“There must be a second key,” said Pete. “Someone uses it when you’re not here and–”
Fenton Prentice held up his hand. “No. Oh, someone comes when I’m gone, but that’s not the worst of it.” Again he looked around as if afraid that he was not alone with the boys. “Sometimes he comes when I’m here. I’ve . . . I’ve seen him. He comes and he goes, and no door needs to open.”
“What does he look like?” asked Jupiter.
Mr Prentice rubbed his hands together nervously. “That’s the sort of question a policeman would ask,” he said. “But he wouldn’t believe my answer. That’s why I called you instead of the police. What I see is . . . not quite a person. It’s more like a shadow. Sometimes I’m reading and I can feel it. I feel that there is a presence here. If I look up, I may see it. Once I saw someone in the hall–someone tall and thin. I started to speak. Perhaps I shouted. He didn’t turn, but went into the den. I went after him. The room was empty.”
“May I look at the den?” asked Jupiter.
“Certainly.” Prentice went to a small, square hall that opened off the living room. Jupe followed him through it into a large, dimly lit room which had shelves of books, deep leather chairs, and a big antique desk. The windows here were on the side of the building. Through the open curtains Jupe could see the church next door. The organ no longer boomed and children’s voices could be heard in the street; apparently choir practice was over.
“There is no way out of this room,” said Prentice, “except for the door to the hall. Don’t suggest a secret passage. I’ve lived in this apartment for many years, and I know there are no secret passages.”
“How long have you had this feeling that you are being invaded by some . . . some presence?” asked Jupiter.
“For several months,” Prentice answered. “I . . . I didn’t want to believe it at first. I thought I was imagining things because I was overtired. But it’s happened so often that now I’m sure I’m not imagining things.”
Jupe saw that the man wanted very badly to be believed. “I suppose anything is possible,” said the First Investigator.
“Then you will take my case?” said Prentice. “You will investigate?”
“I’ll have to discuss it with my friends,” said Jupe. “May we call you in the morning?”
Prentice nodded and left the room. Jupe hesitated, wondering. Suddenly something stirred in the shadowy corner near the bookshelves.
Jupe stared. “Pete!” he said.
“You call me?” answered Pete. His voice was loud and hearty and it came from the living room.
“Pete!” Jupe shouted, and lunged to turn on the overhead light.
A second later the room was brightly lighted and Pete was in the doorway. “What’s the matter?” he asked.
“You . . . you were in the living room when I called,” said Jupiter Jones.
“Yes. What is it? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“I thought I saw you,” said Jupiter Jones. “Over in the corner. I thought you were standing there.”
Jupe shook himself. “Must have been a shadow,” he said. He brushed past Pete and went into the living room. “We’ll be in touch with you tomorrow,” he promised Mr Prentice.
“Very well.” The man who believed he was being haunted unlocked the door and stood aside to let the boys out.
Then they heard a sound that might have been a backfire–or a shot.
Pete almost leaped through the door. He looked down over the balcony railing. The courtyard below was empty, but behind the house, someone was shouting. A gate slammed and footsteps pounded on some staircase that the boys couldn’t see. Then, from a passage which led into the rear of the court, a running figure came into view. A man wearing a dark windbreaker and with a black ski hood pulled over his head raced past the pool and out through the front gate to the street.
Pete dashed for the stairs. He was almost at the bottom when a policeman appeared at the back of the courtyard.
“Okay, buddy!” shouted the cop. “Hold it right there or I’ll let you have it!”
A second policeman came pelting into the court. Pete saw that both men had drawn their guns. He froze where he was on the stairway and raised his hands in the air!
2
The Search in the Night
“MIKE,” said the younger of the two policemen, “I don’t think he’s the guy.”
“Dark windbreaker, light-coloured trousers,” said the other policeman. “He could have tossed that ski mask somewhere.”
“The man with the ski mask ran through here and out the front gate,” said Pete quickly “I saw him.”
Jupe and Bob came down the stairs with Mr Prentice.
“This young man has been with me for the last half hour,” said Prentice to the policeman.
Sirens screamed as patrol cars converged on the area.
“C’mon,” said the younger officer. “We’re wasting time.”
The two policemen hurried out through the front gate, just as the door to Mrs Bortz’s apartment opened.
“Mr Prentice, what have these boys been up to?” demanded Mrs Bortz.
On the right side of the court, a door opened and a young man stumbled out. He was rubbing his eyes, as if just awakened. Jupe looked at him and started slightly.
“What is it?” whispered Bob.
“Nothing,” said Jupe. “I’ll tell you later.”
“Mr Prentice, you did not answer me!” snapped Mrs Bortz. “What have these boys been up to?”
“It’s no concern of yours,” said Prentice. “The police are searching for someone–some felon, no doubt–who ran in from the back alley and then went out through the front gate.”
“A burglar,” said the young man who had come from the apartment beyond the pool. He was wearing a dark sweater and light tan trousers, and his bare feet had been shoved into sneakers. Jupe, who prided himself on his ability to notice details, saw that the young man’s lank, dark hair hadn’t been washed recently. He was hardly taller than Pete and was extremely thin.
“Sonny Elmquist, you’re so clever!” said Mrs Bortz. “How do you know it’s a burglar they’re looking for?”
The young man named Sonny Elmquist swallowed nervously, and his Adam’s apple bobbed above the top of his sweater. “What else could it be?” he asked.
“Spread out!” shouted someone on the street outside. “Check the alleys–and check out that church!”
The Three Investigators and Fenton Prentice went out and stood on the front steps of the apartment house. There were four patrol cars on the street. Flashlights swept back and forth as policemen poked into shrubbery and peered down driveways in search of the fugitive in the black ski mask. A helicopter clattered overhead, its beam probing alleys. In other doorways up and down the street stood more groups of onlookers.
“He couldn’t have gone far!” shouted one searcher. “He’s got to be around here somewhere.”
A chunky man with thick grey hair stood at the kerb talking excitedly to a police lieutenant. As the boys watched, he turned, then hurried toward the apartment-house steps. “Fenton!” he called. “Fenton Prentice!”
Mr Prentice went down the steps, and the man took him by the arm and began to tell him something. Prentice listened intently. He seemed to have forgotten that the boys were there.
Pete nudged Jupe. “Let’s go see what they’re doing at the church,” he suggested.
At the church, the doors stood open. A number of people, including Mrs Bortz and Sonny Elmquist, had gathered on the pavement to stare into the interior of the building. A pair of patrolmen were searching inside, bending to peer under pews.
Jupe went quietly through the crowd and up two steps into the church. He saw candles glimmering in racks in front of the altar–red and blue and green vigil lights. He saw motionless figures–statues on pedestals and statues on the floor, in corners and against the walls. He also saw a police sergeant confronting a stout, red-faced man who had a sheaf of booklets in his hands.
“I tell you, nobody came in here,” said the stout man. “I was here the whole time. I’d have seen if anybody came in.”
“Sure, sure,” said the sergeant. “Now if you don’t mind, please leave. We have to search the building.”
The sergeant looked around at Jupe. “You, too, kid,” he said. “Out!”
Jupe retreated along with the irate man, who still clutched his booklets. Outside, a thin, rather young man dressed in black with a round white collar–obviously a priest–had joined the spectators. So had a short woman whose grey hair was twisted into a bun at the back of her neck.
“Father McGovern!” cried the man with the booklets. “You tell them. I was in the church the whole time. Whoever they’re looking for, he couldn’t have got in without my seeing him.”
“Ah, now, Earl!” said the priest. “They must look, you know.”