The cry stopped as her voice called to it. It was not near the rain barrel, Nancy now decided, but over by the cistern. Quickly she turned in that direction, but when within a few feet of the square little box that covered the artificial well, she was suddenly startled by a noise--a queer noise. "What's that?" was her unspoken question. She listened. It was a man's voice, singing! "Where, where--can that be!" she murmured half aloud, meanwhile unconsciously walking toward the cistern. Then a hammering! A buzzing! "Oh!" screamed Nancy in alarm, now realizing that she had been hearing something very strange indeed. "Oh, I must--get--away!" was her wild determination, as she turned and dashed down the hill, making her way this time through the opening in the fence where the cedar tree had fallen. CHAPTER XXII TARTS AND LADY FINGERS No one would believe her. They all came out of the water as Nancy arrived at the beach, and declined positively, to go in. "I'm too--flustered," she insisted. "My head is swimming now and it doesn't matter about my heels." "But Nancy," protested Marion Mason, one of the Upper Crust Hill girls, "how could you have heard anybody or anything in that open field? No bushes nor trees big enough to hide behind, just there." "It was the cat," insisted Christine Berg, a friend of Marion's. "There are queer cats--always have been--around the old stone house. First, the cat meaowed, just to entice you," said Christine, wringing out the scant skirt of her black satin bathing suit. "And then, when she got you over there, she did the rest," finished the very blonde girl with the lovely hazel eyes. "Sort of ventriloquist," added Isabel. "Well, at any rate, Nan, you have had a thrill. Vera, wouldn't that constitute a thrill, don't you think?" "I'll tell you what _I_ think," chimed in Ruth. "I think we had better hurry to dress or we shall be late for our lesson, and mine is cream-puffs today. Our family can eat cream-puffs until the puff--" But the girls, running up to the little bath houses, deprived Ruth of her audience, and also of the necessity of finishing her simile. Nancy sat on the little board-walk edge of the row of houses, while the girls dressed. Ruth finished first and joined her there. "Really, Nan?" she quizzed, in an under tone. "Most certainly--really," replied Nancy, seriously. "Do you suppose I would make that up for fun?" "No, I don't. It isn't your brand of fun. But it's mighty curious. Do you suppose we should all go up there right now, and go over every inch of the place--" "Oh, no. We must go back to Manny and be good cooks," Nancy answered. "Besides Ruth, she has my check and I'm anxious to see if it is still there, not just a dream check you know," she smiled understandingly at Ruth.