But suddenly Nan, as well as some of the other girls, saw that the stern matron of Lakeview Hall had been crying. Her cheeks were tear-stained and she was still sobbing convulsively as she leaned, exhausted, with her back against the door.
Nan was instantly sympathetic, and cried aloud: "What is the matter, Mrs. Cupp? What has happened?"
"I--I'm so frightened," stammered the lady.
"Oh!" whispered Lillie, shrilly. "She's seen the ghost."
"My goodness!" moaned May, almost letting the red-haired girl fall to the floor.
But the latter, after all, was the one who rose to the occasion. Even Nan was too amazed to appreciate properly the fact that for once Mrs.
Cupp was in a melting mood.
"Give her a chair, Nan, do!" cried Laura, bestirring herself briskly.
"Something has surely upset her. The poor dear! Wish we had a cup of hot tea. But this chocolate is the next best thing to it."
She poured a brimming cup and brought it to Mrs. Cupp, who had been seated at the long table. Before taking the first swallow the lady waved her hand toward the door.
"Lock it!" she gasped.
"It is locked," Nan promptly assured her.
"You can bet it is!" exclaimed the crafty Laura. "We don't want anybody coming in here who will _tell_ on us," she added significantly.
Mrs. Cupp must have heard this, for she flushed as she drank the hot chocolate in great gulps. Or, perhaps, it was only the color coming back into her face, after her fright.
Nan asked, with real feeling: "What was it scared you so, Mrs. Cupp?"
"I--I don't know," stammered the matron.
"But it must have been something?"
"I'm not sure even of that," was Mrs. Cupp's rather disconcerting reply.
"It was the ghost, then!" shrilled Lillie.
"Oh!" gasped Grace, and the two timid ones clung together in alarm and despair.
"Oh, shucks!" exclaimed Amelia Boggs. "It won't break the door down to get in here, so don't be afraid."
"I never was so frightened in my life," declared Mrs. Cupp, drinking the last drop of the comforting liquid. "Never!"
"Do tell us all about it, Mrs. Cupp," urged the red-haired girl, hovering about the excited lady. "And have another cup of chocolate; do!"
"Thank you," replied Mrs. Cupp, with real gratitude.
"Come, girls," said the bustling Laura. "The chocolate's all hot. Don't let it spoil. And the sandwiches and salad must be eaten to be saved.
Pull up your chairs. Won't you try this lovely salad, Mrs. Cupp? And these chicken sandwiches are delicious."
Mrs. Cupp was fairly caught. She had partaken of the hospitality of the forbidden feast. Having accepted the chocolate she made but weak protest against the heartier viands. A delightfully arranged plateful appeared like magic before her and she found a fork in her hand.
Bess was almost bursting with suppressed laughter, and even Nan had difficulty in keeping a straight face. Laura Polk had certainly stepped into the breach. "She deserves a leather medal," whispered May Winslow.
"I'll give her one of my clocks," promised Amelia.
The girls gathered quietly about the long table and the food began to disappear. Perhaps they were not quite as hilarious as they expected to be at the feast; but Mrs. Cupp's presence did not make the viands any the less delicious to the palate. And all of the girls were anxious to hear the tale of the matron's fright.
"What could it have been you saw?" May asked.
"I--I don't know. Something black," was the sober reply.
"O-o-o!" from Grace and Lillie. "_All_ black?"
"Did it look like a black dog?" asked Nan, the practical.
"I declare! it might have been," Mrs. Cupp said, with some relief. "Of course," she added, with sudden suspicion, "you girls didn't have anybody on watch outside?"
"No. We were too scatterbrained for that," laughed Laura.
"And we did not think our light could be seen through any crack," added Nan.
"It couldn't," Mrs. Cupp said promptly.
"How--how did you know we were here, then?" blurted out Bess.
"Ahem! I knew. That is sufficient," said Mrs. Cupp, more in her usual tone.
Then it was true. Nan knew that somebody had played traitor. Mrs. Cupp had been told of the party in the haunted boathouse by some jealous girl, or she would never have come back to the Hall from the village by the shore road. It was a roundabout way, and lonely.
"The road was very dark," explained the still excited matron. "When I came to the big boulder just the other side of the boat landing, something sprang out of the bushes and chased me. It was black, and looked like a man or boy, only it was on four legs--or its hands and knees."
"Maybe it was a dog," said Bess, doubtfully.
"'The black dog Remorse,' no less!" whispered Laura to Nan. "It was the 'black dog' of Mrs. Cupp's conscience, I guess."
"Hush!" returned Nan. She was worried by the happening. The raid on their feast, the information evidently lodged about their frolic with Mrs. Cupp, and this "black thing" that had startled them all, seemed to be all parts of a plot.
"And it chased me!" Mrs. Cupp went on. "I declare, I never was so frightened in all my life! It chased me right to this door----"
"It really was lucky we were here, then, wasn't it?" put in Laura, to clinch the point.
Mrs. Cupp bit into a chicken sandwich, and frowned. "I don't know about that," she said slowly. "I never would have come back by the shore road if I hadn't heard of what you girls were doing here. I don't know but that I consider you are the cause of my being so frightened," she concluded grimly.
CHAPTER XXII
PUNISHMENT