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Page 91
The fresh air seemed to give her strength, and she pulled on and on.
She grew thirsty and stopped to drink some of the water and to bathe
her face and hands. While doing this, her hat slipped overboard and
drifted away, but she did not notice this.
Presently she took up the oars once more, and rowed along the stream
until she reached a spot where there was an island. Here she went
ashore, hiding the rowboat in the bushes.
It was only a small island, but in the center some boys had erected a
hut where they had once camped out. Margaret dragged herself to this
shelter. Her strength was almost gone now, and, as she dropped on a
rude bench, her senses forsook her.
She did not remain unconscious long, but during that time she had a
dream or vision. She imagined that she was back home once more, and
that her father and her stepmother were alive and well, and that the
bitter quarrelling had come to an end. She sat up and brushed the
tumbled hair from her forehead,
"It--it must have been a dream!" she murmured. "It can't be true--that
daddy is dead! I--I must go home and find out!"
She was surprised to find herself on the island, but the sight of the
rowboat brought with it a memory of how she had used the craft, and
once again she got in and rowed away.
This time she headed for the Langmore mansion, and it was not long
before she came within sight of the well-known dock where her own tiny
craft still rested. She looked around. Not a soul seemed to be in
sight.
With a cunningness far out of the ordinary, the poor girl crept along
the shrubbery in the direction of the barn. This structure was locked
up. From the barn she turned to the house, and, watching her chance,
she entered by the cellar-way, which chanced to be standing open.
It was dark and damp below stairs, and the girl shivered as she stood
there, trying to make up her mind what to do next. Should she go right
up and try to find her father? Supposing her stepmother was there,
would she try to make more trouble?
Margaret mounted the stairs and entered the lower hall of the house.
The blinds were closed, and all was dark. She moved towards the room
where the body of her father had been found.
At that moment the woman who had been left at the mansion came from the
kitchen. She caught one glimpse of the girl and set up a shriek.
"It's a ghost!" she cried. "A ghost! Heaven help me!"
The cry was so piercing and so genuine, it roused Margaret from the
stupor in which she was moving.
"My father! He is dead, after all! Oh, daddy!" she screamed, and then
turned, brushed past the woman, and sped out of the back door of the
mansion.
"What's the matter?" came from the policeman who was on guard.
"She--a ghost!" stammered Mrs. Morse. "I saw her!"
"Her? Who?"
"Margaret Langmore! Or else her ghost!" The woman had gone white, and
was shaking from head to feet.
"Where?"
"Here."
"When?"
"Just now!"
"It can't have been the girl. She is in bed, under the doctor's care."
"But I saw her!" insisted the woman.
"We'll take a look around," answered the guardian of the law.
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