She stood there shivering. It came again—that sound—more eerie1, more terrifying than before.
The echo had barely died away when there was a terrific shriek2 within the house, and Phrosy, scantily3 clothed and wild-eyed, rushed from her room.
“Dat’s de ghost! Dat’s de ghost!” she chattered4, terrified. “I done tell you he was ’roun’ dis place! Ah’m gwine leave here in de mo’nin’!”
“Hush, Phrosy, please,” ordered Miss Alling. She, as well as Amy and Nell, had been awakened5 by the hubub, but she alone had had the presence of mind to light a lamp.
Now, with this illumination to sustain them, they gathered in Jessie’s room, Miss Alling doing her utmost to reassure6 and pacify7 the terrified Phrosy.
“Ah’m gwine git mah things on dis minute an’ go straight away f’om here,” protested the latter through chattering8 teeth. “Ain’t nobody gwine hold me here no longer.”
“Don’t be absurd, Phrosy,” said Aunt Emma, in a voice that showed her patience was deserting her. “You know very well you can’t leave here now. There are no boats running till morning, and I am certainly not going to get out the car and try the mountain road after dark. Do you intend to walk?”
“No’m, reckon Ah don’t,” returned Phrosy, somewhat impressed by this argument but still in the grip of panic. “Reckon dere ain’t no gittin’ away till to-morrow, but I sho intentions to take dat mo’nin’ boat. Ah wouldn’t stay in dis place any mo’e nights, no’m, not fo’ a million dollars, Ah wouldn’t.”
“Nobody is likely to offer you that much, anyway, Phrosy,” retorted Miss Alling, adding, as she turned to Jessie: “Do you know what all this is about? I haven’t heard anything.”
“Neither have I,” said Amy, standing9 beside the shivering Nell. “I am afraid Nell and I missed the show.”
Jessie hesitated. It was evident that she was the only one besides the colored woman who had heard that agonized10 moan from the direction of the swamp. Subconsciously11 she had been expecting to hear it repeated, but no sound had greeted her strained attention. If she should tell them that Phrosy was not the only one to be frightened by that strange and eerie cry, would they not perhaps laugh at her, as they were now laughing at Phrosy?
Her hesitation12 was short-lived, however, for, besides the advisability of telling the truth at all times, she felt that she owed it to the groaning13 Phrosy to admit that there was something queer going on down by the swamp.
“I heard a noise,” she said.
The girls and Miss Alling stared at her in surprise, while even Phrosy stopped groaning long enough to bestow14 upon her a look of awe15.
“Why, Jessie, you didn’t really!” cried Amy, delightedly. “What kind of noise?”
“It was a horrid16 sound,” said Jessie, slowly. “Like a wailing17 moan——”
Phrosy let forth18 another hair-raising shriek and began to rock herself to and fro, hands lifted beseechingly19 to heaven.
“Dat’s de ghost what Ah heard! Dat’s de ghost what Ah heard?” she chanted over and over, until Miss Alling was forced to silence her and her voice dropped to a wailing monotone.
The girls were wildly excited and even Miss Alling looked worried.
“I don’t know what to say,” she confessed at last, regarding Jessie seriously. “I had supposed that Phrosy’s imagination was running away with her, but if you heard it too, Jessie——”
“It came twice,” said Jessie. “And it was after the second time that Phrosy yelled——”
“Oh! What’s that?”
It was Nell who spoke20, and the girls jumped nervously21.
“Praise de Lord! Praise de Lord!”
“Phrosy, be quiet—do!” from Miss Alling. “What was it you heard, Nell?”
“It was like a whistle—soft and repeated three times.”
“Oh, that was Darry’s call,” broke in Jessie, feeling wonderfully relieved.
“The boys have heard the commotion22 and have come to find out if we are still alive,” suggested Amy, as they started toward the door, dragging the still-trembling Phrosy with them.
Though she was sure that no one but the boys were behind that door, Jessie waited until she heard them speak before opening it.
As their voices reached her reassuringly23 she flung the door wide, beckoning24 them eagerly to come in.
The boys looked about them eagerly and with undisguised relief as they realized that the girls and Miss Alling—and even black Phrosy—were alive and well.
“You girls shouldn’t scare us like that,” complained Burd. “From the noise, we thought a lion had been let loose among you, at least.”
“It was Phrosy who did the screaming,” said Jessie. “She thought she heard a ghost.”
“Ah done heard dat ghost an’ Ah done see him wiv mah own eyes,” asserted Phrosy stubbornly. “Ah done see dat ghost walkin’ down near de swamp plain as Ah sees you all here in dis room.”
The boys started to scoff25 at this, but when they heard that Jessie had heard the moaning cry down near the swamp, their incredulity changed to wonder and, finally, to alarm.
“May be some poor fellow down there in need of help,” said Darry, and immediately proposed that the three boys should investigate the cry.
The girls were opposed to the idea, and did not want the boys to go. But the boys insisted and finally had their own way.
After two hours of fruitless search during which the girls sat together, talking in low tones, Darry and his companions returned, declaring that they had heard and seen nothing to excite the least suspicion.
“If you ask for my private opinion,” said Miss Alling, “it is that we had all better go back to bed for the present and talk this thing over in the morning. Shoo yourselves back to the cabin, boys, and if you hear any more noises, don’t pay any attention to them.”
After some good-natured grumbling26 the boys did as she suggested. But when, a few minutes later, the girls tried to coax27 Phrosy back to bed, they found her adamant28 in her intention to sit up for the rest of the night.
“Ah’s goin’ to keep dis lamp burnin’ an’ sit just where Ah is,” she declared. “An’ in de mo’nin’ Ah’m gwine away f’om here an’ nothin’ an’ nobody ain’t nebber gwine git me back, no suh, not so long as Ah lives!”
So they left her there, perforce, and in the morning found her sitting in the same place, the lamp burned out and her black head bobbing upon her breast.
But everything looks more cheerful in the daylight and this seemed true even of Phrosy’s ghosts. Between them, and using the argument that whoever or whatever was down by the swamp had not yet attempted to harm them, they finally persuaded Phrosy not to desert them just then. However, her decision to stay was provisional upon the behavior of the ghosts. The next time the “ha’nts” spoke, Phrosy left. That was certain.
The first day passed so swiftly in and about the lodge29 that night found the Radio Girls unprepared—and their radio set not yet erected30.
So it happened that the following morning Jessie got them all up early and set them all to unpacking31 the various parts of the set while she herself got ready for the hardest part of the work, the erecting32 of the aerial.
The boys came around, humbly33 begging to be allowed to work, but, except in the assembling of the parts, Jessie gently but firmly denied their petition.
“We want to show Miss Alling that we are as good sports as she is and really are of some use in the out-of-doors,” she said, smiling at the chaperone, who was interestedly inspecting the various parts of the set. “She wouldn’t believe that we erected the set at home practically by ourselves.”
“I will believe it now when I see it done,” said Miss Alling, crisply, but pleasantly.
“We are the greatest little demonstrators you ever saw,” murmured Amy, handling the detector34 with fond care. “Watch us and learn.”
“They are altogether too sure of themselves, these girls,” said Fol, in an injured tone. “I guess there is no room for us around here, fellows.”
“We’ll come in handy when they start to string up the aerial,” remarked Darry, in a stage whisper. “I reckon they haven’t the least idea how they are going to do it.”
“Trees!” said Jessie, laconically35.
“Humph! Do you suppose you are going to be able to climb into a tree far enough to fasten your aerial wire?”
Jessie squinted36 calmly up into the giant oak whose foliage-weighted branches spread themselves above the lodge.
“As Amy so aptly remarked a few moments ago, watch and learn!” she said, and Darry walked off in high dudgeon.
Burd and Fol, feeling sure that the girls’ resolution would weaken as they watched Barry’s departure, lingered expectantly for a few moments. Then, as no requests for help were forthcoming, they followed Darry, declaring that they intended to linger no longer in a spot where their room was so evidently preferred to their company.
Left alone, the girls worked like beavers37, setting up, assembling, and getting ready for the hardest part of all, the erection of the aerial.
At last all the work was done that could be done upon the ground, and the girls turned to the tree from which they intended to string their aerial. It was a convenient distance from the house, and the wires, reaching from the top of the tall tree to the lodge, should be able to record messages from a considerable distance.
Miss Alling, standing at the foot of the tree, watched the ascent38 with an ever-increasing interest. She was an extremely athletic39 person herself, and yet she doubted if she would have had the nerve to climb to the top of that tree, even in the service of radio. Now and then she cheered them on with shouted words of encouragement. By the time they were two-thirds of the way toward their goal she was fairly prancing40 with excitement.
The girls, intent on their work, heard her only vaguely41 and saw her not at all. As a matter of fact, they were not particularly anxious to look down. It was easier—and safer—to look up, for something told them they had gone a considerable distance from the ground.
Jessie, in the lead, her tool kit42 slung43 over one shoulder, climbed laboriously44 into a crotch of the tree, holding tightly to the coil of wire. With her free hand she beckoned45 to Amy, who, from various scrabbling sounds, she knew to be directly beneath her.
“Shouldn’t wonder if this would do all right,” she called. “Think we are high enough?”
“I think we are far too high,” Amy’s voice answered her. “Don’t move, Jess. I am coming up!”
The next moment a leg was flung over the branch and Amy took her place on the precarious46 perch47 beside Jessie. The two chums looked at each other and laughed.
“Nell is making heavy weather of it,” remarked Amy. She moved closer to Jessie, who was already busy with the wire. “I passed her on the way up, and she was wedged tight between two branches. She said there was one good thing about it, anyway. There was no possible danger of her falling. But I could tell by her face that she wasn’t exactly enjoying herself. Now what first, Jess?”
“Help me fasten this thing,” returned Jessie. “I have to hold on with one hand which leaves me only one to work with and I have need of at least six.”
“I suppose my one wouldn’t do you any good then,” said Amy, giggling48. “But such as it is it is at your service.”
At that moment Nell called to them, and they looked around to find her peering at them from below.
“Any room on that perch?” she asked. “Looks kind of precarious to me.”
“Climb up on the other side, can’t you?” suggested Jessie. “You will do more good there. And, Nell dear, please hurry. We need an extra hand badly.”
At last it was done. One end of the wire was fastened neatly49 and securely to the tree while the other dangled50 earthward, ready for attachment51 to the roof of the lodge.
They started downward cautiously, aware that the descent was more difficult and perilous52 than the upward climb. Slipping, scrambling53, clinging when the footing failed them, inch by inch, foot by foot, they made their way downward.
Suddenly something happened. Jessie cried out sharply. Her foot had slipped. Her hand, flung frantically54 out, grasped nothing. A sea of green leaves and waving branches flew up to meet her. She struck upon something heavily, clutched it, hung there gasping, eyes closed——
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收听单词发音
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1
eerie
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| adj.怪诞的；奇异的；可怕的；胆怯的 | |
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2
shriek
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| v./n.尖叫，叫喊 | |
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scantily
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| adv.缺乏地；不充足地；吝啬地；狭窄地 | |
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4
chattered
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| （人）喋喋不休( chatter的过去式 )； 唠叨； （牙齿）打战； （机器）震颤 | |
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5
awakened
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| v.（使）醒( awaken的过去式和过去分词 )；（使）觉醒；弄醒；（使）意识到 | |
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6
reassure
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| v.使放心，使消除疑虑 | |
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7
pacify
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| vt.使(某人)平静(或息怒)；抚慰 | |
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8
chattering
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| n. （机器振动发出的）咔嗒声，(鸟等)鸣，啁啾 adj. 喋喋不休的，啾啾声的 动词chatter的现在分词形式 | |
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9
standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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10
agonized
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| v.使（极度）痛苦，折磨( agonize的过去式和过去分词 )；苦斗；苦苦思索；感到极度痛苦 | |
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11
subconsciously
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| ad.下意识地，潜意识地 | |
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12
hesitation
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| n.犹豫，踌躇 | |
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13
groaning
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| adj. 呜咽的, 呻吟的 动词groan的现在分词形式 | |
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14
bestow
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| v.把…赠与，把…授予；花费 | |
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15
awe
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| n.敬畏，惊惧；vt.使敬畏，使惊惧 | |
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16
horrid
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| adj.可怕的；令人惊恐的；恐怖的；极讨厌的 | |
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17
wailing
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| v.哭叫，哀号( wail的现在分词 )；沱 | |
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18
forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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beseechingly
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| adv. 恳求地 | |
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20
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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21
nervously
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| adv.神情激动地，不安地 | |
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commotion
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| n.骚动，动乱 | |
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reassuringly
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| ad.安心，可靠 | |
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24
beckoning
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| adj.引诱人的，令人心动的v.（用头或手的动作）示意，召唤( beckon的现在分词 ) | |
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25
scoff
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| n.嘲笑，笑柄，愚弄；v.嘲笑，嘲弄，愚弄，狼吞虎咽 | |
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26
grumbling
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| adj. 喃喃鸣不平的, 出怨言的 | |
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coax
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| v.哄诱，劝诱，用诱哄得到，诱取 | |
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adamant
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| adj.坚硬的，固执的 | |
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29
lodge
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| v.临时住宿，寄宿，寄存，容纳；n.传达室，小旅馆 | |
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30
ERECTED
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| adj. 直立的，竖立的，笔直的 vt. 使 ... 直立，建立 | |
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31
unpacking
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| n.取出货物，拆包[箱]v.从（包裹等）中取出（所装的东西），打开行李取出( unpack的现在分词 )；拆包；解除…的负担；吐露（心事等） | |
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32
erecting
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| v.使直立，竖起( erect的现在分词 )；建立 | |
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33
humbly
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| adv. 恭顺地，谦卑地 | |
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34
detector
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| n.发觉者，探测器 | |
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laconically
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| adv.简短地，简洁地 | |
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36
squinted
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| 斜视( squint的过去式和过去分词 )； 眯着眼睛； 瞟； 从小孔或缝隙里看 | |
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37
beavers
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| 海狸( beaver的名词复数 )； 海狸皮毛； 棕灰色； 拼命工作的人 | |
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38
ascent
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| n.(声望或地位)提高；上升，升高；登高 | |
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39
athletic
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| adj.擅长运动的，强健的；活跃的，体格健壮的 | |
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40
prancing
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| v.（马）腾跃( prance的现在分词 ) | |
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41
vaguely
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| adv.含糊地，暖昧地 | |
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42
kit
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| n.用具包，成套工具；随身携带物 | |
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43
slung
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| 抛( sling的过去式和过去分词 )； 吊挂； 遣送； 押往 | |
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44
laboriously
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| adv.艰苦地；费力地；辛勤地；（文体等）佶屈聱牙地 | |
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45
beckoned
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| v.（用头或手的动作）示意，召唤( beckon的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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46
precarious
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| adj.不安定的，靠不住的；根据不足的 | |
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47
perch
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| n.栖木，高位，杆；v.栖息，就位，位于 | |
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48
giggling
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| v.咯咯地笑( giggle的现在分词 ) | |
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49
neatly
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| adv.整洁地，干净地，灵巧地，熟练地 | |
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50
dangled
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| 悬吊着( dangle的过去式和过去分词 )； 摆动不定； 用某事物诱惑…； 吊胃口 | |
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51
attachment
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| n.附属物，附件；依恋；依附 | |
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52
perilous
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| adj.危险的，冒险的 | |
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53
scrambling
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| v.快速爬行( scramble的现在分词 )；攀登；争夺；（军事飞机）紧急起飞 | |
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54
frantically
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| ad.发狂地, 发疯地 | |
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