands and knees and proceeded at a crawl.

  As the curve of the trail brought him closer to the house, the vegetation grew thinner and lower, so that Sherlock was forced to move even closer to the ground than before. Finally his chest dragged on the soil, and he writhed himself forward with his elbows and one flat-lying knee. It took more time than simple crawling on hands
and knees, and considerably more energy. By lifting his head a cautious inch or so from ground level, he could see the house, but he worked hard and slowly to approach it. Perspiration made moist rivulets in the burnt cork on his face and hands, and soaked the fabric of his sweater. Patiently he followed the disused trail toward the side of the ramshackle porch, where once additional steps had led down, steps that by now had rotted or fallen away. At that point the shadows cast by the broken ruin of the roof were deepest, and Sherlock permitted himself a smile of satisfaction. That, at least, was favorable to his plan.

  He gained at last a tufty little bush next to the place from which the side steps had vanished, and paused beside it to rest. A low-lying nest had been built there by birds, and the sleepers in it woke at his nearness, cheeping grumpily. Sherlock lay still, barely breathing lest he startle the birds into a flutter, and so betray himself ahead of time to—to whatever the house might hold in the way of occupants. It seemed an age before the bush was quiet again, and Sherlock continued to worm forward toward the porch itself.

  He lifted a hand, testing the planks. They were old and a little loose, but he decided they would bear his weight. He raised himself to his knees, then to his feet, keeping his body in a crouched position. As gingerly as a hunting cat, he mounted the porch on all fours. Ahead of him, was the front door.

  It was closed.

  Sherlock remembered the previous night, remembered all too vividly for his own calm comfort. When he and Doc and Max had approached before, with no more than a creepy practical joke in prospect for the three of them, the door had been open a trifle, until the moment when it came open all the way to show them a horrible moving shape. Now it was closed. Who, what had closed it?

  Sherlock remained quiet, huddled in the shadows of the porch. For the first time since the whole adventure of Mr. Brimmer’s missing car had begun, he found himself wishing heartily that he had not assigned himself this particular piece of detective work. His earlier success at mystery-solving, that little matter of the stolen bean jar at Sig Poison’s shop, had never been really dangerous; not even when he and Doc and Sig came face to face with Corey James. That had been in broad daylight, with plenty of citizens of a wide awake town within call if help had been needed. But here, now, night had never seemed darker, woodlands more lonely, and peril closer.

  Should he try to drop back, join the others, and call the whole thing off? Sherlock was willing to stake everything he owned that both Doc and Max would be even readier than he to retire from the spot, return to camp and wait for Mr. Palmer to arrive, complete with police authority and police training for handling such a matter. Of course, if they did retreat at Sherlock’s word, Max would bob up next day with jokes and jeers, about boy detectives so bright that they knew when to let mysteries alone. That might be hard to take with good humor, especially with the rest of the campers listening and perhaps chiming in with gibes of their own.

  After a moment, Sherlock shifted a knee on the porch planks, shifted it backward. A little careful maneuvering, and he would be off of the porch again.

  But as he moved, he heard a noise, a creak of boards. Had he carelessly betrayed his presence? But no, the creak came from inside. A window was close ahead and above him; Sherlock could see the boards that sealed it up from within. Whatever made the creak was in the house, at just about that point. There, another creak.

  A heavy one. Whoever made the floor give and groan like that must be a giant. Not a ghost, a real, flesh-and- blood giant.

  There was still time to get away from there. But, even as Sherlock pondered a way to do this, the time ran out.

  Into view on the main trail through the trees, close to the front steps of the porch, moved the dark-clad, sooty-faced figures of Doc and Max.

  DOC AND MAX DO ' THEIR PART

  As Sherlock vanished into the gloomy trail that led from the road to the house of mystery, Doc and Max felt the chilly nature of the enterprise at least twice as much as before. After all, Sherlock had been the most confident of the party, and he had succeeded in transferring some of his confidence to his friends. Now that he moved ahead and left them alone, it took less than two seconds for them to miss his leadership, example and company.

  They looked at each other. Max, forbidden to exercise his habitual use of quip and repartee to stiffen his courage, tried to draw something of comfort from the thought that Doc was a husky comrade to have along on an expedition that might turn into a scuffle. Doc, for his part, reflected silently that Max seemed calm and resolute. He decided to be at least as brave as Max seemed to be.

  Doc held up his wrist with the watch on it, and both bent close to look at the dial, that gleamed with a sort of ghastly dimness in the night. At first both of them wondered if the watch had stopped; then they could see that the minute hand crawled slowly around, more slowly than anyone would have ever thought possible. To make it even harder to wait in the darkness without speaking or moving, the leaves on the branches around them began a sort of stealthy whispering campaign, alarmingly lifelike; first it seemed that one voice addressed silent companions, then several would join in a sinister chorus, then would fall a deep, dead silence. After more moments, the whispering would begin again. The imagination of Max, long self-trained toward a future career as a writer of thrilling fiction, was especially keen to make out what sounded almost like words. And none of the words, he was sure, would be comforting.

  Three minutes passed like three centuries. Then a fourth. And suddenly the fifth and last minute seemed to hurry to spend itself, just as Doc and Max found themselves wishing they did not have to move at once upon their part of the expedition.

  If they had only known it, they began with the same thought in both their minds. The first step was the hardest, though the second step and those that followed it would not be easy by any standard of comparison. Max, intently modest in situations like these, which could not be passed off with a laugh, cheerfully allowed Doc to take the lead. Doc did so, though for his part he had no inclination to demand that position of honor and peril.

  Far more than at their carefree pranking of the night before, they were aware of their trail and its possible difficulties under the inky shadows cast by the trees of the hollow. Doc knelt several times to feel with his hands. The footing on the trail was firm and bare, no grass or weeds had grown up in this sunless path. Even at noontide this must be a gloomy spot. Doc remembered a snatch of a Virginia hillmen’s song, once heard on the radio:

  In the pines, in the pines,

  Where the sun never shines . . .

  That must be the way it looked here. And how did the rest of the song go?

  . . . His body lay upon the ground,

  His head they never found!

  Doc tried to forget the song at once. If the first two lines sounded like accurate description, the next two were strangely like a baleful prophecy.

  The way was so narrow that any night adventurer, and in particular any night adventurer as broad from side to side as Doc Watson, must be careful to stay in its middle and not start a telltale rustle in the brush and branches that walled in the sides.

  Carefully they picked their way along. It was like the waiting for time to eat up the five minutes of head start Sherlock had asked for. Despite the seeming slowness of the beginning of the trip, the end was coming toward them fast enough. Both boys remembered their previous threading of the path, and both knew that they must be approaching the haunted house. Doc, still in his uncoveted advance position, paused to grope again on the path in front of them, then to left and right, and his hand touched something broad and rough, the bark- covered surface of a fallen trunk. He felt along its length. It seemed to be a section of log some eight inches through, and five or six feet long. Inspiration came into his mind, inspiration worthy of Sherlock himself. Doc put his hand back, touched Max, and drew him close to grope also.

  Without talking, the two understood each other at once. With Doc at one end of the log and Max at the other, they
carefully lifted it, and more carefully still moved it to lie directly across the path. Then Doc tapped Max again, holding his hand close before Max’s nose, with the fingers and thumb closed tightly down. Doc took a step, and straightened a finger. Another step, and straightened another. A third step—

  Max understood, and caught Doc’s other hand and shook it to signal his understanding. The two were to count their steps from where the log was to where they would pause in front of the house. Then, on their way back, they could count again and know when to expect the log, and so cross it without mishap. On the other hand, if anything followed them in furious, blind pursuit, it would blunder into the log and fall heavily, perhaps injuring itself.

  Feeling a trifle better, they came to the thinner belt of trees next to the yard, and paused within this shelter to reconnoiter with their eyes the weed-covered open space. A gentle puif of wind stirred the tops of some mulleins, making just such a ripple among the stalks as might be made by the wriggling passage of a tremendous snake. Doc stepped back from his position of leadership to one beside and close to Max, resolutely telling himself that a snake big enough to create that disturbance would be an anaconda, and not to be found anywhere but in the tropical jungles. For some seconds the boys remained quiet, combing the scene with their eyes. The house could be seen, quiet, huge and with no suggestion of light at any opening. The front door was shut. Enough moonlight filtered through the broken roof of the porch to make them sure of that. As for Sherlock, who had gone ahead of them, there was neither sight nor sound of him.

  Because they were obligated by the terms of the conspiracy to do so, Doc and Max moved forward at last, into the weed-grown open and with gingerly steps toward the porch. They reached the first step, and still no challenge or threat had come to them.

  “Now’s the time,” thought Doc, and opened his mouth to yell. Nothing came out, despite his efforts, and he nudged Max frantically. Max, at least, could never be paralyzed as to vocal chords, and he responded famously.