He disappeared from Mazie’s view, nor could she ascertain his fate. To go there to see would have been sheer madness. Half burned off at the bottom, the two hundred foot tower was already tottering to a fall.
A moment it hung there in space, a second, and yet a third. Having once more trained her glass on the top of it, Mazie saw a figure standing upon the topmost pinnacle. It was the firebug! For twenty seconds he hovered there between earth and sky. Then, just as the tower bent to a rakish angle, he toppled over and fell headlong.
“It’s as well,” she sighed, dropping her glasses and brushing a tear from her eye. “There can be no pain in such a death. Poor fellow! His brain must have been addled.”
For a time she stood there alone, thinking of many things. Then, realizing that the hour was late and that there was little chance of finding her friends even if they were still alive, she turned her face toward home.
“If they are still in the land of the living,” she told herself, “they’ll come straggling in. A cup of hot cocoa will do them good. I’ll have the water ready.”
In the meantime alarms had gone in. At the central fire station the third alarm came in before the megaphone had repeated the second. Clanging and screeching, forcing their way down streets swarming with people, the firefighters came. These ranged themselves along the outer walls of that famous place of play and mirth. No attempt was made to save Forest City. It was useless. The home of riotous joy was doomed. All the firemen could hope to do was to beat back the flames and prevent them from spreading to other parts of the city.
Long after the last structure of the vanished “City” had gone crashing down and the great throngs had crept away to their homes, a solitary figure stood in a dark recess between two buildings, watching the heaps of red ruin and desolation.
A short, sturdy fellow, he stood there hatless, and as the heat from the fire played upon his clothes they appeared to smoke, but it was only steam.
His keen eyes, for the most part watching the center of the fire swept area, now and again went roving up and down the outer lines as if searching for someone.
And then, as if fire were not enough, from the sky there came a sudden deluge of rain. One of those sudden torrents that come sweeping up from the lake in summer, it passed as quickly as it came, but in its wake it left black, smouldering desolation.
The hatless figure had moved to a place of shelter, but as the storm passed he came out again and stood staring at the ruins. As he stood there a shudder shook his frame. It was indeed a thing to shudder at. Two hours before, twenty thousand joyous mortals had rioted there, and now only charcoal and ashes marked its place, while above it all there loomed a blackened and twisted spectre which had once been the Ferris wheel.
“I knew it was doomed,” he murmured at last, “knew it days ago. If only I had got him in time! But now, please God, it is over. There will be no others of this kind.”
At that he turned and walked rapidly away.
Tillie McFadden was the first to arrive at Mazie’s home; indeed, she arrived before Mazie. Mazie found her curled up on a couch in the corner, fast asleep. Her hands were scratched and bruised, there were tear stains on her cheeks, but for all this she slept the peaceful sleep of a child.
Mazie felt an almost uncontrollable desire to waken her, to ask her what had befallen her, what she had seen of the fire, and what had become of Pant. She conquered this desire, to murmur as she spread a blanket over the sleeping girl:
“No. Why waken her to the horror of it all? A long sleep, and she will have forgotten it. Oh, to be a little child again!”
At that she sat down to anxiously await news from her comrades.
In half an hour Pant arrived. As Mazie opened the door he came slouching in without so much as looking at her. That was Pant’s way. But to-night he moved as one in a trance, or perhaps like one who had travelled so far against the wind in a snowstorm that his senses had become so benumbed that he no longer thinks clearly.
It was not a cold night, but Mazie had kindled a little fire in the grate. Without speaking, Pant found a seat by that fire. At once he appeared to fall into a doze.
When the girl touched his arm to offer him a steaming drink he started as from a dream.
After he had gulped down the drink he appeared more alive.
“I carried her down,” he grumbled, half to himself. “Gar! That was hard! We landed on the ground. Then we ran for it, and in the crowd I lost her. Do you think I will see her again?”
“See who?” asked Mazie.
“The Gypsy girl.”
“Who is she?”
“Why, don’t you know? But of course you wouldn’t. She—she’s the one who saved my life and I—I carried her off the Ferris wheel. She would have burned. The car burned before we touched the ground.”
“Oh!” exclaimed Mazie. “Then you were the one who performed that marvelous feat on the wheel? I might have known. No one else could have done that.”
“You—saw us?”
“Yes. But tell me about that other time, the time the girl saved your life.”
Pant told her the story.
“Do you think I’ll ever see her again?” he asked eagerly as he finished.
“You can’t tell,” said Mazie slowly, “you never know. It’s a strange world we live in. There are a hundred million of people and more, in our land. How many do you know? A few. There are eight miles of homes between our house and the heart of the city. Walk the whole distance, eight miles, twelve blocks to the mile, twenty homes to the block, probably two thousand homes. Ten thousand people live in those homes. How many of them do you know? None, perhaps. We live in little worlds of our own. Our little worlds are like ships at sea. We meet and pass others, like ships that pass in the night. You deserted your little world for a night and entered the Gypsy girl’s world. She left hers for a night and entered yours. Now she’s gone back to hers and you to yours. Will you meet again? Why should you?”
“Sure enough, why should we?” echoed Pant.
“Someone at the door!” exclaimed Pant.
Mazie was so overjoyed at sight of the one she found at the door that it was with difficulty that she refrained from throwing her arms about his neck. It was Johnny.
His story was soon told. His dive from the lower balcony of the tower had been successful. Having landed in the water without so much as being stunned, he had done the Australian crawl to the far end of the pool where was a landing. There he had leaped to his feet and gone racing away. Scarcely a moment had elapsed after he reached a point of safety, when the tower came crashing down on the very spot where he had stood.
Having seen the leap of the man he had followed into the tower, he had watched to see if by any miracle of circumstance he might have landed in the pool and followed him to safety. Since this did not seem humanly possible, he had given the man up for lost, but had lingered about the scene until the torrent had reduced the fire to charcoal. Then he had come away.
“Well, here we all are, safe and well,” smiled Mazie.
“And the firebug is dead,” said Johnny.
“How do you know that?” Pant challenged.
“I watched the burning pile until it was done. I tell you he was killed by the fall, crushed by the building that came crashing down upon him. He should be dead enough from all that.”
“But how do you know he was the firebug?” persisted Pant. “You can’t really prove it.”
“I can,” said Johnny positively, “and to-morrow I will.”
Johnny found the fire chief in a sour mood next morning. Two disastrous fires in a single night, both probable cases of arson. One had been tipped off to him beforehand and he had sent Johnny and some of his best men to watch. Yet they had found nothing. It was enough to break the staunchest heart.
“Buck up, Chief,” smiled Johnny, “the firebug’s dead.”
“He is, is he!” roared the Chief. “Didn’t I see him not two hours ago? Ain’t he goin’ to get out of jail unless we can pin something definite on him?”
It was Johnny’s turn to lose heart. The firebug in jail, about to escape for lack of a charge? What did this mean?
“Where—where did you catch him?” he stammered.
“Where’d you expect? By the fire he set, to be sure; the Randolph Street fire.”
“Oh!” Johnny breathed more easily. “You got Knobs Whittaker?”
“Who’d you think? Wasn’t he the man I set you to watch?”
“Why yes—one of them.”
“And didn’t we catch him wandering round in the crowd, big as life and staring round as if he was looking for somebody he’d lost?”
“Did he describe the man he was looking for?” Johnny smiled as he asked this.
“No, why should he? Why should we care?”
“Probably you shouldn’t. Only I thought it might be me he was looking for.”
“You? Why?”
“I had a bit of property of his.” At this Johnny held up the black bag that he had taken from Knobs.
“Where’d you get that?”
“I’ll tell you,” said Johnny, calmly sitting down.
He did tell, and after the Chief had listened with all his ears he exclaimed at the finish:
“Open it up. You’re right, it may contain some evidence and evidence is what we need.”
“Do you know, Johnny,” he said as the boy struggled to break the lock, “that was the hottest fire I ever experienced. There were enough chemicals in that lower story to charge a volcano. It’s a wonder there wasn’t an explosion. Those boys will forfeit their insurance.”
“I might have a little evidence on that point, too,” said Johnny. “You remember my telling of the truck that unloaded there just before the fire? Well, that may have been a plant. Perhaps the company had not ordered those chemicals. Knobs Whittaker may have had them put there.”
“Why?”
“How did the diamond company’s property fare?”
“Total loss. Never saw anything to equal it. Safe just over the chemicals. Dropped right into the mess of those flaming chemicals. The safe was melted to a solid mass.”
“And the diamonds?”
“Diamonds? In the safe, I guess. Or maybe they melted, too. Diamonds are carbon you know, same as coal. Wouldn’t expect them to withstand the heat, would you?”
“Not if they were there,” said Johnny. “I thought it might be——”
At this moment the lock to the black bag gave way. Johnny threw up the cover.
“Shade my eyes!” exclaimed the Chief. “What have we here?”
“Looks like diamonds to me,” said Johnny with a grin.
“So they are!” exclaimed the Chief, seizing a small case and examining its contents closely. “And that was the game. Knobs was in with the diamond merchant! Man! What a haul they would have made!”
The next instant he dashed to the telephone.
“That you, Cassidy?” he said a moment later. “The Fire Chief speaking. Hold Knobs without bail. We’ve got the goods on him. A dead open and shut case. He’ll do twenty years for last night’s work.
“Now,” he said to Johnny after resuming his usual composed manner, “what was this you were telling me about the firebug being dead?”
“That was something else.”
“Another one?”
“The one who set fire to Forest City, and all those other places of public pleasure, the enemy of happiness. Do you remember the tall stooped man with a hook-nose and a limp that I spoke to you about?”
“Yes.”
“That was the man.”
“Can you prove it?”
“I think I can.”
“Well, if you can you’re mighty well off. You’re well off as it is. I’ll make the insurance companies come through with a fat reward on this,” he patted the black bag. “But there’s a reward offered by the city for the firebug. If you can prove that his work is over you’ll be doing yourself a service as well as every law-abiding citizen of this old town.”
“I’ll do it before dark.”
“Go to it, Johnny. More power to your good right arm.” The Chief grasped his hand in a hearty grip, then escorted him to the door.
“Johnny,” said Pant, as their train sped along, “what did Knobs Whittaker have to do with that string of fires—the schools, the Zoo, and Forest City?”
“Not a thing, I guess. It was that man with the hooked nose who set them all.”
“You haven’t proved that.”
“That’s why we are now on our way out to the black shack by the edge of the swamp. I think we’ll find some proof out there.”
They were on the train speeding southward toward the marsh.
“If Knobs wasn’t in with old hook-nose, why were they together in that dive where I came near getting bumped off?” asked Pant.
“Doubtless they were acquainted. Men of the same trade, even if it’s of a criminal nature, usually are. Birds of a feather, you know. It may be, too, that Knobs was encouraging this other man. If the fires set by him could keep the eyes of the police and inspectors off Knobs, then he would have easy going.
“His big game, though, was the diamond shop. It looked easy. To plant all those chemicals beneath his safe, to set a fire, then beat it with the diamonds, leaving everyone to believe they were lost, seemed simple enough. It would have been, too, if it hadn’t been my luck to hit him behind the ear. Got that picture?” he asked suddenly.
“Yes.”
Pant took a small snapshot from his pocket and handed it to Johnny.
“Pretty good, even if it was taken under difficult circumstances,” he said, holding it up to the light.
It was a picture of a large man wearing a mask and holding a silver cream pitcher in his hand. It was the picture he and Mazie had taken at the booth just before the fire started.
“Mask sort of spoils it, but I think they’ll recognize that stoop.”
“Who?”
“The people who have seen him before.”
For a time they rode in silence. Then Johnny spoke again.
“If there is any reward for all this work, Tillie McFadden gets half of it. She gave me the first good hunch.”
“What was the hunch?”
“That the man who set the fires wasn’t in the building when they were set.”
“You expect to prove that?”
“To-day.”
“With a mechanism?”
“No other mechanism than you’ll find in any building of consequence. Here we are!” he exclaimed suddenly.
They were at the station near the marsh.
A half hour later found them creeping on hands and knees, making their way from sand dune to sand dune. In his hand Johnny gripped the black automatic he had taken from Knobs.
“One more dune,” he breathed, “then we’ll have to make a break for it.”
As he rose to creep forward again he caught sight of the roof of the black shack.
The next moment, somewhat excited and breathless, they were dashing for the shack.
Once within the shadow of its side they paused to calm their wildly beating hearts. Then gripping his automatic hard, Johnny popped his head up before the window.
“Huh!” he grunted a second later. “I thought it might be that way. Not a soul here.”
The lock on the door was a simple one and they were soon inside.
“It’s the hook-nosed one’s shack all right,” said Johnny. “I’ve seen him wear this long rain-coat.” He took the coat from its hook. “Bring it along as evidence. And these.” He walked to the corner where were four black cylinders standing on end. They were what remained of the pile he had seen there some time before.
Handling them with great care, as if afraid they might explode, he first wrapped them in a piece of paper he had taken from his pocket, then buckled a strap tightly about them.
For a moment he stood looking about the cabin. Then turning toward the door, he said:
“Come on. I think we have all that is of any value to us here.”
Once back on the beach, they did not return directly to the station, but paused first to interview some fishermen who were mending their nets, and then later to knock at a cabin farther down the beach.
At the cabin a woman said that a man resembling the one in the snapshot had sometimes come to her house for milk. The fishermen were even more positive in their identification.
“Yes sir,” said one of them, “that was his shack out there by the marsh. I’ve often seen him. But what’s the mask for?”
“Carnival,” said Johnny.
“Oh!”
“So you think it was old Hook-nose who shot at you and went hunting you and Mazie out here on the marsh?” said Pant as they walked on.
“I am sure of it. And I’m equally sure that he killed poor old Ben Zook. The last evidence against him will be put to the test this afternoon in the Fire Chief’s office at three. Will you be there?”
“I sure will.”
True to his promise, Pant was there at the appointed hour. So were Mazie and the Fire Chief.
“Now,” said Johnny, as if about to perform some scientific experiment, “I’ll ask you to examine this scrap of black cardboard which Ben Zook and I found on his island after the mysterious blaze out there. Compare it with the outer covering of the four cylinders I have here. Same material, isn’t it, Chief?”
“I’d say it was the same.”
“Now,” said Johnny, “take a look at this telephone which I took from the burning Zoo. As you will see, it is equipped with two pairs of wires. The ends of the smaller wires are scorched.
“If you don’t mind, Chief, I’ll just disconnect these wires and hook them up with your own phone.” He unstrapped the tubes and, selecting one, set the others some distance away. “Now I will connect the other ends by means of the screw contact points which you will see already conveniently placed at the top of this black tube.
“Now,” he smiled, as he stepped back quickly as if expecting something sudden, “if you will be kind enough to take down your receiver and ask the operator to give you a ring?”
For a second the Chief hesitated, then complied with his request. At the same time Mazie crowded herself into the most remote corner.
“Operator,” called the Chief, “give us a ring, will you?” His hand trembled slightly as he hung up the receiver. In the room, for the space of seconds, all was silence, a silence so complete that the buzzing of a fly far up on the ceiling sounded distinctly.
Then came the jangle of the bell. Instantly, as if by magic, the black tube split straight down the middle into two perfect halves, toppled over, revealing a fan-shaped mass of tissue paper which promptly burst into flame. So suddenly did it all happen that had not Johnny seen to it that there was a chemical fire extinguisher right at hand, the Chief might have found himself in the embarrassing position of being obliged to turn in a fire alarm from his own office.
As it was, the fire was soon out. After that Johnny’s three friends sat staring at him.
“The explanation is simple enough,” he smiled. “In the case of every fire set by this misguided man—who was a crank and perhaps a radical as well—he pretended to be a telephone wireman. Having in this way gotten inside, always just at closing time, he connected his wires with the phone, then planted a fire trap such as this in some store-room where there was plenty of combustibles. After making sure that he was the last one out, he left the building.
“Since everyone associated with the office knew that everyone in the office left at a definite hour, there were no phone calls after the trap had been set.
“At his appointed hour, ten, eleven, or twelve o’clock at night, the firebug, by this time perhaps ten miles away, would go to some phone and calmly call the number.
“And Bam! The telephone rings; a spark traveling down one of those fine wires, loosens a spring that throws the trap open, tissue paper unfolds like a fan, a taper is lighted that fires the trap, and all is prepared for the fire alarm.”
“What a pity that so much ingenuity should be used for so dire a purpose,” said the Chief.
“So you think this firebug is dead?”
“I know it. I have a report to that effect, and plenty of proof that he was the man.”
“You shall have the reward. You deserve it.” The Chief turned to grasp his hand.
It would probably not have seemed strange if Johnny Thompson, after such strenuous experiences as these, should have decided to take a long rest. So he did decide, but fate ruled differently. By chance, on that very night, he walked into the shop of an old man who was a wizard at working in wood—ebony, mahogany, teak and rosewood. He showed Johnny some marvels and in the end told him a tale that set Johnny’s blood racing fast.
It was this tale that led the boy off on a most thrilling adventure, which you will find recorded in our next book, “The Red Lure.”