and the pert little face was all smiles. “But the game isn’t out till it’s played out, you know.”
“I fail to grasp the cryptic meaning of that remark,” said Eve, with an insolent stare at Zizi.
“Same here!” and the child’s eerie laugh rang out. “But when I don’t know exactly what to say, I sing out some old saw like that.”
Zizi’s laugh was infectious, and Milly giggled in sympathy, while the others smiled too.
“The experience was mine, last night,” said Mr. Tracy, in his deep, resonant voice. “I suppose I’d better tell of it.”
“By all means,” said Penny Wise, as the clergyman hesitated.
“A phantom appeared to me,” Tracy began, “just as the hall clock struck four. I wasn’t asleep, of that I’m sure, but I was suddenly aware of a presence in the room. A tall, misty shape seemed to take form as I looked, and it had the appearance of a woman with a shawl over her head. She drew near to me, and I could see her face, and it was that of a skull. I was stunned, rather than frightened, and when I tried to call out, I could make no sound. The thing faded away as gradually as it had appeared, and after a time I regained a normal state of nerves. I don’t want to be an alarmist, or frighten anybody, but I—well, I confess I didn’t enjoy the experience, and I take occasion to say now, that I shall leave here to-day. I’m going to Boston, and will return at any time, if for any reason my presence is desired or my affidavit wanted as a witness. You all know what I’ve thought about this whole matter. While not a spiritualist, I’ve preserved an open mind toward any revelations we may have had, and I’m always ready to be convinced. And I may say the sight I saw last night has gone far to convince me. But I don’t care to see it again,” Tracy shuddered, “and at risk of being thought cowardly, I’ve determined to go away. I had intended to go shortly, anyway, and I prefer to go to-day.”
“I don’t blame you, old chap,” said Braye, heartily; “there’s no reason why you should jeopardize your nervous system by exposing it to further shocks. Let Mr. Wise take down the details of your story, keep in touch with us as to your whereabouts and where we can communicate with you, and go ahead. I don’t blame you one bit. In fact, if any one else wants to leave, no objections will be made. How about you, Professor?”
“I want to stay, please. I’m terribly interested in the matter, and I think Mr. Wise is making progress, and will make more, rapidly. I’m anxious to stay.”
“I’m game, too,” said Landon. “In fact I think we all want to see it through, except Mr. Tracy, and he is not so closely associated with the case as the rest of us.”
So Tracy went, about noon of that day, and left an address that he said would always reach him, wherever he might be temporarily.
Milly and Norma regretted his going, for they had come to like the grave, kindly man, but Eve seemed not to care; and the men were all so interested in the work of Penny Wise, that they only gave a hearty good-bye and Godspeed to the departing cleric.
“Queer, that spook should appear to him,” said Wise, after Mr. Tracy had gone.
“He told me some time ago,” said Norma, reminiscently, “that he often heard strange sounds at four in the morning. He said they were like faint moans and rustlings and sometimes a soft step along the halls.”
“Did he ever see anything before?” asked Zizi.
“I don’t think so. He was not very communicative about it, anyway. I think he was nervous on the subject.”
“I know he was,” Eve spoke scornfully. “He was afraid, I’m positive. No one ought to have joined this party who was afraid.”
“We only asked him to fill in, you know,” said Milly, rather apologizing for the minister’s timidity. “And goodness knows, I’m afraid! Or I should be, if Wynne weren’t always with me. If that thing appeared to me,—well!”
Milly could find no words to express her horror, and Landon looked at her anxiously.
“It won’t,” said Zizi, reassuringly, “it won’t, Mrs. Landon.”
“How do you know?” said Eve, a bit abruptly.
“Your mama told my mama and my mama told me,” returned Zizi, who could put such graphic impudence into the silly phrase, that it was impossible not to be amused at it. “Oh, do you do that, too?” she added, as Eve bit her lip in annoyance. “So do I! It’s such a hard habit to break, ain’t it? But you oughtn’t to, it scars your lips. Now, Penny Wise, if you’ll go for a walk and a talk with your little otherwise, she’ll tell you sumpum that you ought to know.”
“Look out, Ziz,” Wise said to her, as they walked off by themselves, and followed the path by the lake, “you mustn’t be too saucy to Miss Carnforth, or there’ll be trouble.”
“Have to, honey. I’ve got to get her real mad at me, to find out her secret. She’s no criminal, as I’ve told you, but she knows who is.”
“Do you?”
“Not yet, but soon. Now, listen, while I expound a few. Friend Spook did appear to me last night.”
“Really?”
“Sure as shootin’! I thought it over, and decided I’d better not admit it to the gaping crowd, or we’ll never find out who does the stunt.”
“But, really, Zizi?”
“Yes, really, Pen. It was about two o’clock,—not four. A tall shape, draped in white, breezed in and toddled around trying to attract my attention. I lay there and looked sort of glassy-eyed, as if I was awake, but kinda hypnotized, you know. Well, I kept up that attitude, and the thing came nearer and leaned over me, and sure enough it had a skull for a face; but, land, Penny, it was a papier maché skull,—a mask, you know. ’Twould be fine in the movies, I must put Manager Reeves up to that dodge!”
“Go on, Ziz.”
“Well, the thing,—the person, I mean, for it was a real, live person all right,—sashayed around a bit, then gave a hollow groan,—I guess that’s what they call hollow,—and slid out. That’s all.”
“You’re a corker, Zizi! Why didn’t you yell?”
“I wanted to see the game. Then, when the pleasant-faced visitor left, I knew it was because I was supposed to have been sufficiently impressed. I thought it over, and I decided that at breakfast, I’d say I hadn’t seen anything, and see who looked self-conscious. And, by jiminy! nobody did! If any one around that table was my visiting spook, he or she carried it off something marvellous! Not one of ’em flickered an eyelash when I said I’d had a sweet, sound sleep all night. I can’t see how any one could be so self-controlled. Now, Penny, could it have been anybody who wasn’t at the breakfast table?”
“Meaning Stebbins or the Thorpes?”
“Oh, no! none of them! But how about some outsider, hired, you know, by somebody in the house.”
“How’d he get in?”
“There’s a secret way into this house. You needn’t tell me there isn’t. Just ‘cause you haven’t stumbled over it yet! Also, who’s doing the hiring?”
“You said everything came around toward Landon.”
“There’s motive there. You see, after Mr. Braye, Mr. Landon inherits all the Bruce fortune, and that’s millions.”
“What’s the matter with Braye being the murderer? He inherits first.”
“That’s just it. If Mr. Braye wanted to kill his relatives to get the fortune, he wouldn’t do it up here, where he’s so liable to be suspected. He’d invent some subtler way, or some less suspicious scheme. But Mr. Landon could do it up here, and feel sure the suspicion would fall