THE DECOY LETTER.
“I’m lost now!”
Such was Larry’s thought as the monarch of the forest prepared to leap
down upon him. Then as the lion came down, he closed his eyes in terror.
The big body hit him on the shoulder and the lion made a clutch for him
with his immense claws.
But the beast was faint from loss of blood, and in desperation Larry
managed to shake him loose.
The young fireman was scratched deeply on the arm and on the left
shoulder, but this counted for little or nothing considering the
greater peril of being torn to shreds by the wild beast.
Then the body of the lion shot down to the bottom of the elevator well.
A fearful crash followed, for the top of the burning elevator was
broken to bits by the heavy weight.
The wounded beast fell directly into the flames and was carried clean
down into the cellar of the burning structure.
From this spot he never escaped and after the fire nothing but his
charred bones were picked up.
As soon as he was free of the lion, our hero slid down the rope until
he came to the floor below the one upon which he had first encountered
the lion.
Here there was a doorway out of the elevator shaft, and he stepped
through this.
He had all he could do to drag himself to a nearby window.
Below, in the alleyway, were several firemen, and he called to them to
help him.
“It’s Larry Barlow!” cried one of the firemen. “He wouldn’t call out
like that unless he needed somebody.”
When two firemen came up the ladder they found him at the window in a
dead faint.
The ordeal through which he had passed had been a severe one and he was
at once removed to the fire-house and given medical attention.
The captain wanted him to go to the hospital, but he asked to be sent
home instead, and this was, later on, done.
The menagerie fire, as it was called, was one long to be remembered,
and all the newspapers spoke of it, and of what a task it has been to
catch those animals which had escaped.
The following week found Larry still at home, but feeling once more
very much like himself. Yet his shoulder was stiff and to go back to
duty was, consequently, out of the question.
“You just stay at home until you are all right,” said Kate. “Why,
you have done as much for the fire department in three months as the
ordinary fireman would do in three years.”
And it must be confessed that Larry was almost inclined to believe this
true.
During his spare time Larry looked over his model of an extension
ladder for the last time and then paid a visit to a reliable firm of
patent agents who had their offices on Broadway.
He was listened to with interest, especially when he told that he was
both a practical machinist and fireman combined, and his model was
examined by several experts.
“You have undoubtedly a first-class thing, Mr. Barlow,” said one of the
members of the firm. “This invention should do all that is claimed for
it.”
“And how soon can you get me a patent?”
“If your ideas are original we ought to be able to put the thing
through inside of six weeks or two months.”
“And what will the cost be?”
“Seventy-five dollars.”
“Must I pay in advance?”
“You can do as you please about that. Your patent will undoubtedly be
worth a good deal more than that sum.”
“Well, I hope so,” smiled our hero.
“The only thing is, after you have your patent, see to it that some
sharp speculators don’t swindle you out of it.”
“I’ll be on my guard.”
“The safest plan would be to go to some reliable steel construction
company and let them manufacture on a royalty—that is, paying you so
much on every ladder they sell.”
“But how can I keep track of every ladder sold?”
“That shouldn’t be very difficult, for such things are not like mouse
traps or puzzles that sell by the thousands. Each one of those ladders
ought to be worth several thousand dollars.”
“And what royalty ought I to get?”
“Ten to twenty-five per cent. of the selling price. On a two thousand
dollar ladder a royalty of three hundred dollars would be fair, to my
way of thinking.”
“It would be fine—if they could sell enough ladders,” cried Larry,
enthusiastically.
“Well, there are forty or fifty big cities that would undoubtedly use
such ladders,” replied the patent agent. “And a city like New York
ought to have several of them.”
When Larry went home to Kate with the news she was much pleased.
“If you could make three hundred dollars each on fifty ladders that
would be fifteen thousand dollars,” she said. “It’s a small fortune.”
“It would certainly be all right for one invention,” returned our hero.
“And while the construction company was selling the ladders you could
patent something else, Larry.”
“If I could find the idea.”
“Pooh! Your head is full of ideas, you know it is.”
“Well, yes, it is full of ideas. I have already a new nozzle in my
head, something that can be turned just as a fireman wishes it, and one
that will keep the fireman cool when he’s in a hot place. And then I’ve
got a patent axe in my mind, too, something entirely different from
what our firemen use.”
So the talk ran on, until they heard the postman’s shrill whistle in
the lower hallway.
“Barlow!” yelled the letter carrier. “Lawrence Barlow!”
“Who can be writing to us?” questioned Kate, and ran down to get the
letter.
It proved to be postmarked Asbury Park, and was written in a fine,
girlish hand.
“It’s from Mary Vern!” cried Kate.
“Let’s see it,” answered Larry, and as his sister handed him the
communication he grew red in the face.
“A love letter—and nothing for me, I suppose,” said Kate, slyly.
“Not much,” he murmured. “Come, let us both read it together,” and they
did.
The communication was a very brief one, and ran as follows:
“My dear friend:
“I received your letter and I thank you from the bottom of my heart
for the interest you have taken in me.
“I need your help very much, and I wish you would come to Perth
Amboy on Thursday evening, at eight o’clock. I will be there,
stopping at Casper’s boathouse, and then I will tell you what I
wish you to do for me.
“Do not tell anybody that you are coming, for Mr. Pollox has spies
everywhere and they will follow you if they can. I suppose he will
try to follow me up as soon as he learns I have left Asbury Park.
“Your sincere friend,
“MARY VERN.”
“P. S.—Please don’t disappoint me, Larry.”
The appeal for assistance went straight to our hero’s heart.
“She is in more trouble,” he said to Kate. “I must meet her and protect
her. Who knows but what old Pollox would kill her if he got the chance.”
“If you go, you must do so secretly,” returned Kate. “The spies may be
watching this house. Oh, what a rascal that man must be!”
The letter came on Wednesday afternoon, and on Thursday afternoon, at
about five o’clock, Larry set off for Perth Amboy.
Arriving at the ferry he crossed to the New Jersey side and then waited
until half-past six for a train bound for Perth Amboy, Asbury Park and
Point Pleasant.
As the summer season was now over the travellers to the seashore were
few and the car in which he sat was not one-third full.
The ride to Perth Amboy passed without special incident and he was
pretty well satisfied that he was not followed.
Never for a moment did he dream that the letter sent to him was a
decoy—that it had never been penned by Mary Vern.
Yet such was a fact. His letter to the unhappy girl had been found in
Mary’s bureau drawer by Laura Pollox, who had immediately turned it
over to her father.
The communication had not only made Martin Pollox furious, but it had
likewise frightened him, and he had immediately laid a plan to get our
hero out of the way.
“He shall follow in the footsteps of his father,” said Martin Pollox,
to himself, and called upon Check Sluggers to once more help him.
The plot was to get Larry to Perth Amboy and then kidnap him and place
him on a vessel bound for New Zealand.
The captain of the ship was Martin Pollox’s tool and he could be
depended upon to see to it that our hero would never again step foot on
land.
And our hero was walking straight into the trap, never for an instant
suspecting that anything was wrong.