Mystery of the Midnight Dog (7 page)

With lots of exaggeration and hand gestures, Ms. Prattle began to read.

No one in the audience seemed to mind the exaggeration. They applauded loudly when Ms. Prattle finished reading, and asked her lots of questions. She talked about how her research had led her to believe that many of the ghost stories she’d heard could be true.

Then it was time for a half-hour break.

Henry slipped his flashlight out of his pocket. “Come on,” he said to Violet. “Let’s go.” He and Violet hurried up the trail toward the parking lot.

People wandered toward the concession stand. Kate Frances and Ms. Prattle walked up the stone steps that divided the two rows of benches where the audience sat to listen. Ms. Prattle stopped and spoke to several people and smiled. But she didn’t sign any books. “Not until after it’s over,” she said. “And don’t forget, more books will be for sale!”

The Aldens passed Kate Frances. They knew she was offering to walk with Ms. Prattle. “No, no,” said Ms. Prattle. “I need a little time to myself. I’ll just walk along the trail and think. Don’t worry. I’ll be back in time to read again!”

She took a flashlight out of her shoulder bag and moved away up the trail.

Jessie and Benny stayed where they were, watching and waiting.

Nothing happened. A few people drifted back to their seats. Benny whispered, “Where’s the ghost dog?”

“I don’t know, Benny,” said Jessie.

Just then, someone screamed.

“It’s the ghost!” a woman shouted.

“The ghost dog!” another voice added.

Even though they’d been expecting it, Benny and Jessie both jumped.

Then they saw it: a white figure moving in and out among the trees.

“Come on!” Jessie said.

She and Benny ran toward the dog, skirting the crowd of people who were trying to back away from it. They dashed to the edge of the woods as the dog disappeared into it.

Jessie pulled the silent whistle from her pocket and raised it to her lips. She blew a blast on it. And then another. And then again.

Benny held his breath.

And then the ghost dog reappeared!

It ran toward them. Then it stopped and turned its head as if listening to something only it could hear. It turned.

Jessie blew harder and harder on the whistle. The dog ran forward, then back, then forward.

Benny ran toward the dog. “Here, dog,” he called. “Nice ghost dog!” He pulled a dog biscuit from his pocket and held it out.

The dog stopped at the edge of the shadows. It looked utterly confused. As Benny ran up to it, he saw that it wasn’t a ghost dog after all—just a white dog covered with something to make it glow, and wearing booties on its feet.

Pulling a collar with a leash attached to it from his other pocket, Benny slipped the collar over the dog’s head. “Good dog,” he said. “Good girl.”

The dog whined a little and looked anxiously over her shoulder. Then she took the biscuit from Benny’s hand and allowed herself to be led out into the light.

“It’s a dog!” someone said.

“It’s not a ghost at all,” said someone else.

Jessie bent to pat the dog.

Just then, Ms. Prattle appeared at the top of the stone steps. The dog saw her and strained on the leash, barking and wagging her tail.

Ms. Prattle walked toward the stage as if she didn’t see the dog.

And she really didn’t see Henry and Violet following her.

She walked up onto the stage and turned to face the audience. She opened her book, although almost no one was sitting down. Faces turned toward her.

“In this chapter—” Ms. Prattle began.

But she didn’t get to continue. Benny let the dog drag him up to the stage. Wagging her tail even harder, the dog jumped up and barked happily at Ms. Prattle.

Ms. Prattle looked down.

Jessie stepped forward. “She’s your dog, isn’t she?” Jessie asked in a loud clear voice.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about!” Ms. Prattle said.

Henry said, “We followed you to your car just now, Ms. Prattle. We saw you take your dog out. We saw the whole thing.”

Slowly Ms. Prattle closed her book. She nodded. Then she knelt down and held out her arms. “Come here, girl. Come here, Dusty. Good girl,” she said. And the dog ran into her arms.

Kate Frances said, “Show’s over! Everybody go home.”

The porch swing creaked as Benny and Violet rocked back and forth in it. Curled in the corner, Watch yawned.

It was late, long past dinner, on the last night of the Aldens’ visit to Elbow Bend. Mrs. Wade had made another special dinner, almost as good as the first one, with peach cobbler and ice cream for dessert.

Now they were all sitting on the porch, talking about the visit—and about solving the mystery.

“I almost forgot to tell you the good news,” Kate Frances said. “More funding is being given to Dr. Sage’s research project.”

“Isn’t that great?” Lainey added. “That means she can pay Brad to keep working for her and maybe even get a second assistant.”

“And I think one of the reasons she got the money was because of all the publicity about the fake ghost dog,” said Brad. He’d joined them for dinner and was sitting next to Lainey on the wicker sofa.

“I still can’t believe that writer, Elizabeth Prattle, would do all that,” said Mrs. Wade. She shook her head. “Some people!”

“She got the idea when she overheard Kate Frances telling ghost stories. That was our first day in Elbow Bend and Kate Frances was giving us a tour of the town,” Violet said. “She heard the ghost dog story then, saw how the other tourists reacted. She realized it might be useful to her to help sell her book—since her book is based on the same story.”

“And she had her dog with her. Dusty. And Dusty was already trained to come to the silent whistle,” Henry added.

“That first night, she just used the whistle as an experiment,” Benny said. “That’s what made all the dogs bark and howl—except her dog, who’s used to the whistle.”

“And then she went to Elbow Bend State early in the morning and turned over trash cans and dug holes and planted that dog collar to make it look like a dog had been through there,” Violet said.

“And then at Stories Under the Stars, she parked her car away from all the others so no one would see her dog inside,” Jessie began.

“But wait,” Brad said. “How did she make it glow? And leave no footprints?”

“The glow came from glow-in-the-dark Halloween paint,” Violet said. “She washed it off Dusty each time. And she put booties on her dog to keep her from leaving footprints.”

“Everybody believed Dusty was a ghost,” Jessie said.

“She made the howling by playing a tape recording of a dog howling,” added Violet.

“And then, after listening to us talk about the ghost dog in the parking lot, she decided to make the ghost dog appear in town. So she took her dog to the woods along the back of this house and did the same thing,” Jessie said.

“Only this time, Watch tracked Dusty, and we found a spot of wet phosphorescent paint on a tree trunk where Dusty had brushed against it,” Henry said. “That’s when we knew we weren’t chasing a ghost but a real dog.”

“But how did you know who did it?” Lainey asked.

Violet blushed a little in the dark, and was glad Lainey couldn’t see her.

Jessie said, “We had a few suspects. But we were able to narrow the list down and set a trap.”

“And we caught her!” Benny concluded triumphantly.

“You sure did, Benny,” said Grandfather.

“She got a lot of publicity,” said Kate Frances. “But I don’t think it was the kind she wanted.”

“Her book is still selling well at the bookstore,” said Mrs. Wade. “But I think she’s sorry she did what she did.”

“She sure left town in a hurry,” Kate Frances said. “I don’t think she’ll try anything like that again.”

“Well, it’s sure been an exciting visit,” Mrs. Wade said. “I hope y’all come again soon.”

“We will,” said Benny. “And we’ll catch more ghosts next time!”

“Oh, Benny,” Violet said, and everyone laughed.

G
ERTRUDE
C
HANDLER
W
ARNER
discovered when she was teaching that many readers who like an exciting story could find no books that were both easy and fun to read. She decided to try to meet this need, and her first book,
The Boxcar Children,
quickly proved she had succeeded.

Miss Warner drew on her own experiences to write the mystery. As a child she spent hours watching trains go by on the tracks opposite her family home. She often dreamed about what it would be like to set up housekeeping in a caboose or freight car — the situation the Alden children find themselves in.

When Miss Warner received requests for more adventures involving Henry, Jessie, Violet, and Benny Alden, she began additional stories. In each, she chose a special setting and introduced unusual or eccentric characters who liked the unpredictable.

While the mystery element is central to each of Miss Warner’s books, she never thought of them as strictly juvenile mysteries. She liked to stress the Aldens’ independence and resourcefulness and their solid New England devotion to using up and making do. The Aldens go about most of their adventures with as little adult supervision as possible — something else that delights young readers.

Miss Warner lived in Putnam, Connecticut, until her death in 1979. During her lifetime, she received hundreds of letters from girls and boys telling her how much they liked her books.

The Boxcar Children Mysteries

T
HE
B
OXCAR
C
HILDREN

S
URPRISE
I
SLAND

T
HE
Y
ELLOW
H
OUSE
M
YSTERY

M
YSTERY
R
ANCH

M
IKE’S
M
YSTERY

B
LUE
B
AY
M
YSTERY

T
HE
W
OODSHED
M
YSTERY

T
HE
L
IGHTHOUSE
M
YSTERY

M
OUNTAIN
T
OP
M
YSTERY

S
CHOOLHOUSE
M
YSTERY

C
ABOOSE
M
YSTERY

H
OUSEBOAT
M
YSTERY

S
NOWBOUND
M
YSTERY

T
REE
H
OUSE
M
YSTERY

B
ICYCLE
M
YSTERY

M
YSTERY IN THE
S
AND

M
YSTERY
B
EHIND
THE
W
ALL

B
US
S
TATION
M
YSTERY

B
ENNY
U
NCOVERS
A
M
YSTERY

T
HE
H
AUNTED
C
ABIN
M
YSTERY

T
HE
D
ESERTED
L
IBRARY
M
YSTERY

T
HE
A
NIMAL
S
HELTER
M
YSTERY

T
HE
O
LD
M
OTEL
M
YSTERY

T
HE
M
YSTERY OF THE
H
IDDEN
P
AINTING

T
HE
A
MUSEMENT
P
ARK
M
YSTERY

T
HE
M
YSTERY OF THE
M
IXED
-U
P
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OO

T
HE
C
AMP
-O
UT
M
YSTERY