CHAPTER VIIITIMMY
Even from the outside one could sense the desolation of the house. It took little imagination to visualize the large, sprawling rooms downstairs and the small, stuffy rooms upstairs weighted down to a point of suffocation by the flat tin roof. Cobwebs, slugs, every scurrying, every crawling thing that thrived in dampness and gloom must thrive in such a place, Skippy thought.
He was glad of Nickie Fallon’s friendly hand on his arm as they ascended the high stoop. And he was considerably cheered by the oily, smiling faces of Shorty and Biff as they all followed in the wake of the two men. He had somehow forgotten that these three lawless boys would have been repugnant to him under other conditions. Now he welcomed them as old companions, and their nearness was comforting in this chill, lonely moment.
“Metal doors ’n everythin’,” Nickie whispered in his ear. “Locks outside too, hah? What’s out is out an’ what’s in is in!”
They entered a stuffy vestibule and passed into a long, dark hall. At the far end of it beside the stairway was a lantern standing on a broken stool. It gave a feeble light at best, but now it sputtered and flickered like some dying thing and sent out weird shadows that stole up and down the dirty walls.
Barker stood a moment as if listening. Then he turned his grave face to Frost and said, “No sound from upstairs. Timmy must be asleep. Go up and get him. We’ll make some coffee and have something to eat. When you come down put some oil in that lantern.”
Skippy wondered who Timmy was, but soon dismissed the thought in his joy at hearing that they would get something to eat. Nickie, too, brightened up at this announcement and Shorty and Biff made no secret of their delight, but gave vent to several nasal grunts.
Frost hurried back and ascended the narrow, rickety stairway two steps at a time. Barker motioned the boys into a room at his right where he already had a lantern lighted.
“Sit down,” he said abruptly. “I’m going out to the kitchen to make coffee.” Then, without having really looked at them, he stepped into the hall. There was the sound of a key turning in the door outside and suddenly he was back again, passing through the room and toward another door as if he didn’t know the boys were there. When that door had closed behind him, his footsteps could be heard echoing over bare boards, until, after other doors slammed, there ensued a few moments of silence.
Skippy had taken a chair like the rest and now he glanced around the big room. Besides the chairs they were occupying there were two other chairs standing, battered and forlorn, against the shuttered and heavily barred windows. The room boasted no other furniture and no rugs; the floor was thick with dust.
“Well, it’s good there ain’t no more furniture to catch the dust, hah?” Fallon commented humorously as he took note of their surroundings. “Say, I wonder what’s the big idea, barrin’ windows—I ain’t keen on bars. Makes me think we’re in Delafield almost.”
Shorty got up softly and moved his chair close to the others. When his pudgy body was seated, he leaned over confidentially and said, “Mebbe we better in Delafield, eh Neecky?” He shook his round head at his friend Biff, then nodded back at Fallon. “Eet look what ya call phoney the way thees Barker don’ look at us an’ how he bring us here to thees spooky, dirty place, eh?”
“Just what I teenck!” Biff agreed in an undertone. “I get dem creeps—you know? Ever’ting eet should be fun eef Barker an’ Frost fool dem bulls an’ take us keeds from de school—eet should be fun eef they do it because they no want us to do the stretch and feel dis seempathy, eh? But no—they act like we was goin’ to funeral, yes Neecky?”
“Aw, forget it!” Nicky answered. “I’ll admit I ain’t got no yen for this joint myself. But we ain’t where we can say we’d like a nice up-to-date apartment. We gotta be glad we ain’t startin’ no long stretch at Delafield. I got a hunch Frost’s kinda slippery an’ Barker’s a queer bird all right, but what’s that when they’re keepin’ us outa the hoosegow!”
“An’ for thees, Neecky—what we do, eh?” Biff asked, squinting his small, brown eyes.
“I think,” Nicky whispered, “they got a small job for us guys to do—see? Ain’t we all done a job or two for ourselves, hah? So we can do a job for them if they ast us—see?” He turned to Skippy suddenly and asked, “Ain’t that right, kid?”
“Sure!” Skippy answered, conscious of an inward tremor as he said it.
“That’s the kind of talk I like to hear, boys!” came a sepulchral voice from the doorway where Barker stood watching them. He was grave and unsmiling, and save for a certain steely glint in his staring eyes, his face looked not unlike a cold, clay mask.
Nickie Fallon broke the tension with a forced, husky laugh. “You’n Frost give us a break, Mr. Barker,” he said nervously, “we’d be short skates if we didn’t try an’ square it.”
“Of course,” Barker agreed without any enthusiasm.
A silence ensued that to Skippy was tense. Barker continued to stand there and stare, and the boys sat rigid in their chairs until the welcome sound of footsteps was heard coming down the stairs and along the hall.
Frost strode into the big room and in his wake was a tall, fair-haired boy of about sixteen whose appearance was somewhat disheveled. He had a wild expression in his light blue eyes and at sight of Barker a shadow crossed his face.
“I been most crazy barred up in that dark hole since daylight!” he cried. “I thought you’n Frost would never come! Honest, I’ll go nuts if I ain’t let out soon. Over a month an’ two kids’re gone an’ I’m still here! Barker, it’s givin’ me the creeps—honest! It’s worse’n if I stayed in the pen up in Al....”
“I’ve arranged for you to go tomorrow night, Timmy,” Barker interposed hastily. And, nodding his long head toward the new arrivals, he added: “You’ll have these boys to keep you company till then.”
Timmy wheeled about, obviously unaware of the boys’ presence in the room until that moment. He drew a hand across his forehead as if dazed. Then suddenly, in a trembling voice, he said, “More!”
Skippy felt himself trembling too.