PEP A PRISONER
Pep Smith at once decided that the man who now held his hand captive
was another of the Slavin spies. He was sure of it as the latter added
to his fierce command the words:
“I’ve been watching out for your sort--stealing, hey?”
“Stealing what?” retorted Pep, vigorously. “No, you don’t!” he added,
as the man tried to reach the camera. “That’s my property, as it
happens.”
Several persons had caught the echo of the snap-clip of the camera. The
rising up of the man and Pep, the start of a struggle, began to attract
attention. Pep’s captor took a new tack. He waved a hand towards the
entrance, uttering a low whistle. The house policeman came hurrying to
the row of seats where the commotion was going on.
“Take this fellow out of here, officer,” spoke Pep’s captor. “He’s been
up to tricks.”
Pep knew that resistance would be useless. Further than that, some
ladies and children near to him were becoming nervous and alarmed. No
one better than Pep knew how quickly a dangerous panic might start
from a trifling incident. He went quietly with the officer, his captor
following.
“What is it--an arrest?” inquired the policeman, as they got down the
aisle away from the center of excitement.
“Later, maybe,” was the response. “Let the management decide that. Take
him to the office.”
The policeman now grasped Pep’s arm, which the other man released. He
marched him clear to the rear, then around the rows of seats and down a
side aisle to the stage end of the house. He opened a door at one side
of the stage, went through a passageway, and ushered Pep into a lighted
room.
This was the office of the New Idea. It little resembled the tasty
business-looking office of the Standard. It contained chairs, a desk
and a table. The air was cloudy with tobacco smoke. Their chairs tilted
back against the wall, their feet elevated on the table, and smoking
cigars, were Slavin and another person.
There was no doubt that Slavin instantly recognized Pep, for at a
sharp stare at the youth down came chair and feet.
“Hello! what’s this?” he shot out.
“Stealing,” reported Pep’s first captor, stepping forward briskly. “You
can go, officer. We’ll let you know if we need you later.”
“All right,” nodded the policeman, lightly, and retired with a knowing
look on his face.
“Stealing; eh?” spoke Slavin, bending a scowling face towards Pep.
“Picking pockets?”
“Say, you don’t have to ask that,” retorted Pep, hotly. “No one better
than yourself knows I don’t have to do that.”
“He was stealing, all the same,” insisted his captor, and as Pep
realized the special emissary of Slavin. “I caught him red-handed.”
“What doing?” inquired the other man, evidently Slavin’s business
partner.
“You get him to give you that camera and you’ll probably find out,” was
the explanation. “I know the fellow, for I’ve seen him before. He’s one
of the Standard crowd.”
The speaker concluded by snatching at the camera. Pep was off his
guard for that. His despoiler handed it to Slavin, who looked it over
casually and pushed it into a drawer of his desk with the words:
“We’ll keep that for evidence and look it over later. Stealing a film;
eh?” he interrogated the previous speaker.
“That’s what. He had that camera in his lap ready for snapping. It’s an
old trick and I suspected him, knowing the crowd he came from.”
“What was he stealing?” interrogated Slavin’s partner.
“The camel film,” was the reply.
“Eh? What’s that?” ejaculated Slavin, with a start. Then he swept Pep’s
face with swift suspicion and added: “Of course that--one of our own
specials. You’re in fine business, you Standard people; aren’t you? I
believe I’ll just hand you over to the police.”
“I wasn’t stealing your films,” protested Pep.
“What do you call it, then?” sneered Slavin.
“I wanted a photo for a friend of mine, who was interested.”
“Yah, that!” jibed Slavin. “It’ll be a fine thing to have the public
know that a partner in the high and lofty Standard goes around stealing
New Idea films; won’t it, now? Say,” he added to his partner, “we’ll
just cage this fellow. It will be a downfall for old Strapp and his
crowd and a capital advertisement for us. Call the officer and make a
regular complaint, Norris,” he ordered, to the man who stood on guard
between Pep and the doorway.
Pep felt that he had placed himself in something of a quandary. He
thought quickly and to some purpose. He turned upon Slavin in a
defiant, fearless way.
“You’ll do nothing of the sort, I’ll guarantee,” he said boldly, “if
you think twice about it.”
“Oh, is that so?” jeered Slavin. “Why won’t I?”
“Because I shall explain why I photographed that film. I said a friend
of mine wanted a picture of the camel in it. I spoke the truth. He
wants that picture because the animal in your film was stolen.”
“The mischief!” ejaculated the partner of Slavin, staring at Pep as if
he had found him out to be a pretty smart boy--and one to be feared.
But if this man was startled--the effect upon Slavin of Pep’s
audacious statement, impolitic though it might have been, was fairly
extraordinary. He actually paled and trembled. For a moment his mind
seemed taking in all the words might imply. Then springing to his feet
he pounced down upon Pep.
“Norris,” he spoke in husky, unsteady tones, “take this fellow down to
the lumber room. Lock him in safe and sound. When the crowd is gone
we’ll put him through the third degree. It isn’t safe to let him loose.”
“No, he knows a lot too much for our good,” growled Slavin’s partner.
Pep’s eyes glowed. He had deftly got these men to verify his
suspicions. There was something underhanded about their possession of
the camel film. Pep had surmised correctly when he had told Vic Belton
and Randy that the starting point in the hunt for the stolen camels was
the New Idea photo playhouse.
Pep was a fighter on most occasions when cornered. However, he knew
that Slavin was in an ugly mood. The three men he faced were big burly
ruffians. Pep did not care about being battered. They could not detain
him long, for Randy and Vic knew that he had come to the New Idea. They
would suspect Slavin and look for him there if he was absent for any
length of time.
“Go ahead,” said Pep, indifferently. “You won’t help yourself by
locking me up.”
The man Slavin had called Norris led the youth to a door at the rear of
the room.
“Get down there,” he ordered, and turned on an electric light in the
vague darkness below. As Pep descended a pair of rickety steps Norris
closed and locked the door.
The apartment Pep found himself in was used as a lumber room. It seemed
to run under the entire stage space. It was littered up with damaged
chairs, pieces of boards, some stage scenery and such trumpery as is
regularly broken or discarded in a motion picture playhouse.
There was not a break in the solid stone wall enclosing the apartment
except where a deep, barred window showed, too high for Pep to reach.
Even could he have done this and have removed the bars, he quickly
discerned that a cat could hardly hope to squeeze through the narrow
aperture.
“I’m fairly booked, I guess,” reflected the youth. “I wonder how it
will all come out? There’s a ventilator that might help me, if I could
reach it. No, it isn’t that. It’s a dump chute.”
As Pep spoke he advanced under a hole in the floor that formed the
ceiling overhead. It was far beyond ready reach. Studying the break in
the floor, however, he found that a box-like structure ran up about
four feet into the room overhead. Then Pep knew that it was a chute
into which the sweepings of the playhouse were dumped.
A heap of dust, scraps of paper, splinters of wood and the like,
littered the floor. Pep the inquisitive pulled the mass over. He
apparently had some leisure to spare. He proceeded to utilize it to
some purpose.
He felt that he could not know too much of the enemies of the Standard.
There were quite a lot of envelopes, postals, advertising matter and
the like. He inspected what there was. There were several duns for
unpaid bills, applications for engagements, offers of service from film
houses.
Pep’s eyes brightened as he fished out a part of a letter. There was
not much of it and he could not find the connecting fragments, but he
felt satisfied with his discovery.
“It’s from the people who got up that camel film,” decided Pep. “‘Can
make a series of about twenty camel subjects’ that scrawl says, ‘and
then work in educational nature reels like bees, butterflies and birds.
Must be secret and cautious and will ship from B twice a week.’ Where’s
‘B’, I wonder?”
Pep pulled over the papers in the heap several times, but he could not
find the rest of the letter. He had kicked aside a creased sheet of
manilla paper several times. Casually picking it up, Pep noticed that
it had enclosed some goods shipped to the New Idea. It bore an address
in ink. Then he noticed that it had the impress of a red stamp in one
corner. As he read what this said he almost uttered a shout.
“Got it, sure!” he crowed and he tore address and stamped words from
the manilla sheet. “This is the paper a package of camel films came in,
sure as shooting. I want to get out of here now, if I can. Yes, I’m
going to do it.”
Pep cast his eyes once more up at the ceiling five feet overhead. Then
he went over to a long plank. This he lifted, dragged and tilted in an
incline against the side wall just under the chute.
It was no task for a healthy, nimble boy to scale this. When Pep
reached the top of the plank he elbowed his way up into the chute,
keeping a safe anchor purchase on the top of the board with one toe.
Very cautiously he grasped the edge of the top of the chute and stuck
his head up. The chute was located in a partitioned-off space behind
the stage. Pep lifted himself out of the chute, felt a blast of fresh
air, and groped his way to its source, an open window.
It was a ten foot drop to a paved court, and to find his way to the
nearest street was nothing. Inside of five minutes Pep was at the hotel.
Randy and Vic greeted him with expectant faces as he burst in upon
them.
“Did you get the picture?” questioned Vic eagerly.
“No--lost my camera; but I’ve found something better. Look here.”
Pep drew forth the scrap of manilla paper. In ink it bore the address
of the New Idea. A red stamp across one corner read “Prepaid” and under
it were the words: “Brinton, Massachusetts.”
“That’s part of the covering that enclosed the camel film,” announced
Pep. “Vic, I think you’ll find your camels at or near Brinton.”