BOOBY TRAP
The cuckoo stuck his head out of the old wall clock to announce that
the hour of seven had arrived. But nobody in the Allen house that
evening bothered to listen to him.
Tiny Mom Allen, in a rustling new housecoat, appeared unaware of even
the wild litter of crumpled paper wrappings and ribbons that surrounded
her. In her lap lay the iron box, and her fingers were already busy
fitting together the bits of velvet with which she was lining it.
Pop was smoke-screening the room with a handsome new meerschaum that
Richard Holt had brought him from Europe, and happily leafing through a
huge new world atlas that had so far provided an answer for every
question he could contrive.
Bert, resplendent in a British tweed sports coat, swung his new golf
clubs one by one, in reckless arcs that threatened every window and
every piece of bric-a-brac in the house.
Richard Holt was trying out a new portable typewriter, a lightweight
model especially designed for globe-trotters like himself. “It even
spells better than my old one,” he had announced.
Ken, after an hour’s experimentation, was still finding new gadgets on
the chronometer his father had bought for him in Switzerland. It was a
stop watch and completely waterproof, and it told the date and the
phases of the moon as well as the hour of the day.
“Got it!” Sandy’s exclamation broke a long silence. He gestured with
the tiny camera he held in his hand. “I knew this thing must have a
delayed-action timer on it some place—it’s got everything else. And I
finally found it.”
He made a few swift adjustments on the little mechanism, moved a lever,
and then set the camera down on the table, lens toward the room. It
made a faint buzzing sound. Sandy waded through torn papers to his
mother’s side, putting his arm around her shoulders an instant before
the buzzing stopped with a sharp click.
“How do you like that, Mom?” he demanded. “I just took our picture.”
“Doesn’t seem possible that anything so tiny could really work,” Mom
said.
“It does, though,” Sandy assured her, returning to the table to reset
the camera that was only half the size of a cigarette package.
“No more of me,” Mom said firmly, getting up and putting her box on an
already well-laden table. “I have to get those dishes cleared away. Any
volunteers?”
Pop peered at her through the haze of smoke. “My old army training,
Mom, taught me never to volunteer for anything.”
“In that case,” Mom said, “I’ll have to draft you.”
Finally they all got up and followed Mom into the big Allen kitchen.
She excused Sandy and Ken from duty, on the grounds that they had done
the dishes the night before, and put Bert to work at the sink. Ken’s
father and Pop dried.
“Bring me my box, Ken,” Mom said, when she had everyone organized.
“I’ve got so much help here I can get back to work on my velvet lining.”
The brightly lighted room gave Sandy all the opportunity he needed to
make further use of his new camera.
“I can’t wait to finish up this first roll,” he explained, taking one
picture after another. “As soon as it’s done I’m going right down to
the office and develop it. Hold it, Bert. Just one more. There, that
does it.”
“Guess I’ll go along,” Ken said. “Want to come, Dad?”
“I do not,” Holt said. “Holding this dish towel is all the activity I
can manage after so much excitement. Besides, I’m husbanding my
strength for tomorrow’s turkey.”
The boys, having decided to walk the few short blocks to the _Advance_
office, put on their heavy lumberjackets. But when they went through
the front door Ken turned back toward the rear of the house.
“Hey,” Sandy said, “I thought we were going to leave the car.”
“We are. I just want to check something.” Ken followed the walk they
had cleared that morning, until he was standing outside the kitchen
windows. “I just want to see how much of the room is visible from out
here,” he said quietly. “Hmm. Practically all of it, except the corner
where the door leads into the hall.”
“So what?” Sandy demanded.
“So now we know that if somebody was standing out here last night,” Ken
answered, leading the way back toward the front sidewalk, “he could
have seen us put the iron box in the shoe box, and leave it there on
the sideboard.”
Neither of them spoke for the distance of a block. Their feet were
crunching on the snow at a cross street when Sandy said, “Well, so long
as you don’t quote me, I’ll admit that business at Schooley’s this
afternoon has me a little worried. I still don’t see exactly why you’re
fastening on the box as somebody’s special target, but it does all
sound slightly fishy. I don’t think we’d get any sympathy if we talked
about it at the house, though—especially now that your father’s here,
to help Pop and Bert out with their usual ribbing.”
“We won’t tell them about it until we have some more proof,” Ken
assured him.
“More proof?” Sandy emphasized the first word.
“Sure.” Ken ignored the skepticism in his voice. “I think we’ve already
got some. And if somebody makes another attempt to break into the house
tonight—”
“Huh? Nice cheerful thoughts you have.” Sandy scooped up a handful of
snow and packed it thoughtfully between his gloved hands. “But maybe
you’re right. At least you may be near enough right so that we ought to
put the chains on both doors tonight.” Sandy hurled his snowball at a
hydrant and hit it squarely.
“Why?”
“Why?” Sandy repeated blankly. “Because you just told me somebody might
be planning to try to get in.”
“Exactly. And if the attempt fails, we’d have no proof that it ever
happened.”
“Perhaps,” Sandy said politely, “you could express yourself a little
more clearly. It would require a great effort, of course, but won’t you
just try for my sake?”
Ken grinned. “In words of approximately one syllable,” he said, “what
I’m suggesting is that we make it easy for someone to get in, but that
we be on hand to catch him. In other words, that we set a booby trap.”
Sandy gave one loud agonized groan and then announced that he refused
to discuss the matter. Down in the basement darkroom, beneath the
_Advance_ office, he went about the business of mixing up his
developing solutions in dignified silence. With a great show of
concentration he figured out a method for suspending the tiny film from
his new camera in a tank designed for much larger film. He turned out
the lights, put the roll into the tank, fastened the lightproof cover
in place and then turned the lights on again.
“Let’s see,” he muttered to himself. “I’m using the finest grain
developer I have. I’d better give it fourteen minutes.” Carefully he
set his timer.
“While I’m here,” he said then, still talking to himself, “I might as
well develop that print of the fire this afternoon. If I want to print
it up in time to mail to Chief James as a New Year’s card....”
Once more his hands were busy, and he turned the lights off and on
again.
“There,” he said finally. “If it’s a good negative I’ll make a nice big
print of it, so he can hang it up in his office, labeled ‘Firemen at
Work.’”
For the first time since they had come into the darkroom he turned
around to look at Ken. His black-haired friend was conscientiously
rocking the first film tank back and forth, as Sandy had so often asked
him to do in the past.
“Thanks,” Sandy said. “That ought to be enough now.”
“You’re quite welcome. Any time.” Ken sat down, stretched out his legs,
and stared up at the ceiling.
Sandy’s mouth finally split in a wide grin. “All right,” he said. “I
give up. What kind of booby trap?”
Ken spoke as if there had been no interruption in their conversation.
“The important thing is to set it without the folks knowing anything.”
“You can say that again,” Sandy murmured.
“So we can’t do much about it until everybody’s in bed.” Ken looked
down at his new watch. “I can’t tell if it’s quarter to nine or
December twenty-fourth.”
“It might be both,” Sandy said helpfully.
“By gum, I believe you’re right.” They grinned at each other briefly.
“O.K.,” Ken said then, “you have just proved what I always
suspected—that you’re the mechanical genius in this outfit. You figure
it out.”
“What’s difficult about it? We leave the chains off both doors. We sit
in utter darkness—in the living room, say, where we couldn’t possibly
be seen by anybody entering either door. And when somebody comes
in—_if_ somebody comes in—” His involved sentence broke off in a vast
yawn.
Ken yawned too. “He finds us,” he said, when he could speak, “fast
asleep. He takes the box. He departs.” He sat up and shook himself.
“That is not my idea of a booby trap.”
The timer bell rang just then, and for the next several minutes they
were busy. The activity roused them a little, but before the films were
hanging from their drying clips both Ken and Sandy had yawned again.
Sandy tried to examine the tiny strip of film with a magnifying glass.
“It looks great,” he muttered. “Wish it were dry already, so I could
try printing them up. Wonder how big an enlargement I’ll be able to
make.”
“Look,” Ken said, “don’t start getting any ideas about staying down
here half the night to work on them. If the rest of the family is half
as sleepy as we are, they’ll be turning in early tonight. And we’d
better be there if we really want to watch for a visitor.”
“All right,” Sandy agreed. “I’m coming. I offer only one slight
correction to your theory. We’d better be there—with a cup of coffee.”
When they turned the corner into the Allen’s block their suspicions
about others being as sleepy as they were themselves seemed confirmed.
The living-room light winked out as they watched, and a moment later
the light went on in the big corner bedroom that belonged to Pop and
Mom Allen. There was also a light in the room Richard Holt was
occupying. Bert’s room was already dark.
“Ken—Sandy—is that you?” Mom called down as they let themselves in.
Sandy answered with a standing family joke. “No, Mom. There’s nobody
here but us chickens.”
“Well, I just wanted to be sure,” Mom replied calmly. “There’s some
cake left—and plenty of milk.”
“Thanks, Mom.” Sandy lowered his voice. “Let’s not rattle the
coffeepot. Let her think we’re having our usual quick snack before
going to bed.”
It was half past ten when they turned out the kitchen light, leaving
the entire house in darkness. Quietly they tiptoed into the living room
and settled themselves on the couch.
“Don’t get too comfortable,” Ken warned, “or you’ll fall asleep.”
“Don’t worry. I’m wide awake now.”
There was a few minutes of complete silence.
“You’re sure you’re awake?” Ken whispered.
“Huh? What?” Sandy stirred.
Ken poked him. “This is never going to work,” he said. “I was almost
asleep myself. Coffee has certainly been overrated as a stimulant.”
“We could take turns,” Sandy murmured. “If I just took a short nap now,
you could—”
“No, you don’t,” Ken said. “Get up. Walk around a little.”
“In a room littered with Christmas presents? I’d stumble over something
right away and wake up the whole house.”
“Well,” Ken said, “I told you to rig up a booby trap.”
“Come on.” Sandy stood up, a shadowy figure in the faint light
reflected into the room from the moonlit snow outside.
“Where are you going?”
“To rig up a booby trap. To fasten a lot of noisy pots and pans up over
the door, so that even if we are asleep we’ll hear anybody trying to
get in.”
“Those things never work,” Ken said.
“Mine will,” Sandy insisted. He crossed the room to the desk and
cautiously prodded among its cubbyholes. “This is what I want—this
light adhesive tape.”
Then he led the way to the kitchen where they opened the cupboard door
as quietly as possible and lifted out a six-quart kettle and several
smaller pans.
“Pie tins,” Sandy whispered. “They make a good clatter.”
“Got them,” Ken murmured.
Using small pieces of tape they fastened several pans over the back
door, so lightly that the opening of the door would be sure to pull
them from their place.
“If anybody opens this enough even to put a finger in, these things
will come down,” Sandy whispered.
“If they don’t come down by their own weight the minute we turn our
backs,” Ken added.
“Don’t criticize. A booby trap was your idea,” Sandy reminded him.
By the time the clock struck eleven the front door had been similarly
rigged, and the boys were back in their place on the couch.
Stillness settled over the house. A board, creaking by itself in the
dry night air, sounded like the noise of a pistol shot. The ticking of
the clock at the far end of the room was as clear and distinct as if it
were right beside them. When a car passed several blocks away both boys
roused out of a near sleep and came to their feet. But after a few
seconds of tense waiting they settled down again sheepishly.
“We going to stay here all night?” Sandy asked, when the cuckoo had
struck twelve and then twelve thirty.
Ken answered him with a warning hand on his arm. There were footsteps
on the porch steps. Both boys listened intently, every nerve alert. Ken
could feel Sandy’s big body tense itself for action.
Carefully they came to their feet. With Sandy in the lead they drifted
silently across the carpet, following the path they had cleared for
themselves earlier.
There was a fumbling at the outer storm door, which was unlocked as
usual.
Ken had one finger ready on the light switch. Sandy was crouched low,
ready to pounce.
Metal scratched faintly against metal. Hands worked cautiously at the
lock of the inner door. An almost inaudible rattle told them that the
mechanism was clicking open. The knob began to turn.
Then the door itself eased slowly open. And suddenly, with an unearthly
clatter, the pots and pans rigged above it crashed to the floor,
cascading over a figure outlined in the doorway.
As Ken snapped on the light, Sandy leaped forward. His arms circled the
intruder, and the two heavy bodies thudded to the floor.
Ken barely had time to notice that Sandy was safely on top when a shout
sounded from upstairs.
“Hey! What’s going on?”
Ken lunged for the intruder’s feet and hung on. “It’s all right, Pop!”
he called. “We got him!” Out of the corner of his eye he could see Pop
Allen tearing down the stairs, with Richard Holt right behind him.
“You’ve got me all right.” The muffled voice spoke from somewhere
beneath Sandy’s considerable weight. “But why?” it grunted. “Just tell
me why?”
Ken’s hands jerked away from the feet he was holding as if they had
burned him. In the same instant Sandy rolled aside, freeing his victim.
And then both boys scrambled hastily out of the way as a furious
red-faced Bert, pushing aside pots and pans, got slowly to his feet.
“Gosh!” Ken said. “Gee, Bert—we thought you were upstairs asleep!”
“Sure,” Sandy echoed. “We thought—”
Then Sandy looked at Ken and Ken looked at him. There didn’t seem to be
anything else to say.
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