  “Where’s your father’s room?” Bill stepped into the corridor, Charlie at his heels. “There—that one opposite—the door’s open. He isn’t there—I looked before I woke you.” “The bed hasn’t been slept in either—come along downstairs. He may be there.” Bill had had an impression the night before of the solid comfort of the house. But it was not until they descended the great oak staircase in the morning that he realized, in spite of dust sheets, how exquisitely the place was appointed. In true manorial style, armor hung in the hall, marble busts gleamed against the dark, beautifully carved panelling, and half a dozen riding crops dangled from a pair of antlers over the low fireplace. Here Charlie took the lead. They went first to the library, with its secret door in the panelling, through which they had entered the house from the garage. A flashlight lay on the table, amongst the remains of the sandwiches. Bill appropriated it, and after Charlie had opened the sliding door by twisting a knob on the fireplace, they investigated the tunnel and its outlet. But the garage and the underground passage were empty of any human being. They returned to the library, and made a round of the rooms on that floor; a small den, two large living rooms, and a dining room. All the furniture was shrouded in dust covers. The rooms looked gloomy and un-lived-in. Scarcely any light came through the closed shutters. Bill’s feeble flashlight seemed to accentuate the cavernous depths of the huge apartments. A back passage led them to the pantry and immense, stone-floored kitchen. On a table near the sink, an unwashed plate and cup told the story of eggs and coffee. Bill turned to the boy. “There! On a bet, he ate and went out.” “Hadn’t we better go over the rest of the house, though?” There was a slight tremor in Charlie’s voice. “This place is creepy. It was like that when I was here before. I never open a door but what I expect a dead man to walk out on me.” “That,” laughed Bill, “would take some doing! You’ll be telling me the house is haunted, next!” “It is.” “Oh, go on—there ain’t no such animals as ghosts. You’re losing your nerve, kid. You probably heard a rat in the walls.” “Rat, nothing! If it wasn’t a ghost, who was in our room just before daylight? It wasn’t Dad. I called and the figure just disappeared.” “Um—that’s funny. Perhaps some friend of your father’s—and they went off together later.” Charlie shook his head solemnly. “Dad hasn’t any friends up here, Bill, or he wouldn’t have had to call on you. But suppose it was a friend he went away with, why didn’t he let us know? I’ll just bet Dad’s in this house right now. Down cellar or upstairs, with his throat cut, like as not!” Charlie was in tears now. “Here, here, now! Stop it! You certainly are a cheerful kid this morning—I don’t think!” Bill scoffed, and patted him on the back. “Detective thrillers and too much food are what ails you. Imagination plus indigestion will make anybody see or hear a lot of things. How do I get down to the cellar? If you’re afraid of meeting more spooks, you’d better stay here.” “No, no, I’ll go with you,” replied Charlie so hurriedly that Bill burst out laughing. “Come on, then, big boy.” Charlie’s mournful face made him feel ashamed of his mirth. “I don’t like this big lonely house any more than you do, but we’ll go down into the cellar just the same, although I haven’t the slightest doubt but that your father left this place hours ago.” An inspection of the cellars and the two upper stories proved conclusively to Bill that except for themselves, there was nobody in the house. However, they found food and plenty of it in the storage rooms. A whole closet full of canned goods, eggs, bread and a couple of hams and four or five slabs of bacon. “Well, old man, let’s have a shower,” suggested Bill, “and then I’ll rustle some breakfast.” Charlie smiled and turned on a tap at the kitchen sink. A faint trickle came from the faucet. “You’ll get no shower, or bath while you’re in this house,” he announced. “The water comes from a well and there’s something wrong with the pump. Dad says the water supply is likely to give out any time.” Bill made a grimace. “How do you take baths then?” “When I was here before we went down to the cove—but never until after dark.” “Gee whiz! A swim is just what I need. I tell you what, Charlie! We’ll have something to eat, take a more careful look for any message your father may have left and then we’ll romp down to that cove of yours.” “Okay by me, Bill. Let’s get the grub. I could eat a horse!” “When couldn’t you?” Bill snorted as they started after the food. When they had eaten and washed up at the kitchen sink, Bill instituted a thorough search for the message in their bedroom and in the library. “It’s no use,” he said at last, “there just isn’t any message, and that’s that. I vote we pop down to the cove and have our dip now. Is it much of a jaunt?” “Oh, no.” Charlie turned from peering through the curtains at the sunshine. “We can get into the shrubbery at the back door and keep under cover pretty well all the time. We’ll be taking chances, though. Dad wouldn’t let us go until after dark.” “Well, he isn’t here,” Bill said casually. “I’m going for a swim. You can stay here, though, if you want to.” “Not me,” declared the boy. “I’d rather be shot than stay in this house alone.” “Where do we go from the grounds?” “Right through the trees until we come to a rough sort of lane. It leads from the main road down to a little bay that’s just the place for a swim.” “Fine. Now, listen to me, kid. If we happen to run into anybody and can’t make a bunk without being seen, we’ll go right up and speak to them openly. There’s no sense in arousing suspicions—or showing that we have any! We’ll say we’re on a walking tour along the coast, and saw the lane leading down to the sea—savez?” “You betcha! And, oh, Bill, I forgot to say that we can’t swim out far. Dad told me that the currents round the point are the dickens and all.” Armed with towels and soap, they let themselves out by the back door and darted into the bushes. With Charlie in the lead, they pushed through the trees, keeping a sharp lookout. Presently they reached the lane, and, without sighting a single creature, they found themselves on the beach. The sand shelved down into a little bay which was about a hundred yards across. Great rocks crowded down into the water on either side. The place was embowered in trees and bushes. It was an ideal spot for a quiet dip. Both lads slipped off their clothes and entered the water. The sea was perfect. Charlie, who wasn’t much on aquatics, paddled about near shore, but Bill soon found himself at the mouth of the bay. Swimming strongly, with an easy crawl stroke, he revelled in the electric chill of the water and the cloudless sky and sunshine. A short distance ahead of him, a huge brown rock jutted up from the water like a buoy. He swam to it and clambered up on its groined shoulder, slippery with endless laving of the sea. Standing upright, he gazed about. Up and down the beach, the tumbled rocks were belted with trees for some miles. Beyond the trees, so far as he could see, were the bare, sharp outlines of tall cliffs overhanging the water. Picturesque enough, thought Bill, but immeasurably lonesome. Out to sea an island lay off the coast, a mile, perhaps two miles away. He could not judge accurately, for it is difficult to decide distance from the level of the water. He remembered seeing it the day before, from the air. As he remembered it, it was a small, rocky, barren-looking place, with a single house on it, though he hadn’t been absolutely certain about the house. He stared in that direction for a minute or two. As he turned about, ready to dive in and return to shore, there was a sharp thud on the rock at his feet. Bill looked down, but saw nothing—The next moment he heard, or imagined he heard, something go past his ear with a whistling sound. He gazed toward the beach, more than a little disturbed. Nothing could be seen but Charlie sitting naked on the sand. There was no stir of bush, not a movement of grass. And yet again above his head—and this time closer—there was a harsh z-z-z-p! of a bullet. Bill heard no sound of an explosion, but suddenly he saw Charlie spring to his feet, snatch up his clothes and dart into the underbrush. The only conclusion he could reach, as he stood on the sea-washed rock, hurriedly collecting his thoughts, was that someone concealed ashore was shooting at him with a powerful air-gun. Without a second’s further hesitation, he flopped into the water. He had intended to swim back to the little bay, but now he hastily changed his mind. To return in that direction while the bullets were flying was like asking for a sudden and unpleasant end to his existence. So he struck out to sea, meaning to make a detour and go ashore at some secluded spot a little further down the coast. He was swimming with his head submerged in the water, in order to conceal his whereabouts if possible from the beach. When he turned on his back to take his bearings, he remembered Charlie’s warning about the current. It seemed to him as he glanced back to the rock where he had stood, that he had covered a great distance in a very short time, even allowing for the extra speed due to his excitement and wrath over the unknown marksman’s attempt to drop him in the water with a bullet. He fixed his eyes on a point on the shore and struck out with all his might. At first Bill could not believe that his tremendous efforts were achieving—nothing. But gradually, after a fierce fight of more than a quarter of an hour’s duration, the truth broke upon him. His distance from the beach was not lessening at all, but was swiftly increasing. He could battle as he liked against it, but the tide was stronger, stronger than he. There was no shadow of doubt in his mind that he was being carried out to sea. It was difficult to meet the situation calmly, but Bill tried to quiet the surge of pain that was sucking the strength from his limbs. It looked as though only a miracle would save him now. He turned on his back, and for a moment a ray of hope sent a warm glow through his veins. He was being borne out on the tide, toward the island! It might be possible to force a landing there. Now that seemed his only prospect of life. With all the vigor he could summon, Bill struck across the current. But when he paused in exhaustion to observe his progress, he saw that it was useless. He had already been swept past the island. It was out of his range. Wearily, Bill shut his eyes, gasping for breath, and felt the power melting away from his numbed limbs. Then hazily he noticed that the island seemed nearer—or was that but a last illusion before the end? No! The rocks were towering above him. He realized that he had been swept around on the current to the seaward side, and that the mainland was out of sight. With his last atom of strength, he tried to strike out toward that shore, but the place seemed to be slipping away from him again. There was a throbbing in his ears, growing louder and louder. A vague, dreamlike impression of touching the gray side of some craft—then his senses left him. |
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