The Mystery of the Fires

“Don’t be absurd!” commanded Mary Louise. “How could Cliff have anything to do with it when he was with us all evening?”

“Haven’t you ever heard of a bribe, Mary Lou?” he asked.

The girl did not answer. The increasing noise of the engines behind them told them that the motorboats had caught up with them. Everybody knew about the disaster now; Mrs. Flick was crying, and Mr. Flick was yelling and waving his arms wildly, calling upon everybody to help him.

He was out of his boat first – he happened to be riding in the Robinsons’ launch – and he dashed madly through the trees that stood between his inn and the river. In his excitement, he almost knocked over a small boy carrying a pail of water from the river.

“Freckles!” cried Mrs. Gay, in a tone of both relief and fear: relief that her child was safe, fear that he had had something to do with the fire. “What are you doing?”

“Trying to save the trees,” explained the boy. “The inn was gone when we got here, but us guys kept the fire from spreading.” He looked up proudly, as if he expected a medal for his bravery.

“I don’t believe a word of it!” thundered Mr. Flick. “I believe you boys set the place on fire. And now you’re trying to lie out of it!”

“I wouldn’t put it past ’em,” muttered Mr. Frazier, at his side. The Fraziers had landed at Shady Nook instead of crossing to the hotel’s shore.

“Tell the truth, boys!” urged Mrs. Gay, for by this time both the Smiths and the two young Reeds had joined Freckles.

“We came along here about dark,” said Larry Reed, who was the oldest of the group, “and smelled smoke. Course, we investigated. The inn was gone. But the ashes were still smoldering, and there was smoke coming out from the bushes. So we ran over to Gays’ and to our house and got buckets and carried water from the river. It’s about out now.”

“You’re sure that’s the truth?” demanded Mr. Reed.

“On my honor, Dad!” replied the boy solemnly.

“Did you see anybody in the woods or around Shady Nook?” inquired Mrs. Flick.

“Yeah. A big guy who looked like a tramp from the woods – it was too dark to see his face – and a funny-looking woman in a gray dress with a big pitcher under her arm.”

“Together?” asked Mary Louise.

“No. The big guy was in the woods. And the woman was running along the road that leads to Four Corners.”

“Nothing but a made-up yarn!” denounced Mr. Flick.

But the fire was really out; there was nothing anybody could do. Frazier suggested that the Flicks and their guests come over to his hotel, and the latter accepted. But the Flicks, realizing that this was not a real invitation, that the hotelkeeper would present them with a bill later on, chose to stay with the Partridges. So at last the group dispersed for the night.

Mary Louise, however, was so exasperated with David McCall that she never even answered his pleasant “Good-night!”

CHAPTER V

Freckles’ Story

“What in the world are you doing?” asked Jane when she came out on the porch the following morning to find her chum studiously poring over a notebook. “You must think school has begun!”

Mary Louise looked up.

“It’s harder than school – but it’s more fun,” she replied. “I’m working on the mystery of the fires.”

“Mystery? You really don’t think the Flicks’ Inn was just an accident?”

“No, I don’t. If it were the first fire, I might believe that. But with the Hunters’ a week or so ago, the whole thing looks sinister to me. I’m frightened, Jane. Ours may be the next. We haven’t any insurance to speak of. Besides, something dreadful might happen to Mother. People are burned to death sometimes, you know.”

“Yes, that’s true,” replied Jane seriously. “But what are you going to do?”

“Treat it just like a case, as I did Dark Cedars. List all the possible suspects and search the neighborhood for desperate characters.”

“Such as gypsies?”

“No, not gypsies. They wouldn’t have any motive this time. But somebody must have a motive – unless it’s a crazy person who is responsible.”

Jane’s eyes opened wide.

“That’s an idea, Mary Lou! There are people like that – crazy along just one particular line. They feel they simply have to light fires. Firebugs, you know.”

“Incendiary is the correct term, I believe,” said Mary Louise.

“Oh, so you’ve already thought of it and looked up the word!”

“Yes, I’ve thought of it. Who wouldn’t have? It’s the first explanation that jumps into your head when you hear of a fire. They say lighted cigarettes start them too, and small children.”

“Small children? But not boys as big as Freckles and the Smiths?”

An expression of pain passed over Mary Louise’s face.

“I’m afraid everybody suspects the boys. Especially Mr. Flick… I’m going to call Freckles now and ask him just exactly what he did yesterday. Then, if you’re interested, Jane, I’ll read you all my list of suspects.”

“Sure I’m interested. I love to play the part of Watson to the great Sherlock Holmes Gay!” Mary Louise stuck out her tongue.

“Don’t be so fresh!” she said, but she was pleased and flattered to be called Sherlock Holmes.

Freckles, eating a bun and followed by Silky, came leisurely through the screen door. Mary Louise asked him to sit down and talk to her.

“Can’t long,” was the reply. “Have to go see old man Flick.”