WELL?" asked Lanny. Curtis Wayland shook his head and smiled. "He thought I was fooling at first. Then he thought I was crazy. After that he just pitied me for not having any sense."
"I've pitied you all my life for that," laughed Lanny. "But what did he say?"
"Said in order for him to let us have the use of town property he'd have to introduce a bill or something in the Council and have it passed and signed by the Mayor and sworn to by the Attorney and sealed by the Sealer and—and"
"And stamped by the stamper?" suggested Dick Lovering helpfully.
"Cut out the comedy stuff," said Lanny. "He just won't do it, eh?"
"That's what I gathered," Way assented dryly. "And if, in my official capacity of"
"Or incapacity," interpolated Lanny sweetly.
Way scowled fearsomely. "If in my capacity of manager of this team," he resumed with dignity, "I'm required to go on any more idiotic errands like that I'm going to resign. I may be crazy and foolish, but I hate to have folks mention it."
"We're all touchy on our weak points," said Lanny kindly. "Well, I suppose you did the best you could, Way, but I'm blessed if I see how it would hurt them to let us use their old road roller."
"He also dropped some careless remark about the expense of running it," observed Way, "from which I gathered that, even if he did let us take it, he meant to sock us about fifteen dollars a day!"
"Who is he?" Dick asked.
"He's Chairman or something of the Street Department."
"Superintendent of Streets," corrected Way. "I saw it on the door."
"I mean," explained Dick, "what's his name?"
"Oh, Burns. He's Ned Burns' father."
"Uncle," corrected Way.
"Could Burns have done anything with him, do you suppose?" Dick asked thoughtfully.
"I don't believe so. The man is deficient in public spirit and lacking in—in charitable impulse, or something." Lanny frowned intently at Way until the latter said:
"Out with it! What's on your mind?"
"Nothing much. Only—well, that field certainly needs a good rolling."
"It certainly does," assented Way. "But if you're hinting for me to go back and talk to that man again"
"I'm not. The time for asking has passed. We gave them a chance to be nice about it and they wouldn't. Now it's up to us."
"Right-o, old son! What are we going to do about it?"
Lanny smiled mysteriously. "You just hold your horses and see," he replied. "I guess the crowd's here, Dick. Shall we start things up?"
"Yes, let's get at it. Hello, Fudge!"
"Hello, fellers! Say, Dick, I'm quitting."
"Quitting? Oh, baseball, you mean. What's the trouble?"
"Oh, I'm not good enough and there's no use my hanging around, I guess. I'm going out for the Track Team to-morrow. I thought I'd let you know."
"Thanks. Well, I'm sorry, Fudge, but you're right about it. You aren't quite ready for the team yet. Maybe next year"
"That's what I thought. Lanny'll be gone then and maybe I'll catch for you."
"That's nice of you," laughed Lanny. "I was worried about what was going to happen after I'd left. Meanwhile, though, Fudge, what particular stunt are you going to do on the Track Team?"
"Weights, I guess. Perry Hull's going out for the team and he dared me to. Think I could put the shot, Dick?"
"I really don't know, Fudge. It wouldn't take you long to find out, though. You're pretty strong, aren't you?"
"I guess so," replied Fudge quite modestly. "Anyway, Felker's yelling for fellows to join and I thought there wouldn't be any harm in trying."
"'And for many other reasons,'" murmured Way. The others smiled, and Fudge, with an embarrassed and reproachful glance, hurried away to where Perry was awaiting him in the stand.
"Fellows who read other fellows' things that aren't meant for them to read are pretty low-down, I think," he ruminated. "And I'll tell him so, too, if he doesn't let up."
"Don't you love spring?" asked Perry as Fudge joined him. "It makes"
Fudge turned upon him belligerently. "Here, don't you start that too!" he exclaimed warmly.
"Start what?" gasped Perry. "I only said"
"I heard what you said! Cut it out!"
"What's the matter with you?" asked Perry. "Can't I say that I like spring if I want to?"
"And what else were you going to say?" demanded Fudge sternly.
"That it makes you feel nice and lazy," replied the other in hurt tones.
"Oh! Nothing about—about the birds singing or the April breeze?"
Perry viewed his friend in genuine alarm. "Honest, Fudge, I don't know what you're talking about. Aren't you well?"
"Then you haven't heard it." Fudge sighed. "Sorry I bit your head off."
"Heard what?" asked Perry in pardonable curiosity.
Fudge hesitated and tried to retreat, but Perry insisted on being informed, and finally Fudge told about the "Ode to Spring" and the fun the fellows were having with him. "I get it on all sides," he said mournfully. "Tappen passed me a note in Latin class this morning; wanted to know what the other reasons were. Half the fellows in school are on to it and I don't hear anything else. I'm sick of it!"
Perry's eyes twinkled, but he expressed proper sympathy, and Fudge finally consented to forget his grievance and lend a critical eye to the doings of the baseball candidates. They didn't remain until practice was over, however, for, in his capacity of "Young Sleuth," Fudge was determined to unravel the mystery of the cowboy-pianist, as he called the subject for investigation. The afternoon performance at the moving picture theater was over about half-past four or quarter to five, and a few minutes after four the two boys left the field and went back to town. Fudge explained the method of operation on the way.
"We'll wait outside the theater," he said. "I'll be looking in a window and you can be on the other side of the street. He mustn't see us, you know."
"Why?" asked Perry.
"Because he might suspect."
"Suspect what?"
"Why, that we were on his track," explained Fudge a trifle impatiently. "You don't suppose detectives let the folks they are shadowing know it, do you?"
"I don't see what harm it would do if he saw us. There isn't anything for him to get excited about, is there?"
"You can't tell. I've been thinking a lot about this chap, Perry, and the more I—the more I study the case the less I like it." Fudge frowned intensely. "There's something mighty suspicious about him, I think. I wouldn't be surprised if he'd done something."
"What do you mean, done something?"
"Why, committed some crime. Maybe he's sort of hiding out here. No one would think of looking for him in a movie theater, would they?"
"Maybe not, but if they went to the theater they'd be pretty certain to see him, wouldn't they?"
"Huh! He's probably disguised. I'll bet that mustache of his is a fake one."
"It didn't look so," Perry objected. "What sort of—of crime do you suppose he committed, Fudge?"
"Well, he's pretty slick-looking. I wouldn't be surprised if he turned out to be a safe-breaker. Maybe he's looking for a chance to crack a safe here in Clearfield; sort of studying the lay of the land, you know, and seeing where there's a good chance to get a lot of money. We might go over to the police station, Perry, and see if there's a description of him there. I'll bet you he's wanted somewhere for something all right!"
"Oh, get out, Fudge! The fellow's a dandy-looking chap. And even if he had done something and I knew it, I wouldn't go and tell on him."
"Well, I didn't say I would, did I? B-b-but there's no harm in finding out, is there?"
Whether Fudge's watch was slow or whether, absorbed in their conversation, they consumed more time than they realized on the way, the City Hall clock proclaimed twenty-two minutes to five when they reached the Common and, to Fudge's intense disgust, the theater was out. The ticket-seller had departed from his glass hutch between the two doors and the latter were closed. Fudge scowled his displeasure.
"He's made his getaway," he said, "but he can't escape us long. The Hand of the Law" He paused, his attention attracted by one of the colorful posters adorning the entrance. "Say, Perry, that's where the Mexican tries to throw her off the cliff. Remember? I'd like to see that again. It's a corker! Gee, why didn't we think to come here this afternoon?"
"I'd rather wait until Thursday and see some new ones," replied Perry. "Come over to the house for a while, Fudge."
"Aren't you going on with this?" asked Fudge surprisedly.
"Well, he's gone, hasn't he?"
"That doesn't keep us from having a look at his hiding place, does it? We'll go around there and reconnoiter. Come on."
But Perry held back.
"I wouldn't want him to think we were snooping on him, Fudge."
"He won't know. We'll just track him to his lair but we won't let on we're after him. It's a good idea to know where to find him in case we want him. And we'd ought to find out whether there's more than one way for him to get in and out."
"I know there is. There's a front door and a back. The back door lets out into that little alley next to Cosgrove's store on Common Street."
"Cosgrove's? Ha!" Fudge stopped abruptly and tried to look as much like his favorite hero, "Young Sleuth," as possible. "That's it, then!"
"What's it?" asked Perry impatiently.
"It's Cosgrove's he's after. Don't you see?" Cosgrove's was the principal jewelry store in Clearfield. "That's why he rented a room in that block, Perry. All he's got to do is to go out the back way to the alley and there he is!"
"You're crazy," laughed Perry. "You don't know that the man's a—a criminal, do you?"
"Well, it looks mighty like it," asserted Fudge, shaking his head in a very satisfied way. "Everything points to it. We'll have a look at the alley first, I guess."
The entrance was only a half-block distant and Perry followed his enthusiastic friend up its narrow llength until it stopped at a board fence beyond which was the back yard of the next house to the Hulls'. On the way Fudge paid much attention to the three barred windows of Cosgrove's store.
"See if you see signs of a file," he whispered to Perry. "That's what he'd probably do; come down here at night and file the bars away. Maybe we'd better go into the store and see where the safe is located."
"If you don't stop tugging at those bars we'll get pinched," objected Perry. He was losing his interest in the affair and had begun to think Fudge's sleuthing rather tiresome. Besides, it was getting sort of dark in the little alley and he had already collided painfully with an ash-barrel. He was relieved when Fudge finally satisfied himself that so far, at least, the bars of the jewelry store windows had not been tampered with. Fudge was evidently disappointed and not a little surprised. He did a good deal of muttering as he went on to the end of the alley. There he stared across the fence.
"Whose house is that?" he asked in a hoarse whisper.
"Judge Folwell's. No one lives in it now, though."
"Hm," said Fudge. "Your house is over there, isn't it?"
"Yes. That's the roof."
"Has your father got a safe?"
"No, he hasn't. For the love of mud, Fudge, come on home."
"Wait a minute." Fudge turned to the back of the brick block. "What's on the first floor here?"
"Ginter's Bakery."
"Then this door opens into that?"
"I don't know. I suppose so. What difference does it make?"
"It makes a lot of difference," replied Fudge with much dignity. "If it does, he'd have to pass through the bakery to get out this way, wouldn't he? And someone would be likely to see him. What we've got to find out is whether it does or doesn't." Fudge walked up the two stone steps and tried the latch. The door opened easily. Inside was silence and darkness. Fudge hesitated. "Maybe," he murmured, "we'd better try the front way first."
They did, Perry, for one, retracing his steps through the darkening alley with relief. At the main entrance of the building on G Street they climbed two flights of stairs, Fudge cautioning his companion against making too much noise, and, with assumed carelessness, loitered down the hall to the last door on the right. There were some five or six offices on each side and several of them appeared to be unoccupied at present. Nor was there anything about the door they sought to suggest that the room behind it was the refuge of a desperate criminal or, for that matter, anyone else. The door was closed and bore no sign. The two boys halted at a discreet distance and studied it.
"Wonder if he's in there now," whispered Fudge.
"Probably," replied Perry uneasily. The hall was silent and shadows lurked in the corners. From the floor below came the faint ticking of a typewriter, but that was all the sound that reached them until an automobile horn screeched outside. Perry jumped nervously.
"Come on," he whispered. "Let's beat it. He might come out and"
At that moment footsteps sounded on the lower flight. Perry tugged at Fudge's arm. "Come on, can't you?" he urged. But Fudge was listening intently to the approaching steps. The person, whoever he was, tramped along the hall below and began the ascent of the next flight. Perry looked about for concealment. A few yards away a half-open door showed an empty and dusty interior. Perry slid through and Fudge followed, closing the door softly all but a few inches. The footsteps reached the top of the stairs and approached along the corridor, passed and kept on toward the back of the building. Cautiously the two boys peered out. It was the cowboy-pianist. He paused at the last portal, produced a key, inserted it in the lock and opened the door. And as he passed from sight he raised a hand and removed the luxuriant brown mustache from his upper lip!