Chapter XIII: The Moving Pictures

Captain Haskin, though he took no one into his confidence as to just what he was doing, impressed Dick and Jack alike as a man who, once started, would never drop any undertaking until he was successful. He might not always succeed, but failure in his case would never be due to lack of effort. So they were not surprised when he came to them a day or two after the Burtons had left town and told them that he had what might be a valuable clue.

"I want you to come to the theatre with me," he said. He smiled as he said it. "That may seem like a frivolous thing to do when we are at work on a mystery of this sort, but you'll see what I mean when we get there."

Dick and Jack, who liked the railroad detective and trusted him implicitly, were certainly surprised, but they made no bones about accompanying him. He had called for them at Dick's house, where Jack was spending the evening, and he said he wanted Tom Binns and Pete Stubbs to be along, too. So they rode with him in the automobile which he was using, and picked up the other Scouts.

"I don't believe you ever saw the particular theatre I'm going to take you to," he said, when he had all four of them in the car. "It isn't much of a theatre, even for a moving picture place. It's a little place over near the river, and the films are cheap and not very good. But you'll see why I picked it out later."

It was a long ride, after they had picked up Tom Binns, even in the detective's big car. As they rode, Haskin kept looking around behind him.

"I've had a queer feeling two or three times to-day," he said, "that I was being followed. I've shadowed so many people in my time that I'm pretty well acquainted with the ways of doing it, and I must say I don't like the look of things. Those fellows are desperate enough to do anything at all, but if they're actually shadowing the detective who's in charge of the efforts to run them down and catch them they've got even more nerve than I thought was possible."

Two or three times, now, as they made their way along, at a slow pace by Haskin's direction, those in the car got a glimpse of a smaller automobile that seemed to hang pretty persistently on their track. They were evidently never out of sight of the occupants of the other car for very long.

"I suppose they know what they're doing," said Haskin, finally, "but what their game is, is beyond me. I'm not trying to hide from them or anyone else. I don't see why they should want to track me down this way. Go ahead, full speed, now! We'll give them a chase for it, if they're looking for that."

It was not long before the car pulled up in a dirty, tumbledown street near the water front, before a shop that had been turned into a moving picture theatre. Haskin paid their way in, and they found themselves in a darkened hall and the pictures were being thrown on to the screen as they entered.

"One of the things these people do to attract people to their theatre," explained Haskin, as they took their seats, "is to have a film made every week right here in the district where it is to be shown. For instance, this week they are showing a picture that was made on the river front a few days ago. People come and think that perhaps they'll see themselves or their friends in the 'movies.' It's lots of fun for them, you see, and it's a good idea for the company that invented it."

Jack and Dick suddenly began to understand.

"Is there anyone we know in the pictures, Captain?" asked Jack.

"That's what I hope, Jack. What I do know is that there is a section of the film that shows three of the men who tried to wreck the train the other night. They are talking with some other men, and it is because I think that one of these others may be this man Broom that I want you to see it and identify him, if you can. Then, you see, we can send out his picture and have a much better chance of catching him."

Haskin had looked around carefully before he spoke. He had no idea that there would be anyone around who would be able to make head or tail out of what he was saying, but he was trained to take chances only when he had to. But there seemed to be no one near except a sleepy, slouchy sailor in a seat immediately behind him. The man had been drinking, and his heavy breathing convinced Haskin that he was harmlessly asleep.

But the next time he looked around the sailor was gone. He must have moved very quietly to escape the notice of Haskin, and he was just passing out through the door when the detective saw him.

"That's bad business!" he said to himself. "It was mighty careless of me. I ought to have known better, certainly, than to talk that way, even if there didn't seem to be anyone around to hear me. I only hope he didn't understand, or that he really is what he seems to be--just a sailor on a spree."

They had a long and tedious wait for the time to come when the all-important film should be begun. What was reeled off first had little interest for any of them. The three Scouts all liked the moving picture shows well enough, but they preferred the other kind, the sort shown in the better houses uptown, and they could not get up much interest in the pictures that seemed to delight those who were seated all about them.

The place grew constantly more and more crowded. It was evidently a popular diversion near the river, and the attraction of the local scenes film, with the chance that any spectator might suddenly find himself a part of the performance, was what pleased them the most and attracted the greatest attention.

At last it was time for that particular film to be begun. It was quite a long one, as it turned out, and it was not until a number of pictures had been shown that Haskin suddenly leaned forward and pointed to a little pier, beside which a motor boat was bobbing up and down.

Jack, with a gasp, and a queer little thrill running up and down his back, recognized three men who stood by the boat. They were quarreling about something, and were by no means still, but there was no mistaking them. They were three of the men that he had seen in the little station on the night that the attempt to wreck the Limited had failed. And, from the edge of the screen, another man was walking toward them.

"There," said Haskin, "that's the fellow I want you to watch. Is that Broom? If it is--"

He couldn't finish. There was a sudden sputtering by the film. The lights went out--only to give place to a dark, red glare near the film. And, at the same moment, there was a wild shriek from the back of the hall--"Fire!"

The lights winked on again in a moment, and then went out and on again, alternating for two or three minutes, so that at one moment the little, crowded theatre was black as ink and the next as light as day. Most of those in the audience were women and children, and they were in a panic in a moment.

"Come on, Scouts!" roared Dick Crawford. "If they don't stop crowding and pushing, not one of these people will get out of this place alive."

The three Scouts knew what to do and how to do it. They were prepared for this as well as for any other emergency. They were, perhaps, the only cool-headed ones in the place. Adding their voices to Dick's, and with Haskin to help them, they managed somehow to restore some sort of order. They fought their way through the packed aisles, and, though the fire was gaining, back by the film, they made the people pass out in good order. Great as was the peril, not one of them flinched.

Jack Danby, in the center aisle, had to bear the brunt of the wild rush for the door, but he managed to keep the people from piling up against the door, and so making a human dam that would have kept everyone from safety. One or two men, and the braver of the women, inspired by the actions of the Scouts, pulled themselves together, and helped them, and before the flames had made much headway, everyone, it seemed, was out. But Jack Danby remembered seeing a child fall just before the last group had gone through the door. He did not see it outside, and, despite protests from all who saw him, he made his way back.

The lights had gone out for good now, but there was plenty of chance to see even in that grimy, smoke-filled place, by the fitful glare of the flames that were reaching out and licking up the seats and the tawdry decorations now. And he had not very far to go before he found what he was looking for--the body of a little girl who had fallen and been overcome by the smoke. He picked her up and with little difficulty carried her out to the street, where a fireman took her from him.

The firemen made short work of the blaze, and Haskin, with the four Scouts, walked away and reached the automobile, which had been forced to move several blocks on account of the fire.

"That fire wasn't any accident," said Haskin, gravely. "Now I know why those fellows were following me. They were afraid of something of this sort. My heavens, what cold-blooded scoundrels they are! They were willing to wreck that train--now they took the chance of killing everyone in that little theatre to keep me from seeing that film--and, I suppose, with the idea that they could get rid of me and the most dangerous witness against them at the same time, and by a single blow."

"Do you really think they did that?" cried Dick, shocked by the idea.

"I think so, yes. But it's one thing to think so, and to say that I think so, and it's quite another to prove it. That's the trouble! But I'm going to try pretty hard, and I'll fix the blame on them and see that they go to jail for it if there's any human way of doing it. It's a pity they succeeded as well as they did. They've destroyed that film, and it would have been mighty useful as evidence against them, let me tell you!"

"Is there no duplicate?"

"I'm afraid not. But we'll try, anyway. There's no harm in that."