“I think we ought to rouse Daddy, or Mr. Alexander,” said Nancy, trembling with apprehension.
“You run and tell your father, while I get Pa out of bed,” said Dodo, groping about for her negligee.
Meantime Polly and Eleanor watched so no one could get in at their window, and the two other girls ran across the hall to their parents’ rooms. In a short time both Mr. Fabian and Mr. Alexander came in and crept over to the window where the girls had heard the burglars plotting.
Mr. Fabian understood French so now he interpreted what he overheard: “Drop the bundle and I’ll catch it. Don’t make a noise, and be careful not to overlook anything valuable.”
“Dear me! If they are burglars where is the one who is told to drop a bundle? He must be inside, somewhere!” whispered Dodo, excitedly.
There followed a mumbling that no one could understand, and then a splash,—as if a bundle of soft stuff had dropped into water from a height. Immediately after this, the voice from below excitedly spoke to the companion above: “——It fell in the well! Now what is to be done?”
“Goody! Goody!” breathed Polly, eagerly, when she heard how the burglars had defeated their own purpose.
But no sound came from the other burglar who was working indoors, and Mr. Alexander had an idea which he suggested to Mr. Fabian.
“You go downstairs softly, while I scout around up here and locate the room where the helper is working. When I give a whistle it means ‘I’ve got the other feller under hand’—then you catch your man, red-handed, out in the garden, and the girls will rouse the house and we will present our prisoners to the host.”
That sounded fine, so Mr. Alexander hurried to his room for his western gun, and started out to hunt up the indoor worker. Mrs. Alexander realized that he was about to do something unusual, or he never would have taken his big revolver.