Part 9 (2/2)
”What you saw through the trees was a white scarecrow.”
”A scarecrow?” He laughed. ”Well, that's a good joke on me and the other guys. We were sure it was a ghost because we could hear the thing screaming. How do you explain that?”
”I can't yet, Chris,” said Nancy, ”But I'm sure that the screams are not supernatural.”
The boy looked doubtful. ”I'm sorry I wouldn't look for your lost ball the other day,” he apologized. ”If I were sure you're right about the ghost I'd search for it later.”
Nancy smiled in amus.e.m.e.nt because she saw that Chris was torn by conflicting emotions. He wanted to find the golf ball, but he could not rid himself of the fear he felt about looking for it.
Nancy said, ”I'd especially like to recover that ball because it was autographed by Jimmy Harlow.”
”Wow, no wonder you want to get it back,” Chris murmured enviously. ”I'll look for it.”
”Have you always lived near Deer Mountain Hotel?” Nancy asked him as they were walking together toward the last hole.
”Sure.” Chris grinned. ”All my life.”
”Then you must know nearly everyone for miles around. Tell me, did you ever hear of a house near the hotel that burned recently?”
The caddy looked slightly puzzled a moment, then he smiled.
”Oh, you must mean the Judson mansion. It stood over there.”
With a sweep of his arm, Chris pointed back toward the woods. He said, ”It was kind of close to the bridge-on the other side of the ravine. It burned more than two years ago in the middle of the night. No one knew how the fire started.”
”You say a family named Judson lived in the house?”
”Not a family. Only Miss Margaret Judson.”
”And is she an old lady?” Nancy inquired.
”Oh, no, she'd be about twenty-three or four now. Her parents died, and she was engaged to marry some guy-a professor at a college near here. But they never did get married. After the fire she ran away and no one heard much about her after that.”
”It was odd that she disappeared directly after the fire,” Nancy remarked.
”Yes, but the Judsons were strange. My mother could tell you a lot more about the family.”
Nancy was elated. This was the first tangible clue she had had to the ident.i.ty of the young woman with whom she had talked at Hemlock Hall. Would Chris's mother be able to tell her more regarding Margaret Judson-facts perhaps which would connect her with the bra.s.s chest discovered near her former home?
”Where do you and your mother live?” Nancy asked the caddy.
Chris gave his address and Nancy wrote it down. ”I'll go to see her,” she said.
CHAPTER VII.
Ravine Riddle
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