CHAPTER IX.
A FINE CURTAIN-RAISER
The sun was rising over the mountains when the flying machines and the motor-car reached the field where the boys had landed the night before. After the escape of Doran, the aeroplanes had searched the hills and gorges for the fugitive, but had found no trace of him observable from the sky.
After seeing that the machines were placed in charge of capable and loyal officers, the boys entered the car with Mellen and were driven to the hotel. When they reached the entrance they found a little crowd assembled in the lobby.
Messengers from the telegraph office were passing out and in, and the clerk seemed to be answering a good many questions by ’phone. Mellen stopped at the office counter while the boys took the elevator for their rooms unobserved by the clerk in the office.
“There’s something strange going on here!” the clerk exclaimed, as Mr. Mellen stepped up. “We have a sheaf of telegrams for you, and a lot more for those boys who came here last night.”
“Well,” smiled the manager, “you may as well deliver them.”
“Deliver them?” repeated the clerk. “How are we going to deliver them? You can receipt now for the ones which belong to you,” he went on, “but what are we going to do with those directed to the boys?”
“Why, deliver them!” answered Mellen.
“But the boys left the hotel last night!” replied the clerk angrily. “Without paying their bills!”
“But they are in their rooms now,” Mellen assured the clerk.
“And they stole woolen blankets off the bed, too!” the clerk almost shouted. “I ought to have them all arrested!”
As the clerk uttered the words in a loud tone a slender, black-eyed man who seemed to Mellen to move about the corridor with the sinuous undulations of a snake, stepped up to the desk.
“So the fugitives have returned?” he asked. “Shall I arrest them at once? You have made the charge, you know!”
“You will find the blankets in the boys’ room,” advised Mellen. “They took them because they had a long, cold ride before them.”
“It is policy to restore stolen goods after discovery!” snarled the man who had asked instructions of the clerk, and who occupied the very honorable position of house detective.
“Look here, Gomez!” exclaimed Mellen. “You keep out of this! The boys had a right to use the blankets outside of the hotel as well as inside.”
“I shall do as the clerk says!” snarled the detective.
“Oh, I suppose we’ll have to let it go if they’ve brought the blankets back!” replied the clerk, reluctantly.
Gomez turned away with a sullen frown on his face, and Mellen saw that he had made an enemy of the fellow.
“These boys are your friends?” asked the clerk of Mellen.
“I never saw them until last night,” was the reply, “but I know that they belong to the party of which Louis Havens, the millionaire aviator, is the head. I presume the telegrams waiting for me here are from Mr. Havens, who expects to be here within twenty-four hours.”
“Not Louis Havens, the great explorer?” asked the clerk.
“The same,” answered Mellen, “and if you’ve anything more to say about the boys, say it to him.”
Taking the telegrams from the clerk, Mellen went back to the machine and, after leaving the prisoner with the police, hastened to Ben’s room, where the other boys were assembled. As he had supposed, the messages were all from Mr. Havens, and all were repetitions of the warning which had been sent the previous night.
“I don’t understand what it means!” Ben said after the messages had been read and discussed. “But it is a sure thing that Mr. Havens knows what he is talking about.”
“I think we’d all better go and get a square meal and go to bed!” Jimmie observed, rubbing his eyes. “The next time I get up in the night to take a twenty-mile ride in the air, I won’t.”
“That’s very good sense,” Mellen agreed. “These telegrams, as you see, state that Mr. Havens cannot possibly reach Quito until some time to-night.”
“Then we can have a good sleep!” Carl agreed. “And sit up all night again if we want to.”
“It hasn’t been such a bad night!” Ben observed. “If we had only kept Doran, everything would be in pretty good shape now.”
“What did the chief of police say when you turned the other gink over to him?” asked Carl. “He locked him up, didn’t he?”
“Yes, he locked him up!” answered Mellen. “But, before I left the station, I saw the fellow at the ’phone and I presume he is out on bail by this time. The police have no recourse if bail is offered.”
“Then I’ll tell you what you do!” advised Ben. “If he is admitted to bail, you hire a private detective and have him watched. He is sure to meet with Doran before very long. He may go to the hills to consult with him, or Doran may come to the city, but the two fellows are certain to come together! Then Doran can be arrested.”
“That’s a good idea,” Mellen answered, “and I’ll attend to the matter as soon as I get back to my office. Now, we’ll all go down to a restaurant and have breakfast. I’m hungry myself just now.”
“What’s the matter with the hotel?” asked Ben.
Mellen did not care to explain to the boys exactly what had taken place down stairs, but he felt that they would be treated with suspicion as long as they remained there, so he decided to ask them to change their quarters as soon as they returned from breakfast.
Making the reply that the morning table d’hote at the hotel was not suitable for hungry boys who had been up all night, Mellen went with the lads to a first-class restaurant. After breakfast he suggested a change of hotels, saying only that they had already attracted too much attention at the one where they were stopping, and the boys agreed without argument. It took only a short time to locate in the new quarters, and the boys were soon sound asleep.
When Ben awoke, some one was knocking at his door, and directly he heard a low chuckle which betrayed the presence of Jimmie in the corridor.
“Get a move on!” the latter shouted.
“What’s up?” asked Ben.
“Time’s up!” replied Jimmie.
“Open up!” almost yelled Carl.
Ben sprang out of bed, half-dressed himself, and opened the door. The first face he saw was that of Mr. Havens, who looked dusty and tired as if from a long journey.
As may be imagined, the greetings between the two were very cordial. In a moment the boys all flocked into Ben’s room, where Mr. Havens was advised to freshen up in the bath before entering upon the business in hand.
“You must have had a merry old time with the Ann,” laughed Ben.
“Never saw anything like it!” exclaimed Mr. Havens.
“Did she break down?”
“Half a dozen times!”
“Perhaps there was some good reason for it,” suggested Glenn, significantly.
“Indeed there was!” answered Mr. Havens.
“Couldn’t you catch him?” asked Jimmie.
“I could not!” was the reply.
While the millionaire remained in the bath-room, the boys discussed all manner of surmises concerning the accidents which had happened to the Ann. They had not yet heard a word of explanation from Mr. Havens concerning the warnings of trouble which had been received by wire, but they understood that the interferences to the big aeroplane were only part of the general trouble scheme which seemed to have broken loose the night before. Finally they all gave up the problem.
“We don’t know anything about it!” exclaimed Jimmie. “And we won’t know anything about it until Mr. Havens gets cleaned up and tells us, so we may as well talk about hens, or white bulldogs, until he gets ready to open up. By the way,” the boy continued, “where is Sam?”
“Mellen took him down to get him into decent clothes,” Ben answered.
“Is he coming back here?” asked Jimmie. “I rather like that fellow.”
“Of course he’s coming back!” Ben replied. “He’s hasn’t got any other place to go! He’s flat broke and hungry.”
“I thought perhaps he wouldn’t like to meet Mr. Havens,” Jimmie commented, with a wink at Carl.
“And why not?” asked Ben, somewhat amazed.
Then the story of Sam Weller’s previous employment at the hangar on Long Island came out. The boys all declared that they wanted to be present when Sam met his former employer!
“I don’t care what you say about Sam!” Jimmie declared, after the boys had finished their discussion of the Long Island incident. “I like him just the same! There’s a kind of a free and easy impudence about him that gets me. I hope he’ll stay with us!”
“He might ride with Mr. Havens in the Ann!” laughed Carl.
“Well, I don’t believe Mr. Havens would object, at that!” declared Jimmie.
“Certainly he wouldn’t object!” replied the millionaire, coming out of the bath-room door with a smile on his face. “And so Sam Weller showed up here, did he?” he asked as he seated himself. “The boy is a first-class aviator, but he used to get his little finger up above his nose too often, so I had to let him go. Did he tell any of you boys how he happened to drift into this section?”
“He told me,” Jimmie replied, “that he was making a leisurely trip from the Isthmus of Panama to Cape Horn. He looked the part, too, for I guess he hadn’t had a square meal for several decades, and his clothes looked as if they had been collected out of a rag-bag!”
“He’s a resourceful chap!” Mr. Havens continued. “He’s a first-class aviator, as I said, in every way, except that he is not dependable, and that of course spoils everything.”
“He’s got the nerve!” Carl observed.
“He certainly has!” agreed Jimmie.
“Well,” Mr. Havens said in a moment, “if you boys like Sam, we’ll take him along. We have room for one more in the party.”
“And that brings us down to business!” exclaimed Jimmie. “Right here,” he went on, “is where we want you to turn on the spot light. We’ve had so many telegrams referring to trouble that we’re beginning to think that Trouble is our middle name!”
“Perhaps we would better wait until Mellen and Sam return,” suggested Mr. Havens. “That will save telling the story two or three times.”
“Is Sam Weller really his name?” asked Jimmie.
“I don’t think so,” answered Havens. “I think it is merely a name he selected out of the Pickwick Papers. While in my employ on Long Island several people who knew him by another name called to visit with him. Now and then I questioned these visitors, but secured little information.”
“Perhaps he’s a Pittsburg Millionaire or a Grand Duke in disguise!” suggested Carl. “And again,” the boy went on, “he may be merely the black sheep in some very fine family.”
“There’s something a little strange about the boy,” Mr. Havens agreed, “but I have never felt myself called upon to examine into his antecedents.”
“Here he comes now!” cried Carl. “With a new suit of clothes on his back and a smile lying like a benediction all over his clean shave!”
The boys were glad to see that the millionaire greeted Sam as an old friend. For his part, Sam extended his hand to his former employer and answered questions as if he had left his employ with strong personal letters of recommendation to every crowned head in the world!
“And now for the story,” Mellen said after all were seated.
“And when you speak of trouble,” Jimmie broke in, “always spell it with a big ‘T’, for that’s the way it opened out on us!”
“I’m going to begin right at the beginning,” Mr. Havens said, with a smile, “and the beginning begins two years ago.”
“Gee!” exclaimed Jimmie. “That’s a long time for trouble to lie in wait before jumping out at a fellow!”
“In fact,” Mr. Havens went on, “the case we have now been dumped into, heels over head, started in New York City two years ago, when Milo Redfern, cashier of the Invincible Trust Company, left the city with a half million dollars belonging to the depositors.”
“That’s a good curtain lifter!” exclaimed Carl. “When you open a drama with a thief and a half million dollars, you’ve started something!”
CHAPTER X.
WHERE THE TROUBLE BEGAN
“When Redfern disappeared,” Mr. Havens went on, “we employed the best detective talent in America to discover his whereabouts and bring him back. The best detective talent in America failed.”
“That ain’t the way they put it in stories!” Carl cut in.
“We spent over a hundred thousand dollars trying to bring the thief to punishment, and all we had to show for this expenditure at the end of the year was a badly spelled letter written—at least mailed—on the lower East Side in New York, conveying the information that Redfern was hiding somewhere in the mountains of Peru.”
“There you go!” exclaimed Ben. “The last time we went out on a little excursion through the atmosphere, we got mixed up with a New York murder case, and also with Chinese smugglers, and now it seems that we’ve got an embezzlement case to handle.”
“Embezzlement case looks good to me!” shouted Jimmie.
“Hiding in the mountains of Peru?” repeated Sam. “Now I wonder if a man hiding in the mountains of Peru has loyal friends or well-paid agents in the city of Quito.”
“There!” exclaimed Mr. Havens. “Sam has hit the nail on the head the first crack. I never even told the boys when they left New York that they were bound for Peru on a mission in which I was greatly interested. I thought that perhaps they would get along better and have a merrier time if they were not loaded down with official business.”
“That wouldn’t have made any difference!” announced Carl. “We’d have gone right along having as much fun as if we were in our right minds!”
“When I started away from the hangar in the Ann,” Mr. Havens continued, with a smile at the interruption, “I soon saw that some one in New York was interested in my remaining away from Peru.”
“Redfern’s friends of course!” suggested Mellen.
“Exactly!” replied the millionaire.
“And Redfern’s friends appeared on the scene last night, too,” Jimmie decided. “And they managed to make quite a hit on their first appearance, too,” he continued. “And this man Doran is at present ready for another engagement if you please. He’s a foxy chap!”
“I’m sorry he got away!” Mellen observed.
“Yes, it’s too bad,” Mr. Havens agreed, “but, in any event, we couldn’t have kept him in prison here isolated from his friends.”
“There’s one good thing about it,” Ben observed, “and that is that we’ve already set a trap to catch him.”
“How’s that?” asked the millionaire.
“Mr. Mellen has employed a detective to follow Doran’s companion on the theory that sometime, somewhere, the two will get together again.”
“That’s a very good idea!” Mr. Havens declared.
“Now about this man Redfern,” Mr. Mellen went on. “Is he believed to be still in the mountains of Peru?”
“I have at least one very good reason for supposing so,” answered the millionaire. “Yes, I think he is still there.”
“Give us the good reason!” exclaimed Carl. “I guess we want to know how to size things up as we go along!”
“The very good reason is this,” replied Mr. Havens with a smile, “the minute we started in our airships for the mountains of Peru, obstacles began to gather in our way. The friends or accomplices of Redfern began to flutter the instant we headed toward Peru.”
“That strikes me as being a good and sufficient reason for believing that he is still there!” Mellen commented.
“Yes, I think it is!” replied the millionaire. “And it is an especially good reason,” he went on, “when you understand that all our previous plans and schemes for Redfern’s capture have never evoked the slightest resistance.”
“Then the embezzler is in Peru, all right, all right!” laughed Carl.
“But Peru is a very large country,” suggested Mr. Havens.
“There’s a good deal of land in the country,” agreed Jimmie. “When you come to measure the soil that stands up on end, I guess you’d find Peru about as large as the United States of America!”
“What are the prospects?” asked Mellen. “What I mean,” he continued, “is this: Can you put your finger on any one spot on the map of Peru and say—look there first for Redfern.”
“Yes,” replied Mr. Havens, “I think I can. If you ask me to do it, I’ll just cover Lake Titicaca with my thumb and tell you to pull Redfern out of the water as soon as you get to that part of old Incaland!”
“Je-rusalem!” exclaimed Jimmie. “And that takes us right down to the haunted temple!”
“What kind of a lake is this Titicaca?” asked Glenn.
“Don’t you ever read anything except base-ball stories and police court records?” asked Ben, turning to his friend. “Before I was seven years old I knew that Lake Titicaca is larger than Lake Erie; that it is five inches higher in the summer than in the winter, and that the longer you keep a piece of iron or steel in it the brighter it will become.”
“Is it a fact that the waters of this lake do not rust metal?” asked Mellen. “That seems to me to be a peculiar circumstance.”
“I have often heard it stated as a fact,” replied Mr. Havens.
“Ask any one who knows, if you won’t believe me,” Ben went on with a provoking smile. “It is said that Lake Titicaca represents the oldest civilization in the world. There are temples built of stones larger than those used in the pyramids of Egypt. The stones have remained in position after a century because of the nicety with which they are fitted together. It is said to be impossible to drive the finest needle between the seams of the walls composed of granite rocks.”
“But what did they want to build such temples and fortresses for?” demanded Jimmie. “Why didn’t they spend more time playing base-ball?”
“You’re a nut on base-ball!” laughed Ben.
“The temples which exist to-day were there when the Incas settled the country,” the boy continued. “They knew no more of their origin than we do at this time!”
“They may be a million years old!” exclaimed Carl.
“Perhaps that’s as good a guess as any,” replied Ben. “We don’t know how old they are, and never shall know.”
“Isn’t it a little remarkable,” said Mellen, “that an act of embezzlement committed in New York City more than two years ago should lead to a visit to ruined temples in Peru?”
“Now about this Lake Titicaca, about which Ben has given us a bit of history,” Mr. Havens said, after replying briefly to Mellen’s question. “We have every reason to believe that Redfern has been living in some of the ancient structures bordering the lake.”
“Did you ever try to unearth the East Side person who wrote the letter you have just referred to?” asked Ben.
“We have spent thousands of dollars in quest of that person,” replied the millionaire, “and all to no purpose.”
“And what do we do to-morrow?” asked Jimmie, breaking into the conversation in true boy-fashion.
“Why, we’re going to start for Peru!” cried Carl.
“And the haunted temples!” laughed Ben. “Honest, boys,” he went on, “I don’t believe there’s anything in this haunted temple yarn. There may be temples which are being guarded from the ravages of the superstitious by interested persons who occasionally play the ghost, but so far as any supernatural manifestations are concerned the idea is ridiculous.”
“Don’t you ever say anything like that in the vicinity of Lake Titicaca,” Mellen suggested. “If you do, the natives will suddenly discover that you are robbers, bent on plunder, and some night, your bodies may find a resting-place at the bottom of the lake.”
“Do they really believe the temples to be haunted?” asked Glenn.
“There are people in whose interest the superstition is kept up,” replied Ben. “These interested people would doubtless gladly perform the stunt just suggested by Mellen.”
“I think I’ve got the combination now!” Jimmie laughed. “See if I’m right. The temples still hold stores of gold, and those searching for the treasure are keeping adventurous people away by making the ghost walk.”
“That’s the idea!” Ben replied.
“And, look here!” Sam broke in. “Why shouldn’t this man Redfern have a choice collection of ghosts of his own?”
“That’s an idea, too,” Mr. Havens remarked.
“I’ll bet he has!” Jimmie insisted.
“Then we’ll examine the homes of the ghosts first,” grinned Jimmie. “We’ll walk up to the portal and say: ‘Mr. Ghost, if you’ll materialize Redfern, we’ll give you half of the reward offered for him by the trust company.’ That ought to bring him, don’t you think?”
“And here’s another idea,” Sam interrupted. “If Redfern has ghosts in the temple in which he is hiding—if he really is hiding in a Peruvian temple—his ghosts will be the most active ghosts on the job. In other words, we’ll hear more about his haunted temple than any other haunted temple in all Peru. His ghosts will be in a constant state of eruption!”
“And that’s another good idea,” suggested Mr. Havens.
“Oh, Sam is wise all right,” Jimmie went on. “I knew that the minute he told me about unearthing the provisions in the tent before he knew whether the savages were coming back!”
“Gentlemen,” began Sam, with one of his smooth smiles, “I was so hungry that I didn’t much care whether the savages came back or not. It appeared to me then that the last morsel of food that had passed my lips had exhausted itself at a period farther away than the birth of Adam!”
“You must have been good and hungry!” laughed Mellen.
“What did you wander off into that country for?” asked Jimmie. “You might have known better.”
“I couldn’t remain in the Canal Zone,” replied Sam, “because no one would give me a job. Everybody seemed to want to talk to me for my own good. Even the chief in charge of the Gatun dam contract told me–”
“Do you know the chief in charge of the Gatun dam contract?” asked Havens, casually. “You spoke of him a moment ago as if you had met him personally.”
“Well, you see,” Sam went on, hesitatingly, “you see I just happened to–”
The confusion of the young man was so great that no further questions were asked of him at that time, but all understood that he had inadvertently lifted a curtain which revealed previous acquaintance with men like the chief in charge of the Gatun dam. The boy certainly was a mystery, and they all decided to learn the truth about him before parting company.
“Well,” Mr. Havens said, breaking a rather oppressive silence, “are we all ready for the roof of the world to-morrow?”
“You bet we’re all ready!” cried Jimmie.
“I’m ready right now!” exclaimed Carl.
“Will you go with us, Sam?” asked Mr. Havens.
“I should be glad to!” was the reply.
No more was said on the subject at that time, yet all saw by the expression on the tramp’s face how grateful he was for this new chance in life which Mr. Havens had given him.
“Jerusalem!” exclaimed Jimmie in a moment, jumping to his feet and rushing toward the door. “I’ve forgotten something!”
“Something important?” asked Ben.
“Important? I should say so!” replied Jimmie. “I forgot to eat my dinner, and I haven’t had any supper yet!”
“How did you come to do it?” asked Mellen.
“I didn’t wake up!” was the reply. “And now,” the boy went on, “you see I’ve got to go and eat two meals all at once.”
“I’ll eat one of them for you,” suggested Sam.
“And I’ll eat the other!” volunteered Ben.
“Yes you will,” grinned Jimmie. “I don’t need any help when it comes to supplying the region under my belt with provisions.”
The boys hustled away to the dining-room, it being then about seven o’clock, while Mr. Havens and Mellen hastened back to the manager’s office.
Passing through the public lobby, the manager entered his private room and opened a sheaf of telegrams lying on the table.
One of the messages was for Mr. Havens. He read it carefully, twice over, and then turned a startled face toward the manager.