The Phantom Town Mystery by Carol Norton
CHAPTER III THE MISSING FRIENDS
Upstairs, in Mary's room which was furnished as it had been when she hadbeen there as a child, curly maple set with blue hangings, the two girlschanged from riding habits to house dresses. Mary wore a softly clingingblue while Dora donned her favorite and most becoming cherry color.
"One might think that we are expecting company tonight." Mary was peeringinto the oval glass as she spoke, arranging her fascinating golden curlsabove small shell-like ears.
"Which, of course, we are _not_." Dora had brushed her black bob,boy-fashion, slick to her head. "There being no near neighbors to dropin." Then suddenly she exclaimed, "Oh, for goodness sakes alive, Icompletely forgot that letter. It's for both of us from Polly and Patsy.I've been wondering why they didn't write and tell us where they haddecided to spend their summer vacation."
Dora sprang up to search for the letter in a pocket of her riding habit.Mary sat near a window in a curly maple rocker as she said dreamily: "Ifwe hadn't come West, we would have been with them--that is, if they wentto Camp Winnichook up in the Adirondacks the way we had planned allwinter."
Dora, holding the letter unopened, sat near her friend and smiled at herreminiscently as she said, "We plan and plan and plan for the future,don't we, and then we do something exactly different, and _most_unexpected, but _I_ wouldn't give up being out here on the desert andliving in a ghost town for all the fun Patsy and Polly may be having--"
Mary laughingly interrupted. "Do read the letter and let's see if theyreally _did_ go there. Perhaps--"
"Yes, they did." Dora had unfolded a large, boyish-looking sheet ofpaper. "Camp Winnichook," she announced, then she read the ratherindolent scrawl. "Dear Cowgirls,"--it began--
"Patsy has just come in from a swim. She's drying her bathing suit bylying on the sand in front of the cabin in the sun. Her red hair, which_she_ calls 'a wind blown mop,' looks, at present, like a mop that hasjust finished doing the kitchen floor. Last winter, you recall, she had a_few_ red freckles on her saucy pug nose, but now she wears them all overher face and arms and even on her back. She's a sight to behold!"
There were spatters on the paper that might have been water. The type ofpenmanship changed. A jerky, uneven handwriting seemed to ejaculateindignantly, "Don't you kids believe a word of it. I'm a dazzlingbeauty--as ever! It's Polly whose looks are ruined--if she ever had any.She won't play tennis and she _won't_ swim and she _will_ eat chocolatedrops--you know the finish, and she wasn't any too slim last year whenshe _had_ to do gym."
The first penmanship took up the tale. "I had to forcibly push Patsyaway. She's gone in to dress now, so I'll hurry and get this letter intoan envelope and sealed before she gets back because I want to tell onher.
"You know Pat has always said she was a boy hater, and the more the boysfrom Wales Military Academy rushed her, the more she would shrug hershoulders and 'pouff!' about them, but she's met her Waterloo. There's aflying field near our camp and a boy named Harry Hulbert is therestudying to be a pilot. Pat and I strolled over to the field one day andever since she caught sight of that tall, slim chap all done up in hisflying togs, she's been wild to meet him. I wouldn't be surprised ifshe's even hoping that his machine will crash some day right in front ofour cabin so that she can bind up his wounds and--"
Once again the jerky, uneven writing seemed to exclaim, "Silly gilly!_That's what_ Polly is! It isn't the flier, it's the flying that _I'm_crazy about. I _do_ wish I knew that Harry Hulbert, but not for anysentimental reasons, believe me. Pouff--for all of 'em! But fly I'm goingto!! In truth, if you girls stay West until the end of vacation, you_may_ see an airplane landing in your ghost town--me piloting!!!???"
Then came a wide space and when the writing began again, it was datedthree days later and was Polly's lazy scrawl. "It's to laugh!" she began."But, to explain. If you wish hard enough for anything, it's _bound_ tohappen. Not that Harry Hulbert's plane crashed in front of our cabin butit was forced down when Patsy and I were out in her little green car farfrom human habitation. Of course we hadn't gone riding _just_ because we_saw_ that particular little silver plane practicing up in the air--oh,no--not at all!"
Patsy's jerky scribble interrupted. "She's a mean, horrid,misrepresenting person, Polly Perkins is! She knows perfectly well we_had_ to go to the village to get a pound of butter for our camp mother,and wasn't it only _polite_ for us to give that poor stranded boy a lift?He _is_ a real decent sort, even though the only thing _he's_ crazy aboutis flying, but we _did_ learn something about him. His father has somesort of a government position in Arizona, where _you_ are, no less. Imean, in the same state, and when Harry gets his pilot's license, he isto be a flying scout, he told us. He said it will be an awfully excitinglife. When there has been a holdup out there on a stage or a train andthe bandits leap on to their horses and flee across the border, Harry isto pursue them in his little silver plane and see where they go. Thenhe'll circle back to where a posse is waiting, notify them, and so thebandits will be captured. Won't that be simply too thrilling for words?Oh, _why_ wasn't I born a boy? I could have been Patrick, then, insteadof Patsy. Believe me, when Harry Hulbert gets his license, and it won'tbe long now--he's _that_ good--don't I wish I could be a stowaway in hisplane! We'd have to leave Polly here though. She's so heavy, the planewouldn't be able to get off of the ground."
The lazy scrawl concluded the epistle. "If Patsy goes West, so do I, butI'll go by train. I have no romantic urge to take to the air with slim,goggle-eyed young men with a purpose in life.
"Our camp mother (nice Mrs. Higgins, Jane's aunt, came with us this year)is calling us to lunch, and right after that Pat and I are going to townto mail this. Pat wants me to say that when _her_ friend Mister HarryHulbert _does_ fly West, she'll give him a letter of introduction to youtwo and I calls that right generous of her considering--"
"Pouff!" came a brief interruption. Then "Goodbye. We're signing off.Patsy Ordelle and Polly Perkins of the famous Sunnybank SeminaryQuadralettes."
"What a jolly letter!" Mary said. "Wouldn't it be fun if the missingmembers of our little clan could be here with us. Patsy is as wild aboutmystery stories as you are and this ghost town just teems with them."
A rich, musical voice drifted up from the back porch, "Senoritas!"
"Oh, good! There's Carmelita calling us to supper, and _am I hungry_?"Dora tossed the letter on the dresser and slipping an arm about herfriend, she gave her a little impulsive hug.
"I don't envy Pat and Poll, not the least little mite," she said as theywent down the broad front stairway together. "It _is_ lovely at CampWinnichook as we well know, since we've been there with them the pastthree summers, but the desert has a lure for me that the little blue lakein the mountains never did have."
"I know," Mary agreed. "Those mountains are more like pretty hills.There's nothing grim or grand about them."
They entered a large, pleasant kitchen, in one corner of which, betweentwo windows, was a table spread with a red cloth. A good-lookingmiddle-aged Mexican woman, dressed in bright colors, stood at the stovepreparing to dish up their meal. "_Buenos dias, ninas_," she said in herdeep, musical voice.
"Good evening, Carmelita," the girls replied, and then, when they hadbeen served generous portions of the Americanized Mexican dish which thegirls called "tamale pie," Dora flashed at the smiling cook a pleasedglance as she said, "_Muchas gracias, Senora_."
Then to Mary, "It doesn't take long to use up all the Spanish _I_ know.Let's take a vow that when we go back to Sunnybank Seminary next fall wewill add Spanish to--" A wistful expression in her friend's face causedDora to pause and exclaim in real alarm, "Mary Moore, do you think,because of your dad, that you _won't_ be able to go back East to school?You have only one year more before you graduate. You know how we four of'The Quadralettes' have counted on graduating together."
Mary smiled brightly. "Of course, I expect to go and take Dad with me."Her momentary wistful doubting had pa
They had finished their supper and were rising when Carmelita, who hadbeen out on the back porch, hurried in and began a rapid chattering inher own language. The mystified girls could not understand one word. But,as the Mexican woman kept pointing out toward the road, they felt surethat someone was coming toward the house, nor were they wrong.