The Dragon's Secret Part 3

"Oh, hus.h.!.+ or Ted will hear. He can't be far away," implored Phyllis, guiltily. "Of course, I don't say what or whom it was hidden by, but there's something mighty queer to me about an empty bungalow being inhabited by _living folks_--"

"What about burglars?" interrupted Leslie, quickly.

"Never _was_ such a thing around these parts, in any one's experience!"

Phyllis hastened to a.s.sure her, much to her secret relief.

"Then perhaps it's the people who own the cottage," offered Leslie.

"No chance. They've all gone off to spend the winter in California--every one. Ted had a letter from Leroy Danforth, who is a great chum of his, last week."

"Well, I _know_ there is some other explanation besides a--a ghostly one!" declared Leslie, nothing daunted. "But anyway, we might have another look at the dragon."

Phyllis went and got it out from its hiding-place in her trunk, and they spent a fruitless half-hour wrestling with its secret fastening. They broke their finger-nails trying to pry it open, they pressed and poked every inch of it in an endeavor to find a possible secret spring; they rattled and shook it, rewarded in this case by the dull thud of something s.h.i.+fting about. It was this last sound only that kept up their courage.

Finally they gave it up.

"I believe we could break it open with an ax, perhaps; but you don't seem to approve of that, so how we're ever going to find out, I'm sure I can't imagine!" declared Phyllis, discouraged.

"Do you know, I think this metal is so strong it would resist even an ax," Leslie soothed her, "and we'd only damage the box without accomplis.h.i.+ng anything. There must be some other way. Why not show it to Ted and your father? Perhaps they could do what we can't."

"I will _not_ share this secret with Ted!" declared Phyllis, obstinately.

"He's nearly nineteen and he thinks he's the most important thing in creation, and he's perfectly insufferable in some ways, now. To have his advice asked in this thing would set him up worse than ever. I won't do it!"

Leslie had to smile inwardly at this outburst. To her, Ted had seemed just a jolly, agreeable, and rather companionable boy, with a very friendly, likable att.i.tude. But she realized that she had not had Phyllis's sisterly experience, so she said nothing more. They put the dragon back in his hiding-place and sadly admitted themselves more baffled than ever.

On the evening of the third day after this, however, a strange thing happened.

To the surprise of Leslie, Miss Marcia had been induced to walk along the beach, after supper, and stop in at Fisherman's Luck to hear a concert--an impromptu one--given by Phyllis and her father and brother.

Leslie had learned that the Kelvin family amused itself in this fas.h.i.+on every night when the fis.h.i.+ng was not particularly good.

"I'd love to hear them play, shouldn't you, Aunt Marcia? Phyllis is a wonder, just by herself, and they must make a delightful trio!" She said this without any hope that her aunt would express much interest; but to her astonishment, Miss Marcia replied:

"Well, suppose we walk down there after tea. I'm feeling so much better that I don't believe it would hurt me, and I'm just hungry to hear some music myself!"

Leslie joyfully imparted the news to Phyllis, and they planned an elaborate program. It was an evening that they long remembered, so absorbed were they in the music that they all loved. And it was not till the end of an ensemble rendering of a Bach concerto, that some one remarked, "Why, it's raining!"

No one had noticed it until then. Miss Marcia was quite aghast, for she seldom ventured out in the rain and she had brought no adequate wraps.

But Leslie settled that question speedily. "I'll take Rags and run up the beach to our bungalow and bring them to you, if Phyllis will lend me her slickers," she declared. "No, you mustn't come with me, Ted. I'll be perfectly safe with Rags, and while I'm gone, you can all be giving that Beethoven sonata that you promised Aunt Marcia. I won't be fifteen minutes."

They finally let her go and settled down to the music once more. She was much more than fifteen minutes in returning, but no one noticed it, so deeply immersed were they in the rendering of the sonata. At last, however, she was back, breathless and dripping and with a curious light in her eye that no one noticed but Phyllis.

"What is it?" Phyllis managed to whisper, when the others were talking and putting on wraps.

"Just this," replied Leslie, breathlessly and jerkily. "While I was in the house--I happened--to look out of my window--as I often do,--no light in my room--and I saw--that light again next door! Rags saw it too--at least he growled in that queer way. I waited and watched a long time--I wanted to go out nearer the place--but didn't dare. Then it disappeared and I didn't see it--any more. Then I came on here."

Phyllis listened to the whispered, jerky sentences in a thrilled silence.

Then she replied: "I'm coming up first thing to-morrow morning--early!

But watch out the rest of the night--if you can!"

Phyllis was as good as her word--better, in fact, for she was actually knocking at the door of Rest Haven before Leslie was out of bed, much to Miss Marcia's astonishment.

"Did you see anything else?" was her first whispered greeting.

But Leslie shook her head. "There wasn't another thing happened. I watched nearly all night--till I fell asleep at the window, in fact!"

"Well, something happened at _some_ time or other!" replied Phyllis, provocatively.

"How do you know?" demanded Leslie, in a twitter.

"I've seen the sign of it. Come outside and I'll show you!"

They made some excuse to Miss Marcia for immediately vacating the house, and hurried outdoors. Phyllis led the way to a certain side door of Curlew's Nest, on the opposite side from Rest Haven, where a sheltering projection of roof extended out for two or three feet over the ground.

The hard rain of the night before had beaten out the sand all about the wooden foot-path to an unbroken smoothness. But just under the protecting roof, Phyllis pointed to something at their feet.

"There it is!" she muttered. And Leslie, staring down, beheld the impression of a single footprint--a footprint very different from either of their own--in the sand!

CHAPTER V

AN EXPLORING PARTY

"Well!" was Leslie's first remark, "that proves _one_ thing beyond a doubt."

"What?" demanded Phyllis.

"That it wasn't a _ghost_ around here. I never yet heard of a ghost who made a footprint!"

The deduction somewhat staggered Phyllis in her pet belief. "I suppose that's true," she had to admit. "I never did, either. But now the question is, who did it and what did he want?"

But Leslie had been carefully examining the footprint. "You say, what did 'he' want. Have you noticed that this footprint doesn't look very much like a _man's_?"

Phyllis stooped over it. "You're right! It's a woman's or a girl's.

Here's the deep imprint of the little French heel, and the narrow, pointed toe. Must have a mighty small foot!" She measured her own beside it. "Still, even mine would look much smaller in pumps or slippers instead of these comfortable sneakers. Might be either a small woman or a girl like ourselves."

"But why is there only _one_, I wonder?" mused Leslie.

"I think the answer to that is simple. She walked on this narrow board-walk up from the back road, probably because it was easier, or, even perhaps, so as not to make any footprints. And just at the doorstep she may have stumbled, or stepped off by mistake in the darkness. Perhaps she didn't even realize it."

Again Leslie had bent over the footprint. "She was coming in when she made it. Do you notice that it points toward the door?"

Phyllis stared at her. "What a perfectly dandy detective you'd make!" she exclaimed. "You simply take in everything!"

"You're just as good and even better!" laughed Leslie, secretly pleased, however.

"Hurrah for us!" cried Phyllis. "We're just a pair of natural _Sherlock Holmeses_! Now, here's what I propose. There's something mighty queer going on here, I believe. And I'm willing to give up my ghost theory, because it _does_ seem silly. But I want to investigate the thing pretty thoroughly, and the only way to do it is to get into that bungalow and see what has been going on inside."

"But Phyllis!" cried the shocked Leslie. "You wouldn't break into some one else's bungalow, would you? And besides, how _could_ you?"