The Mystery of the Cranky Collector Read online

  Everywhere there were bookcases. They lined the walls and nudged close to the dresser and crowded the chairs. They were all filled to overflowing. Pete saw paperbacks and hardcovers, small books and volumes so big they had to be put on the shelves sideways. There were papers, too, some stacked in piles, some rolled into cylinders. Here and there manila folders and big brown envelopes had been slipped in on top of the books.

  Pete glanced at the bed. Old Man Pilcher appeared to be asleep. His breathing was hoarse, but it was regular and even. The skinny hands no longer clutched each other; they were open and relaxed on his chest.

  Pete got up and went to one of the bookcases. He read the titles on the backs of the books. Bloody Murder was one. Another was Shark Hunter. There was a collection of stories by Edgar Allan Poe and a book titled Polaris. Pete slid it off the shelf and opened it. It was a guide for seafarers, telling how to navigate a ship by the stars.

  Pilcher let out a sound that was half a groan and half a snore. Pete jumped as if he had been caught doing something forbidden. He slid the book back onto the shelf and waited, watching the old man and listening to the voices of the guests below. How long would the party go on? How long would he be stuck here watching this cranky old codger sleep?

  He looked at his hands. They were smudged and dusty. Probably the bookcase hadn’t been cleaned for months or even years.

  Pete went into the bathroom and closed the door. There were books here, too. They were heaped on a low table between the old-fashioned claw-foot tub and the washbasin. One was a collection of cartoons; another was a

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  Locked In!

  copy of a book on atomic energy. Evidently Pilcher would read anything and everything. Jupiter Jones was like that. He was a voracious reader who remembered most of what he read. But it was strange to think that Mr. Pilcher, obviously a world-class grouch, shared an interest with Jupe. Jupe might be sort of pompous and preachy at times, but he wasn’t a grouch, ever.

  Pete turned on the water and began to wash his hands, using the sliver of soap from Pilcher’s soap dish.

  Suddenly, sharp and clear, there came the sound of a key turning in a lock.

  “Hey!” Pete grabbed a towel and flew to the door. He turned the knob and pulled. The door didn’t budge. It was locked tight.

  Pete called softly, “Mr. Pilcher? Mr. Pilcher, open the door, please.”

  No one answered.

  Pete rattled the knob. “Mr. Pilcher?” he said more loudly.

  Footsteps went away from the door. Pete put his ear to the wooden panels. He could hear the guests talking and laughing downstairs. The musicians were no longer playing. A door opened nearby and the party sounds grew louder.

  “Mr. Pilcher?”

  Still no one came. No one answered.

  Pete felt himself getting warm with embarrassment, with fright. Was Old Man Pilcher mad because Pete was using his bathroom? Perhaps he thought Pete meant to harm him. He might have gotten confused and decided that Pete was a burglar. Had he gone to call the police?

  Pete sat down on the edge of the tub and waited. If the police came, it would be okay with him. In fact he would be kind of glad to see the police about now. But then there were footsteps again. They were the same footsteps, and they were coming back to the bathroom door.

  Old Man Pilcher must have decided Pete was harmless; he was coming back to unlock the door and let Pete out. But he didn’t touch the door. Instead he gasped, and Pete heard a scuffling sound as if Pilcher had stumbled, or as if he were struggling with someone just outside the door. There was a grunt, then a thud.

  Pete leaped toward the door. He rattled the knob. “Mr. Pilcher?” he yelled.

  At that second the rock group down in the living room burst into a number called “Baby, Why Ain’t You My Baby No More?” It was very loud, heavy on the drums, with lots of amplification.

  “Mr. Pilcher?” Pete shouted, but he could scarcely hear himself. “Mr. Pilcher, are you okay?” The music thundered on.

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  Sweating now, near panic, Pete pounded on the door.

  Pilcher didn’t respond. A heart attack! He must be having a real heart attack, and not just some kind of spasm that wasn’t important. He might be dying now, right outside the door.

  “Got to get out!” cried Pete. He stamped and stamped on the floor.

  No one heard him. No one came.

  “Baby, Why Ain’t You My Baby No More?” crashed to a conclusion, but there was no period of silence. The band roared right into “Rockin’ Rockin’ Rockin’ All the Night.”

  Pete pounded the door in frustration. What can I do? he thought. There’s a sick old man out there in need of help. What can I do? What would Jupe do?

  “Calm down and use your head!” came the voice of the First Investigator in Pete’s memory.

  Right! thought Pete, and he slowly looked around the tiny room. His eye fell on the window.

  The window! Pilcher had a nice, old-fashioned bathroom with a window. Outside the window a tree grew quite close to the house. It looked like a good sturdy alder — ideal for climbing up, or down.

  Pete shoved up the window, then pulled over the table on which Pilcher’s bathroom books were piled. Hopping up on the table, he poked his head and shoulders outside.

  He looked down. He was at the side of the house. A cement walk lay directly beneath him. If he fell, he would break a leg, at the least. Or an arm. Or he might crack his skull.

  But Pete, the best athlete of The Three Investigators, was an expert tree climber. He wasn’t likely to fall. And he didn’t dare fall.

  If I don’t get downstairs and find some help fast, he told himself, Old Man Pilcher might die!

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  3

  The Missing Millionaire

  Pete went down the tree as quickly as he dared, barely pausing to test handholds and footholds. No one had been in the yard beside the house when he climbed out the bathroom window, but by the time he reached the ground a red-haired girl had appeared. “What a fun way to come down,” she said. “Most people just use the stairs.”

  “Right,” said Pete. He didn’t bother to explain but simply dodged past the girl and ran to the other side of the house, where the long windows were open to the living room.

  The music was still blasting when Pete stepped through a window into the mob scene inside. Guests struggled to talk above the sound of the band. Jupe and Bob were sweating slightly as they valiantly passed trays. Pete darted through the crowd toward Marilyn Pilcher, who stood talking to a woman in a gray silk dress. Pete touched her elbow to get her attention. She turned, and when she saw Pete, she scowled. “You’re supposed to be with my father,” she shouted above the music.

  Pete started to explain, then shook his head and beckoned for her to follow him to the kitchen.

  As they went through the dining room she spotted Ray Sanchez at the far end of the room. He was hovering over Harry Burnside as the caterer set platters of thinly sliced ham and turkey and bowls of pasta salad on the buffet table. Marilyn crooked a finger at Sanchez, and he followed her into the empty kitchen and closed the door behind him to muffle the noise of the band.

  “Your dad locked me in the bathroom,” Pete told Marilyn, “when I went in to wash my hands. And a minute or two later I heard a thud. I think he fell. I yelled, but he didn’t answer, so I climbed down a tree, and I think — ”

  That was as far as he got. Marilyn Pilcher ran for the back stairs, and Sanchez strode after her.

  The door to the dining room inched open. Jupe looked in. Bob peeked

  The Missing Millionaire

  over his shoulder. “What’s up?” asked Jupe.

  “I think Old Man Pilcher freaked out,” Pete told him, and explained what had happened. “The daughter’s gone up to check on the old guy.”

  Jupe looked at the ceiling, then at the back stairs. He started toward them.

  “You think you should do that?” asked Bob. “Marilyn Pilcher might not like us butting in if her dad has really
flipped.”

  “If Mr. Pilcher isn’t well, his daughter may need help,” Jupe said primly.

  “Go right up, if you don’t mind carrying your head under your arm,” warned Pete, but after a moment he started up the stairs after Jupe. He had seen Jupe operate too many times as leader of The Three Investigators. Jupe could hold his own if Marilyn Pilcher challenged him.

  Bob hesitated, then followed Pete.

  The upstairs hall was a blizzard of feathers. A pillow had broken open there. The crumpled tick lay on the floor, and feathers swirled everywhere. Marilyn Pilcher was wading through them, banging doors open, looking into rooms, shouting. Sanchez wasn’t shouting, but he was looking.

  “He’s got to be here someplace!” cried Marilyn. “Where could he go? There’s no place he could go!”

  The door to Pilcher’s bedroom stood open.

  Jupe looked in and saw the impression of Pilcher’s body on the wrinkled bed sheets. Tiny flames danced in the fireplace across from the bed, sending wisps of blackened, burned paper up the chimney. Jupe frowned. The day was very warm. Why would anyone light a fire?

  Jupe ran to snatch the tongs from the stand beside the fireplace. He tried to rake the fire out onto the hearth, but there were only the brittle remains of burning paper. They fell to bits as soon as the tongs touched them.

  “What are you doing?” Marilyn Pilcher grabbed the tongs from Jupe. Her voice was rough with anger. “Why aren’t you downstairs passing things? Get out!”

  “Miss Pilcher, my associates and I may be more useful to you if we remain,” Jupiter said, using his most adult manner. Unhurried, he got to his feet. “We have had considerable experience examining places where unusual happenings have occurred,” he explained. “Frequently we have been able to reconstruct events and solve mysteries that have baffled other investigators.”

  Marilyn Pilcher’s mouth opened, but for a moment the girl was speechless. Pete wanted to cheer. Jupe had done it again!

  Jupe now looked calmly around. The bathroom door was still closed; an old-fashioned skeleton key rested in the lock. Jupe went to the door and unlocked it. The bathroom was just as Pete had left it, with the little table under the window and the window open.

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  Jupe removed the key and tried it in the door between the hall and the bedroom. It fit the lock there. “It would probably work in any door in this house,” Jupe observed. “Miss Pilcher, before your father disappeared, he locked Pete in the bathroom. Does he often treat his guests that way?”

  “Your buddy isn’t a guest,” snapped Marilyn Pilcher. “He works here, remember?”

  “Very well,” said Jupe. “Does your father often shut his employees in the bathroom?”

  He looked toward Pete. “After you were locked in, you heard a thud. Something fell. You think it was a body? Could it have been Mr. Pilcher?”

  “It … I suppose it couldn’t have been anyone else,” said Pete. “There wasn’t anybody else here.”

  “Was that fire burning in the fireplace when you were sitting with Mr. Pilcher?” Jupe asked.

  “No.” Pete shook his head. “No fire.”

  “It’s a warm day,” Jupe observed. “Why would anyone light a fire?”

  Jupe looked toward the bed. “One torn pillow on the hallway floor,” he observed. “No pillows on the bed. Was the torn one damaged earlier? And shouldn’t there have been two pillows on that bed? Double beds usually have two pillows.”

  Pete frowned. “I think there were two, but I didn’t really notice.”

  “Of course there were two,” snapped Marilyn. “Look, all this Sherlock Holmes stuff is not impressing me. You guys get downstairs and pass the food like you’re supposed to, and —”

  “Up to a certain point I can tell what happened here today,” said Jupiter, ignoring her orders. “It’s perfectly clear. Pete went into the bathroom, and your father got up quietly, took the key from the bedroom door, and used it to lock Pete in. Then he burned something in the fireplace.”

  Ray Sanchez had come into the bedroom. “He must have had something he didn’t want anyone to see,” Ray said. “He is very secretive.”

  “Ray, don’t encourage this kid!” Marilyn scolded. She turned to Jupe. “So he burned something,” she said. “Then he tore up one of his pillows, and he took the other with him and he hid someplace. He’s ornery. He might do that just to get to me. He’s done worse things when he didn’t like what was going on — and believe me, he doesn’t like what’s happening today.”

  “So he’s trying to frighten you?” Jupe prompted. “If that’s what he’s doing, where is he hiding?”

  Marilyn made an exasperated noise and turned away to continue her search. Ray Sanchez joined her. After watching for a minute, the Three Investigators started opening doors too. Marilyn began to protest, then muttered, “Okay, okay! I guess I can use all the help I can get.”

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  The Missing Millionaire

  The boys saw that the big square bedrooms of the old house were almost uniformly dusty. Most of them appeared to be unoccupied. Some were furnished with beds and dressers, some were empty except for floor-to-ceiling shelves crammed with books and papers.

  “Gives you a new feeling about books,” said Bob. “Like collecting could be a compulsion, like gambling or biting your fingernails.”

  “It’s a disease,” said Marilyn Pilcher. “Believe me, it’s a disease.”

  Books were not the only things Jeremy Pilcher had collected. There were trophies of voyages to far parts of the world — a Turkish fez, a water pipe, a pair of leather slippers that Marilyn told them were from a bazaar in Egypt. There was carved ivory from Africa and there was a tarnished brass lamp that Pilcher had bought in Marrakech. Navigational instruments were jumbled onto shelves beside pencil boxes and old magazines.

  “Dad never throws anything away,” Marilyn grumbled. “And he won’t let anybody clean up here. He’s afraid somebody’s going to make off with some of his precious stuff.”

  Marilyn sighed, and the boys felt a twinge of sympathy for her. She had a sharp manner, but with a father like Jeremy Pilcher, she could be excused a great deal. And evidently Marilyn herself had a yearning for order and neatness. Her own room was tidy and prim.

  The only other orderly area on the second floor of the old house was the computer room, which was next to Jeremy Pilcher’s bedroom. Heavily air-conditioned, it was stark and efficient, with white walls, metal chairs painted a brilliant red, and two computer consoles.

  “One of these is set up to interface with the big computer in the office downtown,” explained Sanchez. “Mr. Pilcher doesn’t care to go out much anymore. He uses the computer to keep in touch. He can give orders to his staff by keying things in on the machine, and he doesn’t have to bother talking to people. Besides, it gives him a record so the staff has no comeback if they don’t follow orders and they mess things up.”

  “My dad likes to know where the blame belongs,” said Marilyn grimly. “Okay, so he isn’t here.”

  “Is there an attic?” asked Pete.

  There was. It contained more books and boxes and souvenirs of the past, but no sign of Jeremy Pilcher.

  When they finished searching upstairs, Marilyn turned to Jupe. “Okay,” she said. “Where is he? You’re such a smart kid, you tell me!”

  “We have eliminated all the other possibilities,” said Jupiter. “Therefore we must conclude either that he walked down the stairs and out the front door, and no one noticed because the guests were busy talking —”

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  “I don’t think so,” interrupted Marilyn. “I could see the stairs the whole time. I think I’d have noticed if he came down that way.”

  “What about the back stairs?” asked Ray Sanchez. “If he went down the back stairs, he could get to the cellar or out to the backyard.”

  “Carrying his pillow?” said Jupe.

  “Why do you keep talking about that pillow?” Marilyn demanded.

  “Because it may be important,” said Jupiter.

  They we
nt down the back stairs. The drifter who had been hired to wash the dishes was busy at the sink.

  “Did you see my father come down here?” Marilyn asked him.

  The man looked around. His face showed he was at least fifty, even sixty, but his body was burly and muscular. A dragon had been tattooed on his right forearm. Jupe thought he looked sullen. The man responded to Marilyn’s question with a shake of his head, and he went back to his dishes.

  Harry Burnside came in from the dining room. “Something wrong?” he asked.

  “I seem to have lost a father,” Marilyn told him.

  The Investigators looked in the basement and found mildew and old trunks and spiders. They went out and circled the house and saw overgrown shrubs and grass that was weedy and lumpy with neglect. Party guests were now eating at the tables that had been set up in the garden, but Jeremy Pilcher was not sitting with them.

  At last there was no place else to look.

  “So it’s like the kid said,” decided Marilyn. “He’s walked out on me. He doesn’t want me to get married, so he beat it. He thinks I’ll get so uptight, I’ll forget about Jim and my engagement and —”

  “Suppose that isn’t it,” said Jupiter. “Don’t forget the pillow. Would a grown man take a pillow along if he chose to disappear? That would be like Linus and his blanket. And don’t forget that thump Pete heard. A sound like a falling body. And what about the fire in the fireplace?”

  “What about that fire?” demanded Marilyn. “And that thump — that could be just … just part of an act he’s putting on. He’s capable of it. It’s all a game with him. He figures if I get mad enough, he makes points.”

  Jupiter shook his head. “Isn’t it just as logical to conclude that your father burned something in the fireplace to keep it out of someone’s hands? And that somebody took him away, using that pillow to muffle his cries?”