Читать книгу The Fighting Five - Noel Jr. Sainsbury - Страница 6

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Again the radio announcer was talking into the microphone above the Gymnasium floor. This time, however, his usual clear-cut diction was slurred and his tone betrayed keen excitement.

"Well, folks!" he said breathlessly, "I've kept you waiting a long time and I apologize—but say, something absolutely unprecedented in the history of sport has happened right here in the State College Gym during the last few minutes. The Clarkville School basketball team has been kidnaped! Believe it or not, I'm telling you the unadulterated truth. The crowd here is just getting wise to the fact and the place is in an uproar. Do you hear 'em? The noise is so great I can hardly hear my own voice. And take it from me, the police on duty are having all they can do to prevent a riot.

"So far as I can find out the facts are these. Masked men entered Clarkville's dressing room shortly after the team went there between halves and after forcing the Fighting Five to get into their clothes and overcoats at the point of a revolver, the gangsters spirited them away. The kidnaped players are Captain Charlie Minor, Zip Young, Shorty Fiske, Monk Leeming and Bull Brown. The city and state police and the federal authorities have been notified and the search is on. Descriptions of the kidnaped players are as follows—"

The mike man talked for a few minutes more, then requested his unseen audience who hung on his words to stand by while he sought further information.

After breaking open the door of their locker-room, Coach Parker and the Clarkville substitutes had rushed into the corridor to find it empty and the birds flown. The sound of hammering and banging came from behind closed doors on both sides of the long, narrow hall. Paying no attention to frantic shouts of their imprisoned rivals, the Clarkville delegation sprinted down the length of the hall to the side entrance of the building, only to find that it was locked from the outside!

Back they rushed to the inner end of the corridor leading to the Gymnasium floor—and here again they were locked in. By his time the Ridgetown team had smashed their door panels and broken into the corridor, fighting mad at the trick they believed had been played upon them. Hurried explanations were made and Mr. Parker held a short conference with the Ridgetown coach. A couple of benches were dragged out of the locker rooms, and using them as rams, Clarkville went to work on the side door of the building, while Ridgetown commenced to batter down the door to the Gym floor. The latter was a much easier job than the door through which the kidnapers and their victims had escaped and the Shooting Stars had its panels and lock smashed long before the heavy oak at the other end of the corridor had begun to splinter.

The alarm was sent out, officials and the police were at once notified, but by the time a search of the premises could be started there was not a sign of the masked band that had carried away the Fighting Five.

Once more the radio announcer was back at his microphone:

"Here I am again, folks!" he was saying. "It took me longer than I expected. This place is bedlam, now that the four thousand people who were watching the game have gotten onto what happened between halves. And there's a good-sized riot going on here right now. Seems a whole lot more like a State asylum filled with loonies on the loose than the State College Gym packed to the rafters with disappointed basketball fans. I've lost a perfectly good derby, at least it was a good derby until a lady with hysterics and an umbrella took a swipe at it just by way of showing her interest—ha! ha! And my coat is ripped straight down the back. No, I'm not bidding for a new one. This little aside is just to give you a better idea of the way these excited fans are getting the old dander up.

"It seems now that this gang of masked gunmen must be either Japs or Chinese. Probably the former, as they efficiently jiu jitsued Shorty Fiske when he showed fight. The Yellow Peril in kidnaping is old stuff in Asia, but a new departure so far as this country is concerned. However, there's no need to get het up about it. This is evidently a private gang that the authorities are up against and the fact that this wholesale kidnaping was pulled off by Orientals should make their apprehension less difficult. But the only trouble is that their nationality, or rather their race, is the one and only clew they left. They locked up everybody they found in the corridor to the locker-rooms, and since a twelve-below zero night with a first-class blizzard going on doesn't encourage street loitering, nobody, so far as we can find out, saw their cars leave the side entrance to the building. There's a chance, of course, that they may be held up by the storm. The snow is already very heavy and it's drifting fast in this forty-mile wind. On the other hand the weather hinders the pursuit, too.

"Hello! Here come the police reserves. . . . They are clearing the place—and it's about time if you want my opinion. I'm out a hat and an overcoat but there's no sense in smashing this mike as well, and that's what I've been expecting for the last ten minutes or so . . . oh—something I forgot to tell you—must admit this riot has flustered me a bit . . . I

omitted to say that when Squirty Pennell, substitute Clarkville

forward, threatened the masked leader, that surprising gentleman of the Orient shot back the well-known phrase, 'horse feathers!'—And that, so far as the pursuit of these criminals and their five captives is concerned sums up the business. The Horse Feathers gang is on their way and now for further information, you will be kept in touch with all new developments by the studio direct. This is Station A.B.C.D.E. . . . Reginald Montmorency speaking and I am signing off now, folks. . . . Good night!"

When Charlie Minor, at his armed captor's side, passed from the locker-room corridor into the night, the snow-swept wind of the blizzard fairly blew him off his feet. He and the little Jap headed the line and instinctively they ducked the lash of the storm that cut like a frozen whip. The Jap tore his mask from his face, grasped his prisoner's arm and together they fought their way round the corner of the building and into the teeth of the storm.

Below the long flight of broad stone steps now deep with drifted snow that led from the main entrance to the street, the automobiles of the spectators inside the Gymnasium were parked along the curbs up and down the street as far as the eye could reach. The two policemen on duty had, as became known later, taken shelter from the blizzard within the Gymnasium's deep vestibule. Except for the drivers of the six big cars with idling motors, lined up in the middle of the street, not a soul was in sight.

Since the gangster's automatic effectually prevented any chance of escape, and with the memory of the competent manner in which Shorty's rebellion had been quelled still fresh in his mind, Charlie decided that firearms and jiu jitsu held the odds. Therefore, he came tractably enough, allowing the man to pilot him to the first of the waiting cars. No sooner had they taken their places, than the chauffeur let in his clutch and they rolled away. Charlie was surprised that no attempt was made to blindfold him or to prevent him from peering out of the car windows. A glance through the rear gave him a blurred picture of the other fellows entering the automobiles behind, each with a Japanese gunman for company. Then as his own conveyance increased the lead, the others faded into the dim glow of headlights and Charlie turned to look at his guard.

That gentleman was complacently smoking a cigarette and, although the automatic was not in evidence, Captain Minor knew that it would be quickly in hand in case of need.

"Do you speak English?" he asked.

"Uh-huh!" answered the dark figure in the opposite corner of the seat. "Do you speak Japanese?"

Charlie chuckled. "Not so you'd notice it."

"Then let's speak American, Mr. Minor."

"Okay. It seems even Japanese kidnapers have a sense of humor."

"Well, why not?"

"Far be it from me to criticize, but you seem to be taking things pretty easily."

"Why do you say that, Mr. Minor?"

"Well—er—contrary to kidnaping procedure as I understand it, you haven't tied me up, or even pulled down the window shades. We might be taking a friendly spin together so far as appearances go."

"That," said the gunman, "is exactly the big idea. What the people who see us pass don't know about this little ride won't hurt them—or us. If they saw a blindfolded man sitting beside me, or shaded windows all around the car, they'd be suspicious. And that might prove unhealthy, certainly for them—and possibly for us!"

"Got it all planned out on a common sense basis, I see—Mr.—er—I don't think we've been formally introduced?" said Charlie with a grin.

"Number Two will do for the present." The gunman flicked the ash from his cigarette into the metal container at the side of the car. "When you get to know us better, Mr. Minor, you'll understand that common sense is our middle name. Naturally, you're a bit sore at being yanked away from your basketball in this impromptu manner. I'd feel the same if our positions were reversed. If you'll take a well-meant tip, you'll accept the inevitable. On the whole I'm sure you won't regret it. Otherwise—but why discuss such an unpleasant alternative?"

Charlie, who had been staring out the window into the snowy night, turned toward his companion.

"Otherwise what?" he inquired. "I don't happen to like bowing to fate, or whatever you call it. But I'm interested in that alternative. How about it, Number Two?" He leaned forward. "If I should suddenly decide that distance lends enchantment and make a break to get away, would you shoot to kill?"

The Oriental answered him unmoved. "My orders are to take no chances. You have a saying—dead men tell no tales."

"Oh—exactly. But they generally raise the dickens of a—pardon the vulgar word—stink! I don't believe that gun of yours would actually enter any discussion we might have. I'll bet anything you like that your orders from Mister Horse Feathers, or Number One, I suppose he is, are to rely on the good old jiu jitsu alone. How about it, buddy? Do my words of wisdom hit the well-known nail on the head or do they not?"

"On the well-known thumb, more likely," laughed the Jap gunman. "My orders are to lay you out as cold and stiff as an Eskimo's fishline, if necessary. Those were the boss' exact words. However, I feel certain I could handle you, Mr. Charlie Minor, and two or three more like you—without my gun."

"Turn me into an Eskimo fishline just the same, eh?"

"Your perception is almost human," his captor remarked affably. "And even if by an unheard-of stroke of luck you should put me out of the running, our chauffeur would make sure of you."

"Do you think he could hear us scrapping through the glass—with his engine running?"

"He wouldn't need to count on that. All I have to do is to touch that button over there and he will turn his head. He is armed, I need hardly mention."

"Oh, of course, I take that for granted," Charlie replied, making certain mental reservations as he did so.

"Also," went on the Jap, "remember that there are other cars right behind us. They'd pick you up the minute anything went wrong in here—such as, for instance, my dropping dead of heart failure, which I'm not likely to do," he added dryly.

"Got it all fixed, all right, haven't you?" Charlie lapsed into silence after that retort.

His captor yawned and lit another cigarette. The more he saw of young Americans, the more stupid he found them. No Japanese youth, he meditated, would rebel against fate like the silly fellow he escorted; nor would a sensible Japanese lad carry on a pointless conversation just for the sake of talking.

Had Number Two known that Charlie had studied jiu jitsu under the famous Nugochi and was, in the words of Clarkville, "a bug on Japanese wrestling," he might not have been so complacent. He would have been even less so had he realized that Charlie had purposely steered the conversation into its channel, and had gained considerable information thereby. Then again that young man spoke and, as before, with a particular end in view.

"Much of a trip ahead?"

"With luck," the man answered, "We ought to be home shortly after eleven o'clock."

"Don't suppose you'll tell me why the five of us have been kidnaped or where we're bound?"

"Neither one nor the other. If you can memorize the course we're taking, you're welcome to do it."

"Not much chance! If you can see more than ten feet on either side of us now that we're out in the country, you've got better eyes than yours truly. And I'm not familiar with this part of the state, anyway."

"Not easy to figure whether we're headed north, south, east or west, eh?"

"Oh, I've kept track of the general direction or directions, I should say."

"You have?"

"Certainly."

"But what airmen call the visibility is practically nil."

"I know it."

"Oh, you do, eh! What's the sense of a foolish bluff, then?"

"I'm not bluffing, Mister Number Two."

"I'm from Missouri, Mister Captain Charlie Minor!"

"I doubt it," laughed Charlie, "but just the same I'll put you wise."

"Come across. I'll tell you if you're right."

"Well, it's like this, and quite simple. The storm has been blowing out of the northwest all day. And I noticed that the wind hadn't changed any when you herded me into this Lincoln. We ran south out of the city, kept on in that direction for a few miles. Then we turned east, then northeast, and now we're headed almost into the wind and therefore approximately northwest. I've been watching the snowflakes, pal. How about it,—do I win?"

"You're not quite as dumb as you look," Number Two admitted ungraciously.

"I can't say as much for you," Charlie returned without malice.

"The trouble with you Americans," growled the gunman, "is that the dumber you grow, the more cocky you are."

Charlie chuckled. "You're left-handed," he remarked conversationally, "and sitting on my right."

"Wonderful guesser," derided Number Two. "How did you figure that one out?"

"Horse Feathers!" said Charlie.

Like a snake in the darkness his own left arm shot out and his sinewy fingers snapped down upon the gunman's left wrist.