THE SKY PATROL ORGANIZES
Amazed, Dick challenged Jeff's statement.
"Priceless emeralds--destroyed? You mean--robbers, don't you?"
Jeff shook his head.
"I don't think so--but I don't know for sure who it is. But I do mean to
ask you if you'd like to help me, and I don't think it would be against
robbers but against somebody that wants to destroy the Everdail
Emeralds."
"The Everdail Emeralds!" Larry repeated the phrase sharply. "Why, Jeff!
I've read a newspaper story about them, in a Sunday supplement. That's
the matched set of thirty emeralds----"
"Curiously cut stones," interrupted Sandy. "I read about them too!"
"That's the ones."
"Matched stones--and priceless," added Larry. "The paper said they were
a present to one of Mr. Everdail's ancestors by one of the most
fabulously rich Hindu Nabobs who ever lived."
"But who would want to destroy them?" Dick wondered.
"That-there is just what I can't tell you," Jeff replied.
"How did you get into this?" Sandy's suspicions came uppermost.
Jeff drew a bulky, registered envelope from his coat, displayed the
registration stamps and marks, and his name and address typed on the
envelope. Drawing out a half dozen hand written sheets in a large
masculine "fist," he showed the signature of Atley Everdail at the end.
"This-here is what got me going," he stated. "Want to read it or will I
give it to you snappy and quick?"
Sandy extended his hand and Jeff readily surrendered the letter.
"I'm letting you see I am straight with you," he remarked.
"You said we couldn't get away to tell anybody anyway," Sandy said, but
he was compelled to admit to himself that although anyone might write
such a letter--even Jeff!--the postmark was Los Angeles and the
enclosure had every appearance of sincerity.
"Never mind old Suspicious Sandy," urged Dick. "Let him read that, but
you tell us."
"It will check up, that way, too," smiled Larry.
"Suits me!" Jeff crossed his legs, leaning against the metal wall, as he
related an amazing and mystifying series of events.
"I'm pretty close to one of the richest men in America," he began. "You
see, we both enlisted in aviation units when the big war tore loose and
got Uncle Sam mixed up in it. We were buddies, Atley and me. Well, after
we came back I stayed in aviation, knocking around from control jobs to
designing new gadgets like superchargers and all. But when he went to
California and began to organize some passenger flying lines, I stayed
East in a commercial pilot's job."
"This letter starts off as if you were old friends," Sandy had to admit.
"Buddies--closer'n brothers," nodded Jeff.
"Atley Everdail sold out stocks and stuff here and went West to work out
some pet ideas about passenger transport," he told Dick and Larry. "Of
course he bought a big place out there and closed up this estate--put it
up for sale. Hard times kept it from selling, the same reason made him
hang onto that-there swell yacht he owned."
"I've seen pictures of the _Tramp_," Dick nodded. "One fine boat."
"She is that!" Jeff agreed. "Well, as Sandy must be reading, about where
he's got in that letter, Mrs. Everdail, who goes in for society pretty
strong, got a chance to be presented, this Spring, before the King and
Queen of England at one of their receptions."
"That's a big honor," commented Larry.
"Naturally she dug up all her finest jewelry," surmised Dick.
"And how!" Jeff nodded. "Now, that-there Everdail necklace that was in
his side of the family for generations--that wasn't took out of the
safe-deposit box once in a lifetime, hardly. Most generally the missus
wore a good paste imitation."
"But to appear before royalty--" Dick cut in.
"It says, here, she took the real necklace, on the yacht, when she went
to England!"
Sandy had lost his suspicious look. His interest, as much as that of his
older chums, was caught and chained by the coming possibilities and he
put down the letter to listen to Jeff.
"She did take the string, as the letter says," Jeff nodded. "It was a
secret--they didn't broadcast it that the necklace was in the captain's
cabin, locked up in his safe. Nobody knew it, not even the lady's
personal maid, as far as anybody supposed."
"Mr. Everdail didn't go with her," guessed Larry.
"He was too busy routing air lines and working out cost, maintenance and
operation plans for his big Western lines," explained Jeff. "But they
took all the care in the world of those emeralds. Even on the night of
the reception, the imitation string was taken to the hotel Mrs. Everdail
stayed at. That-there real necklace was brought to the hotel, in person,
by the captain."
"I don't see what could happen--did anything happen?"
"That-there is what started things," Jeff told Dick. "The missus was in
her private suite, in the dressing bowdoir or whatever it is, with
nobody but her French maid to help, and all the jewels in a box in the
room, hid in her trunks."
"What happened?" Sandy could hardly check his eagerness to learn.
"She was all but ready, dolled up like a circus, I guess," Jeff grinned,
and then became very sober. "All the jewelry was spread out to try how
this and that one looked, with her clothes, separate and in different
combinations."
"But what happened?" persisted Sandy.
"There comes a banging on that-there suite door to the hall and a voice
hollered, like it was scared to death, 'Fire! Fire--get out at once!'"
"Didn't she suspect any trick--was there a trick?"
"She didn't have time to think. That French maid went crazy and started
to hop around like a flea in a hot pan, and yelling, and it upset the
missus so much she forgot all about a fire escape on the end window of
the suite, and rushed out, snatching up all the strings of beads and
pearls and the pins she could carry. But, because she knew it was only
imitation and there wasn't anybody else around anyway, she didn't bother
about the emerald necklace."
"It was a false alarm--there was no fire!" Larry decided.
"All she found was a paper of burnt matches outside in the hotel
corridor that had been set off so when she opened the door she'd smell
smoke. Of course she ran back--and----"
As he reached for the letter, and searched on the fourth page, all three
of his listeners were holding their breath in suspense.
"Here it is," he declared, and they crowded around. "Read it, so you'll
see just what I learned about when she went back."
Bending close, intent and eager, they read:
"Some strong, pungent liquid had been poured on the green necklace," the
letter from the millionaire stated. "No alarm was given. My wife did not
want to broadcast either the fact that she had the real gems or the
trouble in the hotel. But people had heard the 'fire!' cry and doubtless
some suspected the possible truth, knowing why she was getting ready.
"Captain Parks came up later with the real stones and while he waited
for my wife to finish her costume, he examined the fire escape window
and was sure that someone had entered and left by that.
"Now Jeff," the letter concluded, "my caretaker on Long Island has sent
me clippings about a ghost scare on the old estate, and somehow I
connect that with the attempt to destroy the emeralds. I can't imagine
any motive, but there are fanatics who do such things from a warped
sense of their duty or from spite and hatred of rich folks. For old
times' sake, drop everything, get down to bedrock on this thing at your
end--do whatever you think best, but get in touch with the yacht, learn
their plans, cooperate with Captain Parks and my wife to bring that
necklace back to the vaults, and--I count on you!"
"Golly-gracious!" exclaimed Larry, "that's like a mystery novel!"
"But it's no novel!" Jeff said morosely.
"What have you done about it?" asked Larry.
Jeff explained. He had sent a radiogram to the yacht, and as its owner
had already sent one identifying Jeff, he was given the information that
the real necklace was being brought back, extra heavily insured in a
London company, by the captain himself.
"I located and rented this crate we flew here in," he went on. "I played
joy-ride pilot by day at the airport and hopped here of nights. But I
couldn't get a line on anything. I didn't notice that chewing gum until
you, Dick, Larry and Sandy--all of you--started your third degree and
showed it to me. But I did think--if anybody was playing ghost here,
they might be planning to use the old amphibian for something--maybe to
get away to get away with the emeralds if they could get hold of
them--in case anybody thought the yacht was due to lay up here."
"And that's why you brought us here--to help you watch?" Sandy asked.
"Not exactly. But it came over me that at night I didn't get anywhere
and I thought I'd try coming in the daytime--and being that the yacht is
due to make Long Island this afternoon, I thought I might need some help
with a plan I've worked out."
"What is it?" eagerly. Sandy wanted details.
"I've sent the caretaker here--he's as dependable as sunrise!--to a
place out near Montauk Point lighthouse, with Mr. Everdail's fast
hydroplane boat and I've sent a radio message to the yacht captain to be
on the watch to meet the hydroplane pretty well out to sea, and transfer
the necklace to the boat. Then, the yacht will come on and make harbor
here, as though nothing had happened--and all the time the emeralds will
be on the way, down the Sound and East River, to a wharf where I'll have
a motor car, with a dependable chum of mine, to take charge and carry
the package to safe deposit, get a receipt--and there you are!"
"I still don't see how we can help!" Sandy spoke again.
"I mean to hop out in the airplane, sort of oversee the business of the
transfer, and escort the hydroplane till she lands the emeralds, and
then circle around till my friend, with the receipt, goes up onto the
bank roof--it's pretty high up--fourteen stories--and wig-wags an O.K.
And I'd like dependable observers----"
"I'm one!" cried Sandy, his suspicions swept away. "Number two is named
Larry." "Dick is a dependable third!"
"We'll be a regular Sky Patrol!" exulted Sandy. "And watch what goes on
while you do the control job--and, that way--nothing can go wrong!" "Not
with the Sky Patrol 'over'-seeing!" Dick, too, spoke overconfidently.