CHAPTER X
THE MYSTERIOUS ROOM
The boys hung back for a moment on the threshold of the room Sammy had so strangely discovered. Truth to tell they were a little afraid to enter, and no one could have blamed them. For surely there were some queer looking objects in the secret apartment.
That it was a secret room, intended to be hidden from the ordinary person going through the old house, was plain. As one looked at the wall, before Sammy had pushed on what must have been a secret spring, it did not seem different from the rest of the building. There had been a little piece of carved wood sticking out, and this must have worked on some springs and levers to slide back the hidden door.
"Say, this is great!" cried Sammy, delighted at his discovery.
"It sure is," agreed Bob. "How'd you come to do it?"
"I just happened to," answered Sammy. "I saw that carved wood bulging out, and it looked as though it was meant to press on. So I did."
"You're a great one!" cried Frank. "You're all the time talking about finding something mysterious, but it never before amounted to anything. This time you did hit it, Sammy Brown!"
"And I guess you fellows won't laugh at me any more; will you?"
"I won't," said Bob, with a sigh, wishing he had discovered the secret room.
"And look what's in there, fellows!" went on Sammy. "Maybe now we can find out how and who has been taking Mr. Jessup's stuff!"
There was indeed an odd collection of things in the secret room. Besides a bed, table and some chairs, there was on the floor, and on the wall-shelves, some tubes, with shining pieces of glass in the ends. There were tin boxes, springs, long pieces of wire, black wooden boxes, and many other strange things. One of the tubes, with a glass in the end, seemed to be pointed directly at the boys, like some strange gun.
"Come on, let's go in!" urged Sammy. "Let's see what those things are."
For a moment his two chums looked at him, and then Frank said:
"Do you think it's safe to go in?"
"Why not?" asked Sammy.
"Well, that door might suddenly slide shut while we were in there, or there might be a false bottom to the floor, and we'd drop through, or something like that," suggested Bob.
"Huh! You're as bad as you say I am, in thinking up things!" cried Sammy. "I say let's go in. We can put a stick, or something, across the sliding door, so that can't go shut on us."
"Well, maybe that's all right," agreed Bob. "But it sure would be hard luck if we got caught in here. No one would ever know where to find us."
"That's right," admitted Sammy, and, for a second or two, he was almost ready to give up the adventure.
But his desire to see what the strange things were was so strong that he decided, by taking care, it would be all right.
"Oh, come on, fellows," he exclaimed. "Let's take a chance! I'll fix the door."
They found a piece of a broken shutter which they wedged across the sliding doorway so that, even if they, or someone else, accidentally touched the hidden spring which sent the door to and fro, they would not be trapped.
"There, I guess that's all right," cried Sammy. "Now come on in!"
But Bob still hung back, though Sammy stepped across the door sill.
"Well, what's the matter now?" asked the discoverer of the hidden room.
"I'm thinking that the floor might give way," faltered Bob.
"Nonsense!" exclaimed Frank, taking sides with Sammy. "It must be solid, or how would it hold up the tables, chairs and the other things? I'm going in."
Bob would not be left behind, in the mysterious old house, so he followed his chums into the room. They advanced cautiously, and listened closely. There was no clicking sound, that might tell of hidden machinery.
"Pshaw! It's all right!" exclaimed Sammy, presently. "Now to see what those things are."
"Who do you s'pose put 'em there?" asked Frank, as they advanced toward the odd collection of things on the table.
"Counterfeiters!" exclaimed Sammy, promptly.
"Counterfeiters!" cried Frank. "What do you mean?"
"Just what I said," answered Sammy, with a calm smile, as though he knew it all. "This is a hidden place where some men have been making false coins, and maybe bad paper money too."
"You mean money that's no good?" asked Bob.
"Sure," replied Sammy. "Money that looks good, but which isn't—counterfeit money. I've read a lot about it. Fellows, we have discovered a counterfeiters' den!"
Sammy's chums looked rather frightened. It did seem as though they had stumbled upon some strange "den."
"Well, if counterfeiters work here, where are they, and where is some of the false money?" asked Bob. "I'd like to see some."
"Pooh! You don't s'pose they'd leave it around loose; do you?" asked Sammy. "They go out to spend it. That's probably where they are now. We'd better hurry and look around, and then we can go back to town and tell the police!"
Frank looked as though he did not quite agree with Sammy. It was often this way with the excitable small chap. He saw some things and imagined the rest. But in this case it was different. He had really discovered a secret room, and this was more than his chums had done. Perhaps, after all, he was right about the counterfeiters.
The boys advanced farther into the room. A nearer view of the strange tubes, with the glass in the ends, showed the latter to be large and bulging, like the lens of a bull's-eye lantern, or an automobile lamp. Attached to the tubes were black boxes, with a number of springs and levers fastened to them.
"Ha! I know what these are!" cried Frank. "They're telescopes, that's what they are. This isn't a counterfeiters' place at all. It's where one of those men live who look at the stars—astro—astor— Oh, you know what I mean," he added quickly.
"Astronomers," said Bob. "That's what it is, Sammy."
"It is not!" declared Sammy, quickly, bound not to give up his sensational idea. "Those may be telescopes all right, but if they are, the counterfeiters use them to look and see if the police are coming."
"Say, maybe that's right," agreed Frank, with a look of admiration at Sammy. "I never thought of that."
"Pooh! I did!" exclaimed the lad who had found the secret room. He was not going to lose any chance of showing off, now that he had the opportunity. "That's what they are—telescopes for spying out when the counterfeiters are at work."
There were several small windows in the secret room, and they were rather high up from the floor. In fact Sammy and his chums had to drag out boxes to stand on, in order to see above the sills.
They paused a moment in looking over the strange apparatus to glance at the furniture in the room. As I have said, there was a bed, a table and several chairs. The bed did not look very nice, being covered with old blankets and some cut-up bags for covers. But it appeared to have been slept in, and was not actually dirty. In fact it was no worse than the place where the boys had slept when they were wrecked on the other end of Pine Island in the Summer.
"I wonder if they live here all the while?" spoke Bob.
"I guess they stay here when they're not away getting rid of the bad money," said Sammy. "They may come back any minute. We'd better be getting out of here!"
"Let's look around a little more," proposed Bob, who was getting braver now. "What can you see from the windows?"
The boys looked out The windows of the secret room gave a view of only a dense mass of trees, and it was plain that this was the reason no one had ever found the apartment before. That side of the old mansion was opposite a deep and seldom-visited part of the woods.
"Well, we'll look at the counterfeiting machinery a little more, and then we'll go," suggested Sammy. "We'd better tell Mr. Jessup about this, and he can get the police after these fellows."
This seemed good advice to his chums, and they went back again to the table and shelves where the apparatus was spread out. They now examined it all more closely.
"Better not touch anything," advised Sammy, as Bob put out his hand to examine one of the tubes with glass in the end.
"Why not?" was asked.
"Because you might get a shock."
"A shock? How do you make that out?"
"Why there's some electric batteries attached to the things," said Sammy, pointing out the dry cells in their red pasteboard boxes.
"That's right," agreed Frank. "They're the same kind of batteries Jerry Grow has in his motor-boat. And they can give you a fierce shock, too."
"What, those little things?" asked Bob, in surprise.
"Sure," spoke Sammy. "You see the batteries aren't so strong in themselves, but when you run the current through a production coil"
"Induction coil—not production," corrected Frank.
"Well, induction coil then," went on Sammy. "When the current from the electric battery goes through that, it gets stronger, and it sure does hurt."
"I know it does," agreed Bob, "for I got stung once on Jerry's boat, when he was putting in some new batteries. Oh, I won't touch these!"
Look as they did at the strange apparatus, the boys could not understand what it was for, unless, as Sammy said, it was used for making false money. Of course the chums had never seen any machinery for that purpose, and had no idea what was necessary. But Sammy's idea appealed to them.
"I guess we'd better be getting out now," said Frank, after a bit. "I shouldn't like to be caught here."
"Me either!" agreed Bob. "Let's go."
The boys started out of the mysterious room, excited over their strange find, Sammy in particular. This trip to Pine Island was going to be more sensational than their previous one. They were sure of that.
"What'll we do about the door; leave it open?" asked Frank.
"No, we'll close it," decided Sammy, "that is if we can. Then the counterfeiters won't know we've been here, and they'll come back to their den, and we can help the police capture them."
"That's the way to talk!" cried Bob. "You're all right, Sammy!"
And then something happened. How it came about none of the boys knew, but Sammy admitted afterward that he must have touched one of the wires, or springs.
At any rate there was a blinding flash, a great cloud of white smoke shot out, and a loud boom.
"An explosion!" yelled Sammy.
"They're shooting at us!" cried Bob.
"Come on—get out of here!" gasped Frank, as they made their way through the blinding and choking vapor to where they imagined the secret door to be.