The mystery of the missing eyebrows
told her of the sight which had greeted him when he had opened the door
and was laughing about the surprise he had received at the church the
day before.
Then it was impossible to keep Mrs. Willis out of the living room where
she retold the story to the other members of the Hyacinth Club and led
in the laughter which followed. She declared that she was bowed down
with admiration for Renfro and wanted him brought before her. So out of
the kitchen he was half dragged, the napkin Mary had fastened around
his neck still there and the best of his supper back on the table
melting.
But when they were thru feteing him and praising him he went back to
it, not the least minding the terrible condition in which it then was.
For he really believed that his mother, excited by the admiration of
the other women, had become proud of him.
“Mary Dugan,” he interrupted Mary who was out of sorts over the large
pile of unwashed dishes before her. “Now if you were a fellow whose
praise would you rather have--the fellows or your mother’s?”
And Mary being out of patience with all mothers who belonged to
Hyacinth Club and made extra work for the “hired help” replied with
alacrity, “Why the fellows, of course.”
CHAPTER XIX
RENFRO IS KIDNAPED.
Renfro’s next question brought Mary Dugan to her feet. “Were there any
Complaint calls in?” he asked. “Did Morrison or any one call up from
the office or--”
“Hooch,” Mary was herself again in spite of her weariness, in spite
of the pile of dishes, and the excitement thru which she had passed.
“There were several calls for you and all from the office, and I told
them a plenty too, how you’d won the turkeys and had to be allowed to
bring them home in peace, and then when they just kept a callin’ I just
took the receiver and left it off the hook without paying any attention
to the buzzer till your maw heard and came and put it on the hook.”
“But that settled them,” Mary’s voice was full of pride. “For none of
them called again.”
“Oh, well they all got their papers all right--even Captain Pete,”
Renfro’s voice was weary. “But I do hate to have a lot of complaints go
into the office like must have gone in tonight.”
Then he remembered something else. “Did the minister send the addresses
where he wanted the turkeys delivered?”
Mary had to hear the story of the way the turkeys had been won so early
in the game. When Renfro told her that a great deal of credit was due
her, that her going to choir practice Friday night made him think of
the help of the church, she beamed at him.
And then she told him of some new plans she had made for working
together on the kidnaping mystery. The Hyacinth Reading Club with its
extra cooking had taken all of her time that day. Captain Pete had gone
next door with rabbits. The cook there had told her of his arrival and
his departure with more than a half dozen of the same.
“Now allus before he’s come here when he had even a rabbit left,” Mary
was convinced. “So I know he is suspicious of us.”
Renfro was thinking of the experiences he had had that night, and was
making decisions. No, he wouldn’t tell Mary about them yet. He wanted
to be sure the man at Captain Pete’s was his man; he wanted to see him
either in daylight or in a light which would show his eyebrows up a
little better. He wanted to be sure they matched with the missing parts.
And then he rose and went to his room. Very slowly he undressed, waited
until it was quiet below, slipped down stairs and to the drawer in the
kitchen cupboard, in which Mary kept her Bible. Then he took out the
two packages containing the missing eyebrows.
Yes, it would be better for him to carry them for a few days. He might
meet the man on the street, or in a store and after seeing him while
memory was still strong, he wanted to compare with it the parts of the
eyebrows which he had taken from the windows of Judge Wier’s home.
He turned his trousers pockets inside out, then those of his coat,
surveyed the motley collection in each, replaced the different articles
in them and shook his head. His eyebrows would not be safe in such a
lot of things as these. He looked around the room and then he saw his
cap.
With a bound he had it in his hand. The band inside was deep and strong
and loose--all just the way he wanted it to be for a good hiding
place. He knew that telegraph messenger boys carried messages in their
caps. With great care he sewed an envelope inside that band in which he
had sealed the two smaller packages.
Before he went to bed that night he did several little things he had
wanted to do for a long time--wrote a letter to a chum in another
town, counted up his balance in the bank and made out his Christmas
shopping list. He even straightened his dresser, made a memorandum
about delivering the charity turkeys, went to the window, and looked
out at the neighborhood for a time. He felt queer--neither elated nor
depressed, but quite as if a different sort of an experience from any
he had known, loomed before him.
He was glad they had taken his picture at the office. If anything
happened to him--
He laughed boyishly. If he did happen to find the place where Helen
Wier was being kept then they too would be glad they had his picture.
That happy thought sent him to bed and to sleep so fast that it was
quite late when he awoke.
The day seemed to rush by. His mind was on one thing though he heard
of many others. His fame in winning the turkeys had spread thru Grant
high school, thanks to Jimmy Noel and his crew of helpers. The teachers
congratulated him; the boys praised him, and some of the girls he knew
best were inclined to try to twit him.
But he hardly heard them. Before him there loomed the big house in
which the old man had mended the tea kettle, the cabin in which Captain
Pete and his strange guest had quarreled, and the old woman, whose
wearing the scarf had made her have some connection with the mystery.
And always each picture showed to him the fierce, cruel face the old
man assumed when his anger was aroused.
He was early on his route that night and delivered all his papers with
precision. Directly after supper he was going to tell Mary the whole
story and see if she would go with him to the cabin and big house once
more. That was the best he was sure.
But he didn’t get to tell Mary. While he was at the supper table there
was a call from the office for him--a complaint from on his route.
He took the number, went back to the table to finish his dessert and
to listen to his mother give a monologue on the dangers of carrying a
paper route.
Carrying complaints on such nights as this was sure to give him
pneumonia some time she argued. People were careless with their papers.
No doubt the boys often left them at these complainers’ homes and then
they--
Renfro started at her charge. Why he remembered now that he had left
a paper at that number they had given him at the office. That was the
number of the house where the little crippled girl sat at the window
and watched for him--a long, low house without any paint and with a tin
roof on the front porch, which roof was about in the same condition as
that of the big house at which the mystery was deepening.
He went back to the telephone, called the office, and asked for the
number again. He might have heard wrong he thought. Exactly the same
number was given him again. He wanted to tell the manager he remembered
leaving the paper there. The little crippled girl had herself opened
the window that evening for it, but he knew that an argument would only
make his mother more uneasy, more set against his continuing with Old
Grief.
Now that he had been successful she declared he should have a better
route, his own home or one in the business part of town. If once she
conferred with Mr. Bruce who had offered him such a route, Renfro knew
it would be very hard for him to continue with Old Grief.
“And,” he told himself, “I don’t want to leave there until I have the
circulation worked up to 80% of the number of residents on that route.”
He stepped out into the dark street, fumbled his way around the house
to the side porch where his bicycle had been left, but did not take
it. There was a puncture in the front tire and it was flat. He walked
to the corner and here took a car. Car fare was a minor consideration
now that he needed time. He would hurry back, tell Mary about the story
and perhaps then when she had all her work out of the way she would go
scouting with him.
He dropped off the car at the nearest corner, and with the paper under
his arm scurried down the street. Past the big house, next door to the
little one he hurried, and then in sight of the one with the tin roof
and the little crippled girl. His feet suddenly slipped on something
which felt like a carpet of banana skins; down he went clutching at a
hedge to break his fall, and then someone clutched him.
Something strong--it felt like a band of leather was passed over his
mouth. Both of his hands were caught behind him and a sharp thong
passed around his legs. But his eyes were left free. As they tied his
hands behind his back he wondered why he had not been blindfolded. And
a little later he learned.
There were two people doing the work. Renfro knew that,--because one
tied his feet while the other bound his hands. They worked in the hedge.
Renfro wondered then why the city council had allowed all the tall
hedges to stand in this old part of the town. Had they never seen the
possibilities they offered to thieves and people like these? Evidently
these men had realized them fully, for in giving a number from which
to send a complaint they had chosen one next door to one of these
hedges.
And then he realized that one of his captors was a woman. She moved in
front of him and her skirts swished against his knees. That discovery
made him more furious than ever. He twisted his body, shoved with his
shoulders, and pushed against her with all his might. The next minute
he was firmly lifted by the other captor, from whose strength he knew
was a man, carried out into the street and deposited on a small wagon
there.
CHAPTER XX.
HIDDEN IN THE CAVE.
He was placed on the floor of the wagon, face downward. As the wagon
started it went with a jolt which thrust his face against a rough board
and cut his nose and cheek. More jerks did a series of bruises on his
forehead, his chin and his nose. By almost superhuman effort he managed
to roll over on his side and then on his back.
By the time this was accomplished they had traveled down a dark road
quite a distance. It was so dark Renfro could not see three feet ahead
of his face at first. But his eyes soon got accustomed to the darkness.
And little by little, he began to recognize the tops of the trees and
by the feeling of surroundings to know that they were on the road which
ran off East Washington.
Instinct, more than anything else, told him that they turned off at
the second lane of the first on the Hall place. The first one was only
used by pedestrians. The second was for wagons, but it had been used
so little that it was in a horrible condition. The jolting sensation
was terrible. Renfro realized that his face would have been cut beyond
recognition had he not managed to turn over.
They jolted close to trees, through a lot of low underbrush which
ground against the wheels of the wagon and across a little bridge. The
limbs on one low hanging tree struck his face and scratched it still
more.
The silence, which the couple had maintained in town and along the