Читать книгу The Fighting Five - Noel Jr. Sainsbury - Страница 4
ОглавлениеMEN IN MASKS
The door of Clarkville's dressing room had no more than closed on the team, the substitutes and Coach Parker, when it suddenly opened again. Six men muffled to the ears in fur coats slipped into the room and the door slammed shut behind them. The faces of these newcomers were hidden behind black silk masks and each man held a snub-nosed automatic revolver in his hand.
"The honorable gentlemen will be good enough to line up against the wall—at once!"
The order came from the masked leader who stood slightly in advance of his fellows. The voice was smooth and purring, but every chap in the room knew instinctively that this man meant business and that to disobey meant death.
For a fraction of a second Coach Parker stared at their principal adversary, then, beckoning the team to follow him, he walked over to the back wall.
"Come along, boys," he said quietly. "These men are armed; we are not. The sooner we line up and they find that we have no valuables worthy of their trouble, the sooner they will finish and go."
"The honorable gentlemen," went on the masked bandit, "will turn their faces to the wall . . . and there will be no talking, except by me, if you please."
Charlie Minor was mending a broken shoelace when the gunmen appeared, and for a moment he entertained the thought of making a dash for the farther door that led to the showers and lavatories. Then he remembered that these rooms had no other exit, and even if he wasn't shot out of hand he knew he'd be caught like a rat in a trap. So deciding for the present at least to obey orders and wait for a better opportunity, he stood up, gave his captors a single, searching glance and took his place at the end of the line.
Charlie was a quick-witted chap. His eyes now saw nothing but the gray-green wall of the locker room, but mentally he saw several things and saw them plainly. The glance he'd given the gunmen told him that every one of them was short and small boned. The leader spoke English without accent, but somehow his inflection was peculiar—and then the use of the adjective "honorable" . . .
"A Chinaman or a Jap!" thought Charles wonderingly. "Dollars to doughnuts the rest of 'em are the same. What in thunderation can they want of us?"
This he was soon to discover. The leader's voice, with its slightly singsong tone, was in his ears once more.
"The following gentlemen will take two steps backward and right-about-face . . . Mr. Charlie Minor!"
Charlie, dark, slim-waisted, broad-shouldered, and a generous five-foot-eleven, took the two steps backward and swung round as the speaker called the next name.
"Mr. Zip Young!"
Zip, a light-haired, birdlike little fellow, followed Charlie's lead.
Next called was Shorty Fiske, the team's huge center, and it was quite evident from the big fellow's expression that he was furiously angry. Nevertheless, he did as he was bid, scowling savagely at the maskers.
After him came Monk Leeming, a tall, debonair fellow, handsome and one of the best athletes in Clarkville School. Monk was followed in short order by Bull Brown's stocky figure.
The masked leader of the gunmen glanced at his wrist watch. "Gentlemen of the Clarkville School Basketball Team," he said in his toneless singsong, "you are about to leave this place with me."
"Where do you propose to take us?" Charlie Minor's voice betrayed not the slightest tremor of excitement.
"You will be good enough not to ask questions," the masked one returned. "I can allow you no more than five minutes to take a shower and dress. To use your American vernacular—snap into it. Dressed or not, all will be escorted to the cars when the five minutes are up. And you will not talk, please."
He waved toward the shower room and the five members of the team ran for it. There they found one of the armed maskers standing guard. The man had already turned on the water in five of the showers, so without a word, they stripped, stood for a second or two under the lukewarm streams, hurriedly rubbed down and ran back to the locker room. Pop Parker and the substitutes were still lined up facing the back wall while the gang leader menaced their backs with his gun, smoking a cigarette the while. As they appeared he said a few sharp words to his satellites in a strange tongue, then spoke again in his precise English.
"My men will now help you gentlemen dress. Permit me to remind you that we leave here in just three minutes."
Charlie, Zip, Monk and Bull were only too glad of this rather surprising assistance. None of them liked being kidnaped, but knowing that resistance was futile, and not enjoying the idea of going out into an arctic night partially clothed, they were making the best possible speed.
But Shorty Fiske was a quick-tempered, arrogant lad and although he got into his clothes with the speed of a West Point cadet, he was boiling over with a righteous wrath that destroyed his usual good judgment. It particularly irritated him to be forced to take orders from men half his size and weight, and while he threw on his things he made up his mind to grasp the first opening offered to put one of these gangsters out of the running—even if he stopped a bullet for his pains. He doubted that the leader would shoot to kill, and if his scheme proved successful, it would not be himself but his masked valet who would receive the leader's bullet. For now that the little men were as busy as the boys they were assisting, their guns were no longer in their hands, but in the pockets of the fur coats they wore.
Presently Shorty's chance came. His valet was holding out coat and vest for him, when he suddenly swung round and his powerful hands gripped the little man by the shoulders. Shorty's plan was to hurl his valet bodily at the masked gang leader, and there is no doubt that in the ordinary course of events the jaunty gentleman with the gun and the cigarette would have gone down like a lone ninepin. Fiske was strong as an ox and his adversary no more than a featherweight. But as things turned out, it did not work that way.
Later on, neither the members of the team who witnessed the fracas nor Shorty himself were able to tell exactly what took place. All that young Fiske knew was that the masker seemed to slip through his fingers, there came a sharp pain on his right calf, a blow on his Adam's apple that hurt even more, if possible; and he found himself flat on his back staring up at the blue-black muzzle of his antagonist's automatic.
"That, Mr. Fiske," the masked leader told him pleasantly, "is known as jiu jitsu, a form of Japanese wrestling you may have heard of. Now get up and finish dressing, but let me remind you that I or any member of my little company can take excellent care of any or all of you without the help of our guns. Next time the treatment will be much more severe. We don't want to be forced to hurt any of you gentlemen, but your next taste of jiu jitsu will leave you helpless and crippled for three or four hours at least. And now that the time is up," he concluded, "we go."
"But—I say!" expostulated Mr. Parker from his position at the wall. "If this holdup is a matter of ransom, why not come to some agreement now? It will save all involved much worry and trouble."
"You are a clever man, Mr. Parker," the chief replied easily, as the five teammates were marshaled toward the door under their armed guard. "This is certainly a holdup, but time, as you realize, is more precious than money to me just at present. I have the honor to bid you farewell."
"You'll never get away with it!" retorted Squirty Pennell, one of the substitute forwards. "Kidnaping is a hanging matter in this state. Every single one of you will swing for this!"
The masked leader ushered the little procession into the corridor, still keeping a bead on the fellows lined up.
"You are misinformed as to your state laws, young man," he replied urbanely. "I detest American slang, but the only answer I have time to give you is horse feathers!"
The door slammed behind him and those left in the room heard the key turn in the lock.