The Mystery of the Cranky Collector - Carey M. V.. Страница 8

Jupe doubled his fists and struck out, but he missed. Then there was a shove. Jupe stumbled and went down.

Downstairs, the house door banged open.

“Jupe?” It was Bob calling. “Come and get it!”

A voice muttered something Jupe did not understand. The attacker floundered through the blackness to the attic stairs and thundered down and away.

Jupe scrambled up and made for the stairs. He almost fell as he raced down after the intruder. When he reached the second floor he heard his quarry on the back stairs.

Bob called again. “Hey, what’s up? Jupe?”

Jupe dashed down to the kitchen just in time to hear the back door slam. By the time he got the door open again, the stranger had crossed the yard and disappeared down the alley.

6

Footsteps in the Night

Marilyn called the police. They came and took a report on the intruder. They searched the shrubbery around the house. They looked into the garage in back. Then they told Marilyn to call 911 if the prowler returned.

The police also asked if her father had been heard from, and they reassured her that most missing persons showed up on their own. Marilyn said nothing to the officers about a ransom note. She stood in the doorway and watched the squad car drive off, then she sighed. “Who was that prowler? An ordinary burgler? The kidnapper? This is getting really confusing.”

“I’d vote for the kidnapper,” said Bob. “Maybe he got impatient waiting for the bishop’s book.”

“Perhaps,” said Jupe. “Though we have a better chance of finding the book than an intruder does. But it does suggest that someone has been watching the house.”

Marilyn looked around fearfully. “I think I’ll go to my mother’s for the night,” she said. “This place is too creepy.”

“Does your mother live near here?” asked Jupe.

“In Santa Monica,” said Marilyn. “She and Dad are divorced. Yes, that’s what I’ll do. I’ll go there. Except… maybe I shouldn’t. If the kidnapper calls again, I should be here to take the call. Maybe I’ll phone Ray Sanchez and ask him to come over. He’s Dad’s secretary, so I guess he’d do it. I could offer him some overtime.”

“Couldn’t your fiance and his mother come over?” asked Jupe.

“They could — if they hadn’t called earlier to say there was a family emergency and they were flying home to Boston tonight.” Marilyn snorted. “I bet the emergency was getting away from the Pilchers.”

“Bob and I could stay here for the night,” Jupe suggested.

The young woman blinked, and for a second she seemed to struggle with herself, as if she didn’t want to appear pleased at the idea. But finally she said, “Well, sure! I’m your client, so why shouldn’t you be bodyguards? Will your folks let you stay?”

“Probably,” said Jupe. “They’re pretty good about things like this.”

Jupe was right. He and Bob telephoned their homes and had little trouble getting permission to spend the night at the Pilcher house so that Marilyn wouldn’t be alone. After they phoned, Bob reheated the pizza he and Marilyn had brought. They ate, then renewed their search for the bishop’s book. They turned out the shelves in the cluttered rooms on the second floor and found more books and more papers and more relics of the days when Pilcher was a seaman voyaging to far-off lands.

“Your dad must have been kind of adventurous when he was younger,” said Bob when he came upon an ivory elephant that Marilyn told him was from India. “He must have had a ball, going to sea and everything.”

“He could afford to be adventurous then,” said Marilyn gloomily. “When he was younger he didn’t have anything to lose, so he just went where he wanted. But then he somehow got enough together to buy the Comet Steamship Line. It wasn’t much — just a couple of rusty freighters that sailed out of Houston to ports in the Caribbean. They were tramp steamers that went wherever they were needed. Dad was smart, and he made enough with those two old scows to have a third ship built. That one made even more money. Then Dad bought a little bank up in Visalia, and he did some deals on the stock market.

“Mom says it was after he got into the stock market that he really got excited about making money. She says it was like watching someone turn into a compulsive gambler. I–I don’t think Mom understands him.”

“And you do?” said Bob.

She shrugged. “I think I do, as much as anybody. I just wish he wasn’t such a hoarder. Not that he’s that way in business. In business you’ve got to know when to let go. That’s one of the things Dad taught me. You have to be sharp, because if you’re not, the turkeys will get you down.

“I was about five when he and Mom got the divorce. Most of the time I live with my mom when I’m not in school. Lately, though, I’ve been spending more time with Dad. I wouldn’t want him to forget he has a daughter.

It was late when they finished searching the rooms on the second floor. Marilyn said good night and disappeared into her bedroom. Bob and Jupe decided to take turns keeping watch in the upper hall. They were close enough to Marilyn to hear her if something frightened her during the night. Also, they could see both the front and back stairs. No one could creep up on them and surprise them.

Bob took the first shift. He got an armchair from one of the bedrooms and settled himself with a cola in his hand.

Jupe took a blanket from the linen closet and stretched out on a bed in one of the unused rooms, thinking he probably wouldn’t sleep a wink after the excitement of the day. The next thing he knew, Bob was shaking him. “It’s three A.M.,” said Bob. “I’m beat. Your turn to watch.”

Jupe crawled out from under the blanket. Bob crawled in. “Mmmm!” said Bob. “Thanks for warming it up for me.”

“You aren’t welcome,” said Jupe grumpily. He went out to the post in the hall, feeling chilled and depressed, and sat down in the chair. He decided that three A.M. had to be the lowest hour of the day. Compared with three A.M., midnight was cheery.

How long would it be before daybreak, he wondered.

As this thought came, something moved over his head. He looked up, not breathing, listening.

Nothing! Dead silence. The dreary old house was getting on his nerves. He was imagining things.

But then it came again. It was a mere whisper of movement, as if someone walked across the attic floor on bare feet — someone small and light.

But no one could be up there!

Jupe stood up and went slowly, silently, to the attic door. Slowly, silently, he turned the doorknob and eased the door open.

He looked up into total darkness, and he smelled the chill dead smell of the unused space above.

Someone was there. Someone was at the top of the stairs. He couldn’t see anything, but he could hear the faintest rustle of clothing, the sigh as a breath was expelled. And he knew that the unseen one could look down over the stair rail and watch him.

For a second Jupe bitterly regretted not turning out the hall light before he opened the door. If the stalker in the darkness had a weapon, Jupe would make a first-rate target.

Was it the intruder who had attacked him earlier? If it was, why had he come back? And how had he gotten inside? What was he doing in the attic?

Jupe stepped back and eased the attic door shut.

“What is it?” whispered someone close behind Jupe.

Jupe jumped as though he had been shot.

“Hey, it’s only me.”

Bob was there looking tousled, his shoes off. He gestured toward the ceiling. “Somebody’s walking around up there,” he said. He still spoke in a whisper.

“You heard it too?”

A board creaked above them. The intruder had left the stairwell. He was going toward the front of the house.

“You fell asleep,” Jupe accused his pal. “That guy came in and walked right past you, and you were sound asleep and didn’t see him!”