DICK'S "FIND" MAKES GRIDLEY SHIVER
That closed the football season in a blaze of glory. Gridley
H.S. had closed the year without a defeat.
The day after Thanksgiving football is deader than marbles. Gridley
H.S. boys and girls settled down to study until the holidays came
on.
The next thing of note that happened in the student world jarred
the whole town. There might have been a much bigger jar, however.
Dave Darrin often worked, Saturday nights, in the express office.
One night in early December he was employed there as usual. At
about nine o'clock Dick Prescott and Tom Reade dropped in.
"Pretty near through, old fellow?" Dick asked.
"I will be when the 8:50 gets in and the goods are checked up,"
replied Dave. "The train is a few minutes late tonight."
There being no one else at the office, except the night manager
and two clerks, Dick and Reade felt that they would not be in
the way if they waited for Dave.
Twenty minutes later the wagon drove up with the packages and
cases that had arrived on the 8:50 train.
"You two can give a hand, if you like," invited Dave, as the packages
were being passed up to the counter, checked and taken care of.
Prescott and Reade pitched in, working with a will.
"Here, don't shoot this box through as fast as you've done the
others," counseled Dick, as he picked up a small box, some eighteen
inches long and about a foot square at the end. "The label says,
'Extra fragile. Value two hundred and fifty dollars.'"
Dave reached out to receive it, as Dick laid it carefully on the
counter.
"Packages of that value have to be handled with caution," muttered
Dave. "When a fellow puts on a valuation like that, it means
that he intends to make claim for any damage whatever."
"Hold on," muttered Dick, eyeing the counter. "There's something
leaking from the box now."
Dave took his hands away, then bent over to have a look with Dick.
A very tiny puddle of some very thick, syrupy stuff was slowly
forming on the counter.
"I wonder if the contents _have_ been damaged?" muttered Dave,
uneasily. Then added, in a whisper:
"The night manager will blame us, and hold me responsible, if
there _is_ any damage."
Both boys carefully inspected the tiny puddle for a few moments.
"Say, don't touch the box again," counseled Prescott, uneasily.
"Do you know what that stuff looks to me like, Dave?"
"What?"
"Do you remember the thick stuff that Dr. Thornton showed us in
IV. Chemistry the other day?"
"Great Scott!" breathed Dave Darrin, anxiously. "You don't mean
nitroglycerine?"
"But I _do_!" Dick nodded, energetically.
"Wow! Don't stir from here. I'll call the night manager."
Night Manager Drowan came over at once, eyeing the box and the
tiny pool of thick stuff.
"I never saw nitroglycerine but once," remarked Mr. Drowan,
nervously. "I should say this stuff looks just like it. We
won't take any chances, anyway. Dave, you go to the telephone,
and notify the police. Your friends can stand guard over the
box so that no one gets a chance to go near it."
But, while Dave was at the 'phone, Mr. Drowan hung over the box
as though fascinated.
"It takes fire to set this stuff off, doesn't it?" he asked.
"No," Dick replied. "If it's nitroglycerine in that box,
a light, sharp blow might be enough to do the trick. At least,
that was about what Dr. Thornton said."
Dave came back with word that the police would send some one at
once.
"They asked me whom the stuff was addressed to," Dave continued,
"and I had to admit that I didn't know."
"It's addressed to Simon Tripps, to be called for. Identification
by letter herewith," read Dick Prescott, from the label.
"Yes; I have the letter," nodded Mr. Drowan. "It contains the
signature of the party who's to call for the box. That's all
the identification that's asked."
At this moment Officer Hemingway, in plain clothes, came in, followed
by a policeman in uniform.
Hemingway took a look at the stuff slowly oozing out of a corner
of the box.
"My bet is nitroglycerine---what the bank robbers call 'soup,'"
declared Hemingway, almost in a whisper. "All right; we'll take
it up to the station house. Then we'll send for Dr. Thornton,
who is the best chemist hereabouts. As soon as we get this stuff
to the station house I'll hustle back and hide against the coming
of Mr. Tripps. If he comes before I get back, jump on the fellow
and hold him for me, no matter what kind of a fight he puts up."
Dave gazed after the retreating figures of the policemen.
"Bright man, that Hemingway," he remarked. "If Tripps shows up,
we are to jump on him and nail him---no matter if he hauls out
two six-shooter and turns 'em on us"
"We can grab any one man, and hold him," returned Dick, confidently.
"All we've got to do is to get at him from all sides. See here,
Dave, if a fellow comes in and tells you he's Tripps, you repeat
the name as though you weren't sure. As soon as we hear the name,
Tom and I can jump on him from behind, and you can sail in in
front. Eh, Reade?"
"It sounds good," nodded Tom. "I'll take a chance on it, Dick,
with you to engineer the job."
In ten minutes Officer Hemingway was back. He stepped into a
cupboard close to the counter, prepared for the coming of Tripps.
Half an hour later the police station's officer in charge telephoned
that Dr. Thornton had carefully opened the box, and had declared
that it contained four pounds of nitroglycerine. Nor had Dr.
Thornton taken any chances of mistake. He had taken a minute
quantity of the suspected stuff out in the yard back of the station
house, and had exploded it.
At a moment when the office was empty of patrons Mr. Drowan stepped
into the cupboard for a moment, as though searching for something.
"How late do you stay open?" whispered Hemingway.
"Ten o'clock, usually, on Saturday nights, but we'll keep open
as late as you want, officer."
"Better keep open until midnight, then."
So they did, Dick telephoning his parents at the store to explain
that he was at the express office helping Dave.
Midnight came and went. A few minutes after the new day had begun
Hemingway came out of the cupboard.
"You may as well close up, Drowan," the plain clothes man decided.
"The fellow who calls himself Tripps isn't going to show up.
If he had been going to claim his box he'd have been here before
this."
"You think he got scared away?" asked the night manager.
"The fellow was probably keeping watch on this office. He saw
what happened, and decided not to run his neck into a noose.
You'll never have any word from Tripps."
"Isn't it just barely possible," hinted one of the clerks, "that
the man wanted the stuff for some legitimate purpose?"
"A man who knows how to use nitroglycerine," retorted Hemingway,
gruffly, "also knows that it's against the law to ship nitroglycerine
unlabeled. He also knows that it's against the law for an express
company to transport the stuff on a car that is part of a passenger
train. So this fellow who calls himself Tripps is a crook. We
haven't caught him, but we've stopped him from using his 'soup'
the way he had intended to use it."
"Wonder what he did want to do with it?" mused Dick Prescott.
"There are any one of twenty ways in which the fellow might have
used the stuff criminally," replied the plain clothes man. "Of
course, for one thing, it could be used to blow open a safe with.
But safecracking, nowadays, is done by ordinary robbers, and
they're able to carry in a pocket or a satchel the small quantity
of 'soup' that it takes to blow the lock of a safe door, or the
door off the safe."
After thinking a few minutes, Hemingway went to the telephone,
calling up the chief of police at the latter's home. The plain
clothes man stated the case, and suggested that the story be told
to "The Blade" editor for publication in the morning issue. Then,
if anyone in town had any definite suspicion why so much nitroglycerine
should be needed in that little city, he could communicate his
suspicions or his facts to the police.
"The chief agrees to my plan," nodded Hemingway, leaving the 'phone.
"Me for 'The Blade' office."
"See here," begged Dick, earnestly, "if there's to be a good newspaper
story in this, please let me turn it over to Len Spencer. He's
one of our best newspaper men. He'll write a corking good story
about this business---and, besides, I'm under some personal obligations
to him."
"So I've heard," replied the plain clothes man, with a twinkle
in his eyes. Hemingway heard a good deal in his saunterings about
Gridley. He had picked up the yarn about Dick & Co., Len Spencer
and the "dead ones."
"So that 'The Blade' gets it, I don't care who writes the story,"
replied the policeman, good-humoredly.
Dick swiftly called up "The Morning Blade' office. Spencer was
there, and came to the telephone.
"How's news tonight?" asked Prescott, after naming himself.
"Duller than a lecture," rejoined Len.
"Would you like a hot one for the first page?" pursued Dick.
"Would I? Would a cat lap milk, or a dog run when he had a can
tied to his tail? But don't string me, Dick. There's an absolute
zero on news tonight."
"Then you stay right where you are for two or three minutes,"
Dick begged his reporter friend. "Officer Hemingway and some
others are coming down to see you. You'll want to save three
or four columns, I guess."
"Oh, now, see here, Dick-----" came Reporter Spencer's voice,
in expostulation.
"Straight goods," Dick assured him. "When I say that I mean it.
And, this time, I not only mean it, but _know_ it. Wait! We'll
be right down to your office."
Nor did it take Len Spencer long to realize that he had in hand
the big news sensation of the hour for the people of Gridley.
Everyone in Gridley either wondered or shivered the next morning
at breakfast table.
Four pounds of nitroglycerine are enough to work fearful havoc
and mischief.