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CHAPTER XIII
THE “BLACK HAND”
Lemuel Fogg’s opponents scrambled to their feet and sneaked off immediately. The fireman turned his back upon them, and strode down the sidewalk in the direction of the Fairbanks’ home with a stormy and disturbed expression on his face.
“Trouble, Mr. Fogg?” intimated the young railroader, as the fireman approached him.
“No,” dissented Fogg vigorously, “the end of trouble. I’m sorry to lose my temper, lad, but those ruffians were the limit. They know my sentiments now.”
“They were Hall and Wilson, I noticed,” suggested Ralph.
“Yes,” returned the fireman, “and two worse unhung rascals never walked. They came about you. Say, Mr. Fairbanks,” continued Fogg excitedly, “It wasn’t so bad tackling me as a sort of comrade, considering that I had been foolish enough to train with them once, but when they mentioned you – I went wild. You – after what you’ve done for me and mine! Say–”
“Hold on – close the brakes,” ordered Ralph, as his companion seemed inclined to run after his recent adversaries and seek them out for a further castigation. “You’ve made the brake with them – forget them.”
“They had a new plot to get a black mark against you,” went on the fireman. “I heard them half through their plans. Then I sailed into them.”
“Well, breakfast is ready,” said Ralph, “and after that, work, so we’d better get down to schedule.”
The run to which No. 999 had been apportioned covered the Muddy Creek branch of the Great Northern to Riverton. The train was an accommodation and ran sixty miles. It was to leave Stanley Junction at 9:15 A. M., arrive at terminus at about noon, and start back for the Junction at two o’clock.
Ralph left the house about eight o’clock, after arranging to meet his fireman at the roundhouse. He went to the hotel to see Archie Graham, and found that youthful genius in his room figuring out some mathematical problem at a table.
“Well, how are you this morning?” inquired Ralph cheerily.
“First-rate, except that I’m a trifle sleepy,” replied the young inventor. “Say, I was riding under the coaches all night long. It was dream after dream. I believe it tired me out more than the real thing.”
“You haven’t got your new clothes yet, I see,” observed Ralph, with a glance at the tattered attire of his new acquaintance.
“They are ordered,” explained Archie, “but they won’t be here until late this afternoon.”
“When they do,” said Ralph, taking a card from his pocket and writing a few lines on it, “if you don’t want to wait till I have some leisure, take this to Mr. Forgan, down at the roundhouse.”
“Thank you,” said Archie.
“He’ll extend all the civilities to you. I hope you may discover something of advantage.”
“I’ll try,” promised Archie.
Seeing the young inventor, reminded Ralph of Bridgeport, and naturally he thought of the boy he had known as Marvin Clark.
“He telegraphed that he would see me,” ruminated Ralph. “I shall miss him if he comes to Stanley Junction to-day, but he will probably wait around for me – that is, if he comes at all. If he doesn’t, in a day or two I shall start some kind of an investigation as to this strange case of double identity.”
When Ralph got to the roundhouse he found Fogg in the doghouse chatting with his friends. He had to tell the story of the fire over and over again, it seemed, at each new arrival of an interested comrade, and Ralph’s heroic share in the incident was fully exploited. The young railroader was overwhelmed by his loyal admirers with congratulations. Ralph felt glad to compare the anticipated trip with the starting out on the first record run of No. 999, when he had a half-mad sullen fireman for a helper.
As the wiper finished his work on the locomotive, engineer and fireman got into the cab.
“Hello!” exclaimed Fogg sharply.
“Hello!” echoed his cabmate.
A little square strip of paper was revealed to both, as they opened their bunkers. It was patent that some one had sneaked into the roundhouse and had pasted the papers there. Each slip bore a crude outline of a human hand, drawn in pencil.
“Bah!” spoke Fogg, with a brush of a chisel scraping the portraiture on his own box out of all semblance, and then doing the same with the picture on the reverse cover of Ralph’s bunker.
“What is it, Fogg?” inquired the young railroader, to whom the ominous sketches were a new wrinkle.
“Black Hand,” explained Fogg.
“Whose – why?” inquired Ralph.
“The outcast gang. It’s one of their scare tricks. Humph! I’d like to get sight of the fellow who thought he was doing a smart trick. The Black Hands are supposed to warn us that we’re doomed by the gang, see? It’s a notification that the trouncing I gave those fellows Hall and Wilson is a declaration of war to the knife.”
“Well, let it come. Aren’t we equal to it, Mr. Fogg?”
“You are, for they can’t hit you hard. You’ve made your mark,” said the fireman, somewhat gloomily. “I’m not in the same class. I’ve had my weak spots. Besides, it’s me they’ll be after. Dunno, Fairbanks, maybe I’d better not be the cause of getting you into any more trouble. Perhaps I’d better slide for a bit into some switchyard job.”
“What – scared?” cried Ralph.
“No, not scared,” responded Fogg soberly, “only worried about you.”
“Well,” said Ralph, “the master mechanic said we were a strong team?”
“Ye-es.”
“Let’s prove to him that we are. Good-by to the Black Hands, Mr. Fogg, they aren’t worth thinking about.”
So the young railroader rallied and cheered his comrade, and they had got beyond the turn table and had quite forgotten the incident of the pasters, when John Griscom mounted the cab step. He nodded genially to both Ralph and the fireman. Griscom knew pretty much what was going on most of the time, and the master mechanic was a close friend of his.
“Just a word, Fairbanks,” he began in a confidential tone, and the young engineer bent over towards him. “I don’t want to be croaking all the time, but railroading isn’t all fun and frolic.”
“What’s the matter now, Mr. Griscom?” inquired Ralph.
“The old strike gang is the trouble, and will be until they’re laid out, ragtail and bobtail, dead cold. I have a friend in a certain department of the service here. He isn’t giving away official business any, but he isn’t in sympathy with Hall or Wilson. One of them sent a wire to Riverton an hour since. It was to some one the operator never heard of before, evidently a friend of theirs. It mentioned 999, your name, and Fogg. The rest of it was in cipher.”
“We’ve just had a Black Hand warning, here in the cab,” said Ralph.
“Oh, you have?” muttered Griscom. “Then there’s new mischief afoot. Look out for snags at Riverton.”
Ralph realized that it wasn’t very pleasant working under the continual menace of enemies plotting in the dark and in a mean, desperate way. There was nothing for it, however, but to exercise patience, vigilance and courage.
“They shall never drive me from my post of duty,” firmly decided the young railroader. “I shall neither tire out nor scare out.”
Riverton was made on time and with no unpleasant incident to mar a schedule trip. No. 999 was run to a siding, and Ralph and Fogg had over two hours on their hands to spend as they chose. They had brought their lunch, and they dispatched the best part of it in the cab. Mrs. Fairbanks had put it up in a basket, and a two-quart fruit jar held the cold coffee. After the repast Fogg fixed the fire and they strolled down to the depot.
The station agent was an old acquaintance of Ralph. He knew Van Sherwin, Limpy Joe and the people up at the Short Line railroad, kept posted on their progress pretty closely, and he had a good deal of interesting railroad gossip to retail to Ralph.
“Oh, by the way,” he observed incidentally, after they had conversed for some time, “there was a spruce young fellow here this morning asking very particularly about 999 and her movements. He mentioned your name too.”
“Who was he?” inquired Ralph.
“I never saw him before. He was curious all about your run, hung around a while and then disappeared. I haven’t seen him since.”
“Describe him, won’t you?” and the station agent did so. Ralph was sure that the stranger was the youth he had known as Marvin Clark. From that time on until the train got ready for the return trip, the young railroader kept his eyes open for a glimpse of his acquaintance with the double identity. The latter, however, up to the time No. 999 steamed out from Riverton, did not put in an appearance.
“Well, nobody tackled us at Riverton,” observed Ralph, as he and Fogg settled down comfortably to their respective tasks.
“Better not,” retorted the fireman keenly. “I just made a little purchase this morning, and I’m going to stand no fooling,” and he touched his hip pocket meaningly. “Have a swig?” he inquired additionally, as he reached for the jar of coffee and took a drink.
“Oh, I could feast on my mother’s coffee all day,” observed Ralph as the jar was passed to him. “Now, then, you finish it up and hand me one of those doughnuts.”
The little refection seemed to add to the satisfaction of the moment. Their run was a slow one, and there was little to do besides keeping the machinery in motion. The day was warm, but the air was balmy. The landscape was interesting, and they seemed gliding along as in a pleasing dream.
Later, when he analyzed his sensations, the young railroader, recalling just these impressions, knew that they were caused by artificial conditions. Ralph relapsed into a dream – indeed, he was amazed, he was startled to find himself opening his eyes with difficulty, and of discovering his fireman doubled up in his seat, fast asleep. He tried to shout to Fogg, realizing that something was wrong. He could not utter a word, his tongue seemed glued to the roof of his mouth. Ralph barely managed to slip to his feet in an effort to arouse his cab mate.
“Something wrong!” ran through his mind. A vague thrill crossed his frame as, whirling by a landmark, a white-painted cattle guard, he realized that he must have gone five miles without noting distance.
The bridge was his next thought. Muddy Creek was less than a mile ahead. If the draw should be open! Wildly reaching towards the lever, the young engineer sank to the floor a senseless heap, while No. 999, without a guide, dashed down the shining rails!
CHAPTER XIV
A SERIOUS PLOT
“Who stopped this train – and why?”
Dreamily returning to consciousness, these were the first words that reached Ralph Fairbanks’ rallying consciousness. They were spoken by the conductor of the accommodation train sharply. The locomotive was at a standstill, and, staring wonderingly, the conductor stood by the side of the tender.
“I did,” answered a prompt voice, and removing his hand from the lever, the boy whom the young engineer had known as Marvin Clark drifted before his vision.
“Hello!” exclaimed the conductor, “I’ve seen you before. You’re the fellow who caught the train at Riverton just as she left – had a free pass.”
“Never mind me, Mr. Conductor,” responded the other rapidly. “I’m thinking they need some attention,” and he pointed to the fireman, lying doubled up in his seat, and then to Ralph, lying prone on the floor of the cab.
“Fairbanks – Fogg!” fairly shouted the conductor. “Why, what can this mean?”
“Foul play, if I’m a judge,” spoke Clark definitely. “Fairbanks! Fairbanks!” he shouted, stooping over and lifting Ralph in his strong arms. “Here, brace him in his seat.”
“Water!” gasped the young engineer in a choking tone. “My throat is on fire! What has happened?”
“Nothing alarming,” answered Clark reassuringly, “only – I’m glad I happened to be here.”
Ralph’s mouth and throat seemed burning up. The water he drank only partially allayed his frantic thirst. It was with great difficulty that he could arouse himself from a lethargy that seemed to completely paralyze both body and mind. As the moments passed, however, he succeeded in rallying into something like normal. But as yet he was unable to fully understand just what had happened.
“He needs something to stimulate him,” declared the conductor, and stepping into the cab he hastily ransacked the fireman’s bunker. “Aha!”
His tones announced a discovery – likewise a suspicion. He had unearthed two flasks of liquor, one only partly filled.
“Not for me,” said Ralph, waving back the conductor, who evidently was intent on administering a stimulant. “Liquor!” he cried, suddenly bracing up now. “Fogg never brought it aboard. It’s some plot! Why!” he exclaimed, in sudden enlightenment, “I see it all, clear as day.”
What Ralph saw, all hands in the cab soon realized within the ensuing ten minutes. When they had aroused Fogg, there followed animated theory, discovery and conviction. Not one of them doubted but that some enemy had sneaked aboard of the locomotive while it was sidetracked at noon at Riverton and had put some drug in the jar of coffee. They found a suspicious dark sediment at the bottom of the jar.
“Black Hands – mark it down,” observed Fogg. “Whoever did it, also placed those flasks of liquor in my bunker. See the label on them? They come from a place in Riverton I never was in. The scoundrels aimed to have us found in the cab, just as we have been, and a report go in that the heat and too much liquor had crippled us from making the run.”
“You’ve struck it, Fogg,” assented the conductor. “Just stow that jar and those two flasks in a safe place. I’ll have our special agent Adair, the road detective, find out who bought that liquor. No need of any blabbing to the general public. Are you able to complete the run, Fairbanks?”
“Certainly,” reported Ralph, exercising arms and feet vigorously to restore their circulation. Fogg was still dazed and weak. He had drunk more of the coffee than Ralph. Besides, being the older of the two, he did not shake off the effects of the narcotic so readily as the young engineer.
“I’ll help fire – I know how to,” declared Clark.
“You know how to stop an engine, too!” commented the conductor. “All right, Fairbanks, when you’re ready,” and he returned to the coaches. Ralph extended his hand to Clark. The latter met his glance frankly.
“I’ve been trying to get track of your movements by telegraph,” said Clark. “Located your run, and was waiting at Riverton for your train. Got there ahead of time, and came back to the depot just as 999 was pulling out, and caught the last car. First, I thought I’d not show myself until you got through with your trip. Things got dull in those humdrum coaches, though, and I sailed ahead to the tender, saw what was wrong, and checked up the locomotive just beyond the bridge. Say, if the draw had been open, we’d all have had a bath, eh?”
“The miscreants who played this diabolical trick ought to be severely punished,” said Ralph.
There was no evidence of strained relations between the two boys. Ralph recognized that Clark had sought him out to make an explanation. He wondered what it would be. The present was not, however, the time to broach the subject. There was something very manly and reassuring in Clark’s manner, and the young railroader believed that when he got ready to disclose his secret, the revelation would be an unusual and interesting one.
The train was started up, soon made up the lost time, and at 5:15 rolled into the depot at Stanley Junction. Ralph did not feel quite as well as usual and his fireman was pale and loggy, but the main effects of the drug had passed off.
“You go straight home, Mr. Fogg,” directed Ralph. “I will see that 999 is put to bed all right.”
“I think I’ll take advantage of your kind offer, Fairbanks,” responded Fogg. “I’m weak as a cat, and my head is going around like an electric turntable.”
Fogg started for home. Clark rode with Ralph on the locomotive to the roundhouse. The big engine was put into her stall. Then the boys left the place.
“I have something to say to you, Fairbanks,” began Clark.
“I suppose so,” replied Ralph. “It must be quite a long story, though.”
“It is,” admitted his companion.
“Then suppose we leave its recital till we are rested a bit,” suggested Ralph. “I want you to come up to the house and have supper. Then we’ll adjourn to the garden and have a quiet, comfortable chat.”
“That will be famous,” declared Clark. “Say, you don’t treat an imposter like myself courteous or anything, do you?”
“Are you really an imposter?” asked Ralph, with a faint smile.
“I am – and a rank one.”
“Just one question – you are not the real Marvin Clark?”
“No more than yourself.”
“And you are Fred Porter?”
“That’s it.”
“I thought so,” said the young engineer.
CHAPTER XV
“THE SILVANDOS”
“I declare!” exclaimed Ralph Fairbanks.
“For mercy’s sake!” echoed Fred Porter.
Both stood spellbound just within the grounds of the Fairbanks’ home, where they had arrived. Over towards the dividing lot line of the next door neighbor, their eyes had lit upon an unusual and interesting scene.
Two figures were in action among the branches of the great oak tree. They were boys, and their natural appearance was enough to attract attention. They were leaping, springing, chasing one another from branch to branch, with a remarkable agility that made one think of monkeys and next trained athletes.
“Who are they, anyway?” demanded Fred.
“They are new to me,” confessed the young engineer.
The two strangers were about of an age, under sixteen. It would puzzle one to figure out their nationality. Their faces were tawny, but delicate of profile, their forms exquisitely molded. They suggested Japanese boys. Then Ralph decided they more resembled lithe Malay children of whom he had seen photographs. At all events, they were natural tree climbers. They made the most daring leaps from frail branches. They sprung from twigs that broke in their deft grasp, but not until they had secured the purchase they aimed at in the act to send them flying through the air to some other perilous point in view. Their feats were fairly bewildering, and as one landed on the ground like a rubber ball and the other chased him out of sight in the next yard, Ralph conducted his companion into the house with these words:
“That’s odd enough to investigate.”
He did not announce his arrival to his mother, but led Fred up to his room. As he passed that now occupied by the Foggs, it made his heart glad to hear the fireman crowing at the baby to the accompaniment of a happy laugh from the fireman’s wife.
“You can wash up and tidy up, Porter,” he said to his friend. “I’ll arrange for an extra plate, and take you down later to meet the best mother in the world.”
“This is an imposition on you good people,” declared Fred, but Ralph would not listen to him. He went downstairs and out the front way, and came around the house looking all about for some trace of the two remarkable creatures he had just seen. They had disappeared, however, as if they were veritable wood elves. Passing the kitchen window, the young engineer halted.
“Hello!” he uttered. “Zeph Dallas is back again,” and then he listened casually, for Zeph was speaking to his mother.
“Yes, Mrs. Fairbanks,” Ralph caught the words, “I’m the bad penny that turns up regularly, only I’ve got some good dollars this time. On the mantel is the money I owe Ralph for the clothes he got me.”
“But can you spare the money?” spoke Mrs. Fairbanks.
“Sure I can, and the back board, too,” declared Zeph, and glancing in through the open window Ralph noted the speaker, his fingers in his vest armholes, strutting around most grandly.
“I can’t understand how you came to get so much money in two days,” spoke the lady. “You couldn’t have earned it in that short space of time, Zeph.”
“No, ma’am,” admitted Zeph, “but I’ve got it, haven’t I? It’s honest money, Mrs. Fairbanks. It’s an advance on my wages – expense money and such, don’t you see?”
“Then you have secured work, Zeph?”
“Steady work, Mrs. Fairbanks.”
“What at, Zeph?”
“Mrs. Fairbanks,” answered the lad in a hushed, mysterious tone of voice, “I am hired as a detective.”
“You’re what?” fairly shouted Ralph through the window.
“Hello! you here, are you?” cried Zeph, and in a twinkling he had joined Ralph outside the house. “Yes, sir,” he added, with an important air that somewhat amused Ralph, “I’ve landed this time. On both feet. Heart’s desire at last – I’m a detective.”
Ralph had to smile. He recalled the first arrival of honest but blundering Zeph Dallas at Stanley Junction, a raw country bumpkin. Even then the incipient detective fever had been manifested by the crude farmer boy. From the confident, self-assured tone in which Zeph now spoke, the young railroader was forced to believe that he had struck something tangible at last in his favorite line.
“What are you detecting, Zeph?” he inquired.
“That’s a secret.”
“Indeed – and what agency are you working for – the government?”
“That,” observed Zeph gravely, “is also a secret – for the present. See here, Ralph Fairbanks, you’re guying me. You needn’t. Look at that.”
With great pride Zeph threw back his coat. It was to reveal a star pinned to his vest.
“Yes,” nodded Ralph, “I see it, but it doesn’t tell who you are.”
“Don’t it say ‘Special’?” demanded Zeph, with an offended air.
“Yes, I see the word.”
“Well, then, that’s me – special secret service, see? Of course, I don’t look much like a detective, just common and ordinary now, but I’m going to buy a wig and a false beard, and then you’ll see.”
“Oh, Zeph!” exclaimed Ralph.
“All right, you keep right on laughing at me,” said Zeph. “All the same, I’m hired. What’s more, I’m paid. Look at that – I’ve got the job and I’ve got the goods. That shows something, I fancy,” and Zeph waved a really imposing roll of bank notes before the sight of the young engineer.
“Your employers must think you a pretty good man to pay you in advance,” suggested Ralph.
“They do, for a fact,” declared Zeph. “They know they can depend upon me. Say, Ralph, it’s funny the way I fell into the job. You never in your life heard of the slick and easy way I seemed to go rolling right against it. And the mystery, the deadly secrets, the – the – hold on, though, I’m violating the eth – eth – yes, ethics of the profession.”
“No, no – go on and tell us something about it,” urged Ralph. “I’m interested.”
“Can’t. I’ve gone too far already. Sworn to secrecy. Honestly, I’m not romancing, Ralph, I’m working on a case that reads like a story book. Some of the strange things going on – they fairly stagger me. I can’t say another word just now, but just the minute I can, you just bet I’ll tell you all about it, Ralph Fairbanks. Say, you haven’t seen two boys around here, have you – two tiny fellows? I left them in the garden here. They’re in my charge, and I mustn’t lose sight of them,” and Zeph began looking all around the place.
“Two human monkeys, who make no more of flying through the air than you or I do to run a race?” inquired Ralph.
“That’s them,” assented Zeph.
“They were here a few minutes ago,” advised Ralph, “but I don’t see them just now. I wondered who they were. The last I saw of them, they were chasing one another over our neighbors’ lot over there.”
“I must find them,” said Zeph. “They are another of my responsibilities. I hear them.”
As Zeph spoke, there proceeded from the alley a mellow and peculiar but very resonant whistle. It was followed by a responsive whistle, clear as a calliope note. Then into view dashed the two boys for whom Zeph was looking. They were still chasing one another, and the foremost of the twain was making for the house. As he passed a tree full tilt, without the least apparent exertion he leaped up lightly, seized a branch, coiled around it like a rubber band, and his pursuer passed under him at full speed.
“This way, Kara – hey, Karo,” called out Zeph, and the two strange lads came up to him with a fawn-like docility, in keeping with the mild, timid expression of their faces.
“Sare,” spoke one of them with a bow, and his companion repeated the word. They both bowed to Ralph next, and stood like obedient children awaiting orders. Ralph was silent for fully a minute, studying their unfamiliar make-up. At that moment Fred Porter, having come down stairs the front way, strolled around the corner of the house.
“This is my friend, Fred Porter – Zeph – Zeph Dallas, Porter,” introduced the young railroader, and the two boys shook hands. Porter became instantly interested in the two strange lads.
“I’m going to show you fellows something,” said Zeph, “something mighty remarkable, something you never saw before, and it’s going to beat anything you ever heard of. About those two boys. Kara!”
One of the two lads instantly moved to the side of Zeph, who beckoned to him to follow him. He led the boy ten feet away behind a thick large bush, his back to the others.
“Karo,” he spoke again, and the other boy allowed him to turn him around where he stood, his back to the other boy.
“See here, Zeph,” spoke Ralph with a broad smile, “are you going to give us a detective demonstration of some kind, or a sleight-of-hand demonstration?”
“Quit guying me, Ralph Fairbanks,” said Zeph. “You’re always at it, but I’m going to give you something this time that will make you sit up and take notice, I’ll bet. Those boys came from a good many thousand miles away – from the other side of the world, in fact.”
“They look it,” observed Fred Porter.
“Gomera,” exclaimed Zeph.
“Where’s that now?” inquired Fred.
“It is the smallest of the Canary Islands.”
“Oh, that’s it!”
“And they talk without saying a word,” was Zeph’s next amazing announcement.
“Whew!” commented Fred dubiously.
“They do. It’s that I’m going to show you. Perhaps those boys are the only two of their kind in the United States. They are Silvandos.”
“What are Silvandos, Zeph?” inquired Ralph.
“Silvandos,” replied Zeph, with manifest enjoyment of the fact that he was making a new and mystifying disclosure, “are persons who carry on a conversation through a whistling language.”
