WHAT WE CAPTURED
Doc Leland had me lay down on a couch in his office while he doped my
ankle with medicine.
“Um ...” says he, in the course of his work. “How does that feel?”
“It stings,” says I, fidgeting.
“Of course it does. But that hain’t a-goin’ to kill you.”
I was told then that I would be all right again in a few days, but I
wasn’t to do any more swimming in the creek. For the sluggish stream
was full of poison, Doc said.
The meeting was going on in the room. And from the earnest
conversation of the business men I gathered that they were up in
arms over old Caleb’s spree. It was a disgrace to the community, Mr.
Ellery declared.
“I’ve got a boy growing up,” says he, meaning Scoop, “and if I am to
expect him to properly respect his country’s laws, and abide by them,
I’ve got to do my part, as a parent and citizen, and you fathers
have got to do the same, to see that the laws are obeyed. In short,
gentlemen, we’ve got to set our growing boys a good example in law
enforcement and cease this milk-and-water attitude of ours toward
a vicious traffic that we know exists in our midst. That is why I
suggested this informal meeting.”
“I have said right along,” says Mr. Fisher of the Chamber of
Commerce, nodding in approval of Mr. Ellery’s speech, “that we could
stop the moonshine traffic if we got together.”
Bill’s face reddened.
“Is that an insinuation, Fisher, that I hain’t bin doin’ my duty?”
“Not at all,” says Mr. Ellery quickly. “We didn’t get together
to-night to criticize anybody but ourselves. The point is, as I see
it, that we, as a community, have been entirely too lackadaisical in
our support of our officer.”
“Until lately,” says Bill, “we hain’t had an awful sight of ‘moon’
in town. As fur old Caleb’s case, I’ve got a’ idear who sold him
the stuff. But if we were to raid the guy I doubt if we’d git any
evidence. Fur them fellers is reg’lar snakes in coverin’ up their
tracks.”
“Who is this bootlegger?” says Mr. Fisher.
Bill gave a name that surprised and excited me.
“Why! ...” says I, drawing the attention of the men to my couch.
“Maybe this bootlegger is the burglar.”
There was a moment’s dead silence.
“By gum,” says Bill, giving me a warm look, “I never thought of
_that_.”
Doc’s office adjoins the emergency rooms. And at this point the
public health nurse tapped on the connecting door and entered.
“I thought you might want to know,” says she to Doc, “that Cap’n
Tinkertop has partially regained his senses. He tells a queer story
about a ghost--as I understand it, the ghost of a dead sailor
brother. It might quiet him if you were to talk with him.”
“Um ...” says Doc. “So he’s got somethin’ to tell us about a ghost,
has he? That must ’a’ bin the ‘it’ that he seen night before last.”
Here the Cap’n himself pottered into the room, having gotten out of
bed of his own accord.
“Caleb,” says he huskily, searching the room with restless troubled
eyes. “Caleb. Hais any of you gentlemen seed anything of ol’ Caleb
Obed? I’ve bin lookin’ fur him. But I kain’t find him.”
Doc got the trembling patient safely into a chair.
“Saturday,” says the old man, mumbling to himself. “Ham said--I was
to give him--the money--on Saturday night. Ham said----”
“He’s talking about his brother,” says I to Doc.
“But his brother’s dead.”
The old man’s ears caught this.
“Yes,” says he, nodding slowly, “my brother’s daid. Ham, I mean. But
he come back. He allus said he would, an’ he did.” Again the troubled
eyes searched the room, as though the muddled brain was seeking a
way out of its confusion. “Don’t you un’erstand? It was his _ghost_
that I seed--his _spirit_. I woke up sudden. An’ thar he was at the
foot of the bed. An’ he said--he said--I was to give him back--his
money. He said--I haid lost his par’ot--I haidn’t kep’ my part of the
’greement--an’ I was to give him back his money--on Saturday night.”
Mr. Ellery had been listening attentively.
“What money is he talking about, Jerry?”
I explained about the insurance money.
The merchant gave a dry laugh.
“I never was quite foolish enough to believe in ghosts,” says he,
“and particularly am I unwilling to take stock in a ghost that
tries to collect its own insurance money.” He paused in deep
thought. “I wonder,” he went on, “if we aren’t in touch with some
kind of a scheme to defraud the insurance company that carried the
two-thousand-dollar policy. To that point, this man Ham may not be
dead at all. He may have faked a death, scheming to recover the
insurance money in trickery from his not overly bright brother.”
Bill was grim now.
“I’m beginnin’ to think,” says he, waggling, “that they is some close
connection between this bootlegger an’ the Cap’n’s ghost. Fur, as
Jerry says, the robberies followed this feller’s appearance in town,
so why not this other trick, too? Anyway, this bein’ Saturday night,
we’ll jest do a little investigatin’ in that quarter.” Pausing, he
looked at me and laughed in his rough way. “How would you like to git
in the Cap’n’s bed ag’in, Jerry?”
“Nothin’ doin’,” says I, shivering.
“No? Well, calc’late we’ll have to use Fisher then. Fur he’s jest
about the Cap’n’s size. Come on, men.”
“I’m going, too,” says I, jumping up.
I looked for my chums in the street, but to my disappointment they
were nowhere in sight. Presently we turned the corner into School
Street. In the Cap’n’s store Mr. Fisher got into the old man’s bed,
as I had done the preceding night, while the other men distributed
themselves throughout the store in good hiding places. I was in the
bedroom closet with Bill. And, boy, maybe you think I wasn’t excited!
There was a long wait. At least it seemed like an age to me. I heard
the sitting-room clock strike eleven; then eleven-thirty.
Suddenly a hand pressed mine in the dark.
“There!” says Bill, breathing the word in my ear.
I had heard the sound, too--some one, or _something_, was on the
roof. Yet I had to stretch my ears to detect the light, muffled
footsteps. We heard the scuttle open. There were parrot-like
footfalls in the attic. Then the trapdoor in the sitting-room ceiling
was drawn up. Following a short, deep silence, a rope fell with a
slight thud to the floor. To a deep sleeper all of these sounds would
have passed unnoticed.
We had left a lamp burning low in the room. And through the crack
in the closet door I now saw the dead sailor’s “ghost” approach the
foot of the bed, white-faced, its eyes staring and glassy, its breast
bared to show the tattooing. At this point the bed creaked slightly.
Afterwards the men joked Mr. Fisher, accusing him of shivering. And
to that point maybe he did shiver. It wouldn’t have been so very
surprising. Even with my hand in Bill’s I sort of shivered myself.
“B-b-boaz Tinkertop,” stuttered the ghost, in a graveyard voice, “you
have lost my p-p-parrot. You have let it fall into e-e-evil hands.
So, having broken your s-s-solemn promise to me, I d-d-demand my
money back. _Give me my m-m-money!_”
Here Bill threw open the closet door and flashed his gun.
“Hands up!” he roared, which was a signal for the other men to tumble
into the room.
Well, my story really ends with the “ghost’s” capture. As you
probably have guessed, the “ghost” was the Indian medicine man. But
the captured one was no real Indian--he was a younger black-sheep
brother of the Cap’n’s, a man long since disowned by his two older
law-abiding brothers. At one time he had been a character actor in an
Indian play, which explains how the “Indian” idea had become fixed in
his head. Of a naturally tricky mind, traveling around the country in
his later years in Indian disguise selling fake medicine publicly and
moonshine secretly was stuff to his liking.
Angered in getting no lawful share of his oldest brother’s life
insurance money, he had thought up the scheme of stealing the death
parrot from its new owner and playing “ghost,” knowing how very
superstitious the Cap’n was. It was to find out where the black
parrot was hidden in the store that he had spied through the alley
windows. Fortunate for his evil purpose he had seen us take the
strange parrot out of its wall hole, as I have written down. That
was on Monday night--his first night in town. On Tuesday night he
had robbed the brickyard safe. Having found in old Caleb a steady
customer for his moonshine, he had gone to the old bachelor’s home
late Wednesday night, hoping to sell still more liquor. In the open
house he had seen the stuffed black parrot, and, stealing it in a
queer turn of humor, had directly afterwards switched it for the
sooted parrot. In stealing the live parrot that night he had thought,
of course, that he was getting possession of Solomon Grundy. Later
that same night he had robbed the Meyers’ home. And how the sooted
parrot got away from him there you already know.
To-day as a result of his evil life he is in jail. The money that he
stole from the brickyard safe was recovered, and out of the three
thousand dollars we got five hundred dollars. Dad groaned in paying
us this big amount of money. But he had promised us one hundred
dollars apiece if we captured the burglar, so he had to keep his word.
Poppy rented a home on Elm Street with his share of the money and
stocked the house with stuff to eat. He bought some second-hand
furniture, too. However, he didn’t have to buy very much furniture,
for our folks gave him a lot of stuff. Mr. Ott, of course, was freed,
but I really think he was sorry to leave his comfortable cell.
Strange to say a warm friendship had sprung up between the old man
and Bill. And to-day these two men get together and talk “detective”
stuff by the hour. Poppy says, though, that his father, now a regular
employee of Dad’s, has given up all hope of ever being a successful
sleuth.
A rough man, Ham Tinkertop had taught his weird parrot its “blood”
talk. And it was the sailor, tattooed himself, who had tattooed his
two brothers and old Caleb. There was no mystery in the tattooing on
the Cap’n’s and old Caleb’s breasts, nor was there any mystery in the
dead sailor’s odd picture. As for the new grave, it was generally
concluded that old Caleb had been drinking when he had ordered the
grave dug. I am glad to write down in conclusion that we got the
old man to sign a temperance pledge. And he has kept his word, too.
To-day he hates the filthy stuff. I wish all men hated it. For, as
Dad says, moonshine is poison. And the thing for a fellow to do, if
he has any pride in himself, is to leave it alone. Bu-lieve me, I’m
never going to act smart when _I_ grow up and drink any of the rotten
stuff.
If Mrs. Strange ever got track of her stolen mino bird I never heard
about it. It wasn’t her dead bird that old Caleb had. I sometimes
think it was a lucky thing for me that her bird was stolen. For it
was through the bird’s theft that Poppy came to our town to live. I
sure do like that kid. I never expect to have a pal that I like any
better. And he feels the same way toward me. It’s bully to have a
pal like that. So, as I say, I can’t feel sorry that the Cedarburg
woman’s bird was stolen. What was her loss was my gain.
Able again to take care of his bird business, the Cap’n confessed to
us one morning that in his fear of the death parrot he had secretly
advertised the bird for sale. He knew he was doing wrong. His
conscience had hurt him, he said. And this probably explains why he
had been so terror stricken when the dead man’s accusing “ghost”
came.
That same week we captured Solomon Grundy in Bid Stricker’s hen
house. Bid himself had earlier caught the bird, and, in an intended
trick on the parrot dealer (he had found out somehow that the Cap’n
had lost a black parrot), had put the bird in the old man’s bed, not
knowing that the storekeeper had been taken to the emergency rooms.
The enemy chief kept out of our sight while we were in his yard.
He has given us a wide berth ever since his recent “adventure” in
digging up a certain “buried treasure” consisting of four five-cent
toy wheelbarrows!
Oh, yes, in conclusion I must tell you about poor Red. I slipped into
his yard the Monday after Bart Tinkertop’s arrest, and there sat
funny face on the back porch steps polishing silverware to beat the
cars. He had a cushion under him. His aunt was on the porch feeding
crackers to her half-starved parrot. And when I meandered around the
corner of the house she looked at me as though I was some miserable
thing that the cat had dragged in. So I promptly meandered back home
again.
I don’t like that woman!
And that is all for this time. In another book, POPPY OTT’S
SEVEN-LEAGUE STILTS, I will tell you how my new chum and I went into
business and made considerable money. Boy, did we ever have fun! A
smart rich kid who thought he was better than us tried to kick our
business in the seat of the pants. But, bu-lieve me, _he_ got a kick
in the seat of the pants before we got through with him. The things
Poppy did, with my help, make a mighty interesting story, I think.
There is a strange old man in this new book. Br-r-r-r! Through him we
became entangled in a most amazing and most bewildering mystery. Talk
about a shivery adventure! If _you_ don’t shiver when you read this
new book, the title of which I have given above, I’ll miss my guess.
THE END
Transcriber’s Note:
Words may have multiple spelling variations or inconsistent
hyphenation in the text. These, as well as jargon, dialect, obsolete
and alternative spellings, were left unchanged.
Words and phrases in italics are surrounded by underscores, _like
this_. Obvious printing errors, such as missing or reversed order
letters and punctuation, were corrected. Eight misspelled words were
corrected.