CHAPTER XIVTALK AMONG FRIENDS
The day dragged by and though Timmy seemed to have recovered from the effects of his spell, he moped around, melancholy and wrapped in his own gloomy thoughts.
“He’s goin’ nuts, that’s what he is,” Nickie whispered to Skippy after the evening meal was over.
“That’s why we ain’t stayin’ to get like him,” Skippy whispered back.
Nickie winked and nodded. He was beginning to see Skippy’s point of view more and more.
They had cleared away the dishes and sat down to a game of cards at Shorty’s suggestion, which was received with enthusiasm, and even Timmy had brightened and apparently put out of his mind the fears that had so unnerved him during the day.
Just before dusk, Devlin and Frost went out and locked the back door behind them. The boys hurried to the two back windows and peered out through the chinks in the shutters to watch the men go to the barn and presently back out in the queer looking car.
“Wonder where they’re goin’?” Skippy asked of no one in particular.
“Oh, they’ll be back,” said Timmy grimly. “Forme!” He lunged back to the table and took up his hand of cards with grim determination.
“Atta boy!” Skippy said. “Gee, Timmy, don’t get down again, huh? Devlin can’tmakeyou do nothin’ you don’t wanta. You’ll soon find out what he’s gonna tell you to do. Beat it after that; soon’s you get the chance.”
“Yeah, some chance it’ll be takin’, I bet!” Timmy exclaimed. “I got a hunch an’ that’s all there’s to it. But I ain’t lettin’ myself go off the handle no more—I wanta keep what nerve I got to tell Devlin where he’s gettin’ off if he springs any killin’ jobs onme.”
“That goes double,” Nickie said, suddenly very serious. “I don’t like the look in Devlin’s eye, he looks crazy b’lieveme, an’ Timmy’s right bout needin’ all his nerve. He’ll need it—we’ll all need it when the time comes. An’ lissen, guys, maybe we’ll wanta know how we make out afterwards, hah? What d’ye say we dope out where we’ll write letters to, hah?”
Shorty laughed. “Eet is funny, Neeckie. You talk lak that when mebbe we all see each other again some place out west together, eh? Ees that not what you thought when we come here, yes?”
“Yeah—I thought a lotta things when I come here,” Nickie answered. “That’s why I come. But I ain’t so sure about Devlin sendin’ us somewheres out west where we’ll meet—see! He ain’t said nothin’, so I guess it means we say so long when we blow here. Anyways, we land some place; there ain’t no sayin’ there won’t be somewheres we’ll go, so I say let’s write an’ tell each other how we shook Devlin or how we didn’t. Now I got a aunt where you guys can write me in New York. After I get fixed wherever I go, I’ll tip her off an’ she’ll send me the letters.”
“I got a aunt in Glens Falls,” Timmy said brightening.
“I got a aunt in New York, too!” Skippy added. They all laughed at the coincidence, but Shorty and Biff broke into the conversation eagerly.
“I got Pop an’ Mom in New York!” Shorty announced proudly.
“Me, too!” said Biff. “We leeve next door Shorty an’ I bet they all crazy we don’t show at Delafield.”
They fell to talking about their parents proudly. Nickie did some reminiscing about his aunt’s kindly care of him and it seemed that Timmy had somewhat the same story to tell. Skippy was listening intently, but at the same time his mind was going back to the night before when he had heard Devlin denouncing Frost for having brought the two Greeks along.
“Say, fellers,” he said suddenly. “Shorty an’ Biff got parents, huh? You, Nickie, an’ Timmy an’ me—we ain’t got none. I heard Devlin an’ Frost talkin’ last night—I couldn’t sleep so I heard what they said. One thing I know was that Devlin was burnin’ up, ’cause he asked Frost what was he gonna do bout Shorty and Biff ’cause they’re Greek’n’ he couldn’t pass ’em off for his sons. So Frost says he’ll take ’em himself—one he’ll take to Pittsburgh an’ the other to Maine. Anyway, Devlin was mad that they came ’cause he said he didn’t expect ’em. So you know what I think, fellers?”
“Spill it, kid,” Nickie said.
“That Devlin picks on orphans a-purpose!”
“Say,” Nickie said, admiringly, “that’s brains, kid, an’ I don’t mean maybe. That’s callin’ the turn. Holy Smoke, if that don’t seem like what he’s doin’—the orphan racket, hah?” Nickie said as if to himself. “I wonder why, hah?”
Skippy grinned. “I doped out a little about him—maybe I can dope out the rest, huh?”
“Here’s hopin’, kid,” Timmy said smiling. “Anyways, even if you don’t, maybe when I find what’s what an’ get shipped west—maybe I can tip off the bulls so’s you guys won’t have no killin’ jobs to do when Devlin puts the bee on you. It’d be better to go to Delafield an’ get a couple years off on good behavior than be in the spot I’m in tonight.”
“Yeah,” said Nickie thoughtfully, “that’s callin’ the shot, Timmy. Even my full stretch’d be better’n what I’d get for goin’ along with Devlin. Anyways, it ain’t no bad idea to tip off the dicks if you can.”
“You speak crazy!” Biff interrupted. “Timmy teep off, yes, but where he tell them deecks to find us, eh? Do we know where we are, eh?”
The looks they exchanged were an admission of defeat. After all, did Timmy know where he had been this past month and a half—did any of them in that damp, shadowy room have the slightest idea where the lonely house was situated? New York State? New Jersey? Pennsylvania? They might have been in the vast, trackless wilderness of Africa, so cleverly had Devlin concealed from them the location of that dismal house.
Skippy was reminded then of the boy Tucker about whom Mr. Conne had told him. Tucker hadn’t known either where the house was located in which Devlin had kept him imprisoned for a full month. There was something very painstaking in Devlin’s methods. He either completely confused his reform school “protégés” by taking them to live in a house and street which had its counterpart in hundreds of other houses and streets or else he confounded them utterly by driving them deep into this swampy wilderness under cover of night.
What were they to do?
An idea came to Skippy—why not write a letter and give it to Timmy to mail? In the next second, he was thankful that the impulse hadn’t flourished under cold reasoning for he suddenly realized that Devlin would be just the man to anticipate that sort of thing and Timmy would be relieved of any such messages immediately. Also, he was reminded of Carlton Conne’s warning: “Get in touch with no one, kid—tell no oneanythingunless you’re certain that it’s one of my men ... it’s the only way that Dean Devlin can ever be caught ... and your job, kid, is to help me set the trap!”
His job—to help set the trap!What was he to do?
He was still asking himself that when Frost came into the back yard in the noisy, ancient car. Devlin had preceded him in the closed car and was already locking it up in the barn.
“Looks like they took the junk pile to get the big guy’s closed car, hah?” Nickie said, not exactly at ease.
Timmy was looking over his shoulder, watching through the shutters the backyard scene under Devlin’s powerful flashlight. “Looks like I’m gonna ride in the junk pile tonight,” he said simply. “I wonder why, hey?”
Skippy felt suddenly choked and unable to utter a sound and, judging by the silence, the other boys were experiencing the same difficulty.