Several salad containers lay empty on the floor and more had disappeared entirely—been carried away by the thief, or thieves. At least a couple of dozen sandwiches must have been abstracted.
“Goodness!” wailed Bess, right at her chum’s shoulder. “What an appetite!”
“For a ghost, I—should—say!” agreed May Winslow.
But Nan did not feel that the occasion was at all funny. This was downright thievery. And she felt quite sure that she knew who had done it.
“That mean, mean Linda Riggs!” whispered Nan to Bess.
“Do you really think so?” breathed her chum.
“Who else could it be?” returned Nan, with an emphatic nod. But that was all she said at the time. She hurried to light the big lamp and make the girls welcome. At least the discovered raid on the viands served to banish all fear of the boathouse ghost. Ghosts certainly do not have an appetite for chocolate ice-cream, tuna-fish salad, and chicken sandwiches.
“Start the fire—do, Amelia,” begged Nan. “Set the plates and knives and forks, Bess. Make yourselves at home, girls. Don’t be afraid of starving, Laura. There’s loads to eat left.”
“My mind is relieved by that assurance,” said the red-haired girl with a sigh.
Nan had seen to it that each window was curtained and every crevice stopped, so that no light could shine out and play traitor. But the fact that the store of food had been raided disturbed her mind not a little. If Linda Riggs and her chums (for of course the conceited, self-assertive girl did not make the raid alone), played one mean trick, they might another. They might report to some teacher or to Mrs. Cupp, what was going on in the boathouse.