II
We saw an immediate change in Tish from that moment. The very next morning we put on our bathing suits and, armed with soap and sponges, drove the car into the lake for a washing. Unluckily a wasp stung Tish on the bare knee as we advanced and she stepped on the gas with great violence, sending us out a considerable distance, and, indeed, rendering it necessary to crawl out and hold to the top to avoid drowning.
Here we were marooned for some time, until Hannah spied us and rowed out to us. It was finally necessary to secure three horses and a long rope to retrieve the car, and it was some days in drying out.
But aside from these minor matters, things went very well. Mr. Ostermaier, who was not to search, took charge of the hunt from our end and reported numerous entrants from among the summer colony, and to each entrant the following was issued:
1. The cars of the treasure hunters will meet at the Rectory on Saturday evening at eight o’clock.
2. Each hunter will receive a password or sentence, and a sealed envelope containing the first clew.
3. This clew found, another password and fresh sealed envelope will be discovered. And so on.
4. There are six clews.
5. Participants are requested to use care in driving about the country, as the local police force has given notice that it will be stationed at various points to prevent reckless driving.
6. After the treasure is discovered, the hunt will please meet at the Rectory, where light refreshments will be served. It is requested that if possible the search be over before midnight in order not to infringe on the Sabbath day.
In view of the fact that certain persons, especially Mrs. Cummings—who should be the last to complain—have accused Tish of certain unethical acts during that terrible night, I wish to call attention to certain facts:
(a) We obeyed the above rules to the letter, save possibly Number Five.
(b) There was no actual identification of the scissors.
(c) If there was a box of carpet tacks in our car, neither Aggie nor I saw them.
(d) The fish pier had been notoriously rotten for years.
(e) We have paid for the repairs to the motorcycle, and so on.
(f) Doctor Parkinson is not permanently lamed, and we have replaced his lamps.
(g) Personally, knowing Tish’s detestation of cross-word puzzles, I believe the false clews were a joke on the part of others concerned.
(h) We did that night what the local police and the sheriff from Edgewater had entirely failed to do, and risked our lives in so doing. Most of the attack is purely jealousy of Letitia Carberry’s astute brain and dauntless physical courage.
I need say no more. As Tish observed to Charlie Sands the next day, when he came to see her, lifting herself painfully in her bed:
“I take no credit for following the clews; they were simplicity itself. And I shall pay all damages incurred. But who is to pay for this cracked rib and divers minor injuries, or replace poor Aggie’s teeth? Tell me that, and then get out and let me sleep. I’m an old woman.”
“Old!” said Charlie Sands. “Old! If you want to see an aged and a broken man, look at me! I shall have to put on a false mustache to get out of town.”
But to return to the treasure hunt.
On the eventful day we worked hard. By arrangement with Mr. Stubbs, our poultry man, he exchanged the license plates from his truck for ours in the morning, and these we put on, it being Tish’s idea that in case our number was taken by the local motor policeman, Mr. Stubbs could prove that he was in bed and asleep at the time. We also took out our tail light, as Tish said that very probably the people who could not unravel their clews would follow us if possible, and late in the afternoon, our arrangements being completed, Tish herself retired to her chamber with a number of envelopes in her hand.
Lest it be construed that she then arranged the cross-word puzzles which were later substituted for the real clews, I hasten to add that I believe, if I do not actually know, that she wrote letters concerning the missionary society at that time. She is an active member.
At 5:30 we had an early supper and one glass of cordial each.
“I think better on an empty stomach,” Tish said. “And I shall need my brains to-night.”
“If that’s what you think of Aggie and myself, we’d better stay at home,” I said sharply.
“I have not stated what I think of your brain, Lizzie, nor of Aggie’s either. Until I do, you have no reason for resentment.”
Peace thus restored, we ate lightly of tea, toast and lettuce sandwiches; and having donned our knickerbockers and soft hats, were ready for the fray. Aggie carrying a small flask of cordial for emergencies and I a flashlight and an angel-food cake to be left at the Rectory, we started out on what was to prove one of the most eventful evenings in our experience.
Tish was thoughtful on the way over, speaking occasionally of Poe and his system of deductive reasoning in solving clews, and also of Conan Doyle, but mostly remaining silent.
Aggie, however, was sneezing badly, due to the dust, and this annoying Tish, she stopped where some washing was hanging out and sent her in for a clothespin. She procured the pin, but was discovered and chased, and undoubtedly this is what led later to the story that the bandits—of whom more later—had, before proceeding to the real business of the night, attempted to steal the Whitings’ washing.
But the incident had made Aggie very nervous and she took a second small dose of the cordial. Of this also more later on.
There was a large group of cars in front of the Rectory. The Smith boys had brought their flivver, stripped of everything but the engine and one seat for lightness, and the Cummingses, who are very wealthy, had brought their racer. Tish eyed them both with a certain grimness.
“Not speed, but brains will count, Lizzie,” she said to me. “What does it matter how fast they can go if they don’t know where they’re going?”
After some thought, however, she took off the engine hood and the spare tire and laid them aside, and stood gazing at Aggie, now fast asleep in the rear seat.
“I could leave her too,” she said. “She will be of no help whatever. But on the other hand, she helps to hold the rear springs down when passing over bumps.”
Mrs. Ostermaier then passed around glasses of lemonade, saying that every hunt drank a stirrup cup before it started, and Mr. Ostermaier gave us our envelopes and the first password, which was “Ichthyosaurus.”
It was some time before everyone had memorized it, and Tish utilized the moments to open her envelope and study the clew. The password, as she said, was easy; merely a prehistoric animal. The clew was longer:
“Water, water, everywhere, nor any drop to drink.
Two twos are four, though some say more, and i-n-k spells ink.”
“Water?” I said. “That must be somewhere by the lake, Tish.”
“Nonsense! What’s to prevent your drinking the lake dry if you want to? I-n-k! It may be the stationer’s shop; but if it ever saw water, I don’t believe it. ‘Two twos are four, though some say more!’ Well, if they do, they’re fools, and so is Charlie Sands for writing such gibberish.”
What made matters worse was that the Smith boys were already starting off laughing, and two or three other people were getting ready to move. Suddenly Tish set her mouth and got into the car, and it was as much as I could do to crawl in before she had cut straight through the canna bed and out onto the road.
The Smith boys were well ahead, but we could still see their tail light, and we turned after them. Tish held the wheel tightly, and as we flew along she repeated the clew, which with her wonderful memory she had already learned by heart. But no light came to either of us, and at the crossroads we lost the Smith boys and were obliged to come to a stop. This we did rather suddenly, and Mr. Gilbert, who is a vestryman in our church, bumped into us and swore in a most unbefitting manner.
“Where the hell is your tail light?” he called furiously.
“You ought to know,” said Tish calmly. “Somewhere in your engine, I imagine.”
Well, it seemed that everyone had been following us, and no one except the Smith boys apparently knew where to go from there. And just then a policeman came out of the bushes and asked what the trouble was.
“Ichthyosaurus,” said Tish absently. “‘Water, water, everywhere, nor any drop to drink. Two twos are four, though some say more, and——’”
“Don’t try to be funny with me,” he said. “For a cent I’d take the whole lot of you into town for obstructing traffic. You’ve been drinking, that’s what!”
And just then Aggie sat up in the back seat and said, “Drinking yourshelf! Go on, Tish, and run over him. He’sh a nuishance.”
Well, I will say her voice was somewhat thick, and the constable got on the running board and struck a match. But Tish was in her seat by that time, and she started the car so suddenly that he fell off into the road. As the other cars had to drive around him, this gave us a certain advantage; and we had soon left them behind us, but we still had no idea where to go. Matters were complicated also by the fact that Tish had now extinguished our headlights for fear of again being molested, and we were as often off the road as on it.
Indeed, once we brought up inside a barn, and were only saved from going entirely through it by our dear Tish’s quick work with the brakes; and we then had the agony of hearing the other cars pass by on the main road while we were backing away from the ruins of a feed cutter we had smashed.
We had also aroused a number of chickens, and as we could hear the farmer running out and yelling, there was nothing to do but to back out again. Just as we reached the highroad a load of buckshot tore through the top of the car, but injured nobody.
“Luckily he was shooting high,” said Tish as we drove on. “Lower, and he might have cut our tires.”
“Luckily!” said Aggie, from the rear seat. “He’sh taken the crown out of my hat, Tish Carberry! It was nish hat too. I loved my little hat. I——”
“Oh, keep still and go to sleep again,” said Tish. “‘Water, water, everywhere, nor any drop to drink. Two twos are four, though some say more, and i-n-k spells ink.’”
“So it did when I went to school,” said Aggie, still drowsily. “I-n-k, ink; p-i-n-k, pink; s——”
Suddenly Tish put her foot on the gas and we shot ahead once more.
“Schoolhouse of course,” she said. “The schoolhouse by the water tower. I knew my subconscious mind would work it out eventually.”