Chapter XXIX: Silent Night

It would seem that Red Rodgers’ reasons for wishing to rejoin his team were all that one might ask; yet at the very moment he stood there talking with the chubby lighthouse keeper, Drew Lane was telling Johnny Thompson of reasons that to him seemed tremendously important. These reasons had to do with the cause of the kidnaping. Who would not find this a subject of absorbing interest?

Drew Lane possessed an all but superhuman power of finding his way about in the dark. Though he had never before seen Isle Royale, he not only was able to land safely in the channel known as Rock Harbor, but once ashore, he experienced little difficulty in making his way across the ridge to the other channel that lay on the opposite side.

“This,” he said to Johnny as they at last came out upon a short boat landing, “is Tobin’s Harbor. At the back of this harbor the powerful amphibian that carried the Red Rover to Isle Royale lies at anchor. Thus far we are in luck. If the Red Rover is still in their midst we shall be in greater luck. And if we succeed in rescuing him without having our much treasured heads blown off, ours will be the greatest luck in all the world.”

“But whose plane is that amphibian?” Johnny could no longer suppress a question.

“You have a right to know.” Drew Lane’s tone was serious. “It’s quite a story. We have some distance to go. Here’s a boat beside the landing. Probably chained up, but we’ll break her loose. Suppose we get her off? Then you can row while I talk.”

“O.K. Let’s go.”

The padlock that held the boat was a cheap one. Two knocks with a rock opened it as though it were a clam shell.

Ed, the scout, crouching with his dog at the top of the ridge, heard those blows, but wisdom counseled no interference.

Only when the boat was gone did he descend the hill. After skirting the shore for a short distance, he proceeded to drag a light canoe from the center of a clump of bushes where it stood on end, safely concealed. In this, by cutting off at an angle, he was able to keep Drew Lane and Johnny Thompson within striking distance without himself being observed. Did he mean to strike? Perhaps he could not have answered this question himself.

“It’s a curious business.” Drew spoke in low tones, as Johnny with long, strong strokes drove the light rowboat along. “If you hadn’t been in on it perhaps we would have gotten nowhere. You had all the luck.”

“I?” Johnny lost a stroke.

“Luck no end!” Drew rumbled. “Remember the jimmy bar? The invisible footprint? The shavings? Sure you do. They were red hot clues that led us straight to the spot.”

“Then—then it was Angelo, the—the flower shop keeper?” Johnny lost two strokes.

“It was Angelo.”

For a time after that there was silence. This silence was broken by Johnny. His voice was husky. “I only feel bad for the boy, young Angelo. He is a fine young chap. And he has had everything—big car, speed boat—going to college. Everything. And now—”

“Now his father is going to be broke. We are here to arrange all that. We must not fail. To-night Angelo Piccalo is rich. He believes he is safe, that his riches are safe. To-morrow night at this hour, if our plans work out, he will be broke, broke and in prison.

“Too many times—” Drew’s voice was tense with pent-up emotion. “Too many times we go out and get a rich crook and he is able to buy his freedom, by corrupting a judge or a jury with the very money he stole from honest men. This time there shall be no chance for this; not a chance. We—

“Look!” His voice suddenly fell to a hoarse whisper. “Look! Over yonder is the light of a camp fire. Must be their camp, the kidnapers’ camp.

“Here!” Drew bent over, then straightened up to thrust a thing of cold steel into Johnny’s hand. “Put this in your pocket. And this.”

Johnny obeyed.

“Don’t use ’em unless you have to.” The young detective’s tone was low and tense. “But if you have to, shoot often and straight. It’s a tough bunch. Don’t know how many, but plenty, I’m afraid.

“As for the boy, Angelo,” his tone changed, “don’t worry too much about him. He’ll have to get along without his car and speed boat all right. But then there are plenty of people who’ll tell you big cars and speed boats do a boy more harm than good. Gives them false notions of life; that’s what they’d tell you. I don’t know much about that. An old police flivver with, like as not, a share of bullets waiting at the end of the road—that’s as far as I ever got.

“But one thing I _do_ know.” He sat up straight and stiff. “Crooked dollars never did any one any real good. And every dollar Angelo Piccalo spent on that boy was crooked. Flowers! That flower shop was only a blind.”

“It seems strange,” Johnny mused, pulling hard at the oars. “Angelo is an artist at heart. He can make flowers talk. He loves music, and the best in pictures. Why should such a man be a crook?”

“A man’s love of honesty has—

“Look, Johnny! Swing a little more to the left. We’ll keep well out. Then when we’ve passed their camp we’ll swing in. They’re in a sort of clearing. Trees beyond them. Plenty of chance to slip up. They’ll not see us out here on the water. The moon is low yet.”

Again for a time there was silence, such silence as one finds only on a calm bay of Isle Royale at night. Now came from afar the sharp yip-yip-yip of a bush wolf. And now, from the opposite shore of the bay they caught the faint plash-plash of a moose swimming along the shore. Or was it a boat? Johnny’s heart skipped a beat.

“Can’t see us. Works both ways. We can’t see them. Might slip up on us. Then—”

“This artist business,” Drew broke in with a hoarse whisper. “Curious thing. A man can be a fine musician or a painter, and still be a crook. They’ve got some fine artists in Sing Sing. Art and conscience have no connection, it seems. The only thing that saves a fellow from being a crook is a desire deep down in his heart to be honest, to do right by all men.”

Drew lapsed into silence. There were many things Johnny wished to know. How was it that Drew felt so sure he was on the right track? What fresh evidence had he uncovered? How much had his own discoveries helped to bring things about? But this, he knew, was no time for questions. They were nearing a camp. Was it the enemies’ camp? Who could doubt it? The big amphibian could not be a quarter of a mile from that camp.

So in that silence, broken only by the cries of wild things in the night, he rowed on.

And after them, in utter silence, there came a canoe.