The Mystery of the Fires

When the last rowboat had finally reached its destination, the crowd all gathered together on the grass near the shore to record their votes. The two Robinson boys went about collecting them.

Mary Louise was sitting close to her mother, watching her intently.

“The Reed boys aren’t here either,” whispered Mrs. Gay. “I was just talking to Mrs. Reed, and she said she hasn’t seen Larry or George since morning. But she doesn’t seem much worried.”

“Freckles must be all right if he’s with the whole bunch,” Mary Louise assured her. “Nothing much could happen to five boys together.”

Mrs. Gay forced herself to smile.

“I’ll try not to worry, dear… Oh, listen! Mr. Robinson is going to announce the winners!”

The jovial-faced man, Stuart’s father, stepped forward.

“First prize for rowboats goes to Sue and Mabel Reed,” he said. “Come forward, girls, and get your prize. It’s a box of tennis balls.”

The twins, dressed exactly alike in blue dimity, came up together, bowing and expressing their thanks.

“The prize for canoes – to Mary Louise Gay,” continued Mr. Robinson. “More tennis balls!”

David McCall clapped loudly, and everybody else joined in the applause. Mary Louise was a general favorite at Shady Nook.

“The prize for motorboats goes to my son Stuart for his funny-looking contraption!”

Everybody clapped but Jane; she was terribly disappointed. She didn’t see why Cliff’s clever idea hadn’t taken the honors. But glancing at the young man she could detect no resentment in his face. He was a wonderful sport.

After the prizes had been disposed of, the games began, and continued until dark. Almost everyone joined in the fun – even the middle-aged people. All except a few who were helping Mrs. Flick prepare the refreshments, and Mrs. Hunter and the Fraziers, who were too stiff and dignified.

“How do you like Mrs. Hunter?” whispered Mary Louise once when the two chums found themselves hiding side by side in a game.

“Kind of stuck up,” replied Jane. “But she’s better than those Fraziers. He’s positively oily!”

“Didn’t I tell you? I wouldn’t stay in his hotel if our bungalow burned down – no matter how much money we had.”

“Mrs. Hunter seems to like him. But I think it’s Frazier who put the idea into her head that Ditmar set her cottage on fire. Because I heard him say to her, ‘I wonder whose place will burn down tonight. Ditmar stayed home!’”

“Oh, how awful!”

“Sh! Oh, gosh, we’re caught! Why must girls always talk?” lamented Jane.

The moon came up in the sky, making the night more enchanting, more wonderful than before. The games broke up, and Mrs. Flick called the people to refreshments.

“Sit with me, Mary Lou,” urged David, jealously touching her arm.

“We must find Mother,” returned the girl.

“She’s over there with Mrs. Hunter and the hotel bunch. You don’t want to be with them, do you?”

“Not particularly. But I do want to be with Mother and Jane and Cliff. So come on!”

David closed his lips tightly, but he followed Mary Louise just the same. Mrs. Gay made a place for them, and the young couple sat down.

“You’re not still worried, are you, Mother?” asked Mary Louise as she passed the chicken salad.

“I’m afraid I am, dear. If we could only see Shady Nook from here, perhaps the boys would flash their lights.”

“They’re surely all right,” put in Mrs. Hunter consolingly. “They’re big enough to take care of themselves.”

“I’ll say they are,” remarked Mr. Frazier. “I caught them cutting my yew tree to make bows. There’s nothing they can’t do!”

Mary Louise regarded the hotelkeeper with contempt, thinking again how stingy he was. Anybody else would be glad to give the boys a branch of a tree!

“So long as they don’t set anything on fire,” observed Cliff lightly.

“Oh, Cliff!” exclaimed Mary Louise in horror.

David McCall nudged her meaningly.

“Criminals always try to cover up their crimes by laying the suspicion on somebody else,” he whispered. “But only a cad would blame innocent children.”

Mary Louise cast him a withering look. She was beginning to despise David McCall.

When the whole party had eaten all they possibly could, somebody started to play a ukulele, and the young people danced on the smooth grass that had been worn down by so many picnics. Nobody apparently wanted to go home, except Mrs. Gay. Finally Mrs. Reed, beginning to be anxious about her own two boys, seconded the motion for departure.

“Let’s give the rowboats twenty minutes start,” suggested Cliff Hunter. “And the canoes ten. We’ll beat you all at that!”

“If our engines don’t give out,” put in Stuart Robinson doubtfully. He never felt confident about his ancient motorboat.

“Suits me fine!” cried Jane, realizing that the arrangement gave her twenty extra minutes to dance.

The rowboats pushed off, and ten minutes later Mary Louise and her mother and David stepped into their canoe. It was a light craft, built for speed, and both she and David were excellent paddlers. In no time at all they were leading the procession.

It was David’s sharp eyes which first detected signs of a disaster.

“There’s a fire at Shady Nook!” he cried breathlessly.

“Oh!” gasped Mrs. Gay in horror, and turning about swiftly, Mary Louise thought that her mother was going to faint. But she didn’t; she pulled herself together quickly and sat up very straight.

“It’s true,” agreed Mary Louise, her voice trembling with fear. Suppose it were their own cottage – and – and – Freckles!

The canoe rounded the bend in the river and came within full view of the little resort. The Reeds’ house was visible now – yes – and the Gays’! Thank heaven it was unharmed!

“It’s either the Partridges’ or Flicks’,” announced David. “And my bet is that it’s Flicks’. I was expecting it.”

“You were expecting it, David?” repeated Mrs. Gay in consternation. “What do you mean by that?”

“Because Cliff Hunter holds a big mortgage on Flicks’ Inn,” replied the young man. “It means ready cash for him.”

“Don’t be absurd!” commanded Mary Louise. “How could Cliff have anything to do with it when he was with us all evening?”

“Haven’t you ever heard of a bribe, Mary Lou?” he asked.

The girl did not answer. The increasing noise of the engines behind them told them that the motorboats had caught up with them. Everybody knew about the disaster now; Mrs. Flick was crying, and Mr. Flick was yelling and waving his arms wildly, calling upon everybody to help him.

He was out of his boat first – he happened to be riding in the Robinsons’ launch – and he dashed madly through the trees that stood between his inn and the river. In his excitement, he almost knocked over a small boy carrying a pail of water from the river.

“Freckles!” cried Mrs. Gay, in a tone of both relief and fear: relief that her child was safe, fear that he had had something to do with the fire. “What are you doing?”

“Trying to save the trees,” explained the boy. “The inn was gone when we got here, but us guys kept the fire from spreading.” He looked up proudly, as if he expected a medal for his bravery.

“I don’t believe a word of it!” thundered Mr. Flick. “I believe you boys set the place on fire. And now you’re trying to lie out of it!”

“I wouldn’t put it past ’em,” muttered Mr. Frazier, at his side. The Fraziers had landed at Shady Nook instead of crossing to the hotel’s shore.

“Tell the truth, boys!” urged Mrs. Gay, for by this time both the Smiths and the two young Reeds had joined Freckles.

“We came along here about dark,” said Larry Reed, who was the oldest of the group, “and smelled smoke. Course, we investigated. The inn was gone. But the ashes were still smoldering, and there was smoke coming out from the bushes. So we ran over to Gays’ and to our house and got buckets and carried water from the river. It’s about out now.”

“You’re sure that’s the truth?” demanded Mr. Reed.

“On my honor, Dad!” replied the boy solemnly.

“Did you see anybody in the woods or around Shady Nook?” inquired Mrs. Flick.

“Yeah. A big guy who looked like a tramp from the woods – it was too dark to see his face – and a funny-looking woman in a gray dress with a big pitcher under her arm.”

“Together?” asked Mary Louise.

“No. The big guy was in the woods. And the woman was running along the road that leads to Four Corners.”

“Nothing but a made-up yarn!” denounced Mr. Flick.

But the fire was really out; there was nothing anybody could do. Frazier suggested that the Flicks and their guests come over to his hotel, and the latter accepted. But the Flicks, realizing that this was not a real invitation, that the hotelkeeper would present them with a bill later on, chose to stay with the Partridges. So at last the group dispersed for the night.

Mary Louise, however, was so exasperated with David McCall that she never even answered his pleasant “Good-night!”

CHAPTER V

Freckles’ Story

“What in the world are you doing?” asked Jane when she came out on the porch the following morning to find her chum studiously poring over a notebook. “You must think school has begun!”

Mary Louise looked up.

“It’s harder than school – but it’s more fun,” she replied. “I’m working on the mystery of the fires.”

“Mystery? You really don’t think the Flicks’ Inn was just an accident?”

“No, I don’t. If it were the first fire, I might believe that. But with the Hunters’ a week or so ago, the whole thing looks sinister to me. I’m frightened, Jane. Ours may be the next. We haven’t any insurance to speak of. Besides, something dreadful might happen to Mother. People are burned to death sometimes, you know.”

“Yes, that’s true,” replied Jane seriously. “But what are you going to do?”

“Treat it just like a case, as I did Dark Cedars. List all the possible suspects and search the neighborhood for desperate characters.”

“Such as gypsies?”

“No, not gypsies. They wouldn’t have any motive this time. But somebody must have a motive – unless it’s a crazy person who is responsible.”

Jane’s eyes opened wide.

“That’s an idea, Mary Lou! There are people like that – crazy along just one particular line. They feel they simply have to light fires. Firebugs, you know.”

“Incendiary is the correct term, I believe,” said Mary Louise.

“Oh, so you’ve already thought of it and looked up the word!”

“Yes, I’ve thought of it. Who wouldn’t have? It’s the first explanation that jumps into your head when you hear of a fire. They say lighted cigarettes start them too, and small children.”

“Small children? But not boys as big as Freckles and the Smiths?”

An expression of pain passed over Mary Louise’s face.

“I’m afraid everybody suspects the boys. Especially Mr. Flick… I’m going to call Freckles now and ask him just exactly what he did yesterday. Then, if you’re interested, Jane, I’ll read you all my list of suspects.”

“Sure I’m interested. I love to play the part of Watson to the great Sherlock Holmes Gay!” Mary Louise stuck out her tongue.

“Don’t be so fresh!” she said, but she was pleased and flattered to be called Sherlock Holmes.

Freckles, eating a bun and followed by Silky, came leisurely through the screen door. Mary Louise asked him to sit down and talk to her.

“Can’t long,” was the reply. “Have to go see old man Flick.”

“Don’t speak of Mr. Flick in that disrespectful way!” said Mary Louise disapprovingly.

“I will, though. I hate him. He thinks us guys set his old inn on fire, and we really saved his trees. Sweatin’ like horses, carryin’ water from the river, and that’s all the thanks we get!”

“Freckles,” said his sister seriously, “you must tell me all about what you did yesterday. Everything! No secrets. Because this is important. It may save somebody innocent from imprisonment – and help spot the real criminal.”

“O.K., I will, Sis.” He sat down on the hammock, and Silky jumped up beside him. He gave the little dog a piece of his bun, and then he began.

“Up in the woods beyond Shady Nook – past the Ditmars’, you know, and all the cottages – we’re building a shack. A clubhouse for the ‘Wild Guys of the Road.’ So yesterday we took our lunch – the two Smiths, the two Reeds, and I – to set to work.”

“Did you make a fire?” demanded Mary Louise.

“Sure we made a fire. We got to have a fire. But don’t you go thinking that fire spread to Flicks’. If it had, why wouldn’t Ditmars’ and Robinsons’ cottages have been burned? They’re in between.”

“Yes, that’s true. Did you stay there in the woods all day?”

“Yeah. Cooked some hot dogs for our supper, and Larry Reed had a can of baked beans. Boy, we had a swell feed! And never thought a thing about the picnic on the island till it started to get dark. Then we put out the fire, packed our stuff away, and made tracks for home.”

“About what time was that?” asked Mary Louise. “I mean, when you finally left your camp?”

“Nine-thirty or ten, maybe. I don’t know.”

“And you saw two people on your way back, you said?”

“Four people, really, because the Ditmars were taking a walk in the woods. They were quarreling, I’m sure. She was mad at him. Said she thought he was positively cruel!”

“What!” exclaimed Jane. “Looks as if Horace Ditmar might have set the place on fire himself – just as Mr. Frazier was expecting!”

Mary Louise wrote something in her notebook, and Freckles continued:

“Then, a little farther on, we met a tramp. At least, we think he was a tramp, though it was too dark to see his face. He was a big man in shabby old clothes. Overalls, I think. He was coming towards us – away from Shady Nook. We think he’s the man you want!”

“Had you ever seen him before?”

“I don’t think so, but I wouldn’t want to be sure. After we passed him, we saw the funny-looking woman with the big pitcher under her arm. The moon was out then, and we got a good look at her. We all think she was crazy – kind of talking to herself as she went along.

“Then, as we came nearer to Shady Nook, we smelled smoke and found out it was Flicks’. The inn was burned down by then – it was all wood, you know – but there was plenty of fire smoldering around. So we got some buckets at our own houses and began carrying water from the river. We must have worked a couple of hours… Till you came along… That’s all.”

“You’re going to tell this story to Mr. Flick?”

“It’s not a story!” cried the boy indignantly. “It’s the truth!”

“Oh, I didn’t mean it that way,” Mary Louise hastened to assure him. “I believe you, Freckles. But I do wish you had someone to swear to the truth of it – for the people who may not believe you. Some witness, I mean. Did the Ditmars see you boys in the woods?”

“No. When we heard their voices – and I told you she was good and mad – we beat it around another path. Women murder their husbands sometimes, you know!” he added solemnly.

“I don’t believe Mrs. Ditmar would commit murder,” replied his sister. “We met her yesterday morning, and she seemed awfully nice.”

Freckles stood up.

“Guess I better be on my way. Old man Flick’s got an awful temper.”

“Well, be sure to keep yours,” Mary Louise warned him as he walked down the steps.

She turned to Jane. “What do you think about it?” she asked.

“I think it’s a mess. But I don’t believe anybody’s guilty. Probably just some careless servant girl.”

“I don’t know. I’m going over to see Mr. Flick this morning. I’ll have a good reason now that Freckles is sort of involved.

“Now I’ll read you my list of suspects and their motives, and you tell me what you think and whether you can add any names:

“‘Horace Ditmar – motive, to make work for himself.

“‘Mr. Flick and Cliff Hunter – owners, to collect insurance.

“‘Tramp and queer-looking woman – firebugs.

“‘Careless servants – and

“‘The boys.’… Now, can you think of anybody else?”

“It looks like Mr. Ditmar to me – or else the careless servants,” replied Jane. “I’d never believe it was Cliff Hunter. Or Mr. Flick. Why, Mr. Flick was making money this summer – he’d be a fool to set his place on fire. Besides, he was at the picnic. How could he?”

“Things like that can be arranged,” replied Mary Louise, thinking of David McCall’s accusation. “That tramp, for instance, might have been bribed.”

“Well, I’m sure he wouldn’t want to. Now, if it were that man Frazier’s place, the Royal Hotel, I mean, it would be possible. You know what Cliff said about the way he’s losing money. The hotel is practically empty, except for the Hunters and their friends.”

“Maybe it will give Mr. Frazier an idea,” remarked Mary Louise, “and his hotel be the next to burn!”

“You seem to feel sure that something is coming next!”

“I’m afraid so. And I only hope it won’t be our bungalow!”

Mary Louise sighed and closed her notebook.

“It’s much more difficult than that mystery at Dark Cedars,” she said. “Because there you had only one place to watch. If I knew which cottage would be the next to burn, I could hide there and spy. But Shady Nook’s a mile long, and I can’t be everywhere.”

“No,” agreed Jane. “And you don’t like to stay home from all the parties just on a chance that there will be a fire. Has it occurred to you, Mary Lou, that both fires started when everybody from Shady Nook was off on a party?”

“Yes, it has. That’s why it seems like a planned crime to me – not just an accident. As if the criminal picked his time carefully.”

The familiar “chug-chug” of a motorboat interrupted the girls’ discussion. Clifford Hunter shut off his engine and threw the rope around the Gays’ dock.

“Hello, girls!” he called, with his usual grin. “I haven’t had time to work up any new card tricks, but I hope I’ll be welcome just the same.”

“Oh, we have more serious things to think about than tricks,” responded Mary Louise.

“You mean that now you have to turn in and do the cooking since Flicks’ Inn is gone?”

“I really hadn’t thought of that,” answered Mary Louise. “Though of course we shall have to do that very thing. We aren’t rich enough to eat at the Royal Hotel.”

“It’s not so steep, considering the service you get. Maybe Frazier will lower his prices, for he sure needs the business. But, of course, you have a large family. It would be kind of expensive.”

“Where can we buy food?” inquired Jane. So far, the Gays’ breakfasts had consisted of supplies they brought along with them, with the addition of milk, butter, and eggs from a farmer who stopped daily at Flicks’.

“There’s a store over at Four Corners,” replied her chum, naming the nearest village – about five miles away. “We usually drive over once a week for supplies. I suppose I better go in now and ask Mother how soon she wants me to go.”

“Be my guests tonight at the Royal for dinner,” suggested Cliff. “Then you won’t have to bother about buying stuff.”

“Thanks, Cliff, but there are too many of us. Besides, I’d have to go to the store anyway. We’ll need things for lunch. You know how hungry we are when we come out from swimming.”

“By the way,” asked Jane, “where is David McCall staying? And the other people who were boarding at Flicks’?”

“They’re all over at the hotel,” answered Cliff. “Makes the place seem quite lively. Frazier’s stepping around at a great rate, looking pleased as Punch.”

“Oh!” exclaimed Mary Louise significantly, and she wrote another name into her notebook.

She ran inside the cottage and five minutes later returned with her mother’s list of groceries and the keys to the car.

“I’m going over to Four Corners now, Jane,” she announced. “Will you come with me or play around with Cliff?”

Her chum stood up.

“I’ll go with you,” she said. “If you’ll excuse me, Cliff.”

The young man made a face.

“Jane only likes me for my card tricks,” he whined. “If I can’t amuse her, I’m no use.”

Both girls burst out laughing.

“Work up a new one while we’re gone,” advised Jane. “And we’ll see you in swimming.”

CHAPTER VI

More Suspects

“I told Mother we girls would take every other day at the housekeeping,” said Mary Louise as she backed the car out of the garage and onto the road behind the cottages. “That will give her a chance to get some rest from cooking – some vacation. You don’t mind, do you, Jane?”

“Course I don’t mind!” replied her chum. “Maybe the family will, though!”

“Don’t you believe it! We’re swell cooks, if I do say it myself.”

She drove the car along past the backs of the cottages, turning at the road beyond Ditmars in the direction of the little village of Four Corners – a place not much bigger than its name implied. It was a still, hot day; all the vegetation looked parched and dried, and the road was thick with dust.

“I wish it would rain,” remarked Mary Louise. “If we should have another fire, it might spread so that it would wipe out all of Shady Nook.”

“Oh, let’s forget fires for a while,” urged Jane. “You’re getting positively morbid on the subject!.. Is this the grocery?” she asked as her companion stopped in front of a big wooden house. “It looks more like a dry-goods store to me. All those aprons and overalls hanging around.”

“It’s a country store,” explained the other girl. “Wait till you see the inside! They have everything – even shoes. And the storekeeper looks over his glasses just the way they always do in plays.”

The girls jumped out of the car and ran inside. Jane found the place just as Mary Louise had described it: a typical country store of the old-fashioned variety.

“Hello, Mr. Eberhardt! How are you this summer?” asked Mary Louise.

“Fine, Miss Gay – fine. You’re lookin’ well, too. But I hear you had some excitement over to Shady Nook. A bad fire, they tell me. Can you figure out how it happened?”

“No, we can’t,” replied the girl. “You see, everybody was away at the time – at a picnic on the little island down the river.”

“Looks like spite to me,” observed the storekeeper. “Bet Lemuel Adams or his good-fer-nuthin’ son done it!”

“Lemuel Adams?” repeated Mary Louise. “Who is he? Any relation to Hattie Adams, who always waited on the table at Flicks’ Inn?”

“Yep – he’s her father. You ought to know him. He’s a farmer who lives up that hill, ’bout a couple of miles from Shady Nook. Well, he used to own all this ground around here, but he sold it cheap to a man named Hunter. The one who started the settlement at Shady Nook.”

“Yes, I knew him,” said Mary Louise. “He was Clifford Hunter’s father. But he died not long ago.”

“So I heard. Anyhow, this man Hunter got fancy prices for his building lots, and naterally old Lem Adams got sore. Always complainin’ how poor he is and how rich old Hunter got on his land. Reckon it got under his skin, and mebbe he decided to take revenge.”

“Oh!”

Mary Louise wanted to write the name of Lemuel Adams into her notebook then and there, but she didn’t like to. Should she add Hattie’s name too? Had the girl taken any part in the plot?

“What sort of looking man is Mr. Adams?” she inquired, thinking of the “tramp” whom the boys had mentioned seeing in the woods.

“Old man – with white hair. Has a bad leg – rheumatism, I reckon. He walks with a limp,” explained the storekeeper.

Mary Louise sighed: this couldn’t be the same person, then, for the boys would surely have noticed a limp.

“Here’s my list,” she said, handing her mother’s paper to Mr. Eberhardt. “Do you think you have all those things?”

“If I ain’t, I can get ’em fer you,” was the cheerful reply.

The girls wandered idly about the store while they waited for their order to be filled. Jane had a wonderful time examining the queer articles on display and laughing at the ready-made dresses. At last, however, a boy carried their supplies to the car, and Mary Louise asked for the bill.

“Nine dollars and sixty-two cents,” announced Mr. Eberhardt, with a grin. “You folks sure must like to eat!”

“We do,” agreed Mary Louise. “I suppose this will mean more business for you. Or did the Flicks buy groceries from you anyhow?”

“No, they didn’t. They got most of their stuff from the city… Yes, in a way it’s a streak of luck fer me. The old sayin’, you know – that it’s an ill wind that brings nobody luck!.. Yes, I’ll have to be stockin’ up.”

Mary Louise and Jane followed the boy to the car and drove away. As soon as they were safely out of hearing, Mary Louise said significantly, “Two more suspects for my notebook!”