They found the others at the bell tower, basically just milling around.

"Based on my superb detective skills, I guess you found nothing," quipped Josie as they neared the group. One of the fellows who had been lounging on the sidewalk jumped up and shot her a sheepish grin.

"Obviously," Maurice remarked with a soft chuckle. Arden jumped as the four Darewell boys popped out from around the bell tower with a group of girls she had never seen before.

Mary Louise let out a squeal. "Alora! Laura! Jane! Edna! Lizzie! Lu!"

One of the girls turned to her with a bright smile and waved. "Mary Louise!" She rushed up to them and hugged each one. Josie and Eileen followed her and greeted them as well. The others were soon introduced. The first was Alora Jones, the daughter of the richest man in their hometown of Dorfield and was very suspicious of strangers, though it looked like the Darewell boys found it quite easy to endear themselves to her. One look at handsome Frank Roscoe, followed by a sweet and a compliment from Fen Masterson, the protective stance of Bart Keene, and a joke from Ned Wilding, and it was easy to see why. Next was Laura Hilton, her best friend and the queen of social butterflies. Her bubbly personality made her easy to talk to and as such was the center of the gossip. Then there was Jane Donovan, the daughter of the Mayor of Dorfield and Josie's best friend, and Arden could kind of tell why. Jane seemed to view everyone with a kind of detective's eye like Josie did. However, she wasn't interested in becoming a detective, but she wouldn't say no to Josie if she asked for her help. Next was Edna Barlow, a timid young lady who was as sweet as Fen's cakes with an interest in fashion. Then came Elizabeth Wright, or Lizzie, who quickly revealed she was a big fan of Jane Austen and wanted to become an author, especially with a name like hers. And lastly, there was Lucile Neal, Lu for short, who was nearly spoiled by her whole family as she was the youngest and only girl in her family, besides her mother.

Arden attempted to commit everyone to memory. It would take her a couple tries, but she figured since they would probably be hanging out throughout their years there, that she would get to know them all pretty well. Kitty and Louise then joined them, Kitty pocketing her phone. Arden figured she had to have been talking to Linda and yearned to ask where they were, but Josie beat her to it.

"Was that Linda?"

Kitty shook her head. "No, my brother, Ralph. They had decided to sleep in today. Linda and the others found the hangar and are flying. He says they'll see us all tonight."

Josie nodded. "Sounds fine by me. I'm kind of glad they didn't come. We have quite the crowd now."

"Yes, your friends, by the sounds of it," remarked Louise.

"Oh, let me introduce you!" Mary Louise exclaimed. She went about introducing them to the other girls as Josie asked the Darewell Chums what they were doing.

"Trying to figure out how anyone could ring that bell," Ned shot them a grin, "or how we would do it."

Bart was tapping his chin. "Hmm, maybe a pole of some kind? A fishing pole might just do it. A ladder would too, though, but that would be rather troublesome, especially if you're getting away from a group of students."

Maurice blinked. "And what degree are you going for?"

Bart grinned. "Business."

"Specifically business in sports, but, yeah," remarked Frank with a shrug.

"Are you all going into business?" Maurice asked.

Ned scoffed. "What? No! How could you think that with Fen's cooking skills? He's going to be top of the culinary class!"

Fen blushed. "Aw shucks, guys!"

"That's if we can get him to stop eating everything!" Bart quipped. The guys laughed.

Fen swung at him. "Oh, knock it off!"

Maurice chuckled. "Don't worry, Jim can help with that." He stuck a thumb at the langy fellow, now sound asleep. "He'll fight Fen so he can eat everything!" The fellows burst into laughter, which woke Jim.

Jim glanced around groggily. "Huh?" Realizing no one was talking to him, he promptly laid his head down and went right back to sleep.

Louise sighed and clicked her tongue. "Oh, you guys."

Josie let out a breath. "So, nothing?"

Ned shook his head. "Nothing. Whoever did it was smart enough not to leave any clues. I mean, it's not hard to do so. This is on concrete, so no shoe prints would have been left, unless he happened to step in some mud. Plus, whatever he uses to pull on the rope would stay with him, so, you know, not exactly many chances to leave clues behind," remarked Ned with a shrug.

Josie sighed. "Right."

"Did you find out anything?" asked Bart.

Arden glanced at the others. "Well …" Taking turns, they showed them the poems and relayed what Tom Scott and Jake Blakely said about the whole thing. They did reveal that Freddie Cotton was not supposed to be on campus grounds and they should keep an eye out for him, and ended their story with the incident at the pool.

Ahora let out a cry and wrapped Eileen in a hug. "Oh, you poor thing! Are you alright?"

Eileen laughed as she patted her arm. "Obviously I am! I had several lovely rescuers and Josie chased after the fellow!"

"But he got away," mumbled Josie.

"Dang, too bad, but I figure he got a good head start," remarked Bart.

Josie nodded and sighed. "Which was my fault. I paused to make sure the others were getting Eileen out alright."

Ned patted her shoulder. "Hey, no worries. So this time he got away. Next time, he won't be that lucky."

"You can bet on it," remarked Sim. Ethel shot her a quick glare, but said nothing. Arden's heart quickened since she noticed Josie eyeing the two of them again. Oh, if Ethel didn't stop being so obvious with her disapproval of Sim's decisions, Josie wouldn't attempt to figure out their secret. Arden began to wonder if she and Terry would have to run interference before Josie got too interested.

"That's the spirit! With our gang growing the way it is, there'll be no way he could get past all of us!" quipped Ned.

"Oh yes he could," remarked Maurice. Everyone looked at him in surprise. He pointed to the sleeping Jim. "All he has to do is look for Jim and he could get away quite easily enough!" The fellows roared with laughter, but Jim merely rolled over.

Josie puffed out a breath. "Well, since there is nothing more to do concerning the bell tower, let's explore the rest of the campus. Maybe we can find those green curtains, or where they might have been." The group agreed with this and, after waking up Jim, they went off to explore.

They explored, all right, but while they returned to their dorms with a better idea of the campus layout, they had not seen any green curtains.

"Maybe Tom and Jake are right, there just isn't any treasure," said Sim while the girls were preparing for that evening's party.

"There certainly weren't any green curtains," remarked Terry as she applied her makeup. "At least, none that I saw. Did either of you see anything?" Sim and Arden shook their heads.

"No, but there's got to be something! Just, what? What are we missing?"

"Maybe another poem?" Sim shrugged.

Arden pulled the book out of her bag and placed it on the desk, shaking her head. "There isn't another one."

"What if the senator wasn't the one who wrote it?" Terry asked.

Arden knit her brow together. "But if he was using another poem as another clue, what would it be? Where would we find it?"

Sim's mouth turned down as her forehead creased with thought. "What if the secret society has it?"

Arden swerved to face her, eyes widening. "Say what?"

"Well, think about it. If I left clues to a treasure, but didn't want just anyone finding it, I would make sure one or more clues were kept secret, preferably with someone who could keep it secret." Sim shrugged. "It's what a … I would do."

Arden noticed the slip-up, but said nothing about it. Though she longed to beg Sim to trust them right then and there, she knew better than to push her luck. Terry, however, didn't seem to notice. "And of course, we aren't in the secret society, so if they do have any more clues, we couldn't possibly get to them."

Arden sighed. "Well, maybe we should stop trying to find the treasure. After all, the main mystery is, who is ringing that bell? Finding the treasure could be the motive, but then, why would the bell need to be rung? Especially in a way that doesn't rouse the whole campus?"

"Well, if the sprites are in fact real, maybe they have it enchanted to where you wouldn't hear it until the campus really was in danger. But that's all just speculation," quipped Sim.

"Well here's something I've been speculating," said Terry as she gave Arden a smirk, "and that's if the handsome Tom Corbett will keep Arden all to himself tonight."

Arden's face grew hot. "T-Terry! We were just dancing!"

Sim snickered. "Yeah, sure, just dancing. The two of you were giving each other heart eyes all night!"

Arden's face grew even redder. "We were not!"

Terry laughed. "Don't bother denying it, dear, it was so obvious! That being said, it seems like we have our campus-crossed lovers already! I didn't think it would be that quick, or that it would be our very own Arden!"

"He's a nice fellow, but I don't know if he likes me like that! In fact, we might not even end up together and this could be merely a crush!"

"Aha, she admits it!" Terry cheered.

Sim waved her hand and scoffed. "Don't worry about that, I'm sure we'll know by the time we graduate."

"Speaking of time, we had better get going, or we'll be late!" Terry quickly put her makeup away and grabbed her purse. She gave Arden a sly wink on the way to the door. "Don't want to keep Tom waiting!"

"Theodosia Ann Landry, you are insufferable!" shouted Arden as she followed her friends out of the room.

Sim laughed as she put an arm around each of her friends. "Let's bury this hatchet and go have some fun. If I remember correctly, the last party is on Saturday, so there's only two parties left after this to see everyone!"

"Yes, and there might be new people to meet! Let's go!" Terry threw her fist into the air and led the three to Pixie's.

People were arriving at Pixie's when they arrived, a lot more people than the previous night. Word was spreading like wildfire now. Despite denying it only minutes previously, Arden did look around solely for Tom. She recognised a few faces from Sanford, but not Tom and his group. She let out a sigh when she had made sure they were not there yet. Flying must have done that to them, they got so caught up in the thrills of flying they forgot the time. Totally understandable, doing something fun or interesting often did that. Besides, people were still coming in, they were likely on their way. She did see the Darewell Chums enter, along with Mary Louise, Eileen, Josie, and all of their friends, only moments after they had arrived and got caught up in the party. She did have to raise an eyebrow. Alora Jones was present. But then Alora gave a furtive, suspicious glance around the room before retreating into a corner chair, and Arden figured she had let herself get talked into coming. Then the acting troupe came in, and the party really seemed to start. Arden noticed Peggy Lane was glancing around the room, then her eyes lit up and she let out a squeal.

"Andy!"

"Peggy!" A handsome man with blonde hair, blue eyes, and broad shoulders ran towards Peggy and lifted her up in a hug.

"You made it!"

"I told you I would!" he replied with a grin.

"Come on, let me introduce you to the gang, and then you must tell me all about it. Gang, this is my cousin, Andy Lane! He made it into Sanford!" She proceeded to introduce everyone. That's when Arden noticed the perturbed look on Pip Piper's face. He smiled cordially when Andy was introduced to him, but then went right back to scanning the crowd.

"Huh, so her cousin is here too," quipped Bart, nearly making Arden jump out of her skin. She glanced at him as he and the Chums got closer to her, each with a drink in hand.

"Did she finally make it in?" asked Fen.

"Yeah, and it turns out that Louise and Kitty have an open bed, so she claimed that."

"That's swell," said Arden. "But, why was she so late? I thought we all had to be here for orientation?"

Bart nodded. "We did, but she called ahead and let them know she was going to be late. She and her family had been on a cruise that ran into some mishaps and arrived home later than planned, so she kind of needed a bit more time to pack to come here."

"Bit late in the summer to be going on a cruise," quipped Maurice as he joined them, "especially cutting it close to college."

Bart shrugged. "A lot has happened this year for them. Frankly, I'm glad they did go, they needed it. I'm sure Kitty and Louise would be more than happy to bring her up to date on everything." He paused and glanced around. "Which, speaking of, where are they? I figured they would be late since Rita arrived this afternoon, but …"

Ned scoffed. "Oh, come on man, the party hasn't really started yet! They still have time!" Arden glanced at her phone. He was right, there were still ten minutes until it officially started. Arden glanced at the doors, they should be coming in any minute now. But for some reason, she was still anxious. Maybe it was the look on Pip's face, or the fact that she noticed Ralph Clavering pacing, or all of it, but something wasn't right. Then Ralph pulled out his phone, and his eyes widened in shock. At the same time, Arden heard a little ding. Maurice reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone, followed by Jim. Both started reading the message. Their eyes widened as well.

"What?" Maurice just about shouted. At that moment, Arden saw Louise and Kitty come in, followed by a girl she figured had to be Bart's cousin, Rita. They sat down at a table, almost in a daze. Ralph had reached their table and grabbed it to steady himself. Arden was off in a flash, something had happened. Maurice and Jim were right behind her.

"Oh, Louise, what happened? Where are Tom, Linda, and the others?"

"Linda … Tom … the others … they … someone attacked them while they were in the air!"

(Author's Note: Finally updated this after so long away from it! Yeah, about a year, but still, it's good to be back and finally past the writer's block! Hopefully this doesn't interfere with working on Fantasy Faire as now I need to focus on that till the end of June. I started this challenge called Jotting Through June from the Write For Life website and hoping that will help me stay on track. Considering I also have to write articles this week, it might not get me very far, but as far as I need to, just to get the ball started rolling. As you may have noticed, there are more characters added in, and a few more coming. That seemed to be part of the problem, I had to bring in more characters, at least to show that the world is populated. No need to remember all of them, like Arden, you will be reintroduced and get to know them as the series progresses. There will be a few more introduced, who are more important to this mystery than the rest, but you will be introduced to them in time. Hope you enjoyed this chapter! Have a great day, and God bless!)