The Project Gutenberg eBook of The mystery of the missing eyebrows
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Title: The mystery of the missing eyebrows
Author: Stephen Rudd
Release date: September 22, 2025 [eBook #76914]
Language: English
Original publication: Terre Haute, Indiana: R. H. Gore Publishing Co, 1921
Credits: Carla Foust, David Edwards and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (Images courtesy of the Digital Library@Villanova University.)
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MYSTERY OF THE MISSING EYEBROWS ***
[Illustration: Renfro’s hand trembled so that he could hardly pull the
knife from his trousers pocket. It was followed by a note book from
which he tore two sheets of paper. Quickly he opened one blade, the
thinnest of the three in his knife, warmed it with several breaths,
then slipped it under one of the frozen eyebrows on the window pane.]
THE MYSTERY
OF THE
MISSING EYEBROWS
By STEPHEN RUDD
The Newspaper Boys’ Series
Illustrated
_Published by the_
R. H. GORE PUBLISHING CO.
_Copyright, 1921_
R. H. GORE PUBLISHING COMPANY
_All rights reserved_
RENFRO HORN STORIES
TO FOLLOW SHORTLY
By
THE SAME AUTHOR
THE LUCK OF A RAINY NIGHT
THE RISE OF ROUTE 19
THE WHITE BAG’S SECRET
THE CLUE OF THE TWISTED PAPER
THE LONG LOW WHISTLE
THE MYSTERY OF THE BLUE MILK
THE LEAK AT COOGAN’S CHIMNEY
THE GROWL OF THE LOST DOG
THE COURAGE OF RENFRO HORN
THE FALL OF THE EAST SIDE BULLY
THE SCOOP OF THE CUB REPORTER
R. H. GORE PUBLISHING CO.,
TERRE HAUTE, IND.
A WORD TO ALL NEWSPAPER BOYS
This volume, the “MYSTERY OF THE MISSING EYEBROWS,” is the first of
twelve books written about newspaper boys by an old newspaper boy,
and the picture of Renfro Horn is the likeness of a flesh and blood
newspaper carrier, the real Renfro Horn, who inspired these twelve
books, that the newspaper boys of these United States might understand
the responsibility they bear to the world.
The newspaper that you take each night to your subscriber’s door plays
a great part in the life of each subscriber. Thru rain and snow and
cold you go, and if you are a good carrier, as all newspaper boys
should be, you will overcome all problems to have your paper there at
the exact time each day, as early as you can get there, regardless
of weather, unmindful of play, striving all the time to be first to
deliver papers in your territory.
And if you are to succeed later in life, you will constantly strive to
make route gains for your newspaper. A new subscriber each week, a gain
of only one new subscription each week, if you do it regularly, will
mean that you are a good carrier, as good as Renfro Horn and Renfro is
one of the best, for he carried papers on a route for the writer of
this book who is a circulation manager.
When your subscribers quit, make them give you a good reason. And
collect your bills. When folks do not pay, tell them about the six or
seven times you come to their door each week, and ask them if they can
do you just the one favor, and remind them you bring the biggest value
in the world for the money, the news of the whole world, plus your good
service.
Newspaper boys are becoming the great men of the world. We have one of
them as president of these United States. Others are in high places.
The newspaper training is valuable, as much so as school, but you must
look about you and make mental notes and you must be a go-getter like
Renfro Horn. And here he is. Read about this newest and greatest Boy
hero, who is just a carrier of newspapers like yourself. And when you
know him as well as we do, you will like him quite as well, and you
will want to follow his many adventures in the other books to come.
By The Author
[Illustration:
Stephen Rudd
]
The R. H. Gore Publishing Co.,
General Offices, Myers Building,
Terre Haute, Ind.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER PAGE
I. THE MYSTERIOUS HOUSE 7
II. RENFRO WANTS A NEWSPAPER ROUTE 18
III. A STRANGE MAN AT A WINDOW 27
IV. A NEW DOG AT THE OLD HOUSE 38
V. THE STRANGER COMES AGAIN 47
VI. HELEN WIER IS KIDNAPED 57
VII. RENFRO TAKES THE EYEBROWS 67
VIII. RENFRO GETS A SHOCK 76
IX. TRACKS AT THE CABIN 86
X. THE LIGHT ON THE INDIAN GRAVES 97
XI. RENFRO BECOMES A MENTOR 107
XII. THE SCRATCHES ON THE WINDOW 117
XIII. A TRIP TO THE CABIN 127
XIV. THE MAN IN THE HAUNTED HOUSE 137
XV. A DEAL IN TURKEYS 147
XVI. BOY SCOUTS TO THE RESCUE 156
XVII. RENFRO FINDS THE MYSTERY MAN 165
XVIII. THREE MEN IN THE PLOT 173
XIX. RENFRO IS KIDNAPED 182
XX. HIDDEN IN THE CAVE 191
XXI. HELEN WIER IS FOUND 199
XXII. THE LIGHTS ARE REVEALED 206
XXIII. HELEN TALKS TO RENFRO 215
XXIV. LANG TAMMY HELPS RENFRO ESCAPE 224
XXV. THE GLOBE GETS A SCOOP 233
THE MYSTERY OF THE MISSING EYEBROWS.
CHAPTER I.
THE MYSTERIOUS HOUSE.
Renfro Horn was quite sure that Captain Pete would never have spoken
had he not dropped the rabbit. But the sound of its frozen body
striking the hard crust on the top of the snow made the old man turn
around to discover the reason for the sound. And at the same time he
saw the rabbit he saw Renfro.
“Oh,” he snarled, “Spyin’ on me ag’in--sneakin’ on an old man’s own
grounds.”
The jerking of his shoulders broke the string which held the other
rabbits to his shoulder. A rattle like falling twigs. They were all
on the top of the snow. With a rush the old man was down on all fours
trying to roll them together.
Renfro stepped up to help him. And then he saw the three quails and
stopped. One minute he stared at them: the next he stooped and fumbled
with the tops of his shoes.
When he looked down at the ground again the quails were gone, and the
rabbits in a close heap. Renfro knew what was under the pile, but he
pretended not to have seen them. He remembered the notices the game
marshal had had posted about quail hunting the week before.
Imprisonment and fine for the first offense. Captain Pete had one of
these notices on his own big front gate.
“Pretty good luck?” Renfro twisted at the top button on his mackinaw.
“Fourteen rabbits I should guess.”
“Twenty-two,” Captain Pete was proud of his good fortune. “And all shot
in my own fields. You can go on, buddy. I’ll tote them down to my shack
myself.”
“Down to the shack?”
Renfro asked the question. Captain Pete answered it. “Yes, I’m a
stayin’ down there this winter. An old man like me can’t chop wood
enough to keep the big house warm. I didn’t even try to. Moved down to
the shack in September.”
With a last look at the pile of frozen rabbits Renfro walked slowly
away down toward the road which led back to town. The three quails and
the threatened fine were instantly forgotten. But a big question was in
his mind.
If Captain Pete had been living in the shack ever since September, then
who had been living in the big house? Four times recently, when he had
been out on late walks like this one, he had seen queer lights spring
from its windows.
They didn’t stay in one place but seemed to flash from one room to
another. The last time they had been in the right hand room in the
upper story and then suddenly had gone out and flashed in the lower
left hand corner. He had thought it queer then, but had regarded them
as certain proofs of Captain Pete’s queer mind.
Where the two paths, the short cut and the longer way round
intersected, Renfro paused uncertainly. The short one meant a saving of
at least a quarter of an hour and he would be on time for supper. The
longer one would make him late and bring upon his head the reproofs of
both his mother and father.
Yet he wouldn’t know about the lights if he chose the short cut. And
he had to know about them tonight. Better risk his family’s wrath than
miss a chance to solve this mystery.
And Renfro hurried down the long path which led past the big white
house.
Just after he was out on the road he met Clint Moore, the boy who sold
chestnuts on the Horns’ home street in the early fall. “Who’s living in
the old Hall house?” Renfro asked him.
Clint whistled, “Just old dippy Captain Pete Hall,” he laughed. “An
he’s worse off his nut than ever this winter. Don’t have no fire nor
nothin’. We’d think he was dead if we didn’t see his lights of nights
once in a while and see him agoin’ huntin’ past the house.”
Renfro stared at him. The dusk was beginning to get heavy, but he could
still see Clint’s eyes and he knew he was telling the truth. He started
to ask him another question when Clint said, “I’m going your way so
we might just as well walk along together if you don’t mind. There’s
a basket ball game in town tonight and I’m going to go and stay at my
aunt’s.”
He talked on about the ball game but Renfro wasn’t listening. He was
staring at the big Hall house which was less than a quarter of a mile
ahead of them. It set back off the road another quarter of a mile and
in front of it was a long row of pine trees.
They almost shut off all view of the old white shell whose original
owners had claimed that it was “a palace with fourteen rooms.” But in
the upper right hand corner of it a light was plainly visible to both
boys and--
“There’s the old fellow now.” Clint pointed at the small window, thru
the ragged blind of which were gleams of light. “Don’t see it often but
some times--”
And then the light suddenly went out.
Renfro was silent. Captain Pete with his twenty-two rabbits and three
quails was back in the woods. He was sure of that. But who could have
had that light? And did Captain Pete really live in the shack now or
had that been merely a story he had told to take Renfro’s attention
away from the quails?
Renfro was still wondering about that when they reached the end of
the car line and boarded the car which took them past his home. Clint
would have to transfer at Liberty Avenue.
They were the only passengers on the car until three paper carriers
with their big bulky paper bags got on a few blocks farther up the
line. When each had finished carrying his own route he had waited for
the others. Riding in together gave them a chance to talk over profits,
new subscribers and the adventures they encountered on their routes.
Renfro tried to listen to them and to Clint at the same time. His
questions about Captain Pete had reminded Clint of an old hired man
they had once had. He had known Captain Pete Hall before he got to be
so queer. There had been a brother who had been wild to get rich. He
and some confederates from another city had made counterfeit money in
the little shack on the Hall place.
“Captain Pete found their outfit but he didn’t know his brother was one
of the counterfeiters so he went to the sheriff about it and the whole
gang was arrested. His brother got the stiffest sentence of the whole
lot.
“He hated Captain Pete then,” Clint went on with his story. “He said
that when he got out he was goin’ to kill him. Worryin’ about that
upset Pete’s mind.”
When Renfro asked him about the time at which the brother was to be
free again Clint shook his head. The hired man had never told him
anything about the length of the sentence Pete’s brother had gotten.
He had told all of the story he knew. His mother had once said that
Captain Pete’s brother was dead. “Better off that way than the way Pete
is,” he laughed.
When he got off at the corner several other passengers entered the car.
Renfro studied them--the man with the beetling eyebrows and weak mouth,
the woman with the near seal coat and the genuine diamonds. There was
something queer about them. The papers recently told the story of a
jewelshop theft. Renfro began to wonder.
The carrier boys jostled against him as they went to leave the car. The
little one was bragging about a ride he had taken on the patrol wagon
the night before. There had been some trouble in the street on which
his route lay and the corner police had taken him along to help give
directions about the location of some houses.
And then Renfro’s own street was called. With an effort he left the
interesting couple, the lively wide awake carrier boys, and the two men
in uniform. His own avenue lay before him, placid and uninteresting.
The bright street lights made every corner on it as visible as if it
were in the day time.
He ran up the great stone steps to his own home. He opened the door,
entered the hall and knew he was late for supper. With a dash he was up
stairs and to the bath room to wash his face and hands.
And down stairs in the dining room his parents were discussing him. His
father, tall and thin and patrician looking, adjusted his horn rimmed
spectacles and said once more that he knew his son was queer. Otherwise
why would he walk alone as he did? If he didn’t go out to some queer
spot he walked around the home yard. Why, once he had counted one
hundred trips Renfro had made around the house, his head down and his
feet moving at a fairly rapid pace.
Other thirteen year old boys were playing ball or visiting in the drug
stores. It was uncanny--this way he had of walking alone.
Mrs. Horn, also tall and thin and socially graceful, rustled her stiff
silk dress and frowned. She too, thought Renfro was queer. But she was
sure it was all due to the detective stories he read continually. Mary
had told her that morning of seeing a light under his door at about
three o’clock one night, at half past one on another, and when she had
slipped down there had found that he was reading.
“They are about horrible crimes,” she shuddered. “It worries me so that
I cannot sleep. I am afraid he will cultivate criminal tendencies. What
he reads will influence him, I’m sure. Now I read of a boy--”
Mr. Horn shook his head. “Nonsense,” he said shortly. “There’s no
criminals in our families. Renfro is a little queer. None of us boys
was the least bit like him. But he’s clever with all his queer streaks.
Why in that continued story--that detective one he coaxed me to read,
he had the mystery all solved before the last chapter was published.”
Well, Mrs. Horn was determined of one thing. If Renfro had to read such
queer stories he should not do it in the middle of the night. “I’ll
change his room,” she said with emphasis. “There is that old music room
right across from--”
“From mine,” Renfro finished in the door way. “And I’d like to have it
for my own library,” he added and walked to the table.
His unsatisfactory explanation of his walk half angered his father.
But he did not know what to say about it. The report card Renfro had
brought home a few days before had been almost perfect. He couldn’t
command him to hurry from school to study. He was just ready to mention
some errand he had at his office when Mrs. Horn spoke.
“Renfro,” her voice was fretful and accusing. “I needed you this
afternoon to go out to Captain Pete Hall’s for me. It’s rabbit season
now and I wanted some for dinner tomorrow. I waited over an hour for
you and then I drove out there by myself.”
She shivered. “It’s an uncanny place--that big house is. The shrubbery
has grown everywhere and the weatherboards and shutters which have
dropped off the house lay just where they have fallen. It was like
working my way thru a maze to get to the door. And what made it worse
it was just getting dark and--”
“And Captain Pete wasn’t home,” Renfro finished for her remembering
again the three quails, the rabbits and the shack story the old man had
told back in the woods.
Mrs. Horn gave him a severe look. She allowed no one to interrupt her
without giving them a reproof.
“Yes, he was,” she snapped back, “but he didn’t have any rabbits for
sale. What was worse he said he wouldn’t have any at all. He mumbled
something about not going to hunt this season and shut the door in my
face.”
With a gasp Renfro half rose from his chair, stared at his mother,
heard his father’s gruff command to behave himself, and settled back
in his seat again, smoothing out his napkin with a great effort. But
his eyes remained round and his mouth opened and closed several times
before he spoke.
CHAPTER II.
RENFRO WANTS A NEWSPAPER ROUTE.
When Renfro did manage to speak he asked his mother another question.
“What time was that, mother?”
Mrs. Horn studied a minute. The question annoyed her but she was too
well bred not to answer it. “Oh, about five, I should imagine. I waited
until four thirty for you before I left the house, and I was back at
half past five. Why do you ask, Renfro?”
Instead of answering her, Renfro asked another question. “Are you sure
it was Captain Pete, mother? You know he is old now and changed and--”
he hesitated and finished lamely, “It might have been some one else.”
His mother’s high bred voice was impatient. She wanted to dismiss the
subject and discuss finances with her husband, showing him her need for
a larger allowance. “Of course, I am sure it was Captain Pete. Haven’t
I bought turkeys of him for five seasons? Of course, he looks old
now. He looked that way the first time I saw him. And, Renfro, please
be still and let your father and me talk about something much more
important.”
The steel like edge to her words clipped off any further questions
Renfro wanted to ask. But tho he couldn’t ask them out loud they surged
back and forth in his mind while he ate. Could he have been mistaken
about the time he saw Captain Pete in the woods? Had it taken him and
Clint a longer time to walk to the car line than it did him when he was
alone?
And if it did, then why was Captain Pete unwilling to sell any of the
twenty-two rabbits?
Now there had been the three quails. Renfro was sure that Captain Pete
saw him staring at them. Could he have recognized Mrs. Horn and been
afraid that Renfro might tell her about the quails? A denial of having
hunted might throw them off the track should they feel it their duty to
report to the game warden what Renfro had seen.
But Renfro smiled at his own last conclusion. Captain Pete Hall was too
wise a man to believe that. Also he was too greedy to miss the chance
of selling any of his game.
But Renfro’s thoughts were diverted from the old hunter and the
inhabitant of the big old house by his father who directed a question
to him. The discussion with his wife over finances reminded Mr. Horn
that his son too had an allowance. “Keeping your book so that it
balances this month?” he clipped out his words, “And did you save
anything last?”
“Yes sir,” Renfro smiled. “I saved half of my allowance last month. I
want to buy--”
“Some new detective stories.” Mr. Horn laughed and turned the
conversation back to his wife again.
Renfro felt as if he could not stand it a minute longer. With a low
apology he rose from the table and then they noticed him. “Renfro,” his
mother spoke sharply, “You are not to go out of the house tonight--not
even to walk around the yard.”
His father curtly repeated her command. And with sinking heart Renfro
left the room, wandered thru the library and dragged his feet up the
stair way to his own room. It was only half past seven o’clock. And he
did not want to read.
He walked to the window and opened it. The cold air sharpened his
brain. He looked over to the south. Yes, that was the right direction.
Just three miles from the court house tower was Captain Pete’s tumbling
ancestral mansion and the little shack in which Renfro and the old man,
before he had gotten so grouchy, had once roasted potatoes and meat.
“I’m sure it was Captain Pete and I’m sure it was about five o’clock
when I saw him. Now mother must have been mistaken--” he began to think
and then stopped.
Slowly he closed the window. “Mother,” he spoke out loud deliberately,
“saw some one else. Pete has rented that big house or been scared
out of it, or some one who knows how secluded a life Pete lives, has
discovered that he is down in the shack for the winter and is making
the big house his headquarters.”
His hands went deep into his pockets. His mind began to make definite
plans for ways and means to solve the mystery of the stranger whom he
was sure his mother had seen. He himself would watch the house and also
the shack. There was still the possibility that Captain Pete might
have hurried home and he, Renfro, might have mistaken the time a few
minutes.
In that case there was something mysterious about the shack and Captain
Pete did not want him to make any more trips or visits there, giving as
an excuse that it was his new home. “But I’m going out there tomorrow
afternoon,” he began, “and every other afternoon and evening I can,
only first I’ll have to find an excuse which will satisfy the folks.”
For half an hour he worked framing excuses for those trips. And then
Mary, the second maid, brought one directly to his room. Mary was a
woman with imagination and romance, she said, tho in her form she was
fat and homely and of Scotch descent. Cautiously she tapped at Renfro’s
door.
“Here’s the Evening Globe, Mr. Renfro,” she whispered, thrusting the
folded paper into his hand. “Right on the front page there’s more about
that big jewel robbery. Them hired detectives don’t seem to get nowhere
with their clues and I thought mebbe me, with my imagination, and you
so clever in workin’ out mysteries, we could beat them once. It would
show--”
But Renfro didn’t hear the rest of her hopes. The paper clasped in his
hand became the master key to the mysterious house. It had reminded him
of the carrier boys, who had ridden home on the car with him.
They knew their routes like he did his school books. He would buy a
route--this particular suburban route which lay closest to the old Hall
home. None of his trips past it would arouse suspicion then.
He clapped his hands. He would ask his father’s permission the first
thing in the morning. Experience had taught him that it was no time to
make requests directly after an argument between his father and mother.
But his father’s ill humor didn’t last long. By morning he would be his
dignified, businesslike and his exceedingly fair self again.
Renfro was right in that surmise. Smiling, almost affable, his father
offered his son half of the morning paper when he entered the dining
room for breakfast. But Renfro shook his head. “I want to talk about a
job, Dad,” he said. “I want your permission to buy a paper route, one
of the Evening Globe’s.”
His mother answered his request. Such an unheard of thing was out of
the question. None of the boys on their street, none of the sons of the
people in their set, ever thought of such undignified proceedings. And
she would not allow her son to do it either.
“Well,” his father’s eyes twinkled, “Don’t pay too much for it. Buy a
cheap one and see how well it wears.”
A direct look at his wife quieted her on the subject. After Renfro had
left the room he explained his stand. “The only way to stop that kid,”
he shook his head, “is to let him have enough of anything. I’ll see he
gets enough of that paper carrier business right in the start. I’ll
stop on my way down and see the circulation manager of The Globe. I’ll
tell him to give Renfro the toughest proposition of a route he has. A
week from now our worries will be over.”
In the circulation manager’s office an hour later he explained his
errand. “His mother doesn’t want him to carry a route,” said Mr. Horn.
He couldn’t tell his own stand to this shrewd business like young
fellow, “and I promised her I’d see he didn’t carry one long,” he
added. “Give the boy the first one you have which is a tough deal. And
rough it up on him all you can.”
“Mr. Horn,” George Bruce looked directly into the older man’s eyes,
“we have some routes which don’t need the least bit of roughing up
to make them tough propositions for men like me and even you. One is
vacant right now. The business manager wants me to drop that route, and
I’ve almost decided to do so since it has long been a dead loss on our
hands.”
He thumped his fist on the table. “I’m going to put your son out there,
and because I still believe that that route can be made into a paying
proposition I’m going to expect him to make good. I’m doing what you
ask me to do--am I not?”
“And,” he continued after Mr. Horn had given him a hesitant nod, “If he
fails you will have your wish; if he succeeds I’m going to have mine.”
He didn’t speak again until Mr. Horn was out of the room and then he
swung around in his swivel chair and faced his alert stenographer.
“Miss Newell,” he said, and there was a gleam of interest in his keen
blue eyes, “I’m anxious to see that boy. Mr. Horn’s a king of finance.
Mrs. Horn is a society queen. The young prince--well, let’s see how he
wears the family coronets.”
CHAPTER III.
A STRANGE MAN AT A WINDOW.
Late that afternoon, at four o’clock to be exact, Renfro Horn entered
the circulation manager’s office. Behind him lay a line of offices thru
which he had passed, and a line of men with whom he had argued and
urged his way to this seeming potentate of The Globe.
“Mr. Bruce doesn’t see applicants for routes” he had been told exactly
seven times.
But now he was in Mr. Bruce’s office and looking directly at that man,
who was dictating a letter to Miss Newell, his stenographer. Renfro
with his hat in his hand stared around the big room, as simply and well
furnished as his own father’s private office. He liked the pictures
on the walls--some of which were the originals from which the Globe’s
daily cartoons had been made and others, photographs of men famous in
the newspaper world, who had started their careers as route carriers.
Renfro was studying a photograph of a full faced man with a high
forehead when Mr. Bruce finished his letter and looked at him. And
he liked him immediately for the boyish way he had of smiling, the
cordial gleam in his eyes and the sincere tone of his voice while he
had dictated.
“I’m Renfro Horn,” he said, “and I want to buy a route if there is one
vacant.”
Mr. Bruce started. “Oh, yes,” he narrowed his eyes and Renfro realized
that he felt those same shrewd eyes grasping for his past, his present
and future ability all at once. “Any particular part of town, son?”
“Yes sir, out south whenever there’s a vacancy, Mr.--”
“Bruce” finished the other.
“I would like to have the Washington Avenue route--the one farthest
out,” Renfro finished.
“Who told you it was vacant?”
Renfro’s eyes flashed. “Is it right now?” he asked and added, “I was
afraid I would have to wait a while for it.”
“Some fellow has been stringing him on that route,” George Bruce
thought immediately. Out loud he began, “Now, son--”
Then he remembered the promise he had made Renfro’s father. This was
a worse route even than the one he had in mind when he had talked to
Mr. Horn that morning. It was a dead loss. Pride alone kept George
Bruce from stopping that route. The Globe’s rival paper claimed that
they made money on their paper in that part of town, and until he had
discredited that claim George Bruce was determined to keep that route
alive.
Yet only that morning Andy Andrews had announced that after today
he would make no more trips on that route. Here before him was his
salvation. Mr. Horn had wanted his boy to make a failure. All day
whenever George Bruce remembered the interview that morning he had
hoped the boy would succeed. Now after he had seen Renfro he wanted him
more than ever to succeed. “And he hasn’t a chance there,” he admitted
to himself.
“You won’t make much money out there at first, son,” he talked slowly.
“In fact the boy who has been out there has lost so much that he gave
up the route this morning.”
“I can build it up,” Renfro’s eyes held entreaty.
George Bruce nodded. “Slowly,” he returned.
“Do I get it?”
Robert Bruce looked up and down Renfro’s sturdy body, at his determined
dark blue eyes, at his boyish stern mouth. “Yes,” he answered, “and if
you make good out there you can have your choice of any route in town.”
He turned to Miss Newell. “Call Morrison, please.”
He was still studying Renfro when Morrison, the route manager, for the
south side of Lindendale entered the office. “This is Renfro Horn,
Morrison,” he told the younger man. “He is to have Old Grief route.
Andrews gave it up this morning.”
“Yes sir, he was telling me so,” Morrison looked keenly at Renfro.
“He’s waiting now to take some other boy out to teach him the route.
Shall I take him?” he nodded at Renfro.
“Renfro Horn” the circulation manager supplied the missing name. “Yes,
do, please.”
In the outer office Renfro asked permission to telephone his father. “I
don’t want them to worry if I’m late” he explained.
“Oh, you’ll be late all right.” Morrison laughed easily. “Andy’ll tell
you about that.”
When Renfro came back from the telephone Morrison had completed his
survey of him. “You’ve got good legs, Horn,” he admitted, “and can walk
that route. It’s all over everywhere. Now get good ears, listen to what
Andy tells you tonight and I tell you later. We’ve got lots of tough
customers out there, and I want you to watch them. See?”
“And say,” he went on before Renfro could answer, “I don’t like your
name. It sounds too much like a map name. Get something human to use
for a carrier name. Ever have a nickname?”
Another question without an answer--all due to the speed with which he
talked. “I’ll give you a good one--Hooch, if you please--Hooch Horn.
Sounds good--doesn’t it? It has a business like twang to it. So I’ll
just let it go.”
He hurried “Hooch” out to the hall in which Andy was waiting. He
introduced the two boys, gave them car fare to the station at which
their papers were delivered and hurried them away. “I’m giving you
the east route you asked for, Andy,” he said, “but it will cost you
something rather high. Old Grief is the only route the Globe has to
give away.”
Andy chatted all the way out to the station. A steady stream of
questions followed his description of what he termed “the poorest
paying and hardest route in the city.”
Who had wished Old Grief on Renfro? How had Morrison gotten hold of
him? Would he ask for another route as he went broke on Old Grief? And
finally how much experience had he had with route work?
Renfro, recently christened “Hooch,” evaded all direct answers. It was
almost dusk when they reached the station. He helped Andy tear open
the two packages of papers waiting for them there, stuff them into the
paper bag and carry them down the street.
“We’ll throw them tonight,” Andy was a virtual dictator this last trip
of his. “But when it’s windy or rainy you want to be sure to get them
on the porch. Nobody wants to come out here to run down complaints.”
“There’s the worst dead beat in town, Hooch,” he pointed toward a shot
gun house far back in a narrow yard. “He’ll try to get you--does every
new boy. Turn him down. He owes me $1.65.”
They turned the corner and Andy pointed down the street, “Out there--”
his finger went out directly in a line with his face--“there in that
big old house lives the queerest man in the country. No, not in the
house” he corrected himself, “it’s too rummy a shell for anybody to
live in. But in a cabin out there. I went out last night and bought
six rabbits and every one of ’em was shot clean thru the head--the
prettiest shots I ever saw. Go out some time.”
“Was he in the shack you say?”
“Yep,” Andy rolled the paper for the next customer, “I went to the door
but I didn’t get in. It looked interesting but he shut the door while
he hunted out my rabbits. Queer old bird!”
Renfro wished that their route took them out to the white house so
that he could see whether or not there was a light there tonight. In
the library at noon he had walked past the case of old coins and was
reminded of the counterfeiting story Clint had told him.
If Captain Pete’s brother had returned he might be making that sort
of coin again. But his thoughts were cut short by an exclamation from
Andy. A heavy set old man leading a dog by a heavy strap, had jostled
into them. The dog barked sharply and tugged at the strap, but the
man quieted him without a jerk or command--just a simple Scotch name
muttered in a tone rich with a Scotch accent “Lang Tammy.”
And the dog had followed him obediently.
“That old Bird’s a new inhabitant out here,” Andy stared after the
pair. “Suppose he’ll be wanting to start the paper, Hooch. Look out for
him, and get his money first. Remember what they say about the perils
of parting a Scotchman and his money.”
Renfro tried to watch the old man with occasional glances over his
shoulder but Andy raced him along. The old man had not turned off the
long street when he disappeared in the dusk.
“I don’t believe I’ll remember all these places,” Renfro ventured to
remark.
“Then forget the ones who owe accounts.” Andy laughed facetiously and
hurried still more. “This is a case where I’m not prolonging any fond
farewells,” he ended slyly. “Will you, Hooch, when you leave?”
“Oh, I’ll stay,” retorted Renfro and again Andy laughed.
Renfro thought of that laugh the next afternoon as he passed along the
route. And it was a long, slow trip. He had remembered very few houses
at which Andy had left the Evening Globe. After trying to make out
landmarks which he remembered from the night before and failing to do
so Renfro had adopted his own way of locating customers.
When in doubt he merely went to the front door and asked their names
and what paper they took.
The street lights were on when he reached Wayne Street--the street Andy
had termed the aristocratic portion of his route. “Everybody takes the
paper here and everybody pays for it,” he had given the information
proudly, “Even to Judge Wier, the old duffer.”
“Paying promptly is his policy,” Andy tried to be witty. “The fellows
he sentences in court can tell you that, and he gives generous tips
besides payment in full.”
At the corner Renfro slipped off his gloves and blew on his fingers
to warm them. The wind was losing its volume, but the temperature was
dropping. The ice in the gutter had a hard, unmelting look. Little
flurries of snow played around the light globe like myriads of tiny
bugs in summer.
“I’ll fold my papers at the drug store tomorrow evening,” Renfro
growled. Andy might have told him that. He might have been a little
more definite, too, in showing him the route.
A big, wooly dog brushed past him and ran down the street. “Lang Tammy”
Renfro remembered the name the Scotchman had used the afternoon before,
“I wonder if that could be he. He was just about that size. He--”
And then he stopped abruptly in the middle of the block. Directly
across the street from him was Judge Wier’s old fashioned brick house.
The front room was dark, but the room back of it was lighted and the
window blind raised more than half way.
The light coming from it struck the shrubbery and showed a dark figure
lurking there. The house next door was dark. Walking slowly on so
as not to arouse the lurking figure’s suspicion, Renfro watched him
stealthily.
Suddenly the light in the room was dimmed, and the front room became
brilliantly lighted. At the same minute the lurking figure slouched out
of the shrubbery, close to the window with the raised blind and stood
there quietly staring into the room for a few minutes. And then he
slouched back into the shrubbery again.
CHAPTER IV.
A NEW DOG AT THE OLD HOUSE.
For a few minutes Renfro Horn stood irresolute. Then he darted back
down the street a short distance, crossed it, slipped along the
sidewalk until forty feet from the shrubbery, dropped onto his hands
and knees and crawled to the spot where the peeper had disappeared. The
mysterious man had vanished.
A hurried but close search failed to reveal where he had gone. Renfro
did not knock at the door. He had no proof to offer that the man had
been at the window. Telling such a story as that to Judge Wier, reputed
to be the town’s most courageous citizen, would win him a laugh.
As soon as he had finished the street and incidentally his route,
Renfro walked back to Washington Avenue and down it toward the
Hall house. It was dark but his parents would not be worried if he
were quite late in getting home. They had predicted all sorts of
difficulties for this evening.
After a little while Renfro slowed down his pace. The big white house,
the cabin a little farther on, Captain Pete and the stranger were only
a short distance away and he had as yet made no reason for coming to
their premises at night. A request for rabbits? He shook his head.
“I won’t go in. I’ll just peek,” Renfro vowed to himself. “At least
that will give me a beginning for a cue.”
Directly opposite the three big apple trees which remained of the Hall
orchard, a big airedale came sniffing toward him. Renfro stopped, gave
him a keen look and called softly, “Lang Tammy--here sir--Lang Tammy!”
The big dog sniffed his way to Renfro. After reaching him he gave a few
more investigating sniffs and then seized Andy’s discarded paper bag
playfully in his teeth. He tugged at it with all his might. Laughing
Renfro tugged back.
“You’re a peach of a dog, Lang Tammy,” he began, “I’d like--”
Then the strange voice did more than had the strange appearance. It
frightened the big dog. Turning sharply he ran back to the apple trees.
He wheeled around, gave Renfro a look, a sharp bark, and trotted into
the shrubbery out of sight.
Lang Tammy was a new possession on the Hall place. Captain Pete had
not had a dog since his collie had been poisoned a year ago. Renfro
chuckled, “I’ll see him and ask him where he got his new dog” he
decided, “that will help some. He’ll either have to claim or deny the
dog. And I know positively that Lang Tammy’s master is somewhere on
this place.”
He turned off the road, skirted along a rail fence, jumped across a
ditch and stumbled against a rotting stump. Every window in the big
house was dark. He was making his way down to the cabin. The one
opening there was on the other side of the house and Renfro couldn’t be
sure whether or not it was lighted till he came opposite the cabin.
He scratched both of his hands on some briers. His paper bag--Andy’s
discarded one to be exact,--caught on a paling on the second fence and
tore loose with a ripping sound. The wind rattled the limbs on the old
trees and made queer spectral sounds on the tin roof of the big house
directly opposite the cabin.
Renfro looked sharply at it again. It was still dark. And then he
stumbled against the cabin, felt his way around it and stood close to
the window.
Inside there was a small lamp burning. The chimney was smoke stained
and the wick, turned low, made still more smoke. But the light showed
the rude furniture of the room, the meal almost ready on the table.
Yet no one was in the cabin.
Up at the big house it was all dark. Captain Pete couldn’t be there.
Renfro shouldered his torn bag and made his way back to the road. It
was interesting here and he wanted to lurk a little longer, but he knew
that if he were too late in getting home his mother would be uneasy.
“If she worries too much Dad will make me give up the route,” he
thought.
After which he hurried up the road to the side walk. The houses on
either side of the street were little and in the darkness stood sagging
like the skin of a moldy apple. Some of them were lighted; others were
dark. Andy had said the night before that only about half of them were
tenanted.
But in them were probable subscribers for the Globe. Just as Renfro had
about decided to canvas here the next Saturday, the street car slowed
to let off a passenger. At the same time Renfro swung on to ride back
to the end of the line and help change the trolley.
And there sitting opposite him was Old Captain Pete clad in his best
overcoat and hat. A genial smile spread over his face at the sight of
Renfro. “Such rabbit luck,” he ejaculated, “as I’ve had today! Killed
thirty-one and sold ’em every one afore I left Main Street. Your hired
gal bought two.”
When he expressed surprise about Renfro’s being on the car so late the
carrier showed him his empty paper bag. “I’m coming out to get you for
a new subscriber,” he promised.
Like a battered sail Captain Pete’s head shook a denial. “I aint got
no use for newspapers,” he was gruff, “Haint read one regular for more
than twenty years.”
“Not since his brother was sent up,” Renfro remembered the story Clint
had told him.
Still remembering it he rode into his home avenue. And from the corner
he walked home.
Mr. and Mrs. Horn were still in the dining room, Mr. Horn was looking
thru the afternoon papers and his wife was toying with some salted
almonds. She rang the bell when Renfro entered, and Mary brought in his
supper.
Her broad face spread into a grin when she saw Renfro. “Rabbit for
supper,” she whispered sibilantly, “I bought it this afternoon of
Captain Pete Hall myself. Your maw was gone but I took it upon myself
to do it. It’s broiled too.”
“See Captain Pete, Mary?” he asked while he ate. “Dolled up, wasn’t he?”
Mary nodded and simpered. “But his buttons was off something fierce,
Renny,” she declared. “A man like him has no business growing up to be
a bachelor.”
Mr. Horn looked over the top of his paper, first at Renfro and then at
Mary. It wasn’t exactly a look of reproof he gave them but rather of
surprise. However, it was enough to stop their conversation.
“Get frightened alone?” Mrs. Horn’s voice was full of hope.
Renfro shook his head. He honestly had not. His interest had been
aroused however. He must talk to Mary alone about Captain Pete and the
rabbits. He must--
And then his father reached him an envelope. “This was in the mail,” he
told him, “postmarked The Evening Globe. I suppose it’s your contract.”
Together he and his wife arose and went into the library. Renfro tore
open the blue envelope, pulled out a card and read it thru before he
fairly understood it. Going back to the beginning he read it again.
“A full gown turkey to every route carrier who gets ten new subscribers
before Thanksgiving Eve”, he drawled. “Well, it’s up to me to get some
turkeys,” he mused.
He ate bananas without any cream to save time and slipped into the
kitchen. The cook was out and Mary was reading a novel and washing the
dishes at the same time. Renfro’s entrance startled her so that she
let the soap drop into the water and the shower which rose from the
pan, following the splash, went directly into both her own and Renfro’s
faces. They sputtered and gurgled.
Finally, Renfro could speak, “Mary,” he began, “do you think you could
cook six turkeys all at once?”
Mary stared at him, “Six turkeys,” she exclaimed. “Who are you wanting
me to cook for, Renny? Six turkeys, no, I’ll not be cooking turkeys for
all your fine friends! Now in this book here where I was reading, there
is a story about a turkey and a couple what lived on opposite farms
from where it was raised. It was real romantic. The turkey got lost as
turkeys will, and when the girl went to hunt it she found the young man
and they fell in love and were married. It’s just full of mystery and
romance.”
“Well,” Renfro laughed, “none of my turkeys are going to get anyone in
bad like that, Mary. Sure you’ll cook them--won’t you?”
“Where’s the turkeys?” Mary was suspicious.
“Oh,” Renfro smiled a look of mystery in his smile which brought Mary
to her feet. “I’ll have them here all right in time for Thanksgiving
day.”
“And, Mary,” he slipped close to her and gave her a comradely look,
“There’s something on my mind I have to work out. I may need you to
help me. I’m not telling exactly what it is yet, but it’s got mystery
and maybe some romance in it. And you will help if I need you--won’t
you?”
Both of Mary’s hands came out of the pan of suds. “Mister Renfro,” she
said solemnly, “Aint I been wantin’ to give up this sort of work and go
into real detective work for years. Why, once I took a correspondence
school course in it. And I’ll--”
Renfro’s hand was raised in warning, “Just wait, Mary,” he cautioned,
“Just wait until I’m ready to tell you, and then you’ll have your
chance.”
He sauntered back into the dining room. The telephone on the stand made
him decide to call Andy and tell him that he hadn’t missed a single
customer, that he liked the route and would stick. He wanted to know,
too, if Andy was satisfied with his new route.
And Renfro took down the receiver.
Chapter V.
THE STRANGER COMES AGAIN.
It became still colder during that night. Renfro Horn awoke near
midnight to feel a gale blowing around his ears. He got up, shut his
east window and crawled back into bed. “I’ll bet that tin roof is
dancing a regular ghost dance on the big house,” he muttered.
He turned over, pulled the blankets closer over his ears. The next
minute it was morning, and Mary was calling him. “The pipe’s froze
something fierce,” she began, “And you’ll have to eat in the kitchen
close to the range.”
“Suits me all right,” Renfro laughed and jumped out of bed.
At the breakfast table his mother began to worry about his route.
She predicted that he would freeze his feet, and perhaps his hands,
contract pneumonia and lumbago and then her list gave out. His father
looked a trifle uneasy while she talked but said nothing.
However, as he and Renfro walked down the street together, respectively
toward school and office, he gave his son some warnings. “Better mind
them all too, young man,” he seemed very impatient this morning, “if
you should happen to get sick, bang goes your paper route and no
argument.”
A shrill yell drew their attention across the street. Two morning paper
carriers, who went to the Grant School, the same one Renfro attended,
were coming in from finishing their delivery. Their paper bags were
drawn around their shoulders, and their caps pulled low over their ears.
“Jim froze his right ear almost,” sang the taller boy, “and I gave him
first aid. One more merit badge.”
“You bet,” Jim agreed, “If you need any help tonight call on Bob,
Hooch.”
“Hooch?” Mr. Horn was amazed.
“Oh, that’s my nickname,” Renfro affected carelessness. This was no
time he reflected to tell how it had been created, nor how popular
it had become in less than forty-eight hours. So he tried to change
the subject. “Jim Noel’s a first class Boy Scout and he’s trying to
win enough merit badges to get the eagle rank at the Court of Honor
session.”
Mr. Horn nodded, “That’s all right for the other fellows,” he said,
“but if you freeze your ears you go to a doctor.”
At that instant Renfro wished he could tell his father--a few
things--how he had had not only his ears but his nose nipped during one
of his hikes on which he was trying to make some discoveries concerning
quail tracks. He himself had bound the snow onto them. And Mary had
helped him with the other applications the first aid book advised.
But he kept still.
The weather grew milder during the day. At noon the ice along the
curbing near the Grant School was melting a little, but when four
o’clock came it had frozen again. Renfro and Jim Noel, hurrying along
together discussed a hike and rabbit hunt for Saturday if it stayed
cold. But just as they had their arrangements about finished, Renfro
remembered the turkey contest.
“Say, Jim,” he broke in suddenly, “I bet a turkey that if I can get off
my route work to go I’ll track down more rabbits than you do.”
Jim stared at him. “Great guns!” he ejaculated, “A turkey? How come?”
He stared again when he read the card Renfro showed him. “You’ll never
get sixty subscribers on Old Grief, Hooch,” he declared. “Not unless
you pay for their subscriptions yourself. Abie Lubin had it for a while
and he didn’t make anything, so that’s sure proof it’s no good.”
But Renfro only whistled. He and Jim separated at the next corner.
Beyond the edge of the big business districts and thru the residential
part of town to his route Renfro hurried. His papers were at the
station. He swung the bag on his back, wagered to himself that it would
be heavier next week, and started on his route.
He stopped at the most promising houses and asked for new
subscriptions. One woman threatened to have him arrested. Another told
him that the last boy had been crooked and failed to mark two of her
payments, so that the company had sent a collector there; and she added
that if he wanted to be a friend of hers he wouldn’t work for a paper
which stood for such crookedness.
But Renfro persisted, and before he left her door had her subscription
and a week’s payment in advance. He also secured four other
subscriptions before he turned into his last square.
“Pretty good, old boy, considering the time you spent in getting warm,
and that you’re a new recruit,” he said and then laughed. He had been
talking out loud and the woman who was hurrying past him turned round
to stare back.
The wind whipped the tops of the trees and made them crackle and roar.
The air was so cold that flurries of frost seemed to come out of
nowhere but swirl around everywhere. And it was dark except where the
street lights or those in the houses threw long hard gleams out into
the street.
Suddenly, Renfro stopped. Lurking in the blackness ahead of him was a
low set figure, followed by a big dog--the airedale he had seen the
night before and the night before that. Renfro dropped onto his knees
so that he could be concealed behind the water plug and its shadow, and
he watched.
A sudden light from an opened door fell on the big dog, and showed it
to be with the short, heavy set man. As soon as the door was closed
Renfro was sure he heard a low growl, saw a threatening movement and
directly afterward the dog rushed past him, running as if frightened to
an unusual degree.
The light was gone again. Renfro put his hands over his eyes a minute
to accustom them to the darkness again, and then rubbed them vigorously
together. The third and fourth fingers on his left hand felt dull. He
slipped off his glove and rubbed them with snow.
A half nervous laugh shook him. Suddenly he had remembered, no doubt on
account of the cold water plug against his body, of the time he had put
his tongue against a frozen pipe.
The shadow across the street lengthened. The heavy man was slouching
down the street again, up to Judge Wier’s shrubbery and then to the
window thru which he had gazed the night before. Renfro was sure that
it was because there was no light in that part of the house.
But the rest of the house was lighted and if the door were open the
stranger could see into the other room. And he lingered long enough
and close enough to the window to be studying the features of the whole
family if they were there.
Renfro, stiff from his posture and the cold, could not move. The big
dog had been afraid of the man. He would no doubt half kill Renfro
if he discovered that the boy was following him. Besides, Renfro
reflected, if you want to unravel a mystery you have to follow a clue
to it and not burst into open opposition.
The lights in Judge Wier’s house changed at that minute. The part
which had been lighted was darkened and the front rooms became bright
instead. And then the lurking stranger again retired to the shrubbery.
As he had done the night before when he neared the Judge’s house Renfro
dropped onto his hands and knees and crawled to the shrubbery but no
one was there. Still some one had been there and that some one had had
something in mind which would do harm to either the Wier home or family
he was sure.
Judge Wier has scores of enemies. He was noted as giving the stiffest
sentences of any judge in the city. Auto speeders met with as little
mercy at his hands as did the most dangerous criminals.
“I--really--ought--to--warn--him,” Renfro chattered,
“but--still--he’ll--laugh.” But he did call a number. A tired central
informed him that she could get no one on that line. It seemed to be
out of order.
Then Renfro went back to the kitchen and Mary with a determination in
his mind. He would find some sort of an excuse to give his parents for
being very late the next evening. Then he would follow the short, heavy
set stranger. He would see if he took the same direction his dog did
every night--down toward the big house where the tin roof rattled and
made such warning noises.
An excuse. He frowned, when Mary started to speak but she talked
anyway. “Where’s them six turkeys you wanted me to cook, Renny?” she
began, “If it’s the cleanin’ of them I have to do then I better begin
now and--”
“And,” Renfro interrupted her laughingly, “Mary, you’re a peach with
the fuzz still on most of the time. But I know the quality of your
mind below.”
He could hardly keep from dancing. Mary had suggested the excuse
he wanted. The turkeys. Why he had to have them and what better
excuse could he offer his parents than that he was working for new
subscribers. His mother might object but his father would want him to
win any contest he entered.
But before he told them he wanted to talk to Mary a little longer.
“Mary” he began, “got any more rabbits?”
She shook her head. “He doesn’t bring them regular.”
“Then,” Renfro, suggested, “how would you like for me to stop out
there--Captain Pete’s place is just a little distance from the end of
my route--well, let’s say about every other day and buy a couple of
rabbits from the old fellow? Put in sort of a standing order?”
“Sure Renny, you’re that thoughtful,” Mary beamed, “And speaking of
turkeys, Renny, I read another turkey story today. It has the most
beautiful plot. And romance too. The man was a detective and--”
“And, Mary, we’re going to have one too,” Renfro added, “but please,
Mary, do be a dear, and don’t call me Renny any more. I’ve got a
business name and I want my real friends to use it. After this to you,
Mary, I’m Hooch--Hooch Horn,” he imitated the route manager’s tone
exactly, “Hooch Horn, if you please, Mary dear.”
CHAPTER VI.
HELEN WIER IS KIDNAPED.
Before Renfro Horn had been awake three minutes the next morning he
heard sounds of great confusion coming up from downstairs. His father
was talking in a loud excited voice, his mother after giving a half
tone scream began asking questions and even Mary was making her share
of the confusion.
“Another bursted pipe,” Renfro saw the heavy frost on the window, drew
his conclusion and turned over to sleep until they called him.
Mary’s heavy winter shoes clattered up the stairway, crossed the hall
and came straight to his door. She peeped cautiously into his bedroom,
her head encased in a pink breakfast cap thru which were run blue
ribbons. Her mouth was half open, her eyes big and her whole face a map
of mingled surprise, interest and horror.
“Renny--Renny,” she called softly and then changed, “Hooch--oh,
Hooch--your pa just brought in the morning paper and Helen Wier was
kidnaped last night right out of her pa’s own home and she aint been
brought back or they don’t know nothin’ about it and--”
Renfro was sitting bolt upright in bed. “What did you say, Mary?” he
demanded. “Helen Wier kidnaped. When? And how did they find out? Now
answer my questions first.”
Observing directions, Mary told him. Helen Wier, the judge’s twelve
year old daughter had been studying in the little east library, as was
her custom when the family and two guests went into the back of the
house for coffee and a late lunch. She had been sitting at the table
when they left; when they came back she was gone. That was all Mary
knew.
The paper told Renfro a little more. There had been no outcry on
Helen’s part--no sound that anyone had heard. The room showed no
evidence of a struggle except that a vase of flowers on the table was
upturned and the books she had been studying, all were on the floor.
When the family had come back into the library Helen was not there. Her
mother, thinking that she had gone upstairs to bed, had commented on
her going without being told and began to talk of other things when she
noticed the books on the floor and became suspicious.
Helen Wier loved her books as she did her friends. She was very careful
of them. She never would have left them on the floor behind her, open
with their backs bent to the breaking point as were these. And the
papers out of her notebook were scattered around and under the table.
Mrs. Wier muttered something to the rest about being sure something was
wrong with Helen, rushed upstairs to her room and then had begun the
search. That she had been kidnaped was an assured fact. The problem
before the police who had been almost instantly summoned was to find
out who did it and where the child had been taken.
“Weren’t there no note wanting money?” Mary asked the question.
Mr. Horn who was reading the story shook his head. Mary in turn shook
hers tho more wisely. “Then they’ll be hearin’ from the kidnapers
before night”, she said with conviction. “They’ll be telling how
much they want for her return and where to put it and giving all the
directions. The book I studied in that home correspondence course said
that was the way it always went.”
She ended her speech triumphantly, but noticing about the same time
that no one was paying any attention to her backed thru the dining room
into the kitchen, where she talked to herself about the “ignorance of
some people”.
Renfro, after reading the short, and to him, decidedly unsatisfactory
story, followed Mary out into the kitchen. “The paper didn’t say
anything about whether or not the telephone wires were cut,” he began.
Mary’s homely fat face beamed. She liked to be taken into some one’s
confidence. “Them detectives which are huntin’ for a clue know mighty
little,” she said hotly. “Now what course have any of them ever
studied? They just happened to be in on the side of the political party
which won at the last election, and when the city hall jobs gave out
they just put them on the detective force.”
Without any doubt Renfro was in a state of confusion. He didn’t know
whether or not to go around to Judge Wier’s house and tell the Judge
what he had seen on the two successive nights when he had been
carrying his papers past their house, or to take his story to the
police. But he did know enough to keep still until he decided what
course to follow.
But he had come to the kitchen to ask a request of Mary, “For heaven’s
sake, Mary,” he begged, “don’t ever let mother know that place is on
my paper route or it would be goodbye to that route and my new turkey
customers. You won’t, will you?”
Mary shook her head. “But are you working on some clues, Ren--Hooch?”
she asked. “Now if you are, I could help you a lot with my book
learning on detective work.”
“Oh, I will need you all right,” Renfro laughed. “Just you wait, Mary,
and keep still a little while and then your chance will come.”
It was hard work for Renfro at the breakfast table just to ask enough
questions and talk enough about the kidnaping to avoid suspicion,
without telling his parents anything he knew, or ask any of the
questions in his mind. He went directly to the police station from the
breakfast table. He found the chief of detectives a very busy man.
But still he managed to take time to see Renfro and talked a little
until Renfro began to tell of the man he had seen lurking in the
Wier neighborhood and then he banged his hand on his desk. “You’re
the fifth boy who saw some suspicious looking person lurking in that
neighborhood,” he laughed but there was a note of impatience in his
laugh. “I’ve heard of everything from a colored wash woman to the judge
himself.”
After storming about how busy he was and how people who bothered busy
people should be given jail sentences, the chief pointed toward the
door thru which he intended Renfro to leave. “If you kids would read
your school books,” he said solemnly, “instead of a lot of detective
stories written by old maids afraid to go out at night, you would have
more sense about clues and everything else in general.”
Outside Renfro pursed his lips. “All right, Mr. Chief,” he thought to
himself, “I’ll work on my own clue. I’ve one and I hope your men don’t
find out a thing without it.”
He found the entire Grant School aroused by the kidnaping. Girls, who
had been brought to the building by their fathers under orders not
to leave the building until they came after them, stood in groups
inside the hall and would not have ventured outside the building for
a fortune. Some of the people seemed to think that Helen Wier was the
first one to be taken in a kidnaping plot which was to rob Lindendale
of all its girls.
Miss Turpin, the English teacher, allowed the members of her classes
to discuss the affair. All sorts of reasons, were offered for the
kidnaping, most of them being that of a ransom. But Renfro kept still.
Judge Wier didn’t have a fortune nor did he have resources to raise one
in a hurry. Unlike Mary he didn’t believe that a note would come in a
few days demanding money, telling under what particular forest log to
hide it and the conditions governing its hiding.
Miss Turpin herself ventured a suggestion. She too knew that Judge
Wier was far from being a rich man. Now there was soon to come before
the judge for trial a number of men charged with a series of election
frauds. She wondered if they could have taken this course to frighten
Judge Wier from giving them stiff sentences.
“Well,” Abie Lubin remembered his fine for speeding his father’s car,
“Anybody can’t scare Judge Wier by nothing.”
That afternoon the chief of detectives, having heard of Miss Turpin’s
suggestion telephoned the Grant building for her to come to his office
after school. Renfro, too, received a telephone message. It was from
Route Manager Morrison of the Evening Globe. He offered to send an
extra boy to help Renfro carry his route in case he should feel uneasy.
Now that was the last thing Renfro wanted so he laughed at the
suggestion and by so doing rose several notches in Morrison’s mind. He
went directly to the Circulation Manager with his praise. Mr. Bruce in
turn smiled, “I said that boy would make good,” he smiled. “Of course
he won’t make any money on Old Grief, but as soon as we’re sure he’s
what we think he is we’ll give him a regular route. And I shall have
the pleasure of telling his father that he was wrong in his prediction,
and I was right in mine.”
Renfro fairly rushed along his route that afternoon. Still he searched
for new subscribers. It would be foolish he knew to go out to the big
Hall house and the little shack adjoining it until it was dark. Yet he
was going.
It was very quiet at Judge Wier’s house. The people who crowded there
in the morning had gone home. The house was darkened so that Mrs. Wier
could be kept quiet.
Renfro rolled his copy of the Evening Globe, started to throw it onto
the porch and then stopped. Why not take it around to the back door?
That would give him a chance to pass the shrubbery and the window thru
which the man had peeped on two successive nights. He decided to do so.
The shrubbery was intact. The inside of the window was covered with a
heavy coat of frost. Renfro looked thru it but could see only the green
blind which had been pulled to the very sill. And then he saw something
on the outside of the pane.
He stepped close to the window, and looked up at the two strange
looking things. They were about two inches apart, white and stiff and
made up of--?
And then Renfro almost shouted. They were part of a pair of a man’s
eyebrows. Memory of the frozen pipe with his boyish tongue stuck
against it, and the red skin left fast to the pipe, made him understand
this situation. The man who had stood close to the window pane had
pressed his face against the cold glass while he watched the scene
inside the house, his eyebrows had been frozen to the pane more firmly
than he had thought and when he, suddenly frightened, had pulled away
from it he had left these portions of his eyebrows behind him.
“My first clue” Renfro told himself and reached into his pocket.
CHAPTER VII.
RENFRO TAKES THE EYEBROWS.
Renfro’s hand trembled so that he could hardly pull his knife from his
trousers pocket. It was followed by a notebook, from which he tore two
sheets of paper. Quickly he opened the blade, the thinnest of the three
in his knife, warmed it with several breaths and then slipped it under
one of the frozen eyebrows on the window pane.
Zip! It came off--frozen, intact, as solid as it had been when left
on the frozen pane. Carefully Renfro wrapped it in one of the pieces
of paper. By the same process the other portion of an eyebrow was
likewise treated. With both precious packages of what he considered a
magnificent clue stored safely in his most secure inner pocket Renfro
shouldered his now empty paper bag and started toward home.
The desire to journey out to the big Hall house was almost overpowering
him. But wisdom warned him against making the trip. It was late--it
would be eight o’clock before he could get home. If he arrived later
than that there would surely be a family conclave held, the decision
of which might mean that tho he continued to carry his paper route he
would be given no time to either get new subscribers or to follow the
clue which fate had thrust into his hand.
Renfro was almost stunned with his good fortune. In his pocket was the
only clue which, according to the latest reports he had heard, had yet
been found. And he was going to keep it and work it out himself. The
chief of detectives had laughed once, the next laugh would be at his
expense, Renfro vowed, and because he had discovered a clue to the
identity of the person or persons who had kidnaped Helen Wier.
All the way home on the car he kept his hand pressed over the pocket
in which was the clue. Off the car, walking down the home avenue he
watched surreptitiously for a possible bandit. No lady of rank ever
guarded her jewels any more closely than Renfro Horn did the two
mysterious eyebrows.
All around him the bitter wind stung and lashed and hurt like a keen
edged knife. It drove white hard clouds across the sky and at times
hid the moon. But still it was a much lighter night than the one
preceding it had been. Neither Helen Wier nor any other girl could be
successfully kidnaped on a night like this.
“But detectives could follow a clue mighty well,” Renfro turned in at
his own walk, and patted his chest, “only right now they haven’t any
clue.”
His father who had just come past the police headquarters on his way
home from the office, gave testimony that his conclusion was right. The
clue suggested by Miss Turpin about the men implicated in the election
frauds was being traced down but no one hoped for any results.
While they were at dinner Mrs. Horn who had been doubly uneasy over
Renfro’s lateness and also his father’s, voiced her complaints in
fretful language. Mr. Horn, provoked as always by his wife’s fussing
moods issued sharp orders to Renfro, “No trips out at night onto that
route,” he said, “and hereafter you be home at six thirty. Do you
understand?”
Renfro nodded, and reaching into his pocket pulled out the rules
Morrison had given him the first day. “Dad,” he said soberly, “Every
business has its own rules, and the Globe’s carrier system has its own.
You expect your employees to follow yours if they expect to rise in
your business. If I’m to rise to success with the Globe I’ll have to
follow these.”
His mother’s eyes were distinctly hostile but Renfro looked away from
them straight into his father’s interested ones, then back to his paper
and read his rules in a clear, determined boyish voice--
“Never fail to deliver a subscriber.
“A good carrier will get two new subscribers and increase his route two
each week.
“Bills must be paid when due. Only lame ducks pay part of their bills.”
Mrs. Horn sniffed scornfully, caught a gleam of authority in her
husband’s eyes, rose with a rather indifferent apology and strolled
into the library. At a nod from his father Renfro read on--
“Collect your route thoroughly once a week. The meanest man in the
world is the man who would beat a newspaper carrier.
“Tell your customers you come thru the snow and rain and cold six times
a week to their door, for their accommodation, and ask them if they
can’t arrange once a week to have your money for you.
“Get your delivery thru as quickly as possible. The mothers want to
read the Globe before the fathers come home for supper.
“And remember the quitters fail while the boys who respond to
responsibility always succeed as boys and as men.”
When he finished his reading Renfro carefully folded the paper and put
it back into his pocket. He heard his father cough, looked up, caught
his wink and rather low declaration, “I recall my command. These rules
are about the best things I ever heard. Obey them--that’s all.”
Renfro ventured audible thanks. But he cautiously remained in the
dining room when his father left for the library. He knew that his
father would have it out with his mother and that it would be much
better if he were not a listener to their argument. Besides he wanted
to see Mary.
With his hands in his pockets he strolled into the kitchen, watched
Mary stir something into a batter and then carelessly asked, “Did you
see Captain Pete today, Mary?”
To his surprise Mary nodded, “You did, Mary,” he ejaculated, “How did
he look?”
“Cross--fierce like to be sure,” Mary returned. “I didn’t buy none of
his rabbits. They weren’t fresh like. And he had the nerve to argue
with me that frozen rabbits is allus good even if they wuz froze the
week before last.”
A straight look at Mary, and a little delay on Renfro’s part. Then he
smiled scornfully at himself. Experience had taught him that no one
could be trusted better than Mary. Slowly he pulled the two pieces of
paper out of his pocket, laid them on the table, unfolded them so as
not to disturb the arrangement of their contents and called Mary.
In a low, guarded tone he told Mary of the man who had crouched at
Judge Wier’s window, of his trying to follow him and of the finding of
the eyebrows. “They’re my clue, Mary,” he ended proudly, “You’re going
to help me find the man who has these missing eyebrows and who kidnaped
or who helped kidnap Helen Wier--aren’t you?” And he breathed deeply.
“Without the help or knowledge of any member of the detective force.”
“Yes, yes,” Mary whispered, her sibilant tones high with excitement.
“I’ll help you and just us two will do it. I know how to follow that
clue. Them detective lessons will come in handy now. I was just
beginning to think that mebbe I had wasted my money but now I know
and--”
“Mary,” Renfro’s hand clasped over her arm, “Did you notice this
afternoon? Were Captain Pete’s eyebrows--”
“Why I couldn’t see them,” she whispered back. “He had a long scarf
over his head and Hooch, it came clean down to his very eyes. You don’t
think it was him--do you, Hooch?”
Renfro shook his head. “But we’re going to watch everybody who is old
and who might be a criminal or a maniac or who could have had some
reason for kidnaping Helen Wier. In other words we’ve got to find the
man with the missing eyebrows.”
Mary nodded vigorously.
“And, Mary,” Renfro was folding the paper again, “We’ve got to be very
careful of these same missing eyebrows which are our only definite
clue. I’ll hide them away carefully.”
His mother called him just then to hunt her a book he had been reading
a few days before. She was still decidedly cool in her treatment toward
him. But Renfro was more courteous than usual and before he left the
room to go to bed, she was quite motherly to him.
In bed Renfro reviewed the day’s happenings and tried to map out a plan
for the rest of the week. He must do his route work first. That was his
job. Then when each day’s work was over he could follow the clue. If
only the detectives failed to find Helen Wier he was sure he could.
“And I must get my new subscribers,” he was ready to close his eyes.
“The paper says two new subscribers a week, but my record must be five
a day for a time if I get those turkeys. And I must have them. I’ve
promised Mary.”
Before he left for school the next morning he slipped into the kitchen
and bantered with Mary a minute or two. “I’ve earned two of your
turkeys, Mary,” he told her, “So be finding out ways to dress and cook
them.”
Then he explained to her the system he was following in order to win
them. At the back door he gave her a last word of advice. “Mary, if
Captain Pete or any mean looking stranger comes to our door, look at
his eyebrows if you have to sit on him to do it,” he smiled.
“All right, Hooch,” Mary promised in return.
CHAPTER VIII.
RENFRO GETS A SHOCK.
Not until he was in Miss Turpin’s class did Renfro have an opportunity
to hear anything about the kidnaping of Helen Wier, otherwise than
that which had been in the morning newspaper. And in them had been the
statement that all clues offered by members of the detective force and
members of the Wier family had been followed down and led to nothing.
But in Miss Turpin’s class a late comer to school brought more news.
Judge Wier had received a letter that morning in the first mail. It was
just a note written by Helen herself, in her girlish scrawl. She was
well she said and comfortable. That was all.
But the note had been mailed in a city mail box directly across the
street from where Judge Wier lived. That gave the detectives a new
clue. They were--
And then Renfro remembered his clue--the missing eyebrows. With great
deliberation last night he had chosen his hiding place--between the
case and the pillow itself. But his father had called him late and he
had forgotten all about his valuable possessions.
At the close of the recitations he went to the dean, obtained
permission to use her private phone and slipped alone into her inner
office. He talked in a very low tone. First he called his home number.
And then he almost shouted over his own good fortune. Mary had answered
the call.
“Don’t talk, Mary,” he cautioned, “don’t say anything which would give
me away. It’s Hooch. Has anybody made up my bed yet?”
Mary herself had--just a little while before.
“Then you didn’t bother them--my clues,” he almost implored. “You know
what I mean Mary--those eye--eye--you know.”
Mary knew.
Then Renfro told her where he had put them. No, Mary hadn’t seen them,
but if he would wait she would run up stairs and see if she could find
them. A long wait followed during which Renfro counted several hundred
digits to make the time hurry and then he heard Mary’s voice once more.
It was terrible--full of tears, of fear and of grief. They were
gone--Renfro’s leading clues. She had shook his pillows, quite as was
her usual custom, had swept his floor and then and--
The rest of her speech was lost. Renfro had dashed the receiver back
onto the hook, slipped as fast as he could to his cloak room, donned
his cap and gloves and was down at the principal’s office. His white
face, his dark staring horror stricken eyes gave proof to his statement
that he was sick and he was excused for the rest of the morning.
Darting across streets in front of automobiles, down alleys thru which
he had not been in months, panting, puffing, and never stopping, Renfro
rushed into his own back gate, up the walk and into the kitchen where
Mary was weeping copiously. A few questions from him, a few answers
from her and they were both down in the basement, right into the
furnace room.
No, Mary didn’t remember where she had emptied the sweeper that
morning. She usually did but this morning she had been busy thinking
out excuses she could find for going out to Captain Pete’s and
discovering the condition of the old hunter’s eyebrows. She sobbed
audibly while she talked. Mrs. Horn had gone up town to a sale she
informed Renfro and she could cry loud and get all the comfort she
wanted out of so doing.
Together they searched thru the trash pile, then all over the basement
floor, and all the way up and down the dark stairway. And then Mary
remembered the garden plot. The ash man had asked her to empty her
sweepings on the ash pile. He often found pins and needles and
interesting knick knacks for his little girl in people’s ash piles.
And out there Renfro found one folded piece of paper and Mary the
other. They flew into each others arms. Back in the kitchen Mary found
her family Bible and made room in it for Renfro to place the precious
possessions along with the bit of her baby hair and one bridesmaid’s
dress and her long ago admirer’s picture. Mary informed him that
she was going to buy some black paper, some white paint and make a
reproduction of the eyebrows for their everyday use in hunting down
clues.
“The detective book said to make copies of everything you find in
regard to a crime,” she offered the proof of the wisdom of her
suggestion.
“Well you guard your Bible, Mary dear, and wait a little while,” Hooch
begged her, now restored to health again and ready to return to school.
It was Jimmie Noel who at noon suggested to Renfro that he go see his
route manager for suggestions about securing his new subscribers. “He’s
an old hand,” he advised, “and he can give you pointers which will save
you half of your energy.”
Renfro hesitated. That might mean a loss of time and he had determined
to go out to both Captain Pete’s and the big house that night. Still
“The Globe” was his business and a fellow’s own business came first.
Besides his father had given him permission to stay out late.
Renfro found Morrison rushing and fuming. Warren, route manager of
the north side, had boasted that his boys were going to win the most
turkeys. “I can’t have that,” Morrison was urging two of his best
carriers whom he had summoned in to act in an emergency. “Fellows, this
is just like a big basket ball game. Are you going to let your enemy’s
team beat you without a struggle?”
Then he saw Renfro, “Hello, Hooch Horn,” he said genially, “How can I
help you, old man?”
Renfro’s list of twenty new subscribers went onto the counter in front
of Morrison. “Two turkeys won already,” he smiled. “And I thought
perhaps you could give me some suggestions on how to win four more.”
A smile spread over Morrison’s face and then it stopped suddenly as he
examined the list of names. “Ward’s no good,” he ejaculated. “Didn’t
Andy tell you? He beat him out of a bill. And Newkirk did the same and
that Patterson woman--”
“But they all paid in advance,” Renfro interrupted.
Morrison stared at him. “They did!” he half shouted and drew his hand
across his forehead. “They did! Well how in the thunder did you get
money out of them before they got the paper? Boy, you must have a
wonderful line of talk.”
Arm in arm he and Renfro walked to the door. “Go to it, Hooch,” was
Morrison’s last advice, “win these turkeys and I’ll put up the best
feed in any hotel you choose. The south side always does take the
prizes. But for Old Grief to win first honors, Hooch, that would be the
surprise of the Globe during the sixty years it has been a paper.”
“Say,” he called Renfro back, “Bruce said you had guts, when he hired
you.”
Renfro remembered that statement of Bruce’s as he worked against great
obstacles for subscribers that afternoon. But he stuck, tho there
seemed nothing but obstacles in front of him and finally counted out
his five new names. “Turkey number three,” he laughed and pulled out
his watch.
Seven-thirty o’clock and a heavy darkness everywhere. The street lights
were dim tonight and there was almost no one out on East Washington.
Judge Wier’s house had been guarded by a detective, not because of the
discovery of a new clue but Mrs. Wier’s nerves from the morning’s note
had demanded one.
At the little corner grocery Renfro bought a hot dog sandwich and some
weak tea and ate and drank standing close to the door. No one passed
except a colored woman carrying home her “wash.” Out on the street he
hurried down toward the big house and the shack beyond.
He stumbled thru the underbrush at the side of the road, over the rail
fence and into the lane between the two orchards. A dark form loomed
before him. He held his breath and stood still. A low sniff came to
him, a joyous bark and Lang Tammy was against him, his big shaggy body
almost overturning Renfro. He grabbed one end of the bag and the usual
game of pulling followed.
“Like to play, old fellow?” Renfro patted his head. “Next time, old
boy, I’ll bring you a hot dog if I have to go without one myself.”
While he talked to the dog he caught a glimmer of light in the big
house, up on the second floor at the right side in the dormer window
where there were still shutters. It didn’t linger there long and when
it went out the whole house was left in darkness. Nor was it lighted
again.
Renfro turned his back on the big house and stumbled across the
field toward the shack. The orchard was desolate and rocky with a
few remnants of trees which never bore but in the darkness they were
formidable looking and their roots stumbling blocks.
After the orchard came the lane again and then the open space around
the shack. A gleam of light from the window told Renfro that Captain
Pete was at home. Before he crossed to the door Renfro ordered Lang
Tammy “to go home” and after a little the big dog slouched away.
“He’s been taught to mind all right,” Renfro watched the big creature
now an abject object of fear, slinking down the lane, “and he’s been
taught thru terrible cruelty.”
Captain Pete answered the knock. His shaggy head was uncovered and he
knitted his heavy white eyebrows all of which were intact. No, he did
not have any rabbits. The Elks had come out that afternoon and gotten
all he had for a big supper they were having. But he would have some
the next day for Renfro.
Then Renfro grew a bit bold. “Sometimes, Captain Pete,” he said
quietly, “I know your old house is haunted or something, for I’ve seen
lights in it. Now tonight--”
Captain Pete’s head shook a vigorous denial. “There wasn’t anybody
there,” he said. Why it was so full of wide open cracks that nobody
couldn’t stay there. And most of the tin roof was off by this time.
“Captain Pete may be innocent,” Renfro drawled, back on the road again,
“but he’s sure not ignorant.”
CHAPTER IX.
TRACKS AT THE CABIN.
At the corner of Washington Avenue and Twenty-fifth street Renfro
waited for a car. He shuffled his feet to keep them warm and rolled and
unrolled his paper bag while he watched the next corner for the first
glimpse of a headlight. The street light quivered and went out, came on
again and once more began to grow dim.
When out of Plum Street sprang a boy in uniform who rushed into
the middle of the street, caught at the long wire hanging from the
flickering light, gave it several jerks and was rewarded by the strong
white light which replaced the flickering one.
In its light Renfro recognized Jimmie Noel, dressed for a hike, his
provision bag swung over his shoulder, a stout stick in one hand and a
bulky bundle in the other. He gave a shrill whistle. The one which came
in return told that he was recognized.
The two boys met near the middle of the block. But before they
exchanged spoken greetings Renfro saw the squad of khaki clad boys who
were following Jimmie more than a half square away. They halted under
the street light to view the accomplishment of Jimmie. Two of them in
turn shook the same wire he had. The street light grew even brighter.
“Bill Larrison’s patrol,--the Black Bears,” Jimmie nodded at the boys
behind him. “They’re going out to Twin Cedar Cabin for the night. Some
of them are getting ready for their second class tests. Pete Northrup’s
going to cook.”
Renfro’s laugh was eloquent. Pete was the most awkward boy he knew.
Visions of Pete in a kitchen were too much for him.
“Gee, I’d like to see him,” he began.
“Come along then,” Jimmie invited. “I’m a sort of a visitor myself.
Going to give some of the tests for Bill. It’ll be exciting too, I tell
you. Queer things happening out at the camp recently, according to what
the scouts tell, who have gone out there on over night hikes. It’ll--”
But the presence of the eight other scouts, who had caught up with
them, put an end to Jimmie’s flow of confidence. Instead he turned to
the boy who seemed to be leader of the expedition. “Bill,” he began,
“this is Hooch Horn--a pal of mine. I’d like for him to go along.”
“Sure!” Bill was inclined to want all the company he could get. He had
heard much more about the queer happenings out at the camp than had
Jimmie. Another recruit to his crowd would strengthen its fighting
powers should they be called into use.
Renfro hesitated. Under ordinary circumstances he could have explained
the situation to his father so that he would have been willing for him
to go. But his mother’s mood, due to his carrying the Washington Globe
route, made him uneasy about his ability to do so now. However, Jimmie,
the quick witted, came to the rescue.
“Let Ted Bright explain things to your father,” he began. “He often
does that for me when I want to get out. He’s just like his dad--can
talk folks into doing anything he wants them to do.”
Renfro grinned. “All right,” he agreed, remembering his father’s
opinion of the elder Bright and how anxious he now was to stand in
that man’s good graces. “Dad’s still home I’m sure. He can call him up
from the corner grocery.”
While Ted was gone the boys told Renfro about the overnight hike they
had made the week before. The one before them tonight was a short
one,--out East Washington to the second road leading down to the river
road. Just beyond the land owned by Captain Pete Hall was that which
the city scouts had bought for a permanent camp site.
“You know the old cabin out there,” Ward Lane was the speaker now, “the
one with the two big cedar trees in front of it--just above the spring
where the Indian chiefs fought,” he talked rapidly, “we fellows went
out a few weeks ago and repaired it so we could use it for overnight
hikes. Now two patrols have used it but neither one of them will go out
again. They saw--”
“Oh, Hooch,” Ted’s voice several yards away, was happy, “It’s all
right. I had to talk like sixty tho. And I didn’t tell them we are
going to stay all night in the cabin.” He had reached the group now
and was laughing, “I think your mother believes we’re going to stay all
night in some sort of a hotel or other.”
“No doubt,” Jimmie laughed too. “With your explanations, Ted, and your
blarney, she might think anything.”
The patrol fell into regular order and took up its march. Jimmie and
Renfro followed the others. Back over the last part of Renfro’s paper
route they journeyed. Near Judge Wier’s house Jimmie remembered the
kidnaping and wanted to talk about it. Renfro listened, answering
the questions Jimmie asked but taking great care not to show unusual
interest sufficient to arouse Jimmie’s suspicions.
However, the lack of evident interest on the subject on Renfro’s part
disgusted Jimmie. And soon he began to talk about other subjects. The
deserted house on the Hall place, tall and dark and ghostly, reminded
him of Captain Pete’s skill as a hunter. Jimmie had gone with the old
hunter, whose boast was that he never shot his rabbits thru the body
“ef they had the least part of a head.”
The patrol slowed its pace and fell back to Jimmie and Renfro. They
were soon singing some lusty marching songs which put an end to the
conversation between the two boys. And Renfro was glad that it did. He
wanted to watch the landmarks along the road they were taking.
Just beyond the cabin they turned into a road leading to the river.
Six years before it had been kept in good repair for the people who
journeyed down to the fishing camp which was its terminus. But the camp
had been moved, the road was little used and had been allowed to fall
into a bad state.
Renfro stumbled over huge boulders in one place; in another he
went shoe top deep into a rut of snow. The scouts were having like
difficulties. Bill Larrison dropped his provisions and had quite a
scramble in getting them back into his bag again.
At the foot of the bluffs they climbed a fence, made of rails and wire,
crossed a field, hurried down a lane at the end of which loomed two
tall cedar trees. The dark blur back of them Renfro knew was the cabin.
Visions of a roaring fire in the big fire place the scouts had told
about building, began to cheer him when the patrol stopped.
“They’re going to pay their respects to Chief Wampum and Big Eagle,”
Jimmie gave the information.
He pushed Renfro close to a structure built after the fashion of a pig
pen. “The fellow built it around the graves so that the cattle and
horses couldn’t harm them,” Jimmie continued. “They’re real Indian
chiefs. Tell you about them tonight. The scouts who come out here
always have to pay their respects to them.”
A long wailing sound came from one of the boys, followed by Bill’s
heavy, gutteral, “Oh, chief, have you anything to say to your braves
tonight?”
Absolute silence answered his question. A few minutes’ wait and
Bill ordered his patrol to march on to the cabin. The march was
uninterrupted except for a large dog which moved near the boys. One of
them started to drive it away but Renfro intercepted him. “It’s a dog I
know,” he said, and called softy, “Lang Tammie.”
One minute the dog stopped, hesitated, sniffed, turned and ran back
up the hill. Renfro watched him out of sight. Then he went on to the
cabin, into which most of the boys had already gone.
Two coal oil wall lamps had been lighted when Renfro entered the room.
From their light he saw that the partitions had been removed and the
cabin thrown into one big room, a mammoth fire place was in the center
of the north wall. Bunks had been built along the south one.
Several times during the last two years when Renfro had gone on hikes
he had stopped at Twin Cedar Cabin to get a drink from the spring, its
water was noted as being the coldest and clearest in the vicinity.
Too, Renfro had been interested in the landmarks around the site. He
had heard, years before, the history of the spot and had seen the old
woman about whom they told the weird story which had made the site
famous. When she had been but fifteen years old two Indian chiefs had
seen her, both had wanted her for his squaw and they had fought a duel
at the spring, where both had been wounded.
Their braves had carried them away. Years afterward they had returned
and paid respects to the white girl for whom they had fought. She was
an old woman then, but had enjoyed the visit and recounted it ever
afterwards with much pleasure.
“And when they were dead,” Jimmie, as if reading Renfro’s thought,
suddenly said, “their braves brought them back and buried them near the
spring. Those were the graves you passed tonight.”
Renfro was inclined to be incredulous. “Queer I never heard about those
graves before,” he said.
“Yes, it is queer,” Jimmie grinned.
Bill was grumbling over near the fireplace. “Somebody’s been at the
provisions again,” he said. “The soap’s all gone. Why,” he shook an
empty bucket, “so’s the lard--” farther investigation--“and the eggs
you brought out yesterday, Hank, and--” he looked at some prints on the
floor--“whoever it was had a dog.”
Big prints on the floor made him decide it was a large dog. Except for
grumbling over the loss of the provisions, the other scouts paid little
attention to the prints, but to Renfro they held intense interest.
While they built a roaring fire in the fireplace he took his flashlight
to add to the light furnished by the coal oil lamps and examined the
prints closely.
Yes, they had evidently been made by an airedale dog. But close to them
were the muddy prints of a large shoe, the sort worn by a man who was
accustomed to hunting. Smaller tracks were confusing. They might have
been made by a small scout, but still they were narrow enough to have
been made by a girl’s sport oxford.
Renfro put some newspapers over one and on top of them put his paper
bag and mackinaw. The other boys had piled their mackinaws and
provision kits on the floor. In his heart was one hope--namely that
they would not remove his things. He had laid them down so carefully
that he was sure the footprints would remain intact and he could study
them more closely in the morning.
Yes, it was possible. Helen Wier’s kidnapers might have brought her to
this cabin the night they took her. They might have kept her there
until morning and then gone on down the river. They might--
“Out with the lights.” Bill Larrison’s voice became a low growl. “Out
with your lights, fellows and in a body move to the window.”
CHAPTER X.
THE LIGHT ON THE INDIAN GRAVES.
Renfro grasped one of the wall lamps, lifted it from its socket and
with all the power of his lungs blew down the chimney. The blaze was
instantly extinguished and left one smoking wick. At the same moment
Scout Brown had extinguished the other. Outside there sounded faint
footsteps. But when the boys reached the window no one was outside. The
door was opened, the scouts circled the cabin, and even journeyed to
the spring but no one was there.
“Bill’s excited,” Jimmie confided to Renfro, “He’s watching for the
lights at the grave.”
“What?” Renfro was amazed.
“Oh, last summer when we were out here, one of the scoutmasters, who
knew all the old men and women around here, told the boys that once
every ten years the two chiefs would come back to again fight by the
spring. And they believed it. The other two troops which were out here
said that at midnight queer lights played around the graves and word
has gone out that this is nearing the time for the two braves to
appear.”
Renfro laughed and moved close to the fire. “Of course,” he smiled,
“you don’t believe it.”
Jimmie in turn asked a question. “You heard those steps--didn’t you?”
Renfro nodded and smiled. “But you didn’t see anything nor anyone,”
Jimmie continued.
Another nod from Renfro. “And Hooch,” Jimmie moved closer to him. “You
saw those footprints.”
This time he excited Renfro’s interest. He was intensely concerned in
those footprints. He could hardly wait for morning to come to give him
an opportunity to study them. He felt that an answer was due Jimmie,
“Yes, I saw them,” he said, “And they are sure big ones.”
“Now I tell you--”
But Jimmie didn’t get to tell Renfro anything more. The patrol was
back in the room. Some of the boys had made weather observations
while out of the cabin and they were anxious to mark them on their
charts. A discussion on cooking meat followed their work and then the
ceremonials for the evening began.
They had just gotten to the most interesting part when Jimmie announced
that it was bedtime. One of the rules of the cabin committee, in order
to keep a strong friendship with the parents of the scouts, required
the hikers to go to bed at a certain hour. And like good scouts they
observed that rule.
The boys rolled up in blankets on the bunks. Several of them whispered.
Jack Burton next to Renfro, insisted upon telling both Jimmie and
Renfro of how his high school brother got angry every time he came out
to the cabin. The fraternity to which he belonged had wanted to buy
the cabin; but the scouts had offered a larger sum for it than did the
fraternity. “We beat them to it,” the little fellow finished, “and
every boy in that frat hates me ’cause I told the committee they was
wantin’ it and--”
He trailed on and on but Jimmie’s snores told that he was asleep and
Renfro’s mind was bent on other things. He saw again Captain Pete--the
big cabin--the dog--Lang Tammie, and then the many foot prints on Twin
Cedars’ floor. In the morning--
But in the morning he didn’t make his investigation. For hardly had
Renfro gotten to sleep when he was awakened by a low, warning voice.
Sibilant whispers went from one bunk to the other. “The light, the
light!” the boys whispered. “It’s on the graves now.”
Renfro raised on his elbow and saw that he was directly in range of the
window and of the enclosure on the graves. And the boys were right. A
weird unearthly blue light was playing over some of the boards of the
fence and over the two mounds inside the enclosure.
With quick breaths the boys watched it. Jimmie and Renfro went to the
window. For several minutes the lights, alternating from purple to
blue, played along the graves and then suddenly they went out.
“I’m in favor of investigating them,” Renfro began, turned away from
the window, struck the bench with his foot and fell headlong to the
floor. Something on which he landed slipped, he felt a soft wooly, mass
and realized with a start that he had fallen on his own coat.
“And on the foot prints,” he thought with a start.
“Light the lamp, Jim,” he called. “I want to see what I’ve done.”
“Hurt?” Jimmie Noel’s voice was full of hope. A chance for first aid
was not to be despised.
He carried the lamp to where Renfro lay. The other boys followed him.
And with a sinking heart Renfro feared that if he had not destroyed the
contour of the footprints the boys had.
Slowly and carefully he raised himself from the floor. He lifted
the coat, his paper bag and then the paper. Below, it was just an
indistinguishable lot of soil which had once been mud brought in on
shoes--the shape of which Renfro would have given a small fortune to
have been able to have told.
But now he knew that it was impossible.
* * * * *
The next morning Jimmie, Bill and Renfro made a trip to the two graves
while the other boys cooked breakfast in camp style. There were
no marks around the grave, no sign of destruction nor any kind of
invasion. Jimmie crawled over both mounds feeling his way carefully.
“It’s mighty queer,” was the only remark he made when his investigation
was finished.
And Renfro and Bill nodded.
Back in the cabin the other boys were discussing the same happening.
Before they left the cabin they made a vow to tell none of their
experiences to the rest of the scouts but to have weekly overnight
hikes out to the cabin. “Investigation hikes,” Bill dubbed them.
On the way back to town the boys overtook a solitary driver in a low
spring wagon. It was Captain Pete and he gave them a genial invitation
to ride back with him. “Good hunting weather,” he told them and
laughed, “but I don’t notice you fellows brought in anything.”
“We were making a hike,” Bill answered for the crowd. “We camped out at
Twin Cedar cabin last night.”
Captain Pete chuckled. “Where did you git them Indian mounds?” he
insisted.
The boys looked at Jimmie but that worthy did not even offer to answer.
Instead he changed the conversation back to rabbit hunting and got
Captain Pete into a monologue again. While he talked, Renfro studied
him--his face across which there were long scratches and his shifting
eyes. Sometimes they were as gentle as a woman’s and again when he was
angry they were cruel.
As the boys clambered out of the wagon, he gave a shrewd chuckle,
“Didn’t see anything queer out there last night--did you?” he asked.
“Some of the scouts did last week, ’cordin’ to what one of their
mothers told me. Didn’t see nothin’--you fellows--did you?”
And they disdained to even answer.
From the little restaurant where he went to supplement his camp
breakfast, Renfro telephoned home before he went on to school. His
father answered the telephone and he was in a very agreeable mood. He
asked Renfro if he had enjoyed his trip and then gave him a telephone
number which had been left for him the night before.
Renfro recognized the number as that of Morrison’s telephone. The clock
on the restaurant wall told him that he had time to go past the office
on his way to school. Better talk face to face with Morrison than over
the telephone, he decided.
The morning paper on the table had big headlines about the Wier
kidnaping. The story it contained was almost a repetition of the one
the Globe had had the evening before. No new clues had been discovered,
according to the detectives. He also admitted that if any were
uncovered they would be kept secret.
Then followed detailed interviews from all of the Wier servants, none
of whom could or would add a bit of information to the stories already
told. Renfro read them thoroughly. And while he ate his buck-wheat
cakes, he wondered whether or not the cabin at Twin Cedars had harbored
any of the kidnapers.
The lights outside the cabin had interested but not disturbed him.
Now he was inclined to give them more attention. Of course, it was
ridiculous to think that they were made by returning spirits, as some
of the younger scouts seemed to think. But still these lights did not
just happen to come to the grave.
Back of their coming was some weird purpose, Renfro was sure. “I’ll
keep them in mind the next time I go out that way,” he decided. “Jim’s
so interested in them that he’ll ask me to go with him again I’m sure.
They may--”
With a rush of cold air the front door opened and Jimmie Noel entered
the room. He had stopped at the office to see if his brother had
carried his route on time. “No complaints,” he said cheerfully to
Renfro. “Going past home?”
Renfro shook his head. “Have to see Morrison,” he returned.
“I’m not going that way,” Jimmie warmed his hands at the radiator.
“Have to go by home. But I want you to go back to the cabin soon,
Hooch, with me. There’s something back of those lights--something
mysterious. You’re a bear at working out mysteries. And for the good of
Twin Cedar camp I want that one solved. If something isn’t found out to
prove those lights aren’t ghostly things, that camp will be about as
popular as a water snaked swimming hole for the scouts. You’ll go with
me--won’t you, Hooch?”
“You bet!” Renfro smiled. He was surely glad Jimmie had not connected
the cabin with the kidnaping. He didn’t want to share honors with
Jimmie even in working out his kidnaping clues. And besides he wasn’t
sure that the Twin Cedar cabin held any part in the episode. Yet he
wished he had not fallen and himself destroyed the footprints.
CHAPTER XI.
RENFRO BECOMES A MENTOR.
Morrison was at his desk. He jerked out a surly answer to Renfro’s
pleasant, “Good morning.”
In the same mood he turned in his chair and saw Renfro. The frown
by some mysterious manner was jerked into a smile. “Hello Horn,” he
beamed. “Got my message--didn’t you?” In rapid jerks he continued,
“Needn’t have bothered to come in. Could have told you over the wire.
Want you to take a pupil on Old Grief.”
A look of dismay on Renfro’s face answered him. “Oh, no--haven’t the
least idea of taking it away from you,” he hastened to reassure Renfro.
“I want you to take Merle Riker out there with you this afternoon and
teach him how you get new customers.”
He pointed to a chair and Renfro dropped into it. But there was no
break in Morrison’s conversation. “Good kid, but lacks pep--Mother’s
a widow--needs the money--gave him one of our best routes. He’s good
to collect, because the people are all good pay. He doesn’t lose a
subscriber. Doesn’t get any new ones either. Just keeps the route the
way it is. And he’s got the best route for new customers in town--all
except Old Grief,” he winked. “Now the Riker family will need a
Christmas turkey and the Globe needs new subscribers out there. See?”
“Yes sir,” Renfro got in an answer this time.
“I’ll send a sub out in Merle’s place this afternoon and you take him
with you,” Morrison continued. “Keep still about it. Don’t want to make
a precedent out of this--unusual case--feel sorry for the family. All
the kid needs is some pep. Inspire it. Get me, Horn?”
Renfro nodded. “I’ll do my best,” he promised.
And he kept his word. When he reached the station that night, a slender
boy with a face which was molded along feminine lines, and whose
clothes were well worn met him. Renfro studied him a minute before he
began talking. As he studied he decided that like Morrison, he was
going to like this boy. He lacked enterprise. But Renfro believed that
this was on account of shyness due to his poverty.
For when the boy lifted his eye lashes there was a quality of steel
in his gray eyes. His mouth too had a firmness at the corners that
promised much. He walked along the street in quick long steps, which
matched those taken by Renfro and he was ever in an alert, ready to
listen attitude.
“We’ll try some new subscribers first,” Renfro volunteered. “Then you
can help me throw my papers and if we have time we’ll get a few more.”
“All right,” the steel quality was also in the boy’s voice.
Renfro consulted his book, found a number three doors away and led the
way to a little L shaped cottage. A big, burly man came to the door.
“Do you read the Globe?” Renfro began in a pleasant way.
The man started to shut the door with a gruff, “No,” when Renfro’s foot
slipped just inside enough to prevent that. “I am the new carrier on
this route,” he began. “I have taken it for several years’ service, so
I wanted all the people to know me.”
The man stared at him more kindly and opened the door a bit farther
himself. “I don’t like the Globe,” he said, the surliness still in his
voice. “It comes too late in the evening and--”
“It came too late in the evening,” Renfro smiled. “I bring it before
any other carrier on this route brings the other evening papers. And I
can prove it. You ask any of the people on my route.”
The man hesitated. Renfro reached into his bag and brought out a paper.
“I’ll leave one now and stop on my way home to get your order,” he
smiled.
The man took the paper and laughed. “I’ll see,” he promised. “I’m going
to call up the grocer on the corner and see if you are the first boy
out with your papers,” he added. “My wife wants an early paper, so she
can read it before she starts getting the supper.”
Renfro turned to Merle as they walked toward the street. “After that
I have to be prompt,” he said. “We’ll carry my papers now. From now
on--I’ll carry my route before I try to get a single new subscriber.”
Merle nodded. “Yes, Hooch,” he agreed. “I’ll remember that, too.”
He reached out his arm for the papers and Renfro gave him half the
bundle. Together they traversed Old Grief, with its pawn shops, second
hand stores, lunch wagons, cheap butcher stores, army supply store and
dozens of other “imitation places of business”. Then they came into the
poorer residence district, where the children fought for the honor of
carrying the paper to the door. From this they passed into the street
on which lived the old residents of Lindendale, who would not leave
their ancestral homes.
“There,” Renfro nodded toward the big house surrounded with shrubbery
which needed trimming, “is where Judge Wier lives--Helen Wier’s father.”
Merle Riker stared. “Judge Wier helped my mother,” he said simply, “I
hope some one finds his daughter. He’s a kind man.”
Renfro laughed. “Most people don’t know it,” he added.
At one house Renfro stopped to collect. The woman had not had her money
Saturday and was inclined to show an ugly disposition because Renfro
had stopped for it in the middle of the week instead of waiting until
the next Saturday.
“It isn’t convenient for me to pay every time,” she said in a cross
voice, “and if you’re afraid to trust me, I’ll get another paper.”
Renfro looked straight at her. “I have to pay for my papers every
week,” he said. “And I come every evening thru the rain and snow and
cold, right on time, because it’s my job. And you--”
“I suppose you were going to say mine is to pay you on time too,” the
woman was still surly though she saw Renfro’s logic before he had time
to utter it all. “Wait.”
She went into the house and returned with twenty cents.
“She’ll pay next Saturday,” Merle spoke before Renfro could. “She saw
what you meant and knew you were right, too.”
The route finished, Renfro again consulted his red book, in which
all his prospective subscribers were listed. “Want to try a place of
business?” he asked, “Or, are all the people on your route families.”
Merle shook his head and explained that he had three blocks of the
east side stores in his route, though few of the merchants who kept
them were regular subscribers. “They buy the papers on the street,” he
explained, “so I don’t think it’s much difference whether or not I have
them.”
“Means more money for you,” Renfro gave the best reason first, the one
which he knew would appeal to a boy needing money. “Then, too, when
they want a paper they buy most any one. If the boy they meet doesn’t
have the Globe they may ask another boy for one, but if the second one
doesn’t happen to have one then the chances are even that they will buy
another paper. Get me?”
Merle nodded.
So back to the pawn shop, and second hand clothing store district they
went. It was a butcher shop, however, into which Renfro led the way.
He smiled at the man behind the block and waited until the customer
had been served and departed with his bundle. “Read the paper I left
yesterday?” he asked, “and how did you like the market report?”
The butcher came around from behind the block to discuss the market
report. He admitted that he had liked the report in the Globe. “But
I can buy it off the street boy who comes in every evening,” he
volunteered. “I don’t need to bother to subscribe. It wastes my time.”
“Oh, no,” Renfro shook his head but was very courteous, “It won’t take
you nearly so much time to pay me once a week as it does to pay the
boys on the street every day. And sometimes they forget to come in or
you have a customer and they can’t wait, then you have to go to the
door and hunt one up.”
The man grinned. “Oh, beat it,” he laughed good naturedly, “you want my
subscription. Is it a prize?”
“I want to save you time,” Renfro was still serious, “and money.
Sometimes you can’t get the Globe when you go out after it, because the
boys may be sold out. Then you have to take another paper and you have
a different market report. And you may lose money because the other
will not be so thorough.”
“Yes,” the butcher was serious now. “You are a good talker, and I will
subscribe to save time. It is just as you say, though I never thought
of it before. You make out a card and I’ll pay now and you bring it
tomorrow. Early!”
“Yes, sir,” Renfro began making out the card.
The next prospective subscriber was a woman, one of the
have-to-be-convinced of everything sort. Renfro had left her a paper
the evening before and she had read it but yet she couldn’t see much
difference between it and the evening paper she had taken for five
years. Renfro opened one of his papers, carried it to the library
table, showed her the Woman’s page, explained the information which it
contained, talked about the features, the editorials, and knowing the
nature of most women, ended with its strong society column.
“I’ll try it,” she agreed. “I’ll take it a week and then if every copy
is as good as your two samples, I’ll subscribe regularly.”
“Every copy is just like the sample.” Renfro was sober then.
But outside he and Merle chuckled. “She thinks we get out extra good
papers for samples,” they laughed and laughed.
“I’d like to go back to the first man you gave the sample paper,” Merle
said at the sidewalk. “I think I understand now how to get customers
but I’d like to see what he does.”
Back to the little L shaped house they went. The man was ready for
them. “The man at the corner says you are all right. What I want is an
early evening paper, so I’ll sign your subscription card.”
“That is the secret of getting subscriptions,” Renfro confided to Merle
when they were alone again. “Find out what your prospective subscribers
want and then show them that your paper is the one which gives them
exactly that--from early papers to those which are carefully folded and
put in a convenient place on the front porch.”
CHAPTER XII.
THE SCRATCHES ON THE WINDOW.
Mary was in the kitchen when Renfro stormed in the back entrance at his
home that evening. He heard her begin to rattle pans and he knew that
she was going to see to it that he got an extra good supper. “Another
turkey, Mary,” he sang out while he hung his paper bag and cap on the
hooks she had given to him.
Cautiously she came to the door. “There’s company in the living room
with your paw and maw,” she whispered sibilantly. “They’re talking
about the kidnaping. I’ve been lying down close to the door--face and
stomach to the floor,” she confided. “I crawled backwards when I heard
you comin’ and Glory be, I got clean thru the dining room without
knockin’ anything over.”
Renfro followed her into the kitchen. “Gee, but I’m hungry,” he
sniffed. “Mary, love, what have you to feed me?”
Mary became stern. “A pretty detective you are, Mr. Renny,” she refused
to use his manly nickname at the hour of his failure in her eyes.
“Aint I been throwin’ clues in the shapes of hints at you ever since
I begin talkin’? Aint I done got down off my own dignity and told you
how downcast I was on that floor? And what’s to prevent you but a empty
stomach from followin’ my example and learnin’ things your paw and maw
never would tell you?”
“Aw, Mary, don’t be so hard on a fellow,” Renfro’s voice was pleading.
“I was so hungry and I couldn’t grasp any kind of a hint. Course I’m
going to go in there. Only, for goodness sake, have my supper ready
when the talk changes to other subjects!”
But Mary seized his shoulders. “You’re goin’ to do no such thing!” she
commanded. “Your supper is in the warming closet. Take it out and eat
it with the other things on the kitchen table. It’s meself who’s goin’
back. If anybody starts into the room, distract them, Hooch.”
The next minute she was down on the floor and wriggling her way across
the dark dining room. A big red and green snake could not have made any
more twists and turns than she did in getting across the room. Renfro
knew that she was so bulky that she was afraid to try to lie down in
the dining room, so she had instead taken this way of getting to the
door.
He held his hands to his sides to keep from laughing so that she could
hear him. “Bulky but ambitious,” he laughed, “and a good pal,” he
finished soberly.
Back he went to the supper, rattling the pans and dishes unnecessarily
so that his parents knowing that he was home would be more comfortable.
Straight thru oyster soup, roast mutton and peach pie he waded. He was
just ready to venture on a second cup of coffee when he heard Mary
nearing the kitchen door.
Just outside the door she straightened. Disgustedly she spoke, “If them
Wiers aint goin’ to have some detectives from Chicago, and us with such
a good clue.”
Renfro’s face fell. This then would probably be the end of his hopes
to solve the mystery. Still there was a chance for him. No one except
himself and Mary knew of the missing eyebrows.
Then he told Mary about his visit to Captain Pete’s cabin and the
conversation. “Mary!” Renfro stood up in his excitement, “Pete’s face
was a dead give away when I mentioned the lights in the big house. His
eyes were as scared as a kid’s. He knows that somebody is there, and
I’m going to find out who that somebody is and just where the rest of
those missing eyebrows are.”
Mary nodded her head. “Our part of them, Renfro, are still in my
Bible,” she assured him. “I’ve looked at them every hour to see they
don’t fade away. And I bought me a blackboard to reproduce them as your
pa says, for our observation--so as to keep ’em in our mind night and
day.”
In the library Mr. Horn was telling the visiting lawyer about Renfro’s
experience with a paper route when the youngster entered the room. He
boasted of his new subscribers to his mother’s chagrin. “If she knew I
was working for Thanksgiving turkeys she would die,” Renfro laughed to
himself. “I’ve half a notion to spring it on her now.”
But he didn’t. He lingered long enough to be sure that they were not
going to talk about the kidnaping any more, and then he went up to his
own room. For a half hour he worked checking up on his new subscribers
and collections. This done he took up the new magazine on his desk and
tore off the cover. It had been on his desk three days unopened--a
happening which had never before occurred. And all because of his
interest in the turkey contest and the Missing Eyebrow Mystery.
He read the last chapter of the serial. And then he sought Mary again.
“It ended just the way I said it would,” he told her waving the
magazine in front of her. “The two fellows who took the jewels were
Fred and Manuel and they hid them--”
Mary’s hand was raised imperatively. “Listen Hooch,” she said. “I’ve
been making plans myself. Tomorrow night is my regular choir practice.
Before I go to it I’ll come out on Washington and we’ll both go to
them different places--one of us to the shack and the other to the big
house. Then we’ll see who is in both places at the same time. That way
they’ll have no chance to send signals or communicate to each other.”
“Fine, fine, Mary!” Renfro’s enthusiasm was all that Mary could ask.
She murmured something about the pity being that Renfro too had not
taken a correspondence course in detective work and her bosom heaved
with pride.
“But, Mary,” Renfro hesitated, “are you sure you won’t mind missing
choir practice?”
Missing choir practice was one of Mary’s greatest horrors. In all the
fifteen years that she had sung alto in the mission church, she had not
missed one practice. And now she was planning to deliberately miss one.
But she wasn’t. The next minute she set Renfro to rights on that. “I
said I might be late,” she said severely, “I’m countin’ on us workin’
fast. I’m not going to miss nothin’ I tell you.”
But she did miss something. Then next morning at exactly five o’clock
the Horn telephone rang. Mary, calling down maledictions on the head of
whoever would call at that hour, listened to the conversation at the
other end of the wire and with a changed mien proceeded to Renfro’s
door.
It was Jimmie who called. The carrier boy whose Morning Post route was
adjoining his had badly frozen his foot the night before. His first aid
work had relieved him somewhat the night before but this morning he
could not walk. And Jimmie wanted Renfro to help him carry the other
boy’s route.
“I told him you would,” Mary was hunting Renfro’s heaviest coat. “It’s
not so cold as it was last night, Renny. And I knew you would want to
be a good scout and help a carrier out. Now that’s the way I am. When
the soprano soloist was sick and out of church for a whole week once, I
sang high soprano when it was the most important part in the songs and
then dropped right back to alto when the low parts were most important.
There’s nothin’--”
But Renfro was motioning her to the door. “I’ve got to dress in a
hurry,” he told her. “You explain to father and let him make it right
with mother. Now, Mary, for heaven’s sake keep still before mother and
don’t get her started. Let dad--”
A few minutes later he was off, buttoning his coat collar as he ran
toward the station at which Jimmie got his papers. And there he found
Jimmie waiting for him. “Hooch Horn,” he said impressively, “you’re
a good scout. I called up six fellows’ houses before I did yours and
every place I got Hail Columbia, Happy Land for waking up the family.
And you--”
“And I, Jimmie,” Renfro said impressively, “I tell you the reason you
didn’t get the same dope at the seventh house was because Mary Dugan,
good old scout, answered the phone.”
And so flustered was Mary that morning with extra breakfasts and
avoiding any mix-ups with her mistress that she forgot to read the
morning paper. Renfro in turn did not have time to even think of such a
feast. As he folded the papers he had glanced at the headlines, which
told of Judge Wier’s summoning the Chicago detectives and Mrs. Wier’s
getting another note from Helen, it also asserting that she was safe.
So she was frightened half “into fits” as she expressed it when Renfro
rushed into the kitchen in the middle of the morning. “Mary, where is
mother?” he demanded in a loud whisper.
Mary answered that she was out.
“Then I can talk,” he added, “Mary, we are lost; or our clue is--no,
I mean discovered by some one else. I borrowed a morning paper last
hour and there what do you think? Yesterday Mrs. Wier, while walking up
and down the library happened to look at the window from which most of
the ice had melted and discovered some little scratches I made with my
knife when I scraped off those eyebrows.”
He caught his breath. “Of course she doesn’t know they’re mine,” he
added. “But she showed them to the detectives and vowed they were not
there before--that the windows were put in new this fall and were
perfect and--”
His teeth chattering. Mary’s big, strong, red hand went over his
trembling ones. “Hooch Horn,” she said sternly, “You aint worrying half
so much over them finding a clue like ourn as you are because you’re
skeert they’ll think you had something to do with that kidnaping! Now
aint you?”
Before Renfro could answer she stormed on, “Well, they won’t. You and
me is too small fry to even be considered. They know you aint got sense
enough to plan such a thing. If they thought we was workin’ on a clue
they would give us the horse collar. And that’s why we got to work
this plot out. See?”
She shook him soundly. “We’ll go out there tonight as we planned. And
you git back to school. Pretty soon you’ll have that sick excuse worn
clean out. Git back, I say, in a hurry so that I can read the newspaper
and see for myself just what they do know about them winder scratches.”
CHAPTER XIII.
A TRIP TO THE CABIN.
It was exactly a quarter of seven o’clock that night and Renfro with
his paper bag almost empty had just turned the corner into South
Washington Street when he ran plump--into Mary Dugan. She was puffing
as one who had been undergoing great exertion.
“Hello, Hooch!” she managed a casual greeting and then burst straight
into a monologue on the difficulties of her journey. She had hired her
sister to come over to the Horn house to serve the dinner, and the
sister had been late. Mary had boarded the wrong car and had had to
transfer on her way out and--
“But Mary,” Renfro exclaimed, “You’re too early! Something broke down
with the press, we got our papers late. I haven’t got a single new
subscriber and I have two more blocks to deliver.”
“On both sides of the street?” Mary’s question was direct.
“Sure!” Renfro was impatient.
“Then gimme me half of them,” Mary held out her hands on which were
gray cotton gloves and which looked like veritable apparitions in the
darkness. “Now don’t say I won’t know where to leave ’em. I know I
won’t. But we kin work skilful--can’t we? I’ll start right across the
street from you and you whistle at every house where I’m to stop.”
“Some girl, Mary Dugan,” Renfro began to count out papers into her
hands, “Now where did you learn--”
“Hooch Horn,” Mary interrupted him almost dropping her papers in her
eagerness to explain. “You aint learned yet half the clues I learned in
that detective course.”
The papers tumbled again, and would have fallen had not Hooch caught
them. “It’s them gloves,” Mary was quick to realize the impediments the
bulky cotton gloves were in the paper carrying art. Her right one came
off with a dash and was thrust into her coat pocket.
“Now gimme the part of the street you know best,” she commanded. “Your
whistler will be saved some that way.”
A wave of Renfro’s hand and Mary darted across the street. Without any
sign, or any communication except the keen whistles from Renfro, they
finished the two blocks in record breaking time. And then they met at
the end of the block.
“But I haven’t got any new subscribers, Mary,” Renfro hesitated, “I
made my daily quota out several days ago and I can’t break it, you
know.”
“And I made my rule agin’ bein’ late at choir practice several years
ago,” Mary’s alto voice was very dry, “but I’m thinkin’ this here
business is worth breakin’ anything. This here affair of our goin’ down
there tonight means either you miss your subscribers or I miss my choir
practice and--”
“Mary,” Hooch’s hand went on her arm. “Since you are so good a sport, I
can make up my subscribers Saturday and Monday.”
“You ought to be gettin’ them other subscribers from our own part of
town, Hooch,” Mary offered advice, “They’d be easier landed and--”
“But it doesn’t seem fair to get into some other fellow’s territory,”
Hooch began. “Now--”
Mary interrupted him in a determined voice. “Foolishness! Them
circulars you had at home said for you to go anywhere. If you had a
good route them other boys would be a comin’ to it mighty fast. And if
you have any business sense like the Horns all have, you’ll follow my
plan.”
“All right,” Renfro was very meek. Experience had taught him that it
was folly to argue with Mary. “We go down this road, Mary, down the
middle. It’s as slick as glass and I expect we’d better hold on to each
other. We don’t want any broken arms.”
Mary clutched Renfro’s arm with her mittened hand. Together they
slipped, they slid, then fumbled, and nearly fell on their way toward
the lane which marked the turning off place for the big house, and the
little shack.
The sky was clear, there were few trees along the road, and there was a
half moon. So Mary and Hooch had no trouble finding the best place to
scale the log fence. Mary refused all offers of help. She had climbed
rail fences when she was a girl and knew the exact art with which such
a crossing was effected. Moreover she added with emphasis that she “was
not an old lady yet by any manner of means.”
Still she had not counted on the rails being coated with ice. And no
sooner was she at the top of the fence than she was at the bottom on
the other side. Fortunately it was on the opposite side of the fence
she had landed and when Renfro scrambled over and stood beside her she
was on her feet again.
She held herself with dignity and Renfro realizing that there are some
things which it would cause a calamity to discuss was silent. She was
the first one to speak. “You go to the shack and I’ll go to the big
house,” she was the general again though great had been her fall. “It
would be suspicious looking to Captain Pete for me, a single maiden
lady to come knockin’ at his door this time of night.”
“Yes,” Renfro’s voice was meek. Mary never suspected that he was
literally holding his sides to keep from bursting into gales of
laughter.
“And,” Mary was all dignity again. “I don’t want any man to be buildin’
up false hopes on me. It is not Mary Dugan who has yet brought ruin to
a man from raisin’ their expectations and she don’t begin now with an
old time soldier.”
“No, Mary,” Renfro managed another sober response.
Just then there was a crackling and half roaring sound over in the
shrubbery of the orchard. Just as Mary and Renfro stopped and clutched
at each other a dark form came out with a rush and threw itself against
Renfro’s legs.
Mary stumbled, almost fell and then ejaculated a word which she had not
used since she had become a choir singer, but Renfro patted the big dog
and soothed him. “Lang Tammy, Lang Tammy,” he crooned, and then he felt
a broken strap on the dog’s neck, “they’ve had you tied up tonight and
you wanted to see me--didn’t you?”
“Whose dog is he?” Mary demanded with asperity, thinking that Renfro
had kept something from her.
But Renfro reminded her of the dog which had been with the old man whom
he suspected of being Captain Pete’s brother, and who he was sure knew
a great deal about the affair. “Yes, I remember,” Mary was the general
once again. “You’d better get rid of him if you can. Havin’ him with us
would be suspicious.”
Lang Tammy was tugging at Renfro’s bag. For a few seconds Renfro played
with him, and while he did Mary fumbled in her pocket. She dropped
something on the ice. “Some of my peppermints,” she explained. “My
Brother Sam--he allus says if you wants to be friends with a dog just
give him some candy.”
And then Renfro uttered a short, sharp command and Lang Tammy was back
in the orchard again. Renfro was aware that the big dog would not show
up again that night. The afternoon’s tying had offended him. And he
would stay away from the big house to get even with his master.
He watched the dark form in the orchard while they went up the lane,
and he took the opposite direction from the one in which the big house
lay. A few more rods of slipping and sliding and he and Mary arrived at
their place of parting. He gave her some instructions about making her
way around the big house.
“The main thing, Mary dear,” Renfro was solicitous again, “the main
thing is not to fall, you know.”
“Yes, I know,” there was a touch of humor in Mary’s voice, “Me father
used to say that I had the most trouble in keepin’ my head but tonight
it’s a case of whin me worst trouble is keepin’ me feet I’m thinkin’.”
And then they separated.
Renfro found Captain Pete’s door. The old man unbarred it, held high
his little old lamp with the blackened chimney, identified his visitor
and gruffly commanded him to come in. The rabbits were ready, but for
the life of him he couldn’t see any use of Renfro’s coming so late.
When he was young parents didn’t allow their sons to be out so late,
and--
“But I had to carry my paper route,” Renfro spoke pleasantly, and the
captain thawed to an extent.
When he went to wrap the rabbits in an old newspaper he muttered
something about being short on paper and Renfro brought his two extra
papers out of his bag. “Seeing you won’t be a regular customer without
being shown the advantage of a newspaper, Captain Pete,” Renfro smiled
a winning smile, “I’m going to sample you for a while as the boys say.
Every night I have an extra paper I’ll bring it down to you and soon
I’ll warrant you’ll be a regular customer. I always carry an extra so
that if I get a new customer, I can leave the paper right then.”
Pete shook his head. He muttered something about it being too far for
a boy to come alone. All of which only made Renfro more determined to
visit him. As he had declared the night before the actions of Captain
Pete were evident that though innocent himself perhaps, he was not
ignorant altogether about the kidnaping of Helen Wier.
Outside of the shack Renfro circled around to avoid suspicion, should
Captain Pete happen to open the door again, and worked his way back to
the meeting place he and Mary had appointed. He waited, he counted the
minutes, he fumed, he fretted and still no Mary arrived. He pulled out
his watch with its radio face and saw that it was a quarter after eight
o’clock.
“Mary won’t get to sing alto tonight,” he murmured to himself. “We’ll
get back to town just about the time it’s over.”
And then Mary came. She clutched at his arm. “I can’t be stoppin’ to
talk,” she was hurrying him toward the fence. “I’ve promised the leader
I’d get there in time to practice the Sunday anthem and I will keep me
promise too. You can go with me on the car, Hooch.”
“And say,” they were at the fence again, “I’ve got a few clues of my
own. And,” Mary put her foot on the first rail, “You help me all you
can. That falling down sort of affected my constitution, Hooch.”
CHAPTER XIV.
THE MAN IN THE HAUNTED HOUSE.
Mary was the first one to speak and then it was to reassure Renfro,
“You needn’t worry about your folks askin’ any questions,” she told
him. “They went to the show unexpected like and won’t know what time
you get home. I heard your paw tell your maw he’s got the tickets and
he bought only two for he thought you needed to go to bed early after
bein’ out so late with your route.”
Renfro nodded and felt a bit of relief. He and Mary were near the
center of the car. Mary had chosen that spot because there were few
passengers there and they could talk without being afraid some one
could hear them.
All the passengers and even the conductor had stared at the odd pair
when they boarded the car. Several had smiled broadly and Renfro had
been indignant until he had happened to look at Mary and someway in her
downfall at the fence she had gotten her hat turned completely around.
The big red rose directly on the back of her hat was too much for him.
And he too giggled.
“Mary,” he whispered, “Your hat’s back slided and--”
Mary Dugan laughed heartily. “Don’t make much difference,” she added,
“Me nose and face is so bloomin’ red tonight I don’t need the rose for
any further touch of color to me make up.”
And then she began to tell about her experiences. She had moved close
to the big house at the corner at which she had arrived, keeping a
close look out for the big airedale which she felt sure would turn up
at the most unexpected minute. Carefully she had worked her way around
the house--the west side, the south side, the east and there she had
discovered her first sign of life in the big house.
A glimmer of light thru a torn place in the heavy blind over the
window. She had realized in a minute that thru those thick blinds she
would not discover anything. So she had felt her way around to the
north, found a loose weatherboard, pulled it off and worked the blade
of her knife, which she always carried, thru the plastering. A few
vigorous, skilful twists and she had worked a hole which made a good
peeping place for her right eye.
Her homely face became alight with the joy of success. She had chosen
that spot well. It gave her a view into the lighted room. Cautiously
then she had worked out another peep hole for the left eye and then she
had studied every move in the adjoining room.
After a time she had discovered that there was but one occupant and
that he was exceedingly cautious. He moved always so that he was not
near the window. He had passed the doorway only three or four times and
each of these times Mary had studied him closely. He was short, heavy
set, his hair was gray, his clothes of an ancient style and he was what
Mary termed “uncouth” getting an “ou” sound which Renfro felt that he
would always remember.
But he had never once turned his face toward the open doorway and Mary
had not seen his face. So, of course, she knew nothing of the condition
of his eyebrows. But she felt sure that they would be missing. His hair
had been white. Naturally his eyebrows would be too. His hair looked as
if it were very coarse.
And the eyebrows in captivity back in her Bible were so coarse that had
they been scattered on the floor they would hardly have been taken for
human hair.
Moreover the man was in hiding. That was plainly evident. And Captain
Pete? Didn’t that wily old fellow show by his actions that he was
helping to conceal some one in the big house?
Renfro clutched his paper bag in which were the rabbits. Yes, indeed,
he would watch Captain Pete. But Mary was not thinking much of watching
Captain Pete. They must find some way to see that man’s face. No use
to knock. They would have to plan some better ruse than that. She
would think about it over night, she assured Renfro, re-read some of
her correspondence course in “detectiveness” and be ready to have a
conference with him on the next day.
“Some plan, partner,” Renfro slapped Mary boyishly on the back
completely dislodging her hat. “You’re a brick, a gold one, and a
jeweled one and--”
“A plain chimney one,” Mary laughed while she twisted and turned her
hat until she felt that from the way it set on her head that the red
rose was either directly in front or behind. A cautious search with her
fingers made her mind easy on that, and she continued her conversation.
“All right, Hooch, only don’t never call me a brick for a foundation.
It’ll make me think of that fence and my downfall. All the way to that
house I was so frivolous like, that I kept humming over and over. ‘How
firm a foundation, Ye Saints of the Lord’, and laughin’ because I, one
of the Saints, couldn’t git over a wobbly log fence, and wonderin’ what
I would do should I strike a firm foundation in my path.”
They had reached the mission, now, and the choir was in full force of
rehearsal. The bass was leading much to Mary’s disgust. She snorted
derisively and assured Renfro that when she got in there they wouldn’t
ever hear that insurance agent, who put on airs, sing.
At the door when he turned to go home she suddenly clutched at his
coat. “Oh. Hooch,” she whispered, “I clean forgot to tell you something
very disturbin’ I read. When them detectives looked at them scratches
on the window they said right away they had been done by a knife and
then they found two of them coarse hairs. They didn’t think much of
them, the paper says, but still they are keeping them. And” she pushed
him down the steps, “that means we have got to work fast.”
Renfro found that he was trembling when he reached the foot of the
steps--not from fear of being apprehended himself but of some other
person discovering the kidnapers before he could. His only hope lay in
the fact that the detectives had all based their search on the idea
that Helen Wier had been kidnaped by persons who would either soon
demand a ransom or by some one who wanted to have revenge on Judge Wier.
And neither Captain Pete nor his brother could have that motive in
mind he was sure. He had investigated some old newspapers at the Globe
office that evening and found that Judge Wier had been a mere stripling
of a lawyer when Captain Pete’s brother had been found guilty of
counterfeiting and been sent to prison. Also he had not had anything to
do with the prosecution.
He looked back over his shoulder, and saw the light in the windows of
Mary’s church even down to the basement. It was all a brilliant blaze.
“A fire!” He gasped and started to run back.
Then he remembered. Mary had said that the charitable women of the
church were going to work there that night to fix Thanksgiving baskets
for the poor. They were making clothes for them. The other members of
the church would have to donate the food and clothing.
Renfro gave a sudden jump. It was followed by another, and then a wild
Highland fling. “I have it, I have it, I have it!” he yelled out loud.
A door opened directly in front of him. An inquisitive head was thrust
out, a fretful voice asked, “What’s the matter?”
And Renfro fled.
Half way down the block he stopped to laugh. “But it was worth making
some one think I was insane,” he laughed. “And I’ll do it, too.”
Early in the morning he would go to the minister of the church which
his mother, his father and himself attended. He would tell him about
the turkeys. He would offer three of them to the poor, which the
church would feed at Thanksgiving time. There were many people in that
wealthy church who bought The Globe on the street instead of being
regular subscribers. He would add some of them to his list.
“I’ll do it--I will,” he whispered this time.
But his whisper was full of ardor. “And wait until next week when I see
Morrison’s face. Six of those turkeys are mine.”
Just then he decided to go into a little lunch room hardly bigger than
the lunch wagons in the west part of town, and get himself something
warm to drink. There was one near the corner at which the car stopped.
He looked through the door, saw the steaming “hot dogs” on an iron
grate and entered.
The place was deserted except for the old man doing the cooking and a
dog lying close to his little stove. The big dog was a collie and a
very suspicious creature for he barked at Renfro as he entered. The man
quieted him with a hoarse growl, took Renfro’s order and filled it all
the time frowning sullenly as if he considered a customer an insult.
He was tall and thin and bent and broken. Evidence of a hard life were
written all over him. His shrewd eyes spoke volumes about bartering.
Renfro was wondering about the methods he used when there sounded on
the back door an imperative tapping and the man went back to answer it.
Renfro watched him swing some rabbits into view, heard him quarrel
about the shots being in their bodies instead of their heads, and
smiled when he paid the person who was selling the rabbits with a
handful of small coins. “Seems to lower the price that way,” he thought.
And then he listened closely. The restaurant man has said something
about the thickets west of town being full of rabbits and that a fellow
who had access to them ought to be a little cheaper on his rabbits to a
poor restaurant man than was this old man.
With a careful, quiet movement he was off his stool, and had started
toward the front door. But the big dog intercepted his progress, had
given a series of growls and stood in a menacing position till the
owner slammed the door and came to Renfro’s rescue.
The man was half way down the street before Renfro was to the front
door. And it was evident he did not intend taking a car so Renfro
skirted around a block and passed him farther down, face to face.
At least Renfro’s face was toward the other’s, whose visage was shaded
by a heavy pair of goggles.
But Renfro knew one thing. The man was not Captain Pete. And he was
almost sure of another. That he was the man whom he had met face to
face the first time he had seen Lang Tammy. But of one thing he was
uncertain. Mary had seen a stranger in the big house a short time
before. Then how could he have gotten across the town on foot in such a
short time?
CHAPTER XV.
A DEAL IN TURKEYS.
Saturday was almost over before Renfro got to see the Rev. Mr.
Bottleman, who was the clergyman in charge of the church which he and
his parents attended. He had made his first trip to the parsonage early
in the morning, before he had time to tell Mary about the stranger at
the little lunch room on the night before.
And Mr. Bottleman had been out making some early morning calls on the
sick. But his wife, a very friendly woman giggled and blushed like a
young girl, assured Renfro that he would be back at noon and urged him
to come then as she always considered the time, during which a man was
eating, the best time to make a request.
She and Renfro had been friends since Renfro’s dog had ruined the
garden of the deacon, whose wife criticized the parsonage lady for the
length or rather the lack of length to her street costume. Though she
didn’t have any idea what sort of a request he was going to make of her
minister husband she determined to help obtain it if she could.
From there Renfro had gone direct to a meeting of Morrison’s carriers.
Morrison usually had meetings only on great occasions such as giving
out Christmas presents or the bestowing of prizes won by his boys or
for other events of that order, but this time he felt that one was
necessary to stimulate all the carriers in his district to carry away
Thanksgiving turkeys.
It was the first time Renfro had seen the boys who worked in his part
of town together. They filled Morrison’s room, Boy Scouts in uniform,
tall boys out of uniform, little ones in corduroy suits and fat ones in
heavy overcoats. The boy next Renfro was a Freshman in high school and
the son in a family of eight children, all the boys in which were then
or had been newspaper carriers.
“It’s just like joining the army,” he informed Renfro. “Once it gets in
your blood you have to enlist. And we kids had to work to pay our way
thru high school.”
Morrison began talking. He told them how nearly to the winning mark
several carriers on other routes were. Then he gave the rating of the
boys in his own section. Renfro smiled when his name was read first on
the list. Now if his Sunday idea worked out all right he was sure that
he would move up miles ahead by Monday.
“Hooch Horn,” Morrison beamed on Renfro, “has Old Grief, and he got
every one of his subscribers out there on that route.”
The boy who had carried the route in the spring laughed derisively.
“Gettin’ subscriptions out there,” he said, “is as easy as eatin’
pancakes on a cold morning. But collecting the money for them is just
the same as eatin’ them same pancakes when it’s hot in July.”
Renfro stared at him but was silent. He knew that Morrison would tell
him how many subscriptions had been paid in advance. And Morrison did.
He had big hopes for Hooch he said.
After the talk Renfro noticed that the older carrier boys eyed him
with respect. It was a new experience for him to be rated according
to his own work and not just according to his father’s reputation,
and he liked it. None of the boys there knew whether his father was a
financier or a butcher; but they all did know that he was a successful
route carrier for The Globe and that was what counted.
The meeting over, Renfro called up the parsonage again but the minister
was still away. There was no use for him to come out there to wait,
Mrs. Bottleman told him, for her husband had telephoned that he was
going out to a country parishioner’s home after some supplies for a
poor family.
“He went with the doctor, and his car is pretty much out of order these
cold days,” she laughed, “so you just call from time to time today and
I’ll let you know when he comes.”
Back at his home Renfro ate his dinner and talked a short time to Mary.
The staff of detectives following a clue which they had obtained were
leaving for another city, the name of which was a secret. Some of Judge
Wier’s enemies had been tracked there.
There had been no more letters from Helen, so they were sure that she
was out of town and that these, the family had received, had been
brought back to town before they were mailed to avoid suspicion. Mrs.
Wier had given up hope of ever seeing her daughter again but the Judge
with his grim determination still believed that she would be found.
“And the guilty parties shall be punished,” he ended his declaration
sternly. Even his wife’s entreaties and the detectives’ advice to avoid
threats could not influence him.
Mary considered this news good news. But as to the man who had been
selling rabbits to the restaurant keeper the night before she didn’t
believe he would throw any light on their mystery. The town was full of
low heavy set men. And did Hooch see his eyebrows?
Hooch had not. He had worn heavy goggles. But still Mary was skeptical.
She had definitely arranged in her mind, following more research in her
correspondence school books, that the guilty parties would be lodged in
the haunted Hall house. Of course, she didn’t expect Helen Wier to be
found there. Like the detectives, she believed that the child had been
spirited out of the city, but she knew positively that the Hall men
knew something about the kidnaping, “Well, all about it,” she added.
That afternoon, the minister still being an absent personage, Renfro
canvassed his route for new customers and got just three. “A third of
a turkey, almost,” he laughed to himself.
Saturday’s paper was out early so he was thru delivering it by
four-thirty. He made it a rule to collect in the mornings. Straight
from Washington Street he went across the town to the Methodist
parsonage in which the Rev. Bottleman lived. And there he found that
that gentleman had just returned.
His smile when he shook his hands with Renfro was encouraging. With
spirits rising Renfro put forth a direct question, “Would you like to
help get some turkeys for three poor families in your church?”
The minister didn’t smile. “You bet!” he agreed boyishly.
Renfro plunged immediately into the story of the Globe’s offer of a
turkey for every ten new subscribers their carrier boys secured. “I’ve
made up my mind to have six,” his mouth closed in the firm decisive
line Henry Horn’s did when starting a business venture, “And I need
some more subscribers.”
“Yes,” Mr. Bottleman raised his eyebrows.
“I want you to announce my proposition to your parishioners after
church tomorrow morning. Tell them that the poor get the turkeys. I get
the business. That’s what I want.”
“Sure I’ll do it,” a gleam of amusement crossed the minister’s face but
Renfro didn’t see it. And immediately the pastor began talking.
“You stand at the little table just inside the outer door as the
congregation leaves the church,” he gave definite directions. “Exactly
as I do, following a missionary sermon, and preceding the missionary
collection. You’ll get some new subscribers I’m sure.”
Back home Renfro ate his supper and planned to have a quiet evening.
But there came a complaint from the office. Mr. Bruce had given
directions that each boy, on whose route there came any complaint of a
missing paper, was to see that that paper was properly delivered.
And there were two missing on Old Grief.
Renfro brought his skates and with them over his shoulder made his way
to the street. With the papers in his overcoat pocket he skated out to
the two little cottages at whose doors he had left papers earlier in
the evening. Either a neighbor’s dog or a neighbor’s boy he felt sure
had gotten the papers.
“Gee, I hope this doesn’t last all winter,” John Lehman, the carrier of
the best route in town, met Renfro on Main Street with a whole stack of
papers in his arms. “I think that the kidnapers must have decided to
steal newspapers instead of lawyer’s kids. I’m so dead tired I won’t go
to church in the morning,” he complained.
Renfro was glad of that for John went to Dr. Bottleman’s church.
And the next morning as he sat in the pew next his mother he looked
around and did not see a single Globe carrier whom he knew. He waited
impatiently all thru the sermon for Dr. Bottleman’s announcement about
the turkey proposition. When it did come he felt that he was blushing
to the roots of his hair and wondered why his mother did not put out
her hand and say that he could not do that.
But his mother was amazed along with several other members over the
peculiar announcement. Nor did she notice when he slipped out of the
pew and took his stand at the church door.
He saw neither of his parents until near the end of the processional
of people leaving the church. And then he was so excited over his good
luck in having gotten enough subscriptions, lacking one, to have won
the turkeys. He was counting the list when he happened to look up and
see his parents.
His mother’s face was fiery but his father was smiling. Gravely he took
out his pocket book and counted out the money for a subscription. “Have
it sent to Mary’s mother,” he said, “I heard her say the other day that
she wished they could afford the paper at her home.”
Renfro took the money, gravely counted it and then looked up at his
father, his eyes twinkling, “Dad,” he said boyishly, “You’re the fellow
who put the finishing touches on the flock. Your subscription makes me
have the necessary sixty. The turkeys are mine!”
CHAPTER XVI.
BOY SCOUTS TO THE RESCUE.
Twenty-four hours passed and Mary Dugan knew nothing about the winning
of the turkeys. On the way home from church Renfro had asked his father
and mother not to mention his success to Mary. “Afraid she’ll kick on
cooking the whole lot?” Mr. Horn laughed.
Mrs. Horn stared at her husband with hauteur. He was in admirable humor
over the whole affair. The Rev. Mr. Bottleman had shook his hand after
he and Renfro had had a little talk over the success of the scheme.
“Another king of industry, Horn,” the minister had laughed.
Renfro had touched his arm. “Will you have your three names ready for
the charity turkeys?” he asked. “I’d like to deliver them in a few
days.”
“I’ll get them to you tomorrow night,” the minister promised. “I want
to do some looking around to be sure that they are delivered at the
homes where there are the most children.” He put out his hands. “Come
again, when you have another deal like this one,” he said gravely.
And then the Horn family had gone out to their car and started home.
Mr. Horn, sensing the mood of his wife from the lofty elevation of her
chin, did a monologue on the sermon; and Renfro was trying to picture
Morrison’s pride in the morning when he heard that six turkeys would go
to one of his carriers.
When suddenly Mrs. Horn gave a moan and grabbed her husband’s arm.
“Oh,” she began, “what if there happened to be a reporter at the
church. We’ll be the laughing stock of the town all because you gave
your permission for him to carry that detestable route and--”
“We’ll be the victims of three funerals tomorrow if you grab my arm
like that again,” Mr. Horn said hotly, “Didn’t you see how close I ran
to that telephone pole?”
Then Renfro reassured his mother. The Globe would not use the story
without Mr. Bruce’s permission, he knew. Also no other paper would
carry one line of it because that would mean free advertising for the
Globe. “And newspapers aren’t run that way,” he ended.
But Mrs. Horn was not convinced.
However, she soon forgot her worries. A knot of neighbors on the corner
caused Mr. Horn to stop his car. He found the group discussing new
turns in the Wier kidnaping. The detectives in a town half way across
the state had ordered the arrest of a man, one of the gangsters, who
had been indicted in the election fraud case and had left the town the
night Helen was kidnaped.
They would arrive in town that night. The man’s actions had been
mysterious for several days before the kidnaping, in fact enough so
for the police to send word out to watch him. “But as usual with our
police,” said the doctor on the corner, who himself having been robbed
during the fall, was vindictive, “no watching was done.”
That afternoon Renfro called Morrison for news of the Wier kidnaping,
verifying what news in regard to the story he had heard that morning.
It seemed to be an assured fact that this man had been arrested and
that he was being brought back tonight.
Renfro too heard stories about the scratched window pane. But the
workman who put in the new windows at the Wier house offered evidence
which seemed to make all these no clues at all. Very seldom he said
were a set of windows ever installed in a new home without some of them
being scratched by the workmen.
Most of the work done involved the use of knives. And these scratches
were knife made. The chief of detectives, hearing this had laughed and
promptly put in his desk the two gray hairs he had been guarding since
a short time before.
Monday morning papers told of the return of the man believed to have
some knowledge of the crime and his incarceration in the city jail.
Mrs. Wier’s condition, according to the story, was improving. Another
letter had come to the Wier home, this one sent from a nearby city,
written in the child’s handwriting, assuring her mother that she was
well and comfortable.
On his way to school Renfro telephoned Morrison. And that executive had
been very jubilant. “How did you do it?” he demanded, “and are you
sure all your subscriptions are acceptable?”
“Sure,” Renfro laughed back, “I’ve got the money in advance.”
Then came a conversation with Bruce, and Renfro was ordered to come
around past the office that afternoon early enough to have his picture
snapped with the prize turkeys. Renfro had laughed to himself, “mother
will die,” he imagined her horror when she saw the picture, “But I
can’t help it. Business is business, and mothers have to expect some
publicity if their sons are successful.”
At the office that afternoon he stood very straight while his picture
was being made. The six turkeys were magnificent birds. The boys, who
owned routes for several months, and those, who had been carriers for
more than a year, were very envious. And also eager to hear how Renfro
had secured his subscriptions.
Mr. Bruce called Renfro into his office, and to him and Morrison,
Renfro told the story of his business deal with the minister, and of
its success. Mr. Bruce had then held out his hand. “Congratulations
old man,” he had beamed. “You’re one of the fellows I need right at the
post. There are going to be some vacancies in some dandy routes. You’ll
have first choice at any of them.”
“I protest,” Morrison was all dignity, “Mr. Bruce, Hooch belongs to
my bunch. He can’t be sent in any other district route manager’s
territory.”
It was then Renfro spoke, “If you please, Morrison,” he was quite in
earnest, “I would like to keep Old Grief.”
And both Morrison and Bruce were speechless.
A little later, Renfro decided to take his turkeys home before he
carried his route. That would make him later and he would have a better
chance of investigating his eyebrow mystery. And after he straightened
his shoulders and thought to himself, “The turkeys are won and I’ve got
to solve that mystery in the same way I won them.”
It was Macauley who suggested that Renfro drive the turkeys
home--Macauley, who had a twinkle in his eye and a rich brogue, both
of which should have made most people suspicious but they rarely did.
He had lived on a farm in his youth. He had helped care for turkeys,
“the most recreant birds in the category of farm animals,” and he
laughed boyishly, “and always they wandered away daily while I hunted
them daily and drove them miles. All you need, Hooch, is two or three
fellows to help you, and to remember this bit of advice. KEEP TO THE
ALLEYS FOR FEAR YOU MIGHT FRIGHTEN THE LADIES.”
Three boys started out to help Renfro drive his brood home--among them
the little carrier whose route was next Renfro’s and who had rushed
into the office the minute he had heard that Old Grief had won Renfro
six birds. Jimmy Noel called in a rush to be ready to offer first aid
and have a chance to win more merit badges, and after him a little
colored boy who had been playing in the alley back of the Globe office.
The birds trotted down the first stretch of alley in a beautiful manner
and then they crossed the street with the same precision. The second
alley would have been a quiet course had it not been for the washwoman
who was carrying a bundle of clothes toward the oncoming flock.
Thinking these turkeys were runaway birds and scenting an easy way to
get a Thanksgiving dinner she dropped her washing and started after the
largest bird.
And then came the stampede. Jimmy, Renfro and Bill, the other route
boy kept after the turkeys which perched on buildings, ran in all
directions and made a medley of noises which could never be described.
But the little colored boy took after the woman of his own race and
after she had given up the chase of the turkey he kept up his pursuit,
shouting at the top of his voice.
At the corner Jimmy sighted some other scouts starting on a five mile
hike. He signaled them with all the authority of a patrol leader in
his troop and they, being good scouts, joined in the chase. Two little
girls who had wished for boyish adventure recognized this as a great
opportunity and came to the throng.
Such chasing, such climbing, such squawking as followed. But before
long the entire six were back in a group in the arms of six sturdy
scouts. “One good turn today,” they informed Renfro, “Better let us
help you get them home.”
And Renfro agreed. At the next corner they were met by a colony of
colored people, the old washwoman gesticulating and protesting, while
the little chap who had pursued her was also talking vehemently. Renfro
gasped at the bunch. It was their evident determination to accompany
himself and the scouts to the Horn residence.
He raked his mind. And then he talked to Jimmy. “Mother’s club is
meeting tonight,” he said. “If this bunch would follow me home well--”
And Jimmy, the general, was quick to size up the situation. “Give the
kid a turkey,” he suggested. “You can’t cook them all, anyway, and he
sure has run some. Besides he isn’t a scout and doesn’t have to do a
good turn for us other fellows.”
So Renfro handed the little colored chap a turkey. And to their
amazement the little colored boy and the big colored woman whom he had
been pursuing, straightway made up all their differences and went away
carrying the turkey between them.
“Well, Jimmy,” he laughed, “I’ll change my mind. He’s a good scout
after all.”
CHAPTER XVII.
RENFRO FINDS THE MYSTERY MAN.
Like a patrol of victorious soldiers, the Boy Scouts in khaki, with
the big turkeys perched on their shoulders, entered the Hall domain
from the alley entrance. Jimmy’s decisive “Halt!” brought them all
to attention--all except the turkey, on the head of which was the
responsibility for the alley episode, and he flapped his wings and
started all the other turkeys to doing likewise.
There was no law in all the list of the manual which told how to
control a recreant turkey. So Jimmy forgot his dignity as a patrol
leader and clutched one of the birds by the neck. She screamed no
longer. But her big wings flapped, her body twisted, and even her tail
seemed to go into convulsions.
Convulsions which caught Mary Dugan’s attention as she passed by the
window with a bowl of thousand island dressing in process of completion
for the salad for the Hyacinth Reading Club now in session in the Horn
library. The bowl went into the kitchen table, and Mary Dugan out thru
the back door, across the porch, and right into the midst of the group.
“The saints be praised!” Mary Dugan forgot what she called “The Horn
Decorum” and reverted to her own home ways. “And now that you’ve
surprised me by winnin’ ’em all on a Monday here you’re goin’ to choke
’em to death before I can have the pick of the one I want to cook.”
She flew to the big garage door, threw it open, and gave stentorian
orders, “Here,--put ’em in here--let ’em roost in peace till I’ve
finished my supper. Then I mix ’em a bit of dough for refreshment
followin’ a soldier party.”
She bowed to the boy scouts and opened the rear gate for their
departure as soon as the turkeys were inside the garage and the big
door swung shut again. Her gesture was imperative. With Jimmy hastening
them on, they did not mark time but did “double quick” steps down the
town’s best alley.
Then Mary Dugan looked at Renfro, “There be only five,” she accused
him. “You don’t mean to tell me all them boys let a turkey get loose.”
“No, Mary,” Renfro was impatient. “It was really a salvage article in a
worth while conflict. But I’ll tell you all about it and how I happened
to get them so soon and everything--new clues and all,” he promised,
“only I’m late as the dickens with my route now and there’ll be a dozen
complaints and I have to go.”
Now whatever else could be said of Mary Dugan the fact remained that
she was always a good scout and without another question she swung open
the alley gate once more, watched Renfro through it and shouted down
the alley after him. “There be three kinds of cake and striped ice
cream for the reading club. I’ll save all kinds for you.”
Again Renfro chose an alley route through town. It was the quickest
way to reach Washington Street and the drug store. Once there he saw
something unusual. All the packages of papers except his own were gone.
Swish! That was the sound of tearing the paper which bound them. Clash!
They were going into his bag. And clatter--he was off down the street
to the front porch of his first customer.
Up one street, around a corner into another, and back and forth on it
he went. It was dark, the thaw predicted by the weather man had set in
early in the afternoon, and there were places where it was so slippery
from the melting ice that he had to walk very slowly and carefully. He
did not complain. Old Grief had become the first rung of his ladder to
success. And a mighty good rung she had been.
At the corner, nearing the Wier house, Renfro brushed against a
stooped, old woman of the type usually seen around pawn shops and
cheap restaurants. She was carrying a lot of bundles, but it was not
these Renfro noticed. Around her neck with both ends flapping free and
showing plainly in the glow from the light in the middle of the corner
intersection was the peculiar looking scarf the old man whom he had
passed outside the sandwich shop last Friday night had worn.
“Humph!” Renfro laughed at his own exclamation days later. But he was
too amazed then to say anything else. It was possible for two people to
have as odd scarfs as were these, but hardly possible he thought. And
then--well then, he decided to do a little investigating.
He sauntered a little farther down the street, stepped behind a
tree and watched the old woman journey slowly down Washington
street--still more slowly, and still more slowly, but always in the
same direction,--the one taken by everyone of the queer looking
individuals who journeyed out to the big old house, which everyone said
was haunted--everyone except Captain Pete who declared that claim all
tomfoolishness.
Renfro looked back to his own surroundings. He was directly across the
street from Judge Wier’s house. The blinds were drawn to the bottoms
of the windows. The afternoon papers had said that Mrs. Wier was very
despondent again. There had been no letter from Helen that day. She had
declared that she knew the child was dead and wished that she too would
die.
The man in the county jail had been questioned and sweated, and sweated
and questioned, but still stuck to his original statement that he knew
nothing about the kidnaping. Though the chief of police declared that
it was a foolish waste of time the detectives were off on the trail of
his confederates.
“And Helen’s not two miles from this very spot,” Renfro declared
vehemently to himself. “And perhaps she is suffering though she wrote
that she wasn’t. Well, I’m going out to the shack and the big house
tonight and I’m not going to come home until I know something much more
definite than anything I’ve seen up to this time.”
He half ran to finish the remaining few houses on his route, then
hurried down the road, crashed across the orchard and down to Captain
Pete’s little cabin. Once he heard a queer suspicious noise in the
undergrowth just beyond the orchard, but he felt sure it was Lang Tammy
come to jump on him and play a game of tug-of-war with his paper bag.
Near the cabin he stopped a minute to listen. He looked around the
corner. Everything was quiet. He stopped, listened intently and then
heard voices. Two men, talking in rather loud tones as if they were
having an argument. Something sounded like the thwack of a fist on a
table and then Renfro walked to the cabin door.
He knocked with a decisive, determined air. Captain Pete called out,
“Who is there?”
But Renfro answered with another knock, more determined than the first.
He heard the growl of a dog and then stopped as if some one had choked
the creature into silence. And then he did a veritable tattoo of knocks
on the big, heavy door.
And stamping angrily across the floor Captain Pete came to open it. The
heavy door jerked on its hinges with the force of an angry host and
Captain Pete’s grizzled face seemed to fill the door way but not quite--
For back in the shadow of the room sat a man, stooped over something--a
man who was heavy set and short and who looked exactly like the
stranger, whose shadow Renfro had seen so often on the curtain of the
window at the big house across the deserted orchard and lane of Captain
Pete’s domain, again on the coming out of the back of the restaurant
stand and several times on Washington Street.
“I told ye I didn’t want the paper,” Captain Pete growled.
Then Renfro did the thing which surprised Captain Pete too much for
him to realize in time to object to what he was doing. He stepped into
the room, around the table and up to the stooped, old man, “Would you
like to have a sample copy of The Globe?” he asked.
The question, the boy so near him and everything, seemed to frighten
the old man out of his self possession. He shifted his feet, shook his
head and then raised it enough so that Renfro could see his eyes, and--
ABOVE THEM THE OTHER HALF OF THE MISSING EYEBROWS.
CHAPTER XVIII.
THREE MEN IN THE PLOT.
One instant Renfro stood staring--the next he gave a quick jump. For,
with a threatening growl the heavy old man had sprung forward, his fist
raised menacingly. Past Captain Pete out thru the open door Renfro
jumped and ran together.
Behind him he heard the old man swearing, heard a loud growl, a series
of barks, imperative orders “Get him, Tam,” and ran behind the first
shelter which offered itself--a low old ash hopper, which had stood
near the cabin since pioneer days.
He was not afraid of the big airedale dog but he did have an idea that
the old man--might shoot if he happened to be able to get hold of any
of the arms Captain Pete kept hanging on the wall, all loaded as he had
told Renfro, ready for the first rabbit which would cross his track.
The big airedale shot around the ash hopper. Renfro dropped on his
knees to be out of sight. But against Renfro he only sniffed, rubbed
his head over his rough mackinaw and whined like a happy child over
the joy of finding a playmate once more.
From the open door came sounds of quarreling. Renfro listened, heard
Captain Pete tell the other man to call his dog back, that the boy was
a friend of his and was not to be harmed.
“But ye warned me agin’ him yourself,” the other growled.
“Call yer dog back!” Captain Pete was determined.
“I aint,” the other’s voice was dogged.
“Then I’ll--” there was a break in Captain Pete’s speech, and Renfro
raised on his knees so that he could see the inside of the cabin.
Captain Pete was reaching for one of his guns. The other man slouched
toward the door and called gruffly. “Lang Tammy, come here,--come here!”
But Captain Pete still held his gun. And Renfro, fearing violence on
Captain Pete’s part, softly commanded Lang Tammy to go back into the
house. With dragging feet and hanging tail the big dog obeyed his
command. Once inside the door, the dog gave a yelp of pain. Renfro rose
angrily to his feet but the big door was swung shut.
“Well, I’ll not bring any more papers here without observing the rule
of preparedness first,” he declared as he crouched close to the fence
and worked his way back to the lane again.
He talked to himself all the way. “And one sure thing, Lang Tammy’s my
friend. He even deserts his master for me. But no wonder the way he
yelped when he went back into the cabin. Poor doggie.”
At the fence he stopped. Yes, there across the deserted orchard in the
lower west window of the big house was a dim light, and moving back and
forth across the blind a dim shape. Some one was in the deserted house.
Two men in Captain Pete’s shack! That was the Captain and his brother,
Renfro had felt sure of that. But there was another in the big house.
“There was a woman,” he remembered the old woman who had carried the
supplies and worn the scarf.
Well, he would cross to the house, peep in the window and make sure
that it was she. It might--
He stopped--it might be Helen Wier shut in that little room, left
alone in the big house while her captor visited at the cabin.
But--he shook his head. That wasn’t probable. They would be afraid
she might escape. It must be the old woman whom he had passed back on
Washington Street. He would make sure.
Cautiously, he worked his way across the orchard, around the house,
close to the west window, and with his face as near the window as he
dared place it. But hardly had he gotten it there until the light went
out and the noise of footsteps told him that the person inside had gone
across into the other room.
With a joyous exclamation Renfro found the peep holes, which he had cut
out a few nights before with his knife. Carefully, he put his eyes to
the two holes, stared thru them, waited a long time, and then his watch
was rewarded.
For with great deliberation an old man, the exact counterpart of
Captain Pete carried a lamp to the little table, spent much effort in
adjusting it, brought to the table some sort of a little melting pot,
under which he lighted a fire and then moved away again.
Renfro remembered the stories he had heard about Captain Pete’s brother
being a counterfeiter. Here he was, evidently getting ready to ply
his counterfeiting trade again. The little melting pot, and array of
instruments he was collecting and bringing to the table. The lamp under
the melting pot burned dully. The old man tested the something in it,
shook his head, indicating that everything was all right and went away
again.
When he returned he carried a large tea kettle, which he proceeded to
settle on his knees. Then with the soldering he took from the pot on a
long soldering iron he began to mend a hole in its side near the spout.
It was a relieved but disappointed laugh Renfro gave. The old man was
doing the most ordinary thing in the world--the old man who looked so
much like Captain Pete that no one could doubt their relationship.
Slowly Renfro journeyed down the lane toward the road, Washington
Avenue and home again. The old lady had not been in evidence again. The
old man in the house was a simple old soul whose part in the crime if
he had any was of an unsuspecting accessory.
Again, no doubt Captain Pete knew much, though he might have been
innocent of any part of it. But the man with the missing eyebrows? Yes,
indeed he was the fellow, and Renfro knew that it was up to him to move
quickly and with well thought plans if he got him before he escaped.
He rode home on the car. He was so hungry that he felt that his ribs
were caving into his stomach. With home in sight his spirits began
to soar. Mary was sure to have him a good warm supper and a good
cold dessert to top it off--Mary would be ready to listen to all his
adventures and to pat him on the back and urge him to greater effort.
Mary was--
And then the light outside the garage door went on and Mary was out
there with Renfro’s father gesticulating, talking in loud tones,
protesting against his opening the door any wider and trying to command
and explain at the same time. Renfro grasped the situation in a minute.
He rushed to Mary’s aid.
“Don’t open it wide, Dad, or they’ll all come out,” he begged. “My
prize turkeys you know. They are all in the garage but the one I had
to give the colored boy for chasing the old woman who would have stolen
it anyway--”
“But I have to have my car,” Mr. Horn was impatient. “And besides the
garage is no place for these infernal birds anyway. Your mother had no
better judgement than to tell all those women I would take them home in
the car and I want it in a hurry before the lodge meeting is over.”
He motioned Mary to one side and Renfro to the other. “Can’t you two
keep them in the corner while I drive out,” he began.
His hand reached the switch. A button was pressed and the garage was
flooded with light. And there on the top of the big Marmon sat a sleepy
red and bronze and black mixture of feathers and skin--the largest
of Renfro’s prize turkeys. Another was on the hood, the third on the
gasoline tank, the fourth on a wheel. The fifth was not in evidence.
Not until he stepped in front of the car did Mr. Horn discover the
whereabout of the fifth turkey. Silently and with a gesture which not
only accused but did so vehemently, he pointed through the windshield.
There on the steering wheel, as if guarding the wheel of state, sat the
fifth of the big birds.
“Who ever heard of putting turkeys in the garage?” he began, “You don’t
seem to have any sense as to the proper way of doing things. Your
mother--”
“Mister Horn,” Mary was the sly strategist again, “Mrs. Horn’s a
waitin’ in there for this machine to be takin’ her company home. She’s
got the head ache and you know--”
With rapidity then, the work of getting the turkeys into the corner
huddled together and Mary’s guarding them, was finished. Mr. Horn
backed the machine out. Mary and Renfro followed him and the door was
closed.
Outside Mr. Horn’s good humor returned. Mrs. Willis, the wittiest woman
in the community, he often said, and the wife of his best friend was on
the porch. Before either Mary or Renfro realized what he was doing Mr.
Horn had her to the garage, had showed her the turkeys in the corner,
told her of the sight which had greeted him when he had opened the door
and was laughing about the surprise he had received at the church the
day before.
Then it was impossible to keep Mrs. Willis out of the living room where
she retold the story to the other members of the Hyacinth Club and led
in the laughter which followed. She declared that she was bowed down
with admiration for Renfro and wanted him brought before her. So out of
the kitchen he was half dragged, the napkin Mary had fastened around
his neck still there and the best of his supper back on the table
melting.
But when they were thru feteing him and praising him he went back to
it, not the least minding the terrible condition in which it then was.
For he really believed that his mother, excited by the admiration of
the other women, had become proud of him.
“Mary Dugan,” he interrupted Mary who was out of sorts over the large
pile of unwashed dishes before her. “Now if you were a fellow whose
praise would you rather have--the fellows or your mother’s?”
And Mary being out of patience with all mothers who belonged to
Hyacinth Club and made extra work for the “hired help” replied with
alacrity, “Why the fellows, of course.”
CHAPTER XIX
RENFRO IS KIDNAPED.
Renfro’s next question brought Mary Dugan to her feet. “Were there any
Complaint calls in?” he asked. “Did Morrison or any one call up from
the office or--”
“Hooch,” Mary was herself again in spite of her weariness, in spite
of the pile of dishes, and the excitement thru which she had passed.
“There were several calls for you and all from the office, and I told
them a plenty too, how you’d won the turkeys and had to be allowed to
bring them home in peace, and then when they just kept a callin’ I just
took the receiver and left it off the hook without paying any attention
to the buzzer till your maw heard and came and put it on the hook.”
“But that settled them,” Mary’s voice was full of pride. “For none of
them called again.”
“Oh, well they all got their papers all right--even Captain Pete,”
Renfro’s voice was weary. “But I do hate to have a lot of complaints go
into the office like must have gone in tonight.”
[Illustration:
There were two people doing the work. Renfro knew that, because one
tied his feet while the other bound his hands. They worked in the
hedge. ]
Then he remembered something else. “Did the minister send the addresses
where he wanted the turkeys delivered?”
Mary had to hear the story of the way the turkeys had been won so early
in the game. When Renfro told her that a great deal of credit was due
her, that her going to choir practice Friday night made him think of
the help of the church, she beamed at him.
And then she told him of some new plans she had made for working
together on the kidnaping mystery. The Hyacinth Reading Club with its
extra cooking had taken all of her time that day. Captain Pete had gone
next door with rabbits. The cook there had told her of his arrival and
his departure with more than a half dozen of the same.
“Now allus before he’s come here when he had even a rabbit left,” Mary
was convinced. “So I know he is suspicious of us.”
Renfro was thinking of the experiences he had had that night, and was
making decisions. No, he wouldn’t tell Mary about them yet. He wanted
to be sure the man at Captain Pete’s was his man; he wanted to see him
either in daylight or in a light which would show his eyebrows up a
little better. He wanted to be sure they matched with the missing parts.
And then he rose and went to his room. Very slowly he undressed, waited
until it was quiet below, slipped down stairs and to the drawer in the
kitchen cupboard, in which Mary kept her Bible. Then he took out the
two packages containing the missing eyebrows.
Yes, it would be better for him to carry them for a few days. He might
meet the man on the street, or in a store and after seeing him while
memory was still strong, he wanted to compare with it the parts of the
eyebrows which he had taken from the windows of Judge Wier’s home.
He turned his trousers pockets inside out, then those of his coat,
surveyed the motley collection in each, replaced the different articles
in them and shook his head. His eyebrows would not be safe in such a
lot of things as these. He looked around the room and then he saw his
cap.
With a bound he had it in his hand. The band inside was deep and strong
and loose--all just the way he wanted it to be for a good hiding
place. He knew that telegraph messenger boys carried messages in their
caps. With great care he sewed an envelope inside that band in which he
had sealed the two smaller packages.
Before he went to bed that night he did several little things he had
wanted to do for a long time--wrote a letter to a chum in another
town, counted up his balance in the bank and made out his Christmas
shopping list. He even straightened his dresser, made a memorandum
about delivering the charity turkeys, went to the window, and looked
out at the neighborhood for a time. He felt queer--neither elated nor
depressed, but quite as if a different sort of an experience from any
he had known, loomed before him.
He was glad they had taken his picture at the office. If anything
happened to him--
He laughed boyishly. If he did happen to find the place where Helen
Wier was being kept then they too would be glad they had his picture.
That happy thought sent him to bed and to sleep so fast that it was
quite late when he awoke.
The day seemed to rush by. His mind was on one thing though he heard
of many others. His fame in winning the turkeys had spread thru Grant
high school, thanks to Jimmy Noel and his crew of helpers. The teachers
congratulated him; the boys praised him, and some of the girls he knew
best were inclined to try to twit him.
But he hardly heard them. Before him there loomed the big house in
which the old man had mended the tea kettle, the cabin in which Captain
Pete and his strange guest had quarreled, and the old woman, whose
wearing the scarf had made her have some connection with the mystery.
And always each picture showed to him the fierce, cruel face the old
man assumed when his anger was aroused.
He was early on his route that night and delivered all his papers with
precision. Directly after supper he was going to tell Mary the whole
story and see if she would go with him to the cabin and big house once
more. That was the best he was sure.
But he didn’t get to tell Mary. While he was at the supper table there
was a call from the office for him--a complaint from on his route.
He took the number, went back to the table to finish his dessert and
to listen to his mother give a monologue on the dangers of carrying a
paper route.
Carrying complaints on such nights as this was sure to give him
pneumonia some time she argued. People were careless with their papers.
No doubt the boys often left them at these complainers’ homes and then
they--
Renfro started at her charge. Why he remembered now that he had left
a paper at that number they had given him at the office. That was the
number of the house where the little crippled girl sat at the window
and watched for him--a long, low house without any paint and with a tin
roof on the front porch, which roof was about in the same condition as
that of the big house at which the mystery was deepening.
He went back to the telephone, called the office, and asked for the
number again. He might have heard wrong he thought. Exactly the same
number was given him again. He wanted to tell the manager he remembered
leaving the paper there. The little crippled girl had herself opened
the window that evening for it, but he knew that an argument would only
make his mother more uneasy, more set against his continuing with Old
Grief.
Now that he had been successful she declared he should have a better
route, his own home or one in the business part of town. If once she
conferred with Mr. Bruce who had offered him such a route, Renfro knew
it would be very hard for him to continue with Old Grief.
“And,” he told himself, “I don’t want to leave there until I have the
circulation worked up to 80% of the number of residents on that route.”
He stepped out into the dark street, fumbled his way around the house
to the side porch where his bicycle had been left, but did not take
it. There was a puncture in the front tire and it was flat. He walked
to the corner and here took a car. Car fare was a minor consideration
now that he needed time. He would hurry back, tell Mary about the story
and perhaps then when she had all her work out of the way she would go
scouting with him.
He dropped off the car at the nearest corner, and with the paper under
his arm scurried down the street. Past the big house, next door to the
little one he hurried, and then in sight of the one with the tin roof
and the little crippled girl. His feet suddenly slipped on something
which felt like a carpet of banana skins; down he went clutching at a
hedge to break his fall, and then someone clutched him.
Something strong--it felt like a band of leather was passed over his
mouth. Both of his hands were caught behind him and a sharp thong
passed around his legs. But his eyes were left free. As they tied his
hands behind his back he wondered why he had not been blindfolded. And
a little later he learned.
There were two people doing the work. Renfro knew that,--because one
tied his feet while the other bound his hands. They worked in the hedge.
Renfro wondered then why the city council had allowed all the tall
hedges to stand in this old part of the town. Had they never seen the
possibilities they offered to thieves and people like these? Evidently
these men had realized them fully, for in giving a number from which
to send a complaint they had chosen one next door to one of these
hedges.
And then he realized that one of his captors was a woman. She moved in
front of him and her skirts swished against his knees. That discovery
made him more furious than ever. He twisted his body, shoved with his
shoulders, and pushed against her with all his might. The next minute
he was firmly lifted by the other captor, from whose strength he knew
was a man, carried out into the street and deposited on a small wagon
there.
CHAPTER XX.
HIDDEN IN THE CAVE.
He was placed on the floor of the wagon, face downward. As the wagon
started it went with a jolt which thrust his face against a rough board
and cut his nose and cheek. More jerks did a series of bruises on his
forehead, his chin and his nose. By almost superhuman effort he managed
to roll over on his side and then on his back.
By the time this was accomplished they had traveled down a dark road
quite a distance. It was so dark Renfro could not see three feet ahead
of his face at first. But his eyes soon got accustomed to the darkness.
And little by little, he began to recognize the tops of the trees and
by the feeling of surroundings to know that they were on the road which
ran off East Washington.
Instinct, more than anything else, told him that they turned off at
the second lane of the first on the Hall place. The first one was only
used by pedestrians. The second was for wagons, but it had been used
so little that it was in a horrible condition. The jolting sensation
was terrible. Renfro realized that his face would have been cut beyond
recognition had he not managed to turn over.
They jolted close to trees, through a lot of low underbrush which
ground against the wheels of the wagon and across a little bridge. The
limbs on one low hanging tree struck his face and scratched it still
more.
The silence, which the couple had maintained in town and along the
road, was now broken. The old woman, whose voice was almost as gruff as
her companion’s complained of the way he drove. He in turn offered to
share the privilege with her if she so desired to seize it.
An imperative “whoa” stopped the horse, suddenly. The man clambered
out, thrashed around the wagon, seemed to be tugging at a door. A
squeaking of rusty hinges followed his efforts, and he called out
gruffly, “Drive on in Maggie, and remember the log on the east side.
You hit it the last time.”
Renfro hoped that Maggie would not hit it this time. He held his breath
while the wagon jolted thru the door into a dark, dilapidated building
which was full of moldy odors. And there the horse stopped. He had to
lie still while they unhitched the horse, all done in the darkness.
They discussed the harness which seemed to be needing repairs from what
they said.
The old man told Maggie to get some food at a bin, but she replied that
she couldn’t find it by just feeling around. She wanted to light the
lantern but he wouldn’t allow her. A trifle crossly she refused to even
try to help farther. And he said surlily, “If you had them 15 years in
the darkness I did, you’d be able to find anything by feel.”
After that she was more patient and seemed to help all she could with
the finishing of the feeding. She came with the old man to the wagon,
and stayed with him while he took out a knife and cut the strap which
tied his legs.
“You walk with me, just as I tell you, or you’ll know what you’ll get,”
the man’s surly voice was charged with a threat which Renfro knew he
would not hesitate to keep.
So he meekly followed his directions and walked between the two of
them. The old woman who seemed to have a more human disposition than
the man, helped Renfro along by holding his arm. They went across
decaying vegetable matter, through a door, close to a manger, and then
into another room, smaller and close and possessing much more moldy
odors than had the others.
There the old man lifted some sort of a door in the side of what seemed
to be a banked part of the barn and they all stepped into a place so
dark that Renfro could not see at all. While the old woman closed the
door, her companion lighted a lantern.
For several minutes the light, though it was dim, blinded Renfro. Then
his eyes gradually became accustomed to the light, and saw that they
were in a narrow passage way. A few feet along it, and they came to
some steps. They went down them--down, down, down, into an opening
which seemed to be a cave. And there Renfro with his hands tied, and
his mouth still bandaged was thrust into another and darker place and
the door, which had been opened to allow him being pushed through, was
shut again.
His first sensation was that he was on solid ground. Then his feet
seemed to give away under him and he fell heavily, his head striking
something sharp and hard. A quick pain, worse than any he had felt
during the short ride, and then Renfro drifted into unconsciousness.
When he came to, it seemed that hours had passed, but it had really
been only a period of some twenty minutes. He was lying on a pallet of
mouldy smelling rugs and comforters. They were full of hard knots which
sent shooting pains through his bruised body.
The room was not entirely dark now. There was a dim light and Renfro
turned a little onto his side, saw that it came from a coal oil
lantern, which emitted much more bad smelling smoke than it did light.
The bandage had been taken from his mouth. But the stout cords were
still on his wrists, and others had again been tied around his ankles.
They were tied in such a manner that if he lay perfectly still they
were comfortable, but if he twisted or attempted to move, they cut into
his flesh like circular knives.
But in spite of the pain caused by his moving, Renfro managed to twist
himself until he could see the nature of the room in which he was
imprisoned. It was cold and damp and mouldy. Odors like those coming
from a musty cellar, in which vegetables had long been stored, were
strong around him.
There was some one in the room but Renfro could not see who it was.
Heavy, rapid breathing behind him--in the direction he felt sure was
the door through which he had been thrown--proved that. He watched
directly above him and to the side of the room he was facing.
And after a little looking he realized that it wasn’t a room at all but
a cave in which he was a captive. The rough jagged wall and ceiling
were of rock, from which hung stalactites now stained and discolored
by the rain and smoke of fires, which had been kept burning in a rusty
coal oil stove.
There was a fire in the stove now, and Renfro was getting some heat
from it. Besides it and the pallet, on which he was lying, Renfro could
see no other furniture in the room. The lantern was flat on the floor.
Renfro shivered. He was cold to the marrow of his bones. He shivered
again and then a long, hard sneeze came out of his nose and throat. It
was followed by another of the same, and then a whole series.
The person behind him stirred and came around the pallet until Renfro
could see her--a swarthy, heavy set woman with a sour, disappointed
visage and stooped, weary shoulders. Over her head she wore the odd
colored scarf Renfro had seen twice on the street--first outside the
little hot dog restaurant and next on East Washington Street.
She looked down at Renfro and he saw that her eyes were not half as
hard and sour looking as her face. Her lips drawn in a straight line
seemed to relax a little in their severity while she looked. And then
she opened them and asked one short word, “Cold?”
“Yes, Ma’am,” Renfro sneezed again.
With her free hand, the other was holding something under the scarf,
she pulled the coal oil stove closer to his pallet and then she opened
a door, slipped through it and closed it after her, and Renfro was left
alone--but not for long. When the door opened again, it was the old man
who entered this time, a heavy, horse blanket in his arms.
On his head was the hunting cap with the sharp, low hanging bill.
He spread the blanket over Renfro, gruffly asked him if he wanted
something to eat and, after receiving a negative answer, squatted on
the floor and looked close at the boy.
And Renfro looked back at him. There was instant recognition on the
part of both, the old man who had been in Captain Pete’s cabin and the
boy who had burst in and handed him a sample copy of the Globe.
For quite a time they stared at each other and then the old man
realized that his attempts to frighten Renfro had failed. He gave a
short chuckle, which was more disagreeable than anything else, and then
jerked off his cap.
And in the dim light to which Renfro’s eyes had grown accustomed, was
plainly visible the remainder of the eyebrows, half of each of which
had been left sticking to Judge Wier’s frozen window pane.
CHAPTER XXI.
HELEN WEIR IS FOUND.
The old man’s first words came in the form of a question. “Where are
the rest of ’em?”
Renfro did not attempt to answer. To force an issue the old fellow was
tempted to use gruffness but a look deep into Renfro’s steely blue eyes
told him that would be a waste of time. The boy couldn’t be frightened
into telling anything. Better treat him as he would a man.
“You scraped them off the window pane?”
This time Renfro answered, “Yes.”
“I knew some one had when I read the newspaper about the knife
scratches,” the old fellow was talking like a human being, and not in
the gruff disagreeable tone he had used up to this time. To be exact
he seemed to be getting some pleasure out of talking to some one who
had recently come from town and who knew the town’s version of the
kidnaping affair.
“And I knew it was you,” the talker was measuring wits with Renfro, “as
soon as I saw you staring at me, out at that hot dog shop.”
His voice was triumphant. He rose from his half sitting, half kneeling
posture and came over to Renfro. Turning him over roughly he went into
his pockets, pulled out all of the contents, and carried them to the
lantern. He was so busy examining them, that he could not see the look
of elation on Renfro’s face, followed by one of apprehension toward his
cap which was on the floor not far from his pallet.
With a surge of joy Renfro realized that it was muddy and dilapidated
and torn. In that condition it would not receive any attention. No, the
hiding place of the missing eyebrows was safe.
The fact that his search was unsuccessful made the old man quite angry.
He threw the things he had taken out of Renfro’s pockets to the floor,
and came back to the boy. “You didn’t destroy them.” There was no
question but just a simple statement.
Renfro was silent. “Well you’ll tell me where they are and I’m goin’ to
git them tomorrow.”
Again silence. For some reason or other the old man did not seem to
care to argue. He merely stared at Renfro, curiosity keen in his deep
eyes. And was it imagination or did Renfro actually see a gleam of
admiration in them as he stood and stared?
The door opened and the old woman’s voice, now weary and fretful, put
forth a question, “Does he want anything to eat, Bart?”
Renfro answered for himself--a courteous “No, ma’am--I thank you.”
The same voice with its touch of queerness mumbled something about it
bein’ late, and she was sleepy, and for Bart to come out and leave the
boy alone. Then Bart threw another cover on Renfro, took the coal oil
stove in one hand, the lantern in the other and followed her through
the door.
And Renfro was left in black darkness. The cover on him warmed him and
he began to feel drowsy. He was too tired to wonder what the folks were
doing at home now that it was time for him to be missed, or to regret
the fact that he had not taken time to tell Mary of the find he had
made in Captain Pete’s cabin the night before.
He didn’t wonder whether or not they would start a search for him.
He was thinking of his route. Who would Morrison send out tomorrow to
carry it for him? And would he find his list of new customers? And
would they remember to take the three charity turkeys to the parsonage
and--
There was a sharp bark in the next room. Renfro’s heart surged with
joy. He was not alone in the cave. He had a friend as a fellow
prisoner. That bark came from Lang Tammy. And after it a girlish voice
said sharply, “Can’t you see Tammy’s half starved to death? He wants
milk--don’t you, Tammy?”
And Renfro twisted until the throngs cut down into his flesh. That
voice belonged to no one else but Helen Wier. She was in the cave
too--just on the other side of the partition from Renfro.
At exactly the same time Judge Wier and Henry Horn were in council with
the detectives at the police station. After Renfro had gone an hour
from the Horn home a search had been instituted for him. Inquiry at the
Globe office had failed to give them any evidence except the number of
the house from which the complaint had been sent.
A hurried trip out there and Mr. Horn and Morrison, who had come to
his aid in looking for Renfro, discovered that the complaint call had
been cleverly faked. Their suspicions were fully established. But still
they did not give up hope. They called up all the homes of Renfro’s
friends, they had both the house and office of the Globe ready to send
out relief calls if Renfro should happen to appear.
But hours passed, and there came to the two men no news. And then they
had gone to the police station. Judge Wier was summoned and the two
fathers went into close conference.
They, with the detectives, decided that for the sake of their search,
after both Helen and Renfro, that it was best not to let the town
know of Renfro’s disappearance until evening--not even Mrs. Horn. The
detectives wanted a chance to start a well organized search.
Early attempts to hunt Helen had been hindered by the crowd of people
who had collected as soon as the news of her kidnaping had spread.
Scores of foot tracks around the fateful house, all made by the curious
persons, had made it impossible for footprints to furnish a clue.
Cleverly Mr. Horn concocted a story for his wife about Renfro’s going
home with Morrison to do some extra work, early in the morning. When he
told her about it she was very much out of humor and condemned paper
routes in biting language.
“If she only knew the truth,” Mr. Horn thought to himself and trembled.
Some time the next day she would know the truth.
Mary Dugan, dead tired, heard the story and believed it without a
qualm. She was sorry Renfro had to do the extra work. That meant just
one more day for her to feed the turkeys, which he had said belonged to
the church.
Morrison in turn had gone out to the Bruce home, and Bruce, after
hearing the story, had gone straight to the city editor. Together they
mapped out the course they would follow. Their noon edition would
contain a story of the kidnaping--that would be their scoop, and early
in the afternoon they would send more detectives to help the local ones
in the search.
Then Bruce and Morrison departed to their individual homes and went to
bed.
But neither Henry Horn nor Mary Dugan slept much that night. The
detectives had assured Mr. Horn that they would soon find Renfro, that
his kidnaping had given them definite proof that Helen Wier had been
taken by local criminals. They would start an investigation from a new
angle.
In the morning, of course, he would not go to work, just seemingly do
that, so as not to disturb his wife. He would show those kidnapers that
he was not a slow man to deal with like Judge Wier had been. He would
prove to them they couldn’t--
And directly above them Mary Dugan had hunted her Bible, read her
Golden Text for next Sunday and was fumbling with the family pictures.
And then she remembered the missing eyebrows. She opened the book at
page 222, the one next to which she had put them.
And then she fell back with a low cry. The packages were gone. There
was not even one white hair left.
CHAPTER XXII.
THE LIGHTS ARE REVEALED.
Merle Riker carried the names of his six new subscribers to Morrison’s
office only to discover that Morrison was out. Wearily he sat down
into the big chair to wait. He had accomplished what had seemed to him
impossible a few days before. And he wanted Morrison’s approval. And
after that he wanted Renfro Horn’s.
“He taught me how to do it,” Merle had told Jimmie Noel on his way to
the office. “Renfro Horn is a good sport.”
“He’s a good scout,” Jimmie added soberly, “And that reminds me. I
haven’t seen Renfro all day. Let’s go out there tonight and have a talk
with him.”
Merle promised. “My mother doesn’t care for me being out at nights when
I’m with a boy like Renfro Horn,” he explained. “Meet at the corner
drug store?”
Jimmie had agreed to that meeting place. Just as soon as Morrison came,
Merle decided he would rush home, announce to the Riker family they
had a Thanksgiving turkey, eat a hurried supper and come back to the
meeting place and then go to the Horn home.
But Morrison didn’t come. The clock struck six-thirty, seven, and then
Merle rose. He went straight to the corner drug store, met Jimmie, and
took him home with him. So Jimmie heard Merle’s announcement about the
Thanksgiving turkey and witnessed the joy it created. And as soon as
Merle had eaten his supper they started back to the Horn residence.
But there they faced another disappointment. Mary Dugan told them
Renfro wasn’t home, was still out on his route and that they could walk
out to meet him if they wanted to see him.
“She isn’t cross usually,” Jimmie volunteered. “But she’s tired out or
something. Usually it’s as Hooch says, ‘Mary Dugan is the best scout of
them all.’”
Together the two boys walked out toward East Washington Street, but
though they watched every corner and every car they didn’t see Renfro.
“Might as well give it up,” Merle was disappointed, “and go home. I’ll
tell him in the morning.”
“We’re near the Globe office,” Jimmie offered. “We might go past and
stop in to see if Morrison’s back. You’d like to tell him, if he’s
there--wouldn’t you?”
They went to the carrier’s room, found it empty but the door to
Morrison’s was ajar. Jimmie started toward it and stopped, his
attention suddenly riveted by voices he heard. “But his mother must not
know.” It was Mr. Horn talking.
He recognized Bruce answering. Morrison too chimed in. And little by
little Jimmie learned the whole story--of how Renfro had been kidnaped,
of how they were keeping it a secret and of how they hoped in this way
to get a quicker solution of the kidnaping mystery.
Jimmie, when he learned all the particulars, pushed Merle back out onto
the street again. “How much did you hear?” he there demanded.
“Not enough to understand anything except that Renfro has been
kidnaped, too, just like Helen Wier,” Merle was inclined to be gloomy,
“and they were both my friends.”
“And we’re not to tell a word we heard,” Jimmie caught Merle’s arm and
shook him. “Do you understand? Telling this would hurt Renfro. It
would lessen their chances to find him. We’ve got to keep still and--”
“Help find him,” Merle answered, the steel in his eyes shining so that
Jimmie could see it as he never had before.
Jimmie Noel stopped. “Wait,” he commanded, “Wait a minute. I have to
think.”
For fifteen minutes Merle waited. Then Jimmie drew him toward the
corner. “Can you stay out very late?” he asked. “It may be all night. I
have an idea. It may be nothing and again it may reveal to us where and
how Renfro was kidnaped. Can you go out to ‘Twin Cedar Cabin’ with me?
And stay all night?”
Merle nodded. “I’ll call mother. If I tell her we’re going out there to
see Renfro, she’ll be all right,” he explained, “and that is what we
are going to do if he’s there--isn’t it?”
“You bet!” Jimmie’s spirits were soaring, “I’ll telephone, too. And
I’ll tell Jack Burton we’re going. I won’t tell him about Renfro but
I’ll ask him to go along. He has some sense and he may help out some.”
They separated and a little later they met, having deemed it more safe
to use different telephones. “Jack can’t go,” Jimmie explained. “His
brother raised a row against him going and so he has to stay at home.”
On the way out to the camp, Jimmie explained many things to Merle--of
how when the cabin had been purchased and he had heard the story of the
two chiefs who had fought for the hand of the pretty white girl, he
and one of the young scout masters had decided to add to the lure of
the place for all good scouts. They had gone out secretly and dug two
graves, burying two old skeletons which had been in the trash room of
the high school.
“It wasn’t hard to believe those skeletons belonged to Indians,” Jimmie
laughed, “so we named the graves those of Wampum and Big Eagle.”
And then he told about the odd lights which they had seen on the nights
they had been there. “Now I was suspicious,” he added, “and began to
study ways those lights might have been made. And I just discovered the
other day. Someone who wanted to keep anyone away from that cabin could
have placed a number of batteries there and then operate them from
quite a distance. I believe that is just what someone is doing.”
He drew a deep breath. “Every time any of the fellows go out to the
cabin to stay all night they watch for the lights and they are not
disappointed about seeing them either. So it stands to reason that they
are being operated to keep scouts away from that cabin. Now, tonight
we’ll lay for those fellows. I have a hunch we’ll find a fellow who is
connected with Renfro’s kidnaping.”
Merle listened while Jimmie made his plans. They would go to the cabin,
light the lamps, and build a roaring big fire in the fire place. Then
Merle would stay in the cabin while he--Jimmie would go to the graves,
hide near there and watch for some sign of life.
They reached the cabin safely. The lamps were lighted, the fire made,
and then Jimmie slipped out of the cabin. A little later, Merle,
following directions, extinguished the lamps and crept to the window.
He looked down toward the mounds. And soon his watch was rewarded.
Violet and blue lights alternately played over the graves. They left
for a little while and then they came back. For about fifteen minutes
they lingered this time and then they suddenly went dark again.
Merle waited. Minutes passed, and then longer minutes. But the lights
did not come back. Nor did Jimmie. This was a hard wait for Merle. He
began to wonder if anything could have happened to Jimmie. He had been
told before Jimmie left not to dare leave the cabin but just stay there
and watch. Something of unusual importance might happen right there.
And just as he was about to throw Jimmie’s commands to the winds and
leave the cabin to search for him, Jimmie appeared. He was a ruffled,
muddy Jimmie. “Great Scott!” he ejaculated, “I was never so disgusted
in my life. If I hadn’t had that club in my hand and given them a dozen
or more healthy raps I would feel like batting my head in the hope I
could get some more brains into it.”
He went to the fireplace and sat down. “It was just as I thought,” he
said. “Those lights came from electric batteries. Only they belonged
to the high school boys who want this cabin. They tried to get it when
the scouts got it but we had the most money. Jack Burton’s brother
led the gang. Whenever Jack would start out here they would come and
operate their battery system. They thought they would scare us out
pretty soon.”
Merle was quite as disappointed as Jimmie. He came over and sat down
beside him. “I ran into the whole nest of them,” Jimmie continued, “and
I knocked them right and left with my club. I think they thought I was
a score of scouts for they ran--FROM ONE BOY,” he laughed.
Merle laughed with him. “But that doesn’t help us with Renfro,” he
began suddenly.
“No,” Jimmie shook his head, “Poor old Hooch! Wouldn’t he have liked to
be in on this tonight?”
Later they snuggled up in their blankets and went to sleep. And when it
was morning they soberly went back to town, both of them with one great
determination and one secret in their minds. They were going to keep
still about Renfro Horn’s being gone and at the same time they were
going to help hunt him.
“Tonight, I’m going to walk over his route after I carry mine,” Merle
assured Jimmie, “and hunt out every suspicious looking person on it.
Want to go along?”
“Yes, sir,” Jimmie was emphatic.
“And keep still all day?”
“You bet!” Jimmie’s lips went close together.
“Then tonight at six o’clock,” Merle had the last word, “and meet me at
Flaherty’s butcher shop.”
CHAPTER XXIII.
HELEN TALKS TO RENFRO.
Renfro awoke early the next morning. The room of the cave in which
he was confined was dark and the air seemed colder, more mouldy than
on the night before. He wished that they had left the foul smelling
lantern in his room, though the evening before he had hoped it would be
removed.
His wrists and ankles felt numb. Last night they had ached for quite
a long time. He decided while he lay alone in the dark that when Bart
or Maggie came in he would ask them to ease the cords a bit. But when,
after more than an hour, the old man, still wearing the low brimmed cap
and surly air of the night before, came into the room Renfro decided
not to even mention the tightness of the cords.
It was the same smoking, ill smelling lantern of the night before that
he swung in his hand. He set it down near the bed, looked at Renfro,
and then felt of the cord around his wrist. “Not so bad as that--not
that bad, though it was a long time,” he muttered to himself.
He rose heavily and fumbled his way through the door back into the
other room. This time as he had done every time before he closed the
door after him. “No use doing that,” Renfro thought, “I’ve already
heard Helen’s voice.”
The old woman came back with him. She carried a bowl of steaming stew
in which onions were one of the principal ingredients. That was evident
from the odor. And with it were several slices of toasted bread.
“Do you want some coffee?”
Renfro decided that her voice was not gruff through a habitual
bad disposition but exposure and poor food and it might have been
suffering. He forced a smile when he assured her that he would rather
have some milk if she could give him some.
“After a while,” she promised, “presently when I go up to the grocery.”
When it was evident that he was going to eat the stew, the old man
helped him raise himself to a sitting posture. Then he cut the cords on
his wrists. “Now eat,” he said and spoke without any surliness. “And
when the door is fixed a little more you won’t be tied any more.”
A grim smile came onto his face. “You are too smart a boy to have loose
for a time,” he said.
Renfro was interested in the way he spoke. At least it was evident from
what he said that he was to be kept in captivity quite a time. While he
ate the stew which was not a disagreeable mess, he wondered what sort
of confusion was raging back in Lindendale. Would the detectives decide
that it was a kidnaping plot? Would they set out on another trip to a
far off city for more evidence?
He was sure they would not do that. There was Mary, who had shared with
him conjectures concerning the identity of the owner of the missing
eyebrows. She would tell them about the trips to Captain Pete’s, to the
big house, and from there he was sure it would be easy for detectives
to work their way to the old barn.
He smiled contentedly and ate on until the bowl was almost empty. If he
had known that Mary thought him safe at the home of one of his friends,
that his mother believed the same, that full charge of the secret
investigation had been given over to the detectives he would have been
discouraged to the despair point.
After he was through eating, old Bart fastened new bandages, much wider
but stronger than the others on his wrists. But they were a distinct
advantage, for they did not hurt half as badly as had the others. And
when he had changed the narrow ones around his ankles to the wide
variety, Renfro, though far from being in a pleasant posture, was not
uncomfortable.
As soon as they made the discovery that he was going to be agreeable
and not cry or abuse them over his imprisonment, the old couple became
much less hostile. Renfro knew from their attitude that they did not
want to hurt or punish him--but merely to keep him shut up until they
had made some plans concerning Helen Wier.
“Well if it’s money they’re after, they’ll sure ask dad for some
too, as soon as they discover who I am,” he began to think and then
remembering Mary, decided that they wouldn’t get far with their plans
before they were discovered.
After promising to bring him something to read the old man took up
the dilapidated lantern and followed his wife, who had gone back into
the other room several minutes before. Renfro heard him lock the door
between the two rooms of the cave; and later give some commands to his
wife and Lang Tammy, who was once more in the cave.
Though the lantern was gone the cave was not so dark as it had been.
Renfro moved until he discovered the source of the light. It came from
over the top of an old door--the one, he felt sure--that the old man
had spoken about nailing more firmly before he should be turned loose.
He twisted at his thongs. They were tied too tight to ever be torn
loose. He tried them with his teeth but they were too tough for him
to make more than an impression on them. And making impressions would
only harm him, for once discovered they would be responsible for closer
watch than ever being put over him.
Quietly he lay back on his pallet and waited. In the other room they
were talking in muffled tones. A long conversation followed, a bustling
noise, and then silence.
And finally out of it came a voice which Renfro knew. “Who is in
there?” it demanded. “Is it any one who knows me? I’m Helen Wier.”
Renfro could have shouted for joy. “I’m Renfro Horn,” he answered.
“Where are they gone?”
“Up town,” Helen was just outside the locked door. “I’m not tied like
they say you are, but I’m locked in. Tell me everything you know--about
mother and father and everything. And why don’t they find me?”
Renfro had to pitch his voice loud and make it peculiarly piercing to
reach her through the heavy door and the big room of the cave. He told
her of everything he knew, how her letters had reassured her mother and
kept her well.
“Yes, they let me write them,” Helen’s voice seemed changed, more
piercing, more strident. Renfro decided that it was from her life in
the cave. “They’re not mean to me--and they don’t want money. They’re
keeping me, to get even with father.”
Quietly and without any emotion she told her story. Bart had been
sentenced to fifteen years in the penitentiary by her father years
ago. He had served most of those fifteen long years which had meant
separation from his family. While there he brooded over the loneliness
of himself and became almost a maniac, with one purpose in mind--namely
to get even with the judge who had sentenced him.
At first he had decided to kidnap the judge himself. He had kept that
thought in mind for years. When his old cellmate had gone free one day
and they had given him another he had been given a chance to plan for
the future, Captain Pete’s brother had been put in his cell and he, in
time, told of his home, of his crime, and the hidden cave in which he
and his confederates had at first made the counterfeit money.
Getting bolder the counterfeiters had moved into the cellar of the big
house and been discovered. But only the part of the story which was
concerned with the cave had interested Bart. From that time on he made
his plans. As soon as he was free he would come back to Lindendale,
kidnap Judge Wier and imprison him for months in this hidden cave.
Separation from his family for that time would give him just a hint of
what Bart had served on account of his sentence.
“Maggie told me all this,” Helen put her lips close to the key hole for
her throat was getting tired through talking so loud. “She wants me to
know all of it so that when they let me back to father I can tell him
all of it and understand exactly how and why Bart got even with him.”
“But isn’t Captain Pete in it?” Renfro persisted in asking a question
though Helen was still talking.
“No, neither he nor his brother. They just happened to discover the
cave and then they knew where I had been hidden. They’re afraid of
Bart. They won’t ever tell until I’m safe back home and Bart and Maggie
are away and safe in another part of the country, and happy because
they’ve had revenge.”
She talked a little while longer about the life in the cave. She
and Renfro conjectured together on the probable time they would be
imprisoned. And Renfro didn’t tell her of Mary Dugan’s knowledge of all
his clues and his hope of rescue from her. A surprise he decided would
be a good thing for Helen Wier.
After a time they, following Helen’s fear that the old woman would
return, lapsed into silence. Renfro sat and studied the door around
which came in small shafts of light. Now if he could only manage to get
loose before that door was made more secure he felt that he could work
his way through the door. But if--
And in the other room there came confusing sounds. Bart and Maggie had
returned, and a scuffling and barking and cavorting around told him
that they had brought with them Lang Tammy.
CHAPTER XXIV.
LANG TAMMY HELPS RENFRO ESCAPE.
Old Bart, true to his promise, brought Renfro a book and the lantern
to furnish him light for the reading. Maggie, also considerate, had
polished the lantern shade, until now it gave a light which made the
cave a definite room and was bright enough that Renfro could easily
read.
But first he looked around the room. The stalactites, which had been
specters in the half darkness, became things of beauty in the bright
light. Renfro had heard that there were limestone deposits in the
ground under the Hall farm. Now he was sure of it. Why this cave was
very beautiful and full of promise.
“If old Jake--” Helen had told him the name of Captain Pete’s
brother--“had only known it,” he thought, “there was a wealth on his
own land much larger than any he could counterfeit during a lifetime.”
Bart was examining the lock on the door. He had brought in with him
a package which when opened revealed another lock that he tried to
adjust. But it was soon evident from his swearing that the new one was
too small for the door.
Carefully the old man wrapped it up. Angry over his failure he turned
upon Renfro. “You needn’t be grinning,” he said, “I’ll get a better one
this afternoon.”
By slipping over on his stomach and with his hands under him Renfro
could manage to read out of the book of pioneer stories Bart had
fetched from the Hall library. He turned the pages with his tongue. But
between pages he thought hard. If he could get loose by hook or crook
he could get that old door open he was sure.
He remembered the story he had read in the detective magazine of a very
wiry man who had managed to use a knife with his teeth. In Renfro’s
pocket had been a sharp knife. Bart had taken it out. Had he carried it
away or left it with the other things on the floor?
“While he’s gone this afternoon I’ll roll over there and see,” Renfro
made his plans definitely.
A little later Maggie brought him his dinner, milk and other things she
had considered delicacies which a boy of Renfro’s breeding was sure to
like. She was unusually kind and Renfro felt sorry that she should be
so deluded as she was.
He was so restless that he could hardly wait until Bart should start
away again and he could roll over after the knife. That would take time
and he must be free from the fear of discovery. He breathed a sigh of
relief when he heard Bart begin to make preparations to leave. He heard
Maggie argue with him about some things she wanted from her little
home, back in town.
Bart refused to go after them, telling her that if she wanted them
badly enough she would go herself. And after a little while she decided
to go along. Better and better Renfro decided. Now he could do his work
with alacrity, perfectly safe from any fear of discovery at all.
Bart came in after the lantern, carried it out, refilled it and brought
it back. This time he left the door slightly ajar and while he was at
work Renfro saw a big form slip in, crawl into the farthest corner and
lay there. It was Lang Tammy and he was hiding because of the whipping
Maggie had given him for tearing the binding on her coat.
Not until they were gone did Renfro call Lang Tammy and then he came,
crawling and pleading exactly like a dog which has recently been
beaten. But as he reached Renfro and made sure that it was his friend
he became joyous and barked joyfully and frantically. And then he made
ready for a game of tug.
Joyously he seized one end of the free bandage on Renfro’s hands. He
gave it a pull which cut into the boy’s wrists cruelly. Another pull,
another cut, and Renfro tried to stop him. But the big dog was intent
on the game which was now a winning one for him. Another tug, this time
a long tearing one, and something slipped, the knot the old man had
tied so firmly that morning. Renfro jerked at his hands and Tammy was
onto the bandage again.
And then it came loose. Renfro could have hurrahed from joy. Instead
he rolled over quickly to his pile of articles taken from his pocket,
found his knife, cut the thongs around his legs and stood tottering,
his legs stiff and aching. With a bound he was to the door working
at the lock. Indeed it was old and rusty. It gave way before his
onslaught and he stood free to go out into the open.
He flew back to the other door. “Helen,” he called softly, “I’m free
and you’ll be in a little while. If they come back before help comes,
be sick or do anything you can to keep them interested and away from my
door.”
Outside he stood in a new world which he soon identified as being
the thicket below the hill on the Hall farm. He found the lower road
and fairly flew to the edge of town, boarded a waiting car and rode
directly to the office of the Globe.
The big building looked like paradise to him. Straight through the
outer door, into the hall and back to the door marked “Route Manager,
Morrison,” he hurried. And inside it he fell into Morrison’s arms.
“That wasn’t a complaint, Morrison!” he burst out. “That was a fake
call! I went--”
“You--Hooch, you--you!” Morrison gasped like a drowning man, seized
Renfro, and half carried, half dragged him into Circulation Manager
Bruce’s office. The office was deserted except for that worthy and his
stenographer. He looked up at the confusion, jumped to his feet and
caught Renfro in the curve of his arm.
And to him Renfro began his story once more. “That wasn’t a complaint
call last night at all. It was just a fake. I was kidnaped. It was a
cave. And I found Helen Wier and--and--”
“You found Helen Wier?” Bruce shouted his question. Then before it
could be answered he had dragged him to the door. And there he decided
that the boy was not going fast enough. Up into his arms he lifted him.
Through the hall to the elevator cage he went, Morrison following.
“Car up!” Bruce was still shouting. “Can’t wait.”
Up the steps he ran. At the landing he ducked but Renfro’s head struck
the ceiling a hard whack, in spite of that, Renfro merely winced. At
the top of the steps Bruce made a sharp turn, rushed against the door
marked “Managing Editor” and threw it open with the weight of his big
body.
Morrison, puffing and trying to obtain answers to a whole chain of
questions he was hurling at Renfro, still perched perilously near the
top of Bruce’s shoulders, followed. He saw Bruce drop Renfro, grab a
little man who was having a discussion with Mr. North, The Globe’s
managing editor, pull him to the door, shove him through and then lock
the door after him.
“What in the--” North jumped to the floor, scattering proof sheets in
all directions. “What--”
The little man who had been forcibly ejected was beating and pounding
his protest on the panels of the big oak door but Bruce didn’t mind
him. “North,” he jerked North so that he faced Renfro, “This is Renfro
Horn.”
“And,” Morrison would not be ignored, “he has found Helen Wier.”
“When--where--how?” North was all editor.
“In a cave! I was there too. They kidnaped me last night,” Renfro burst
out. “She’s there now! Locked in! Bart and Maggie are up town. Let’s
get her before they come back.”
North pushed Morrison toward the door. “Get a taxi,” he ordered, “and
keep your mouth shut.”
He jerked open his desk, took his revolver from a drawer and thrust it
in his pocket. Five steps carried him to the locked door. He jerked it
open, breaking the lock. “Warriner,” he called. “We’re making a trip.
Big story! Extra edition! Get the presses ready for it. I’ll take Figg
with me.”
The man sitting at the table on the front of which was printed “City
Editor,” jumped to his feet. “Figg!” he bawled, “Figg!”
While they waited North demanded Warriner’s revolver and handed it to
Bruce. “You’re going too,” he said.
Figg came out of the cubby hole which bore the name Sporting
Editor--big, burly and aggressive in every step and gesture. No one
ever mentioned a gun to Figg. With the first word of “Big story,” he
had his gun out of his desk and in his pocket.
No one mentioned elevator this time. They made their descent down the
steps. Through the hall, a curious crowd stopping at sight of the odd
procession, they rushed. Morrison outside had the taxi door open and
into it they sprang, Bruce, North, Figg and Renfro. Morrison thinking
that he was to be left behind clung to the running board.
Renfro’s directions were shouted to the driver by North. Out of town,
breaking all traffic rules they went. A sharp turn by the tile factory
took them down the river road. Beyond it they rode a few yards, made
another turn, jolted up a deserted lane and came to an abrupt stop.
Around the shrubbery to the passage to the open door Renfro led them.
Inside the room Lang Tammy sat in a dejected attitude. Bristling every
hair he jumped at the intruders, saw Renfro and sprang on him with a
joyful bark.
But a girlish voice sounded above all the confusion. “Renfro, have them
hurry! It’s time for Maggie and Bart any minute.”
CHAPTER XXV.
THE GLOBE GETS A SCOOP.
Not until the taxicab turned into Elm Street back in town once more did
Helen Wier speak. She simply crouched in one corner of the taxicab and
stared out of the window. There she clutched at Figg’s arm. “That’s my
street,” she pointed at the one they left. “I have to see my mother
right away. I do,” she was emphatic, jerking his arm savagely, “I do!”
Then North became the cunning editor. “Not immediately,” he spoke in
conciliatory tones. “The shock would kill her. She has to be prepared.
We’ll attend to that at the Globe office.”
Renfro stared at Helen. How white and thin she looked! Her voice had
sounded hollow back there in the cave. Now as he afterwards described
it, she looked hollow, too. Leaning against his knees, Lang Tammy was
staring up at him with happy eyes. From time to time he kissed his hand
and gave Figg hostile growls.
Everything at the Globe was waiting for them. Outside a long line of
newsboys was waiting for the extras to be shot through the presses and
out to them on the street in a few minutes.
A crowd of girls from the business office stared through the windows
at the motley procession. The elevator man, watching outside his cage,
rushed in again and seized the lever. They shot up to the editorial
floor and rushed into the room where Warriner had his star writer at
his machine and his copy boys ready.
He looked at the crowd. “Shoot!” he commanded. “The girl first.”
And Helen Wier encouraged by North told her story in weary, strained
gasps. “I was in the library alone reading that night. I heard a noise.
There was somebody in the room. He had a gun pointed at me. He said he
would kill me if I screamed. He said there was some one in the other
room who would kill my mother if I didn’t come with him. His forehead
was bleeding. Something was wrong with his eyebrows--”
“Oh, yes,” Renfro jumped forward and jerking off his cap, turned down
the band. “His eyebrows were missing. They froze to the window pane.
He jerked them off and I found them on the pane. That’s how I found
Helen.”
North jerked him over to one side. “Your time next,” he commanded, and
nodded at Helen.
“Outside the house, he made me walk into the shrubbery. I was afraid
they would shoot my mother.” Helen’s tone was full of worry. “They
didn’t--did they?”
“No, no, she’s safe,” North clipped out his words.
The typewriter stopped its clicking. The feature writer rolled out one
sheet, Warriner grabbed it and another one was in its place.
“Shoot!”
Warriner gave the command again. “They gagged me then. A woman helped
him. She was Maggie. And they put me in a wagon. We rode miles. It was
cold and I didn’t have any coat--just an old rug they put around me. We
went through some buildings. And then down into the cave.”
It was Renfro whom North asked to give a description of Bart and
Maggie. He told his own story first--of the first night he had seen
the stranger peering into the Wier home, the second experience, his
attempt to telephone the Judge, of the line out of order, and then of
his finding the eyebrows frozen to the window pane.
The reporters moved closer to him while he talked. North interrupted
to ask questions. Warriner gave orders to copy boys, to the writers at
their machines, through a telephone to the press room and through it
all managed to hear every word of the story.
When Renfro at the close of his story again took off his cap,
pulled down the band and exhibited his specimens--The Missing
Eyebrows--carefully opened one of the square packages and took one
look, held it to North, and then handed it to one of the men. “Have
them photographed and a plate made,” he ordered.
And then he was down to the press room. North once more took
command--got more detailed stories from both Renfro and Helen, had
half a dozen reporters writing at once--descriptions of the cave, of
the rooms there, of Maggie and Bart and then one of Lang Tammy who was
still by Renfro’s side, his nose firmly clutched by one of the boy’s
muscular hands.
There was a shout below. Morrison and Bruce both jumped. “The paper’s
off the press,” the reporter nearest the chute yelled and North turned
to Helen, “Get ready to go home,” he said kindly, “I’ll telephone your
mother.”
“Telephone mine,” for the first time Renfro remembered his parents. “I
can’t get home and back before it’s time to carry my route.”
North motioned to the cub reporter. “Tell Bruce to send some other boy
out on Horn’s route tonight,” he commanded. “I want to take Horn home
myself.”
The trip down the stairway was made more slowly this time. North
noticed that Renfro was limping. He reached out his hand and steadied
him. “Best story of the year,” he muttered. “And we scooped them all.”
And Renfro understood him. But he didn’t say anything except to nod at
Lang Tammy. “I’m going to keep him,” he said, “I wonder if they’ve got
Bart and Maggie yet.”
“Figg will tend to them,” North smiled. “I sent him back with some of
the boys to get the story for the next edition.”
At the door his editor’s mantle seemed to drop. He looked first at
Helen and then at Renfro. He had several children out at his home.
“You’re great kids!” he grinned.
But there was a volume in that grin and both of them realized it. In
the taxi he was quite as laconic. “Your folks will about die! I talked
to both of your dads.”
Yet it was Helen’s mother who was waiting on the porch when the taxi
drove up in front of the Wier home. She rushed down the walk as Helen
rushed toward the house. Half way they met.
North turned his head. But he heard Mrs. Wier talking. She had taken
Renfro’s hand. The tears from her eyes dropped on it but she talked
bravely, and in a collected manner, giving him the greatest eulogy he
had ever received.
The judge too talked to the boy, as one man does to another. Helen left
her mother’s arm to come over to him. “But you won’t be hard on Bart,
daddy,” she begged. “You--see--now--we know--how--cruel--it--is to be
away from the people we love.”
Judge Wier nodded his head. He looked up at North. “I will attend to
them,” he smiled, “but still I feel it would not be best to quote me on
that. Just say that I shall not be too harsh on these people.”
Mrs. Wier nodded. Then she looked at Renfro. “His mother is waiting,”
she said.
And North took Renfro back to the taxi in which Lang Tammy was waiting.
As they crossed town, Renfro nodded toward the street. “This is my
route,” he said. “They call it Old Grief.”
“The turkey route,” North laughed. “We’re going to use that story
tomorrow in our Thanksgiving number.”
He nodded at some of the dilapidated buildings on a cross street. “Want
to change it?” he asked.
“No sir!” Renfro’s answer was emphatic.
Mary Dugan was standing out close to the curbing, a clean white apron
tied around her expansive waist. Her hand reached out and grasped
Renfro’s with all the force a man gives an obstinate pump handle. And
she shook it manfully.
Now, Mary Dugan was of the kissing type, but she respected manhood.
And in fifteen minutes Renfro had grown from a boy to a man in her
estimation. Nor did she weep though she had shed copious tears when
she had heard the story. “I missed them eyebrows last night,” she
said, “and I’ve dressed both of them turkeys which was left. The three
charity ones I carried out to the preacher’s parsonage myself. I told
them to eat one themselves, as he did the free advertisin’ for you.”
Proudly she led the way to the house after she had delivered her
speech. Renfro’s mother caught him in her arms in the most genuine,
motherly embrace he had known for a long time. She sobbed and sobbed
and could not talk. But he knew without her saying a word how happy she
was.
Mr. Horn laughed nervously to North. “I’ve been through Hell a thousand
times during the last twenty-four hours,” he said. “But thank Heaven I
had the courage to go through alone. I never told my wife a word about
Renfro’s being gone until you told me that he was safe. She thought he
was visiting.”
He managed a few fatherly hugs in spite of his wife’s constant clinging
to Renfro. His eyes were charged with love and beyond that a look
of pride. He started to say something directly to Renfro about his
feelings but with a great effort Renfro managed to wriggle out of his
mother’s arm and start toward the dining room.
“Where are you going, Hooch?” Mary Dugan sprang to her feet with the
suspicion in her mind that Renfro was hungry.
But Renfro waved her aside. “I’m going to call up the office,” he
returned. “I want to find out of Morrison if there have been any
complaints on my route.”
THE END.
The next RENFRO HORN book will be
_THE LUCK OF A RAINY NIGHT_
THE LUCK OF A RAINY NIGHT
or
Renfro Horn Wins the $10,000 Reward
In this second book of the Renfro Horn series of Newspaper Boys’
stories, Renfro Horn wins the enmity of the carrier on Route No.
19, because Renfro is held up as a model carrier by the Circulation
management of the Globe.
And on the darkest, rainiest night of the year, the carrier of Route
No. 19 plans to lure Renfro to a desolate place where he hopes to
give him a beating. But Renfro, who has been keen on the trail of the
Insurance Mystery, stumbles on the body of the man who is supposed to
be dead, and he wins the reward which the Insurance company has offered
for the location of Clyde Truesdale.
THE RISE OF ROUTE 19
or
Renfro Gets a Regular Detective Badge
“Old Grief” has now been made a respectable route under Renfro Horn’s
careful carrier service, and the Globe has the largest number of
subscribers in that section of the city, so to test Renfro Horn’s
fighting spirit, Bruce, the circulation manager, offers Renfro Route
19, one of the bad routes along the river front, where the house boats
are moored, and a better route in a better part of the city.
But Renfro Horn, being in quest of success and excitement takes Route
19 and thus begins an interesting series of adventures for this boy
carrier, who is the peer of the city’s best detectives. It ends with
the Mayor of the city pinning on his coat lapel a regular detective
badge, because Renfro has found the stolen finger prints.
THE WHITE BAG’S SECRET
or
Renfro Horn Trails Down the Thieving Dog.
By Stephen Rudd.
The jewels of Mrs. Laidlaw Garth have mysteriously disappeared. Mary
Dugan’s cousin, Bridget O’Hara, is the maid in the house and is under
suspicion.
Renfro and Mary believe she is innocent. Through the location of one of
his old paper bags, Renfro gets a clue which leads him to believe that
Mrs. Garth’s dog, “Bluff,” stole the jewels. He and Mary set out to
find them, and they are successful, of course.
But there is thrill in this story for any red blooded boy.
Published by the R. H. Gore Publishing Co.
THE CLUE OF THE TWISTED PAPER
or
The Mystery of the Lost Girl.
By Stephen Rudd.
Can a paper, which a newspaper carrier boy twists into a roll and
throws on a porch, contain a clue to the identity of the girl who has
forgotten who she is or where she comes from? Renfro Horn, the carrier
boy detective, proves this can be done.
He and Mary Dugan do it.
And the lost girl--well she is a wonder child. But read all about this
absorbing mystery in “The Clue of the Twisted Paper.” It’s coming soon.
Published by the R. H. Gore Publishing Co.
* * * * *
Transcriber’s note
Typos fixed; non-standard spelling and dialect retained.
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