CHAPTER 4
A Midnight Visitor
It was delightful to sit on the beach that evening even though they could not use their new seats. The family sat there long after supper watching the sunset.
Gulls flew overhead and landed on the rocks near by.
Suddenly Henry said, “It’s queer how sleepy we get.”
“It’s the sea air,” said Mr. Alden. “Go to bed anytime you want.”
In fact, the whole family went to bed at nine o’clock and were asleep very soon after.
The Conley town clock struck as it always did. Ten, eleven, twelve. And then Watch began to whine. His hair stood up along his back and around his neck. He began to howl.
“No, Watch,” said Benny. “If you’re going to howl every night at midnight, you might as well go home. You’re no help to us.”
But Watch went right on howling.
“I wonder if someone is cooking in that little house,” said Henry.
“No one’s there,” said Benny. “We would have heard him go crunch, crunch, crunch on those little stones.”
“That house is all boarded up anyway,” said Jessie. “The door must be locked and the windows don’t open. Nobody could be in there.”
“Someone might take off a board and get in a window,” said Henry. “Then he could put the board back every night. Tomorrow we’ll take a look.” Benny wanted to go right down. But just then Watch began to quiet down. He gave a last growl and went to sleep.
“You’re a funny dog,” said Benny. “See that you keep still the rest of the night.”
But it was not Watch who kept Jessie and Violet awake a little longer. When Jessie turned out her light she looked out of her window. In the moonlight she saw a woman walking quietly away. Her feet did not go crunch, crunch. She walked softly in the tall beach grass.
Jessie called quietly to Violet. She came and looked out, too.
“A woman!” she whispered. “What do you suppose she is doing here?”
“She’s going away at least,” answered Jessie. “We certainly don’t need to get Benny down again. And Watch is quiet. Look, Violet. She is hiding behind those bushes before she goes up the street.”
The street was empty. The stores were dark. Very soon the woman went quietly up the road and out of sight. The two girls went back to bed and fell asleep.
About dawn Watch growled softly. But everyone was sleeping deeply. No one awoke.
In the morning Jessie called everyone to breakfast out on the rocks.
“I know my place,” said Benny, “on account of the B.”
When everything was eaten, the girls told their strange story about the woman.
Mr. Alden said, “I think we had better look that little house over. Everyone can help. Try each board to see if it is loose.”
The Aldens began with the front windows and found everything tight. The door was locked. There was no loose window board. Watch trotted along quietly and did not bark.
“It’s funny,” said Jessie, “that Watch doesn’t bark.”
“Maybe there’s nothing for him to bark at now,” said Mr. Alden. “Certainly this house is shut tight.”
“Hey! Look at this!” said Henry suddenly. He caught a sheet of paper that was blowing down to the sand. The paper was marked into little squares. There were numbers and strange letters in each. Sometimes there were question marks.
“That doesn’t mean a thing to me,” said Jessie.
“Me either,” agreed Henry. “But I think somebody is pretty clever. It looks like college science work, but I don’t understand it. It’s not in my studies so far.”
“Just as if someone were testing something,” said Violet slowly. “Like an experiment.”
“Exactly!” cried Henry. He smiled at his little sister. “But how does it fit in with cooking smells and your seeing a woman at night?”
“Keep that paper, Henry,” said Mr. Alden as they went back to the rocks.
Just then Violet spoke of the shells.
“The beach is covered with them,” cried Benny
He jumped off the rocks to the sand. “I know this one. It’s a clam shell, and this one is a scallop shell.”
“Here’s a queer one,” said Jessie. “It has five toes.”
“That’s a cat’s paw,” said Mr. Alden. “See how many kinds we can find.”
Mr. Alden knew all about shells, as well as about birds and flowers.
They found a snail shell, a slipper shell, and gold and silver colored shells. In all they found fourteen different kinds.
“There’s plenty of seaweed here, too,” Benny said. “But who would want to collect that? Maybe that cross boy would find it interesting.”
“This makes me think of Blue Bay,” said Violet, smiling. “We ate out of shells there.”
“But this is safer for swimming than Blue Bay,” said Henry. “No sharks here.”
Jessie said slowly, “It’s too bad we don’t have swim suits. I suppose four new suits would cost too much.”
“No,” said her grandfather, “you need new ones anyway. And you mustn’t be on the beach and not go swimming.”
“Maybe Mr. Hall has some suits,” Jessie went on. “He has almost everything.”
She smiled to think of suits and groceries and everything else mixed together in the little store.
They put their shells on the rock table and walked over to the store.
“No,” said Mr. Hall, “I haven’t any swim suits. But there is a lady down the street who sells hats. She has suits, too. You’ll see the sign as you go out.”
Benny said, “I saw the sign when I came in. It said ‘HATS’—and that’s where we go to buy bathing suits? That’s funny.”
“Well,” said Mr. Hall with a laugh, “my sign says ‘GROCERIES’ and people come here to buy paint and wallpaper.”
They went out of the store and down the street.
The dock was near by and Benny pulled Henry over to see the boats. “Look at that one,” he said. “She’s a beauty. Her name’s Sea Cook II.”
Henry said, “I guess a boat like that isn’t too big for one man to run. You’re right, Benny, she is a beauty.”
Just then Jessie and Violet called to the boys. The girls were more interested in suits than boats. The boys saw Grandfather waiting with, the girls. Together the Aldens looked in the window of the hat shop. There were beautiful summer hats in the window—and one suit. It was blue.
“There’s your suit, Jessie, if it fits,” said Henry. “Of course, Ben wants red.”
“Right,” said Benny. “Red is my color.”
The lady in the hat shop smiled to see the whole family coming in. She said her name was Mrs. Ross.
Suddenly Henry looked out of the window. The black-eyed man was going by.
“Do you know who that man is?” Henry asked.
“Oh, yes, indeed. His name is Tom Cook.”
“What does he do for a living?” asked Mr. Alden.
“He’s really a fisherman. But sometimes the fishing is poor, so he works on odd jobs. They say he has made a fortune selling lobsters and renting houses to the summer people.”
“He doesn’t look it, does he?” said Henry. “He looks poor.”
“He saves his money,” said Mrs. Ross. “He won’t spend a cent. He has a fine boat and he won’t let his son use it, and his son is no little boy. He’s seventeen years old already.”
An idea hit Benny, but he didn’t say anything aloud. The man was a Mr. Cook. That beautiful boat was the Sea Cook II. It must be the blackeyed man’s boat.
Henry was thinking, too. That first day they had met Mr. Hall and rented the lighthouse—hadn’t he said a man named Cook had bought the summer kitchen? Maybe here was another clue.
“Too bad,” said Jessie.
“Yes, it’s too bad. The boy does use it, though. People say that he is always taking that boat out after dark. They say he has some fancy idea in his head. Nobody knows what it is. He always comes back carrying something. Sometimes it is a small thing like a jar, and sometimes a great big thing like a barrel. At least that’s what I’m told.”
“I wonder what it is?” said Benny.
“I haven’t the least idea,” said Mrs. Ross. “He goes way out. Out of sight. His father doesn’t know he takes the boat, though how the boy has kept him from finding out, I don’t know.”
“I bet some day he’s going to find out,” said Benny. “Then there will be trouble.”
“Trouble?” cried Mrs. Ross. “There’s enough trouble already in that house between Mr. Cook and his son. The mother stands up for the boy. The father will hardly speak to his own son.”
“Why?” asked Mr. Alden.
“Well, you see this boy is very smart. He finished high school at sixteen. He’s been just hanging around ever since. His father won’t let him work. Too proud. And the boy wants to go away to college. His father won’t let him.”
“Oh, my!” said Benny. “That’s the cross boy we saw in the store, and the cross man with the black eyes is his father. That explains a lot, doesn’t it, Grandfather?”
“Yes, Benny. Those two will always be in trouble unless we do something about it.”
“Did you say ‘we’?” asked Henry in surprise.
“Yes, we,” answered Mr. Alden with a smile. |