The Mystery of the Hichcocke Inheritance (11 page)

Bob and Pete looked at each other and then
looked at Patricia, who could only sit helplessly.

“I warned ye of the ghost!” cried Jebediah,
brandishing his cane like a wild-man. “I warned ye but ye wouldn’t
listen to old Jeb! Called me crazy you did! Now poor Miss Julia has
been frightened half out of her wits!”

The limping groundskeeper suddenly turned to
the Fitchhorns and sneered in a menacing voice. “If I find out ye
had a hand in this, I’ll club ye over the head with my cane ye no
good tyrant!”

“Jebediah!” Patricia cried in dismay.

“Shocking!” shrieked Stella. “Absolutely
shocking that family would be treated this way!”

“Now see here, bub...” growled Timothy
Fitchhorn, stepping close to Cousin Jeb. “You just watch it, you
old scoundrel. I’ve had about all I’m going to take from you for
one night!”

Jebediah O’Connell began rolling up his
shirtsleeves, his eyes narrowing. “Perhaps we should be settling
this like men,” he threatened.

Bob and Pete looked on in fascination as
Timothy Fitchhorn wiped his brow with a handkerchief. “You don’t
scare me, you...you blustering Scotsman!”

“That is quite enough!” Everyone jumped when
a stern voice shouted from the kitchen doorway. “There will be no
fighting in this house!”

“Winston!” Julia sobbed, rushing to her
fiancé. “The ghost – it ‘twas here! I saw her with me own eyes down
the cellar steps! She was wearing an old dress and she held a noose
up for me to see and her face was a-glowin’ just like death
itself!”

As the butler embraced the distraught woman,
Bob observed that Winston was also quite wet from the rain.
Probably due to the butler having to cross over from the servant’s
cottage to the house, the small Investigator guessed.

Lightning and thunder cracked outside,
making the lights flicker again. Julia cringed and buried her face
in Winston’s shoulder. “There, there,” he said in a soothing voice,
putting an arm around his fiancé’s shoulders. Winston spoke to his
wife in a hushed voice. “You’ve had a scare, darling. Let me take
you to the cottage so you can lie down. I’ll prepare an icepack for
that bump on your head.”

“Oh, thank you, dear,” Julia whimpered.
“With your permission, I’ll leave dinner to you, m’lady,” said
Julia to Patricia. “I’m afraid I shan’t be much of a cook
tonight.”

Patricia said “Of course,” in a tender
voice. “I’ll take care of everything, Julia. You just go and rest
for awhile.”

As Winston helped Julia out of the room,
Jebediah O’Connell gave one last glare to Timothy Fitchhorn and
stormed out of the kitchen. Fitchhorn looked disdainfully at the
boys, then pulled on the lapels of his overly tight sport coat and
marched out of the room with his bird-like wife in tow.

“I don’t know if I can take much more of
this,” Patricia moaned, burying her face in her hands. “I don’t
think I can live here another month until the house sells!”

Pete looked at Bob and sighed. “Well, I
guess this means we have to search the cellar for the ghost again.
Come on.”

Pete pulled Bob by the arm, but the smaller
boy didn’t budge. “Hey,” said Pete, “what’s gotten into you,
Records?”

Bob was silent for a moment, as if he were
lost in deep thought. Then he spoke softly. “I think we may be
wrong about the Fitchhorns.”

“What about the Fitchhorns?” asked Patricia.
“What are you talking about, Bob?”

Bob showed her the front page of the
newspaper which he had been clutching in his hand the whole time.
Patricia gasped when she saw the grainy photo of the Fitchhorns
leaving the bank.

“Criminals!” she said furiously.
“Con-artists trying to get their hands on my father’s money. Well,
they won’t get a cent. Not one!” She buried her face in her hands
and began to sob. Bob put a comforting arm around her shoulder.

“What do you mean we might be wrong about
the Fitchhorns?” Pete asked stubbornly, pointing to the newspaper.
“It’s all right there in black and white!”

But before Bob had a chance to explain, they
all heard a slam at the front door. Moments later Jupiter and Ben
hustled into the kitchen, sopping wet and with bare feet!

“What happened!” cried Patricia in a worried
voice. “Are you boys okay?”

“We’re fine, Aunt Patty,” Ben grinned. “In
fact, we’re better than fine! Jupiter has discovered who our ghost
is!”

Pete leaped up with a huge grin on his face.
“But not before Bob and I discovered it!” he gloated with
satisfaction. “Guess what we learned about the Fitchhorns!”

“Wait a minute – don’t tell me!” said Jupe
dramatically. He pulled on his bottom lip as if he were
concentrating deeply. “Hold on...it’s…it’s coming to me!
Wait...I’ve got it.” he cried. “Timothy and Stella Fitchhorn are a
husband and wife con-artist team that have swindled people all over
Europe!”

Pete and Bob looked at each other in
astonishment, their mouths hanging open.

“How did you know?” cried Pete in amazement.
Then understanding washed over his face. “You must have found
another newspaper!”

Jupiter grinned at the Second Investigator
and patted him on the shoulder. “I assure you I did not find
another newspaper, Pete,” he laughed, pulling a slightly damp
envelope out from under his shirt. “And it wasn’t mindreading,
either.”

“That’s what we went to London for,”
explained Ben. “Jupiter has got the key to the case right inside
that envelope!”

Bob Makes An Accusation

“
THE FITCHHORNS ARE
the ghost?” cried Patricia, “or is it someone else?”

Jupiter shook his head. “I don’t have any
concrete evidence yet – but I think I can get it!”

“How Jupe?” asked Pete.

Jupiter grabbed an apple from a basket of
fruit on the kitchen table and bit into it hungrily. He had a big
smile on his face and he explained while he munched. “By having
everyone in this house assemble in the library so we can unmask
this ‘ghost’ once and for all!” he said dramatically.

“Records, Second – go around the house and
tell everyone to meet in the library in five minutes.”

“At least let me know what happened to your
shoes and socks,” demanded Patricia.

“They were too muddy to wear inside, Aunt
Patty,” answered Ben. “When Jupiter and I pulled up the drive, we
saw someone by the light of my headlamps creeping around the
garden. Of course we jumped out and gave chase – well, Jupiter will
fill you in on the rest when we get to the library.”

“Okay, Jupe,” she said, throwing up her
hands. “Lead the way!”

Within five minutes the entire household
except for Julia had congregated in the musty library. Jupiter
paced back and forth in front of the windows. He held the large
envelope in one pudgy hand and the apple in the other, as the
lights flickered in tune to the thunder outside.

“Winston, be a dear and bring us some
candles,” said Patricia. “In case the lights go out.”

“Very good, madam,” he bowed. The tall
butler left the room and soon returned with several candles. He
placed them about the library and lit them with a box of
matches.

Patricia smiled, slightly embarrassed.
“Thank you, Winston. I guess I don’t want to be left in the dark on
a night like this.”

“Of course, madam,” the butler agreed.

Timothy Fitchhorn poured brandy into a
crystal tumbler and pushed his hair back on his head. “Okay kid,
this better be important,” he said impatiently. The fat man put his
arm up on the mantle of the fireplace and drank deeply.

“Yes,” agreed his wife, honking her nose
into a lace handkerchief, “we’re missing our favorite television
program!”

“Aye,” said Jebediah, “someone should be
with poor Julia. ‘Tis not right leaving her by her lonesome on a
night like this.”

“Actually,” said Jupiter, “she’s in the
safest place of all.”

Winston was lazily spinning the large globe
in the corner. He suddenly looked up at Jupiter and glared. “What
do you mean, young man?” he snapped. “I believe Jebediah is
correct. Perhaps I should fetch my wife this instant”

Jupiter stopped pacing and stood in the
middle of the room. “I simply meant that she is safe in the
servant’s cottage because the ‘ghost’ is in this very room as we
speak!”

They all looked around them, as if the ghost
of Molly Thibidoux were sneaking up behind each one of them, ready
to cinch her icy noose around their necks. A fresh burst of
lightning and thunder crackled – and when the lights in the library
flickered, everyone in the room gasped.

Jupiter seemed the most frightened of all.
At the sound of the thunder, he clumsily dropped the half-eaten
apple he was holding. It fell on the floor in front of Winston.

“Sorry,” he said, somewhat embarrassed. The
overweight Investigator kneeled down to pick up the apple and
smiled. “I guess I’m a little jumpy,” he confessed.

“Are you going to keep us in suspense all
night, Jupe?” Pete said impatiently. “Where’s the ghost at?”

“All right, Second,” he nodded. “But let’s
start at the beginning and work our way up to the ghost, shall
we?”

“You better start somewhere,” Timothy
Fitchhorn threatened, “or I’m leaving!”

“For once I agree with the blowhard,” said
Jebediah crossly.

Jupiter ignored them and took a deep breath.
“The first thing we need to discuss is the last clue from the
jukebox record – ‘Hidden Treasures.’ If you’ll remember, the second
verse said: ‘Time has stood still without you, I’m like Adam
without an Eve, I’ll go on searching the universe, until I’ve
buried what I grieve.’”

“Mr. Hichcocke’s letter said that we were
wrong about the meaning,” remembered Bob.

“But you said this morning that you had
figured out the real meaning,” added Pete.

Jupiter grinned at his partners. “I did –
and so did someone else! When you take each line as a riddle in
itself, the answer becomes clear. ‘Time has stood still without
you’ is what threw us off track the first time. It’s clearly a
reference to a timepiece of some sort, but we were too hasty in our
judgment. The rest of the verse tells us exactly which timepiece to
look for!”

“Well, which one is it?” Stella Fitchhorn
chirped excitedly.

Jupiter had a superior look on his face.
“That’s simple enough,” he said. “The second line tells us! ‘I’m
like Adam without an Eve.’ Well, according to Genesis – the first
book of the bible – where did Adam and Eve live?”

“I know that one!” cried Pete. “The garden
of Eden!”

“Exactly!” crowed Jupiter. “So if the first
line means ‘time-piece,’ we can assume the second line of the song
means ‘garden.’”

Patricia looked confused. “But what kind of
timepiece could be in the garden?” she asked. “A clock would be
ruined out there.”

“Naturally a real clock would rot away,”
agreed Jupiter. “But not a marble clock!”

Suddenly Jebediah’s eyes lit up. “By jimmy,
I think I see what the fat one’s drivin’ at...Mr. Hichcocke was
talkin’ about the sun-dial in the garden! That’s a timepiece, and
it’s broken too. The metal gnomon that makes the shadow broke off
years ago. That’s what ‘Time has stood still without you’
means!”

The Fitchhorns and Jebediah rushed over to
the stained glass window that looked out onto the garden. Pete,
Bob, and Patricia crowded close behind.

“It’s too dark to see anything,” Pete
reported, cupping his hands on either side of his eyes. “We’ll have
to go out there.”

Jupiter smiled at Ben and shook his head.
“There’s really no need,” he said. “Someone else has already
deduced the last two lines of the verse. Once you understand the
pattern it’s really quite simple. ‘I’ll go on searching the
universe, until I’ve buried what I grieve,’ simply means ‘search
for something buried.’

“And someone has done just that!” Ben
Hichcocke cried. The lights in the library flickered again –
staying off a fraction of a second longer this time.

“But who?” asked Patricia.

Jupiter Jones stood in the middle or the
library looking as proud as a peacock. He drew himself up to his
full height. “Someone who knows every inch of this house. The same
person who has never been around when the ‘ghost’ has made an
appearance,” he said.

“The Fitchhorns!” cried Patricia. “They’re
the ones that have been trying to scare us out of the house so they
could find the treasure!”

Timothy Fitchhorn took a step forward.
“Careful what you say, missy,” he growled. “I’m not a man to be
crossed!”

Stella Fitchhorn’s face glowed red. “How
dare you say such a thing to family!” she bellowed.

“We know you’re not family!” Pete said
hotly. “We saw the newspaper!”

Timothy Fitchhorn stood speechless. He wiped
beads of sweat off his brow with a handkerchief and sputtered.

“I...I don’t know what you’re talking about.
W-what newspaper?”

Bob threw the newspaper onto the coffee
table where everyone could observe it. “The one that you spilled
coffee on so we wouldn’t see it. The one that says you and your
wife are con-artists who have scammed people all over Europe!”

“W-w-why that could be anyone!” Stella
Fitchhorn sputtered nervously. “Anyone at all!”

Timothy Fitchhorn glared at his wife. “I
told you to let me do the talking.” He calmly straightened his
jacket and brushed back his greasy hair. “That picture doesn’t
prove a thing. We have committed no crime here – and we are
certainly not impersonating a ghost. The idea! What could possibly
be gained from dressing up as a ghost anyway?”

Pete took a step forward. “To scare us out
of the house,” he accused, “so you could search for the treasure
without being caught! Too bad you didn’t count on us being
Investigators and not being scared off that easily.” He looked at
Bob and Jupiter and grinned lamely. “Well, two out of three,
anyway.”