CHAPTER XV
The Phantom Piper
Nancy and Bess lost no time in scrambling after George, who was now rolling and tumbling rapidly down the mountainside.
Fortunately, a short distance below, the ground leveled off slightly. By digging in her heels, George managed to stop her descent. When the two girls reached her, Nancy asked anxiously, “Are you hurt?”
Before George could reply, Bess spoke up. “Is she hurt! Look at all those scratches! We must get you to a doctor right away, George.”
“Don’t be silly,” George said firmly. “I feel as if I’d just had a good beating, but there’s nothing more serious the matter with me.”
She stood up, and with the other girls’ help, brushed off as much dirt as she could.
“When we get back down, I’ll have a good old cleanup in the river. Then I’ll be fine.” George scowled. “I’d like to catch that red-haired fellow who pushed me!”
Suddenly all three girls realized that Fiona had not followed Nancy and Bess. She was nowhere in sight, and when Nancy called there was no answer.
At once the girls became fearful. Had the red-bearded stranger tried to injure her, too?
“I’m going back up and find Fiona!” Nancy declared.
The cousins insisted upon going too, and the three hastened to the shoulder. Several times they called Fiona’s name, but got no response.
Just then Nancy, standing at the highest point, saw Fiona some distance down the far slope, at the edge of a forested section. She acted as if she were trying to hide from someone.
Nancy waved the cousins on, then went toward Fiona. Reaching the Scottish girl’s side, Nancy asked her what had happened.
Fiona smiled. “Maybe you’re teaching me to be a detective,” she said. “Anyway, I figured that since the red-bearded man was running in this direction, maybe he had come from this side of Ben Nevis. I thought I might spot him.”
“Did you?” Nancy asked, as Bess and George walked up.
Fiona shook her head. “I didn’t see Mr. Red-beard, but I want you all to look down there.” She pointed.
In a narrow glen below them was a flock of sheep. Fiona said she had seen a shepherd there a few minutes before, but now he was gone.
“It is most unusual for any shepherd not to have a collie with him,” she said. “It occurred to me that the man I saw might be an impostor, and the sheep have been stolen and brought here to await transportation.”
“Fiona, you’re wonderful!” Nancy cried. “This is an excellent clue and we should report it to the police.”
“We can’t—from here. We’ll have to wait until morning.”
“If Fiona’s right,” said Nancy, “that red-bearded man has probably been following our movements very closely. Perhaps it was he who first used the bagpipe signal of Scots, Wha Hae to warn his friends when he found out that we were going to camp here. Then, when we were actually hiking up the mountainside and getting too near his area of operation, he had to do something desperate.”
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“And he thought,” said George, “that it he threw me down the hill you’d all come to my rescue and give up the climb.”
“Exactly.”
Bess heaved a great sigh. “Since you have been alerted, Nancy, Redbeard won’t dare make another move. So, for the time being, the sheep won’t be taken away.”
Bess’s reasoning seemed sound, so the girls left the spot, made their way back to the summit, and down to the river. George bathed her face and hands in the cool water and felt refreshed.
That evening the Scottish campers entertained for the three American girls. First there was group singing of Scottish songs, old and new. Nancy and her friends were able to join in a few—”Annie Laurie,” “My Luve is Like a Red, Red Rose,” “The Banks o’ Doon,” “Sweet Afton,” and “Auld Lang Syne.”
After the singing was over, first the girls, then the boys put on dances to the music of bagpipes which one of the young men had brought. Then two couples danced several reels and jigs.
Presently Fiona, laughing, said to Nancy, “The next one they’ll do is in your honor. It’s a good jig, called ‘Miss Nancy Frowned.’“
“What fun!” said Nancy, and watched closely.
Three couples performed the dance, which looked rather intricate as they went through a series of crossovers and changing of partners. Presently one of the girls dropped out and insisted that Nancy take her place. The American girl, although a good dancer, found the steps a little difficult at first. Nevertheless, the whole group clapped loudly.
The entertainment ended with a lovely solo by Fiona. Nancy, Bess, and George marveled at her clear, birdlike voice as she sang a very pretty tune.
“Farewell to the Highlands, farewell to the north, The birthplace of Valour, the country of Worth;
Wherever I wander, wherever I rove, The hills of the Highlands for ever I love.”
Applause was loud. Next came a midnight snack, then the whole group went to sleep either under tents, in bedrolls, or wrapped in heavy blankets.
But Nancy could not sleep. She thought the sound of the rushing water might have a lulling effect, but instead it seemed to be talking to her. “I can almost hear it telling me I’m on the fringe of a big discovery!”
About an hour later Nancy was startled to hear a distinct whistling that she was sure came from a bagpipe. The piper must be signaling! For what? To whom?
Nancy crept out of her blanket, stood up, and scanned the mountainside. The moon was already out full, bathing Ben Nevis in a brilliant white glow. On a ridge, some distance below the summit and partially screened by mist, Nancy saw the silhouette of a piper. The whistling sound had stopped and now the figure vanished.
Had the piper been a phantom or a real person?
Nancy recalled that when she had heard the bagpipes whistle before, the truck she suspected of carrying stolen sheep had whizzed past Mrs. Drummond’s croft. Was the whistling she had just heard a signal that all was clear to move out the sheep the girls had seen in the glen?
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“There’s no way of my stopping them!” Nancy told herself ruefully. “Even it all we campers climbed the mountain to find out, it’s so far we’d be too late.”
She chafed under her helpless position, but finally sheer weariness overcame her and she dropped off to sleep.
Nancy was awake early—before anyone else. When she saw Fiona stirring a bit later, she told the Scottish girl what she had heard the night before. “Would you go up to that same shoulder of Ben Nevis with me?”
“Of course!”
When the girls reached the crest, they hurried down the other side to look down into the glen. Not one sheep was in sight!
“Oh, dear!” Fiona exclaimed. “Your hunch yesterday may have been right, Nancy.”
“Let’s go see if we can find any clues,” Nancy urged.
On the way, Fiona remarked that Scottish flocks are allowed to wander at will around the mountainside. “So we might yet see the missing sheep.”
When the girls reached the glen, there was still no sign of animals or persons around. Nancy did notice a crude, tiny croft, and thought perhaps it belonged to the shepherd.
“We’ll call on him,” she said.
The two walked over and knocked on the door, but there was no response. Fiona suggested that the croft might be empty, and tried the door. It was not locked. She opened it and the girls walked in. They saw a cot, a table, and a small quantity of food in a cupboard. There were ashes in the fireplace.
“Someone certainly has been staying here,” Nancy remarked.
Feeling like intruders, Nancy and Fiona were about to leave when Nancy’s eye was attracted to an open book on the table. She stepped closer for a second look. It was a Gaelic dictionary. Underlined on the exposed page was the word mall!
“Fiona, this was one of the words in that strange message in Mr. Dewar’s hotel room!”
Quickly Nancy began looking through the dictionary for other words in the message.
“Here’s rathad!” she said excitedly. “It’s underlined too!”
Next she found dig, glas, slat, long, bean, ball, gun, ail. All had been marked!
CHAPTER XVI
Charge Against Nancy
It took both Nancy and Fiona a few moments to realize what a great discovery they had made. Then the Scottish girl asked, “Will you tell all this to the police?”
“Yes, indeed, and also what happened at Mrs. Drummond’s.” Nancy’s brow furrowed in concentration. “Fiona, I wonder if the words ‘highway ditch’ in the message could mean a particular road on which the thieves travel.”
Fiona looked surprised. “I thought you had decided it meant Mr. Dewar or one of his friends was to force your car into the ditch.”
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“That was only a guess. And my new theory is too. I wish I could decipher ‘lock rod’ and ‘wife member without stamp.’“
Nancy decided to leave the dictionary open at the page bearing the word mall so as not to alert the person staying in the cabin that anyone had been there. Nancy picked up the book to turn the pages and suddenly gasped.
Underneath it lay a paper with her autograph!
“What’s the matter?” Fiona asked.
Nancy explained and her Scottish friend looked worried. “Then the man who bought your autograph from the little boy in River Heights is using this croft as a hideout.”
Nancy was in a quandary. Although pieces of the puzzle were beginning to fall into place, she was now doubly worried about her involvement in the mystery. “I’m positive now that Paul Petrie or someone working with him has my autograph to use for an illegal purpose.”
Again Nancy’s thoughts flew to the word “wife” in the strange message. Was somebody’s wife impersonating Nancy and using her signature?
The young sleuth wondered what to do. If she removed the piece of paper, the occupant of the croft would be put on guard and might run away and warn his friends to vanish also.
“This is too good a chance to miss for the authorities to capture one of the men red-handed,” Nancy decided. “I’ll leave the paper.”
She replaced it on the table and covered the autograph with the open dictionary. Before leaving the croft, the two girls peered cautiously outside. No one was in sight, so they hastened up the slope and down the other side to the river. All the campers were awake and breakfast preparations were under way.
“Nancy! Fiona!” cried Bess and George together, when the two appeared. Bess added, “Where have you been? Everybody has been looking for you!”
“I’m sorry,” said Nancy.
She quickly whispered her exciting news to the cousins. They were astounded and glad to start back for Douglas House directly after breakfast.
When they reached the estate, the girls found Lady Douglas walking in the garden. She was surprised at their early return and exclaimed, “Don’t tell me you have solved the mystery!”
“No, Great-Grandmother,” Nancy replied. “But we think we have a valuable clue. I want to report to the police immediately.”
Lady Douglas’ face clouded. “The police want to speak with you also, Nancy. I’m afraid I have disturbing news for you.”
The elderly woman said that a telephone call had come from the local superintendent. “When they told me why they wanted to get in touch with you, I said the whole thing was utterly preposterous. The very idea of their being suspicious of you!”
Nancy took her great-grandmother’s arm and said, “They are suspicious of me! What about?”
Lady Douglas explained that recently a number of worthless checks for large amounts had been cashed in Scotland. The signature had been traced to the girl whose picture was on the cover of Photographic Internationale.
Nancy’s face was grim. “So my autograph has been dishonestly used—by a forger!”
She now told Lady Douglas about the man who had purchased her signature from the little boy and how she had found it in the croft.
“This is more serious than I thought,” said Lady Douglas. “I told the superintendent he had no right even to mention this to you, but he was insistent, so I finally promised him you would call the office as soon as you arrived and explain the matter yourself.”
“Excuse me, please,” said Nancy, and ran into the house.
Her phone call was answered by the superintendent, who said he would send Inspector Anderson and Inspector Buchanan to the mansion to talk to her. By the time they arrived, Lady Douglas and the four girls had assembled in the big drawing room.
Anderson was young, very pleasant, and appeared to believe Nancy’s denial that she had written any worthless checks. His fellow officer, however, was a bit gruff. It was clear that Buchanan thought Nancy was not telling the truth, mainly because the evidence against her was so overwhelming.
“I have no accounts in this country,” said Nancy, “so naturally I have no checks. The guilty person perhaps only resembles me slightly.”
“On the contrary,” Buchanan said brusquely, “we have an accurate description of the young woman and it fits you. Also, several people have identified the photograph on the magazine cover as being that of the person who cheated them.”
Nancy was stunned. As she was trying to figure out what to say next, Buchanan told the girls he had orders for none of them to leave the house until they had permission from the police office.
Lady Douglas spoke for the first time. “If I say I will take full responsibility for Miss Drew and her friends, will that satisfy your superintendent?”
Nancy realized that the situation had reached a ticklish stage. Buchanan obviously did not wish to risk incurring the displeasure of Lady Douglas. On the other hand, he had his duty to perform. The young sleuth had a sudden inspiration—she would try to reach her father on the telephone and see if he could settle the matter!
She put the question to the two inspectors and they agreed. Fortunately, Nancy was able to locate the lawyer in his Edinburgh hotel room. When he heard the story, Mr. Drew became angry and insisted upon talking to one of the inspectors.
Buchanan came to the phone, and after a few minutes’ conversation with the lawyer he hung up and in turn telephoned his superior. Nancy rejoined the others in the drawing room.
Finally Buchanan returned and announced, “Mr. Drew also has offered to take full responsibility for his daughter’s appearance in court if required. For this reason, you young ladies will not have to stay on the premises.”
“Thank you,” said Nancy. “I’m going to try tracking down the person who’s using my name on worthless checks!” She thought she had a couple of good leads, but did not divulge these to the inspectors.
Nancy did tell them, however, about the sheep-stealing incident at Mrs. Drummond’s and of her suspicion that the croft in the glen might be a hideout of one of the sheep thieves. “Yesterday I saw a flock there, but every animal was gone early this morning. It you go to the croft, you will find my name on a piece of paper. It was left by someone who obtained my autograph in the United States.”
The two officers looked at Nancy in astonishment. She thought she detected a more conciliatory expression in Buchanan’s eyes. Nancy added, “You will find the autograph under a Gaelic-English dictionary.”
The inspectors went off, saying the glen would investigated at once. After luncheon Nancy telephoned the police office to find out if there were any news yet.
“Yes, Miss Drew. Everything had been removed from the croft but the furniture.”
Nancy’s heart sank. Another good lead had ended in failure!
“What about the sheep?” she asked. “Did you learn whether or not they had been stolen?”
“We did. A farmer has reported about fifty missing. He said they vanished like the little people of Fairy Bridge.”
When Nancy returned to the other girls, she reported the latest news, then asked Fiona, “What did the man mean by the little people of Fairy Bridge?”
The girl from Skye gave Nancy a whimsical look. “There is a legend that long ago a race of people, like sprites or Welsh leprechauns, lived not far from my home. They loved to play tricks, but when the giants—the big people—came around, the little people knew they could not cope with them. They always hid until it was safe for them to come out and cause some more innocent devilry. One of their hiding places was under a very ancient stone bridge which came to be known as the Fairy Bridge.”
Nancy and her friends smiled, and Bess said with a sigh, “I wish we would meet charming characters like that nowadays instead of sheep and jewel thieves!”
The girls walked around the garden, all chattering gaily except Nancy. Finally George said to her, “What’s on your mind, Nancy? I’ll bet you want to go back to that croft in the glen and do a little sleuthing yourself. But you’re afraid the police won’t approve.”
“You’ve guessed it!”
“Let’s go, anyhow!” George urged.
Nancy said with a rueful grin, “I’ve had enough trouble with the police, but I’ll go if my great-grandmother gives her consent.”
To her delight, Lady Douglas approved of the idea, saying, “I realize how real a detective you are, Nancy, and that you have three incentives—finding your missing heirloom, the sheep thieves, and now the worthless check passer. I know you feel the three mysteries are intertwined.” She kissed each of the girls in turn. “Best of luck to you all!”
Fiona thought she could find a shortcut to the side of the mountain where they had seen the hidden glen. At her direction Nancy turned the car off the main road and onto a very lonely one. Presently the girls became aware of billowing smoke in the distance. As they rounded a bend they were startled to come upon a hillside of dry seedlings on fire.
At once Fiona cried out, “We must get the brooms and beat it out!”
CHAPTER XVII
The Chase
“Brooms?” Bess echoed. “What do you mean, Fiona?”
“You will see. Nancy, speed up! We must put out the fire before it spreads to the tall trees!”
Nancy did not stop for questions. She raced the car along the road until Fiona said, “Slow down! The brooms are right ahead!”
At the edge of the field was a wooden stand containing stout brooms. Nancy pulled over. Fiona hopped out and dashed to grab four of them. As she rejoined the others, the Scottish girl said the brooms were made of birch twigs, bound together with stout wire. “These are always kept handy for fire fighting.”
Nancy quickly backed the car around and sped off. Fiona explained that anyone who spotted a brush fire was supposed to try putting it out. A few seconds later Nancy reached the scene of the burning seedlings.
“We’ll separate and work on the outer edges,” Fiona ordered. “It may feel a little hot on your feet, but we can’t do anything about that.”
The girls wielded the brooms vigorously on the burning hillside and within half an hour they had extinguished the centermost point of the blaze. The young fire fighters leaned on their brooms wearily. They had saved the big trees!
“I’m sure glad that’s over!” said Bess. She would have liked to sit down and rest, but there was no place to do this.
As the foursome trudged back to the road, they looked at one another. The girls’ faces were red and perspiring from the heat. Their hands were rough and beginning to show a few small blisters. Skirts and sweaters were dirty and the color of their shoes unrecognizable.
George remarked, “We’re sure a sorry sight! I hope we don’t meet anybody.”
Bess giggled. “You spoke too soon. Look who’s waiting for us!”
A car had stopped behind Nancy’s and two police officers were standing in the road.
“Anderson and Buchanan!” George exclaimed.
When the girls, carrying their brooms, reached the roadway, the two men looked at them in astonishment. Nancy spoke up, giving Fiona all the credit for knowing what to do.
“But the main thing is, you succeeded!” Buchanan said admiringly.
“I’m glad we were here at just the right moment,” said Nancy, and started toward her car.
Inspector Buchanan hesitated a moment, then walked up to her. “I’m sorry, Miss Drew, that I ever had any doubts about your honesty. I’m sure that no check forger would take time to stop and put out a forest fire.”
Nancy smiled at him. “You were only doing your duty,” she said. “Let’s forget the whole thing, shall we?”
Buchanan nodded and his companion grinned.
Nancy and her friends climbed into the car and waved to the two men. Nancy drove off, leaving Anderson and Buchanan to make a final check of the fire scene.
In a little while the girls reached a spot where Fiona suggested they park.
“We’ll climb from here. I think I can find that glen with the croft where we saw the sheep.”
The Scottish girl proved to be a good pathfinder and presently located a trail leading up the mountainside. Nancy figured that this probably was the route along which the stolen sheep were driven, then anesthetized and piled into a waiting truck.
The girls kept a sharp lookout but saw no one. A few minutes later they reached the croft and began a search of the premises. Not a single clue came to light.
“The only place we haven’t looked,” George said, “is in that heap of ashes in the dooryard.”
She and Bess found long twigs and began to scatter the ashes. Underneath was a heap of unburned trash. It contained tin cans, banana peels, and bits of broken glass.
“That phony shepherd who lived here was a good housekeeper, anyway!” said Bess. “He certainly tidied up this place.”
The remark intrigued Nancy. She wondered why, if the man had intended to get away in a great hurry, he should have bothered to clean up.
Bess was still delving and presently found a small canvas nailed to a board. On it was a conglomeration of colored paints. “What in the world is this?” she asked. After looking at it a moment, she tossed the canvas aside.
Nancy picked it up. Since it was so foreign to the rest of the debris, she felt it might have some significance. No explanation came to her at the moment, so she decided to take the canvas along.
The pile of rubbish was again put together and the ashes sprinkled over the top. Nancy said she thought it was time to call a halt to the investigation.
“Let’s go home now.”
During the ride back, Nancy was quiet and thoughtful. By the time they reached Douglas House, she had decided to try an experiment. After bathing and dressing, she went on a search and collected several hand mirrors.
Later Fiona, Bess, and George found Nancy in Lady Douglas’ sitting room with her great-grandmother. The young sleuth was bending over a table. On it she had laid the canvas, with the mirrors propped up in a circle in the middle of it.
“What on earth are you doing, Nancy?” Bess demanded.
“I had a hunch,” her friend replied. “This canvas, which has various colors that don’t seem to depict anything, may have been painted like the picture we saw of Bonnie Prince Charlie in the museum. Remember? The one with the cylindrical mirror in the center which reflects the portrait of the prince?”
The other girls nodded and peered into the mirrors. None of them could see anything like a picture. Lady Douglas examined the canvas, but could make nothing out of it.
“I agree with Nancy, though, that this might have some significance,” she said. “But how else can we try to find out?”
“Perhaps we have the wrong arrangement,” said Nancy. “Have you a circular glass object which I could make into a mirror?”
Lady Douglas said she could not think of anything, but Nancy was welcome to look around the house and use whatever she could find.
At once the young detective set off with the canvas. In a cupboard on the first floor she found a large goblet of clear glass.
“Just the right size,” Nancy decided. “I hope my idea works.”
She returned to her great-grandmother and asked if it would be all right to paint quicksilver on the inside of the goblet to make it serve as a mirror.
“Yes, indeed, Nancy. Perhaps Tweedie can help you. He has all sorts of things cached away, and possibly may have some quicksilver.”
Unfortunately Tweedie had none, so Nancy decided to drive into Fort William and purchase a small quantity of the coating.
The other girls wanted to go along, so presently the foursome was on its way. As they turned into the main street, Nancy said excitedly, “Look! Isn’t that the red-bearded stranger in the car up ahead?”
Her friends followed her glance. “Sure is!” George declared grimly. “He’s in a different car.”
Nancy set her jaw. This time he was not going get away from her! She memorized the license number of his car and then set out in pursuit.
The man was driving fast and Nancy increased her own speed. For a few minutes she was afraid she might be stopped by some constable. But presently both cars were out of town and the chase continued.
The red-bearded man seemed to know that he was being followed. He put on a tremendous burst of speed and raced down the road. Nancy kept right after him!
The pursuit went on and on, southward, in the general direction of Loch Lomond.
“Maybe he’s going to the houseboat!” Bess suggested when they were halfway there.
George said she hoped he would stop there. “It’ll give me great pleasure to nab him and turn him over to the police!”
Nancy took her eyes off the road for one second to look at her gas gauge. It registered empty!
“Oh, dear!” she exclaimed in dismay. “I’ll have to stop for gas, and we’ll lose our man!”
CHAPTER XVIII
Unmasked
The words were hardly out of Nancy’s mouth when her car coughed and came to a halt. She groaned.
George shrugged in resignation. “Well, that’s that! Anyway, Nancy, you can’t blame this car trouble on your unknown threateners!”
Nancy did not answer. She slipped from the car and ran up the road to a house. A pleasant-looking woman answered her knock.
As Nancy asked, “May I use your phone? I want to call the police,” the woman stared at her.
Finally she smiled and said, “You’re the American girl detective, aren’t you? The one whose picture I saw on the cover of “ Photographic Internationale!”
“For once I’m glad to be recognized,” said Nancy, smiling.
The woman invited Nancy inside and motioned to a telephone on the hall table. Nancy asked her how to get the proper police office and soon was connected with the superintendent.
“Yes, lass?”
Nancy quickly reported that she was on the trail of a red-bearded man who, she thought, was a sheep thief. “Inspectors Anderson and Buchanan know me,” she added.
“Your story is very interesting,” said the police officer, who told her his name was MacNab.
Nancy explained how the suspect had eluded her. “Please, won’t you try to apprehend him?” She gave the license number of his car. “If you catch the man, will you hold him at headquarters until I can come and identify him?”
Mr. MacNab promised to follow her suggestion. “Perhaps you had better come here, anyway. I’d like to hear more of your story.”
Nancy assured him she would be there shortly, then, after receiving directions to police headquarters, said good-by. She next asked the kind woman, who said she was Mrs. Evans, how to telephone for petrol and this time was relieved of the chore by her accommodating hostess.
While they were waiting for the petrol to arrive, Mrs. Evans asked curiously about the red-bearded stranger Nancy was chasing. “Is he involved with some case you’re working on?”
Nancy answered as offhandedly as she could. “I’m staying at my great-grandmother’s outside of Fort William. As you may know, a good many sheep have been stolen from that area. I just happened to pick up a clue that might connect this man with the thieves. I thought it was worth reporting.”
The young detective’s explanation seemed to satisfy Mrs. Evans, who switched the conversation to Nancy’s great-grandmother. “I learned from the papers that you were going to visit Lady Douglas.”
Nancy laughed. “You may be interested to know also that a friend of mine entered my photograph in a contest and won a trip for two people. Those two are out in the car right now, and I must return to them.” Nancy opened her purse. “How much do I owe you for the phone calls?”
Mrs. Evans looked surprised. “Why, my dear lass, I would not think of taking any money. It has been very delightful to meet you and to be of service. It’s funny how people’s paths cross, isn’t it? In this case, an empty petrol tank brought you to me!”
She broke into a jolly laugh and accompanied Nancy to the car. At that moment a serviceman pulled up with a large container of petrol and poured the petrol into the tank. In the meantime, Nancy had introduced her friends to Mrs. Evans. Then, after paying the garageman, she thanked Mrs. Evans for her kindness and drove off.