The girls were glad enough to walk out into the sunshine, and presently they climbed back into the car. Granny chuckled as they squeezed in and waved “good-bye” as Sim backed away.
“There, Dot, how did that strike you?” Arden breathlessly asked when they were safely on their way. “Do you still think it’s a put-up job on our part?”
“Arden, I’m sorry,” answered the girl. “I’m entirely convinced, and I’m on your side. Wasn’t she fascinating?”
“Just like someone out of a play,” Terry exclaimed. “Isn’t it a shame? Taking her own house and land away from her! If I were a ghost I’d come to her rescue, too! Even if I did have to break up a wrecking gang.”
“What could those men have seen?” Sim wondered aloud. “They certainly were scared.”
“When we get home we’ll have to consider each person, the way detectives do, and reason out who would be likely to know, or be responsible for those manifestations,” Arden suggested. “Shall we? Let’s write it out—and see if we can solve the mystery systematically.”
This suggestion met with whole-hearted approval, and all the rest of the way home the girls talked of the best method of “detecting.” Sim stepped on the gas and bounced the girls unmercifully, she was so anxious to get home, but they clung together and didn’t complain.
They had something new to do now and could hardly wait to begin. A first-rate mystery to be unraveled, in the most up-to-date detective fashion. It would be through the method of clues and eliminations of clues, and the girls were “all for it.”
CHAPTER VII
Trial by Jury
Sim’s library was an ideal room for the girls to carry out their plan. Seated at a large desk, where Sim’s father often worked at night, Arden assumed the rôle of judge, or lawyer, they were not quite sure which. Sim, Terry, and Dot, in varying positions of comfort, were perched around her.