|
|
Chapter 1
Click on any picture to enlarge it.
Velma was annoyed, bored and frustrated, although she could not immediately decide on the order of priority of these feelings. The reason for feeling thus was simple; she was securely tied to a chair, gagged and utterly helpless.
Velma was also very surprised to find herself bound and gagged and had no idea why it had happened. She had agreed to undertake some ancestral research into the Griffin family for a friend and that research had brought her to England, where the family had its origins. It turned out that the library of Shrewsbury College in Oxford had an archive of the Griffin family papers and she had decided to begin the English phase of her research there.
Investigating a family history was not something Velma would ordinarily undertake, but it was for a friend and, as the techniques of carrying out research are much the same irrespective of the topic, it was a task she was well equipped to undertake. Besides, it gave her an excuse to visit England with Daphne and Fred while Shaggy and Scooby were away helping with a summer camp.
Elizabeth Wyvern, the college librarian had been wonderfully helpful when Velma made her initial approach by phone and set aside one of the small individual study rooms in the Victorian library building for her exclusive use. Velma had been impressed to discover that all the documents had at some time been microfilmed and indexed and that the images had subsequently been scanned onto computer. She was able to work in comfort, sitting in a leather swivel chair with everything she wanted available on the computer terminal in front of her. Most of the text was easily readable, with only a few documents for which Velma would wish to see the originals, either because the scans were indistinct or too small or because she needed to see them in color. She had her laptop computer with her to make some notes as she went and a reporter’s notebook open to jot down odd references.
All had gone well for the first hour or so. Velma was already accumulating a wealth of interesting data to be followed up in the library and elsewhere when she was rudely interrupted by being hit hard on the back of the head. She did not lose consciousness but was too dazed and shocked to offer more than token resistance as her wrists were bound behind her back, her ankles and knees tied, her body lashed tightly to the chair and her humiliation completed with a thick cloth gag wedged between her teeth and knotted behind her head. She had a brief clear view of her assailant, but was not sure if she believed what she saw.
As her head cleared, Velma took stock of the situation. She struggled with the ropes securing her more as a matter of principle than with any real hope of escape. She had been tied up often enough in the past to know that her skills as a modern-day Houdini were negligible. Sure enough, she achieved nothing. The room she was in offered no help; convenient sharp edges that she might use to cut herself free were conspicuous by their absence. There was also no obvious way to attract attention. The door was a heavy Victorian affair, so any yells for help would be unlikely to be heard with her gag and an inch or so of oak to deaden the sound. The window was small and high and impossible to reach. There was a telephone line to the room. Velma could see the socket. Unfortunately, there was nothing plugged into it.
Velma knew that if she sat and waited long enough, she would be rescued by the librarian as she checked the building preparatory to the end of her shift, but that would not be until 8pm or later and it was now only about 11am. She resolved to find some way to escape or be rescued.
The way she had been tied, Velma was able to swivel the chair around with her feet, but it was far too heavy for her to be able to move it. She discovered that where she had dumped her purse on the floor, it was just within reach of her feet. It was also not zipped up, so she was able to spill the contents by kicking it over, in the hope that it might yield something useful. She was relieved to see that her passport and wallet were still there. It was not immediately obvious how much help the other items might be. Her hotel room keys and house keys had sharp edges, but even with free hands, it would be a thankless task sawing through rope with a key. The remainder of the contents were even less promising: a hairbrush, spare glasses, clean handkerchief, paperback novel, cellphone and a surprising number of pencils and ballpoint pens.
Velma turned the cellphone over with the toe of her shoe. There was a surprisingly good signal for the inside of a massively built Victorian college. Also, she noticed with growing hope, she had forgotten to lock the keypad before putting it in her purse. Help could be just a button press away.
Trying to contain her excitement, Velma scrubbed the heels of her shoes on the carpet until she was finally able to kick them off. Daphne’s cellphone number was programmed into speed-dial location 5 on her phone, so all that she had to do was to press and hold down the middle button until the call connected. She maneuvered the phone into a position where she could reach it comfortably and carefully placed her right big toe on the keypad. It was difficult to feel accurately through the thickness of her sock, but when she was sure she had the right button, she pressed it and held it until she could hear the tiny sound of the ringing tone.
After a few seconds’ wait, which seemed to stretch out for hours, Velma was relieved to hear Daphne’s voice. “Hi, Velma!” Velma yelled urgently through her gag, hoping she would be understood or at least heard. After a few seconds, she heard Daphne’s voice again, apparently speaking to someone else. “Nope, nobody there, I think she’s just forgotten to lock her phone and it’s gone off in her purse.” Velma was furious with herself. She had to find some way to communicate with Daphne.
Velma forced herself to calm down and think clearly. If she could only get and hold Daphne’s attention, she was sure they could work out some way to communicate effectively. After a few minutes’ thought she selected one of the scattered ballpoint pens and attempted to pick it up with her toes. It took several tries, but eventually Velma had the pen in a secure grasp between the toes of her right foot. All this work with her feet was beginning to take its toll in abraded skin at her knees and even through her socks, her ankles were suffering too.
Using her left toe this time, Velma again dialed Daphne’s number. Almost immediately, she heard her friend’s voice. “Hi Velma! Are you really there this time?”
Velma was ready this time. Using the pen, she tapped out SOS in Morse code against the case of her phone: Taptaptap tap-tap-tap taptaptap.
Daphne understood instantly. “SOS? Ohmigosh, are you in trouble, Velma?”
Tap.
“Can’t you speak?”
Tap.
“Hang on, Vel, one tap for ‘no’ and two for ‘yes’.”
Tap tap.
“You need help?”
Tap tap.
“You can’t talk and you didn’t send me a text. Are you tied up?”
Tap tap.
“Gagged?”
Tap tap.
“Anyone guarding you?”
Tap.
“Are you still in Oxford at that college library you were going to?”
Tap tap.
“Right. I don’t have a number to phone, but I’ll find you. I’m on my way; see you in an hour or so.”
Velma was mightily relieved. Daphne sometimes had some odd priorities in life, in Velma’s view, but she was a loyal and resourceful friend and an utterly reliable colleague. She settled herself down to wait.
Daphne’s idea of a visit to England was less scholarly than Velma’s. Anyone who had been at school and college with Daphne knew she was no slouch academically, but that didn’t mean she wanted to spend her free time in libraries. Her vacation was still giving her plenty of thinking to do. That morning she was in Harvey Nichols’ London store in Knightsbridge, weighing up the relative merits of a violet pantsuit and a deep purple skirt suit. Both were eminently suitable for a young journalist, with just the right combination of smartness and panache. Pants were practical but also very flattering to a long-legged woman, especially if worn with heels. On the other hand, there was a classic elegance to a skirt of almost any length that was hard to beat.
The sales assistant’s idea of advice was to parrot back to the customer her own opinions, which Daphne was finding deeply unhelpful and increasingly irritating. Just then, the cellphone in her purse rang. “My friend Velma,” she explained to the assistant as she pressed the green button on her phone. She had hoped Velma would be able to offer some advice, or at least suggest the basis for a decision, but the call was evidently the result of a button on Velma’s phone being pressed accidentally.
With increasing despair, Daphne decided to try on the pantsuit again. She examined herself critically in the mirror. Something about the cut of the legs, she wondered. Experimentally, she elevated herself onto tiptoe just a touch and smiled. It just needed fractionally higher heels to do the trick. On the other hand, the coat for the skirt suit was just so perfect. The phone ringing again distracted Daphne from the morass of indecision she was rapidly sliding into.
The mounting horror on the sales assistant’s face as she listened to Daphne’s half of the conversation was probably a sight to behold, but Daphne’s attention was focused entirely on her friend Velma bound and gagged in a library in Oxford.
“Decision made,” Daphne announced briskly as she hung up, “I’ll take them both.” She thrust a credit card into the assistant’s hand and ran back to the changing room to get her own clothes back on.
Commendably, seeing Daphne’s urgency, the sales assistant had pushed one of her colleagues away from the till, had rung up both of Daphne’s purchases and had the card slip and a pen ready for her by the time she emerged from the changing room. Daphne signed and took back the card while the assistant deftly folded the pantsuit and added it to the carrier bag already containing the skirt suit.
Shouting apologies as she went, Daphne elbowed other customers out of the way as took the steps of the escalator at a run and was on the sidewalk in Knightsbridge inside a minute. She looked left and right and almost immediately spotted a black taxi cab approaching from the right with the orange light indicating that it was unoccupied. Daphne strode imperiously out onto the road, raised her hand and yelled, “TAXI!” The cabbie ignored two other people making more tentative signals and stopped smartly in front of her. Being a tall redhead dressed in purple made a person rather conspicuous, Daphne reflected, but that was sometimes very useful.
Daphne instructed the driver to take her to Paddington train station as quickly as possible and closed her eyes briefly as he executed a hair-raising U-turn across three lanes of traffic. The cabbie sensed Daphne’s urgency and rose to the occasion, jockeying expertly for position through the alarmingly busy intersections at Hyde Park Corner and Marble Arch as he circumnavigated the eastern end of Hyde Park. A final few hundred yards through a bewildering maze of back streets brought them to Paddington station where the driver expertly slotted his cab into a space between other taxis depositing passengers. Daphne handed over a 20 pound note and leaped out with her bags, thanking the driver profusely as she did so. As she went, Daphne calculated that her tip had probably exceeded the actual fare, but somehow paying in pounds rather than dollars, it didn’t feel like real money.
Advice from a station official, who was surprised by her urgency, but nevertheless very helpful, led Daphne to a ticket machine. To her relief, the machine accepted her American credit card and issued her with a ticket to Oxford. Paddington station is not particularly large, but bustling and confusing to a newcomer. Daphne glanced around and spotted a woman in a railway uniform. “Oxford?” she demanded, wincing inwardly at the terrible impression of Americans she was leaving with everyone today.
“Platform 6,” the woman replied, apparently quite unperturbed and pointing the way. Daphne thanked her as she rushed past. Entering the train through the first open door, she collapsed onto a seat with her luggage beside her.
After a few minutes, the train’s doors closed and it pulled smoothly out of the station. With no more rushing to do until the train reached Oxford, Daphne had time to contact Fred and bring him up to date on events. She retrieved her cellphone from her purse and punched in the number.
Fred felt like an explorer in foreign territory. He was in Twickenham, where the English national rugby team plays their international games. Fred had read somewhere that American football had been developed from the English game of rugby. He had heard of rugby and had even seen it played once, but that had been by a women’s team at college. As he was in England, he had decided to find out more about the sport. It was summer, when English folks’ thoughts turn to cricket, so there was no opportunity to see a game played, but he had discovered that there was a museum dedicated to the history of rugby at the stadium in Twickenham.
The museum evidently attracted most visitors on match days and was almost deserted on a warm summer morning. Fred welcomed this as it allowed him to browse at his own pace without feeling that he was impeding anyone else. The museum was well laid-out and presented; Fred found it fascinating. He already knew that the game began with a set of rules codified at Rugby School in the 19th century but was amused to learn that on the one hand a boy named William Webb Ellis was still remembered and celebrated as being the first to pick the ball up and run with it, while on the other hand, all historical sources dismissed the story as a myth. He found the actual history equally confusing. Apparently there was not just one but two almost identical versions of the game arising from a schism in the spot’s governing body. The impressively moustached player shown on a poster dating from 1910, was in fact part of an exhibit outlining the origins of Rugby League, the breakaway variant.
At last Fred found the information he was looking for. University rugby games between McGill and Harvard in the 1870s were noted as being the origin of American football. Delight turned to frustration as Fred realised that there was no information beyond that. He decided to ask the museum curator if there was more to be learned on thsi topic. However, just as he was about to look for assistance, his cellphone rang.
“Hi Daphne!” he announced cheerfully. “I’ve found this really cool museum all about rugby. You know, the game they play here with a football-shaped football?”
“Not now, Fred,” Daphne replied sharply, interrupting him. “This is important.”
Daphne rapidly brought Fred up to date on Velma’s call for help and told him that she was mounting a rescue mission.
“It’s not like Velma to get in trouble like this,” Fred commented, now worried for his friend’s safety. “I’ll be there as soon as I can, Daph. Call again if there’s more news.”
Fred went in search of the museum curator as he had been about to do before the phone call, but now the only question in his mind was how to get to Paddington train station as quickly as possible.
With nothing to do but sit and wait in increasing discomfort, Velma’s annoyance and boredom had soared to levels she would not have believed possible. As far as she could estimate, about an hour had passed since she had spoken to Daphne, but with her hands tied behind her back, she could not see her watch. Both the computer terminal and her laptop had long ago switched to their screensavers, so she could not read the on-screen clocks either.
Occasionally, Velma had heard voices as people passed in the corridor outside her study room. She tried to attract attention by yelling the first few times but had now given up as quite clearly no one could hear her.
At last Velma heard the unmistakable sound of the door being unlocked. Miss Wyvern, the college librarian entered, a tall woman in her late thirties or perhaps a little older, soberly dressed in a black calf-length skirt with a high-necked crisp white silk blouse largely hidden by a black cardigan sweater buttoned to her neck. Her sensibly robust black shoes and opaque black stockings emphasized her no-nonsense demeanor. The trademark white cotton gloves identified her as a curator of old books and manuscripts. She froze in open-mouthed shock at the sight of Velma tied to the chair. Daphne gently pushed the librarian to one side and set about the task of freeing her friend.
“Thanks,” Velma croaked hoarsely as soon as her mouth was free. “A lot of use I am getting jumped and tied up when I’m not even investigating a mystery!”
“Getting tied up just happens,” Daphne reassured her. “It’s what you do about it that counts and you were brilliant to phone me like that.”
After the briefest of pauses to stretch cramped limbs, Velma turned her attention to her laptop. She busied herself for a few moments then turned to Daphne with a look of exasperation. “My notes have all gone,” she remarked flatly.
“Your computer’s been wiped?” Daphne asked, aghast.
“No, just the file I had been making my notes in as I was working this morning,” Velma assured her. “I had some jottings in a notebook too and those are gone as well,” she added.
“But you use weird software,” Daphne objected. “How would anyone know how to do anything to your computer?”
“It’s not that weird, it’s just open source,” Velma retorted. “Lots of academics use Linux and Oxford is full of academics.”
“Who did this anyway?” Daphne asked.
“Well, somebody hit me hard on the head,” Velma explained, tentatively fingering the back of her skull and wincing as she found a tender lump. “I wasn’t knocked out, but I think I must have been real confused after that.”
“Well, tell us what you remember, anyway,” Daphne suggested. “It might still give us some clues.”
“OK, I was very dizzy just after I was hit and really don’t remember much about being tied up. I felt as weak as a kitten and couldn’t do a thing to resist. It was only afterwards that I got a good view of my attacker.” Velma paused, apparently uncertain as to whether to continue.
“And?” Daphne prompted.
“And,” Velma continued, “I don’t quite believe this myself. I saw a tall woman in green doing something to my computer. And, get this, she was wearing a long Victorian dress. I didn’t get a clear look at her face but I think she might have been wearing a veil.”
The college librarian gasped. Daphne and Velma had been so intent on their own conversation they had almost forgotten she was there. They turned to her in mild surprise.
“It’s the Lady in Green. She’s the librarian’s ghost,” Miss Wyvern said, with a slight tremor in her voice. “Not me obviously, but the first college librarian when Shrewsbury College was founded at the end of the 19th century. She died quite young with the task of setting the library up not quite finished. Not to her satisfaction anyway.”
“Wouldn’t a woman librarian have been unusual in Victorian times?” Velma queried.
“Ordinarily, yes,” the librarian confirmed, “but Shrewsbury was founded as a women’s college and only started accepting men in the 1970s.”
“Any mystery about her death?” Daphne asked.
“No, I believe it was tuberculosis, although they probably called it phthisis or consumption then,” the librarian assured her. “Anyway, because she left her work unfinished, some people believe that she is still keeping an eye on the place to make sure it’s all running smoothly. A sort of guardian spirit.”
“Any sightings?” Velma asked tentatively.
“Lots,” Miss Wyvern confirmed, now warming to her subject. “Mainly she is seen late at night, often by students working hard on essays or assignments. Seeing the Lady in Green is generally thought to be a mark of her approval and something of a good luck indicator.”
“Hmm, I would think that a stressed-out student, relying on caffeine rather than sleep to keep going, might very well be prone to see apparitions in the night,” Velma remarked with a note of cynicism.
“True,” the librarian conceded with a smile, “but we still like to think she’s looking after us.”
“This ghost is supposed to be a benevolent spirit?” Daphne queried.
“Oh, yes, she’s definitely on our side.”
“So she’s never been known to hit someone over the head and tie them up?” Daphne persisted.
“No,” Miss Wyvern declared emphatically. “I don’t think anyone has even suggested that she might be solid.”
“Whoever jumped me was definitely solid,” Velma observed ruefully.
“I can show you her picture, if you like,” the librarian offered. She logged Velma out of the terminal she had been using and entered her own ID and password. A few mouse clicks later, there was an image of a Victorian lady on the screen, clearly reproduced from a painting. It was hard to judge her age. The formal dress and hairstyle and her reading glasses suggested a woman of middle years, but the face appeared younger. Appropriately, her right hand rested on a stack of books placed, rather improbably, on a short Ionic column. She stared enigmatically off to one side of the canvas with the suggestion of a smile on her lips, as if something amusing had caught her attention.
“That’s her!” Velma exclaimed. “Or at least it’s the same green dress or one very like it.”
“The original of the painting is in the entrance hall,” the librarian added. “You will get a better view of it there.”
The conversation fell silent for a moment as Velma and Daphne wondered what to do next.
“Would you like me to phone the police?” the librarian inquired.
“Not just yet,” Velma replied, glancing at Daphne to check that she was of the same opinion. “I think we’ll take a look here ourselves and see if there is anything here worth their following up.”
“Very well, I’ll be in my office downstairs.”
“We’ll call in before we leave,” Daphne assured her.
As the librarian left the room, Daphne remarked to Velma, “I know it’s tough you getting tied up, but I’m kinda glad we have a mystery to solve.”
“Me too,” Velma replied with a grin.
Daphne opened her capacious purse and took out a tube of silver powder, a magnifying glass and a small but very bright penlight. “Let’s see if this ghost leaves fingerprints,” she suggested, offering the equipment to Velma.
Velma started with the keyboard of her laptop. “Nothing doing,” she concluded. “It’s not even worth dusting: see for yourself.” She handed the magnifying glass to Daphne.
Daphne looked carefully. Most of the keys were smeared with the marks of her Velma’s fingers, but the Delete key and the arrow keys were completely clean. “Very precise just to wipe the keys that she touched and none of the others,” she remarked.
“If the keyboard is clean, then I don’t think we will find any prints anywhere else,” Velma concluded as she handed back the magnifying glass. “My notebook has a couple of pages missing, but that’s about it for clues.”
“Well, we have a lot of rope here,” Daphne replied. “That might tell us something.”
Velma knelt down to examine the tangle of rope on the floor. “It’s something synthetic, probably polypropylene, it’s about 3/8 inch diameter, maybe a little less, and it’s blue. I’m not sure what else you can say about it, but I’ll take a sample in case we think of something.”
“Blue polypropylene rope seems like a very strange choice of tying-up material for a ghost,” Daphne mused.
“You mean she ought to use ectoplasm or something like that?” Velma teased.
“No, but if you’re going to take the trouble to dress up as a ghost, why not use old-fashioned hemp rope to keep in period? Or jute? Or cotton sash cord?” Daphne explained.
“I see what you mean,” Velma conceded. “Maybe it was just handy? The gag looks like a cleaning cloth, so that was probably just chosen for convenience.”
“Maybe, but that would suggest something done in a hurry without much forethought,” Daphne pointed out, “while a costume suggests she has done lots of planning.”
“Assuming, of course, ‘she’ really is a ‘she’,” Velma pointed out.
The two friends gathered up Velma’s laptop and purse then headed down to the librarian’s office where Velma thanked her and assured her that she would be back to finish her research.
| End of Chapter 1 | ||
| Contents | On to Chapter 2 |
Text © Copyright Gillian B 2005
Pictures © Copyright Gillian B, Jaguaro, Amanda Dressel 2005
