Kitabı oku: «The Mystery of the Fires», sayfa 8
CHAPTER XV
Captive
Mary Louise was not far away from Shady Nook in the matter of miles, but she felt as if she were worlds away. Everything was strangely different from anything she had ever known – grotesque and terrible. For the place she was taken to was an asylum for the insane!
Little did she think as she entered the Adams’ farmhouse that afternoon that her freedom was to be snatched from her. That she was to be held in hopeless captivity, without any means of communication with the outside world. A prisoner in a house that was far worse than a jail, enduring a life that was living death!
When no one answered her knock at the Adams’ door that afternoon, she opened the screen and walked in, calling first Hattie and then Rebecca by name. Finally the latter replied.
“I’m up here, sick abed!” called the woman. “Who be you?”
“It’s Mary Louise,” she answered. “May I come up and see you, Rebecca?”
“Yes, yes. Come! Have you found a well of clear water?”
Mary Louise laughed to herself as she ran up the stairs. She wished that she could find some well water for the poor deluded woman, but there was none in the vicinity. She wondered what Rebecca would do if she ever did discover a well.
She entered the bedroom, smiling and shaking her head at the poor eager creature.
“No, Rebecca – not yet. But I’ll find you one some day. How are you feeling?”
“I’m better. I want to get out soon. Will you get me a drink of water, Mary Louise?”
“Certainly,” replied the girl. “From the kitchen?”
“Yes. From the kitchen.”
The woman sank back on her pillow, and Mary Louise went for the water. When she returned, Rebecca was half asleep.
“Here’s your water, Rebecca,” she said. “But where is Hattie?”
“I don’t know. Gone away, I guess. They’ve all gone away… Soon I’ll go too…” Her voice trailed off as if she were half dreaming, and Mary Louise walked to the door. She heard the sound of a car in the driveway below, and hoping that it might be Hattie, she went down the stairs.
But the car standing in front of the house was not the dilapidated Ford that belonged to the Adams family. It was a big black limousine which reminded Mary Louise of a hearse or a funeral carriage, and she shuddered. It might have been an ambulance, but ambulances were usually white. She wondered what a car like that could be doing at the Adams farm.
Two men got down from the driver’s seat in front, and Tom Adams came and joined them at the porch steps. They talked in low tones to each other. Mary Louise opened the screen door and came out on the porch. Suddenly she heard her own name mentioned, and a cold chill of horror crept up her spine. What were they planning to do to her?
“She says she’s Mary Louise Gay,” remarked Tom. “Insists on it. And she does look like a girl by that name. But don’t believe her. She’s my sister Rebecca.” He raised his eyes and looked straight at Mary Louise. “Hello, Rebecca!” he said. “We’re going to take you for a ride!”
Mary Louise’s brown eyes flashed in anger.
“Rebecca’s upstairs, sick in bed,” she retorted. “Go and see for yourselves.”
Suddenly, with the agility of panthers, the two men sprang forward and grabbed Mary Louise’s wrists.
“Come along, Rebecca,” one of them said. “No use struggling. We’re taking you to a nice farm.”
With a desperate effort to free herself from the men’s grasp, Mary Louise kicked one of her captors in the leg. He let go of her hand, but the other man held her tightly.
“Wild little beast,” he remarked. “Now, sister, you take it easy. We ain’t going to hurt you. You’ll like it where you’re going – you’ll get better care than you do here. Your brother says there’s nobody here to look after you now that your mother’s gone.”
“He’s not my brother!” shouted Mary Louise. “And I can prove it! Just drive down to Shady Nook – a couple of miles – and ask anybody!”
But the men preferred to ignore this challenge; they picked Mary Louise up bodily and thrust her into the back of the limousine, shutting the door and turning the key in the lock!
She found herself sitting on a long seat that ran the length of the car. There were no windows on the side; only two tiny oval glasses in the back door permitted a little light to enter the enclosure. Before she could utter another sound she heard the engine start, and the vehicle went into motion. Over the rough, stony driveway, onto the dirt road that led away from the farm, in the opposite direction from Shady Nook.
Mary Louise’s first impulse was to scream as loudly as she could in the hope of attracting the notice of the occupants of some passing car or of some farmer working in his field. But second consideration told her that such a proceeding would do her no good at all. As soon as those men in the front seat explained that she was a crazy person being taken to an insane asylum, nobody would believe anything she said.
The realization of this fact brought a deathly hopelessness to her whole body. Her arms and legs felt inert, her head sank back against the cushion as if her very spirit were flowing away. Leaving her helpless – and finished with life.
For perhaps ten minutes she sat thus, unmindful of the country through which she was being driven. As if she had been stunned by a physical blow and no aid were near.
Then suddenly she thought of Tom Adams, and a fierce anger took possession of her, reviving her spirits, bringing her back to life. She would not give up! She would fight to the bitter end; she’d make him pay – and pay heavily – for his diabolical cruelty!
She moved along the seat to the far end of the car and peered through the tiny window. The road over which they were passing was narrow and rough; the country unfamiliar. It was not a main highway, Mary Louise instantly concluded, and she wondered in which direction it lay from Shady Nook. She wished now that she had watched it from the beginning. She did not even know whether they had crossed the river or not.
“Still, I suppose that doesn’t really matter,” she thought. “Because, if I can manage to get away at all, I can easily find my family. They’ll be hunting for me.” Tears of distress came to her eyes as she pictured her mother’s anguish. And her father was so far away!
“Why did I ever try to be a detective?” she groaned. “The punishment is too horrible. Mother and Daddy would rather lose their cottage and have the whole settlement at Shady Nook burned than have me endure torture like this!”
On and on they went through the lonely, unpopulated country. Time seemed to stand still; it was as if the afternoon were to last forever. Yet when Mary Louise glanced at her wristwatch she saw that it was not yet five o’clock!
They crossed over a little stream, and the car turned at an angle and climbed a hill. Up, up they went, until they reached a narrow road at the summit. Looking down into the valley below Mary Louise could see a stream – not as wide as the river – winding its peaceful way in the summer sunshine. It was a beautiful spot – if you could enjoy beauty. But it meant nothing at all to the unhappy girl.
“That looks like a main road across the valley on the opposite side of the stream,” she thought. “If I can escape, I’ll make for that. Thank goodness I know how to swim!”
She wished that she had thought to glance at her watch when the car started, so that she could roughly judge the distance from Shady Nook by the time it took to cover it. But she had been so miserable that she could not tell whether she had been riding twenty minutes or a couple of hours.
At last, however, the car came to a stop at a high iron gate which reminded Mary Louise of a penitentiary. So this was the way they guarded feeble-minded people!
One of the men got down from his seat, took a key from his pocket to unlock the gate, and swung the heavy iron doors open. When the car had gone through he locked them securely behind him.
A shiver of horror passed over Mary Louise as she heard that final click. A sense of hopelessness overpowered her to such an intense degree that she felt physically sick. A life of utter emptiness was closing her in, as if her mind and her soul had been extracted from her body. How much more fiendish her existence would be than that of any ordinary victim of kidnapers! But then, Tom Adams had not kidnaped her because he wanted a ransom, but only because he desired to get rid of her. Well, he had succeeded! Nobody in the whole world would think of looking for her in an insane asylum.
The car wound around a lovely driveway, shaded by trees, and stopped in front of a long, low plaster building that appeared to be at least a hundred years old. A man and a woman came out of the ivy-covered door as the driver unlocked the back of the limousine.
With her head held high in defiance, Mary Louise stepped out.
“How do you do, Rebecca,” greeted the woman, a plain-faced person of about fifty, in a gray dress.
“There has been a ghastly mistake!” announced Mary Louise, trying to keep her tone dignified. “Tom Adams is a criminal, and because I found him out he has sent me here, calling me his feeble-minded sister. I am not Rebecca Adams – but Mary Louise Gay!”
The man and the woman exchanged significant glances.
“Mr. Adams warned us that you would say that,” replied the man. “He said you do look like a girl named Mary Louise Gay. But try to forget it, Rebecca. We have your papers, signed by your own brother and your cousin, so there is nothing you can do about it but submit.”
“My cousin!” repeated Mary Louise, thinking of her aunt’s children, aged nine and six. How could they commit anybody to an insane asylum?
“Yes. Stanfield Frazier.”
“Frazier!” she cried in scorn. “He’s not my cousin! He’s no relation. He’s a crook too, like Tom Adams.”
“Now, now, Rebecca, calm yourself,” advised the woman, taking Mary Louise’s arm. “And just come along with me. You don’t want to make trouble! Wouldn’t you rather walk by yourself than have these men carry you?”
Tears of anguish came to the girl’s eyes; she looked desperately about at the group of people who were surrounding her, searching for some spark of sympathy or understanding. But the men were all regarding her with an amused expression of tolerance, as if her action were just what they had expected.
“Isn’t there some way I can prove that I’m sane?” she demanded. “Some test I can take?”
“Oh, don’t get yourself all worked up, Rebecca,” answered the woman. “Your brother told us you were all right most of the time and that you probably wouldn’t give us any trouble. We’re not going to put you into chains. You’ll like it here.”
Mary Louise groaned. There was nothing she could do or say so long as they believed that wicked Tom Adams.
So she meekly followed the woman into the house. Its large hall and big reception room were plain and old-fashioned, with very little furniture in them, but she noticed that everything was scrupulously neat and clean. For that much she was thankful. Often, she had read, the places where kidnapers confined their victims were filthy and germ laden. She need have no fear of disease here – except disease of the mind!
A younger woman in the white uniform of a nurse came into the hall to meet them.
“This is Miss Stone, Rebecca,” announced the older woman. “She will help you and take care of you. Now go with Miss Stone to your room.”
“Didn’t you bring any bag, Rebecca?” asked the nurse, as she led Mary Louise up a flight of stairs to a long corridor.
Mary Louise smiled grimly.
“Kidnapers don’t usually allow their victims time to pack their suitcases,” she said. “And if you don’t mind, Miss Stone, will you call me by my right name? It’s Mary Louise Gay.”
The young woman nodded solemnly.
“Certainly, Mary Louise,” she replied.
Mary Louise looked at the nurse hopefully, wondering whether she was really finding a friend. Did the nurse believe her?
All the doors along the corridor were closed, but Mary Louise had no way of telling whether they were locked or not until, down near the end, she suddenly heard a loud pounding. Miss Stone stopped and, taking a key from her chain, unlocked the door. A mild-faced woman of about thirty-five came out.
“I just wanted to see who was coming,” she said. “Ah! A pretty girl.”
Miss Stone paused and introduced them courteously. The patient was dressed in the blue calico of the institution, but there was nothing queer or odd about her looks. She appeared to be much more normal than Rebecca Adams.
“This is Mary Louise Gay,” said Miss Stone. “She has come to live with us. And this, Mary Louise, is Joan of Arc. The girl who saved France, you remember?”
“Oh!” gasped Mary Louise, in amazement. Was Miss Stone joking, or did the patient really believe she was Joan of Arc?
The woman in calico smiled proudly.
“Yes,” she said. “I rode right at the head of my soldiers. I told them God was on our side. And we won! But they are going to burn me at the stake for being a witch if they ever find me. That’s why I stay here. I’m safe here. Aren’t I, Miss Stone?”
“Yes, dear, you’re safe,” was the nurse’s gentle assurance.
A lump came into Mary Louise’s throat. The pathos of it all! Yet how kind and sweet Miss Stone was. Oh, but – ghastly thought – the nurse was being kind to Mary Louise in the same way! That was why she humored her by calling her “Mary Louise.” And all the time she believed her to be Rebecca Adams!
Three doors farther down the nurse stopped and unlocked another door.
“This is to be your room, Mary Louise,” she said. “It’ll be nicer when you put some flowers in it. We have a lovely garden, and most of the patients have their own special flower beds. You can grow whatever you like best.”
Mary Louise looked about her. Never in her life had she seen such a plain room. It contained only a bed and a washstand and one chair. Not even a bureau or a table! The window was high and uncurtained. To her horror Mary Louise saw that it was protected by iron bars!
“You take off your clothing now and have a bath. You can put your own things in the drawer of that washstand, and I’ll bring you fresh clothing. Everybody wears blue here.”
“Where do I take my bath?” asked Mary Louise dully. Not that she cared in the least, except that it would be something to do.
“I’ll take you to the showers when I come back with your new clothing,” replied Miss Stone. And to Mary Louise’s dismay the nurse locked the door from the outside as she departed.
The next twelve hours seemed to Mary Louise the longest she had ever lived through. After her bath she was told to lie down until supper time. She was entirely alone in that bare room until six o’clock, with nothing to do but think. Finally an attendant brought her a tray of food, well cooked and wholesome but far from dainty. Nevertheless, Mary Louise ate it, for she knew that she must keep up her strength if she ever hoped to make an escape. Another attendant removed the tray, and she was left alone again until eight o’clock. Then Miss Stone returned.
“We have a little vesper service in the reception room, Mary Louise,” she said. “Would you like to come and join us?”
The girl jumped up eagerly. Anything would be better than this dreadful idleness.
“Don’t your patients have anything to do?” she inquired as she went down the hall with the nurse. “This doing nothing is enough to drive anybody crazy!” She smiled to herself at the use of the common expression and wondered whether Miss Stone noticed it.
But the nurse gave no sign of any amusement. “Oh, yes, Mary Louise,” she replied, “there will be lots for you to do tomorrow. Everybody takes some share in the work, if possible. Unless they are too ill. And we go for walks around the grounds and work in the garden. But we thought you’d be too tired tonight and would just want to rest.”
They joined a group of perhaps twenty people in the reception room for the singing of hymns, and the same woman who had met Mary Louise at the door of the building read the Bible. Mary Louise looked about curiously at her fellow inmates and did not find them particularly strange-looking. One or two of them had queer, staring eyes like Rebecca Adams, but for the most part they appeared normal. Which fact made it all the harder for Mary Louise to prove anything about herself to the caretakers!
At nine o’clock the service was over and everybody went to bed. But, exhausted as she was, Mary Louise could not go to sleep. She tried over and over to formulate some plan of escape, but with the locked doors, the constant supervision of nurses and attendants, and that high stone wall, it seemed absolutely hopeless.
It was only when the first gray light of dawn broke in the sky that she finally dozed off and then fell into a deep, heavy sleep.
CHAPTER XVI
Weary Waiting
Like her daughter, Mrs. Gay did not go to sleep until dawn of the following morning. Her mental torture was even keener than Mary Louise’s, for her imagination suggested all sorts of horrible fates, worse than the one the girl was actually enduring. Physical violence, association with hardened criminals, hunger, thirst – and – death. That was the most terrifying thought of all – the fear that Mary Louise might already be dead!
Like her daughter’s, too, Mrs. Gay’s suffering was all the more intense because she had to bear it alone through the long, silent night. Freckles and Jane, tired out from their vigorous search, had fallen instantly asleep. There was nobody to sympathize with the poor frenzied mother. She swallowed dose after dose of aspirin, until finally, with the first gray streaks of dawn, she at last fell asleep.
Freckles was the first person awake in the household the next morning, and he immediately started the breakfast. Jane, arriving on the scene fifteen minutes later, was surprised and delighted at the boy’s progress.
“We better not waken Mother,” he said. “I don’t suppose she got much sleep last night.”
“I’m afraid not.” Tears came to Jane’s eyes as they rested on the forlorn little dog sitting so disconsolately in the corner of the kitchen. “Freckles, what do you think could have happened to Mary Lou?” she asked.
“I think Tom Adams did something to her. Kidnaped her, probably. But I had one idea this morning, Jane, while I was making the coffee. Maybe he hid her in his own house somewhere! We never thought to search that.”
“Bright boy!” exclaimed Jane, so loudly as to awaken Mrs. Gay, who heard her from her bedroom. For one ecstatic moment the woman hoped that her daughter had been found. But Freckles’ next remark dispelled any such idea.
“It’s worth looking into,” he continued. “But I don’t really think she’s there, or Hattie would come and tell us. I can’t believe Hattie is an enemy – or on Tom’s side. She’s too fond of Mary Lou.”
Mrs. Gay, attired in a kimono and looking white and exhausted, peered in at the kitchen door.
“That coffee smells so good,” she said, “that I just can’t wait for a cup of it.”
Freckles grinned in delight and poured out the steaming liquid. It seemed to revive his mother, and she drank it eagerly. But she could not eat any breakfast.
“We’re going up to Adams’ first,” announced the boy. “I’ll get Stu Robinson to drive us in his car – and we’ll take Silky along. If Mary Lou should be hidden there, Silky’d find her… And, Mother – if the police come, be sure to have them talk to Horace Ditmar and get a look at that threat he found shoved under his door yesterday!”
“I will, dear,” returned Mrs. Gay, smiling to herself at the idea of taking orders from her small son. But the boy was proving himself both practical and businesslike in the management of the whole affair.
“I wonder whether Adelaide Ditmar will open her dining room today as she planned,” remarked Jane.
A lump came into Mrs. Gay’s throat, but she managed to reply calmly:
“I think so. She has all her food bought, and besides, the people are expecting it. Mrs. Reed told me last night that Sue and Mabel are both going to help her – if – if – Mary Lou doesn’t come back in time. You had better tell Hattie Adams to come down to the Ditmars’ as soon as she can, though I don’t believe Adelaide is planning to serve lunch.”
Jane nodded, and finished her breakfast. After she and Freckles and the little dog had gone, the people from the other bungalows began to arrive at the Gays’, to start upon a new search for the missing girl. Horace Ditmar sent them off in various directions while he and several of the older women stayed behind to help and to advise Mrs. Gay.
At nine-thirty a small red car drove into Shady Nook and stopped at the Gays’ bungalow. Three plainclothes men got out, displaying their badges for identification.
“We want the whole story,” they said. “So far we know nothing – except that Mary Louise Gay, of Riverside and Shady Nook, is missing.”
“We don’t know much more ourselves,” sighed Mrs. Gay. Then she proceeded to tell the story of the girl’s disappearance the preceding afternoon.
“As far as we know, the last person who saw her alive is Rebecca Adams, a feeble-minded woman who lives over at a farm where we know that Mary Louise started to go. Nobody saw her after that.”
“Have you any suspicions at all?” inquired the detective.
Horace Ditmar answered that question by telling about the three fires at Shady Nook and by showing the paper which had warned him of the possibility of a fourth.
“Mary Louise suspected Tom Adams – the brother of this feeble-minded woman – though we don’t know yet upon what clues she based her suspicions,” he concluded. “But it looks as if Adams was guilty, for he ran away. He didn’t take Mary Louise with him – we know that, because his sister drove him to the Junction – but we’re afraid he did something to her first.”
“So our first duty is to find this Tom Adams,” announced the detective, rising. “Can you take us over to the farm now, Ditmar? Or rather, just one of us, for the other two better stay here and investigate that threat. And we want a picture of Miss Mary Louise Gay. We’ll get one of Adams and print them both in every newspaper in the country.”
“But that’s not the only clue we’ll work on,” put in another of the men. “That may be entirely wrong, and Miss Gay may just have met with an accident, or even lost her memory. There are many cases of that, you know.”
Mrs. Gay nodded. That was just the trouble: so many dreadful things might have happened to Mary Louise!
However, she resolved to keep up her spirits until she actually heard bad news. She could endure the tension in the daytime, she thought, by keeping herself active; perhaps, before night, her husband would come.
So she hunted out some pictures of Mary Louise for the detectives and answered their questions for an hour. Just as the two men left to go to Ditmars, to investigate the threat and guard Adelaide, the roar of an airplane in the sky drew Mrs. Gay’s attention. It was an auto-giro, fluttering over a near-by field where there did not happen to be any trees.
Breathlessly she waited while it made its landing. But the motor did not stop, and only one man got out of the cockpit. Then, as the auto-giro speeded away, the man on the field began to run towards Shady Nook. In another moment she identified him as her husband – Detective Gay, of the police force!
He took the porch steps two at a time and, out of breath as he was, lifted his trembling wife into his arms. For the first time since the disaster Mrs. Gay broke down and sobbed. But what a relief it was to give way to her feelings at last! Her husband shared her anguish and understood, comforting her as best he could with words of assurance.
“We’ll find her, dear, I’m sure we will!” he said. “Mary Lou isn’t a baby: she’ll show lots of pluck and courage. I’m counting on that daughter of ours every time!”
“Have you any plans at all, dear?” she inquired.
“Yes. Lots. I’m going to do a lot of telegraphing as soon as I get the whole story. I was never so thankful before that I’d chosen the detective profession.”
“Have you had anything to eat?”
Mr. Gay smiled. “Now that you mention it, I don’t believe I have. You might fix me some coffee while you tell me just what happened.”
Freckles and Jane returned while Mr. Gay was eating his meal, but they had nothing to report. Hattie was sure that Tom could not be guilty; she believed that he was running away from his gambling debts. Nevertheless, she had consented immediately to a thorough search of the house and barn for the missing girl. Yet even Silky’s sharp nose could not find her.
The boy was delighted to find his father at home; he felt immediately that a great weight had been lifted from his shoulders. For, like Mary Louise, he believed that his father could almost accomplish the impossible.
“We’re going over to the other shore after lunch – with Silky,” he said, “and hunt some more.”
“That’s right, Son,” approved Mr. Gay. “We’ll never give up till we find Mary Lou!”
None of the other searchers returned with any news all that afternoon. The day was hot and sultry, and to Mrs. Gay, interminable. Everything was so strangely quiet at the little resort; no radios played, no young people shouted to each other or burst into singing. Even the birds seemed hushed, as if they too sensed the tragedy of the usually happy little colony.
Late in the afternoon the four girls who were working at the Ditmars’ went into the river to cool off with a swim, and Mr. Gay decided to join them. But it was more like a bath than a swim, and nobody seemed to enjoy it.
Mr. Gay dressed and joined his wife on the porch, waiting for the detectives to return. Suddenly a noisy car came towards them – a bright green roadster which was somehow familiar yet did not belong at Shady Nook. It was dusty and dirty; its two occupants wore goggles, as if they had been participating in a race, and until they spoke neither of the Gays recognized them. Then they identified them instantly as Max Miller and Norman Wilder, from Riverside.
“Any news yet?” demanded Max eagerly as he jumped out of the car.
“No, not a bit,” replied Mr. Gay. “How did you boys find out about it? Is it in the papers?”
“It’s in the afternoon edition,” replied Norman, handing a newspaper to the other. “But of course we started before that. There was a wire to the Riverside police last night, that we got wind of. So we started early this morning.”
“I think it’s fine of you both to come,” said Mrs. Gay, though she could not at the moment see what possible help they might afford.
“We’re going to have a swim, clean up our car, and eat,” announced Max; “then we’re going to drive all around here within a radius of a hundred miles, tooting our horn and going slowly.”
“I didn’t know you boys knew how to drive slowly,” remarked Mr. Gay teasingly.
“Well, we really won’t need to toot our horn,” returned Norman in the same light manner, “because the color of our car is loud enough to shriek for us!”
Mabel and Sue Reed, passing by the bungalow on their way back to the Ditmars’, stopped in and met the boys. Mrs. Gay asked them to put two extra places at the dinner table for them.
Gradually the searchers returned – without any success – and everybody went to Ditmars to dinner. It was a lovely meal. Adelaide Ditmar proved that she knew how to prepare food and serve it attractively, and, in spite of their anxiety, everybody enjoyed it. Everybody except Mrs. Gay, who could only pick at her food.
True to their resolve, Max and Norman drove off in their car immediately after supper, with Freckles and Jane along with them. The rest of the inhabitants of Shady Nook settled down to a quiet evening of waiting. Waiting and hoping for news.
About eight o’clock Mr. and Mrs. Frazier came over from the hotel to offer their sympathy to the Gays.
“I don’t want to alarm you, Gay,” said Frazier, “but I think you haven’t given enough thought to the river. Mary Louise was playing tennis on our court early in the afternoon, and the most natural thing in the world would be for her to take a swim afterwards. You know yourself that even the best of swimmers have cramps.”
Mrs. Gay clutched her husband’s arm tightly in an effort to control herself. What a horrible suggestion!
“Terrible as it is, drowning is better than lots of things that might happen,” remarked Mrs. Frazier.
Mrs. Gay glared at the woman with hatred in her eyes. How could she sit there and talk like that? She rose abruptly.
“You’ll have to excuse us now, Mrs. Frazier,” she said unsteadily. “My husband and I have things to do.”
The hotelkeeper and his wife got up from their chairs just as the detectives’ car stopped at the bungalow. Everybody waited tensely.
“No news of your daughter, Mrs. Gay,” announced one of the detectives, immediately. “But we are on Adams’ trail. He’s been spotted, speeding across the country in a stolen car. This afternoon they found the car, abandoned near a woods. Undoubtedly he’s guilty.”
Frazier’s white face became even more pasty-looking. Nobody noticed it, except Mr. Gay, who made it his business to watch people’s reactions.
“If I may say something,” put in the hotelkeeper, looking straight at the detective, “I think you’re on the wrong track. Adams is guilty of a small theft – he stole two hundred dollars from me, and he left some gambling debts. That’s why he’s running away. But I believe your real criminal is right here at Shady Nook!”
“Who?” demanded all the detectives at once.
“Ditmar. Horace Ditmar. These fires have proved to be a good thing for him. Ditmars took over all that boarding-house trade after Flicks’ Inn burned down. Mary Louise was on the inside, so they were probably afraid she’d find out too much – and – disposed of her.”
“I don’t believe a word of it!” cried Mrs. Gay angrily. “I’d trust both Adelaide and Horace anywhere. And how about that threat they got? You saw that?” she asked the detectives.
“That was just a clever trick,” explained Frazier lightly, “to throw off suspicion. You notice it has not been carried out!”
Almost in hysterics, Mrs. Gay felt that she could not bear those dreadful Fraziers another minute. Desperately she clung to her husband’s arm for support.
