“This charge is false! Absolutely false!” shouted the aged inventor.
“That may be,” admitted the chief shaking his head. “But the charge has been made, and we hold the warrant. The courts will settle it. We must now arrest Tom. Where is he?”
“He isn’t here!” cried Mr. Swift, and small blame to him if there was a note of triumph in his voice. “Tom sailed away not half an hour ago in the airship Red Cloudl You can’t arrest him!”
“He’s escaped!” shouted the constable. “I told you, chief, that he was a slippery customer, and that we’d better come before breakfast!”
“Dry up!” commanded the chief testily. “So he’s foiled us, eh? Run away when he knew we were coming? I think that looks like guilt, Mr. Swift.”
“Never!” cried the inventor. “Tom would never think of robbing the bank. Besides, he has all the money he wants. The charge is preposterous! I demand to be confronted with the proof.”
“You shall be,” answered Chief Simonson vindictively. “If you will come to the bank you can see the rifled vault, and hear the testimony of a witness who saw your son with burglar tools in his possession last night. We also have a warrant for Mr. Wakefield Damon. Do you know anything of him?”
“He has gone with my son in the airship.”
“Ha! The two criminals with their booty have escaped together!” cried the chief. “But we’ll nab them if we have to scour the whole country. Come on, Higby! Mr. Swift, if you’ll accompany me to the bank, I think I can give you all the proof you want,” and the officials, followed by the amazed and grief-stricken inventor, left the house.
CHAPTER 13
MR. DAMON IN DANGER
The sensations of the voyagers in the airship, who meanwhile, were flying along over the country surrounding Shopton, were not very different than when they had undertaken some trial flights. In fact Mr. Damon was a little disappointed after they had waved their farewells to Mr. Swift and Mrs. Baggert.
“I declare I’m not at all nervous,” he remarked, as he sat in an easy chair in the enclosed car or cabin, and looked down at the earth through the plate-glass windows in the floor.
“I thought you’d be all right once we got started,” commented Mr. Sharp. “Do you think you can stand going a trifle higher?”
“Try it,.” suggested the eccentric man. “Bless my watch chain, but, as I said, I might as well die this way as any other. Hitting a cloud-bank is easier than trying to climb a tree on a motorcycle, eh, Tom?”
“Very much so, Mr. Damon,” conceded the young inventor, with a laugh.
“Oh, we’ll not attempt any cloud heights for a day or two,” went on Mr. Sharp. “I want you, to gradually get used to the rarefied atmosphere, Mr. Damon. Tom and I are getting to be old hands at it. But, if you think you can stand it, I’ll go up about a thousand feet higher.”
“Make it two thousand, while you’re at it,” proposed the odd character. “Might as well take a long fall as a short one.”
Accordingly, the elevation rudder was used to send the Red Cloud to a greater height while she was still skimming along like some great bird. Of course the desired elevation could have been obtained by forcing more gas from the machine into the big, red container overhead, but it was decided to be as sparing of this vapor as possible, since the voyagers did not want to descend to get more material, in case they used up what they had. It was just as easy to rise by properly working the rudders, when the ship was in motion, and that was the method now employed.
With the great propellers, fore and aft, making about a thousand revolutions a minute the craft slanted up toward the sky.
The ship was not being run at top speed as Mr. Sharp did not care to force it, and there was no need for haste. Long distance, rather than high speed was being aimed at on this first important flight.
Tom was at the steering wheel, and, with his I hand on the lever controlling the elevation rudder, kept watch of the face of Mr. Damon, occasionally noting what height the hand on the gauge registered. He fancied he saw the cheeks of his friend growing pale, and, when a height of thirty-five hundred feet was indicated, with a yank the young inventor put the airship on a level keel.
“Are you distressed, Mr. Damon?” he asked.
“Ye—yes, I—I have—some—some difficulty in breathing,” was the answer.
Tom gave his friend the same advice the aeronaut had given the lad on his first trip, and the eccentric man soon felt better.
“Bless my buttons!” he ventured to explain. “But I feel as if I had lost several pounds of flesh, and I’m glad of it.”
Mr. Sharp was busy with the motor, which needed some slight adjustments, and Tom was in sole charge of navigating the airship. He had lost the nervous feeling that first possessed him, and was becoming quite an expert at meeting various currents of wind encountered in the upper regions.
Below, the voyagers could see the earth spread out like a great map. They could not tell their exact location now, but by calculating their speed, which was about thirty miles an hour, Tom figured out that they were above the town of Centreford, near where he had been attacked once by the model thieves.
For several hours the airship kept on her way, maintaining a height of about a mile, for when it was found that Mr. Damon could accommodate himself to thirty-five hundred feet the elevation rudder was again shifted to send the craft upward.
By using glasses the travelers could see crowds on the earth watching their progress in the air, and, though airships, dirigible balloons and aeroplanes are getting fairly common now, the appearance of one as novel and as large as the Red Cloud could always be depended upon to attract attention.
“Well, what do you say to something to eat?” proposed Mr. Sharp, coming into the main cabin, from the motor compartment. “It’s twelve o’clock, though we can’t hear the factory whistles up, here.”
“I’m ready, any time you are,” called Tom, from the pilot house. “Shall I cook grub, Mr. Sharp?”
“No, you manage the ship, and I’ll play cook. We’ll not get a very elaborate meal this time, as I shall have to pay occasional visits to the motor, which isn’t running just to suit me.”
The electrical stove was set going, and some soup and beefsteak from among the stores, was put on the fire. In spite of the fact that the day was a warm one in October, it was quite cool in the cabin, until the stove took off the chill. The temperature of the upper regions was several degrees below that of the earth. At times the ship passed through little wisps of vapor-clouds in the making.
“Isn’t this wonderful!” exclaimed Mr. Damon, as he sat in an easy chair, partaking of some of the food. “To think that I have lived to see the day when I can take my lunch a mile in the air, with a craft flying along like a bird. Bless my knife and fork but it certainly is wonderful.”
Mr. Sharp relieved Tom at the wheel, while the young inventor ate, and then, with the airship heading southwest, the speed was increased a trifle, the balloonist desiring to see what the motor could accomplish under a heavy load.
A drop of several hundred feet was made about an hour later, and, as this made it warmer, Mr. Damon, who was a great lover of fresh air, decided to go out on the platform in front of the cabin. This platform, and a similar one at the rear, was railed about, to prevent accidents. A fine view could be had from them much better than through the floor windows of the car.
“Be careful of the propeller,” advised Tom, as his friend went outside. “I don’t believe you’re tall enough to be hit by the blades, but don’t take any chances of standing on your tiptoes.”
“Bless my pocket handkerchief, indeed I’ll not,” came the answer. “But I think I shall wrap up my throat in the scarf I brought along. I am subject to neuralgia, and the breeze may bring on an attack of it.”
Wrapping along, woolen scarf about his neck, the eccentric man ventured out on the open platform. About the middle of it, but sufficiently high to be above a person’s head, was the forward propeller, whirring around at swift s
peed.
Tom, with his eye on the various gauges and the compass, was steering the airship. He glanced at Mr. Damon, who appeared to be enjoying the view from the platform. For an instant the eyes of the lad were taken from the form of his friend. He looked back suddenly, however, his attention attracted by a smothered cry. He was horrified by what he saw.
Mr. Damon was leaning far over the edge of the railing, with nothing between him and the earth a thousand feet below. He seemed to have lost his balance and had toppled forward, being doubled up on the iron pipe railing, his hands hanging limply over. Then, as Tom cried to Mr. Sharp to shut off the motor, the lad saw that, hanging to the blade of the propeller, and being whirled around in its revolutions, was a part of Mr. Damon’s red scarf.
“Hurry! Hurry, Mr. Sharp!” yelled Tom, not daring to let go the steering wheel, for fear the ship would encounter a treacherous current and tilt. “Hurry to Mr. Damon!”
“What’s the matter?” asked the balloonist.
“He’s dead—or unconscious—hanging over the railing. He seems to be slipping! Hurry, or it will be too late!”
CHAPTER 14
ANDY GIVES THE CLUE
When Mr. Swift followed the chief of police and the constable to the town hall his mind was filled with many thoughts. All his plans for revolutionizing submarine travel, were, of course, forgotten, and he was only concerned with the charge that had been made against his son. It seemed incredible, yet the officers were not ones to perpetrate a joke. The chief and constable had driven from town in a carriage, and they now invited the inventor to ride back with them.
“Do you mean to tell me a warrant has actually been sworn out against my son, Chief?” asked the father, when they were near the town hall.
“That’s just what I mean to say, Mr. Swift, and, I’m sorry, on your account, that I have to serve it.”
“Hub! Don’t look like you was goin’ to serve it,” remarked the constable. “He’s skipped out.”
“That’s all right, Higby,” went on the chief. “I’ll catch em both. Even if they have escaped in an airship with their booty, I’ll nab ’em. I’ll have a general alarm out all over the country in less than an hour. They can’t stay up in the air forever.”
“A warrant for Tom—my son,” murmured Mr. Swift, as if he could not believe it
“Yes, and for that Damon man, too,” added the chief. “I want him as well as Tom, and I’ll get ’em.”
“Would you mind letting me see the warrants?” asked the inventor, and the official passed them over. The documents were made out in regular form, and the complaints had been sworn to by Isaac Pendergast, the bank president.
“I can’t understand it,” went on Tom’s father. “Seventy-five thousand dollars. It’s incredible! Why!” he suddenly exclaimed, “it can’t be true. Just before he left, Mr. Damon—”
“Yes, what did he do?” asked the chief eagerly, thinking he might secure some valuable evidence.
“I guess I’ll say nothing until I have seen the bank president,” replied Mr. Swift, and the official was obviously disappointed.
The inventor found Mr. Pendergast, and some other bank officials in the town hall. The financiers were rather angry when they learned that the accused persons had not been caught, but the chief said he would soon have them in custody.
“In the meanwhile will you kindly explain, what this means?” asked Mr. Swift of the president.
“You may come and look at the looted vault, if you like, Mr. Swift,” replied Mr. Pendergast. “It was a very thorough job, and will seriously cripple the bank.”
There was no doubt that the vault had been forced open, for the locks and bars were bent and twisted as if by heavy tools. Mr. Swift made a careful examination, and was shown the money drawers that had been smashed.
“This was the work of experts,” he declared.
“Exactly what we think,” said the president. “Of course we don’t believe your son was a professional bank robber, Mr. Swift. We have a theory that Mr. Damon did the real work, but that Tom helped him with the tools he had. There is no doubt about it.”
“What right have you to accuse my son?” burst out the aged inventor. “Why have you any more cause to suspect him than any other lad in town? Why do you fix on him, and Mr. Damon? I demand to know.”
“Mr. Damon’s eccentric actions for a few days past, and his well-known oddity of character make him an object of suspicion,” declared the president in judicial tones. “As for Tom, we have, I regret to say, even better evidence against him.”
“But what is it? What? Who gave you any clues to point to my son?”
“Do you really wish to know?”
“I certainly do,” was the sharp reply. Mr. Swift, the police and several bank officials were now in the president’s office. The latter pressed an electric bell, and, when a messenger answered, he said
“Send young Foger here.”
At the mention of this name, Mr. Swift started. He well knew the red-haired bully was an enemy of his son. Andy entered, walking rather proudly at the attention he attracted.
“This is Mr. Swift,” said the president.
“Aw, I know him,” blurted out Andy.
“You will please tell him what you told us,” went on Mr. Pendergast.
“Well, I seen Tom Swift hanging around this bank with burglar tools in his possession last night, just before it was robbed,” exclaimed the squint-eyed lad triumphantly.
“Hanging around the bank last night with burglar tools?” repeated Mr. Swift, in dazed tones.
“That’s right,” from Andy.
“How do you know they were burglar tools?”
“Because I saw ’em!” cried Andy. “He had ’em in a valise on his motor-cycle. He was standing at the corner, waiting for a chance to break into the bank, and when me and Sam Snedecker saw him, he pretended to be fixin’ his machine. Then the bag of burglar tools fell off, the satchel came open, and I seen ’em! That’s how I know.”
“And you’re sure they were burglar tools?” asked the chief, for he depended on Andy to be his most important witness.
“Sure I am. I seen a picture of burglar tools once, and the ones Tom had was just like ’em. Long-handled wrenches, brace an’ bits, an’ all. He tried to hide ’em, but me an’ Sam was too quick for him. He wanted to lick me, too.”
“No doubt you deserved it,” murmured Mr. Swift. “But how do you know my son was waiting for a chance to break into the bank?”
“’Cause, wasn’t it robbed right after he was hangin’ around here with the burglar tools?” inquired Andy, as if that was unanswerable.
“What were you hanging around here for?” Mr. Swift demanded quickly.
“Me? Oh, well, me an’ Sam Snedecker was out takin’ a walk. That’s all.”
“You didn’t want to rob the bank, did you?” went on the inventor, keenly.
“Of course not,” roared the bully, indignantly. “I ain’t got no burglar tools.”
Andy told more along the same line, but his testimony of having seen Tom near the bank, with a bag of odd tools could not be shaken. In fact it was true, as far as it went, but, of course, the tools were only those for the airship; the same ones Mr. Sharp had sent the lad after. Sam Snedecker was called in after Andy, and told substantially the same story.
Mr. Swift could not understand it, for he knew nothing of Tom being sent for the tools, and had not heard any talk at home of the bag of implements ordered by the balloonist. Still, of course, he knew Tom had nothing to do with the robbery, and he knew his son had been at home all the night previous. Still this was rather negative evidence. But the inventor had one question yet to ask.
“You say you also suspect Mr. Damon of complicity in this affair?” he went on, to the chief of police.
“We sure do,” replied Mr. Simonson.
“Then can you explain?” proceeded the inventor, “how it is that Mr. Damon has on deposit in this bank a large sum. Would he rob the bank wher
e his own funds were?”
“We are prepared for that,” declared the president. “It is true that Mr. Damon has about ten thousand dollars in our bank, but we believe he deposited it only as a blind, so as to cover up his tracks. It is a deep-laid scheme, and escaping in the airship is part of it. I am sorry, Mr. Swift, that I have to believe your son and his accomplice guilty, but I am obliged to. Chief, you had better send out a general alarm. The airship ought to be easy to trace.”
“I’ll telegraph at once,” said the official.
“And you believe my son guilty, solely on the testimony of these two boys, who, as is well known, are his enemies?” asked Mr. Swift.
“The clue they gave us is certainly most important,” said the president. “Andy came to us and told what he had seen, as soon as it became known that the bank had been robbed.”
“And I’m going to get the reward for giving information of the robbers, too!” cried the bully.
“I’m going to have my share!” insisted Sam.
“Ah, then there is a reward offered?” inquired Mr. Swift.
“Five thousand dollars,” answered Mr. Pendergast. “The directors, all of whom are present save Mr. Foger, Andy’s father, met early this morning, and decided to offer that sum.”
“And I’m going to get it,” announced the redhaired lad again.
Mr. Swift was much downcast. There seemed to be nothing more to say, and, being a man unversed in the ways of the world, he did not know what to do. He returned hone. When Mrs. Baggert was made acquainted with the news, she waxed indignant.
“Our Tom a thief!” she cried. “Why don’t they accuse me and Mr. Jackson and you? The idea! You ought to hire a lawyer, Mr. Swift, and prosecute those men for slander.”
“Do you think it would be a good plan?”
“I certainly do. Why they have no evidence at all! What does that mean, sneaking Andy Foger amount to? Get a lawyer, and have Tom’s interests looked after.”
Mr. Swift, glad to have sane one share the responsibility with, felt somewhat better when a well-known Shopton attorney assurred him that the evidence against Tom was of such a flimsy character that it would scarcely hold in a court of justice.
The Tom Swift Megapack Page 33