The Mystery Hunters at the Haunted Lodge

by Capwell Wyckoff

There was another exodus from the lodge as the girls followed the boys, accompanied by the leaping, barking Castor Oil. Jennie had been feeding him marshmallows, and he was completely her slave, so much so that, when Charlie had run out, his clumsy animal companion had watched him go without any desire to follow him. He was content to run with the girls, dashing and barking in a wild display of good spirits.

Barry could hear the girls talking, and he watched them disappear down the slope that led from the front of the Bronson cabin to the lake. Something had happened down there, and he was anxious to know what it was, but his duty now was to watch the man who had taken refuge on the back porch of the hunting lodge. No doubt his plans had been upset as had Barry’s, and it was interesting to see what he would do under the circumstances. Would he beat a retreat down the passageway and be lost to them, Barry wondered? Of course, if the man did, it would be much safer for them simply to get some officers of the law up there and try and trace the tunnel and find out where the man lived. But the thought did not satisfy him. He wanted to catch the prowler on the spot, so that he would have no loophole through which to escape when accused of causing the disturbances at Bluff Lodge.

Perhaps the shadow would go back into the tool house and wait until they got back, so as to produce rappings and noises. If this was his program, Barry felt sure that he could tackle the man on the spot and hold him until help arrived, but he would want that help to be pretty near at the time. No doubt the prowler was armed, as anyone engaged in a desperate business was likely to be, unless he had scorned to go armed against a group of high-school boys and girls.

Barry was not left long in doubt. The man had hesitated because he had been doing some rapid thinking, and at last he had made up his mind. Leaving the back porch, he ran hastily to the living-room window and peered in. Then he bent low to escape the light from the fire and the lamps and passed on to the front, where he crossed the porch and entered the front door.

Barry guessed his intention at once. The boys and girls had run out and left many things behind them, among other things some fairly good coats, and the pocketbooks of the girls were on the table. The black shadow had made up his mind to take them and get away, and perhaps to come back with his knocking pranks later on. Knowing the lodge as well as he seemed to, he would no doubt go out the back as they came in the front. Fate had put him in position to make a daring and completely successful raid.

Barry lost no time. Running his best, he left the timber and cut on a straight line for the lodge. He did not know what the boys were doing down there at the lake, and he had no time to go and find out. It was his supreme chance, and he had the feeling that if he lost out now, the ghostly prowler of Bluff Lodge would never be captured. He leaped to the porch and ran across it into the dark hall and finally jerked the door to the living room open, blinking in the light of the lamps as his eyes swept the interior of the place.

The tall man in the black overcoat, hat, and gloves whirled at the sound of his coming and turned two burning dark eyes upon him. But if Barry expected to see his face, he was disappointed. A black handkerchief obscured all of it except his eyes, which seemed to glare out above the covering. He had been feverishly picking up coats, hats, and pocketbooks and was in the act of taking a fur piece belonging to Mrs. Jordan when Barry burst into the room. As the boy faced him with resolute though pale face, the man pointed a black-gloved finger at him.

“Get out of here, boy!” he cried, hoarsely. “Get out or you’ll wish you had!”

Barry had made up his mind, on the way, that talking would be a waste of time. From the moment that he had opened the door he was preparing for the struggle that was sure to come. He had opened his Mackinaw coat while running, and now he dropped it to the floor behind him. Then, even while the man was pointing at him, he leaped across the floor at the black-clad figure.

He was tense and his throat was dry as he closed in on the intruder. His great fear was that the man would draw a weapon and shoot him down. But the truth of the matter was that he had engaged the man at exactly the right time. The outlaw had his arms full of coats and other things, and as Barry grappled with him he was vainly trying to shake a pocketbook loose, the chain of which had become twisted around his middle finger on his right hand. This incident, small as it was, gave Barry a fighting chance.