Nancy said she would speak to the others immediately and call back. He gave her the number.
She hurried to the dining room. The ghost hunters were just leaving. Quickly she explained to them about the call but added:
“There’s a possibility that Ned is being held by kidnappers who made him telephone. It might be a ruse to get us away from here and over to the Red Barn.”
“But how can you find out?” Bess asked.
Nancy smiled. “Sometime ago Ned and I decided on a code identification. When I call him back, I’ll use it.”
Dave was intrigued. “May we listen?” he asked.
“Come along,” Nancy said.
For privacy they all went to her room and she made the call. The woman who answered the phone said she would get Mr. Nickerson at once.
When Ned came on the phone, Nancy asked him, “What is your right name?”
He laughed heartily. “I get you. It’s Edward Emerson.”
“Hold the line a minute, Ned,” Nancy requested. She turned to the other ghost hunters and said, “That answer means Ned is not a prisoner. If he had been he would have said ‘I keep my middle name a secret.’ ”
Nancy spoke to Ned again. “We’ll be at the Red Barn Guesthouse early tomorrow morning.”
As soon as Ned had hung up, Nancy telephoned Sergeant Brothers and told him Ned had been kidnapped but escaped. Then she asked the officer if he had any information about the cabin with the dummy in it. He told her no one had come there in the meantime and the owner had said he had never given permission for anyone to use the place.
“We removed all of the paraphernalia and brought it here to headquarters,” Sergeant Brothers said. “By the way, that male dummy is very interesting. Actually he’s a kind of robot with all sorts of gadgets to make him perform. He can walk, run, and even attack a person with some karate-like motions.”
Nancy told the detective her suspicions about Madame Tarantella and the initials on the shell. “She may be part of the gang carrying on some shady business. We’re moving tomorrow to the Red Barn Guesthouse outside Middleburg.” The officer thanked her, then said that the police would get in touch with her if there were any further developments.
When Nancy told the other ghost hunters about the robot, George said, “Um! It could attack someone or steal without leaving a single fingerprint!”
“One thing is sure,” Nancy went on. “The person who built it is a clever engineer. That, of course, points to Wilbur Prizer.”
When the ghost hunters reached the Red Barn Guesthouse the following morning, Ned took them into the living room. They found that he was the only person staying there. George remarked upon this.
“People are afraid to come here,” Ned told her. “The owner, Mrs. Hodge—she’s in the attic now —is very discouraged and said she may have to sell the place for far less than it is worth. Does that sound familiar?”
In a chorus the ghost hunters answered, “Sevanee Lake and Pine Grove Camp.”
“I suspect something similar may be occurring here,” Ned remarked. “We’ll have to find out.”
Nancy asked, “Have there been any other ghostlike happenings here besides the phantom horse with the rider running after it?”
Ned nodded. “Mrs. Hodge says all sorts of queer things have been going on here lately, some of them inside the house. The old ghost story had long since been forgotten. Then a few weeks ago a guest actually saw the apparition.
“She told others, and little by little everyone moved out. After that, newcomers stayed only a short time because one of them always saw the horse and the rider. Of course the story spread and now no one writes for reservations or stops here.”
“What a shame!” Bess exclaimed.
Burt said in a quiet voice, “You don’t think Mrs. Hodge is having hallucinations, do you?”
“No, I don’t,” Ned replied. “I was introduced to one of the happenings last night.”
“Oh, what was it?” Bess asked excitedly.
Ned said he had been awakened by terrible screaming out on the road. “It sounded as if someone were beating another with a chain.”
“Horrible!” Bess shuddered.
“It alarmed me, naturally,” Ned went on. “I ran to the window and looked out. There wasn’t a person in sight. I half expected to see an apparition, maybe even the horse and rider, but nothing appeared.”
“The screaming had stopped?” Nancy asked.
“Yes. This morning I asked Mrs. Hodge about it. She had heard the sounds too and looked out, but saw nothing suspicious. She’s convinced that someone is trying to ruin her business on purpose.”
For a few minutes they discussed the strange affair, then Nancy said, “Ned, tell us what happened to you after you left me under the bridge.”
“A couple of thugs jumped me from some bushes. I was no match for them so I pretended to black out. They dumped me in the back of their car. An hour later on a side road they had a flat tire and got out. I suddenly ‘came to life’ and ran off in the woods. But why did they kidnap me?”
Nancy told him about her experience at the bridge and added, “They wanted you out of the way.”
The conversation was suddenly interrupted by a loud crash upstairs!
CHAPTER XIII
The Vanishing Horse
THE ghost hunters dashed up the stairs, with Ned in the lead. They hurried along the second-floor hall to a door leading to the attic. A woman stood at the foot of the stairway.
“Mrs. Hodge!” Ned exclaimed. “What fell?”
The woman was ash white. In her plain, pale-gray dress and white hair, she almost looked like a ghost herself.
She answered in a trembling voice, “A—trunk. It’s been standing on top of another one for years. All of a sudden while I was up there it began to teeter, then crashed to the floor.”
It was evident to Nancy that Mrs. Hodge was unnerved. Without waiting for an introduction she went up to the woman and put an arm about her waist.
“Please come and lie down,” she said gently. “We’ll investigate and see if we can find out why the trunk toppled over.”
She supported Mrs. Hodge, who led the way to her own bedroom. The others followed, all expressing sympathy over her fright.
Ned then introduced Nancy and the other ghost hunters. Mrs. Hodge acknowledged their friendly greetings and remarked that this was no way for the owner of a guesthouse to welcome anyone.
“Please don’t worry about it,” Nancy said. “We know you have had a great deal of trouble and we’d like to help you. Will it be all right if we search the attic?”
“Please do,” Mrs. Hodge said.
Since the attic was small it was decided that only Nancy’s group would go. Rita wanted to determine for herself if there were any supernatural angles to the incident and she went with them.
They climbed the stairs and looked around. The crudeness of the unfinished attic and the small windows indicated that the house was very old. Antique pieces of furniture and boxes stood here and there. An old blanket was flung across a rafter.
To one side lay the toppled trunk. Its lid had opened, scattering flimsy old-fashioned dresses on the floor. Behind it stood the other trunk.
Nancy hoped to find a reason for the accident. While the others in the group looked around the big room, she and Ned pushed the second lightweight trunk away from its position. They found that its contents were antique dolls and toys.
“Ned, look!” Nancy exclaimed, pointing to the floor.
Where the trunk had stood was a trap door with an iron handle. Ned pulled the door up easily. The underside was covered with wall paper which matched that of the bedroom closet below. The door to the room was open.
“Someone was under this trap door and pushed it up,” Nancy remarked. “I guess he stood on the dressing-table stool that’s in the closet.”
“Let’s go downstairs and see if anyone’s hiding,” said Ned.
With a quick explanation to the oth
ers, they scurried down the stairs and rushed to the bedroom with the trap door. No one was there. The couple made a quick search of the other rooms on the second floor, then hurried to the first floor. They had no luck there either.
“I guess the intruder made his getaway while we were all talking to Mrs. Hodge in her bedroom,” Ned surmised.
They went upstairs and told Mrs. Hodge what they had discovered.
Nancy asked, “Did you know there was a trap door in that closet?”
“No, I didn’t. Oh dear! This is just one more sign that I am being harassed by the real and the unreal.”
“Have you any suggestions as to where the mischief-maker might be hiding?” Nancy asked. “Do you have a basement?”
“Yes, but I keep it locked and carry the key with me. He couldn’t be down there. But it’s possible he might be hiding out in the barn.”
“We’ll look there,” Nancy said.
She went back to the attic and told her friends what she and Ned had found and their plan to search the barn.
“Please come and help us,” she said. Smiling at Rita, she added, “I’m afraid there was nothing supernatural about the fallen trunk. An intruder probably had been waiting for another chance to scare Mrs. Hodge. Perhaps he stayed in that room as a guest and found out about the trap door.”
The rest of the ghost hunters started for the barn, but Nancy stayed behind to speak to Mrs. Hodge. “Can you recall the names of all the people who rented the room with the trap door during the past year or so?”
“Not offhand, but I’ll show you my guestbook.”
She and Nancy went to the first floor and Mrs. Hodge brought out the old-fashioned register. Together, she and Nancy quickly scanned the list of guests.
Suddenly Nancy stopped at a date one year previously. She pointed to it excitedly. “Here are two names familiar to me,” she said. “Mr. and Mrs. Wilbur Prizer.”
Nancy asked what the man and woman looked like. Mrs. Hodge’s description exactly fitted the couple Nancy was trying to find!
“They’re the ones!” Nancy exclaimed. “Can you tell me anything else about them?”
“Well, not much. They seemed very nice and kept to themselves a lot. The two were great hikers. They spent much of their time outdoors walking through the fields and woods.
“Once Mrs. Prizer said to me, ‘I wish I had a place like this. Did you ever think of selling it?’ Of course, I told her no. At that time my business was very good.”
Elated with her clue, Nancy hurried off to join her friends and tell them what she had learned.
Ned said, “When I was kidnapped, I picked up a note on the car floor. It said, ‘Force sale red barn.’ I’m sure it’s this place.”
“Obviously you’re right!” Nancy exclaimed. “Prizer is trying to break down Mrs. Hodge’s resistance before offering her a low price for the farm.” The others agreed.
They had found no one hiding in the barn or any of the outbuildings and gave up the search. During the afternoon the group discussed ways to track down the mysterious horse and rider that appeared at the farm.
“It will be bright moonlight tonight,” Nancy spoke up. “Why don’t we take turns standing watch in the barn and see if the phantom animal appears?”
The ghost hunters agreed and drew lots for time periods. Nancy’s group was to be on duty from ten to two. They all took naps directly after supper and then appeared in the barn promptly at ten.
“We didn’t see a thing,” Helen reported as her foursome finished their watch. “Everything quiet.” She laughed. “I’d like to bet that if there’s going to be any excitement it will come during the time Nancy Drew is here!”
The young detective and her friends settled down to watch. There were the usual sounds of night birds and insects, but nothing else. The young people found it hard to stay awake and kept nudging one another when a head fell forward in sleep.
It was a beautiful night. Stars gleamed brightly and the moon shone brilliantly. Every tree, bush, and building was sharply silhouetted. If anyone should appear, he surely would be seen clearly.
Off in the distance a clock struck the midnight hour. One minute later Bess grabbed Nancy’s arm.
“There it is!” she whispered.
Emerging from the woods was a white ghostlike horse. It began to gallop across the field.
“There it is!” Bess whispered
As everyone watched tensely, its rider came from among the trees. He was dressed in white riding attire, and ran pell-mell after the horse.
At first the animal came directly toward the barn and the onlookers wondered if he intended to dash inside. They shrank back from the doorway. But a few seconds later the horse veered around and headed toward the woods. The trailing rider turned also and sped after it.
“We must try to catch him!” Nancy exclaimed.
She and the others rushed from the barn and raced across the field. Would they find the animal and the man among the trees or had they gone on farther? By the time the ghost hunters reached the spot where the man and his horse had entered the woods, there was no sign of either.
“They weren’t real! They were phantoms!” Bess said shakily.
Ned dropped to his knees and put his ear to the ground. “Funny,” he said, “I can’t hear the sound of hoofbeats.”
“Of course not,” said Bess. “The horse and rider were spooks!” She recommended that they all go back to the barn until two o’clock and then get some sleep.
Since it seemed impractical to try to follow the horse and rider through the dark woods, the searchers did as Bess suggested. No one else appeared during the rest of the period.
The episode was reported to the next set of watchers. In the morning they reported that nothing had happened during the rest of the night.
“But I wish it had,” Don said in disappointment.
At Sunday breakfast Nancy proposed that the ghost hunters make a search in the woods for clues to the strange horse and rider. All agreed that it was a good idea and set off together.
As they walked through the field leading to the woods, Rita said in a hushed tone, “There are no hoofprints! That means he was a ghost horse!”
“I agree,” said Bess. “Oh dear! I don’t like this.”
Nancy found a series of footprints, however, in exactly the direction the phantom rider had taken from the woods and back again.
“I’ll bet,” said Rita, “that these footprints belong to somebody else. The ghost horse had a phantom rider.”
Following the man’s footprints, the searchers came to a place in the woods where several bushes were broken down.
A moment later George cried out, “I see hoofprints!”
She started to run and soon outdistanced the others.
Suddenly Bess screamed, then cried in terror, “George fell out of sight!”
Seemingly the earth had swallowed her cousin!
CHAPTER XIV
The Shell Clue
HORRIFIED, Nancy and her friends rushed ahead to find out what had happened to George. Had the ghost rider waylaid her?
“George! George! Where are you?” Bess cried frantically.
It did not take them long to find George. She had fallen into a shallow pit covered with brush. Disentangling herself from the twigs and branches, she said sheepishly:
“I sure fell into a trap. Old George doesn’t know whether she’s supposed to be a bear or a rabbit!”
The others laughed and Bess heaved a great sigh of relief. Burt reached down a hand to help George climb out.
“I wonder why someone dug a pit here,” Dave remarked.
“Probably to keep anybody from following the horse,” George declared. “Let’s find the hoofprints and pursue them.”
The group hastened on through the woods. It was easy to follow the marks, but unfortunately they ended at the main road which was macadam and failed to show the prints.
“I guess we’ll have to give up,” Ned remarked. “Too bad.” r />
Disappointed, the ghost hunters turned around and retraced their steps through the woods.
Dave said he was still puzzled about the horse. “We know that it was real and so was the rider. But why didn’t the animal leave hoofprints in the field?”
Nancy said she had a theory. “I don’t believe that white horse was real. It was probably a tremendous balloon stretched over a mechanical horse which the rider guided by remote control.”
“You mean like the phantom canoe?” George queried.
“Yes. And of course this makes me think that the rider was Wilbur Prizer.”
Burt said he could not understand why the man went to such elaborate, and presumably expensive, means to pull a ghost trick. “Is he some kind of nut?”
“Or a heartless crook,” said Nancy.
When they reached the pit which George had fallen into, Nancy stopped. “I have a hunch we should investigate under the brush in there.”
The boys jumped in and removed the twigs and branches. Then Nancy slid down and began to search. There were many leaves to be cleared away, but finally her efforts were rewarded. She picked up a small shell.
“I wonder if somebody threw this in here,” she said, “or if the digger dropped it from his pocket.”
George remarked, “Another shell! Is anything carved on it?”
As soon as Nancy climbed topside where the light was better, she began to examine the shell.
“Here’s a mark!” she said. “The same as I’ve seen before—MT.”
“That woman must be an avid collector,” Dave remarked. “This shell is pretty.”
It was deep orange and had an interesting curled-over section to form the abode of the snail which had lived inside.
When they reached the guesthouse, Mrs. Hodge asked the ghost hunters if they would like to attend church with her. At once Nancy and Ned said they would be glad to accompany her.
George said, “I’d like to go, too. How much time do we have to get ready? I fell in a hole and I’ll have to take a bath.”
“Oh, you have a half hour,” Mrs. Hodge said.
“I’ll make it,” George said and dashed up the steps two at a time.