Ruth Fielding at Briarwood Hall: or, Solving the Campus Mystery

"I don't see what Mrs. Tellingham keeps Picolet for," complained another girl.

"For a spy," snapped Mary Cox. "But we'll get the best of her yet. She isn't fit to be a teacher in this school, anyway."

"Oh, she's a good French teacher – of course. It's her native tongue," said one of the other girls, who was called Belle Tingley.

"That's all very well," snapped Mary. "But there's something secret and underhand about her. She claims to have nobody related to her in this country; but if the truth were known, I guess, she has reason to be ashamed of her family and friends. I've heard something – "

She stopped and looked knowingly at Ruth and Helen. The former flushed as she remembered the man in the red waistcoat who played the harp aboard the steamboat. But Helen seemed to have forgotten the incident, for she paid no attention to Mary's unfinished suggestion.

It worried Ruth, however. She heartily wished that her chum had said nothing to the Cox girl about the man who played the harp and his connection with the little French teacher.

CHAPTER VIII

THE MARBLE HARP

The social meeting of the Up and Doing Club lasted less than an hour. It was quite evident that it had been mainly held for the introduction of Ruth Fielding and her chum into the society of the Briarwood girls. Those gathered in the assembly room did not number any Seniors, but were all of the Junior grade, and all older than Ruth and Helen. "Primes" were not allowed by Mrs. Tellingham to join any of the class-governed societies.

In spite of the fact that Ruth suspected Mary Cox of deliberately throwing herself in the way of Helen and she on their arrival at the school, with the sole object of getting them pledged to this society, the girl from the Red Mill could not fail to appreciate the good-natured attempts of the Upedes to make them both feel at home in their new surroundings. They must be grateful for that.

Nor were they urged at this time to join the club. At least, nobody said more to Ruth about joining than had the stout girl, Jennie Stone, on their way to this meeting. The party broke up in such good season, that it was scarcely dark when the chums left the room in the dining hall and strolled back to their dormitory with their new friends. The lamps around the campus were being lighted by a little old Irishman, who wore a wreath of short, gray whiskers and hair about his face – a regular frame. His long upper lip and his chin were shaven, and this arrangement gave him a most comical appearance.

"You're late again to-night, Tony," Jennie Stone remarked, as she and Ruth came down the steps of the dining hall together.

The little Irishman backed down the short flight of steps he carried, with a groan. He had just lighted the final lamp of the series that surrounded the campus.

"And well I might be – well I might be," grumbled the man. "'Tis me needs fower pair of hands, instead of wan pair, and as many legs as a cinterpig." Tony evidently meant centipede. "'Tis 'Tony, here!' and 'Tony, there!' iv'ry blissid minute av th' day. An' 'tis movin' trunks an' boxes, and the like – Mis' Grace should hire a nelephant at this time of the year, an' so I tell her. An' what with these here foreigners too – bad 'cess to them! I have to chase ev'ry rag tag and bobtail on the place, so I do – "

"Not tramps again, Tony?" cried Jennie Stone.

"'Tis worse. Musickle bodies, they be. Playin' harps an' fiddles, an' the loikes. Sure, 'twill be hand-organs an' moonkeys to-morrer, belike. Ah, yes!"

"Maybe some of these traveling musicians can play the marble harp yonder," said Heavy, with a chuckle, pointing to the now half-shrouded figure in the center of the campus.

"Oh, wirra, wirra! don't be sayin' it," grumbled the old man. "There's bad luck in speakin' of thim folks."

Jennie Stone squeezed Ruth's arm, still laughing, as they went on and left the old Irishman. "He's just as superstitious as he can be," she whispered. "He really believes the old story about the harp."

"He ought to believe in a harp," laughed Ruth, in return, "he being Irish. Tell me, who is he?"

"Anthony Foyle. He's the only workman about the place who sleeps on the premises. His wife's our cook. They're a comical old couple – and she does make the nicest tarts! They'd melt in your mouth if you could only make up your mind to hold them long enough on your tongue," sighed Heavy, rapturously.

"But what's the story about the marble harp?" queried Ruth, as they came to the dormitory and joined the other girls. "You mean the harp held by that figure at the fountain?"

"Hello!" cried Belle Tingley. "Heavy's trying to scare the Infant with the campus ghost story."

"Oh! a real ghost story!" cried Helen. "Do let's hear it."

"Come into our room, Cameron," said Lluella Fairfax, lazily, "and I will tell the tale and harrow up thy young soul – "

"And make thy hair stand on end like quills upon the fretful 'porkypine,'" finished Mary Cox. "Yes! let Lluella tell it. It is well for Infants to learn the legends as well as the rules of Briarwood Hall."

Helen was used to being called "Infant" by now and didn't mind so much. She was so much taken with their new friends and the Upedes in general that she went right into the room occupied by Mary Cox and her chums, without a word to Ruth, and the latter followed with Heavy, perforce.

The windows of the "quartette" looked out upon the campus. The lights in the other dormitory shone brightly and the lamps around the open space, which the buildings of Briarwood surrounded, glimmered in the dark. Voices came up to them from the walks; but soon these ceased, for the girls were all indoors. The campus was deserted.

"Don't let's light the lamp," said Lluella. "I can tell stories better in the dark."

"And ghost stories, too," laughed Helen.

"Not so much of a ghost story – at least, there's nothing really terrible about it," returned Miss Fairfax, slowly. "I suppose there are not many people who talk about it, outside of our own selves here at Briarwood. But once – before the school came here – the marble statue down there was the talk of the whole countryside. I believe Mrs. Tellingham doesn't like the story to be repeated," added Miss Fairfax. "She thinks such superstitions aren't good for the minds of the Primes and Infants," and the story-teller laughed.

"However, it is a fact that the original owner of Briarwood Hall had a beautiful daughter. She was the apple of his eye – all beautiful daughters are apples of their fathers' eyes," said Lluella, laughing. "Jennie is her father's apple – "

"Adam's apple," suggested Mary Cox.

"Such a size for an Adam's apple would choke a giant," murmured Belle Tingley, for the three were always joking poor Heavy because of her over-plumpness.

"Don't you bother about my father," said Jennie, calmly. "He gives me a dollar every month for chocolate creams, and you girls help eat them, I notice."

"Hurrah for the Stone pere!" cried Mary Cox. "Go on, Lluella."

"You sound as though you cheered for a sea-wall of masonry, or some such maritime structure," complained Jennie. "'Stone pere,' indeed!"

"She sha'n't have any of the next box of creams, Heavy," said Lluella, soothingly.

"And I'm not sure that you will, either," replied the fat girl. "Do tell your story, Miss!" and Heavy yawned monstrously.

"How dare you yawn before 'taps'?" cried Belle. "I'll douse the water-pitcher over you, Jennie."

At this threat the fat girl sat up promptly and again urged Lluella to continue her tale. So Miss Fairfax continued:

"This rich old gentleman with the apple in his eye – in other words, a beautiful daughter – had a great deal more money than sense, I think. He engaged a sculptor to design a fountain for his lawn, and the draped figure you have seen upon that pedestal down yonder, is supposed to be the portrait of the beautiful daughter cut into enduring marble by the man who sculped. But, unfortunately for the old gentleman's peace of mind while he sculped the marble the artist likewise made love to the young lady and they ran away and were married, leaving the old gentleman nothing but the cold marble statue playing the marble harp, in place of a daughter.

"The father's heart at once became as adamant as the marble itself, and he refused to support the sculptor and his wife. Now, either the runaway couple died miserably of starvation in a garret, or were drowned at sea, or were wrecked in a railroad accident, or some other dreadful catastrophe happened to them – I'm not sure which; for after a time there began to be something strange about the fountain. The old man lived here alone with his servants for a number of years; but the servants would not remain long with him, for they said the place was haunted."

"Oh my!" exclaimed Helen.

"That's right, Miss Cameron. Please show the proper amount of thrilling interest. They said the fountain was queer. The water never poisoned anybody; but sometimes the marble strings of the marble harp in the marble hand or the marble daughter would be heard to twang in the night. Weird music came from the fountain at ghostly hours. Of course, the little harp the statue holds is in the form of a lyre; and what the people were who told these stories about the ghostly twanging of the instrument – you may draw your own conclusions," laughed Lluella Fairfax.

"However, the old gentleman at last broke up his household, or died, or moved to town, or something, and Briarwood was put up for sale and the school came here. That was a good many years ago. Dr. Tellingham's wig matched his fringe of hair when the school first began here, so that must have been a good while ago. The twanging of the marble harp has been heard down through the school ages, so it is said – particularly at queer times – "

"Queer times?" asked Ruth.

"Why, when something out of the common was about to happen. They say it twanged the night before our team beat the basket-ball team from Varden Preparatory. There was a girl here once who ran away because her folks went to Europe and left her behind at school. She was determined to follow them, and she got as far as New York and stole aboard a great steamer so as to follow her parents; only the steamship she boarded had just come in instead of just going out. They say the marble harp twanged then."

"And when Heavy failed to oversleep one morning last half the marble harp must have twanged that time," declared Mary Cox.

A gentle snore answered from the window seat, where Jennie Stone had actually gone to sleep.