The Secret of the Sand Castle (3 page)

“Are you talking about Fire Island? Tell me about it,” urged Judy. “Were there a lot of houses washed out to sea?”

Mrs. Barton shook her head. “Not many. Most were found floating in the bay. Some were flattened and buried in the sand. We went back there, but it was no use. We couldn’t find a trace of our little cottage. We never had another summer place.”

“Where did you live? It must have been hard to start all over again,” Judy said sympathetically.

“Yes, it was hard,” Mrs. Barton agreed, “but Henry was not a man to be stopped by a hurricane.

We finally got together enough to buy a house in town. It’s a big house. Too big for me, the children say. They think I should sell it and live with them, but I just can’t do it. I keep feeling I must get back to Minnie.”

“Minnie?” Judy questioned.

“My cat. One of the neighbors is feeding her while I’m away. I won’t be gone long. My daughter ought to realize that I can’t pull up roots at my age and live in someone else’s home. They have a dog who wouldn’t tolerate Minnie.”

“That would make it hard,” Judy agreed. “I have 16

a cat, too, and he feels the same way about dogs. His name is Blackberry.”

“That’s an odd name. How did you happen to call your cat Blackberry?”

“I’d been picking blackberries to sell in Roulsville the day Peter gave him to me.”

“And did you sell them?”

“The blackberries? Yes, to Peter’s grandmother.

They were all smashed because I’d fallen off the colt I was riding and spilled them, but she wanted them for jam, anyway, so it didn’t matter.” They both laughed at that and settled themselves more comfortably in their reclining seats. Most of the passengers on the bus were already sleeping.

“Do you think it bothers them if we talk?” Hazel Barton asked presently. “I’ve been alone so much lately that it does my heart good just to be sitting next to someone.”

“It’s all right if we keep our voices low,” Judy replied a little drowsily.

“We will. I want to hear more about you and your Peter. Did you both live in Roulsville?”

“Yes, before the flood.”

“I heard about that. The big dam above town broke during a storm, didn’t it? Made me think of the hurricane I’ll call Judy for want of a better name.

Were your homes washed away—like mine?” Judy nodded, not wanting to talk about it. She 17

didn’t like the idea of having a hurricane for a namesake, either.

“Wasn’t your brother the hero who rode through town and warned everybody?” her companion persisted. “Seems to me I read something about it in the papers several years ago. Your name was mentioned, too. More than once, as I recall it.”

“I have solved a few mysteries,” Judy admitted modestly. “So has my cat, Blackberry.”

“Minnie doesn’t solve mysteries. She just makes them by getting herself lost all the time. Usually I find her shut in a closet or a bureau drawer,” her mistress added with a laugh.

They talked for a while longer about cats, each one sounding the praises of her own pet, before sleep overcame them.

When Judy awoke her seat partner was gone and the bus driver was telling everyone to change buses.

It was some unearthly hour in the morning. Daylight was a long way off, but Judy was suddenly wide awake.

“Why did I have to fall asleep and let her leave without even saying good-bye? Poor soul! She needs someone,” Judy thought. “I could have paid her a visit and made her life a little less lonely, but now I don’t even know where she lives.” 18

JUDY had expected Irene to meet her when she arrived at the bus terminal in New York. But now, as she looked out the window, she was surprised to see three of her friends waiting on the platform outside.

First there was Irene Meredith, the Golden Girl of TV and radio fame, looking more like a schoolgirl than a young wife and mother. With her was Pauline Faulkner, the blue-eyed, black-haired daughter of Dr. Bolton’s old friend, Dr. Faulkner. The third girl was Florence Garner, who, more recently, had joined in the search for a fourth girl they had called the Phantom Friend.

That had been a strange mystery. Judy still couldn’t think of it without shivering. But now there was no friendly voice to ask, “Are you cold?” and suggest that she put on her coat. She did put it on simply because it was easier to wear it than carry it 19

out of the bus. Her suitcase was heavy as she had brought warm slacks and sweaters as well as a favorite dress she planned to wear to the studio party.

“There she is, lugging that heavy suitcase!” Irene exclaimed as she made a wild dash for the bus and stopped to apologize to a couple of unfortunate passengers who had been in her way. The result was that Pauline was the first to reach Judy’s side.

“Greetings!” she cried, hugging her while Flo re-lieved her of her suitcase. “Irene told us about Fire Island and we’re all going. That is, if you want us.

You remember Florence Garner, don’t you?”

“How could I forget her! Do you still work for that Madison Avenue firm, Flo?”

“Yes, and it’s still the same rat race—”

“Irene!” Judy interrupted to exclaim as the golden-haired girl embraced her. “How good of you to bring Pauline and Flo to meet me! And so early, too, when you could have slept late on Sunday! Is it true that we’re all going to Fire Island?”

“Yes, just for the day. It’s all arranged.”

“We haven’t had breakfast yet, Judy. Have you?” Pauline asked.

“Just coffee in Scranton before daylight. I was looking for my seat partner but, somehow, I lost her.

I’ve been regretting it ever since.”

“What did she do, disappear like our Phantom 20

Friend? I knew you’d run into a mystery,” declared Flo. “I said so, didn’t I, Pauline?” The dark-haired girl laughed as she led the way to a nearby restaurant. “You certainly did,” she agreed.

“You practically predicted it. You said we’d all be hanging onto every word Judy said at breakfast.

Well, here’s a table and here we all are, hanging on.”

While they were eating Judy told them about Hazel Barton and the cottage she had lost in the worst of the Fire Island hurricanes.

“She called it hurricane Judy though, of course, they didn’t name hurricanes then. She said there could still be an Irene or a Judy. That’s what started the whole conversation,” Judy explained. “It seemed so strange that she should use our names without even knowing who we were.”

“So you introduced yourself?”

“Exactly,” Judy agreed, “and then we talked and talked. I meant to ask her where her cottage was.”

“Would it matter?” Irene asked. “It would be nothing but a sand dune now. The Sand Castle is supposed to be one of the few cottages in Fair Harbor that withstood that hurricane. Two cottages were buried, one on either side of it.”

“They were!” This news electrified Judy.

“Couldn’t we find out something about them?”

“You mean dig for buried treasure? Sorry!” Flo 21

said with an exaggerated gesture. “I forgot my shovel.”

Pauline laughed, but Irene was serious as she turned again to Judy. “Really, there was some digging done. The story goes that, for years after the hurricane, an old lady in black came back every summer to dig for her jewels. You don’t suppose that was your Hazel Barton, do you?”

“It doesn’t sound like her. She wasn’t wearing black and, from the way she spoke, I don’t think she’d care to go back to Fire Island. Losing their cottage was quite a tragedy. She lost her husband just recently, too. Her children are all married, and now she lives alone with her cat in a big house. I forgot to ask her where it was,” Judy sighed. “Now I don’t suppose I’ll ever see her again.”

“I wish I could have seen her. I had an Aunt Hazel—but that would be too much of a coincidence,” Flo stopped herself. “Anyway, my aunt wouldn’t have spoken to a stranger on a bus.

She hardly spoke to my mother after they were grown up.”

Judy was surprised at this sudden confidence.

Usually Flo talked about her job or other people’s problems—never her own.

“Why? Was there a quarrel or something?” Judy asked curiously.

“There was something all right,” Flo replied, im-22

mediately on the defensive, “but my father always says if you can’t say anything kind about a person it’s best to say nothing at all.”

“That would keep a lot of people quiet,” declared Pauline.

Flo thought about this for a minute.

“I guess it did keep my mother quiet,” she admitted. “She hardly ever mentions her sisters. I’m not even sure of their names.”

“I’d die of curiosity,” declared Judy. “Didn’t you ever try to find out?”

“I’m not sure I want to know them. Mother’s name is Florence, like mine, and she has a brother Bert who visits us occasionally. He’s the oldest. If they’re all like him—but why talk about it?” Flo broke off suddenly. “There isn’t time to go into my family history.”

“Flo is right,” Irene agreed, “we mustn’t miss our train. Dale has promised to meet it at the Babylon station and drive us to Bayshore where we get the boat. If we miss it there isn’t another—”

“Let’s go, then,” Flo interrupted, finishing her coffee and putting what was left of the sweet roll she had ordered into her pocketbook.

The other three girls followed her example.

“We may need this food,” Irene commented as they left the restaurant. “Mrs. Hatch says we’re wel-come to any canned goods we find in the cottage, 23

but if we can’t find a can opener—”

“I brought one,” Pauline reassured her.

“Who is this Mrs. Hatch?” Judy wanted to know.

Irene explained that she was one of the real estate people who took care of rentals and that Walter Brand was her lawyer.

“You won’t need to see him,” she finished. “Dale has already talked with him. It’s all arranged for me to show you the Sand Castle. You’ll love it, Judy.

It’s so—well, different.”

“Haunted
was the word Horace used. My brother thinks there’s bound to be a haunted house wherever I go, and maybe there is. You mentioned the Sand Castle in a letter last summer, and it does seem to me you said there was a mystery. I would like to help solve it, but—”

“No
buts
!
You simply have to see it,” Irene insisted. “We stayed there for a couple of weeks in August and all three of us fell in love with it, especially little Judy. Dale tried to buy it, but the title isn’t clear. I suppose it will be when all the relatives have been notified and the tax hens paid off. You know about things like that, Judy. I’m not even sure what a tax lien is.”

“It’s just a paper to show that someone besides the owner has paid the taxes on a piece of property.

If the taxes are let go too long the one who holds the hen can foreclose and force a sale.” 24

“I see.”

The expression on Irene’s face was still puzzled, but she didn’t ask any more questions until they were on the Long Island train. She offered Judy the seat next to the window.

“I thought you might like to look out,” she explained when they were on their way. “Long Island is a long way from your Pennsylvania hills, but you may find the scenery interesting.”

“I find the conversation more so,” Judy replied with a smile. “I’m supposed to find out about some property on Fire Island, and from what my cousin Roxy says in her letter it could be the same cottage that you call the Sand Castle. It’s—let’s see.” Judy pulled the letter from her pocketbook and spread it out so that the other three girls could help her locate the property. Flo seemed especially interested.

“Here it is!” she exclaimed, reading from the letter. “The estate consists of all the property on Birch Lane for two hundred feet from the ocean.”

“That would be two or three cottages, wouldn’t it?” asked Judy.

“Maybe, before the hurricane. It wouldn’t be more than one or two now. The Sand Castle stands pretty much by itself,” Irene began.

“With a buried cottage on either side of it!” Judy interrupted excitedly. “One of them just has to be 25

the cottage Hazel Barton lost. Why couldn’t we do just a little digging? If we find anything of value we can return it to her.”

“But you just said you don’t know where she lives,” Flo protested.

“That’s true,” Judy agreed with a sigh of resigna-tion as she turned toward the window determined to watch the scenery as Irene suggested and forget all about the buried cottages.

26

THE scenery, once the train had emerged from the tunnel under the East River, was just houses and more houses without so much as a park to separate one Long Island town from another. It didn’t look at all like an island to Judy, who was eager for a sight of the ocean and said so.

Irene laughed. “You’ll see enough of the ocean to last you a lifetime when we reach Fire Island,” she predicted. “I just hope Dale is there at the station to meet us. We’ll have to take a taxi to the boat if he isn’t—”

“He won’t be,” Pauline broke in to prophesy. “If I know your husband, and I think I do, Irene, working for his literary agent and all—”

She didn’t finish the sentence. Just then the train lurched to a stop and her words were lost in the confusion as a crowd of screaming school children rushed for the available seats. Judy found herself 27