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Mystery of the Iron Box

<h2 id='chap11' class='c011'>CHAPTER XI</h2> <div class='nf-center-c0'> <div class='nf-center c013'> <div>A SCHEME FOR ATTACK</div> </div></div> Barrack kept his pistol pointed at them. “Cal!” he shouted. Inside the cabin there was a crash. Ken could visualize what had happened. The big man in the turtle-neck sweater, hurrying toward the door, had apparently knocked down a chair in the crowded little room. For an instant Barrack’s eyes shifted toward the cabin doorway. Sandy moved before the man’s glance had refocused. Like a steel spring uncoiling, his six feet straightened out—one shoulder forward, aimed for Barrack’s midriff. Ken leaped forward too, only a fraction of a second behind him. He chopped at the hand that held the gun just as Sandy’s shoulder made contact. The gun flew wide over the side of the barge. Barrack almost followed it, under the impact of two hundred pounds of well-conditioned muscle. Almost before Barrack landed heavily against the bulwark, the boys had spun around and were tearing across the deck toward the ladder. The man named Cal emerged through the cabin doorway just as they charged past. He never had a chance to stop them. He hadn’t even raised his fist when Ken struck him a glancing blow that threw him backward. The boys didn’t attempt to find the actual location of the ladder in the darkness. They vaulted straight over the bulwark, side by side, and landed on the concrete pier six feet below with bone-jarring thuds. But both of them were on their feet an instant later and pounding toward the street, the shouts behind them echoing in their ears. They reached the opening in the fence just as they heard the engine of Barrack’s car roar into life. Ken glanced briefly back over his shoulder. Barrack had parked the car with its nose pointed toward the barge. He would have to back up and swing around. Sandy was glancing quickly up and down the dark deserted street. “There’s a diner down there!” he panted. The glow of neon lighting he was pointing to was at least three blocks away, but it seemed to be the only haven in sight. They had covered less than a block when Barrack’s car emerged from the pier. It paused there briefly. The driver was apparently looking to see which way they had gone. And then, apparently, he sighted them. The car swung in their direction, its tires screaming. “We’ll never make it!” Sandy gasped. Ken’s eyes caught a flash of light on the opposite side of the street. He turned his head toward it without breaking his stride. “Look!” A taxi was entering South Street from the cross street just ahead and slowing to a stop at the corner. As the two sailors in the back seat climbed out, Ken and Sandy were already tearing across toward it. Barrack’s headlights were close enough to outline them clearly. “Hey!” Sandy yelled as they ran. “Cab!” The driver waved a casual hand to let them know he saw them coming. Ken tumbled inside just as Barrack’s car shot past. Sandy piled in on top of him. The driver, only mildly surprised at their haste, said, “In a hurry, huh?” Ken watched Barrack brake to a stop just ahead of the taxi. “Not particularly—not any more,” Ken managed to answer. “Take us uptown to Radio City, please.” The cab swung in a wide U turn and headed north. Ken and Sandy slumped wearily back on the seat. For a moment they had all they could do to catch their breath. “We messed that up for fair,” Sandy said finally, still gulping for air. “I messed it up,” Ken said. “Me and my big sneeze.” “Say, bud”—the driver pivoted his head to speak to them—“is that joker behind us a friend of yours?” Ken sat up and swung around to look through the rear window. A pair of headlights were close behind them. “Not that I know of,” Ken said. “Why?” “That’s the car that stopped just ahead of me as you got in,” the driver explained. “He made a U turn, just like I did, and he’s been on our tail ever since. Thought maybe he was trying to catch up with you.” Ken and Sandy looked at each other in the glow of a street light they were passing. “He’s no friend of ours,” Ken said decisively. “You don’t mind if I try to lose him then?” the driver asked. “I hate a fellow that nudges my rear end like that.” “It’s O.K. with us,” Sandy assured him. “Go right ahead.” “I don’t like this,” Ken muttered. He kept one eye on the rear window. “Here he comes.” “I don’t like it, either,” Sandy agreed. “He probably would have used that gun, but fortunately we didn’t get a chance to find out.” “If anybody asked him, of course,” Ken said, “he’d undoubtedly say he was just protecting private property from trespassers—and there’s no doubt that’s what we were.” “Sure,” Sandy said. He was rubbing absent-mindedly at the knee he had landed on when he dove off the barge. “But the way he had that gun ready—” He shook his head. “There must be a bigger danger of trespassers around stone-loaded barges than I thought.” “Maybe that’s not plain stone—maybe it’s gold ore,” Ken suggested flippantly, but his eyes glued to the back window were still grim. Barrack’s car had followed them skillfully around two more corners. “Oh, indubitably.” Sandy’s tone matched Ken’s. “Or platinum ore. And now explain why it was Barrack who had the gun, instead of—what did he call him?—Cal. And what Barrack was doing there in the first place.” Their cab, driving up lower Broadway now—a deserted canyon at that hour of the evening—stopped for a red light. The car behind stopped too. “I think I’ll get out and give that guy back there a poke in the snoot,” the driver of the cab said. His hand was already on the door handle. “His lights are driving me nuts.” Ken spoke quickly. “Wait until we get out. We’re in a hurry.” “Well—O.K.” The driver sighed as he settled back behind his wheel. “Maybe by then I’ll have my temper under control. I know I shouldn’t always be wanting to give a guy a punch in the snoot. It’s just my impulsive nature.” Ken and Sandy laughed in spite of themselves. “I know just how you feel,” Sandy assured the man in the front seat. “I have the same trouble myself.” But the laughter was out of his voice before he stopped speaking. There was a menacing quality in the persistence of those lights behind them. As they neared Fourteenth Street the traffic began to get heavier. Soon the cab driver was able to swing in and out of the lanes of cars in a series of swift maneuvers that forced Barrack’s car to drop behind. “That’ll hold him,” the driver said with satisfaction. “He’s pocketed now!” “But something tells me he won’t stay pocketed,” Sandy murmured. “Even if we really lose him he could catch up with us later at your father’s apartment.” “And if he arrives there, complete with gun, to ask what we were doing on the barge,” Ken said, “what do we tell him? That we were just out for a moonlight stroll along the river?” “We ask him what he was doing there.” “And of course he’d tell us,” Ken said sarcastically. “Of course.” Sandy laughed shortly. “Everything about him so far has been absolutely straightforward—the way he came to your father’s apartment, the way he told us he didn’t know Grace, the way he left that package for Grace to pick up—” He broke off angrily. “I’m certainly beginning to be mighty curious about that man. But I don’t see how we can learn much more about him, now that he’s got us spotted. If we turn up in his way again—” “I’ve got an idea!” Ken leaned forward to speak to the driver. “We changed our minds. Take us to the Pennsylvania Station instead.” “What? Penn Station?” The driver glanced around in surprise. “But I thought you were in such a hurry to get to Radio City.” “Yes, we were,” Ken said. “But—” “You have to humor him,” Sandy explained to the back of the man’s head. “It’s his impulsive nature.” “Oh. Sure. In that case. Anything your little heart desires.” The cab swung left on Twenty-ninth Street and sped westward toward Seventh Avenue. There it turned right for the big railroad station a few blocks northward. It was difficult to be certain, in these busy streets, but Ken thought he spotted Barrack’s car half a block behind. “What’s your idea?” Sandy asked. “You gave it to me,” Ken answered. “We’re going to make Barrack think we won’t turn up in his way again.” The cab swung down into the ramp that led directly into the terminal. Ken paid the driver, thanked him, and then led Sandy through the door into the station. “Let’s wait here a minute,” he said, just inside. “What for?” “Our shadow. We don’t want to lose him.” “But I thought—!” “Here he comes.” Barrack’s car was pulling up to the same spot their taxi had left only a few seconds before. The man in the turtle-neck sweater, wearing his pea jacket again—apparently he hadn’t had time to stop for his cap—jumped out of the front seat. Then Barrack, at the wheel, drove the car away. “Let’s go.” Ken took Sandy’s arm and moved casually forward. “I’m glad we’ve got Cal instead of Barrack. From the way he banged around in that cabin tonight, I don’t think he’s very quick on his feet.” “It certainly would be nice,” Sandy said, “if I knew what you had in that alleged mind of yours.” Ken glanced over his shoulder. “Good,” he murmured. “He’s only about fifty feet behind. Everything’s proceeding according to plan.” He steered Sandy toward the Information Desk. “When is the next train to Brentwood?” he asked in a clear voice. “Brentwood? Just a minute.” The information clerk consulted a schedule. “Eight one. On Track Ten.” “Thank you,” Ken said. “Might as well get our tickets now,” he added to Sandy. At the ticket window, Ken spoke loudly and clearly. Their shadow, partly concealed by a mountainous heap of luggage, was only a few feet away. As Ken tucked the two one-way tickets to Brentwood into his pocket he said, glancing at his watch, “We’ve got just an hour. How about something to eat?” “That’s the first sensible thing you’ve said in the last ten minutes,” Sandy muttered under his breath. He pulled out his wallet and counted the money in it. “Not quite six dollars,” he announced. “How much have you got with you?” Ken checked. “Eight dollars and some change.” “All right. I’ll take command of this phase of the action. Ever since I saw our friend there eating that doughnut and drinking that hot coffee—while we were freezing out in the cold—I’ve wanted to pay him back. And I know just the way to do it.” They both still felt stiff and bruised from their leap to the dock, but the comparative warmth of the cab and the greater warmth of the station had thawed them slightly. They walked almost briskly toward the largest of the station’s many restaurants. Sandy led the way inside and chose a table in full view of anyone standing outside the big window overlooking the busy arcade. Ken, shielding himself behind a large menu, stole a look through the glass. “He’s there.” “Good.” Sandy grinned. “He’s going to love this. I could tell from the way he was eating in the cabin that he really enjoys his food.” He looked up at a waiter who had hurried to their table. “We’ll start with clams on the half shell,” he said. “Then soup—onion, I guess. And then a sirloin for two—very rare. With it we’d better have some....” When the waiter headed for the kitchen a few minutes later he had a slightly glazed expression on his face. “I take it we’re not really going back to Brentwood,” Sandy said over the clams. “That act of buying the tickets in a loud voice was just an act?” Ken looked at him innocently. “Of course we could go back tonight—but then we’d miss the basketball game.” Sandy lifted an eyebrow at him. “I see. And what else would we miss?” Ken shrugged. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “All I really had in mind was convincing them that we were clearing out of town—going home to Brentwood and our own business. I thought it would calm their suspicions.” “By ‘them’ you mean Barrack and our boy Cal out there?” Sandy glanced through the window for an instant. “He’s drooling!” he announced happily. “Barrack and Cal,” Ken agreed. “Grace too. I’m assuming they’re all tied in together in something.” “I think that’s pretty obvious,” Sandy said. “But in what? What kind of game are they playing—skulking all over town that way, mysteriously transferring packages from one person to another? And apparently ruining what used to be a perfectly good wholesale tobacco business?” “Your guess is as good as mine,” Ken said. He waited while cups of steaming soup were substituted for the plates of empty clamshells. “The only explanation that occurs to me,” he said quietly, “is that Grace is a fence—a receiver and distributor of stolen goods. It would explain his lack of interest in the tobacco business.” Sandy considered the suggestion, his eyes slowly brightening. “I think you’re right. Then Barrack is probably a thief. That’s why he had to be so careful about transmitting that package to Grace.” Ken nodded. “And maybe Grace uses Cal, on the barge, for transportation. Cal could get the stuff out of New York.” Sandy stopped with a spoonful of soup halfway to his mouth. “But then what was Barrack doing on the barge? If he’s afraid to have any open contact with Grace, why wouldn’t he also be afraid to show himself around the barge?” Ken thought for a long moment and then shook his head. “I give up. I can’t think of any explanation for that—unless he’s trying to cross Grace up some way.” He frowned down into his soup. “I wish we’d had a chance to learn more about the Tobacco Mart when we were down there this afternoon. I can’t help but feel that that’s the center of whatever’s going on.” Sandy filled in the brief wait between the soup and the steak with a thick piece of French bread, lavishly buttered. “It’s certainly too bad,” he said, “that we don’t know just a little more about at least one of those characters. Then maybe we could go to the police.” “There’s certainly nothing we could tell the police now,” Ken said. “Of course, if we hung around the Tobacco Mart again tonight—after we’d convinced our friend out there that we’d gone meekly off to Brentwood—we might find something interesting.” Sandy’s glare cut him off. “That is the kind of suggestion,” he said loftily, “that has, in the past, landed us in some unpleasant situations.” Ken grinned. “That’s right. And also, quite often, into some pretty exciting yarns. For which we have earned a reputation. Not to mention,” he added, “sizable checks.” “Money is not everything,” Sandy informed him. “And reputation is not everything, either.” “I’ll toss you for it,” Ken said, pulling a quarter out of his pocket. “Heads, we make one more quick survey of the Tobacco Mart tonight. Tails, we forget the whole business.” Sandy was still maintaining his air of firm disinterest. “You are taking advantage of my well-known sportsman’s instinct,” he said. “I cannot refuse to toss you for it, but I insist upon going on record as opposed to the whole idea.” Ken handed him the coin. Sandy flicked it up in the air with his thumb and watched it as it fell to the table. “Tails it is,” Ken announced. “All right, we forget the whole business.” He attacked his steak. “This is certainly good, isn’t it?” he remarked conversationally. “How can you eat at a time like this?” Sandy demanded. “Aren’t you interested in the outcome of the coin tossing?” And when Ken looked up at him, with an air of puzzlement, Sandy added, “I thought it was understood that I would toss for two out of three.” “Oh.” Ken grinned. “Was it?” “Certainly.” Sandy tossed the coin again. “Heads,” he announced. He tossed it the third time. “Heads again,” he said. With a heavy mock sigh he handed the quarter back to Ken. “Your impulsive nature has again overcome my good judgment,” he said. “You have forced me to agree to accompany you on a safari to the Tobacco Mart.” <div class='pbb'></div> <hr class='pb c000' /> <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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