“Oh, Mother! You just don’t understand them,” Judy objected. “They knew each other long before they met me. Besides, we’re—well, different. We don’t care about being proper the way a Farringdon-Pett does. Roger Banning did say a funny thing, though. It was something about Dr. Bolton’s kids winding up as the patients if Cubby would let them. That wasn’t just the way he said it. Dad, what do you think he meant?”
“I don’t know,” the doctor admitted, “but I’ll be at the hospital between eleven and twelve o’clock. Call me there if you need me. Perhaps you’d better call anyway,” he added. “I’m a little worried about this haunted fountain, as you call it. I haven’t forgotten the haunted road. Your ghosts very often need medical care.”
“I see what you mean, Dad.”
Judy had not forgotten the haunted road, either, or her terrifying experience at the end of it. Now she was deep in a new mystery. The spirit of the fountain had not called for help, she reminded her father. The voice had called, “Go away!” She was sure of that.
“Probably it was only one of those boys hiding under the fountain and trying to frighten you,” Mrs. Bolton said. “They might have known they would only whet your curiosity. Have you told Peter about it?”
“I haven’t seen him,” replied Judy. “Has he called?”
Judy’s mother said he hadn’t. “Perhaps you’d better call him,” she added. “Tell him there’s a nice chicken pie I can warm up for him if he hasn’t had dinner.”
“I think he has, Mother. From the way he spoke I think he had plans for the whole evening. But I’ll call, anyway.” Judy dialed the number and soon heard the telephone ringing in her own house in Dry Brook Hollow. It was right beside the door so that she could hurry in and answer it if she happened to be outside. Peter had another outside wire in his den, and there was an extension in their bedroom. Nobody could complain that it took too long to reach the telephone. After six rings Judy decided there was nobody at home.
“Peter may be on his way here. If he is, I hope he let Blackberry out of prison. I think I shut him in the attic by mistake,” confessed Judy. “He was up there playing with my sewing things.”
“Thinks he’s a kitten, does he?” chuckled the doctor. “I wouldn’t worry about him if I were you, Judy girl. Cats have a way of taking care of themselves.”