A SUMMER NIGHT MYSTERY
David Collins was on the piazza with a book when he heard the call. He sprang up and ran to the end towards Lady Gay Cottage.
“Hullo, Pollee! What is it?”
“Can you come over? I’m all alone. Mother’s gone to ride with the Scribners, and father’s up in Forestford at a consultation.”
“I’ll come right now. Say, this is a dandy book! Shall I bring it along?”
By the time the story was finished, David reading it aloud, it was too dusky for another, and the children sat and talked, one in the hammock, the other in the lounging-chair.
Presently Colonel Gresham drove out. David watched him, while Polly indulged in her usual admiration of Lone Star. The carriage was out of sight before the boy turned his eyes from the road where it had vanished.
“I do wonder where he is going,” he sighed.
“Probably to give the poor horse some fresh air and exercise,” responded Polly. “I see him go out nearly every night about this time.”
“Yes, I know,” returned David grimly, “but it isn’t just for Lone Star’s health.”
“Maybe it’s business then. Did you wish you were with him?”
“Oh, no, not that at all!” David hastened to say. “Perhaps I oughtn’t to speak of it—I shouldn’t only to you. But I know you won’t tell.”
“Tell what?” laughed Polly. “I don’t know anything to tell, and I wouldn’t tell it if I did!”
“I don’t know either—wish I could find out; then we’d know what to expect.”
“What do you mean, David Collins? Why do you care where your uncle goes?”
“Because it may make a great deal of difference to mamma and me. We’re dreadfully worried.”
Polly’s face took on an anxious shadow.
“You’re not afraid he’s—getting to gambling—or drinking, are you?” Her voice dropped almost to a whisper.
David stared as if he doubted his hearing; then he threw back his head, and laughed.
“Uncle David—gambling! drinking! Oh, Pollee! that’s too funny! oh, my!”
Polly laughed, too, out of sympathy.
“Well, you said,—” she began in excuse.
“I didn’t say anything of that kind—oh, Polly! No, we aren’t worried about Uncle David’s habits.”
“Well, what is it, then? I’m not going to guess any more.”
“I wouldn’t,” giggled David.
“Anyway I’ve made you laugh,” exulted Polly. “You have been as grave as an owl all the evening.”
“Let me tell you—then you won’t wonder I’m grave.”
“I’ll let you all right,” Polly chuckled.
David was too seriously troubled to notice.
“It is this way,” he went on; “you know how Uncle David has always taken us to ride after supper, either mamma or me alone, or both in the surrey—he has ever since it was mild enough.”
“Why, yes, I’ve gone with you lots of times.”
“And now he takes somebody else—a lady, nearly every night!”
“It is too bad,” Polly returned plaintively. “We’d love to have you go with us, if we could only go ourselves; but father can’t get away, and—”
“Oh, I don’t mean that!” David burst out. “It isn’t because we’re so anxious for a drive; but, Polly, don’t you see? If Uncle David is taking a lady out every night, it means something!”
“What does it mean?” queried Polly in a puzzled voice.
“Why, that he is going to be married!”
“O-h!”
“And that means that mamma and I must get out!”
“No, it doesn’t!”
“Mamma says so.” David’s head came down with decision. “Mamma wouldn’t stay to be in the way, and, oh, dear! Now you see why we are so worried.”
“But how do you know he takes a lady to ride?”
“Because I’ve seen her.”
“Who is it?”
“I can’t tell—that’s the trouble. We have known he went out alone, but we didn’t think much about it till a week or so ago. I’d been up to Archie Howard’s, and was coming home through Oregon Avenue,—you know how shady it is up there,—and just along by the Woodruffs’ Uncle David whirled past me. I guess I was looking so hard to make sure it was he that I didn’t notice the lady much, but it wasn’t a man.”
“Was that all? That doesn’t mean anything! Maybe he just happened to pick her up on her way home. He knows ’most everybody.”
“No, he didn’t! If he did, he picked her up again two nights afterward, for I was down on Curtis Street, and just before I got to the avenue there they were! They were going like lightning, and I couldn’t make out any more than I could before. The lady was on the other side of Uncle David; but I’m sure it was the same one.”
“But couldn’t he take a lady to ride without marrying her?” asked Polly slowly.
“Why, I suppose some men do,” answered David; “but mamma says when a man of his age—who hasn’t been round with the ladies for years and years—takes one out evening after evening, it isn’t for nothing. And mamma says, of course, when he brings a wife home we can’t stay. Oh, I don’t know what we shall do! I thought we should live here with Uncle David always. It is making mamma just sick. I know she keeps thinking of those dreadful years before he made up, and if we’ve got to go back to them again!”
“I wouldn’t worry,” soothed Polly. “Maybe it isn’t anything at all. I don’t b’lieve he’ll get married. If he’d been going to, he’d have done it before he got so old.”
“He isn’t very old. He’s only a little over fifty.”
“That’s old to get married, isn’t it?”
“Oh, I don’t know!” replied David absently.
“Well, I shall be married before I’m fifty,” announced Polly decidedly.
David laughed.
“Who you going to marry?” he chuckled.
“Why, of course I don’t know yet,” she responded; “but I shan’t wait till I’m fifty years old.”
“No, I guess you won’t,” he agreed.
The sound of light hoofs speeding down the street turned the attention from the weighty subject of marriage back to the Colonel himself.
“That isn’t he, it’s a little man,” observed Polly.
“I knew it wasn’t Lone Star’s step,” David replied. “Besides, he doesn’t come home so early as this.”
“Oh, say,” Polly broke out in an undertone of excitement, “let’s go up on Oregon Avenue! Maybe we should meet them!”
“I don’t suppose they always go that way,” mused David; “but it wouldn’t do any harm to take a walk—”
“No, come on!” urged Polly, jumping up. “But I must lock the house first. Mother has a key.”
“I’ll help,” volunteered David, following Polly into the front hall.
With windows and doors secure behind them, the two started for Oregon Avenue, Polly talking all the way.
“It was along here that you saw them, wasn’t it?” she questioned softly, as if fearful that her voice might carry to the piazza parties that lined the pleasant street.
“Just about,” David answered; “but it’s lighter further on. There’s a carriage block in front of that big gray house where you can sit down and rest.”
“I’m not a bit tired,” Polly insisted, yet to please David she sat dutifully on the stone indicated for at least three minutes; then she suddenly decided that it was too conspicuous, and they moved on up the avenue.
The night was warm and still. Occasionally a puff of cooler air would meet the children at some dusky driveway or odorous garden, and they would halt to enjoy it. From dark verandas and brilliant houses laughter and song floated out to them as they passed along. Altogether this stalking Colonel Gresham was rather a delightful affair, and sometimes in the pleasure of the moment their errand would be almost forgotten.
Not many carriages were abroad, and this was not one of the highways frequented by motor-cars. Every vehicle, therefore, claimed the children’s attention. Far up the avenue, on a corner where an arc light cast fitful shadows over the intersecting roadways, they stopped to catch a breeze straying up from the harbor. Polly was blithely chattering.
“’Sh!” whispered David.
The sound of hoofs came faintly through the stillness.
“I believe it is!” Polly whispered back.
David nodded eagerly.
“Dear me, how that light bobs up and down!” Polly complained. “I hope it will be bright when they get here.”
“Let’s stand in the shadow!” David pulled her under a broad maple tree.
On came the hoofs, nearer, nearer. The light suddenly flared.
“Oh, goody!” exulted Polly.
“It is Lone Star!” whispered David.
The familiar horse appeared in the flickering circle of light. Behind him the form of a man and a woman were barely discernible—then utter darkness! Lone Star trotted by the discomfited two, and was gone. The light did not come back. The children clutched each other in silent disappointment. Polly was the first to find words.
“Wasn’t that just mean?”
David laughed—a grim little laugh.
“Don’t! It hurts. I’m too mad to laugh.”
He chuckled. Then he grabbed Polly excitedly.
“Come on!” he cried.
“Where?” breathlessly hurrying along by his side.
“The avenue makes a big curve above here, before it gets to the fork, and we can go straight up this next street and head ’em off, maybe—they’re going pretty slow.”
“I don’t b’lieve we can.”
“We’ll try it anyhow. You’re not tired?”
“Oh, no!”
Racing over long stretches, slowing to catch breath, then running again,—thus the fork was finally reached. But no Lone Star or the thud of his feet greeted eyes or ears.
“I might have known we couldn’t go as fast as Lone Star!” David exclaimed disgustedly.
“You don’t s’pose they’ve gone up to Cherry Hill Park, do you?” questioned Polly. “It’s just above here, you know.”
“Perhaps. Want to try it?”
Of course she did, and on they trudged, taking note of neither time nor distance, until all at once Polly was conscious of weariness.
“It seems further afoot than in an automobile, doesn’t it?” she laughed.
“Yes,” nodded David; “but we’re almost there. Wonder which road they’d be likely to take.”
Polly could not even guess, so they followed the driveways at random, on, and on, and on.
There was no lack of company. Young men and women, walking cozily close; wandering lovers from over the sea, like children hand in hand; groups of laughing, chattering girls and boys;—all these, but never a Lone Star or a dignified Colonel with his possible sweetheart.
“Let’s sit down and rest,” proposed David. “You must be tired.”
They dropped on a convenient bench, and Polly let go a sleepy little yawn.
“I don’t believe there’s any use in waiting round here,” began David.
Polly did not reply. Her head was drooping.
The lad drew her gently to his shoulder.
“I guess—I was ’most—asleep,” she said drowsily, and shut her eyes again.
The passers-by glanced curiously at the two on the bench. Soon there were few to look, then none at all.
David leaned his head against the slatted back. It was not an easy pillow, but it gave the needed relief, and he slept.
“David Collins, I b’lieve you’re fast asleep!”
It roused the boy with a start. He gave a little shamefaced laugh.
“I don’t see what made me do it,” he apologized.
“Well, we’d better go home as quick as we can get there,” decided Polly. “What time do you s’pose it is?”
Neither could tell, but presently a town clock struck ten.
“That isn’t so bad as I thought,” giggled Polly. “But what will the folks say!”
They hurried along the path, till, suddenly, David halted.
“Did we pass this big fountain?” he questioned abruptly.
“I—don’t remember it,” Polly faltered.
“We’re on the wrong path,” he hastily concluded. “Let’s go back!”
They wheeled about, and were soon following a driveway that they were sure led to the park entrance. Yet they trudged on and on, and still the green expanse, dotted with trees, flower-beds, and shrubbery seemed to stretch endlessly before them.
“Seems ’s if we ought to get somewhere pretty soon,” observed Polly, a plaintive note in her voice.
David replied absently. He was thinking hard. Where was that big stone gateway? He strained his eyes in a vain endeavor to discern it in the distance.
“What if we couldn’t find our way out, and they had to come and look for us!” pondered Polly. “Only they wouldn’t know where to look!”
“Oh, we’re not lost!” exclaimed David, in what he tried to make a fearless tone; but Polly, as well as he himself, knew it to be a fib, spoken only to hold their fast-going courage.
“Let’s stop a minute, and see if we can’t tell where we are,” proposed Polly, just as if that were not what they had been doing, at brief intervals, ever since they had passed the unfamiliar fountain.
They had come to no satisfactory conclusion, and were still peering sharply into their surroundings, when Polly spied a figure in the path ahead.
“There’s a boy!” she whispered. “We can ask him.”
As the lad approached, something in his easy swing seemed familiar.
“It looks like—” began Polly—“why, it is! Oh, Cornelius!” she cried excitedly, as the light showed the unmistakable features of her friend of the convalescent ward. She sprang forward to greet him.
“Holy saints!” ejaculated Cornelius O’Shaughnessy. “However come you kids out here, this time o’ night?”
They told their story in breathless snatches, omitting only what had brought them hither.
“Come f’r a walk, did ye!” sniffed Cornelius. “Wal, ye’ve had it sure! Now, see here! I’ve got to go over on North Second Street to git a receipt f’r some cake Cousin Ellen give my mother, or I’ll ketch it when the show’s out—that’s where my mother is now! She says, the last thing, ‘Cornelius, mind yer don’t forgit to go up after that receipt, f’r I want to make th’ cake in th’ mornin’!’ I says, ‘Sure I won’t!’—and I never thought of it again till just as I was goin’ up to bed! It happened to pop into my head, and if I didn’t hustle down those stairs! An’ here I be! Now ye just sit down and wait, and I’ll go ’long back wid ye.”
The boy darted into the shadows and was lost. Polly and David felt more alone than before.
“Queer, we should meet him ’way out here, at this time!” David had lowered his voice, as if fearful of being overheard.
“He came just to find us,” purred Polly. “What a nice boy he is!”
“Don’t talk so loud!” cautioned David.
“He can’t hear. He’s too far away.”
“Somebody might.”
“There isn’t anybody,” she laughed, yet involuntarily she was obeying David’s injunction.
They sat there on the bench what seemed a very long time, still Cornelius did not appear.
“Let’s walk along a little way and meet him,” proposed Polly.
The deserted park seemed vastly more lonely than an empty street. Polly kept up a soft chatter. David wished silently that Cornelius would come. The shrubbery that bordered the way made weird shadows along the path, and more than once David had to grip his courage in a hurry to keep from halting in the face of some grotesque shade. Queer little prickles crept up and down his legs. Why didn’t Cornelius come!
“You’re not afraid?” he whispered, as Polly clutched his arm more tightly in passing a clump of dogwoods.
“Oh, no!” she chirped contentedly, the harmless shadows behind them, “not with you!”
The boy’s retreating courage came back. He felt himself grown suddenly taller and stronger. He walked forward with a firm, steady step.
“We mustn’t go too far, or Cornelius might miss us,” warned Polly. “There he is now!” as the straight little figure swung into sight.
The three had a merry walk home, notwithstanding the distance and the haunting fear in the hearts of two of them that there would be anxiety because of their unexplained absence. Cornelius insisted on accompanying them to within a block of home, and then he stood on the corner and watched them away.
Mrs. Dudley met them at the foot of the steps, both hands outstretched.
“Children! where have you been?”
Polly felt nearer than usual to a real reprimand, and she hurried to explain.
“We didn’t mean to be gone so long, but we got lost in Cherry Hill Park—”
“Cherry Hill Park! What in the world started you up there this hot night?”
“Why, we went up on Oregon Avenue, and then thought we’d just go over to the park, and we got tired,—or I did,—and we sat down on a bench and went to sleep—both of us!” Polly giggled at the remembrance. “Then we couldn’t tell which way to go, and Cornelius came along, and he had to do an errand for his mother, and we waited a good while for him—and that’s why we didn’t come before.”
“Well, you have had a time! You’d better run right home, David, for your mother is worried. She supposed you were over here, and came to see what kept you.”
“Is Uncle David home?” questioned the boy tentatively.
“I think she said not.”
Polly’s eyes and David’s met in tacit understanding—the secret was Colonel Gresham’s, and not to be spoken of. Then the boy whirled towards home.
“Good-night!” called Polly, and to the accompaniment of fleeting footfalls came the answering “Good-night!”