CHAPTER XVIII
Suspicions
"What do you think, Joe?" asked Frank, as they were speeding back to Bayport on their motorcycles.
"I don't think Uncle Dock is a scientist any more than I am."
"That's my opinion, too. Why should they have so much secrecy about a new kind of breakfast food? Why won't they even let Lester into the workroom with them?"
"Something fishy about it. And it's plain by now that Uncle Dock doesn't like strangers around the place."
"That poor kid must lead a lonely life with that gang. It's a wonder he doesn't run away from them."
"He has no place else to go, I suppose. He seems a nice sort of chap, too," Joe answered.
"Well, we didn't get anything definite from him, but we know enough to make us mighty suspicious of what's going on in that old mill."
"I'd just like to get a look at that machinery in the secret room the boy mentioned."
Frank was silent for a while.
"I wish Uncle Dock hadn't seen us there to-day. It'll make it awkward now if we ever go back. He has told us to stay away, and now he'll be suspicious if he ever sees us around there again."
"We might tell dad what we know about the place."
But Frank vetoed this suggestion.
"I'd rather work along our own lines until we get something more definite," he said. "If we get some real evidence we can tell dad about it. So far we have nothing to go on but our own suspicions."
All the way back to Bayport, the Hardy boys discussed the various aspects of the case, and although they agreed that the mysterious activities of the three men at the old mill tended to indicate almost anything but scientific endeavors, they realized that if they investigated too thoroughly they might get into serious trouble.
"We'll just wait a while and keep our ears open," Frank decided. "If those fellows are in the counterfeiting game they'll do something to give themselves away. And then we'll be right on the job."
When the boys arrived home they amused themselves in the gymnasium in the barn for some time, had an impromptu boxing match and finally, after a shower bath, went down street. It was a sleepy Saturday afternoon and the city was very quiet.
"Nothing much doing around here," remarked Frank. "We should have stayed out in the country."
"We could go out in the motorboat for a while."
"Fine. Let's go."
But at that moment they heard the whistle of the afternoon express. Like most boys, they had a weakness for trains. There was a fascination about the great locomotives that held them spellbound and they liked nothing better than to watch the trains that passed through Bayport and to speculate on the towns and cities they had come from or were bound for. At times when school became exceptionally distasteful they had often gone down to the railway station and wished they could board the first train that came by, to travel on to strange countries. Somehow, they had never been so daring as to do this, common sense invariably coming to the rescue, but the lure of locomotives and shining rails still held them in its grasp.
They moved down the street toward the station and came out on the platform just as the express was pulling in. Idly, they watched the few passengers who emerged from the coaches, envied the engineer who was lolling majestically in the cab, watched the conductor in his smart uniform, and looked at the people who were boarding the train.
Suddenly Frank nudged his brother.
"Isn't that Markel?" he asked.
Joe followed his glance. Near the steps of one of the Pullman coaches was a familiar figure, with cap pulled down over his eyes. There was no mistaking the fellow; he was indeed Markel, one of the associates of Uncle Dock at the old mill.
What particularly attracted the boys' attention, however, was the fact that Markel carried a bulky paper package under his arm.
He had not seen them, but there was something so furtive in his manner that the Hardy boys made themselves as inconspicuous as possible in the shadow of one of the pillars near by.
Markel lounged about near the coach, now and then glancing up anxiously, as though expecting some one.
Within a few minutes, just as the conductor shouted, "All aboard!" a tall, thin-faced man with a neat black mustache, emerged from the coach. He glanced hastily down at Markel, nodded swiftly, said something in a low tone, and Markel forthwith handed him the package. The tall man snatched it from his grasp, turned and retreated quickly into the coach again.
Markel, as soon as this transaction had been completed gave a shrug of his shoulders as though he had been relieved of an unpleasant burden, turned swiftly on his heel and walked away. He disappeared into the station just as the train began to pull out.
The whole affair had occupied but a few seconds and had passed almost unnoticed by any one on the platform save the Hardy boys. Any who may have noticed the handing over of the package doubtless attached little importance to it. The Hardy boys themselves would not have given it more than a passing glance had it not been for Markel's connection with the mystery of the old mill.
"What do you make of that, Frank?"
"Markel must have passed on a sample of the new breakfast food."
"He seemed mighty secretive about it."
"I'll say he did. You'd think it was a bomb he was handing over instead of breakfast food. He waited until the train was just pulling out before the other man came for it."
"No breakfast food about that performance."
"I don't think so either. Evidently Markel and the gang are in touch with some one in the city. You remember that Lester said Markel came into Bayport every little while with a package under his arm. That must have been one of them."
"Well, that's a little more evidence to go on."
"Give them enough rope and they'll hang themselves. I'll just bet dollars to doughnuts that there is counterfeit money in that package instead of breakfast food. This man Markel looks to me like a crook, and his tall friend on the train didn't look any too trustworthy either. My idea is that they are using the mill as a plant where they turn out the money, then they give it to one of their men on the train and he takes it to some other city for distribution."
"That looks like it," Joe agreed. "You could tell that Markel had something on his conscience when he handed that package over. He looked mighty shifty about it."
The boys walked back down the street, still discussing the events of the day. They spent the rest of the afternoon out in Barmet Bay, in the Sleuth. For the time being, they dismissed the affair of the mill from their minds, being content, as Frank had said, that the counterfeiters, if they were such, would ultimately betray themselves.
When they returned home that evening for supper they did not tell their father what they had learned. But Fenton Hardy himself brought up the question of counterfeit money when he told them that he had that afternoon received a telegram from Federal authorities asking him to further his investigations.
"They have evidence that more than ten thousand dollars in counterfeit money was put into circulation within the past three days," he told the boys. "The affair is going beyond all bounds."
"And Paul Blum is still silent?" asked Frank.
"Can't get a word out of him. I'm inclined to believe he doesn't know anything about the men who are at the head of the organization. I think he was only a tool, employed to get the money in circulation. But I wish you two lads would keep on the lookout for any clues. It will help me a lot if we can run these counterfeiters to earth. Then, besides, there is a big reward."
"We'll do our best," they promised.
And, secretly, they wondered what Fenton Hardy would think if he knew how much work they had already put on the case and how much evidence they had already gathered, tending to indicate that the old mill on the Willow River was in some way connected with the activities of the counterfeiting gang.
"If you can get anything definite in this case," said Fenton Hardy, with a smile, "I'll be ready to admit that you have some abilities as detectives—"
"Fenton, don't encourage them," objected Mrs. Hardy.
"Nonsense, Laura," he replied. "If they want to be detectives and if they have the talent for it, you might as well try to keep water from running downhill as to stop them. They've done good work on two difficult cases already."
"And I have a hunch that we'll do something on this case, too," said Frank, with confidence.