The Mystery of the Cranky Collector - Carey M. V. - Страница 15

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• 15/25
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It was quiet in this corner of the store — very quiet. There were not many customers, and one lone salesman prowled the aisles. His feet made no noise on the carpeted floor. After a time Jupe’s head drooped. He was tired. The prowler in the attic had kept him wide-eyed and edgy the night before, and now he was paying for it.

That attic — that was another mystery. What was happening in that attic? Did a ghost walk there?

Jupe reminded himself sternly that he did not believe in ghosts. People did not come back from the grave. The noise he’d heard must have been the old house creaking in protest as the night wind blew in off the ocean.

For a minute — just for a minute — Jupe felt himself doze off. For a minute he slept. Then he came awake with a start, and he opened his eyes.

It was dark. Jupe looked around and saw shapes — strange, black shapes. It took him a moment to recognize them. They were the shapes of bureaus and wing chairs and wardrobes.

Jupe went rigid with alarm. It was late! The store was closed, and he had slept right through the closing.

He stood up, listening. There must be a cleaning crew, but he did not hear them. There must be security people patrolling the store at night. Why hadn’t they found him and roused him?

But they wouldn’t have found him unless they took special care to see that no one was huddled on that particular sofa. It faced away from the aisle. Any watchman could walk within three feet of Jupe and not know he was there. The cleaning people could pass very close and never notice him.

Jupe rubbed his eyes. Beyond the bureaus and the wing chairs there was a light that shone with a dim red glow. A sign beneath the light said EXIT.

Jupe stumbled through the blackness toward the sign. When he reached the exit, he saw a second sign: EMERGENCY EXIT ONLY, ALARM WILL RING IF THIS DOOR IS OPENED.

Jupe imagined himself pushing open the door and stepping out into the mall. Bells would jangle. Lights would flash. No doubt there was a TV monitor where security men kept watch. The monitor would light up. The men would come running with their guns drawn. Before Jupe could find his way out of the building, he would be nabbed.

Jupe shuddered. A few months before, a Pasadena youth had been found in a mall after closing time. He had been charged with trespassing and attempted theft. The story had appeared in all the papers.

Jupe did not want to be featured in the local newspapers. How would it look for the head of an investigation firm to be apprehended at night in an empty department store?

Jupe turned away from the emergency exit and crept through the darkness to the main entrance of the store. But this was blocked by a huge steel shutter.

He went on, careful to make no noise, and found the employees’ exit. This door also had the warning that an alarm would sound if it were opened.

A clock next to the employees’ exit told him it was eleven P.M. Aunt Mathilda would be furious.

He searched until he found a pay phone. He put two dimes in the slot and dialed home. Aunt Mathilda answered. She sounded anxious and angry.

“Jupiter Jones, where are you?” she demanded.

“Marilyn Pilcher needed us,” said Jupe. That was true enough so far as it went.

“Well, sometimes I need you, too,” said Aunt Mathilda. “You never think of that. Are you at the Pilcher house with that poor girl? Is there any word of her father?”

“No, not yet. Listen, Aunt Mathilda, would you mind if I stayed over tonight? I really think I should.”

“I do mind, but probably you should. All right, Jupiter. But be careful.”

Aunt Mathilda hung up.

Jupe left the phone and felt his way back to the furniture department, back to the sofa. He was beginning to think of the sofa as his home base. He sat down, prepared to wait through the long hours until morning.

Soon he realized that he was hungry. He remembered reading a story about kids who were locked in a department store at night. They had raided the refrigerator in the store restaurant. But Jupe had not seen a restaurant when he went through the store that afternoon. He suspected that there was none. Becket’s wouldn’t need a restaurant; there were loads of food shops in the mall.

Should he go looking for food? There might be a candy counter or a department that sold gourmet foods.

He decided against it. It could be too risky.

His eyes closed. He dozed again, and he dreamed that he was at the Pilcher house and someone was knocking at the door. In his dream he knew who it was — it was Jeremy Pilcher. The old collector wanted to get in. “I’m coming!” cried Jupiter. “Don’t go away! I’m coming!”

With a mighty effort he started upright. It was light! He saw people in front of him. They were staring at him, laughing, pointing. They were brisk morning people who wore business suits and carried newspapers. One of them was knocking and knocking at the window.

That window! There had been no window when he sat down yesterday evening. Why was there a window now?

He realized then that in the darkness he had gotten into a different part of the furniture department. He was not on the sofa he had chosen yesterday. He was on a different sofa. People were clustered outside to watch Jupe sleeping in Becket’s display window!

Jupe jumped up. Any second the security people would come and grab him! The police would be summoned. They would send for Aunt Mathilda and Uncle Titus.

He heard the guards now. They were unlocking the employees’ entrance.

Jupe ran and ducked behind a roll-top desk.

Someone hurried down the aisle. “He was there!” said a man. “Right over there. He’s here someplace!”

A second man passed close to the roll-top desk. “How come your crew didn’t spot him last night?” a gruff voice demanded.

“We can’t check every blasted chair in the place,” said the first man.

When the men were past, Jupe put his head up and saw them near the display window. They were staring at the sofa as if it could tell them where he was.

Behind Jupe there was a new sound. Jupe looked around. A skinny man in an olive drab jump suit was at a control panel near the main entrance of the store. He was rolling up the great steel shutter that closed that entrance.

The way was clear.

Jupe leaped up and darted past the man in the jump suit. Someone yelled as he whizzed through the mall and out an automatic door to the parking area.

His bike was still there, locked to the rack. He almost dropped his keys in his eagerness, but he managed to get it unlocked. He yanked the bike free and pedaled away as a shout went up behind him.

Jupe did not look back. Sometimes it was wiser simply to run for your life!

“I do not believe in ghosts,” announced Jupiter. He scowled at Pete.

“Okay, keep saying that,” Pete shot back, “but if it wasn’t a ghost, what was it? It walked past me in the hall, and I heard it but I couldn’t see it. And I felt cold when it went by. I’ve heard those stories where the room gets cold when a ghost is there. I think the cop on the stairs felt it too. I saw him shiver.”

“So he felt a draft,” Bob put in. “You felt a draft. The Pilcher house is old and drafty.”

The Three Investigators were in Headquarters. Jupe sat behind the desk looking rumpled and sleepy-eyed after his night in the department store. Pete was awake, but it was the wide-eyed, staring wakefulness of someone too keyed up to relax. Only Bob looked as if he had had a good night’s rest.

Bob had brought his library books to Headquarters with him, and now he flipped one of them open.

“Do we really care if it was a ghost?” he said. “Any haunt who’s hanging out in Pilcher’s attic has probably been there for a long time. It didn’t suddenly decide to snatch Mr. Pilcher off to the Twilight Zone. We’re supposed to be finding the old man or finding the bishop’s book. Maybe we can do that if we know more about the message on the computer. Now, guys, I don’t want any cheering or clapping or anything, but I have found Sogamoso!”

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