Europe -- Fiction; Imaginary wars and battles -- Fiction; War stories
"Yes, I did hear what sounded like moaning voices," admitted Marta
rather sheepishly. "But of course it was imagination. Now we have a man
with nerve enough to go into the dungeons, we'll lay this ridiculous
psychological bugaboo at once; that is, if you have the nerve!" She
arched her brows in challenging scrutiny of Bouchard, while her eyes
twinkled at the prospect of adventure. "I thought I had, myself, but
before I got to the dungeons the clammy air wilted it and I was rubbing
my eyes to keep from seeing all kinds of apparitions."
She puzzled Bouchard, she was so facile, so ready, so many-sided. But
the more she puzzled him the stronger became his conviction of her
guilt. He guessed that all this talk was only a prelude to some trick to
keep him out of the tunnel. Poor at speech at best, slightly fussed by
her candid good humor and teasing, he hesitated as to his next remark.
He was going to be short with her in stating that he would go into the
tunnel immediately, when she took the words out of his mouth.
"This way, please. I'm all impatience. I only wish that you had
suggested it before."
As they passed out of the room Minna leaned against the wall, exhausted
and wonder-struck.
"Miss Galland is beyond me!" she thought. "Does she think those hawk
eyes will miss that little button of the panel door?"
"We'll need a lantern," said Marta as she took up the one she had been
using from a corner of the tool room; while Bouchard, slowly turning his
head like some automaton, was examining every detail of floor and wall,
spades, hoes, and weeders, for a hidden significance. The lantern was
still hot, and Marta's finger smarted with a burn, but she did not
twitch. She was so keyed up that she felt capable of walking over
red-hot coals, while she joked about ghosts. "There!" she exclaimed,
after the lantern was lighted. "This is going to be great sport. Ghost
hunting--think of that! We might have made a ghost party Too bad we
didn't think of it in time. Yes, it's a pity to be so exclusive about
it. Even now we might send for General Westerling and some of the other
staff-officers."
She paused and looked at Bouchard questioningly, perhaps challengingly;
at least, he thought challengingly. He had half a mind to concur. Could
anything be better than to have Westerling present if suspicions proved
correct? But no. She wanted Westerling and that was the best reason why
he should not be present. Yet there was no sign of chicane in the
brimming fun of her eyes that went with the suggestion. Bouchard's
search for the proper words of dissent left him rather confused and at a
disadvantage. With sympathetic quickness she seemed to guess his
thoughts, and in a way that he found all the more exasperating.
"No, no! We're too impatient! We can't wait, can we?" she exclaimed.
"Let's go. Let's get the ghosts single-handed, you and I. If we win
we'll demand a specially large bronze cross to be struck for us."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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