The Mystery of the Hichcocke Inheritance (6 page)

Ben’s automobile was a sleek convertible
with four seats. Pete whistled as he ran his finger along the
glistening hood.

“Are you sure Bob and I can’t come along,”
he begged.

Jupiter grinned at his friend. “I’m afraid
not. But I promise Ben and I will have enough fun for the both of
you.”

“Very funny!” said Pete, rolling his
eyes.

“Try to remember that you’re on a case!”
added Bob as they climbed into the sportster.

The car roared to life and the boys strapped
on their safety belts. “Here we go!” announced Ben.

With a spray of gravel, the fine automobile
zipped down the long drive. When they had gotten well out of sight
of Hichcocke Manor, Ben eased the car to the side of the road and
parked.

“There’s a horse trail through the woods
over there that hunter’s use during fox season,” he instructed Bob
and Pete as they climbed out from the back seat of the car. “Stay
to the right and it will lead you to the back of the house. From
there you can use the Abernathy’s servant entrance to sneak back
inside.”

“One of you keep an eye on Jebediah while
the other watches the Fitchhorns,” advised Jupiter. “And be
careful,” he added.

“And you fellows try not to have too much
fun,” said Pete dryly.

With that the streamlined auto sped off,
leaving the two investigators by the side of the road.

“Being First Investigator sure has its
perks,” complained Pete.

Bob smiled at his friend and clapped him on
the back. “Come on,” he said, “let’s get hiking.”

All was quiet at the house by the time Bob
and Pete returned. They carefully surveyed the back yard to make
sure the coast was clear.

Pete hissed, “Look!”

Jebediah O’Connell was lurking about the
grounds of the estate, poking his cane at some garden stones and
looking beneath them. The man with the wooly mustache and crumpled
tweed hat put his hand on a crumbling sundial and bent down to
examine something on the ground.

“I wonder what he’s looking for?” whispered
Bob.

“Why don’t you stay and find out,” said
Pete. “I’ll go find the Fitchhorns.”

“It shouldn’t be too hard,” Bob grinned.
“Just follow the sound of fighting!”

“Thanks for the tip,” said Pete under his
breath. “I’ll see you later.” The Second Investigator waited until
Jebediah’s back was turned and then sprinted toward the servant’s
entrance at the back of the house.

Bob watched as his friend slipped inside,
and then made himself comfortable behind a fallen tree, watching
and waiting to see what the cantankerous Jebediah O’Connell would
do next.

Inside the house, Pete moved like a shadow.
He darted from room to room, every once in awhile stopping to
listen. The house seemed too quiet. He was beginning to wonder if
the Fitchhorns had left for the day when the sound of a door
squeaking on its hinges made him catch his breath, and his skin to
break out in gooseflesh.

Pete decided the sound had come from the
pantry, the small room just off from the kitchen that was used to
store dry goods and canned food. He tip-toed over to the kitchen
and stole a quick glance around the corner.

The door to the cellar was open!

He bit his lip and looked around. Where was
Bob when he needed him? The muscular boy hesitated for a moment,
and then snuck over to the door and listened again. He thought he
heard someone moving around down there, but he couldn’t be sure.
Taking a deep breath, Pete crept down the cool stone steps. The
musty smell of dampness and age oozed up at him, making him wrinkle
his nose.

A single light bulb burned at the foot of
the stairs, but the rest of the cavernous cellar was engulfed in
deep shadows that made Pete’s flesh crawl. Pipes of all sizes ran
like a crazy maze across the ceiling, and old stones and plaster
crumbled from the ancient walls. He was considering going back and
getting Bob when another sound like a creaking door made him stop
in his tracks.

Someone was down there!

Pete Crenshaw summed up all his courage and
forced himself to navigate through the dusty shelves that housed
jars of pickled food and the countless wine bottles of Hichcocke
Manor. A wooden door, grey with age, stood open at the far end of
the menacing cellar. He gulped and cautiously approached it on the
balls of his feet.

A cobweb brushed against his face and he
nearly let out a startled cry. The tall boy then heard a clicking
noise and realized it was the sound of his own teeth chattering in
his head. He clenched his jaws together and tried to think how
Jupiter Jones would act in this situation.

Pete hesitated before the open door,
stopping again to listen. A leaky faucet dripped somewhere in the
darkness. Squinting his eyes into the murky shadows, he slowly
crept through the doorway. He could just barely make out three
steps which descended into the small room. He stood on the top step
and waited – the only sound he heard was the blood rushing in his
own ears.

Suddenly, a hand shoved him roughly in the
back, and with a yelp, Pete went sprawling head first into the
darkness!

The athletic Second Investigator prided
himself on his agility and he carefully broke his fall – landing on
the smooth stone tiles while turning his body so he could see who
his assailant was. But what he saw made his skin break out in a
fresh case of goose pimples!

Just before the ancient door slammed closed,
engulfing him in complete and utter darkness, Pete Crenshaw caught
a brief glimpse of a glowing woman in a Victorian dress holding a
noose in her hand!

S
.O.S.

BOB ANDREWS PULLED his jacket over his head
and grumbled. What had started out as a fine mist an hour before
had eventually turned into a light rain, and now threatened to
become a full-fledged downpour.

Still Jebediah O’Connell puttered around the
grounds, now with a large umbrella over his head, stopping here and
there to look closer at something or poking his cane about. Bob
wondered if Pete was having more fun inside. At least he was dry,
the studious boy thought to himself.

Bob looked at his watch. It was well past
lunch-time, but his growling stomach could have told him that. Bob
contemplated calling off the surveillance of Jebediah so he could
go inside and dry off and get something to eat. No, Jupe would
never stand for that, he thought. Better to keep prowling around
the woods, following Cousin Jeb as he walked endlessly in the
rain.

The small boy shivered and tried to keep his
teeth from chattering. He resigned himself to the fact that he
would just have to remain cold, hungry, and generally miserable
until Jupe and Ben returned from London.

Luckily for Bob, he had only to wait another
hour before he could come in from the cold. From his vantage point
in the trees, Bob saw Benjamin O’Connell’s silver car, now with the
top up, come speeding up the circular drive and skid to a halt.
Careful not to be seen by Jebediah, he skirted around the side of
the house to meet his friends.

“Any luck?” he asked.

Jupe held up a small paper sack in his hand
as they raced inside. “They let us listen to it at the store,” he
said. “But I bought it anyway, just in case.”

As the boys stripped off their wet jackets,
Patricia O’Connell came into the hallway looking worried.

“I’m so glad you’re back, boys,” she
said.

Ben noticed something was bothering his aunt
and he looked alarmed. “What’s wrong, Aunt Patty? Has something
happened?”

The pretty lady smiled and looked slightly
embarrassed. “No, no, nothing happened,” she said. “It’s just
that...well, I’ve been hearing things in the house since you’ve
been gone.”

“Do you mean the ghost, ma’am?” asked Bob
with excitement.

“Oh no!” she said, forcing nervous laughter.
“I’m sure it’s nothing like that. I guess it’s been awhile since
I’ve been in this big house all alone and...heavens, I don’t know
where the Fitchhorns are, and I haven’t seen Cousin Jeb for hours!
I tried to take a nap, but then I kept hearing those strange
noises.”

“Your Cousin Jeb is out in the garden,” Bob
informed her. “He’s been out there for hours.”

Jupiter rubbed his chin and looked
thoughtful. “Could you show us where you were the last time you
heard the noises?”

“In the kitchen,” she said.

The boys followed her there and then stood
very still, listening in earnest for the mysterious, ghostly
sounds.

She looked more embarrassed than ever. “I
heard the strangest tapping noises – like in the pipes – and I even
swore I heard a voice a couple of times.” She looked sheepishly at
the boys. “Well, whatever it was, it’s gone now.”

Jupe smiled at her. “We were just about to
have a meeting, why don’t you come with us,” he suggested, hoping
to put her at ease. “Is there someplace private where we can
talk?”

“In the library,” she said. “This way.”

The library turned out to be a huge, dimly
lit room full of books and shadows. The volume-lined walls seemed
to go up forever, finally ending at an impressive vaulted ceiling.
The faint smell of old, musty paper lingered in the air and made
the boys think of the public library back in Rocky Beach, where Bob
held his part-time job.

An enormous globe rested in one corner of
the room, and a tall ladder on wheels allowed books to be shelved
around three of the walls. In one corner of the room there were no
books. This is where huge, stained-glass windows made an elaborate,
somewhat spooky picture of a knight in blue armor astride a black
charger with glowing ruby eyes. A piece of glass toward the bottom
of the window, shaped to look like a scroll of paper, had the
words: KNIGHT TEMPLAR in ancient English letters.

Patricia drew aside thick velvet curtains to
let some light into the gloomy space, revealing the intimidating
glass.

Bob whistled. “I’d hate to clean those
windows. That knight is looking right at us.”

“And that horse isn’t any friendlier,” added
Ben with a shiver.

“I think we’re very close to solving the
riddle,” interrupted Jupe. “But we’ll have to move quickly. It
would appear that another party in this house wants to locate the
treasure just as badly.”

“I take it that was the meaning of your wink
earlier,” Patricia said wisely. “Do you have any idea who it might
be, Jupiter?”

Jupe peered out one of the sections of clear
glass at the gathering storm clouds that were approaching. From his
vantage point he could see the garden with the sundial and Jebediah
at the far end. “What do you know about the Fitchhorns, Mrs.
O’Connell?” he asked. “For that matter, what do you know about your
Cousin Jebediah?”

Patricia sat in an oversized leather
armchair and sighed, rubbing her forehead again. “The Fitchhorns
first arrived here with some shady lawyer while I was at the
reading of my father’s will in Hollywood. They showed some papers
to Julia and claimed that they proved they were related and
entitled to a share of the estate. Well, I kind of figured that my
father’s death would bring all sorts of kooks out of the woodwork,
so I didn’t think too much about it. Heaven knows I had enough on
my mind as it was, so I told Julia to let them stay until I got
here. I guess I was hoping they would lose interest and eventually
leave.”

“And what about your cousin?” Jupiter
prodded.

Patricia sighed. “Jebediah is a strange bird
to say the least. He seems honest enough. He took an early
retirement because of his leg and helps out around the house as a
groundskeeper. I let him stay free of charge as his payment. He
seems quite content with the arrangement – but at times he’ll grow
sullen and withdrawn, a virtual recluse. He’ll disappear for days
and not tell a soul where he’s been.”

There was a soft knock on the door, and
Winston entered holding a tray. “I thought you might like some tea,
madam.”

“That’s very thoughtful of you, Winston,”
smiled Patricia. “The boys were just saying they think they might
have solved the puzzle.”

“Splendid! Do all American boys show such
ingenuity?” Winston beamed. “But I say, were there not three of
you?”

“Gosh, that’s right!” Bob exclaimed. “Pete’s
been gone for hours!”

Jupiter looked alarmed. “You mean you
haven’t seen him since Ben and I left for London?”

“Not since we split up,” answered Bob.

“Perhaps we should search for Master Pete,”
volunteered Winston. “He may have become lost somewhere on the
grounds. They are quite large – a person could get lost for days
out in the woods!”

Jupiter was about to suggest splitting up to
look for Pete when he stopped in his tracks. “Wait a minute,” he
hissed. “Listen!”

The group in the library stood very still
and waited in silence for a tense moment.

“I’m afraid I do not hear anything, Master
Jupiter,” Winston said finally. “It will be dark soon. If Master
Pete is in the woods...”

“Wait...Shhh!” he whispered again. “Did you
hear that?”

The group listened again. This time, very
faintly, they could just make out a tapping sound that seemed to be
coming from the floor.

“By jove, I do hear it!” cried Ben. “It
sounds like someone banging on a pipe.”

“That’s the sound I heard!” said
Patricia.

“It’s an S.O.S. signal!” Bob exclaimed. “It
must be Pete trying to signal us!”

“Where could Pete get access to the pipes?”
Jupiter asked quickly.

“Why, in the cellar!” Winston cried. “Follow
me, lads!”

The lanky butler nearly ran out of the
library, with the boys and Patricia close at his heels. He led them
to the pantry where he tore open the door and the group clattered
down the stone steps. Winston fished around in the dark until he
found a string to the single light-bulb at the bottom of the steps.
When he clicked it on, the boys could see a complex network of
pipes running along the low ceiling – it seemed impossible to tell
which one Pete was banging on!