“What?” Both Phyllis and Gale were on the edge of their chairs with renewed interest. “How?”
“No one knows,” Valerie replied. “The maid saw the curtains blazing in the library. She called the caretaker and he ripped them down and stamped the fire out. There was nothing they could have caught fire from. It must have been done deliberately.”
“But who?” Carol scoffed. “Why?”
“Things like that aren’t done,” Janet added. She looked at Phyllis and Gale. “You two look as though you actually believed it.”
“Tell them what you know, Gale,” Phyllis advised. “But,” she added, “you mustn’t go around telling the other girls. We can’t prove anything—it is only what we think.”
“We’ll be as mum as mice,” Carol promised. “If we have been missing anything, tell us!”
Gale told them of the things she had discovered and of the things she suspected. The other girls were astounded.
“We will have to appoint ourselves solvers of the mystery,” Carol suggested.
“We are the best mystery-solvers at Briarhurst,” added Janet. “But where do we begin? There aren’t any clues or anyone to suspect.”
“Good detectives find those things,” Madge informed her.