“He upset Grumper’s plans?” Nancy inquired with a smile.
“He turned them upside down. Grumper was in a panic that Hendrick would find him and reclaim the stolen jeweled bell.”
“How did he learn Mr. Hendrick was in Candleton?”
“Through his cousin Franz, who served as a lookout at the cliff. Whenever people came near the cave, he sounded the gong and Grumper, hearing it in the laboratory, hurried down and tried to scare them away with his ghost act.”
“Then the rush of water and the tolling bell had nothing to do with his appearances,” said Nancy.
“No, but they sometimes happened close together,” Slocum replied. “Whenever Franz spied someone on the cliff, he would run down to the laboratory and have Grumper send up sleeping-gas fumes through crevices in the rocks.”
“I know now that Franz was the second little elf I thought I saw in my dream!” Nancy exclaimed. “He frequently came to the Salsandee Shop and carried away food.”
“Yes, he had a little car hidden in some bushes at the foot of the cliff.”
“I suppose he also stole the note A. H. lost at the shop,” Nancy said.
“That’s right. Franz knew A. H. by sight and happened to see him drop the note in the tearoom. Later he stole it from the drawer. Before Franz could show it to Grumper, Harry Tyrox got hold of it and then the cat was out of the bag. He tried to get the bell, but Grumper wouldn’t let him have it. Harry was afraid of him because he could put people to sleep with his drugs.”
“Tell me,” said Nancy, “were you the person who passed my friend George in the passageway yesterday morning?”
Slocum started. “I was there but I didn’t know anybody else was. We have a secret closet with a stone door, where we keep Mon Coeur products. I was in the closet. When I came out the passage was dark. My flashlight didn’t show up anybody.”
“Did you lock the door at the top of the stairs?”
“Yes.”
Nancy went on, “You haven’t told me how my father was drugged.”
“When your father told Harry and his pal he intended to prosecute, Harry knew we had to do something quick. Harry followed Mr. Drew to the New York airport, then telephoned Madame to intercept him. We were ordered to see that he conveniently disappeared for a few weeks. Grumper made up a vial of liquid which would turn into sleeping fumes, and gave it to Madame. She arranged to get into a taxi with Mr. Drew, and just before leaving it, opened the bottle and dropped a small amount of the liquid on his coat. It was just enough to affect him but not the driver.”
“How did my father reach Fisher’s Cove Hotel?”
“The driver of the cab had been paid by our men and knew what to do. He took your father there. I registered him under another name, and then kept an eye on him.”
“It was Madame, I suppose, disguised as a maid, who had my father moved from his room.”
“Right. Whenever he was getting better, she gave him another dose and put him to sleep.
“By accident the hotel manager discovered your father’s condition and called Dr. Warren. When Harry overheard the manager tell me to call you, he decided that you were to be drugged too and removed with your father to some other hideout. But Amy, my wife, was afraid I was getting in too deep with the gang and wanted to spike that part of the plan. That’s why she warned you by telephone to keep away. At the last minute Harry concluded the double kidnapping was too risky and called it off.”
“Your wife was far wiser than you, Mr. Slocum.”
“I wish now I had listened to her,” the hotel clerk said miserably. “My wife works in a beauty salon. The day you came for your father she borrowed a wig from there, dressed as an old lady, and looked for you in the lobby.”
“Then she was the one who dropped the note into my lap!”
“That’s right.”
Nancy and her friends were happy when they learned that Harry Tyrox, alias Monsieur Pappier and Mr. James, together with his New York accomplice, still possessed most of the money he had fleeced from innocent victims. Mrs. Chantrey, Mother Mathilda, and the others who had bought the worthless stock would recover a sizable amount of the cash they had put into it.
“What will become of Amy?” George asked, as the girls sat on the Chantrey porch after lunch discussing the case. “Her husband will be sentenced to prison, and she’ll be left alone.”
“The Maguires are taking her back,” Nancy replied. “Mother Mathilda phoned me a little while ago. They’re all returning to the cottage in a few days—which reminds me, we should go there this minute!”
“But why?” Bess asked in surprise. “All the gang have been caught.”
“True, but the mystery of the cave is only half solved. Mr. Hendrick recovered the jeweled bell from Grumper. But we know it wasn’t his bell that frightened people away from the place. Another bell must be somewhere in the cave. I intend to find out!” Nancy sprang to her feet. “Anyone going with me?”
“How about me?” inquired a voice from the driveway.
Turning quickly, the girls saw Ned Nickerson approaching the porch. It was his last day in Candleton, and Bess and George generously declined an invitation to ride with the couple to the Maguire home.
“Why this trip?” Ned asked. “Anything special?”
“I want to clear away the moldy food and cobwebs Tyrox and his men left there. The Maguires would be shocked. And I’d like to find the tolling bell.”
At the deserted cottage the two spent an hour cleaning away the debris. Then Nancy looked at her watch. “The tide won’t come in for a while. We can make a complete investigation of the cave.”
Ned chuckled. “I came prepared! I have a gasoline lantern in the car, and it gives off a brilliant light. We’ll really be able to see what’s down there.”
He went for it and Nancy found two blocks of wood to prop open the secret doors.
The cosmetic factory bore only a faint trace of fumes. Passing through it quickly, Nancy and Ned went down the stone steps to the bottom of the cave. With the tide out, it was possible to walk on the ledge to the entrance.
Nancy turned the other way, however, and asked Ned to focus the light in that direction. Almost at once she found the gaping hole through which the water rushed in at high tide. To Ned’s astonishment, she reached her arm far back into the gap.
“What are you looking for?” he demanded.
Nancy did not answer, but a moment later she asked his help to pull out a rusty, corroded bell. As it swung slowly, a doleful tolling echoed in the cave.
“The warning bell!” Ned exclaimed. “How did you know it was hidden back there?”
“I didn’t, but I got to thinking about the story of the pirates and the loot they hid here.”
“Yes, but the bell never rang until recently,” Ned protested. “How can you explain that?”
“My guess is that at the time the pirates hid their loot in this cave, the opening was very small and only a little water trickled through when the tide came in. Perhaps they placed the bell where it would be tapped lightly when water struck it, and they’d know the tide had changed.
“But as the years went on, the waves carved a wider opening, and more and more water poured into the cave. And just recently the violent action of the waves has caused the bell to toll loudly enough to be heard outside the cave.”
“That bell must be very old,” Ned commented. “Maybe it has been in this cave since Revolutionary War years.”
“I’m sure of it, Ned.” Nancy peered at the trademark, then excitedly she said, “This is a Paul Revere bell! Just what A. H. said he was looking for! I should like to keep it. A. H. said yesterday he wanted to reward me for recovering the jeweled bell. This bell is reward enough for me.”
“No one could dispute your claim to it but the pirates!” Ned chuckled as he took the bell. He carried it up the stone stairway, through the laboratory, and up to the cottage.
“It must have been very exciting in the old days,” Nancy
said wistfully. “How I wish I could have been here to solve a mystery when the cave was a pirates’ hideout!”
“Mysteries!” Ned exclaimed, turning out the lantern. “Haven’t you had enough of them?”
Nancy was sure she never would have. Soon an intriguing invitation would involve her in another baffling mystery, The Clue in the Old Album.
“Anyway,” said Ned, “there’s one puzzle I wish you would solve for me.”
“What’s that?”
“Why you always change the subject when I try to talk to you about something that isn’t a bit mysterious!”
Nancy smiled and said, “Ned, someday I’ll promise to listen.”
Carolyn Keene, Mystery of the Tolling Bell
Thank you for reading books on BookFrom.Net Share this book with friends