cave. She also gave them Billy's account of why he'd
been hanging around their barn, and she told them
how well he behaved with animals. “He seemed so
upset by the death of that little lamb,” Nancy added. “I
really don't think he's got anything to do with the stuff
going on at Moorsea.”
Annabel knit her brow as she listened, then shot a
questioning look at Hugh. “I suppose we could always
rehire him,” she said with a rueful smile.
“Don't speak too soon, darling,” Hugh declared. “If
you ask me, Billy could still be guilty. He could have
planted the earring in the cave and then rescued
Maisie to make himself seem innocent.”
“I think that's unlikely,” Nancy said. “Billy seems to
act on instinct. He's not the type to make a
complicated plan like that.”
“I wonder if the earring could belong to the wife of
one of the Singhs,” George remarked. “We know that
Devendra, at least, has a wife. Her dog was at their
office this morning.”
“That's possible,” Nancy said. “But it's also possible
the earring has nothing to do with the case. Someone
could have lost an earring in that cave before Maisie
was even taken.”
“Speaking of Maisie,” Hugh cut in, “it's time for her
dinner.”
“And it's time for me to go help Peggy prepare our
dinner,” Annabel added. Flashing Nancy a dazzling
smile, she said, “Now that Maisie's home, I feel much
more optimistic about our case.”
One thing, Annabel, before you go,” Nancy said.
“Did you have any luck getting Malcolm's message
pad?”
“Ah, yes.” She reached into a desk drawer and
pulled out the pad. Nancy examined it in the light of
the window.
“I don't see anything,” she said, before handing it
back to Annabel.
“Well, girls,” Annabel said, “we'll see you both at
dinner.”
After the Petersons left, Nancy said, “I know you
don't agree with me, George, but Malcolm still looks
guilty. I'd like to keep a close eye on him tonight. That
road sign is pretty suspicious, and also nothing bad has
happened to him at the inn so far. And just because
there's no mark on his message pad proves nothing.”
“But what about the earring, Nan?” George asked. “I
know you said it might have nothing to do with the
case, but I kind of doubt it. I mean, how many visitors
does that cave get? It's in the middle of nowhere. I'll
bet you anything the person we're looking for is a
woman—or at least has an accomplice who's a woman,
like Devendra's wife.”
“Still, let's take turns watching Malcolm's stairway
through the night. Who knows? We just might catch
him getting ready to do some trick.”
“All right,” George agreed, “but I'm convinced
you're suspecting an innocent man.”
“I say, Annabel,” Ashley Macmillan-Brown
remarked over her lemon cake with mint-flavored
sheep's milk ice cream that evening at dinner. “This
dessert is scrumptious. I'd thought sheep's milk ice
cream sounded foul, but really it's lovely.”
Annabel smiled as she poured the guests coffee from
a gleaming silver pot.
This is good,” Nigel agreed. “I'm so glad that the
right food has managed to come my way for the last
three nights. Maybe these strange pranks have ended.”
Annabel laughed as she set the coffee pot down. “I
hope so,” she said, holding up crossed fingers. “Did
everyone know that Maisie was found this afternoon?
Perhaps that's a sign that our run of bad luck is finally
over.”
“Could be,” Malcolm said cheerfully. “After all,
nothing too awful has happened here since yesterday
when Maisie disappeared—unless we count my
embarrassing loss at tennis today to Nigel.” He slapped
the restaurant critic on the back as the man was sipping
his coffee.
Nigel glowered at Malcolm. “Don't you dare do
anything to compromise my perfect meal,” he snapped,
mopping up a spot of spilled coffee from his lap.
Mr. Macmillan-Brown cleared his throat. “Nothing
awful has happened today, that's true,” he mused. “But
does that mean the pranks have ended? Or does it
mean that the culprit will strike again soon, now that
the dog has been found and everything seems to be
back to normal?”
“But the Dartmoor area is never normal,” Georgina
put in. “No one expects it to be.”
There was an awkward silence as everyone digested
Georgina's remark. Then Nigel said, “Macmillan-
Brown, you're making me nervous. Let's not dwell on
bad things that might happen but probably won't.”
“Has it occurred to anyone that the chap might be
one of us?” Ashley asked innocently. Her worried eyes
scanned the various guests.
“Hush, dear,” her mother said. “That's a bit rude.”
Everyone finished dinner in an edgy silence. Finally
Malcolm pushed back his chair. “I'm tired—I think I'll
read in my room this evening. I intend to get a good
night's sleep so I can beat George in tennis tomorrow,”
he added, winking at her.
George shot him a pleased smile. “He doesn't seem
to be annoyed with us anymore,” she whispered to
Nancy.
Nancy leaned toward George. “No, but if he thinks
we're onto some other suspect, he's wrong,” she
murmured. “Let's go to bed early so we can watch his
room.”
After dinner Nancy and George sat around the living
room fireplace for a while with the other guests and
told them about their ride on the moor. After they'd
described the fog coming in, Georgina gave a horrified
gasp, then chimed in with yet another ghost story.
When Ashley asked her father to play a game of chess,
the group broke up to do different activities, and
Nancy and George excused themselves to go upstairs.
Once inside their room, they cracked open their
door, which had a perfect view of the third-floor
stairway.
“This is a lucky break for us,” Nancy commented.
“We can watch Malcolm's stairway from our room. Do
you want to take the first watch, George, or shall I?”
“I'll do it,” George offered. “You get some shut-eye,
Nancy. I'll wake you if I hear any action—human,
ghost, or otherwise.”
“Thanks, George,” Nancy said with a grin. After
throwing on a nightgown, she settled gratefully into
bed. Within minutes, she was fast asleep.
“Nancy!” George's urgent voice woke her.
“Someone's walking in the hallway!”
Nancy sat up with a jolt. She could tell that several
hours had passed because the bright hallway light was
off and a hush had fallen over the house.
In two seconds flat, Nancy joined George by the
cracked-open door. The girls huddled down and
peered through it. A small lamp in the downstairs foyer
provided a dim light.
Soft footsteps padded nearby. Nancy held her
breath, listening. To her surprise, the footsteps weren't
coming from Malcolm's upstairs room. They were
coming from down the hallway to their left.
“Maybe those stories about Dartmoor's ghosts are
true,” George whispered.
“No way, Fayne,” Nancy muttered. “You're letting
Dartmoor get to you.” But despite her bold words, her
spine prickled.
Of course there were no such things as ghosts, she
told herself, but the big old silent house was creepy at
this hour. She shivered, hugging her nightgown to her
chest as she crouched by the door. She didn't dare
open it wider for fear the person would notice them.
The grandfather clock in the downstairs foyer slowly
began to chime, drowning out the sound of the
footsteps. Twelve chimes, Nancy counted. Midnight.
Once more the footsteps sounded in the hall, and
Nancy thought she heard a soft sigh. Could it be the
wind? she wondered. She cast an anxious glance
behind her at the curtain fluttering in the night breeze.
She looked again through the crack—and her breath
stuck in her throat. In the shadowy light, a pale, eerie-
looking figure glided into view. It was a woman
wearing a long white robe, moving with her arms
outstretched.
13. The Haunted Hallway
A rush of adrenaline shot through Nancy as the
apparition floated by them. After the stories she'd
heard about ghosts in Dartmoor, she couldn't help but
feel shocked at the sight of one. After a moment Nancy
took stock of the situation. The pale woman wasn't
some specter roaming the halls of Moorsea Manor by
night. She was Georgina Trevor—sleepwalking!
With her eyes closed, Georgina moved toward the
large curved stairway that led downstairs. She started
down it, her wraithlike shadow moving like some huge
insect on the cream-colored wall. Seconds later she
disappeared around a bend.
Nancy and George traded amazed glances. “Let's
go,” Nancy whispered. She grabbed a robe from a hook
on the door and threw it on.
They hurried into the hall. Clutching the banister,
they peered down the stairs just in time to see
Georgina's white robe trailing into the dining room.
Nancy and George ran down the stairs. Their bare
feet made no sound on the cold marble floor of the
foyer. They tiptoed into the dining room.
The pantry door was swinging back and forth, but
the dining room was empty. “She's in the pantry,”
Nancy whispered, pointing at the door.
“She seems to know exactly where she's going,”
George commented suspiciously as the two girls
sneaked toward the door. “Wouldn't sleepwalkers be
acting a little klutzier? I'll bet she's faking.”
“I'm not sure,” Nancy said. “Let's open the door and
see what she's doing now.”
George opened the pantry door a crack and peeked
through. Turning to Nancy, she said, “Georgina's in
there, all right—standing totally still in the kitchen
doorway. I can see the back of her robe.”
“I wonder if she's tampering with tomorrow's
breakfast,” Nancy said. “Hurry. Let's follow her.”
Hustling past George, she pushed the pantry door
open wider. A sudden gut-wrenching squeak from the
hinges made goosebumps rise on Nancy's skin and
made George jump.
Georgina whirled around. “Who's there?” she
screeched, her watery eyes wide with shock. “Oh, it's
you two. You gave me a fright. I thought you might be
one of the ghosts that live in this house.” She placed a
hand on her heart, breathing heavily.
“We're sorry, Georgina,” Nancy said, pretending to
be surprised at seeing her. Fudging an excuse so that
Georgina wouldn't think they'd followed her on
purpose, Nancy added, “Uh . . . we couldn't sleep, so
we decided to come downstairs to get a snack.”
“You say there are ghosts here?” George inter-
rupted. “Have you seen them?”
“No,” Georgina said with a dismissive shrug. “But
I'm certain they're here—somewhere. I can feel it in
my bones.”
“So, what are you doing here, Georgina?” Nancy cut
in. “Looking for a snack, too?”
Georgina wrinkled her tiny nose, reminding Nancy
of a confused rabbit. “A snack?” she echoed. “No, I
don't think so. I must have been sleepwalking. I do that
from time to time. In fact”—she glanced around with a
puzzled air—“I have no memory of coming down here
at all.”
“You were wide-awake when we walked through this
door,” Nancy remarked.
“Was I? Well, that awful squeak must have woken
me up. The Petersons really should oil that hinge. It's
disgraceful.”
“The Petersons have had a lot on their mind, lately,”
George said.
“Ah, yes,” Georgina said with a vague smile. “They
have, haven't they?”
Nancy studied Georgina as the older woman gazed
into the distance. Was she really this, absentminded
and weird? Nancy wondered. Or was she putting on an
going to leave Georgina alone and go back to bed.
Nancy stepped forward and slipped her arm through
Georgina's. “Let's go upstairs. George and I want to
make sure you get to your room safely.”
Georgina fluttered her eyelashes. “Don't worry
about me, Nancy. Why don't you girls fix yourselves
snacks? I can get back upstairs on my own just fine now
that I'm awake.”
“No,” George said, taking her other arm, “we insist.
You still seem a little shaky. We can't let you go back to
your room all alone.”
Georgina looped her arm through George's. Then,
bowing her head, she meekly allowed herself to be
escorted upstairs to her room.
“I must have had a bad dream,” she murmured
along the way. “That's usually why I sleepwalk.”
“All these ghosts in the house,” George said, arching
an eyebrow at Nancy over Georgina's head. “They
make it impossible for anyone to get a good night's
sleep.”
Georgina beamed. “You're an understanding soul,”
she commented once they'd reached her bedroom
door. She looked George over approvingly. “Those
spirits do make it very hard for one to get a good
night's sleep.” Then, without another word, she flitted
into her room and shut the door.
Nancy and George hurried back to their room. Once
inside, Nancy said, “So, George—do you think it's
possible for anyone to be that spacey? Or do you think
she's covering up a clever plan to tamper with our
breakfast?”
George burst out laughing. “Sorry, Nan,” she said
after a moment. “But I've been stifling that ever since
Georgina opened her mouth downstairs. That stuff
about the ghosts is too much. I can't figure her out at
all. She doesn't seem capable of putting together a
single straight sentence, much less masterminding a
plan to put the Petersons out of business.”
Nancy thought about the earring she had found in
the cave. Could it be Georgina's? she wondered.
“Tomorrow,” she said aloud, “I'm going to search
Georgina's room. If I can find the matching earring,
then our mystery will be solved.” Sneaking a grin at
George, Nancy added, “Sorry to disappoint you,
George, but Malcolm isn't off the hook—he might still
make an appearance. Anyway, you go to sleep. It's my
turn to watch.”
By five in the morning, Nancy had slipped back into
bed in frustration. After their midnight encounter with
Georgina, the house had been disappointingly quiet.
“She's sick?” Nancy asked, staring in surprise at
Annabel the next morning. “What's wrong?”
Nancy, Annabel, and Hugh were standing on the
beach. The Petersons were cleaning rowboats and
securing oars in the locks, preparing for an exploration
party to a nearby island later that afternoon.
The crisp sea breeze slapped against Nancy's face.
Sunlight danced on the blue water, and tiny whitecaps
foamed here and there across the huge expanse of sea.
The crescent-shaped beach, littered with driftwood
and shells, was sheltered, but the waves looked bigger
today than they had before, Nancy thought. Hugh was
taking a quick break from his work to throw sticks into
the sea for Maisie.
“Georgina's got a headache,” Annabel explained,
responding to Nancy's question. “She came down to
the kitchen early this morning and told me she felt
quite under the weather, so I fixed her a breakfast tray,
which she took upstairs.”
“I guess there's no way I can check out her room this
morning,” Nancy said, feeling frustrated.
Annabel shook her head. “I'm sorry, Nancy, but
Georgina's definitely up there. She told me she hopes
to sleep off her headache after breakfast, and she asked
that the maid wait till the afternoon to clean her room.
Apparently, Georgina didn't have a very good sleep last
night.”
Nancy cast her mind back to the unsettling events of