  Moselle called from the telephone in the back hall: “Oh, Miss Sim! It’s the gentleman again—Mr. Pangborn!” Sim hurried to the instrument while the other girls looked at one another, laughter in their eyes and with hearts beating faster. “Our old friend of the orchard masquerade,” said Arden. “Do you suppose he’s going to vanish again—take another name and get into some other mystery?” asked Terry. “I hope he’s coming here to spend Christmas!” Dot was very frank in her desires. “It would be a change from ghosts and musty old houses.” “Hush!” warned Arden. “The phone is open—he’ll hear us.” They were chattering loudly near where Sim was speaking and listening over the telephone. They heard her say: “Oh, but how nice! Of course!—Come right over. We’ll have dinner in a little while, and there’ll be a place for you.—Oh, yes, we have been very busy.—What?—I’ll tell you when you come over. But what are you doing in this part of the country?—We thought you were enjoying your millions.—Oh, getting even with me, I see—you’ll tell us when you get here.—Yes, this place is easy to find. All the taxi men know it. See you later!” Sim danced back through the hall to where her friends waited with anxiety to hear the other half of the conversation. “Was it really Harry Pangborn?” demanded Arden. “Of course it was and is! He’s coming over!” Sim laughed merrily. “But why?” “How?” “What for?” “Wait! Wait!” begged Sim, holding her hands up to ward off her importunate chums. “He’s going to explain it all when he comes over. It seems he just arrived in Pentville this afternoon. He was nice enough to say he remembered that we all lived here, and he’s lonesome, so he’s been keeping our line busy. He almost gave up finding us in.” “But what’s he out here for?” asked Terry. “Came especially to see you, my dear,” laughed Sim. “Oh, be serious!” begged Arden. “Well, I can safely wager he didn’t come to see me,” Dot put in. “I really hardly met him. You three monopolized him at Cedar Ridge and then got his thousand dollars’ reward.” “We didn’t get the thousand dollars,” Sim said. “It was really the college swimming pool.” “And Arden solved that mystery,” added Terry, referring to one told of in The Orchard Secret. “If I can only solve this one of Jockey Hollow I’ll go in for mystery solving as a profession,” Arden laughed. “I might major in it at Cedar Ridge.” “Perhaps,” suggested Dot, “now that Harry Pangborn is here, he can help you.” Arden looked at the visitor. Was there anything sarcastic in the remark? Hardly, for Dot smiled brightly. “I still can’t guess why he has come here,” said Terry. “You shall know very soon, child,” mocked Sim. “Now we must get busy and wash our faces. And, oh, I wonder what sort of a dinner Moselle can give us? I must have a talk with her. Run along, girls, get painted and powdered, and I’ll follow as soon as I can.” Shortly after this, Harry Pangborn drove up to the Westover home in a “small but expensive car,” as Dot remarked, catching a glimpse of its gleaming lamps out on the drive. The young man came in, bronzed as to complexion, smiling charmingly, and showing his white even teeth, and greeted the girls with the comradeship of a co-ed. “So glad to see you again,” he told them. “And now, as I heard Sim say she wondered why I was here, I’ll tell you. I’m here in this particular place because I am lonesome for such company as yours.” (That was being gallant.) “And I’m in Pentville because I have a mission to perform in Jockey Hollow.” “Jockey Hollow!” cried the four girls together. “Do you mean you are going to try to rid Sycamore Hall of its ghosts?” asked Arden a moment later. “Ghosts!” exclaimed young Mr. Pangborn. “I don’t know anything about ghosts and less about Sycamore Hall. What’s the joke?” “Ever since they got me here,” supplied Dot, who seemed rather “taken” by the young fellow, “these girls have done nothing but discover ghosts—ghostly noises, dead women on a bed, a man mysteriously missing and found in a cellar—and it all happened at Sycamore Hall, an old Revolutionary mansion in Jockey Hollow that is going to be torn down to make room for a new road.” “This is news to me,” said Harry Pangborn. “I didn’t count on this when I was asked to come to Jockey Hollow. But it’s—grand!” “Just why were you asked?” Sim wanted to know. “Well, you are familiar with the fact that I fell heir to my grandfather’s estate on Long Island,” was the answer. “On it is a big wooded park, and as I happen to be a nature lover, and a wild bird enthusiast in a small way, I carried out some ideas started by my late grandfather and have built up quite a bird sanctuary, as they are called—a place for the conservation of all wild life; you know, of course. I put some new ideas into my experiments. Word of it got around, and I was asked by Dr. Max Thandu, the State Park Commissioner here in your part of the country, to make a sort of survey of Jockey Hollow and lay out a bird sanctuary there. I agreed, for I thoroughly believe in this sort of thing.” “You mean you are going to work around here?” Dorothy asked. “Work,” echoed Arden. “What Harry does is never just—work.” She had called him “Harry,” and a self-conscious flush made her look even prettier. “I understand Jockey Hollow, with its Revolutionary associations, is to be made a state or national park,” Harry went on, smiling kindly at Arden. “The bird sanctuary will only be incidental to its historic value. But I am glad to do my little part there. So, having some leisure time, and the Christmas season being rather a hectic time down our way, and being fond of the woods in winter and solitude—in a way—I decided to use my Christmas vacation by coming to Jockey Hollow and getting some first-hand information.” “What could be nicer for us?” Sim complimented. “Are you going to stay until after Christmas?” Arden inquired. “I hope to. I understand Jockey Hollow is rather a big place, and it will take me several days to survey it, locate proper places for feeding stations, and arrange for a water supply for the birds. When I told Dr. Thandu I would come here, I suddenly happened to remember that you Cedar Ridge girls lived out this way, and so I’m afraid I kept the operator rather busy this afternoon giving her your number, Sim.” “Oh, that, too, would have been kind of you. Central isn’t ever very busy here. I’m sure she rather enjoyed it. The girls listen in, you know.” “She hasn’t anything on me!” he laughed. “Well, now you know why I’m here.” They had all settled down comfortably, and it seemed, with Harry there, their party was complete. “But I thought you said,” remarked Dot, “that you wanted solitude for Christmas,” her eyes were mischievous. “Oh, well, there is solitude—and solitude!” he countered, his gaze sweeping them all in turn, but lingering upon Arden. “But tell me about the ghosts. Are they just too—too divine?” They told him at dinner, which was a success in every way, Moselle and her daughter doing themselves proud in the viands and the serving thereof. Moselle simply loved company, especially young men company. “Now, what do you think of it all?” Arden asked when the various phases of the happenings at the Hall had been recounted. Harry Pangborn was silent for a moment as he crushed the ashes of his cigarette on the plate. The girls waited, not a little anxiously, for his opinion. It was good to have a man around—especially such a delightful young man as Harry Pangborn—one whom they knew and could trust. “Well?” asked Sim, at length. “Well,” he blew out a cloud of smoke, “it sounds to me like either one of two things,” came the answer, slowly given. “It’s either a trick of some mischievous person or persons, as you have hinted, perhaps engineered by a rival contractor. Or—” again a pause—“there may be something in it.” “Do you really mean—ghosts?” gasped Terry. “Well, perhaps what some persons call ghosts,” the young man answered. “Let us say natural manifestations that take on a weird meaning or significance because they are not understood. I now have a double duty here. I’m going to lay out the Jockey Hollow bird sanctuary and——” He lighted a fresh cigarette. “If you’ll leave this to me,” he continued as he inhaled the aromatic smoke, “I’ll do some real investigating, if you want me to.” “It really ought to be done,” said Arden gladly. “We want to help Granny Howe if we can, to put her in a position where she can claim this property; though it seems hopeless after all these years. And we also want to help this Jim Danton. We’ll be so grateful for your help, Harry, and we are so relieved to have you here—just now.” “Such as it is, you shall have it!” promised Mr. Pangborn. |
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