Part 33 (2/2)
”Better not be too sure,” cautioned Walter. ”Wait until you take a look upstairs. I only glanced around.”
”How in the world could they do all this without making a noise?” asked Paul. ”It seems to have been done in a hurry, and boys are rather clumsy-I know I was. They ought, by rights, to have stumbled all over themselves, doing this by the light of only a pocket flash. And yet we heard no racket as we ran up. It was all quiet.”
”That's one queer part of it,” admitted Walter. ”It almost makes one believe in--”
”Ghosts! Go on and say it,” challenged Cora. ”You can't scare us.”
”Any more than we are frightened now,” said Belle.
”Are you frightened?” asked Jack.
”A little,” she confessed. ”Wouldn't you be-if you were I?”
”I might be,” he admitted. ”But we'll get at the bottom of this for you, and catch those youngsters.”
”If we only could be sure they were boys,” Belle murmured.
”Who else could it be?” asked Jack.
”Ask us something easier,” suggested Paul. ”Go ahead upstairs, girls, and see if anything is missing.”
This advice was acted upon, and when the place was aglow with lights Cora and her chums took ”an account of stock,” as Jack said.
”Well, any of your 'war paint' missing?” he demanded of his sister when she came down.
”Only a few little trinkets,” she said, ”ribbons and things like that.
If it were not impossible, I should say girls had a hand in this.”
”It isn't impossible,” declared Walter. ”Girls can do almost anything nowadays. But it isn't likely. Some boys are just as fond of bright things as are girls, and probably these youngsters hope to make neckties of your ribbons.”
”Well, what are we going to do about it?” asked Jack, when they had sat discussing the curious happening for some time.
”What _can_ we do?” Walter demanded.
”I know one thing _I_ am going to do,” declared, Belle, ”and that is I'm going home in the morning.”
”No!” cried Cora.
”I am if this mystery isn't cleared up. It's getting on my nerves horribly,” and she gave a quick glance over her shoulder as a slight noise sounded.
”I did that,” confessed Hazel, who had dropped a book.
”Don't do it again, my dear,” begged Belle.
”Now look here!” cried Cora, ”this won't do. We're going to stick it out. We agreed on that, you know. We're going to find out what this mystery is.”
”That's what I say!” came from Bess.
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