Читать книгу Radio Boys in the Secret Service; Or, Cast Away on an Iceberg - J. W. Duffield - Страница 7

Table of Contents

There was nothing for Guy and Artie to do but obey. The highwayman spoke and acted as if he meant business. He flashed a strong pocket electric light, illuminating the fog around them. The muzzle of the pistol had an ominous appearance, and the better part of valor seemed to be caution. The fellow was of medium height and build, and his voice was one of the strangest Guy had ever heard. Later Artie described it as a “combination of a squeak and a roar.” At first Guy believed this footpad to be the one whom Artie had frightened a few minutes before, but the difference in their voices convinced him otherwise.

“Perhaps they’re working together,” he concluded.

“We’ll go,” said Artie with surprising coolness, in response to the highwayman’s command, as he stepped from the sidewalk to the pavement. “Come on, Guy.”

The latter followed, and presently the man ordered them to halt.

“Now, spill out,” he commanded, still covering them with the light and the pistol. “Turn all your pockets inside out.”

But the “honk” of a horn was now heard a short distance away. A motor car was approaching.

“Get over to this side till it passes,” was the highwayman’s next instruction.

They obeyed, and the motor went slowly by. Guy would have called for help, but the weapon warned him to keep silence. Presently the boys were ordered back into the middle of the street.

“Now,” continued the man, whose face could not be seen clearly because it was behind the light; “out with your valu’bles. Jus’ drop ’em on the pavement an’ move on. It won’t hurt me to pick ’em up. Any gentleman ought to be willin’ to bend ’is aristycratic back once in a while, you know.”

“You’d be a heap better off if you’d bend your back with a pick an’ shovel,” retorted Artie boldly.

“Shut your trap, sissy,” the highwayman ordered. “You don’t look as if you ever overworked a muscle, ’cept your tongue. You better glue that up ag’in the roof o’ your mouth when you’re in the presence of gentlemen o’ my class—you might get into trouble. But I ain’t got no more time to waste. Pull your coats off first an’ drop ’em. I won’t take ’em away, and if you come back here in the morning, you may find ’em ag’in.”

Guy wondered at the term “sissy” applied to his companion. It was not light enough for the highwayman to distinguish the effeminate features of the hotel clerk, and the latter’s voice was not girlish.

“I haven’t got any money,” declared Artie as he took off his coat and dropped it to the pavement.

“No, I don’t suppose you have,” the footpad replied; “but I don’t want to miss any chances. You might have a ‘tuppence’ sewed up in the lining o’ yo’r wais’co’t, you know. Now, off with that, too.”

Meanwhile Guy had been on the alert for a favorable opportunity to make a dash away in the fog, but the highwayman was watchful. Neither of the boys had enough valuables on his person to make it worth while to risk the boring of a bullet through him in order to save them.

But suddenly there was an interruption to proceedings. Without the least warning, a hand shot out in the fog, grasped the wrist of the hand that held the pistol, and in a twinkling the weapon was wrested away.

“Help, lads! Get ’im by the legs!”

This instruction came from the rescuer sharply and vigorously. Both boys sprang forward to obey, but they were too late. The highwayman broke loose and disappeared in the darkness.

“Blast the luck!” exclaimed the new arrival, picking himself up from the pavement where he had fallen in the scuffle. “He was too slippery for me. But my jiu-jitsu training came in good anyway,” he added as he reached for the highwayman’s pistol, which he had dropped.

“It’s funny that gun didn’t go off when it fell,” said Artie.

“It’s too bad you didn’t keep it in your hand when you took it away from him,” said Guy regretfully. “You could ’ave turned it on ’im, and he wouldn’t ’a’ dared to run.”

“I didn’t want to shoot ’im,” replied the rescuer. “I wouldn’t like to go through life without the consciousness of having killed a man.”

“Well, he ought to have a bullet in his leg anyhow,” declared Artie. “I don’t believe in letting such fellows get off scot free.”

“I’m satisfied as it is,” volunteered Guy, who was not of a vindictive nature. “He got a good scare an’ no money. But we haven’t thanked this gentleman for what he did.”

“Give me a swift kick, will you, Guy?” exclaimed Artie in disgust. “I’m ashamed o’ myself. You’ll go back to America convinced that we English are just as slow as they say we are.”

“No danger of that,” assured Guy “You’ve shown me a pretty lively time tonight. Is this what you meant by seeing London in a fog?”

“Not exactly, though I expected something to happen to show you what a fog means to us.”

“That’s when most of our hold-ups occur—in a fog,” explained the rescuer. “A highwayman is safer in one of our fogs than he would be in your Rocky Mountains. But I must be moving along.”

“We wish to thank you for rescuing us Mister—! May we ask your name?”

“Smithers—J. C. Smithers. I’m living at the Morley hotel.”

“Why, that’s where we’re stopping—I mean I am. My friend here works there.”

“Is that so?” returned Smithers in tone of surprise. “I’m pleased to hear it. Where were you bound for?”

“Nowhere in particular,” replied Artie. “We were jus’ takin’ a walk.”

“Seein’ London in a fog, eh? So was I—taking a constitutional. But I guess I’ve had enough and will go back. Come in and see me any time—tomorrow evening if you will.”

“We surely will,” promised Guy. “We’re not likely to forget very soon what you did for us.”

“Oh, that’s nothing,” assured Smithers modestly. “It was easy to do. I had all the advantage. By the way, you haven’t told me your names yet.”

“Beg your pardon,” said Artie. “This is Guy Burton. He’s from the United States. My name is Arthur Fletcher. I’m a clerk at the Morley. I think I remember you. You came to the hotel yesterday, didn’t you?”

“Yes, you’ve got a good memory.”

The boys decided they had seen enough of London in a fog for one evening and returned with Smithers to the hotel. As they were about to separate in the lobby, their new acquaintance repeated his invitation to them to call at his room the following evening.

Guy said nothing about his adventure to his mother that night. He decided that it would make her nervous and that it would be better to tell his story in the morning. But at the breakfast table, where he related his experience, he found his mother possessed of more nerve than he expected. To be sure, she was startled, but as her son had suffered no physical injury, she took the matter coolly and advised him to go out no more on foggy nights.

That evening Guy and Artie called at the room of Smithers. The latter proved to be a striking combination of shrewdness, smiles and nervous alertness. He was rather stout and his eyes were small, black and keen. He received the boys with a warm welcome, unnecessarily warm, it seemed to Guy.

“Awfully glad to see you lads,” he said, seizing them in turn by the hand. “Come right in an’ make yourselves at home.”

“Making themselves at home” consisted of taking seats offered by Smithers, who produced a box of cigars and invited his guests to help themselves. The latter, however, not being addicted to the habit, declined.

“Wise lads, very wise,” declared the host warmly. “Nearly everybody smokes, but nearly everybody is foolish, too. My only regret is that I must smoke alone tonight.”

“I use’ to smoke, but my doctor told me I mus’ quit,” explained Artie. “He said it was likely to give me a London fog on the brain.”

“Ha, ha, ha,” laughed Smithers. “That’s a good one. I suppose he was afraid if you got fog on the brain, you might be held up.”

“Yes, he was afraid my business ability would be held up.”

“Good! Excellent! There’s a great lesson for smokers in that. Isn’t it so, Mr. Burton? I haven’t a doubt I’d be a millionaire if I hadn’t been addicted to the weed. I had excellent natural business ability. As it is, I’m only moderately well-to-do. What are your views on the subject, Mr. Burton?”

“I’m in a funny position on the subject of smoking,” said Guy. “I don’t believe it’s good for a fellow, and yet, I can’t believe it puts a London fog in everybody’s brain an’ holds up his business ability. My father smokes, and they say he’s the best business man in Ferncliffe.”

“Mebby he’d be another Baron Rothschild if he didn’t smoke,” suggested Artie.

“Didn’t Rothschild smoke?—an’, supposing he did, what’u’d he ’a’ been if he hadn’t?” was Guy’s logical inquiry.

“Ha, ha, ha,” laughed Smithers again. “Great idea, Burton.”

“If Rothschild did smoke, he might ’a’ owned half o’ England by quittin’ before he began,” declared Artie sophistically.

“Desist, lads, desist,” implored Smithers with mock concern. “If you produce any more such stunning logic, I won’t be able to sleep any more until I’ve sworn off smoking. And I don’t want to do that. It’s the chief care-killer of a bachelor.”

“Are you a bachelor?” inquired Artie, somewhat embarrassed.

“Dear me, yes. Don’t these quarters look like it—eh, Burton?”

“Then you live in London?” Artie continued.

“Certainly—I’m in business here,” looking at Guy as he spoke.

Smithers apparently did his best to make the evening pleasant for the boys, but he seemed to be much more interested in Guy than he was in Artie. In fact Guy told himself that the way in which the man ignored the hotel clerk at times was extremely uncivil. They discussed the holdup of the night before, and the rescuer produced the weapon he had taken from the highwayman. This proved to be an old-fashioned thumb-cock, with a five-chamber cylinder.

“Why didn’t it go off when it dropped on the pavement?” asked Guy.

“It was only half-cocked an’ couldn’t,” replied the host.

“He’s a funny highwayman,” declared Artie. “He must ’a’ wanted to get caught.”

“Maybe he had a tender conscience and was afraid he might shoot by accident—eh, Burton?” suggested Smithers with a smile.

As the boys were about to leave, the man extended to them a warm invitation to call again any time he was in. Guy, however, felt embarrassed because the hospitality seemed to be directed principally at him.

“He’s a fine man, isn’t he?” observed Artie as they waited for an elevator.

“Seems to be all right,” answered Guy.

“Seems to be?” exclaimed Artie reproachfully. “It’s funny you’re so cool about it when he’s so much interested in you. You’re the one he wants to call again.”

“That’s just what I don’t like about it. He’s a nice fellow and all that; but it isn’t very polite for a host to give all his attention to one when two invited callers are present.”

“You’re a queer one!” exclaimed Artie. “That didn’t bother me any. You’re a rich man’s son, an’ I’m only a hotel clerk. That’s the reason he was more interested in you.”

It was Guy’s turn to be astonished. He had not thought of this aspect of the affair.

“I’m surprised at you,” he said reproachfully. “I don’t believe he thought of such a thing. If he did, I haven’t any use for ’im.”