Mandie Collection, The: 4 (24 page)

When they paused in the hallway above the main stairs, the singing was more distinct.

“It must be around here somewhere,” Mandie said, quietly opening doors from the hallway into rooms that they knew were unoccupied.

“Oh, this is aggravating!” Mandie exclaimed.

While she and Celia stood in the center of the landing, the singing suddenly stopped. Everything was absolutely quiet, not a sound anywhere.

“That beats all!” Mandie said in a loud whisper. “Now it stops before we can find out where it’s coming from.”

Even though the girls stood waiting for a few minutes, there was no more singing to be heard. Giving up, they went back to bed.

Mandie rolled over and said, “I think it came from the tower.”

“I just don’t know,” Celia said. “It sounded to me like it was coming from down in the yard.”

“How about waking me up if you hear it any more tonight?” Mandie asked. “And if I hear it I’ll wake you. Tomorrow we’ll talk to Jonathan.”

The girls dropped off to sleep and Snowball curled up on their feet.

The house was quiet for the rest of the night.

CHAPTER SEVEN

DANGEROUS PLANS

At the breakfast table the next morning, no one bothered to mention the fact that the Bagatelles were not present.

Mrs. Taft told the young people she had no plans for them for the day. “Y’all may do whatever you wish today,” she said, “just behave yourselves. We came here to relax and rest, so that’s what I think we ought to do.”

“But we do need some exercise,” Senator Morton said, taking a sip of his coffee. “Maybe we could all take a long walk.”

Mandie sighed, looked at him, and said, “Maybe tomorrow, Senator Morton. I’d like to be lazy today.”

“It’s nice to be lazy once in a while,” Jonathan said.

Uncle Ned looked around the table and asked, “I go visit friends of friends. Does Papoose like to go? We get pony cart.” He smiled.

The young people looked interested, but Mandie, thinking how long his visit might be, quickly declined, saying, “I don’t think so, Uncle Ned. I don’t even know these people you’re going to visit.”

“I not know people, but friends back home know people. Ask me visit.”

Mandie wondered how his friends back home could have friends all the way across the ocean in Switzerland. But then Uncle Ned knew lots of important people, all the way up to the president of the United States. It might be an interesting visit, but she decided she’d better stay at the chalet
and make plans with her friends for their search. After all, they would only be in this house a few days before they traveled on to Germany.

“Thank you, Uncle Ned, for asking me, but I’ll just stay here today,” Mandie told him politely.

As they all rose from the table after the meal, Mrs. Taft turned to the senator and said, “I believe a nice long walk would be invigorating. Shall we go?”

The senator smiled and agreed.

“Don’t y’all get lost now,” Mrs. Taft admonished the young people. “And be sure you are ready and waiting when it’s time for the noon meal.”

“Yes, ma’am,” the three chorused.

Mandie with Snowball on his leash and her friends walked down to the stables with Uncle Ned as he went to get his horse. Jonathan had whispered that this might be a good time to get some rope while Eckart was busy saddling the Indian’s horse.

Mandie and Celia kept talking to Uncle Ned and following Eckart around while he brought the horse in and put the saddle on. Jonathan disappeared.

Uncle Ned squeezed Mandie’s small hand as he mounted. “Papoose be good,” he told her. “I not here to see. But Big God see. I be back before sunset.”

“And
you
be good, Uncle Ned,” Mandie teased as she waved and the old Indian rode off. Snowball ignored the activity, meowing and rubbing around his mistress’s ankles.

Mandie and Celia turned to face Eckart after they saw Uncle Ned ride away. “That cat is not afraid of horses,” he said.

“Oh, no, you see, Snowball was born on the farm where I lived with my father. We had horses,” Mandie explained, as Snowball played with pebbles in the doorway of the stable. Her eyes darted around, trying to locate Jonathan. She hoped he had already taken some rope and gone back to the house with it.

When Eckart wasn’t looking at Celia, she looked at Mandie and rolled her eyes toward the house. Mandie understood that Jonathan was gone.

“If you’d like to ride in the cart again, I would be happy to get it ready for you,” Eckart offered, smiling at Mandie.

“Not right now, Eckart. Thanks anyway,” said Mandie. “I think we’ll go back to the house.”

Before leaving, she decided to question him about the tale surrounding the tower. “Eckart, please tell us about the tower. We won’t tell anyone, will we, Celia?”

Celia shook her head.

Eckart looked at Mandie silently for a moment and then at Celia before he finally spoke. “I am sorry, but I must honor my employers’ wishes. I cannot discuss their private affairs. You understand that, don’t you?”

“Yes, but this tale about the tower, whatever it is, is not exactly private business if the whole village knows about it,” Mandie said.

“It is all right if you discuss it with some of the villagers, but all the servants here have been forbidden to talk of it,” Eckart said. He turned and started back toward the stable. He stopped and added, “Whenever you wish to use the cart, please let me know. I sincerely hope you will enjoy your visit here. Now I must go back to work.” With that, he went on inside the building.

Mandie and Celia looked at each other, then started walking back to the house.

“Maybe we should have gone with Uncle Ned,” Mandie said. “Who knows, we might have met up with someone to talk to about the tower. No one here is going to tell us about it.”

“Mandie, maybe we are meddling in the Thalers’ private business,” Celia said as they neared the house. “Have you thought about that?”

“Not really
meddling
, Celia, when everyone in the whole countryside is supposed to have heard about the tower. It’s common knowledge,” Mandie said. She saw Mrs. Taft and Senator Morton in the distance sitting on a bench amid a profusion of bright blooms. “There’s Grandmother and the senator, over there. Come on. Let’s hurry and find Jonathan before Grandmother changes her mind and decides to find something for us to do.” She scooped up Snowball and ran up the steps to the door.

As the girls hurriedly entered the hallway, they saw the Bagatelles coming down the main stairway. Mandie stooped to busy herself with Snowball so she could see where they were going. The Bagatelles ignored the girls as they carried on their conversation in French and disappeared down the long corridor toward the parlor.

There was a soft “psst” from above and the girls looked up to see Jonathan standing at the top of the stairs. They quickly went up the steps.

“Did you get the rope?” Mandie asked in a whisper, in case someone else was around.

“Sure. I got lots of it—more than we’ll need,” Jonathan told the girls with a smile. “I hid it under my bed.”

The girls laughed.

“Oh, you know, Jonathan,” said Mandie, “we haven’t had a chance to tell you, but we heard the singing again last night.”

“You did? And you didn’t call me?” Jonathan was clearly disappointed. “What did you do?”

“Celia and I walked around the house trying to decide which direction it was coming from, but we just couldn’t tell,” Mandie explained.

“I must have slept awfully sound, because I didn’t hear it,” Jonathan said, leading the way into the parlor at the top of the stairs. “Look, girls, please call me if you hear it again.”

The girls agreed. Mandie put Snowball down and stooped to take off his leash. Suddenly she jumped up and excitedly told her friends, “I know! I know! I know where the singing was coming from—the tower!”

Celia and Jonathan looked at her in surprise and sat down on the settee.

“The tower? How do you know?” Jonathan asked.

“The tower is supposed to be haunted, remember?” Mandie said. “There has to be some reason that everyone thinks it’s haunted—something you can see, or hear, or something!”

“You’re right,” Jonathan agreed quickly.

“But, Mandie,” Celia objected, “the singing didn’t sound like it was coming from the tower. I thought it sounded like someone in the yard.”

“That could be because this house is so monstrous that everything echoes. The walls are so thick, and there are so many hallways and doors and everything, you never know where the sound is coming from,” Mandie told her.

“Well, maybe,” Celia said, evidently not completely convinced by Mandie.

“If we can get to the tower, I think we’ll find the source of this singing,” Mandie told her friends.

“And we’ll do that tonight,” Jonathan said.

“You mean we’ll try,” Mandie corrected him. “It may not be possible to cross the roof and get inside the tower.”

“We can do it,” Jonathan assured her.

“Just the same, I think we ought to keep on looking for some way to get into the tower,” Mandie told him. “Just stop and think. This house
was built with the tower in the original section, and there must have been some entrance into the tower back then. Otherwise, why build the tower? Besides, it has windows, and the windows have curtains. Where did they come from?”

“But the house could have been remodeled, Mandie, and the tower completely sealed off,” Celia said.

“I don’t agree with that,” Mandie said. “For one thing, as far as I can tell, the curtains on the windows in the tower don’t look old and dirty. They would be if there was no way to get inside and wash them now and then.”

“The remodeling could have been done recently, perhaps when the Thalers bought it,” Celia suggested.

“I still think there’s a way in,” Mandie insisted.

“You may be right, Mandie, and we can continue looking, but I don’t think we’ll find any entrance to the tower—at least not from the house,” Jonathan said.

“Well, what are we waiting for?” Mandie asked, standing up. “Pretty soon it’ll be time to go downstairs and eat.”

“Wait,” Jonathan told her. “Let’s get our plans settled for tonight first. That is, our plans if we don’t find an entrance from the house.”

“All right, but let’s hurry,” Mandie insisted.

“We can tie the rope around the beam between the windows, like we said,” Jonathan said. “I’ll grab the rope and swing out onto the roof, then work my way over to the chimney. I’ll fasten the rope there, but I’ll leave enough slack in it so you can grasp it here at the window and hold on to it while you follow.”

“You mean like putting one hand in front of the other as I swing on the rope?” Mandie asked, sitting back down.

“Right,” Jonathan replied. “It won’t be as bad as it sounds, because your feet will still touch the roof as you swing forward, and I’ll also tie a piece of rope around your waist just in case you should slip.”

“And what are you going to be doing all this time?” Mandie asked.

“I’ll wait for you when I get to the chimney,” Jonathan said. “And then we can work our way to the window of the tower.”

“And what if the window in the tower is locked?” Mandie asked.

“I’ll carry a hammer in my belt and we’ll just break the glass if necessary,” Jonathan said confidently.

“But, Jonathan, we’d be destroying other people’s property,” Celia spoke up.

“I can always pay to have it fixed,” Jonathan replied.

“But you won’t have any money until your father comes over to Europe unless you borrow it from the senator or us,” Celia reminded him.

“I know, but I can always get money from somewhere,” Jonathan said. “Now you, Celia, should wait down on the lawn below us and warn us if anyone comes along and sees what we’re doing. You could start singing or something.”

“And you’ll have to stay pretty well hidden down there so nobody sees you. They’ll wonder what you’re doing out there alone at night if they see you,” Mandie reminded her.

Celia sighed, “I sure hope we don’t get caught.”

“We won’t go up there until we think everyone is in bed and asleep for the night,” Jonathan assured her.

“But remember,” said Mandie, “the observation room, where we have to go outside, is in the wing where Grandmother and Senator Morton are staying.”

“But it’s not close to their suites,” Jonathan said.

Mandie stood up again and picked up Snowball as she put his leash back on. “Let’s go up there and look things over now that we have plans made. I want to see if it looks possible,” she said.

The three quietly made their way up to the observation room. They didn’t want anyone to notice them. And they especially didn’t want to run into the Bagatelles.

Arriving at the top of the stairs, they found the room empty.

Mandie pointed and asked, “You’re talking about this beam here?” The wide beam stuck out on the outside of the window. All the windows seemed to have a similar beam for ornamental purposes.

Jonathan came to her side and leaned out the window. “Right,” he said. “Now look out that way. See that chimney? I think I can swing over to it on a rope.”

Mandie leaned out beside him. She could see a huge chimney some distance away. When she looked down, she realized how high up they were. It would be an awfully long drop to the yard from up here if they slipped and fell. For some reason she was nervous about the whole plan.

Celia, standing behind them, said, “I sure hope y’all don’t fall or get hurt. It could be awfully dangerous.”

That made up Mandie’s mind. She would show Celia she was not afraid to take chances. Celia was always scared of everything.

“Oh, Celia, we’re not going to fall or get hurt,” Mandie told her. She turned to look at her friend and said, “You’ll probably be in more danger down there alone in the dark by yourself. Are you sure you want to do it?”

“Of course, I’ll do it, Mandie,” Celia said quickly but nervously. “Don’t worry about me.”

“All right, it’s all settled then,” Mandie said. “Why don’t we go look around in that room in the servants’ quarters now?”

“But we’ve already been there twice. I don’t see what we could hope to find,” Jonathan said.