CHAPTER IX
THE BIG SAFE-ROBBERY
“Oh, Larry,” said Mrs. Dexter, when the sound of the stranger's footsteps had died out down the hallway, “maybe we should have taken his offer. Twenty-five hundred dollars is a lot of money, and we are quite poor.”
“I know it, mother,” spoke the lad. “But I think there is something back of all this, or why should those men be making so many efforts to get possession of this land?”
“Maybe they want it for a special purpose, Larry.”
“I suppose they do, but they are not offering what it is worth.”
“Why, you know your father used to say it was worth very little,” said Mrs. Dexter.
“I know he did, mother, but the land may have increased in value since he had it. It must have, or those men would not come to us and make an offer. If land is poor and of no worth you have to go all around hunting for a customer, but when it is of some value customers come to you. That's what makes me think this land will prove valuable. The men would not want it if it was only ordinary swamp.”
“I hope you are right,” said Mrs. Dexter, with a sigh, for it was hard to think of losing a chance to get what, to her, was a large sum of money. “We may hold the property a good while, providing it is not sold for taxes, and not get anywhere near that price for it, after all.”
“Of course there is a certain risk,” admitted Larry, “but I think it is worth taking. Mr. Newton thinks so, and has advised me to hold on to the deed. We must put it away carefully.”
“It is in that tin box where I have all your father's old papers,” said Mrs. Dexter.
“I think I'll keep the box under my bed,” spoke Larry. “I don't suppose a burglar would take it if he saw it, but there's no use running any chances. So I'll hide the box.”
When he went to bed that night he carried the box with him, first looking to be sure the deed was in it. Then he placed the receptacle under his bed, away back, and close to the wall.
“If anyone wants to get that they'll have to climb under the bed,” said Larry. “And if they do, I'm pretty sure to wake up. Then—let's see, I wonder what I would do then?”
He paused to look about him, in search of a weapon, half smiling as he did so, since he had not the faintest idea that a burglar would enter their humble apartments.
“That club will be just the thing,” thought Larry, as he saw a heavy stick standing in the corner. It had been used as a clothes prop, for the lines that were strung on the flat roof of the tenement, and Jimmy, playing Indian, had brought it into the house that day. “This is better than a revolver,” thought Larry, placing it at the head of his bed.
Then he fell asleep, to dream of nothing more exciting than going fishing in the creek in his old home at Campton. He dreamed he was pulling a big fellow out, and that his pole broke, tumbling him backward upon the grass. He gave a great jump, which awakened him, and he saw the sun shining brightly in through his window.
“My! I must be late!” he exclaimed, jumping up. “I'll have to hustle.”
He made a hurried breakfast, and arrived at the office a few minutes after eight o'clock, to find the place somewhat excited. A number of reporters were standing about, with copies of morning papers, but they seemed to be more interested in something else than in the journals.
“What's up?” asked Larry, of some pf the younger reporters.
“Big safe-robbery in Brown's jewelry store,” was the answer.
“Did they get anything?”
“We haven't heard any particulars yet,” replied Mr. Newton. “I just got the tip from police headquarters. But they think a good many thousand dollars' worth of gold and diamond jewelry is missing. The safe is a wreck.”
Just then Mr. Emberg came in, and Mr. Newton quickly told the city editor of the robbery.
“Jump out on it,” said Mr. Emberg. “Take—let's see—take Jones with you, and Larry also. We want a good story. I'll send a photographer down to take a picture of the safe.”
Larry was well pleased to be assigned to help two of the best reporters on the paper. Some of the other men seemed a little envious of Larry, but, as is usual in good newspaper offices, nothing was said, and the men went out on their assignments, as given by the city editor, without a murmur, though some details were disagreeable enough.
Larry, with the two other reporters, lost no time in boarding a car for the scene of the robbery. They found a big crowd outside the jewelry store, which was located in a part of the city where persons of society and wealth did much of their shopping. A number of policemen, as well as detectives in plain clothes, were on guard in front of the establishment.
“Come, now, you'll have to move on,” one of the bluecoats cried. “Can't block the sidewalk. Move on. There's nothing to see.”
“Maybe we can find a stray diamond or two,” suggested someone in the crowd, whereat there was a laugh.
“If you find any diamonds,” rejoined the officer, “hand 'em over to me, and I'll get the reward.”
The three reporters made their way through the crowd to the front door of the store.
“Ye can't come in here at all, at all!” exclaimed a big Irish policeman, blockading their path.
“We're reporters from the Leader,” said Mr. Newton.
“Can't help it if ye are editors from the Tail-Ender!” the bluecoat went on, with a smile at his own wit. “Orders are I'm t' let not a sowl in at all, at all!”
“That's all right, Pat,” said a sergeant of police, coming up at that juncture, and seeing how matters were. “These are not ordinary persons, you know,” with a smile at Mr. Newton and the others. “They're reporters.”
“Well, if ye says it's all right, it's all right,” the policeman said to his superior. “Ye kin go in,” he added grandly to the newspaper men, as he stepped aside.
It took but a glance to show what had happened. Burglars had blown the massive door of the safe open, by using some powerful explosive. Then with tools they had pried open the inner doors, and had taken whatever suited their fancy. Larry wondered that the explosion had not wrecked the store, in the center of which the safe stood. He spoke of this to Mr. Newton.
“Those fellows used just enough explosive to crack the door, but not enough to do any damage outside,” said the older reporter.
Mr. Newton, who was in general charge of getting the story, soon made his plans. A few questions he put to one of the members of the firm who was on hand, showed him how the affair had occurred. The burglars had entered by forcing a rear window. They had placed a screen up in front of the safe, so that when the policeman on the beat looked in through the front door, as he frequently did during his rounds, he could not see the thieves at work.
“Have you a night watchman?” asked Mr. Newton of the firm member, Robert Jamison.
“Yes, and that's the queer part of it. He claims he was chloroformed by the thieves early in the evening, or at least by one of them. We sent him home, as he is quite ill from the effects of the drug.”
“That's a good part of the story,” said Mr. Newton. “Jones, you go down to the watchman's house, and get all the particulars you can. Larry will stay here, and help me.”
When Jones had gone Mr. Newton made a close survey of the premises. He made a rough sort of diagram of how the thieves must have entered, and how they probably escaped. Then he told Larry to get a list of the diamonds and jewelry that had been stolen. Mr. Newton in the meantime had several talks with the police officers about the matter.
By this time quite a number of reporters from other papers had arrived, and, with the bluecoats and detectives, the store was pretty well filled. Mr. Jamison, with the assistance of one of his partners, made up a list of the stolen things, and then had his typewriter make several copies, which were distributed among the reporters, Larry getting one.
Larry could not help but think this was a rather up-to-date method of reporting, where the man who was robbed went to so much trouble for the reporters.
“He's glad to do it,” said Mr. Newton. “You see, the thieves will try to pawn their booty, and by publishing a list of it, pawnbrokers will be on the lookout. It's as much to his interest as it is to ours.”
After getting all the facts possible, Mr. Newton and Larry waited until Jones came back from the watchman's house.
“Did you see him?” asked Mr. Newton, when Jones returned.
“Yes, and I got a good story.”
“Well, keep quiet about it. Maybe none of the others will think of sending down, and we'll beat 'em.”
It appeared from the story the watchman told Jones, that, early in the evening, a well-dressed man had approached the guardian, whose name was Henderson, and started a conversation with him.
They talked for some time, and finally the stranger gave Henderson a cigar. The watchman said he preferred a pipe, and asked the stranger to wait until it could be brought from a rear room where the watchman kept it.
“Henderson went back to get it,” said Jones, in telling the story, “and the stranger followed him. The watchman was about to object, saying no one was allowed in the place after dark. But the stranger was so pleasant that the watchman was not suspicious. He followed Henderson into a sort of office in the rear, and there, while Henderson was getting his pipe, the stranger suddenly attacked him.
“He held a cloth with chloroform on, to his nose, and, though the watchman struggled and tried to cry out an alarm, the robber was too much for him. Henderson was soon left unconscious, and he thinks he must have been drugged, for he did not recover his senses for several hours. That's all he knows. When he came to, the safe was blown open, and it was nearly morning.”
“That slick stranger, after drugging Henderson, probably stayed in the store,” said Mr. Newton, “and when the time came he admitted his confederates. After that it was an easy job for the professionals.”
“Well, I guess we've got everything,” continued Mr. Newton, as he prepared to go. “It will make a good story.”
The three Leader reporters had been standing near the rear window whence the robbers gained an entrance after their companion had, from within, forced the bars outward.
“What's this?” asked Larry, stooping over, and picking up a small piece of paper. It had some peculiar blue marks on it.
“Looks as though someone had stuck their fingers in a bottle of ink, and then placed them on this paper,” said Jones.
“Let me see it,” asked Mr. Newton.
Larry handed it over. Mr. Newton took a long look. Then he smelled the paper.
“Whew!” he whistled softly. “This may give us an important clew to the burglars!”