Mandie Collection, The: 8 (42 page)

“That’s on your mother’s side,” Ted said. “I hear tell you have some Cherokee connections.”

“Oh yes, my mother is Grandmother’s daughter. But my father’s mother was full-blooded Cherokee,” Mandie told him.

“Which makes you one-fourth Cherokee,” Bonnie added.

“But you don’t look like an Indian, with that blond hair and blue eyes,” Ted told her.

Mandie frowned, trying to decide whether he was being critical of her ancestry. “But I am one-fourth, and I am proud of it. That’s what God made me,” she said, straightening her shoulders and looking him in the eye.

“Excuse me, Ted,” Bonnie said, quickly waving to someone across the room. “I see the Stones motioning for us to come over there. Remember, we promised to spend some time with them tonight.” Turning to Mrs. Taft and Mandie and Celia, she added, “If y’all will please excuse us, we will try to catch up with you later. Nice meeting you, Mandie and Celia.” She put on a brilliant smile.

“I’m glad to have met y’all,” Mandie said, not to be outdone with her politeness.

“Yes, it was nice,” Celia added.

As soon as Bonnie and Ted got out of hearing distance, Mrs. Taft said, “Well, Amanda, I take it you were not interested in really becoming acquainted with those two.”

“Well, Grandmother,” Mandie began slowly, and then looking directly at her grandmother, she added, “They were too formal, too stilted. I don’t think they were really interested in meeting us, either. They’re not my kind of people.” “Why, Amanda, what in the world do you mean by that, not your
kind of people?” Mrs. Taft asked, moving over near a tall potted plant to get out of the flow of traffic.

“Pardon me, but I believe I know exactly what Miss Amanda is saying,” Senator Morton spoke up. “Those two young people acted stuffy and too uppity. I caught that immediately. I’m sorry you are not going to be friends, but their elders were a completely different kind of people—friendly, down-to-earth, and really good friends with your grandmother and me. I just don’t understand your generation sometimes, Miss Amanda.”

“Please, let’s not get into that,” Mrs. Taft quickly spoke up. “We made an effort, since their families were old friends of ours, but let it go at that. You girls, move on around the room and get acquainted with other people. Enjoy yourselves.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Mandie said, grinning that her grandmother usually understood her so well.

Mandie and Celia continued moving through the crowd. Several people stopped them to introduce themselves. The girls didn’t see the turtle-costumed couple again. Finally midnight came, and everyone unmasked, but there were no surprises because the girls didn’t recognize any of the guests.

“I haven’t seen Bonnie and Ted again, have you?” Mandie asked as they stood by the doorway to the hall.

“Yes, I saw them leave with those people they called the Stones. I suppose they had more interesting things to do,” Celia replied.

When the rooms were finally empty, the girls told Mrs. Taft and Senator Morton good-night.

“Be sure you girls go straight to your room and stay there, now. It’s too late to go wandering around anywhere,” Mrs. Taft told them in the parlor.

“Yes, ma’am, we will,” Mandie told her. “I’m really tired. We have to get Snowball from the kitchen, and then we’ll go upstairs. Good night.”

Mandie and Celia hurried down the inside hallway this time to the kitchen. The room was full of servants and noise as the cleanup after the party progressed. Bella saw them when they entered.

“Lolly take cat upstairs,” Bella called to them. “Good night.” She turned to her duties.

“Well, all right. Thank you, Miss Bella,” Mandie replied. She and Celia hurried back into the hallway and up the stairs to their room.

“I’m glad to see Snowball is really here this time,” Mandie said as she opened the door and found the white cat curled up on the big bed.

“Me too,” Celia agreed, pulling the ribbon out of her long auburn curls. “I believe I’ll fall asleep the minute I get in that bed.”

“You mean without even discussing all those people at the party?” Mandie teased, unfastening the bodice of her dress and preparing for bed. “Why, I figured we had lots to talk about.”

“Oh, Mandie, can’t it wait till morning?” Celia said with a big yawn as she removed her party dress.

“I suppose so,” Mandie said, walking over to the wardrobe and opening the doors to get her nightclothes down. She glanced up at the hangers, stomping her foot. “Celia, the hangers are mixed up again.” She let out a long, loud sigh.

“Maybe it was Lolly. Bella said she brought Snowball up here,” Celia reminded her. “Anyhow, I’m too sleepy to bother. I’m going to bed.” She quickly pulled down her nightclothes and hung up the dress she had worn.

“All right,” Mandie agreed.

Within a few minutes the girls were ready for bed. They jumped under the sheets and said good-night to each other.

Soon Mandie could hear Celia’s breathing rhythm change and knew Celia was asleep, but she couldn’t go to sleep herself. She got up silently and went over to sit in the window and look out. The moon was shining, but most of the buildings in the distance were dark. The townspeople had gone to bed.

Curled up there in the big chair, a million thoughts ran through Mandie’s head. She thought about the party, and about Bonnie and Ted, whom she was sure were the ones she and Celia had seen in the park. She wondered where Eleanor and Rickard, the “turtles,” had gone, because she believed they left the party early. Then there was Juan. Where was he right now? Was he the one who had been in their room?

“Oh shucks!” Mandie murmured to herself as the mysteries swirled around in her head. “I need Joe to help me figure things out.”

And Joe Woodard, what was he doing right now? Would he be able to take some vacation from college and come back home while
she was out of school for the summer? She missed him and didn’t like the idea that he was so far away. Never in their lives had they been so far apart.

Mandie slowly drifted off to sleep in the chair. She was suddenly awakened by a thud in her lap and straightened up to find Snowball there. She rubbed her eyes and yawned.

Looking around the room, Mandie realized she had been dreaming of home. And she didn’t like what she had dreamed. She had plainly seen Joe Woodard arm in arm with a beautiful brunette, who was smiling happily at him. Mandie had been trying to find him in a maze of rooms and watched as the two walked by. Joe didn’t seem to see or hear her when she called to him. He kept his eyes on the brunette and disappeared into the next room.

“My goodness!” Mandie exclaimed to herself. “That was a stupid dream, or was it? How do I know what Joe Woodard is doing down there in New Orleans at that college?”

Mandie put Snowball down and stood up and stretched. She walked over to the bed and saw that Celia was still sleeping.

“It doesn’t really matter because it was all a dream,” Mandie muttered to herself as she climbed quietly back into bed. “I’ll sort it all out tomorrow.”

CHAPTER NINE

WHAT IS JUAN UP TO?

Mandie was up early the next morning in spite of the fact that she had been up late the night before. Snowball, who usually slept at Mandie’s feet, had crawled up the bed, and his purring in her ear woke her.

“Snowball, move,” Mandie told the cat as she opened her eyes and found him curled up on her pillow. She gave him a little shove, which brought an angry meow from him as he dug his claws into the bedclothes.

Glancing at her friend, Celia, who was still sleeping, Mandie quietly crawled out of bed, stretched, and went over to the open window for a breath of fresh air. Kneeling down at the low windowsill, she looked out into the early dawn. Faint streaks of light appeared in the east of the gray sky as the sun came up.

“Thank you, Lord, for another day,” Mandie murmured as she watched the sky lighten.

She thought of the many mysteries that had appeared during her visit to this old city. She had not been good at solving anything so far. One thing she was sure of was that Bonnie and Ted were the couple she and Celia had seen in the park that night. But how had they known Mandie and Celia would be in the park? She had a feeling they were up to no good, and she was waiting to catch them in their ulterior motives and expose them to her grandmother and Senator Morton.

And who was rearranging their clothes in the wardrobe? And why? It didn’t happen every time they left their room, and that in itself was a mystery. Why didn’t the person who was doing this change the hangers every time the room was vacated?

“And I just know that was the strange woman from the ship that we saw at the lighthouse,” Mandie murmured to herself. “So where is the woman? And what is she doing in St. Augustine? I’d like to talk to her. She might help solve some of these mysteries.”

Suddenly Mandie caught a glimpse of two men standing under a palm tree in the yard below. She leaned forward and could just barely see that they were talking as they made gestures with their hands.

“That’s Juan!” Mandie exclaimed to herself. “And that is the big man with the beard talking to him.” Then she really got excited because she could tell by their motions that Juan was talking to the man! Juan talking! Juan was not really deaf and mute as everyone thought. She had believed all along that he could talk and hear. So why was he playing deaf and mute? “Oh, if I could only hear what they are saying!”

Mandie knew that by the time she put on her clothes and slipped downstairs to eavesdrop, the men would probably be gone. But she was going to try anyway. She rushed to pull down her dress from the wardrobe and get into it, then found her shoes nearby. Buttoning the bodice of her dress as she went, she ran down the stairs to the door that led outside beneath her room. Stopping inside to look out through the glass in the door, she saw the two men still in the yard.

“If I open the door, they will probably see me,” Mandie moaned in disappointment. “How can I get out unnoticed?” She looked around.

Trying to keep an eye on the men, she glanced around the hallway. There were several windows, but she didn’t see another door anywhere. How could she get outside?

Turning back to look through the glass in the door again, she saw the two men shake hands, evidently saying good-bye. Juan started toward the house, and Mandie heard a faint remark from the other man. Juan instantly turned back, and, making motions with his hands, he plainly spoke to the man.

“—meet at the boat ... tonight ...” Juan told the man, but Mandie could not hear all his words. To her it sounded like they were making a date to meet at a boat somewhere that evening.

Mandie was so surprised at hearing Juan talk, she almost got caught
by him as he entered the house. She dived behind a huge chair nearby, upsetting a lamp, which she grabbed and took down with her as she sat on the floor hidden from his view. She peeked around a corner of the chair and saw Juan look around the hallway. And then to make matters worse, Mandie heard Snowball meow and knew he was not far away. If he came to her, she would be discovered.

Juan stooped down to rub Snowball’s head as the cat came up to him. Then the man picked up the cat and set him on the staircase nearby.

“Go! Psst!” Juan told the cat and clapped his hands. Snowball immediately took off running up the steps. Juan laughed and went on down the hallway and disappeared through a door on the left.

Mandie finally let her breath out. She realized she had been holding it ever since Juan came into the house. She quickly rose, set the lamp back on the table, and ran for the stairs.

Mandie made it to her room without anyone seeing her. She stepped inside and closed the door as Snowball dashed in before her. She felt giddy with excitement as she leaned against the closed door.

“Where have you been so early, Mandie?” Celia asked as she rose from the bed and stretched.

“Oh, Celia, you’re awake!” Mandie cried excitedly and went to perch on the arm of the chair nearby. “Celia, I was right. Juan can talk. I heard him. He—”

“You heard Juan talk?” Celia interrupted in surprise.

“Yes, he was talking to that big man with the beard we saw before,” Mandie tried to explain. “And they made plans to meet at a boat somewhere tonight. I couldn’t hear all of it. Oh, Celia, I was right!”

“My goodness, Mandie!” Celia exclaimed. “Where were they? What were you doing? Following them around or what?”

Mandie explained how she had seen them from the window and had raced downstairs to spy on them.

“I’ve thought all the time that Juan could hear and talk, and I was right,” Mandie declared.

“What are you going to do? Are you going to tell Senator Morton?” Celia asked.

“Probably later, but let’s keep this our secret for the time being so we can watch Juan and see what happens next,” Mandie told her. “I
wish I could have heard where this boat is they are going to meet at, but they were talking so low I couldn’t make it all out.”

“A boat? Well, at least we know it has to be around water if it’s a boat,” Celia replied as she got her dress down and began putting it on.

“And there’s lots of water around St. Augustine, remember?” Mandie replied. “And there must be lots of boats, too.”

“So many that I’d say it’s hopeless trying to figure out where they are meeting,” Celia agreed.

“Not exactly hopeless, Celia, but hard to do,” Mandie told her, sliding back into the chair over the arm. “Now, let me see. We have to plan our strategy.” She frowned as she thought about it. “If we watched Juan tonight, we could just follow him when he leaves the house.”

“Mandie, you are not talking about roaming around looking for a boat after dark, are you?” Celia asked, brushing her long auburn hair.

“Celia, they said they would meet at the boat tonight, and tonight must mean after dark, I suppose,” Mandie replied. “The only problem I see is if Juan decides to leave the house while we are having supper tonight. We can’t very well watch him while we eat.”

“There’s no telling where Juan might go when he leaves the house tonight,” Celia reminded her. “Why, we could even get lost following him, and then we’d be in trouble.”