The Flickering Torch Mystery Part 12

"Very much."

Asa Grable opened a door.

"Come down the cellar and I'll reveal a wonderful experiment.''

He pressed a switch. A light flashed on, illuminating the stairs and the bas.e.m.e.nt below.

The scientist turned out the light in the upper room before they descended the steps.

The cellar was a dank, low-ceilinged room with rows of closets lining all four walls. There was a wooden table, cluttered with test tubes and gla.s.s containers with various-colored liquids. In the middle of the room was a large vat containing a dark solution that boiled slowly.

"Surely this hasn't anything to do with silkworms!" exclaimed Joe.

"It's an experiment I've been working on. A very important experiment," said the scientist. "I haven't shown it to anyone yet, so you're not to talk about it."

Fussily, he advanced to the table and removed a large test tube from a rack. The tube was 126 filled with a muddy liquid, and this Grahle poured carefully into the vat. Joe watched, fascinated.

"Now," he said, chuckling, "you'll see something that will open your eyes. I can hardly believe it myself."

He turned from the table and opened one of the closet doors. When Joe saw the contents of the closet, he almost cried out in astonishment. It contained a dozen wooden clubs like the one the boys had found in the greenhouse yard! The one they had thought was a torch handle!

Grable returned from the closet with one of the strange objects. Joe was puzzled. The man had denied that the other club was a part of the equipment he used in the greenhouses.

Had he lied? What were all these torchlike handles doing here?

The scientist seemed quite unaware of Joe's astonished bewilderment. From a shelf he picked up a metal rod and inserted one end of it deftly into the hole at the end of the wooden handle.

"Now watch closely!" he whispered.

Asa Grable plunged the rod into the hot solution in the bucket.

"And now," said the scientist, looking up at Joe, "now for the miracle!"

He drew the rod from the bucket. Around the metal was a gray, gluey ma.s.s. In contact 127 with the air it cooled, and quickly began to harden.

'' There!'' cried Asa Grable. '' The greatest discovery of my life! Greater than my silkworms. It will make me famous! I've worked years for this. I've endured a thousand disappointments. And now-success!''

Joe gazed at the hardening ma.s.s.

"What is it! What is it, boy?" cried the scientist, his eyes shining with excitement. "Don't tell me you can't recognize it!"

"Not-rubber!" gasped Joe with astonishment.

"Yes! Rubber. And yet no part of it came from a rubber tree!" Asa Grable brandished the stick in his excitement. '' Genuine commercial-quality rubber made by artificial means."

He became quieter, his voice lowered. "Of course, this is still in the experimental stage. The process will have to be improved. But it is real rubber."

Joe congratulated the happy scientist, knowing what a tremendously important achievement this was.

"The Grable Process!" mused the man rapturously. "It will go down in history as one of the greatest discoveries of all time."

"Mr. Grable," ventured Joe after a few moments, "I was looking at that stick you took out of the cupboard. Is that the same one my brother and I found here a few days ago?"

128 "Not the same one," said Grable promptly. "I think that one is upstairs. But they're almost identical. I have a closet full of them."

"But didn't you say you hadn't used that stick in your work?"

"Not with my silkworms," smiled the scientist. "But they came in very handy for this other experiment."

"Where did you find them?" asked Joe.

"Eight here. I imagine a former owner of the place must have left them. All the property in this neighborhood-the Experimental Farm lands, the Trumper property, all this acreage way out to Barmet Bay once was one big place.''

Joe had no time for further questions, for suddenly there was an alarming interruption. A rifle shot! The explosion rang out in the silent night.

Asa Grable jumped in alarm. "What's that ?" he gasped.

Joe wheeled, and ran up the cellar stairs. He remembered the rifle he had left by the fence. Had Archibald Jenkins found it and fired at d.i.c.k Ames ?

Asa Grable hurried up the steps close at Joe's heels. The two raced outside. There, in the yard, they found Archibald Jenkins, rifle in hand and in a high state of agitation.

'' It went off!" the young man was muttering. "I hardly touched the thing."

"That bullet whizzed just about a foot over my head," d.i.c.k Ames was saying heatedly.

129 "I didn't think the gun was loaded." Then Jenkins saw Joe and Asa Grable. He frowned, recognizing the boy. "What are you doing here?"

"I'm a-callin' on Mr. Grable," returned Joe in the vernacular of a hired hand. "Havin' a little trouble with yer gun?"

"Never mind about that," grunted Jenkins. "I think you and this man here had better clear out. This is a very dangerous place for prowlers."

'' Seems to me it's a dangerous place for anyone," grinned d.i.c.k with a meaning glance at the rifle. '' I guess I 'd better go.''

"It's late for you to be up, Mr. Grable," remarked Jenkins. "Don't you think it's time you were in bed?"

"Why, yes, Archibald, I suppose it is," agreed the scientist with surprising meekness.

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He said goodnight to Joe, and the two boys left. When they looked back, Jenkins and Asa Grable were strolling toward the cottage. The younger man was holding the rifle on his shoulder in a very military manner.

'' I thought I 'd lost you,'' said d.i.c.k, as they crossed the field to the place where they had parked the car.

"And I thought you'd been shot. What happened?"

"Oh, Jenkins found the gun by the fence.

130 When he picked it up, it went off. Startled him out of a year's growth," chuckled d.i.c.k.

"How did you make out with Grable?"

'' Not badly,'' answered Joe with reserve. '' I learned a few things that may he very important."

From the roadway they could see lights in the Trumper farmhouse-lights upstairs and down. This was so unusual that Joe was puzzled.

"I had intended to go out on the cliffs, although by this time Frank probably has been there in our boat and gone back already," he said. "Say, there seems to be something the matter at Trumper's. Maybe we'd better drop in for a minute and see if it's serious."

Joe's intuition had served him well. There was indeed something the matter at the Widow Trumper's place. Just before the boys reached the lane a taxi shot out of the driveway, rounded the corner sharply, and roared off down the main road to the village. Joe thought he caught a glimpse of Aunt Gertrude in the rear seat.

"I must be mistaken!" he thought. "She wouldn't be going anywhere at this hour of the night."

On the porch he found Mrs. Trumper in a state of great excitement. She looked relieved when she saw Joe.

"Where have you been?" she exclaimed. "We've searched everywhere for you. Your 131 Aunt Gertrude has just gone this minute. You'll have to hurry!"

"Hurry! Where to?" Joe blurted out.

Mrs. Trumper wrung her hands. "Back to Bayport. A telephone call came a little while ago."

"What about?" Joe demanded, unable to make head or tail of the good woman's fl.u.s.tered explanations.

"The fire!" cried Mrs. Trumper. "A chum of yours telephoned that the Hardy home is on fire!"

CHAPTER XVI.

FENTON HARDY TAKES A HAND.

"gbeat scott!" yelled Joe. "Our house is on fire! Come on, d.i.c.k. Let's get going!"

They leaped off the porch and scrambled back into the car. In a few moments they were out of the lane and speeding toward the village.

"All we needed was this!" groaned Joe. "Now how could the house have caught fire when it's all locked up and everyone has been away?"

"Maybe it isn't serious," consoled d.i.c.k.

"How am I going to get to Bayport? I can't ask you to drive me all the way in. I may be in the city all night. And you have to be at work in the morning."

" I '11 tell you what I '11 do,'' d.i.c.k said. " I '11 get out at my rooming house, and lend you my car."

"That's great of you," said Joe sincerely. "I'll take good care of it."

"I'm not worrying about that. I only hope the fire isn't bad."

"Aunt Gertrude didn't waste any time. She'll probably be ordering the whole fire department around by the time I get there."

In the village d.i.c.k got out and Joe took the wheel.

"I'll call you up and tell you the whole story tomorrow morning,'' the Hardy boy promised.

"And thanks for everything."

"Good luck!" cried d.i.c.k, as the automobile roared off down the village street.

Joe was full of apprehension as he drove toward Bayport. He was sure the fire was no accident. Coming so close after the warning note the Hardy boys had received that evening, he sensed something sinister behind it. Was it the work of the man or men behind the greenhouse robberies? Or some of the flickering torch outfit?

He remembered that Fenton Hardy's library and filing cases held secret records that many dangerous criminals would give a lot to see destroyed. What better time could they have chosen than one when the entire Hardy family was absent?

The car rounded a curve, its headlights shining brightly on the ribbon of road ahead. Joe caught a glimpse of a roadster, halfway in the ditch, and a figure trudging along the highway a few yards away. There was something strangely familiar about the person.

"Frank!"

Joe jammed on the brakes. The car screamed to a stop. He flung open the door and jumped out.

134 '' How about giving me a-Joe! What in the world are you doing here I''

"No tune for explanations," replied his brother, bundling Frank into the car. "We have to get home. And fast."

"Home? But there's no one there. And listen, I want to know a whole lot of things. I'm so glad to see you alive, I can hardly begin to tell you. What happened up there on the cliff?

How did you get away?"

"I don't know what you're talking about. In the meantime, do you know our house is on fire?" Joe put the car in gear and stepped on the gas.

"On fire!" fire!" gasped Frank. "You're making it up!" gasped Frank. "You're making it up!"

"No, I'm not. Aunt Gertrude started for home in a taxi twenty minutes before I left.

Someone phoned from Bayport and told her about it. She must have pa.s.sed you on the road."

Frank was so astonished by Joe's news about the fire that it was some time before he told about what he had seen on the cliff. It was enough to know that his brother was safe and well. Within record time they reached the outskirts of the city, wheeled into High Street, and drew up in front of their home.

The sight of a huge red fire truck and a crowd in the roadway told them that the story of the fire had been no invention. But the Hardy house was still standing, and as they pushed 135 their way through the curious throng, the boys were relieved to see that the worst of the fire was over. They saw no flames, although the air was filled with murky smoke.

The fire chief, in rubber coat and white hel met, recognized them.

"Ah, here you are!" he said. "I thought you'd show up before long."

"Is the place badly damaged?" asked Frank anxiously.

"It could have been worse," said the chief. "Fortunately, the alarm came in time. The back of the place is gutted. One of your chums happened to see the blaze before it got very far under way. There he is standing by the fence, eating a hot dog. Now where in thunder did he get a hot dog at this hour of night?"

Chet Morton, munching solemnly as he watched the firemen at their tasks, looked up.