Phyllis produced a large-sized electric torch. “How do you suppose we are going to see anything in that dark place without something like this? We certainly mustn’t open any windows.”
Leslie confessed she hadn’t thought of it, and then watched with amazement while Phyllis skilfully inserted the blade of a knife in the crack of the door, wiggled it about a moment, and triumphantly lifted the hook inside from its ring and swung open the door.
“Hurry in!” she whispered. “We must close this quickly before any one can notice.”
They shut the door in haste, and Phyllis flashed on her light. Then she replaced the hook in its ring. “Now we’re safe! You see, this is a little side-closet like a pantry, where the ice-box is kept. They had the door made so that the ice need not be carried in through the kitchen.”
“But that’s a very poor catch for the door—just that little hook!” cried Leslie. “I should think they’d have something more secure than that.”
“I suppose it is,” agreed Phyllis, “and they’ve often said so themselves. And yet it’s just one of those things that never gets changed. Anyhow, nobody ever locks anything down here, only fastens things up when the season is over. There’s really nothing valuable enough here to lock up or to be attractive to thieves. And so it has just gone on, and I suppose that hook will remain there forever! But come along! Let’s get down to business. This way to the living-room!” and she led the way along a passage and into the big main room of the bungalow.
It was very much on the style of that of Rest Haven, furnished with attractive willow furniture, and with a large brick open fireplace at one side. As Phyllis flashed the torch about in a general survey, Leslie noticed that the cottage was obviously dismantled for the winter. The furniture stood huddled against the walls; there were no dainty draperies at the shuttered windows, and the rugs were rolled up, tied, and heaped in one corner.
“Nothing seems out of the way here,” said Phyllis. “It’s just as the Danforths usually leave it. Now let’s look into the bedrooms.”
They journeyed through the four bedrooms with no different result. Each wore the same undisturbed air of being shorn of its summer drapery, with beds starkly stripped of all but their mattresses, and these covered with heavy paper. Then on into the kitchen, which seemed, of all the rooms, to wear more nearly its normal aspect. But even there everything, apparently, appeared as it should.
It was in the kitchen that Phyllis stopped short and faced Leslie. “Well, doesn’t it beat everything!” she exclaimed. “After all we’ve seen and heard,—yes, and found,—there’s not a thing here that looks as if a living soul had been in it since Mrs. Danforth closed it up. Now what do you make of it?”