The Mystery at Bob-White Cave (3 page)

“The wind has been here ahead of us. We can’t ever get over this big fallen tree!” he cried. “What’ll we do? The lightning is bad—real bad!”

“Around to the left! Deploy! Hurry!” Brian ordered. “And, Mart, no more alarms, please. There’s no real danger.”

“We’ll find shelter as soon as we can,” Jim called. He had hidden for days in the big Catskill woods back home, trying to keep out of his cruel stepfather’s sight, before Honey and Trixie found him and Honey’s parents adopted him. Skilled as a woodsman, he firmly took over from Brian.

“Straight ahead!” he called. “Keep going the way Brian started us, toward the cliffs overhanging the river! There may be shelter there. Hurry!”

They were all soaked to the skin, for the rain came down in buckets, undeterred by the heavy foliage above them.

Suddenly a haven opened up where the sandstone ledge on which they were walking curved past a cavernous opening.

“Get in there quickly!” Jim called. As he pulled Trixie to shelter and hurried the Bob-Whites inside, a big tree crashed near the entrance.

The inside of the cave was pitch-black. They couldn’t see one another—couldn’t see a thing except a faint blur of light through the cave opening.

Safe from the storm’s fury, they shook themselves free of water.

Habitually, they never went anyplace without their flashlights, a lesson they had learned from experience in the Catskill woods. Now they shone their lights in circles to explore their surroundings. A room perhaps fifty feet long and fifty feet wide spread about them. The ceiling, high enough that they could easily stand upright, sloped toward the back till it reached the ground.

“It’s just a big hole in a cliff,” Jim said, “and a pretty lucky one for all of us, I’d say.”

Trixie moved her light quickly over the damp clay ground, along the side walls, here and there over the ceiling, then back again to the ground. Finally she held the beam on a corner in which a pile of bones stood out in the light.

Jim went closer to investigate. “I don’t like the looks of this. They’re bones of little animals—squirrels, raccoons....”

“Probably trapped in here and died,” Mart said. “Don’t you think so, Brian?”

Brian moved closer. “No, I don’t. I don’t think Jim thinks so, either. We’re in some animal’s den.”

“A catamount!” Honey cried. “Remember that one that scared us so in the woods at home? Let’s get out of here. It’ll be here soon, and we’ll all be killed! Won’t we, Trixie?”

“What did you say?” Trixie asked. Her mind wasn’t on the storm or on a catamount or on a pile of bare bones. She was looking for a sinkhole where a “ghost” fish might linger. With her flashlight, she had hunted out every inch of the big room. “There’s not a sign of water in here. I’ll never find the fish here!”

“You
do
have a single-track mind,” Mart said. “Did you even notice the storm before we came in here?”

“Of course I did, silly. I have a lot on my mind, though. If you don’t want that reward money, I do. I’m not overlooking anything.”

“I think this cavern is neat,” Brian said. “Look at the way my flashlight brings out the color of the rocks!”

“Yeah,” Jim said. “Gosh, look at this one!”

“I don’t want all of us to be eaten alive, even if we
never
find a ghost fish or any more rocks,” Honey said, shaking with fright.

She had been right at Trixie’s side during most of her dangerous adventures, and she had promised to be a partner in the Belden-Wheeler Detective Agency, but she wasn’t as fearless as Trixie, and she didn’t pretend to be. “You take too many chances. One of these days you’ll go too far, Trixie Belden. Do you think the storm could possibly be over? All those bones scare me, and I’m afraid of the wind outside.”

“Bones can’t hurt you, Honey. Don’t be afraid,” Trixie said reassuringly. “I think the storm may be over. I’ll slip outside and see.”

A few feet from the cave, Trixie stood looking about her. At her side, Jacob suddenly lifted his head and stiffened. Trixie followed his eyes to the undergrowth above the cave opening. There, among the leaves, was a terrifying feline face, with long, gleaming teeth bared, ready to slash. Jacob braced his thin body and snarled. The wildcat growled its answer, its ears laid back menacingly.

Paralyzed with fear, Trixie tried to call out, but no sound came from her throat. The animal slunk closer. Jacob, with every hair on end, barked fiercely. The wildcat poised to spring. A convulsive trembling shook Trixie’s body as, unable to make a sound, she awaited the wildcat’s attack.

The smoothly muscled body hurtled toward the helpless girl—and a rifle shot rang out! The wildcat dropped to the ground, shot through the head, the wound clean and deadly.

Trixie, immediately released from her spell, screamed. Jacob circled her, barking. The other Bob-Whites spilled from the cavern and were horrified at what they saw. Honey, tears streaming down her face, clung to Trixie. White-faced, appalled, and silent, the boys stood before the big cat’s body.

“Who shot it?” Jim asked.

Trixie shook her head. She didn’t know.

“Hello there!” Jim shouted. His echoing voice was the only answer.

Her brothers’ concern took the form of anger. “I could beat my head against the rocks for not realizing what might happen!” Brian said.

“Yeah,” Mart agreed, “me, too. Look at that dog!”

Jacob sniffed the air, wagged his tail, then made off across the woods.

Trixie, somewhat recovered from her fright, lifted her head. A whiff of tobacco smoke drifted through the rain-washed air. “The person who saved me must be someplace close,” she said. “Did you smell that tobacco?”

“Nope,” Brian said and jumped to the ground from the cliffside where he’d been hunting through the brush. “Not a sign of anyone, not even Jacob.” He shook his head, perplexed. “Why would anyone save another person’s life and then just disappear? It beats me!”

“Thank heaven for his rifle!” Jim said.

Mart looked thoughtfully at the wildcat’s stiffening legs. “The mystery deepens. There must be a big bounty on one of these skins. That alone should make whoever shot it come forward and claim the hide. How does he know we won’t drag it off to get the bounty?”

“I don’t know the answer to any of your questions,” Honey replied, her arm still around Trixie. “I know one thing, though: I want to get back to the lodge as soon as we possibly can. Trixie has had a frightful shock. We have, too. Our clothes are soaked, and that wind is like ice.”

“You’re right,” Brian agreed. He whistled for Jacob, who came running, his tail erect and waving. “Home!” Brian commanded. Jacob set off through the woods, baying lustily. Far south, another coonhound answered mournfully. Then another took up the cry.

“We can’t go through that underbrush where Jacob went,” Brian said, “but my compass says we’re at least headed in the right direction. Try and find a path.”

“Isn’t that the way we came down?” Trixie asked, pointing to a stony, overgrown trail a few feet above them.

“It is! Smart girl, Trixie!” Jim said. “Well, we’ll have quite a tale to tell your Uncle Andrew when he comes home tonight. Gosh!”

We won’t be able to tell him we found the ghost fish that editor wants,” Trixie said sadly. “We’ve just
got
to go after those fish first thing in the morning!”

Ghosts, Ghosts, Ghosts! • 3

MRS. MOORE was waiting at the lodge door when the Bob-Whites returned.

“My, but I’m glad to see you!” she said. “It was a bad storm. I worried, even though Linnie said I needn’t. She was sure you’d find shelter. I know, though, how helpless some of the people have been who have visited Mr. Belden. Linnie’s gone off to pick up your uncle. They should be back soon. Mercy, you’re all soaked through. You’d better get dry clothes. What’s the matter, Trixie? You look so white. A snake didn’t bite you, did it?” she asked anxiously.

“A snake didn’t,” Honey said, trembling with cold and still frightened. “A wildcat almost did.”

“A what?” Mrs. Moore screamed. She hurried to take Trixie in her arms and make sure she was all right.

“A catamount... a bobcat... a wildcat... whatever you’d call it,” Jim said. “It was a fierce-looking cat as big as Jacob.”

“Oh, my blessed Lord!” Mrs. Moore said and hugged Trixie tight. “A wildcat! An angel must have saved you!”

“Yeah, a ghost angel,” Mart said, “who shot him right in midair as he was going for Trixie.”

“A ghost?” Mrs. Moore asked, her voice trembling. “Whoever shot that wildcat disappeared into thin air,” Mart went on. “Trixie said she didn’t see a soul —just smelled tobacco smoke. That was all. The way we figured it, he must have been a strange guy not to show himself. Jacob acted funny, too. After the wildcat was killed, Jacob didn’t growl or bark. He wagged his tail and shot off into the woods.”

“A ghost!” Mrs. Moore repeated. “Jacob came home quite a few minutes before you did. I was uneasy about that. Thank heaven, your uncle will soon be here, Trixie. You’re still shivering. No wonder, poor child! Don’t you want me to go upstairs with you and help you get into dry clothes?”

Honey assured Mrs. Moore they’d be all right, but she held on to Trixie’s arm as they went up the stairs. Halfway up, Trixie shook off Honey’s arm. “I’m not so scared now,” she said. “It was a narrow escape, wasn’t it? I was so sure it was Jim who shot that wildcat.”

‘It would have been Jim if you hadn’t dashed out of that cave by yourself. You shouldn’t have done that. You should have known it was dangerous.”

“I just wanted to see if the rain had stopped. I wasn’t hurt, was I?”

“You were awfully close to being killed, and you know it, Trixie. I’m not too sure I want to be a detective—not the kind who has wildcats jumping after her, anyway. I’d rather be the kind who would sit in an office and try to figure out who the mysterious person was who shot the wildcat.”

They went on upstairs.

Trixie dipped her face in the basin of water that stood on their dresser; she threw her head back and shook water from her short sandy curls. “Yes,” she said, thoughtfully toweling, “that is a real mystery, isn’t it? Almost like a ghost. There! That reminds me of the ghost fish. Linnie said there are lots of caves around here, but if they haven’t any more water in them than the one we were in today, they won’t do us much good. I want to find those fish.”

“I do, too, but I wish sometime we could just have fun when we go places. Mart said he wishes the same thing.”

“Doesn’t either one of you care anything about getting that station wagon? About helping handicapped children?”

“There you go again. You know we do; we want it just as much as you do. But we don’t want to work every minute and always have awful things happening. We’d like to have a little fun.”

“We had fun fishing today, didn’t we? I like to have fun, too, but I want to keep the search for those fish uppermost in my mind. Don’t you think exploring caves is going to be fun?”

“It wasn’t any fun today. I don’t want to find any more wildcats.”

“I’m sure that doesn’t happen very often. Uncle Andrew didn’t even warn us about wildcats, and neither did Mrs. Moore or Linnie. Instead, Uncle Andrew said that wild animals have pretty well left the Ozark woods—that they’ve been hunted and killed. He said they hardly ever see even a deer anymore. We see lots of them in your woods back home. Mrs. Moore said that only a few years ago, deer used to come up in her yard and feed with the chickens.”

“How wonderful!” Honey, dressed in dry jeans and shirt, pushed back the new curtains she had hemmed and hung at their bedroom window. “You can see for miles,” she said. “I believe that’s the mule wagon coming up from the hollow. Isn’t that it, Trix?”

Trixie looked, then called to the boys in the next room, “Uncle Andrew will be here soon. Let’s go downstairs and wait for him; we’ll help him unload the supplies.”

When Linnie drove the mules into the yard and turned them expertly, just at the lodge’s back door, the boys and Trixie and Honey were there waiting and waving. Jacob wriggled his body ecstatically and jumped onto the seat with his mistress.

I see you’re safe after the storm,” Uncle Andrew said as he handed the supplies into waiting arms. “Linnie told me you were off in the woods or down at the lake fishing. Did you have any trouble?”

“We sure did—” Honey started to say.

Trixie put her hand firmly over her friend’s mouth and hushed her. “We’ll tell you all about it later, when you’re eating the bass we caught. What on earth is in all those boxes?”

“Take them inside, and before Mrs. Moore stows them away, you can see what’s in them. What trouble did you have, Trixie?”

But Trixie had gone through the lodge door.

The boys unharnessed the mules for Linnie and led them to the shed. Mart was rewarded with a swift kick from Shem, while the other mule, Japheth, looked at him with a wild eye.

“A person never could get much attached to a mule, that’s for sure,” Mart said, rubbing his hip where the blow had landed.

“They’re one-man mules—or one-girl mules,” Brian said. “They’re crazy about Linnie. She never even ties them in the shed. They’d never wander off from where she is; they just follow her around the way Jacob does.”