A SURPRISE CACHE
Left to themselves, Willie and Jack took up the vigil near the kettle of
fluid believed to be nitro-glycerin.
“If this stuff is still active, it’s a miracle it hasn’t been set off,”
Jack remarked, pacing nervously along the fence. “Why, there’s enough
explosive here to blow that automobile plant to smithers.”
“Us too, Jack.”
“Sure. Nitro’s mighty tricky stuff. I hope Ken, War and Bob get those
cops here in a hurry.”
Scarcely ten minutes had elapsed when Willie thought he heard a car on
the nearby cemetery road. As they listened intently, it halted some
distance away and the motor was switched off.
“That can’t be a police car,” Jack decided, becoming worried. “Ken would
have brought the cops closer. Anyway, the fellows haven’t had time
enough to get help here.”
“It might be that bird in the ancient auto coming back again.”
“Exactly what I was thinking,” Jack agreed. Scanning the nearby trees,
he noticed a cluster of dense bushes which offered a fairly promising
hiding place.
As he was considering the possibility of seeking refuge in an emergency,
Willie suddenly exclaimed: “Jack, someone is coming this way from the
road!”
“And it’s that same fellow!” Jack observed, pulling his friend toward
the bushes. “Quick! He hasn’t seen us.”
The two Scouts took cover. Although the screen of foliage was a thin,
unsatisfactory one, the stranger who approached, seemed too intent upon
his thoughts to glance in that direction.
Jack and Willie obtained a clear view of the man. He was about
forty-five years of age, short and carelessly dressed in working
clothes. A billed cap was pulled low over his eyes.
“Sure he’s the same one who’s been coming here so often?” Willie
whispered. “If he isn’t, we’ll have to warn him not to get near that
kettle.”
“He’s the same one,” Jack answered grimly. “He’s going straight to the
fence too.”
Just then, the stranger, noticing that dirt had been disturbed by the
barrier, stopped short. He uttered a muffled exclamation, and then went
on.
The Scouts saw him bend down to gaze at the exposed kettle, and
carefully raise the lid.
“That’s his nitro!” Jack asserted. “It’s live stuff too! See how careful
he is?”
The stranger turned unexpectedly, surveying the area with alert eyes.
Jack and Willie remained motionless.
But the workman had noticed footprints in the soft earth near the fence.
His gaze followed an indistinct shoe pattern directly to the clump of
bushes.
Almost before the two realized that they had been detected, he whipped
out an automatic.
“Come out o’ there!” he ordered, moving slowly forward. “With your hands
up!”
Jack and Willie silently obeyed. One glimpse directly into the face of
the sullen stranger convinced them that he would tolerate no delay. His
dark eyes had a wild look which unnerved them more than the barrel of
the automatic.
“What are you boys doing here?” the stranger demanded harshly.
“Why, n-nothing,” Willie answered.
“You dug up that kettle by the fence, stupid!”
“What if we did?” Willie retorted. “Nothing in it anyhow, except water.”
“Water!” the one with the revolver echoed. “You’re lucky to be alive!”
“Then it’s nitro?” Jack asked quietly. “Why did you bury it by the
fence?”
“What should I have done with it? Carry it around in my pocket? I’d like
to get rid of the stuff, but how?”
“Dump it in the creek,” suggested Willie. “There’s one running through
the cemetery.”
“You are stupid!” the stranger accused. “Don’t you know nitro is heavier
than water? It would sink to the bottom and form a layer.”
“Notify the police,” advised Jack. “They’ll know what to do.”
The workman glared at him. “Sure,” he said sarcastically, “they’ll know
what to do all right! You kids give me a pain! You never should have
come poking around here. That stuff would have been okay if you’d left
it alone. Now I’m in a spot.”
“How’d you get the nitro in the first place?” Willie questioned.
The stranger did not reply. His face twisted with worry, he ordered the
Scouts to start walking toward the roadway.
“Where you taking us?” Jack asked, moving as slowly as he dared.
He could sense the man’s uncertainty, and was stalling for time. If only
Ken, War, Bob and the police would arrive!
“I don’t know what to do with you,” the stranger admitted. “If I let you
go, you’d blab about the nitro. I’ve got to move it, but where, I don’t
know.”
“Why don’t we talk this over?” Jack suggested. “Maybe we can work out
something.”
“Yeah? What? I don’t trust you.” Scowling, the stranger paused as he
came to a cemetery bench. He sat down, but kept his automatic trained on
the two Scouts who remained standing.
“If you’re afraid to go to the police, why not let us do it for you?”
Jack proposed.
The workman looked momentarily interested, but shook his head. “No soap.
The nitro would be traced to me. Besides, I may have a use for that soup
later on. It’s valuable stuff—too valuable to be thrown away.”
“Dangerous though,” Jack suggested, lowering his hands.
“Keep ’em up,” the stranger ordered sharply. “No tricks!”
Jack continued to talk, though he scarcely heard his own words. From the
roadway he had caught the hum of a motor. A police car perhaps? If so,
the officers had avoided using a siren, which would have been a dead
give-away.
“What was that?” the stranger asked suspiciously.
“Car going through the cemetery,” Jack answered with a shrug. “You sure
are nervous.”
“You would be too, if you’d nursemaided ten pints of nitro for six
months! I can’t sleep nights for worrying about it.”
“So that’s why you’ve kept coming back here so often?” Willie inquired.
He could hear a slight rustle of leaves and thought that someone must be
moving afoot through the trees.
“Sure,” the man admitted. “I had to make certain the stuff was okay. It
would have been too, if you kids had kept away. I could wring your
necks!”
“What are you going to do with us?” Jack asked, trying desperately to
hold the full attention of the stranger.
By this time, he and Willie had glimpsed Ken, War and Bob walking near
the fence. The man with the revolver could not see them, for he sat with
his back to the approaching Scouts.
Jack and Willie were certain a car had stopped closeby in the cemetery,
but there was no sign of the police. They were worried too, lest at any
moment their three chums might betray their presence. If only they would
catch on to the situation!
Deliberately, Jack began to argue in a louder tone, hoping his voice
would carry to the fence. To his relief, he saw Ken turn to gaze toward
the bench. Quickly, he shifted his own gaze lest his intense interest
alert his captor.
Moments passed. Then as Jack and Willie remained with hands raised, they
heard a soft rustle of leaves. Their friends were stealing up behind the
park bench!
“I’ve got to take you with me,” the stranger suddenly announced, his
mind made up. “Get going! To the car!”
Jack and Willie turned as if to obey. At that moment, as their captor
started to arise, the other Scouts closed in from behind.
Before the man could resist, they overturned the bench, toppling him to
the ground. The automatic was discharged harmlessly into the air. Jack
seized and held the man’s arm.
Overwhelmed by numbers, the stranger found himself powerless to move.
Ken, Bob and Willie used the overturned bench to hold him pinned to the
earth.
“Quick! Get the police!” Ken urged. “Their car is down the road. We came
on ahead.”
But there was no need for anyone to seek assistance. The revolver shot
had brought the police on a run. A moment later they came up to take
charge of the captive. Unprotesting, he allowed them to lock handcuffs
onto his wrists.
“Good work, boys!” one of the officers praised. “Do you know this guy
you’ve nailed?”
The Scouts admitted that they had no idea as to his identity.
“He’s Blackie Williams, an expert safe cracker,” they were informed. “He
did a long stretch at the state penitentiary. Got out about a year and a
half ago.”
The prisoner was escorted to the police car. While he remained under
guard, one of the officers went with the Scouts to inspect the cache of
nitro-glycerin.
“This is the real stuff,” the policeman announced after a brief
examination of the liquid in the kettle. “There’s enough here to blow up
the cemetery.”
“Still active?” Jack questioned.
“It probably is. This stuff is too tricky to be moved by anyone except a
nitro expert. You Scouts were lucky you weren’t blown to bits.”
“I guess so,” Jack admitted ruefully. “We had no idea what was in the
kettle when we started digging. Luckily, our spade never jarred the
container.”
“It’s going to be a job getting rid of that nitro,” the policeman said.
“The important thing now is to bottle up this area, so no one gets hurt.
You boys willing to help?”
“Sure,” Warwick agreed eagerly.
“Then post yourselves along the cemetery road,” the policeman
instructed. “Don’t let anyone in. If that nitro should let loose, this
whole place would go up in one loud bang!”