Chapter XXXVI

UNTANGLING THE WEB
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It was a strange setting, the rays from the kerosene lamp on the table throwing a soft glow over the diamonds which were still heaped on the black velvet.

Bob was anxious to tell his own story, but first he wanted to know about his uncle.

“Sure you’re all right?” he asked.

“Oh, my arms and legs are still a little numb and I can’t talk any too well, but I’m coming around fast now.”

Bob launched into a detailed explanation of all of the events which had taken place since the disappearance of his uncle in Jacksonville.

“Luckiest thing that ever happened to me was when I ran into the sheriff,” he said.

“No doubt about it,” agreed his uncle. Then he went on, “The men we captured tonight are the brains of the gang. From what Hamsa said after he got here this afternoon I gathered that two more members of the gang were picked up by you and Condon Adams last night.”

“That’s right,” said Bob. “But I can’t figure out how Hamsa got down here so soon and I thought he’d never get out of the river he fell into on the way down from Washington.”

“Hamsa is a tough customer,” said Merritt Hughes. “He has a tremendous physique and was able to swim to shore. Then he chartered a private plane and came south.”

“They’ve been running in the diamonds by plane all the time,” said Bob.

“Curt has been their pilot. He’s got a fast amphibian and last night he made contact with Hamsa near Atalissa and informed him that a large consignment would be delivered tonight. They were careful to make only the contacts with the smuggled gems here to keep suspicions away from this island.”

“Where did Curt get the gems?” Bob wanted to know.

“They were brought over from Europe aboard tramp steamers. Curt would contact the ships well off the coast and then fly the smuggled stuff in at night. They were careful about the type of gems they brought in. Why these diamonds on the table could be sold almost any place without suspicion. In fact, Hamsa actually went around the country peddling them to customers who had no idea that they were smuggled property.”

Bob, leaning back in his chair, looked at his uncle.

“You must have been brought directly here,” he said.

“Just as fast as the fellow they call Rap could get me here. Hamsa had been in Washington. Somehow he got wind that Department of Justice men were being put on his trail and he learned that Adams and I had been sent south. It was up to Rap to get us out of the way. Then Hamsa came down and it was just luck that he met you and Tully on the train. What looked like a bad situation for us turned out all right.”

Bob chuckled.

“Won’t Tully be sore when he learns that the whole case has been cleared up without him getting even as far as Jacksonville.”

“I wouldn’t worry about Tully, Bob. This is another feather in your cap. Just keep plugging away and you’ll get toward the top in the Department mighty fast.”

Merritt Hughes bent down and gathered up the smuggled gems, wrapping them in the velvet and replacing them in the leather case.

“We might as well destroy this place so that it will no longer be used for such purposes,” he said, and as he stepped out of the door behind Bob he aimed a shot at the kerosene lamp. A sheet of flame spread through the interior of the shanty and the dry wood crackled lustily as the fire ate into it.

The glow of the burning shanty illuminated the clearing and they found their way easily to the old wharf where Sheriff McCurdy and his prisoners were waiting for them. Further out the amphibian was drifting at its anchor.

“We’ll have to leave that for another trip,” smiled Merritt Hughes. “Sheriff, let’s start for town. I’m hungry and sleepy.”

With their three captives in the bow, Bob and his uncle just behind them and the sheriff at the wheel at the rear, they started out of the bayou, another successful chapter written in the bureau of investigation’s war on crime.

THE END

Transcriber’s Notes
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--Copyright notice provided as in the original—this e-text is public
domain in the country of publication.

--Silently corrected palpable typos; left non-standard spellings and
dialect unchanged.

--In the text versions only, delimited italicized text by _underscores_.

End of Project Gutenberg's Agent Nine and the Jewel Mystery, by Graham M. Dean