intention of having "the dago," as they jokingly called the Italian, at
the party, with his organ and monkey. And many another lad, to whom Ned
imparted the news, smiled knowingly and said:
"Aw, quit your kidding!"
"No, it's a fact--honest!" Ned declared.
And so it proved.
For when the lads and lassies (for the girls were invited) filed into
the hall, there, in a place of honor on a platform, was the Italian
organist and his pet simian.
"Oh, but we can't dance to that doleful music!" objected Nina Farnsworth
as she saw what some of the girls called the "orchestra."
"Don't worry!" laughed Blanche Richmond, "Bob has the jazz band from
Cardiff over--talk about music--my feet are aching to begin!"
Bob had his own special object in hiring Pietro to come to the party
with Jacko, and making dance music wasn't it. In due time it shall be
made known to you.
And, knowing that his young friends liked to dance as much as he did
himself, Bob had provided the wherewithal, so to speak. Cardiff--the
city where the "elephant man" had engaged the attention of the chief and
the young detective that rainy night--Cardiff had an orchestra of young
men, noted for their jazz ability--that is if you grant it takes any
ability to play jazz music. And this Bob had engaged.
It was the custom for members of the Boys' Athletic Club to take turns
giving little affairs, such as dances and parties, so it was not unusual
that Bob should do so.
He had been a little diffident about approaching Pietro on the matter,
but he had put it in such a way that the Italian had consented after a
little thought, and a quick, shrewd look into Bob's face.
"You no maka bad tricks with Jacko?" he asked.
"Of course not!" cried Bob. "You and the monkey will be treated
perfectly fair. It's just that I want a little something different at my
party--something to make the boys and girls laugh. The monkey will do
that."
"Oh, sure! Jacko--he do many tricks. I show you!"
Bob had called on the queer Italian at the latter's room in the Railroad
House. It was a poor enough place to live, but it suited Pietro and
others of his kind.
"Sure, the dago's up in his room," Mike Brennan, proprietor of the hotel
had said in response to Bob's inquiry. "Go on up--we don't keep
elevators or bell boys here!"
So Bob had found the man in his dirty, dingy room, with a heap of rags
in the corner for the monkey to sleep on.
"He do many fine tricks," said the Italian, once he understood the
object of Bob's call. And he put Jacko through his stunts.
The compensation was agreed upon, Bob giving the man a few dollars more
than he had asked, and now it was the night of the party, and Pietro,
his organ and Jacko were on hand.
"Oh, isn't he a dear!"
"So cute!"
"Will he bite?"
"I'd love to hold him! May I?"
Thus the girls in raptures over the monkey which sat perched on his
master's organ, his wizened face looking pathetically at the gay throng
about him.
"Jacko no bite!" murmured Pietro, and he seemed proud of the attention
his simian was attracting. "You take him!"
He held the little creature out to Nina, but she drew back with a scream
of real or pretended fright.
"I'd love to hold him!" exclaimed Mary Wilson. "Do let me! Come on, you
queer little imp!" she murmured.
The monkey whimpered but went to her and put his little hairy paw about
the girl's neck.
"Oh, I wouldn't do it for the _world_!" cried Nina.
"He's a dear!" murmured Mary. "His hands are as soft as a baby's."
The monkey readily made friends, and he had a feast of peanuts, for all
the boys had done as Bob requested, and there were enough of the goobers
to last Jacko a year, it seemed.
"Go on--play something!" cried Bob to his organ orchestra, and the
wheezy instrument was set in operation. The boys and girls laughed,
particularly when Jacko did some of his tricks, which he performed
better to the strains of the organ, it seemed.
Then the jazz took its turn and the party was on.
This isn't a story of Bob Dexter's party, and I don't propose to tell
you of the jolly times that went on there--for it was a jolly affair--no
doubting that. The jazz was of the jazziest, the monkey and organ made a
great hit, and the refreshments were all that could be desired.
But there was something more than this.
It would not have been exactly correct to say that Bob Dexter gave this
party solely for the purpose of advancing him toward a solution of the
Storm Mountain mystery--to help him discover the secret of the log
cabin. For he had been planning to give a party for six months
back--before he ever even dreamed that Hiram Beegle would be robbed of
the treasure map.
However, the party now fitted well into Bob's plans, and he took
advantage of it to carry out a scheme he wanted to try.
The party was at its merriest, and the boys and girls were gathered in a
ring about the organ grinder and his monkey, when Bob touched Ned Fuller
on the arm.
Ned, who had been tossing nuts to the monkey, turned about and, in
answer to Bob's nod of the head, followed his chum to a quiet corner.
"What's up?" asked Ned. "Want me to help you dish out the ice cream,
Bob?"
"No, the steward will do that."
"But something's up--you look serious. Those fellows haven't got old
Hiram for good this time; have they?"
"Not that I know of. But I want you to take charge of things here for a
little while."
"Take charge of things?"
"Yes. Take my place--act as a sort of deputy host"
"What's the idea?"
"I'm going away for a while."
"You aren't sick, are you?"
"Far from it. But I want to do something. I may as well tell you what it
is, and then, if anything happens, you'll know where I am."
"Say, this seems like it was getting serious!" murmured Ned, looking
closely at his chum. "You haven't caught that Rod chap, have you?"
"Well, no, not exactly, but I may get on his track, if I have luck.
Listen, Ned. I had that Italian come here to-night for a special
purpose."
"And a good purpose it was, I'll say if you ask me. He's the hit of the
evening, outside of myself!" And Ned puffed out his chest.
"Stow that talk!" chuckled Bob. "But I mean I got the Italian here so he
would be out of his room at the Railroad House."
"Ah, noble youth! Providing entertainment--to say nothing of food--for
the poor and downtrodden! Atta boy, Bob!"
"Cut it out! I don't mean that way! I asked the dago here so he wouldn't
be in his room."
"Naturally if he's here he can't be in his room," bantered Ned. "Two
objects can't occupy the same place at the same time. Neither can even
an Italian organ grinder be in two places at once. Q.E.D. you know,
Bob!"
"Oh, will you be serious!"
"Is this serious?" asked Ned.
"It may be--yes. Listen! I'm going out--I'm going to take a run down to
the Railroad House and make a search through the room of this fellow.
That's why I got him here--so as to give me a clear coast. I can run
down in my flivver and be back inside of half an hour. Can you keep
things moving that long--until I come back?"
"I'll try, even if I have to stand on my head to amuse 'em!"
"Good boy! But don't do anything rash. Don't raise a rumpus, and if any
one asks for me cover my absence. Above all don't let the dago know I've
gone to his dump."
"Trust your old college chum for that, Bob. I'm Little Old On The Job
for yours truly. Shoot! When you going?"
"Right away. It will soon be time to serve the ice cream and cake, and
they can think I'm looking after that. Mum's the word now!"
"Mum is right!" echoed Ned with a wink.
They had conversed rapidly and in low voices in one corner of the room,
while nearly all the guests were gathered about the monkey and the
Italian.
Seeing that they were likely to be thus amused for some time, Bob
slipped out. Ned was on the alert to forestall possible embarrassing
questions.
"I'm going up to the Italian's room a minute," said Bob to the Railroad
House proprietor, a little later.
"Help yourself," indifferently replied Mike Brennan. "He's out, though."
"Yes, I know. He's entertaining over at the Boys' Club."
"Oh, sure! Now I remember ye!" cried Mike. "You're th' lad that come and
hired him. I s'pose he forgot his music!" and he chuckled. "So ye had t'
come for it, did ye? Sure these dagos aren't any good, though Pietro is
as decent as any. Go on up wid ye!"
Bob made his way along the dimly-lighted hall until he came to the door
of the room where the Italian slept. Bob had been in the Railroad House
before, once when it was raided by the police. He knew that the locks on
the doors were old-fashioned and that a buttonhook would open most of
them. An ordinary slender key, with one ward on it, would more than do
the trick, and Bob had several keys of the skeleton variety.
He was not surprised to find the door unlocked, when he tried it before
using any of the keys he had brought. But if he wasn't surprised at the
ease with which he entered, he was surprised at the sight he saw when he
pushed back the portal.
For the room was lighted by a dim gas jet, partly turned down. And in
the sickly gleam Bob saw a man in the room--a man stooping over a chest
in one corner.
At first Bob believed that Pietro had gotten there ahead of him. But the
manifest impossibility of this soon made itself known to him.
The man bending over the Italian's chest straightened up suddenly at the
noise of the opening door.
He was a man of rough appearance, and his left hand was missing. In
place of it was an iron hook--for all the world like Captain Cuttle.
With a sharp intaking of his breath, the man with the hook faced the
young detective. Bob, on his part, could not repress a gasp of surprise.
"Well!" snarled the man at last. "What do you want?"
"Who are you?" demanded the lad.
The two glared at each other in the dim light of the turned-down gas
jet.
*CHAPTER XIX*
*THE LAST CHORD*
Bob Dexter had to do some quick thinking. He had not counted on finding
any one in the Italian's room, when he left the party to make a quick
survey of the sordid apartment. That is all Bob wanted to do--to look
about and either confirm or do away with certain suspicions that had
entered his mind.
For he had begun to get suspicious of Pietro, in spite of the ingenuous
ways of the smiling Italian, and the suspicions began when the man hired
the bramble patch from Judge Weston, with the avowed purpose of planting
food for the monkey.
Now that he had come, and found a stranger in the room, and a sinister
stranger, with his ugly iron hook in place of a hand and arm--Bob hardly
knew what to do or say. He could not make the inspection he wished with
this suspicious man present.
And the man with the hook was not only suspicious in himself, but he
regarded Bob with suspicion. The lad knew that at once--it was evident
not only in his manner but in his look.
Quickly Bob's eyes roved about the room, seeking that on which he could
either build further suspicions, or begin to manufacture new ones.
However, what he wanted could not be found by a casual inspection.
What Bob was after was something to connect this man with the sea. Since
the time he had seen him idly plaiting sailors' knots in the monkey's
cord, the lad had had an idea, in the back of his brain, that the fellow
at one time had been a hand before the mast. But that one little slip,
if such it was--the idle tying of the odd knots--was the only evidence,
so far, that Bob had. He wanted more.
Hence, when he had decided to give his party, and had thought of hiring
Pietro, the idea had occurred to him that he could easily slip away for
a half hour or so and look through the man's room. Some of the many
objects, associated with sailors from time immemorial, would turn the
trick and prove that Pietro was not exactly what he pretended to be--a
traveling maker of music.
Whence had come this man with the iron hook strapped fast to his arm? He
might have stepped directly from the pages of "Dombey and Son." Who was
he?
That is what Bob wanted to know.
For perhaps half a minute--and that is a long time when under such
stress as were the two--for perhaps half a minute they remained staring
at each other--Bob tense and ready for anything that might happen--the
man with the hook ugly and suspicious.
Then, at last, the man seemed to give way to the lad. At least he did to
this extent that the angry look faded from his face, and he
laughed--albeit uneasily.
"Guess you got in the wrong room, didn't you, lad?" asked the man. "You
don't belong here!"
Bob resolved to chance all on a bold throw. He felt pretty certain that
Pietro had not taken in a partner. The man did not seem to be an
Italian--far from it. And neither Pietro nor the landlord had said
anything about a visitor.
Yet here was this man with the hook making himself very much at home in
Pietro's place. So Bob resolved on a bit of bluff.
"Aren't you in the wrong room?" came the demand again.
"No more than you are!" countered Bob shortly. "Who are you, and what
are you doing in Margolis' place?"
The shot went home.
"Oh, you know him, do you?" asked the man.
"Of course I do!" and Bob followed up the advantage he thought he had
gained. "I hired him to play at a party for me to-night."
Bob would have been stuck there but for something that came into his
mind. How could he explain his presence there in the absence of the
room's rightful inmate, when he had admitted that Pietro was at the
party?
The lad, somehow, remembered that hand organs are operated by a round
piece of brass, called a "barrel," and that on this barrel are points of
steel, like tiny pins. As the barrel revolves, to the turning of the
crank, which operates a worm gear, these points open valves, allowing
air to pass over the brass reed-tongues, thus producing "music." Each
barrel has on it a certain number of steel points, set in such a way
that they play a set number of tunes, no more. To enable a hand organ,
or a street piano, to play other melodies it is necessary to insert
another barrel, with different pins on.
Why would not his party guests become tired of a repetition of a set
number of tunes? Wouldn't they demand others? And to get them it would
be necessary to insert a new barrel in the organ, even as a new roll is
put in a player piano.
"I have it!" mused Bob to himself. "I came here to get another barrel so
Pietro could play other tunes. That will do the trick!"
So he spoke up and said:
"Have you seen anything of the other barrel?" He was careful not to say
that he had come for it, for that was not his original object.
"What barrel?" asked the man.
"To go in the organ--to play different tunes," the lad explained.
"Huh! I don't know anything about tunes!" growled the man with the hook.
"If Pietro sent you for it--all right. Take it if you can find it. But I
didn't come here for that. What time's he coming back from this party of
yours?"
"Oh, not for a long while yet. It's only just started."
"Urn! Well, I'd like to see him. I got particular business with him. He
doesn't know I'm here, but I am!"
The man flung himself into a chair which creaked under his weight.
"Look for the barrel--or whatever it is if you like," he growled.
But now Bob had lost all desire to explore the dirty room and its almost
as dirty contents. Suddenly another idea had come into his mind.
This man--the stranger with the hook--had claimed to be a friend to the
Italian. Otherwise he would not have been allowed to enter his room in
the absence of Pietro--as was evident he had done. Though for that
matter Mike Brennan did not operate his Railroad House with any real
regard for his guests. Those with valuable possessions did not put up at
his hotel.
But this man's air was anything but friendly. Somehow Bob got the
impression that the visit was distinctly unfriendly. The man with the
hook seemed angry. It was evident in his words and manner.
"No, I won't disturb things," said Bob, as he prepared to leave. "I'll
send Pietro for it himself. He'll know just where it is. I'll go back
and send him."
"And tell him to hustle back here!" growled the other. "I've waited long
enough--I'm getting tired. Tell him Jake Dauber is waiting for him."
"Jake Dauber!" repeated Bob.
"That's the name--yes--want me to write it out for you?" there was anger
and impatience in the voice.
"Oh, I think I can remember," said Bob, vainly trying to piece together
broken bits of the puzzle that was in his mind. "I'll tell him."
He did not linger longer. There was no use. He could not have done what
he came for. But perhaps now there would be no need. The man with the
hook presented a new complication in the Storm Mountain mystery.
"I'll tell him--good-night--Mr. Dauber," murmured Bob as he stepped out
into the dim hall.
"Um!" was all the answer he received. Though the man with the hook
shouted after him: "Tell him to git a move on."
At first Bob had, it in mind to disobey the injunction he had received.
He wasn't going to deliver the message to the Italian. His chief
objection to this was that to do so he would have to admit having been
in the room of Pietro.
"But he'll know it anyhow," decided Bob. "Ill tell him, after all. Or,
rather I'll give him the message. Then later, if Pietro wants to know
why I went to his room I can tell him I thought maybe he had another
barrel to his organ. And I really wish he had--his tunes are getting
monotonous."
This was a way out--a fair and square way.
"I'll tell him about the man with the hook!" decided Bob.
And when he gave the message, such a look of terror and despair came
over the face of the Italian that Bob felt sorry for him. The jazz
orchestra was playing its best or its worst, however you look at it, and
the Italian had nothing to do. The guests were dancing and had partaken
of some of the refreshments. No one seemed to have noticed the short
absence of the young detective.
"You--say--man--with hook arm?" faltered the Italian.
"Yes--at your hotel--in your room. He wants you."
"Wants me?"
"Yes--in a hurry."
"Oh--I--I go--but I promise you, Senor Dexter--I say I come to make
monkey do tricks at your party--I play----"
"You've played enough--you've earned your money," said Bob with a smile.
"Better go back. That man with the hook--he's anxious to see you. Who is
he? He says his name is Dauber."
"He is--one devil!" hissed the Italian, as, shouldering his instrument,
and calling to his monkey, he hurried out.
"There's going to be trouble there, if I'm any good at guessing,"
declared Bob to himself. "And after this party I'm going back to the
Railroad House and see what has happened."
It was early morning when the last guest had gone, and Bob jumped into
his flivver, making his way to the Railroad House. Mike Brennan boasted
that he never closed, that he had "lost the key," and couldn't.
Consequently the place was lighted even at the hour of two in the
morning.
"What, you back again?" growled Mike, who acted as his own night clerk.
"Yes. Is that Italian here?"
"Who, Pietro and his monkey?"
"Yes."
"No."
"You mean!" exclaimed Bob. "You mean he----"
"He's gone--yes! Paid what he owed and skipped out--he and that feller
with the iron hook that came earlier in the evening. And say, there was
something queer between them two."
"Something queer?" questioned Bob.
"Sure! That dago was in a sweat of fear of the man with the hook. Why,
even the monkey seemed to be scairt! I never see anything like it.
Honest I didn't."
"Maybe they had some sort of a quarrel," suggested Bob.
"Maybe. Though I didn't hear anything of that. I did hear something,
though, that made me think there was a phoney game in it."
"What did you hear?" asked Bob.
"Why all along this dago has been calling himself Pietro--Pietro
Margolis, you know."
"Yes," agreed the lad.
"Well, when he was going out--after paying what he owed me--and I must
say he was fair and square--when he was going out he gave one last
squeak to his organ--queer sort of a squeak, too."
"Yes," said Bob. "A sort of last chord, perhaps."
"Maybe; but then I don't know nothing about music. But what I started to
say was this fellow's name isn't Pietro at all!"
"It isn't?"
"No. This man with the hook called him Rodney!"
You could almost have knocked Bob Dexter over with a feather then.
*CHAPTER XX*
*NEW SUSPICIONS*
Realizing that it would not be wise to show too much emotion and
surprise in front of Mike Brennan, the young detective controlled his
astonishment as much as possible, though it was difficult.
"Oh, well," he murmured, as if it was the most natural thing in the
world, "maybe Rodney was Pietro's middle name."
"Maybe, but I don't believe so," asserted the proprietor of the Railroad
House. "Rodney isn't a dago's name at all, and, what's more, I don't
believe this chap is an Italian at all."
"You don't?" asked Bob, and then he elaborately yawned and stretched, as
though wearied with his night of pleasure, and as though what he was
hearing didn't at all matter to him. But it did--very much.
"No, I don't!" declared Mike Brennan.
"Well, that isn't going to make me lose any more sleep," declared Bob,
again yawning. "I just came to tell him something, but if he's gone some
other time will do." He gave the impression of elaborate indifference,
so much so as even to deceive Mr. Brennan.
"There won't be any other time," declared the proprietor. "This
fellow--Rodney or Pietro or whatever his name is has gone for good."
"Good riddance, I say," exclaimed Bob, though he didn't really mean it.
"He wasn't any credit to the town, playing that wheezy music and digging
holes in a bramble patch to plant monkey nuts--crazy stuff I call it.
But what makes you think he wasn't an Italian, Mr. Brennan? He looked
like one and talked like one, and nobody but a dago would go around with
a hand organ and a monkey."
"I don't know about that, but when this man with the iron hook called
the other 'Rodney,' your hand organ man turned around and in as good
United States' talk as I ever heard he said: 'Shut up, you big chump. Do
you want to spill the beans?' And that's no kind of talk for an Italian
who pretends he can't use English."
"No, maybe not," laughed Bob, though within he was far from laughing. He
saw big events just ahead of him--he saw a glimmering of daylight where
there had been darkness, in the queer mystery of Storm Mountain. "Well,
was that all?"
"Yes, except that they went off together in a sort of huff, mainly, I
think, because this man with the hook called this Pietro by a name he
hasn't been using."
"Oh, that man with the hook was a quarrelsome sort of chap," observed
Bob, easily, "he had a perpetual grouch on, I'd say. It isn't going to
worry me. I'm glad my party's over, or those two might have called and
tried to break it up," he finished with a laugh.
"His remark could not have been better calculated to draw a reply from
Mike Brennan--a reply that gave Bob just the information he wanted but
for which he hesitated to ask. For the hotel man said:
"Naw, they weren't goin' to any party! They wanted to catch the milk
train to get out of town. There was something in the wind, I'm sure of
that. And I'm just as glad they got out of my hotel. I keep a
respectable place, I do!" growled the big, burly Irishman.
He did--when he thought it served his purpose to do so. The police, more
than once, had combed Mike Brennan's place in a search for criminals,
and Bob knew this.
"So they took the milk train, did they?" he asked.
"Yep! Got out of town as soon as they could--hand organ, monkey and
all."
"Well, then I can't give him another job," remarked the young detective,
as if this was the object which had brought him at that early morning
hour to the Railroad House. "We'll have to get a man with a harp next
time we want special music," and he laughed.
"A harp is good!" chuckled Mike Brennan. "Sure, I might have a go at
that meself! Good-night t' you!"
"Good-night!" echoed Bob, as he jumped into his flivver. "I guess he
hasn't tumbled," he said to himself as he steered in the direction of
the railroad station. "I may have this all to myself yet."
Bob's idea is clear to you, I suppose. The name Rodney had opened up big
possibilities to him. Rodney--Rod--Rod Marbury--the suspect. And yet
Mike Brennan either had not heard this name used in connection with the
robbery at Storm Mountain, or he did not connect Rodney with Rod. For
Rod was the name most often used by the police and in the stories
circulated about the queer case.