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Mystery of the Iron Box

<h2 id='chap03' class='c011'>CHAPTER III</h2> <div class='nf-center-c0'> <div class='nf-center c013'> <div>A SCRAP OF FILM</div> </div></div> The area in front of Morris’s store was one of vast confusion. A hook-and-ladder truck blocked it off from the east and a chemical truck from the west. Traffic had piled up behind both of them, in a solid mass. And the sidewalks were jammed with people. It looked as if everyone in Brentwood had converged on the spot. The voice of Andy Kane, chief of Brentwood’s five-man police force, rose over the hubbub. “All right, keep moving there!” he shouted. “There’s nothing to see here, folks. Keep moving!” Ken and Sandy squeezed through to him. Chief Kane glared when he saw them. “There’s nothing for you here either,” he said. “That’s the fire—the whole thing!” He pointed a scornful finger at a metal wastebasket standing in the middle of the street, still smoking faintly but now safely covered with the white foam from chemical extinguishers. “So that’s all it is!” Sandy’s glance took in the busy policemen, urging the crowd along, the two great fire engines with their coils of hose, the firemen in heavy black waterproofs, and the jammed traffic. “This is something the fire chief will want to remember,” he said with a grin. “See you later,” he added to Ken, and disappeared into the crowd with his camera. A few minutes later Ken spotted him on the roof of Morris’s two-story building, aiming his lens at the crowd below and at the small foam-shrouded wastebasket at its center. When Sandy rejoined Ken again he was still grinning. “I’ll print this up for the chief’s New Year’s card,” Sandy said. Then he straightened his face quickly as Chief Dick James emerged from the jewelry store. “Everything under control, Chief?” Ken asked. James nodded shortly. “Total damage one wastebasket and a black smudge on about five square feet of wall. Quick thinking on Sam Morris’s part, of course,” he added, “or it might have been a real fire. The minute he saw flames coming out of the basket he picked it up and carried it into the street.” “How’d it start?” Ken asked. “Cigarette?” James shrugged. “Probably. Or a still-burning match. People are so danged careless. Wonder it doesn’t happen oftener, the way they toss stuff around.” Sandy, bending over the wastebasket, sniffed curiously. “Smell this thing, Chief,” he said. “Maybe it’s my imagination.” “What are you imagining?” But James bent over the basket and took a deep breath. Then he looked up with the same puzzlement that Sandy showed. “All right, masterminds,” Ken said. “What gives?” “Film,” Sandy said. “Or at least that’s what it smells like. But why would there be film in Sam’s basket?” “That’s a good question,” James said. “Let’s go ask Sam if he’s got the answer.” But before they went inside the shop he called one of his men over and instructed him to take the wastebasket to the firehouse and examine it carefully. There were fewer customers inside the store than there had been earlier, but otherwise it looked very much as it had earlier that morning. Sam Morris, wearing a smoky streak down one cheek, came forward to speak to them. “Sorry about all the excitement, Chief,” he said. “Your box is repaired,” he added to the boys. “Gosh!” Ken said. “I’d forgotten all about it.” “Would there have been any film in that wastebasket, Sam?” James asked. “Film?” The jeweler looked blank. “What kind of film?” “We don’t know,” James said. “We’re not even sure if that’s what it was, but that’s what it smells like.” Sam shook his head. “I don’t know what was in the basket. It stands over there, beneath that desk.” He pointed to a writing shelf built against one wall, for the use of customers who wanted to fill out cards to enclose with gifts. “It’s usually almost empty, except for a couple of cards that have been blotted or spoiled, or maybe an empty cigarette package. I don’t know why anybody would have thrown film in it.” “Film is inflammable stuff,” James pointed out. “Maybe somebody wanted to start a fire in here.” “A pyromaniac?” Sam looked unbelieving. James shook his head. “I was thinking of a crook—a man smart enough to start a fire, so that he could make off with a handful of rings, or watches, during the excitement. Have you checked your stock, Sam?” Morris shook his head. “It didn’t occur to me. I had the basket out in the street in a couple of seconds, and then I came right back in. My clerks were here all the time.” He smiled wearily. “There wasn’t half as much excitement in the store as there was out in the street after the trucks arrived.” “Where were you when the blaze started up?” James asked. “Behind the partition—in the workroom.” Morris gestured toward the rear wall broken by a single door and a windowlike gap above a ledge. “I’d just finished putting in a watch crystal for the man who was here when you boys were in earlier,” he added to Sandy and Ken. “He’d been waiting for a few minutes and I was just handing him his watch through the window there when one of the customers yelled ‘Fire!’ I saw the smoke right away, and I ran out of the workroom through that door and carried the basket to the street.” “You don’t know what merchandise was out on top of the counter at the time?” “No, I don’t, Chief. But I can find out.” Morris hurried off and held brief consultations with both his clerks. When he came back he looked relieved. “There were no small items being displayed just then,” he said. “One clerk was showing electric percolators, and the other was displaying cut glass to one customer and selling a smoking set to another one at the same time.” James still didn’t look entirely satisfied. “Check your rings and watches and other small stuff as soon as you get a chance, Sam, and let me know if anything’s missing.” “All right,” Morris agreed. “But I still don’t think there was anything deliberate about that fire. It must have been just a careless smoker who threw a match in the basket.” “You didn’t see that happen, did you?” Sandy asked. “No—and my clerks didn’t either. I asked them. We were just too busy to be looking around.” “Sure.” James nodded. “Well, maybe we’re guessing wrong about this film business. But if we run down anything we’ll let you know.” “Don’t forget your box, boys.” Morris hurried back to the window in the rear partition, reached a hand through, and lifted it from a shelf just inside the opening. “How much do we owe you, Sam?” Ken asked. Sam smiled. “Since when do I charge a good friend for a few minutes’ work?” He shook his head. “Go on—beat it. Just see if you can get it home without dropping it again.” The boys thanked him and left the store with James. “Give us a ring if you really do turn up some film in that basket, will you, Chief?” Sandy asked. “Sure.” Back in the Advance office Ken handed the box to his father. “We’ve got Mom’s present all right, but we haven’t got much of a story.” “We haven’t got much of a story yet,” Sandy corrected him. “What does the ‘yet’ mean?” Pop demanded, while Richard Holt lifted the cardboard lid and assured himself that the catch on the little iron box was now in perfect working order. Sandy explained the possibility of incendiarism. Bert’s automatic hoot of laughter died when he realized that Chief James shared Sandy’s suspicion. “But if Sam says nothing was missing, it doesn’t sound like a grab-and-run deal,” Pop pointed out. “He doesn’t think anything is missing,” Sandy reminded him. “He might still find—” He broke off as the phone rang. A moment later Sandy was talking to the caller who had asked for him. “No kidding?” he said. “About six inches? And thirty-five millimeter, huh? Did you find a cartridge or a spool?” He listened for another moment and then said “Sure. Thanks, Chief,” and hung up. “I guess you all heard that.” There was a note of triumph in Sandy’s voice. “They found a six-inch scrap of thirty-five-millimeter film in the wastebasket. My guess is it’s the remains of a roll for a candid camera like mine.” “That still doesn’t make it an incendiary job,” Bert said firmly. “Probably some customer of Sam’s had just picked the roll up at a drugstore, where he was having it developed. He looked at it while he was waiting in Sam’s, saw that it was no good, and threw it away.” “Could be.” Richard Holt nodded his agreement. “Of course anybody should know better than to throw film into a public wastebasket where it might cause just this kind of trouble. But there are always careless people around.” “Write just a brief paragraph on the fire, Ken,” Pop said decisively. “Then, if Sam does report anything missing among his stock, we’ll go to work on it.” He turned to Dick Holt. “Did Sam do a good job on your box?” “Perfect,” Ken’s father assured him. “Fine. I’m not surprised. Sam’s a good man.” “And he wouldn’t let us pay for it, Dad,” Ken said. Pop smiled. “I’m not surprised at that either. Here, I’ll help you with that, Dick,” he added, as the correspondent brought out the wrapping paper and ribbon he had put into his overcoat pocket that morning at the house. Ken and Sandy were alone in the office that noon. Pop and Bert had carried Richard Holt off to their weekly lunch club meeting. “Don’t cook up any more mysteries,” Bert had warned as he left. “Mysteries!” Sandy made a face at his brother’s disappearing back. “Every time we ask a simple question we’re accused of stirring up trouble.” Ken slipped a sheet of paper into his typewriter and twirled the roller. “We don’t do badly,” he said, smiling. “Maybe they’ve got some reason to suspect us.” Sandy stared. “Whose side are you on, anyway? You were the one who started the whole business this morning.” “Sure—sure. And I’m not satisfied about that business yet. But I guess maybe it was a little too much when we came tearing in with talk about an incendiary fire. Especially,” Ken added pointedly, “in view of something I remember you telling me a while ago.” “What was that?” Sandy asked. “You told me that modern camera film is called safety film because it does not go up in flames, fast—the way film used to do.” “That’s right,” Sandy agreed. “It doesn’t.” “Then why would anybody deliberately try to start a fire with film?” Ken asked. Sandy smiled. “A really smart crook wouldn’t, maybe,” he admitted. “If he was somebody like you, for example, who had had the benefit of my educational conversation. But film used to be very inflammable, and it probably still has that reputation with a lot of people.” Ken looked unconvinced. “I still don’t think it was very smart of you to become suspicious just because you smelled film in that basket. After all, if a man plans to rob a jewelry store, and his success depends on a good rousing fire, you’d think he’d look into the subject a little first. That he’d make sure he had the right materials on hand.” “Well, I thought maybe this wasn’t carefully planned,” Sandy said argumentatively. “Couldn’t it have been done on impulse—on the spur of the moment? In that case you might easily duck into a drugstore and buy a roll of film. It’s easy to carry around. It’s not noticeable. It’s—” “Wait a minute!” Ken broke in suddenly. “Maybe it all fits together!” “Maybe all what fits together?” “It’s the iron box—Mom’s present! That’s what’s doing it.” Ken folded his arms over his typewriter and rested his chin on them, staring at the gaily wrapped package that now stood on Pop’s desk. “Yes, that’s it. I’m sure of it.” His voice was tense. “Are you out of your mind?” Sandy demanded. “What are you talking about? What’s the little iron box—?” “Listen,” Ken said. “It’s all perfectly obvious. That box is important to somebody. The somebody, whoever he is, knew Dad was bringing it home with him. He—the somebody, I mean—went to Dad’s apartment last night looking for it. It wasn’t there. He knows something about Dad—at least enough to realize that he was coming to Brentwood. So later last night he tried to break into the house here, but I scared him off. He must have hung around, saw that we were taking the box to Sam Morris’s this morning, and made another attempt there.” “And there he is foiled again!” There was laughter behind Sandy’s mock-dramatic voice. “Right,” Ken said. “Because, as you explained to me yourself, he made a bad choice of material for his fire. He wants to create a diversion. He has some vague idea that film is inflammable, and dashes into the nearest drugstore to get some. He slips into the crowd at Sam’s, drops it into the wastebasket, along with a lit match, and then—” Sandy, openly grinning now, picked it up. “And then sees his whole villainous dream go up in a tiny cloud of smoke.” “Right,” Ken said again, more firmly than ever. “Because, for one thing, the fire only lasts a second. And, for another, that man waiting for his watch crystal is standing right in front of the window, unconsciously protecting the box on the shelf inside. Sam told us he was there when it happened. Remember?” “Oh, I remember all right,” Sandy admitted. “But the whole thing sounds like a hallucination, my friend. In the first place, why would anybody particularly want the box? Your father told us it wasn’t valuable—that he picked it up from the porter in the Rome office.” “It’s an antique,” Ken pointed out. “Sure. So is any old stone you can find in a field.” “Look,” Ken said, “I don’t know why anybody wants the box. But it looks to me as if somebody does. I was right about somebody breaking into the house last night. You were right about the film in Sam’s wastebasket, which is certainly an odd place for film to be.” Sandy stood up abruptly. “O.K.,” he said. “Maybe we can check that part of your nightmare, anyway. If somebody bought that film with the deliberate purpose of starting a fire, he probably got it in Schooley’s photo shop right across the street from Sam’s. Let’s go and find out.” They grabbed their coats and started for the door. Ken picked up the box from Pop’s desk on the way. “I think I’ll keep my hands on this—just in case,” he said. The photographic supply shop was as crowded as Sam’s store had been. Several minutes went by before the boys could catch the attention of one of the clerks. But finally one of them said, “Hi, Sandy. What is it today? Film or flash bulbs?” “Neither,” Sandy told him. “Just some information. Did you sell a roll of thirty-five millimeter this morning?” The clerk’s eyebrows rose. “Are you crazy? I must have sold at least fifty. In case you don’t know it, chum, tomorrow is Christmas and quite a few people seem to want to take pictures that day.” “I know,” Sandy said, “but—” “Wait,” Ken interrupted. “Let’s put it this way. Did you sell any to a man who either didn’t seem to know anything about film, or who didn’t care what kind he bought?” The clerk’s eyebrows rose another fraction of an inch. “Of all the idiotic—” he began, and then stopped. He looked at the boys sharply for an instant, and then called over his shoulder to a fellow clerk. “Rick! Got a second?” Rick left his customer who was examining a small camera and joined them. “What’s up?” “Didn’t you tell me about some queer duck who came in this morning to buy film and didn’t know what size he wanted or what speed or anything?” Rick nodded. “Sure. He just asked for film. When I asked what size, he said it didn’t matter. And then when I kind of stared at him he said it was for a little camera. I figured he meant a miniature job, so I suggested a cartridge of thirty-five millimeter and he said that would be fine. But he didn’t know whether he wanted color film or black and white, and he didn’t know what I was talking about when I mentioned high-speed stuff. I finally gave him a spool of the cheapest film we have, just to get rid of him.” Ken made an effort to keep his voice calm. “Do you remember what he looked like?” “I probably wouldn’t remember my own mother if she came in here today,” Rick said with a grin. “But I do recall one more funny thing about that guy,” he added suddenly. “Right after he left I had to reach into the front window for a camera some customer wanted to see, and I noticed him crossing the street. The dumb cluck was opening the cartridge box and exposing the film to the light! He’s sure going to be in for a surprise when he tries to take pictures with it.” “I wouldn’t worry about it,” Ken said, beginning to pull Sandy away. “I doubt if he planned to take any pictures at all.” <div class='pbb'></div> <hr class='pb c000' /> <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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