Skippy Bedelle Part 31

"Well, it's my phonograph," said Tootsie sullenly, and immediately departed for her room--by request.

For two days the phonograph remained quiescent, but about this time Miss Clara Bedelle announced that some one had been tampering with her figure.

"Your figure, Clara? How shocking!" said the older brother.

"My dressmaker's figure, and what's more, some one," said Clara, looking hard at Tootsie, "_Some one_ has been in my closet and disturbed my dresses!"

"How _very_ strange," said Tootsie sarcastically. "Are you sure it isn't your imagination--child?"

"And I know who did it."

"Perhaps you know, too, who stole my phonograph," said Tootsie angrily.

The next afternoon the phonograph departed for four hours. Tootsie searched her sister's bedroom and then called Skippy into consultation.

"It's Clara all right," said Skippy. "We must set a watch on her."

"She has a mean and spiteful nature. She does it just to get me punished."

"Leave it to me."

"What will you do?"

"Say, what's it worth?"

"What do you mean?"

"What do I get if I catch her red hot?"

"I'll give a dollar," said Tootsie recklessly.

"That's too much," said Skippy, with an appearance of generosity. "I'll sleuth for a quarter a day. Cash in advance. But my orders go. Savvy?"

Tootsie paid down the fee, and following instructions departed next morning with the family for the beach, while Skippy, returning across lots, wriggled on his stomach over the lawn and slipped into the house by the cellar window. For three days Tootsie duly paid out her quarter and received the most comforting of reports. On the fourth day, however, a discussion arose.

"'Course if you sit there, no one's goin' to come," she said, fingering her last quarter. "I know it's Clara by the look in her eyes."

"Sit there! What kind of a sleuth do you think I am?" he said indignantly. "Look here. See that phonograph--see anything queer about it? Pick it up."

Instantly the grating sounds of a dinner bell were heard and a horrible crash.

"Lookout! Don't drop it, you chump! See that string that pa.s.ses down the back of the wall and into the closet?" said Skippy, proudly exhibiting a patent alarm which he had constructed with the aid of a delicately balanced dishpan. "I'm in the dining-room under the table. Well what?"

"Heavens! If Daddy ever sets that off!"

"He won't. You bet, I'll see to that," said Skippy hastily. "Well what?

Do I get another quarter?"

There was a slight mental indecision after which the quarter came reluctantly to the detective. Tootsie went thoughtfully down to the beach. The new method did redound to the stability of the phonograph, but was Skippy really working as rapidly as he could?

"I should have offered a dollar and no more," said Tootsie to herself.

"If this keeps up I'll be broke in a week."

So distressing was this outlook, that her mind refused to be diverted, and after a brief hesitation she returned to the house, intent on a more satisfactory financial arrangement. Now Tootsie was as fond of mystery stories as Skippy himself, and so with due regard to etiquette she dodged down the hedge, slunk behind the lilacs, and noiselessly let herself into the dining-room window. Then, cautiously, on hands and knees, she approached the mysteries of the dining-room table, behind the red cloth of which Skippy was to be waiting.

"Hist! It's me," she said in a wary whisper. Then, having consumed ten minutes in moving six feet serpent fas.h.i.+on across the creaky floor, she gained the table. Skippy was not there. She rose violently, b.u.mping her head, scrambled out and rushed into the parlor. The phonograph likewise had disappeared.

"He's on the trail at last," she thought excitedly. "Hurray!"

But at that precise moment the strangest of strange, uncanny sounds was heard. Tootsie stood stock still and listened with a pumping heart.

There was no question about it, the phonograph was gone, yet faintly, like a sinking moan, she heard, she was sure she heard, the thin, tinny sounds of a Sousa two-step. The room was dim, the house deserted. For one brief moment she stood panic-stricken, poised for flight. Then she shook her head angrily.

[Ill.u.s.tration: The partner of his arms, escaping, rolled over towards Tootsie. _Page 182_]

"Fiddlesticks, phonographs don't have ghosts!"

And listening more intently, she gradually located the familiar strains as coming from the distant carriage house. In a fever of expectancy Tootsie flew across the lawns and gained the open door. Above her the phonograph was pumping out the thrilling measures of the latest two-step, but what puzzled her immediately were the scuffling, s.h.i.+fting sounds, like a scurry of rats, which accompanied it. Then a suspicion of the truth came to her and she tiptoed up the stairs. On the open floor Skippy with his arms about a strange shape was painfully treading in and out of a maze which, with a bench, a barrel and two chairs, he had arranged to visualize the perils of the ballroom.

"Thief!"

Skippy started, s.h.i.+ed into the bench and went over backwards while the partner of his arms, escaping, rolled over towards Tootsie, discovering under Clara's best organdie dress the net-work of wire which made up the missing dressmaker's form!

CHAPTER XXVI

CONTAINING SOME HIGH MELODRAMA

THERE are great moments in life when the acquired veneer of society drops away and human beings revert to type. Tootsie lay down on her back and kicked her legs in the air, howling with glee. Skippy, disentangling himself from the bench, rose with slow deliberation. He saw that he faced a crisis. If Tootsie, now rolling before him in hysterical agony, ever was allowed to tell such a story as this, there would be no future for John C. Bedelle but to s.h.i.+p before the mast. Skippy thought hard and Skippy had the instincts of a diplomat. He decided to begin with a light conciliatory manner.

"Well, Tootsie, old girl, you've got the goods on me. What's your price?"

Tootsie's reply was a succession of hysterical gasps that sounded like a child with the whooping cough laughing over a comic section.

"What's your price?" Skippy repeated more firmly, but striving to maintain a sickly smile.

"OW! OW! OW!" said Tootsie, holding in her sides.

Skippy began to be alarmed. He thought a moment and then carefully removed the dressmaker's form and hid it behind a packing-case. But the sight of Skippy's dancing companion brought forth a fresh attack of hysterics. Then he had recourse to water and a dripping oily sponge. The sight of this so affected Tootsie that she rose precipitately and staggered to a chair. Skippy at once abandoned the sponge and sympathetically proffered his handkerchief.

"It's goin' to cost me a lot of money," he thought, considering her with anxiety. He had fifteen dollars stowed away with the intention of adding it to the cash returns of his approaching birthday and acquiring his first dress suit. He made a mental surrender and advancing to the somewhat calmer Tootsie, a third time asked:

"Well, come on! What's your price?"

"Thief!" said Tootsie, all at once remembering her grievance.