The Girl Detective Megapack: 25 Classic Mystery Novels for Girls

by Mildred A. Wirt

  “Ah, yes, perhaps. But I feel it is not so. And many times, oh my friend, when I feel a thing is so it is so. But when I just think it is true, then it is not true at all. Is this not strange?”

  “It is strange. But you gypsies are strange anyway.”

  “Ah, yes, perhaps. For all that, I am not all gypsy. Once I was not gypsy at all, only a little French girl living in a little chateau by the side of the road.”

  “Petite Jeanne,” Florence spoke with sudden earnestness, “have you no people living in France?”

  “My father is dead, this I know.” The little French girl’s head drooped. “My mother also. I have no brothers nor sisters save those who adopted me long ago in a gypsy van. Who else can matter?”

  “Uncles and aunts, cousins, grandparents?”

  “Ah, yes.” The little French girl’s brow clouded. “Now I remember. There was one—we called her grandmother. Was she? I wonder. We play that so many things are true, we little ones. I was to see her twice. She was, oh, so grand!” She clasped her hands as if in a dream. “Lived at the edge of a wood, she did, a great black forest, in a castle.

  “A very beautiful castle it was to look at on a sunny day, from the outside. Little towers and spires, many little windows, all round and square.

  “But inside?” She made a face and shuddered. “Oh, so very damp and cold! No fires here. No lights there. Only a bit of a brazier that burned charcoal, very bright and not warm at all. A grandmother? A castle? Ah, yes, perhaps. But who wants so grand a castle that is cold? Who would wish for a grandmother who did not bend nor smile?

  “And besides,” she added, as she sank into a chair, “she may not have been my grandmother at all. This was long ago. I was only a little one.”

  “All the same,” Florence muttered to herself, some time later, “I’d like to know if that was her grandmother. It might make a difference, a very great difference.”

  CHAPTER XX

  A PLACE OF ENCHANTMENT

  Then came for Petite Jeanne an hour of swiftly passing glory.

  She had arisen late, as was her custom, and was sipping her black coffee when the telephone rang.

  “This is Marjory Dean.” The words came to her over the wire in the faintest whisper. But how they thrilled her! “Is this Petite Jeanne? Or is it Pierre?” The prima donna was laughing.

  “It is Petite Jeanne at breakfast,” Jeanne answered. Her heart was in her throat. What was she to expect?

  “Then will you please ask Pierre if it will be possible for him to meet me at the Opera House stage door at three this afternoon?”

  “I shall ask him.” Jeanne put on a business-like tone. For all that, her heart was pounding madly. “It may be my great opportunity!” she told herself. “I may yet appear for a brief space of time in an opera. What glory!”

  After allowing a space of thirty seconds to elapse, during which time she might be supposed to have consulted the mythical Pierre, she replied quite simply:

  “Yes, Miss Dean, Pierre will meet you at that hour. And he wishes me to thank you very much.”

  “Sh! Never a word of this!” came over the phone; then the voice was gone.

  Jeanne spent the remainder of the forenoon in a tumult of excitement. At noon she ate a light lunch, drank black tea, then sat down to study the score of her favorite opera, “The Juggler of Notre Dame.”

  It is little wonder that Jeanne loved this more than any other opera. It is the story of a simple wanderer, a juggler. Jeanne, as we have said before, had been a wanderer in France. She had danced the gypsy dances with her bear in every village of France and every suburb of Paris.

  And Cluny, a suburb of Paris, is the scene of this little opera. A juggler, curiously enough named Jean, arrives in this village just as the people have begun to celebrate May Day in the square before the convent.

  The juggler is welcomed. But one by one his poor tricks are scorned. The people demand a drinking song. The juggler is pious. He fears to offend the Virgin. But at last, beseeching the Virgin’s forgiveness, he grants their request.

  Hearing the shouts of the crowd, the prior of the monastery comes out to scatter the crowd and rebuke the singer. He bids the poor juggler repent and, putting the world at his back, enter the monastery, never more to wander over the beautiful hills of France.

  In the juggler’s poor mind occurs a great struggle. And in this struggle these words are wrung from his lips:

  “But renounce, when I am still young,

  Renounce to follow thee, oh, Liberty, beloved,

  Careless fay with clear golden smile!

  ’Tis she my heart for mistress has chosen;

  Hair in the wind laughing, she takes my hand,

  She drags me on chance of the hour and the road.

  The silver of the waters, the gold of the blond harvest,

  The diamonds of the nights, through her are mine!

  I have space through her, and love and the world.

  The villain, through her, becomes king!

  By her divine charm, all smiles on me, all enchants,

  And, to accompany the flight of my song,

  The concert of the birds snaps in the green bush.

  Gracious mistress and sister I have chosen.

  Must I now lose you, oh, my royal treasure?

  Oh, Liberty, my beloved,

  Careless fay of the golden smile!”

  “Liberty ... careless fay of the golden smile.” Jeanne repeated these words three times. Then with dreamy eyes that spanned a nation and an ocean, she saw again the lanes, the hedges, the happy villages of France.

  “Who better than I can feel as that poor juggler felt as he gave all this up for the monastery’s narrow walls?” she asked. No answer came back. She knew the answer well enough for all that. And this knowledge gave her courage for the hours that were to come.

  She met Marjory Dean by one of the massive pillars that adorn the great Opera House.

  “To think,” she whispered, “that all this great building should be erected that thousands might hear you sing!”

  “Not me alone.” The prima donna smiled. “Many, many others and many, I hope, more worthy than I.”

  “What a life you have had!” the little French girl cried rapturously. “You have truly lived!

  “To work, to dream, to hope,” she went on, “to struggle onward toward some distant goal, this is life.”

  “Ah, no, my child.” Marjory Dean’s face warmed with a kindly smile. “This is not life. It is but the beginning of life. One does not work long, hope much, struggle far, before he becomes conscious of someone on the way before him. As he becomes conscious of this one, the other puts out a hand to aid him forward. Together they work, dream, hope and struggle onward. Together they succeed more completely.

  “And then,” her tone was mellow, thoughtful, “there comes the time when the one who had been given the helping hand by one before looks back and sees still another who struggles bravely over the way he has come. His other hand stretches back to this weaker one. And so, with someone before to assist, with one behind to be assisted, he works, dreams, hopes and struggles on through his career, be it long or short. And this, my child, is life.”

  “Yes, I see it now. I knew it before. But one forgets. Watch me. I shall cling tightly to your hand. And when my turn comes I shall pray for courage and strength, then reach back to one who struggles a little way behind.”

  “Wise, brave child! How one could love you!”

  With this the prima donna threw her arm across Jeanne’s shoulder and together they marched into the place of solemn enchantment, an Opera House that is “dark.”

  CHAPTER XXI

  FROM THE HEIGHTS TO DESPAIR

  “Today,” said Marjory Dean, as they came out upon the dimly lighted stage, “as you will see,” she glanced about her where the setting of a French village was to be seen “we are to rehearse ‘The Juggler of Notre Dame.’ And today, if you have the courage, you may play the juggler in my
stead.”

  “Oh!” Jeanne’s breath came short and quick. Her wild heartbeats of anticipation had not been in vain.

  “But the company!” she exclaimed in a low whisper. “Shall they know?”

  “They will not be told. Many will guess that something unusual is happening. But they all are good sports. And besides they are all of my—what is it you have called it?—my ‘Golden Circle.’”

  “Yes, yes, your ‘Golden Circle.’”

  “And those of our ‘Golden Circle’ never betray us. It is an unwritten law.”

  “Ah!” Jeanne breathed deeply. “Can I do it?”

  “Certainly you can. And perhaps, on the very next night when the ‘Juggler’ is done—oh, well, you know.”

  “Yes. I know.” Jeanne was fairly choking with emotion.

  When, however, half an hour later, garbed as the juggler with his hoop and his bag of tricks, she came before the troop of French villagers of the drama, she was her own calm self. For once again as in a dream, she trod the streets of a beautiful French village. As of yore she danced before the boisterous village throng.

  Only now, instead of stick and bear, she danced with hoop and bag.

  She was conscious at once that the members of the company realized that she was a stranger and not Marjory Dean.

  “But I shall show them how a child of France may play her native drama.” At once she lost herself in the character of Jean, the wandering-juggler.

  Eagerly she offered to do tricks with cup and balls, to remove eggs from a hat.

  Scorned by the throng, she did not despair.

  “I know the hoop dance.”

  The children of the troop seized her by the hands to drag her about. And Jeanne, the lithe Jeanne who had so often enthralled thousands by her fairy-like steps, danced clumsily as the juggler must, then allowed herself to be abused by the children until she could break away.

  “What a glorious company!” she was thinking in the back of her mind. “How they play up to me!”

  “My lords,” she cried when once more she was free, “to please you I’ll sing a fine love salvation song.”

  They paid her no heed. As the juggler she did not despair.

  As Jeanne, she saw a movement in a seat close to the opera pit. “An auditor!” Her heart sank. “What if it is someone who suspects and will give me away!” There was scant time for these thoughts.

  As the juggler she offered songs of battle, songs of conquest, drama. To all this they cried:

  “No! No! Give us rather a drinking song!”

  At last yielding to their demand she sang: “Hallelujah, Sing the Hallelujah of Wine.”

  Then as the prior descended upon the throng, scattering them like tiny birds before a gale, she stood there alone, defenseless, as the prior denounced her.

  Real tears were in her eyes as she began her farewell to the glorious liberty of hedge and field, river, road and forest of France.

  This farewell was destined to end unfinished for suddenly a great bass voice roared:

  “What is this? You are not Marjory Dean! Where is she? What are you doing here?”

  A huge man with a fierce black mustache stood towering above her. She recognized in him the director of the opera, and wished that the section of the stage beneath her feet might sink, carrying her from sight.

  “Here I am,” came in a clear, cold tone. It was Marjory Dean who spoke. She advanced toward the middle of the stage.

  Riveted to their places, the members of the company stood aghast. Full well they knew the fire that lay ever smoldering in Marjory Dean’s breast.

  “And what does this mean? Why are you not rehearsing your part?”

  “Because,” Miss Dean replied evenly, “I chose to allow another, who can do it quite as well, to rehearse with the company.”

  “And I suppose,” there was bitter sarcasm in the director’s voice, “she will sing the part when that night comes?”

  “And if she did?”

  “Then, Miss Dean, your services would no longer be required.” The man was purple with rage.

  “Very well.” Marjory Dean’s face went white. “We may as well—”

  But Petite Jeanne was at her side. “Miss Dean, you do not know what you are saying. It is not worth the cost. Please, please!” she pleaded with tears in her voice. “Please forget me. At best I am only a little French wanderer. And you, you are the great Marjory Dean!”

  Reading the anguish in her upturned face, Marjory Dean’s anger was turned to compassion.

  “Another time, another place,” she murmured. “I shall never forget you!”

  Half an hour later the rehearsal was begun once more. This time Marjory Dean was in the stellar role. It was a dead rehearsal. All the sparkle of it was gone. But it was a rehearsal all the same, and the director had had his way.

  CHAPTER XXII

  THE ARMORED HORSE

  As for Jeanne, once more dressed as Pierre and feeling like just no one at all, she had gone wandering away into the shadows of the orchestra floor, when suddenly she started. Someone had touched her arm.

  Until this moment she had quite forgotten the lone auditor seated there in the dark. Now as she bent low to look into that person’s face she started again as a name came to her lips.

  “Rosemary Robinson!”

  “It is I,” Rosemary whispered. “I saw it all, Pierre.” She held Jeanne’s hand in a warm grasp. “You were wonderful! Simply magnificent! And the director. He was beastly!”

  “No! No!” Jeanne protested. “He was but doing his duty.”

  “This,” Rosemary replied slowly, “may be true. But for all that you are a marvelous ‘Juggler of Notre Dame.’ And it is too bad he found out.

  “But come!” she whispered eagerly, springing to her feet. “Why weep when there is so much to be glad about? Let us go exploring!

  “My father,” she explained, “has done much for this place. I have the keys to every room. There are many mysteries. You shall see some of them.”

  Seizing Jeanne’s hand, she led the way along a corridor, down two gloomy flights of stairs and at last into a vast place where only here and there a light burned dimly.

  They were now deep down below the level of the street. The roar and thunder of traffic came to them only as a subdued rumble of some giant talking in his sleep.

  The room was immense. Shadows were everywhere, shadows and grotesque forms.

  “Where are we?” Jeanne asked, scarcely able to repress a desire to flee.

  “It is one of the property rooms of the Opera House. What will you have?” Rosemary laughed low and deep. “Only ask for it. You will find it here. All these things are used at some time or another in the different operas.”

  As Jeanne’s eyes became accustomed to the pale half-light, she realized that this must be nearly true. In a corner, piled tight in great dark sections, was a miniature mountain. Standing on edge, but spilling none of its make-believe water, was a pond where swans were wont to float.

  A little way apart were the swans, resting on great heaps of grass that did not wither and flowers that did not die.

  In a distant corner stood a great gray castle. Someone had set it up, perhaps to make sure that it was all intact, then had left it standing.

  “What a place for mystery!” Jeanne exclaimed.

  “Yes, and listen! Do you hear it?”

  “Hear what?”

  “The river. We are far below the river. Listen. Do you not hear it flowing?”

  “I hear only the rumble of traffic.”

  “Perhaps I only imagine it, but always when I visit this place I seem to hear the river rushing by. And always I think, ‘What if the walls should crumble?’”

  “But they will not crumble.”

  “We shall hope not.

  “But see.” The rich girl’s mood changed. “Here is a charger! Let us mount and ride!”

  She sprang toward a tall object completely covered by a white cloth. When the cloth had been
dragged off, a great steed all clad in glittering armor stood before them.

  “Come!” Rosemary’s voice rose high. “Here we are! You are a brave knight. I am a defenseless lady. Give me your hand. Help me to mount behind you. Then I will cling to you while we ride through some deep, dark forest where there are dragons and cross-bowmen and all sorts of terrifying perils.”

  Joining her in this spirit of make-believe, Jeanne assisted her to the back of the inanimate charger.

  Having touched some secret button, Rosemary set the charger in motion. They were riding now. Swaying from side to side, rising, falling, they seemed indeed to be passing through some dark and doleful place. As Jeanne closed her eyes the illusion became quite complete. As she felt Rosemary clinging to her as she might cling to some gallant knight, she forgot for the time that she was Petite Jeanne and that she had suffered a dire disappointment.

  “I am Pierre!” she whispered to herself. “I am a brave knight. Rosemary loves me.”

  The disquieting effect of this last thought awakened her to the realities of life. Perhaps, after all, Rosemary did love her a little as Pierre. If this were true—

  Sliding off the steed, then lifting Rosemary to the floor, she exclaimed:

  “Come! Over yonder is a castle. Let us see who is at home over there.”

  Soon enough she was to see.

  The castle was, as all stage castles are, a mere shell; very beautiful and grand on the outside, a hollow echo within. For all that, the two youthful adventurers found a certain joy in visiting that castle. There was a rough stairway leading up through great empty spaces within to a broad, iron-railed balcony. From this balcony, on more than one night, an opera lover had leaned forth to sing songs of high enchantment, luring forth a hidden lover.

  They climbed the stairs. Then Petite Jeanne, caught by the spell of the place, leaned far out of the window and burst into song, a wild gypsy serenade.

  Rosemary was leaning back among the rafters, drinking in the sweet mystery of life that was all about her, when of a sudden the French girl’s song broke off. Her face went white for an instant as she swayed there and must surely have fallen had not Rosemary caught her.

  “Wha—what is it?” she whispered hoarsely.