When the door closed behind Mr. De Lorme and Zip, Dee scrambled out
of the dense bush, cut through into the alley and turned toward
Bill’s. He was shaking but whether with fright or apprehension he
could not tell. He only knew that something of awful import was
close at hand.
There was a wireless in Zip’s room! Actually a wireless in his
father’s house! And was it chance that his father was asking about
the thirteenth?
When Dee reached the back gate he sat down on the curb and gave
himself up to his thoughts. But thinking did not help. It was all a
miserable muddle; no head, no beginning, and no end. Dee sneered at
himself for a suspicious cub, yet he knew that other houses never had
the dark air of mystery that hung over his home. And his mother’s
letters. When they flashed into his mind, Dee knew that there was
something afoot that at least called for an explanation. What was
his part in the dark play unfolding back there? What was it that the
blinded chemist was working on so endlessly?
Dee determined to know. At first he decided to talk it all over with
the boys, then to keep his own counsel until he had some real clues.
At the present he could only connect his father and the scraps of
information that he had gathered with the dynamiting that had been
going on, and reflection told him that he had very little indeed on
which to base his suspicions.
Certainly there was not a word in the letters to his mother; his
father’s reference to the thirteenth might have had a very different
meaning, and all the other straws of circumstance might have meant
nothing at all. Dee realized how suspicion colors everything.
Finally he went up to the club room and said that he had not seen
Anna; he would see her the following day. He soon went home,
dragging his unwilling feet to the door of the house that now seemed
the abode of evil spirits. As he turned the knob he glanced at his
wrist watch. Nine o’clock.
He went slowly up to his own room, entered and leaving the door wide
open behind him, went over to the window and sat down in the dark.
He stared hopelessly out into the dense waving branches of the trees,
thinking, thinking. He was perfectly still, and when Zip came
hurriedly out of the laboratory and glanced into the boy’s room, he
evidently did not see him and passed on downstairs. He returned
presently, a package under his arm, and went into the laboratory,
locking the door. Still Dee sat in the darkness, silent and moody.
He heard a plane humming overhead and knew that it must be Ernest in
his new flyer on his way to Stithton. Ernest had told the boys that
he would always fly low and beat out taps in the exhaust whenever he
went over.
Once more Zip came out of the laboratory and left the house.
Although the night was clear, he wore a light raincoat, and he
carried a small black satchel. Dee had seen this satchel many times.
Zip took it when he went down-town, as a woman carries a shopping bag.
Another half hour went by, with Dee moodily staring into the street.
Then, very softly, so that Dee could scarcely hear the muffled
ticking, the wireless in Zip’s room commenced to call. Over and over
Dee heard the signal. Finally with swift decision he leaped to his
feet. Remembering that Zip might return at any moment, he went
softly down the stairs and slipped the latch so that Zip could not
unlock the door. Dee hoped that he would think the latch had
slipped. In any event, he would be obliged to ring for admission.
Slipping off his shoes, he raced up the carpeted stairs, and
noiselessly passing the door of the laboratory, entered Zip’s room
and commenced his search for the instrument. The faint ticking
guided him and he discovered the wireless cleverly concealed in a
bureau. The drawers had been changed so that the whole front opened
like a door. There Dee found a perfect set of instruments, and
dropping on his knee, he answered the call and commenced to take the
message.
“How goes it?” asked the wireless, and Dee, remembering Zip’s pet
word, said, “Fine, fine!” and waited.
“Take this down,” said the wireless next. “We need ten cases. See
that they are in charge of the keeper in the inner chamber. The
thirteenth is the day.”
“All right,” answered Dee, and waited breathlessly. In the silence
he thought he heard his father walking in the hall. Reaching over,
he turned off the electric light.
“Two men are coming to take the stuff out,” the wireless went on.
“They will come as usual. Be very careful. We are closely watched.
Leave the garage--”
With a start Dee turned, and the receiver jolted from his hand. The
room door had opened suddenly, and Mr. De Lorme entered. He had
evidently heard the ticking and was hurrying to take the message.
As he crossed the dark room to the electric light, Dee sat
motionless. He was caught! There was no way for him to escape. Mr.
De Lorme pressed the electric button and flooded the room with light.
Then Dee, blinking in the sudden glare, looked up full at his
step-father.
But what a change! In all his life Dee had only known his
step-father as bowed, half helpless, nearly blind, his eyes always
guarded by the dark, disfiguring glasses. Now before him stood a
straight, sinister man, with clear, piercing eyes that bored into his
own. As he saw Dee an indescribable snarl distorted his features.
“Spying!” he cried, and with a savage blow knocked the boy down.
Dee leaped to his feet. A trickle of blood ran down where De Lorme’s
heavy seal ring had cut his cheek, and Dee mechanically wiped it
away. As De Lorme took a step toward him the front door bell rang.
Zip had returned. For a moment Mr. De Lorme hesitated, then taking
Dee by the collar roughly bundled him to the attic door, thrust him
up the stairs, and Dee heard the key turn in the lock.
The boy sat down on the top step, his heart pounding furiously.
Well, he was a prisoner all right! He wondered dully if they would
kill him. He supposed so. And that very plan was being discussed
down in the closed laboratory. Mr. De Lorme was walking the floor,
furiously gesticulating, tossing the hair from his forehead, striking
one hand savagely into the open palm of the other.
“Of course we will have to get rid of the worthless cub,” said De
Lorme. “I have kept him with me because of the fat inheritance he
will receive when that old aunt of his dies. She does not know where
he is, but it has been enough for me to know where the _property_ is.
And that can’t escape. But I can’t afford now to have him about. He
knows too much. Get rid of him, Zip.”
“How?” asked Zip blankly. Zip was perfectly willing to assist in the
manufacture of infernal machines that would blow hundreds of innocent
persons to a frightful death. That was part of Zip’s distorted
creed--the wholesale abolishment of property and personal power; but
he was kind to animals, and it did not occur to him that Mr. De Lorme
meant what he said, so “How?” he repeated.
“Any way you like!” raved the madman. “Shoot him! Poison him!
Drown him! _I_ don’t care! Do you suppose that we can afford to get
ourselves strapped into the electric chair for a blundering cub like
that? You might, but not I. I, De Lorme, the maker of explosives, I
who am known in our Order as the Avenger: what right have _I_ to risk
my life for a cub?”
“How much does he know?” asked Zip.
“Much or little, it does not matter,” said De Lorme. “He was at the
wireless; he has seen me with my disguise off. Why, you were the
only man living who knew that I am a perfectly well man! That boy
has never guessed or dreamed that I am not half blind. Think how I
stumbled round the Park with him. Half to win pity from our most
aristocratic and respectable neighbors, half to fool that boy.”
“Why not swear him to secrecy and make him one of us?” asked Zip.
“One of us, one of our Order?” thundered Mr. De Lorme. “He is a
slave to what he calls law and order; he is all patriotism. They
have lectures in their schools. Ah, when we get this government into
our hands things will be different! Then Truth will be taught. Get
rid of him, Zip. I command it!”
“I don’t like it,” said Zip stubbornly.
De Lorme turned on him with the savage suddenness of a panther.
“Then do you want to be snuffed out for disobedience?” he demanded.
“No, I don’t,” said Zip, “but you are so angry that you can’t see
straight. How are we to get rid of the boy here; here on a block
where every man and woman and child knows him? You yourself have
made him make friends.”
“It was a safeguard,” said Mr. De Lorme. “Think of the fool women
who have sent jelly and beaten biscuits home with him for his sick
father! Bah!”
“All right,” said Zip, pressing his momentary advantage, “It is as
you made it, is it not? Well, we will not be here much longer. We
can keep him a close prisoner, and when we go we will decide what to
do with him. There are millions of safer places than this for the
sort of work you want me to do.”
Mr. De Lorme pondered this. “All right,” he agreed finally. “I am
willing to concede this much. See that the boy is kept a close
prisoner for the next two days. He cannot possibly escape from the
third story.”
“No, there is not even a balcony,” said Zip.
“Go up in the morning--no, tonight, and put the fear of death into
his soul,” said Mr. De Lorme. “I cannot see him. It disturbs my
balance, and I am unfit for our delicate labor when I am nervous.
Let him have food, but not too much.”
He snatched the door open and went over to the door leading into the
attic and shook it. It was stout and heavy, and yielded nothing to
his savage handling. Dee heard him, and running down, leaned his ear
against the panel. So he heard the end of the strange conversation.
“That will hold him,” came the muffled voice of Mr. De Lorme. “Give
him water too. I shall have to work all night now, if this dynamite
and the infernal machines are finished in time. Better take a nap,
Zip. You are worthless when you are sleepy.”
“Will you rest?” asked Zip.
“No, not I,” said the arch plotter. “I need no rest when I do this
work, only I must not be annoyed. Do not mention the boy to me!”
Heavy footsteps passed down the hall and a door closed. Stepping
backwards up the stairs, Dee gained the top and lighted the electric
light.
He wondered what next. The next came quickly. Zip appeared, locking
the door behind him. He had a pitcher of water in his hand. Setting
it down he looked at Dee with a queer grin. Dee did not speak.
“What made you do that?” Zip asked finally.
“Do what?” said Dee, willing to talk in the hope of gaining some
information from the plotter.
“Monkey with the wireless,” explained Zip. “You must know about the
whole thing.”
Dee laughed. “I reckon I do,” he said. He resorted to a trick.
“I wonder if you thought I was _all_ in the dark all the time,” he
asked. “Don’t you suppose I knew what you were working on back there
in that laboratory? What do you think I am? As blind as _he_
pretended to be? I guess not! What do you think about the men who
come here in the middle of the night? You make me tired!”
“Well,” said Zip, surprised off his guard, “if you have known about
our Order and the dynamite we are producing, I suppose you know where
we are storing it and all the rest of it.”
“I am not telling anything I know,” said Dee. He had learned what he
wanted to know from Zip’s loose tongue. But the man’s next words
chilled him.
“I was sent up here to tell you that you will have to behave pretty
well if you hope ever to get out of this,” he said. “Your life hangs
on a thread, and a thin one. De Lorme would have killed you tonight
if I had not begged for your life. I may as well tell you that you
are a prisoner, and your best chance is to behave and make no
trouble. I will bring your breakfast to you in the morning.”
“All right,” said Dee. “Leave it on the stairs. I don’t want to
talk to you or see you again.”
“Keep talking like that and you won’t get any breakfast,” growled Zip
sullenly, and left.
Dee found some extra bedding and made himself a very comfortable bed
on the floor, where he slept soundly until morning. The first thing
he heard was the key turning in the lock as Zip placed his breakfast
on the stairs and retreated. The attic had been intended for
servants’ quarters. Dee explored and found in one end a small
bedroom and a decent bathroom. He ran a cold bath and, plunging in,
felt fit for any fate. Next he found a pile of magazines that had
evidently been left by the former owners. He looked at his tray and
thanks to Anna, began to think that his imprisonment was not to be
painful at least. By afternoon, however, time commenced to drag.
Three or four times he had heard Bill and Eddie whistling down in the
street. The whistle had a peremptory note. Dee wondered what was up.
He went to the window, but the screen was nailed in and he was afraid
to call. And the boys did not look up. It was a tall house. By
five o’clock Dee was walking the floor. When about six Zip came with
his supper and peered at him over the top step, Dee refused to speak.
“All right!” said he. “Tomorrow you go on bread and water, young
fellow, and you will find it down here at the door. I won’t come a
step for you until you come off your high horse.”
“There is water up here,” Dee said.
“Bread it is, then. As soon as you act decently you shall have more.
We are pretty busy downstairs. When it comes the thirteenth, just
listen and you will hear some noise.”
He chuckled evilly and went down, locking the door.
Dee did not eat his supper. He sat by the window and puzzled out
plan after plan. _How_ could he get the message to the boys? How
could he effect an escape? It grew dark and below he heard the
children playing, and saw a gleam of white as the girls walked two
and two back and forth on the block.
Presently he heard a whistle. Then another, in a different key.
Bill and Eddie were below. Dee pushed against the screen, but it did
not give. He knew it would mean death if he whistled. Then
inspiration came.
Taking his flash from his pocket, he sent a message into the night.
It was a frightful risk. If Mr. De Lorme and Zip happened to be
taking their evening walk, they would see it, but Dee knew that he
must take a chance. The thirteenth was drawing near. Perhaps
hundreds of innocent men and women would die on that day if he was
not freed.
“S.O.S.! S.O.S.!” over and over he flashed, wondering if the boys
would understand that secrecy was vital.
The whistling stopped suddenly, and Dee ventured another message.
Then he stopped, straining his eyes into the deepening darkness. In
what seemed about an hour, but what must have been ten minutes Dee’s
heart leaped. Out over in the ornamental bushes that filled the
lower end of Triangle Park came a tiny flash of light, then another.
A moment more, and Dee caught the Wireless Club signal. He flashed
an answer. Then as briefly as possible he declared his dangerous
position. “Go away! Danger! Tell Ernest and Frank. Help at once!”
There was no answering flash to this, and Dee wondered if the scheme
had been discovered. He did not dare leave the window, although he
was listening with all his might for sounds at the stairway for he
knew that if the flashes had been seen his life would pay the forfeit.
All at once the light glimmered again, this time from the fence
surrounding the Reform School across Third Street.
“All set! Two o’clock! Be ready!” they flashed.
Sleep banished, hope springing in his breast, Dee awaited the
appointed hour.