Chapter IX: A Trap

"Wait! I want to talk with you!" Penny called.

The boy paid no heed. As she ran after him he darted into the nearest alley.

Provoked, Penny hastened back to the car where Susan was waiting.

"Let's try to catch him," she proposed, springing in beside her chum.

Susan turned the coupe in the narrow street and drove into the alley. They could see the boy only a short distance ahead.

"We'll overtake him," Penny cried jubilantly.

Aware that he was being pursued, the boy ran faster. Then noticing an opening between two buildings, he squeezed through it and was lost to view.

Penny tried to follow afoot but soon gave it up. She returned to the coupe disheartened.

"He eluded us this time, Sue. I suppose that boy thought I meant to have him arrested. Actually, I only wanted to question him."

For some twenty-five minutes the girls cruised around the block, hoping to sight Jerry Barrows again. Although they kept close watch of the alleys he did not reappear.

"Did you notice anything peculiar about that boy's appearance?" Penny inquired as they turned toward home.

"No, why?"

"He was dressed much better than on that night when we caught him in our garage. He doesn't look as if he had ever had much hard luck."

"I imagine his entire story was a lie," Susan declared. "He didn't keep his promise to call at your father's office, and now he runs like a coward when we try to talk with him."

"I don't see how I was taken in so easily," Penny confessed ruefully. "I couldn't help liking the boy. I hoped he would turn over a new leaf."

Alighting at the Nichols home, she invited her chum to remain for dinner.

"I can't tonight," Susan told her regretfully. "We're having guests."

"I suppose I'll have to eat alone then. No use expecting Dad home."

In this she was mistaken. Entering the house, she discovered Mr. Nichols submerged in his favorite easy chair.

"I didn't look for you home so early, Dad."

"Nor did I expect to make it when I left the house this morning. However, I must return to the office immediately after dinner."

"Is it so very important?" Penny demanded.

Her father smiled.

"Lonesome?"

"Not exactly, only the evenings seem so long."

"Why don't you go to a moving picture show?"

"I've seen every good one in town. Besides, I'm tired of movies."

"I realize I am being a very poor father," Mr. Nichols acknowledged, reaching over to squeeze her hand. "You might come back to the office with me."

"I'd like that," Penny said instantly.

"It will be very dull," her father warned.

Directly after dinner, they motored to Mr. Nichols new office opposite the Brunner garage. Since the detective expected to occupy it only a few weeks at the most, it was equipped with the barest of necessities. There was a battered desk, three chairs and two telephones. Nothing more.

"What in the world do you do here?" Penny questioned.

"Mostly sit and wait," the detective admitted. "I receive reports from some of my men here. During the day I watch the street."

With a wave of his hand he indicated a powerful field glass which lay upon the desk.

Penny picked it up, training it upon the Brunner garage on the opposite side of the street.

"Why, it brings everything remarkably close! Do you sit here at the window and watch for the auto thieves?"

"Something like that. We've set a trap."

"A trap?" Penny was all interest.

"Yes, we've planted several expensive new cars in key positions on the street. Our men are secretly watching them, of course. We hope that the auto thieves will select one of our models to strip."

"It must be tedious waiting."

"It is, but if we catch the gang our patience will have been rewarded."

"But what of Rap Molberg?" Penny questioned doubtfully. "Surely he must delegate the actual thievery to others."

"I'm not so sure," Mr. Nichols said slowly. "It wouldn't surprise me to learn that Molberg acts upon orders from someone higher up. However that may be, if we capture some of the lesser fry, they can be made to talk."

The detective busied himself at his desk. For a time Penny amused herself by watching pedestrians through the field glass. Growing tired of that, she buried herself in a magazine. It was not very interesting. By nine o'clock she was thoroughly bored.

"I think I'll go home," she announced. "I don't believe anything exciting will happen tonight."

"So that's why you came," her father chided. "And I thought it was because you craved my company!"

"I did, but this bare office is too depressing."

"Then I'll excuse you," Mr. Nichols smiled. "Take a taxi home if you like."

"No, I think I'll walk."

It was a pleasant mellow evening and Penny was in the mood for a long stroll. She chose a roundabout route home.

She was absent-mindedly crossing a street, thinking of nothing in particular, when an automobile without headlights shot past her at a high rate of speed. Frightened, Penny sprang backwards.

"The nerve of that driver!" she thought. "He missed me by inches."

She watched the car swerve around a corner and race up a dead-end street.

"Why, this is the very place where I lost track of Rap Molberg!" she told herself.

She rushed to the corner. Her fascinated gaze followed the retreating automobile. It tore madly to the end of the street where it abruptly halted.

Penny lost sight of it for an instant. Then to her surprise, the headlights were flashed on. In the reflected light she saw the tall walls of a large manufacturing plant.

The beam was turned off again. Darkness swallowed up the car.

While she was straining to see, Penny heard the shrill blast of a warning siren from far up the street. The next instant, a police radio cruiser shot past.

With a loud screaming of brakes, the police car came to a stop not far from Penny.

"Did you see an automobile without headlights come this way?" the driver asked tersely.

Penny was only too glad to offer information.

"It turned into this dead-end," she began.

The officers did not wait to hear more. With a roar, the cruiser was off again. It reached the end of the street and halted because it could go no farther.

Penny, bent upon missing nothing, followed as fast as she could.

By the time she reached the radio cruiser one of the officers had alighted. He was looking carefully about. Sighting Penny, he walked over to her.

"Say you! I thought you told us that car came this way."

"It did," Penny maintained staunchly. "I saw it go to the very end of this street. The lights flashed on for an instant. Then the car seemed to vanish. I think it must have gone into that building."

She indicated the Hamilton Manufacturing Plant. The officer surveyed it briefly.

"Don't kid me!" he snapped. "Only a Houdini ever went through solid walls!"

He climbed back into the police car, saying gruffly to the driver: "Get going, Philips. It was a wrong steer. We must have missed that car at the turn."

Penny waited until the cruiser disappeared around the corner. Then she crossed the street and stood staring meditatively at the tall walls of the Hamilton Plant. There was no doorway leading into the building.

"It's uncanny," she murmured. "Yet I know very well that car went in there some way." The building was entirely dark. There were no windows on the street side. Only a vast expanse of unbroken wall.

"It's too dark to see anything tonight," Penny decided after a brief hesitation. "Tomorrow I'll come back and perhaps make a few interesting discoveries!"

And with that resolution, she turned and walked rapidly toward home.