The Penny Parker Megapack: 15 Complete Novels (74 page)

“Oh!” Light broke upon Penny. “So you heard our conversation! You were listening!”

“I happened to be standing in the loading dock. I know you have the letter. Hand it over.”

Penny backed a few steps away toward her father’s office. “So you admit you wrote it?” she challenged.

“I admit nothing. But I want that letter.”

“You’ll not get it,” Penny defied him. “Peter Fenestra, you were the one who put that warning note on my desk a few days ago! And I know why, too! You were afraid I’d learn too much about the octopus tattoo. Well, I’ve learned plenty!”

Fenestra’s face became contorted with rage. He choked, “You’ve been down in the cave!” and started toward Penny.

Thoroughly frightened, she eluded his grasp. Running into her father’s office, she slammed the door. Bracing her body against it, she managed to turn the key before Fenestra could force it open.

“Come out of there!” he shouted furiously. “Come out, I say!”

“And I say I won’t!” retorted Penny. “Just try to get in!”

She pushed her father’s heavy desk across the room, placing it in front of the door.

Fenestra rattled the handle several times, and threw his body against the panel once or twice. Then she heard footsteps as he walked away.

“That’s only a trick to get me to come out,” thought Penny. “I won’t be stupid enough to fall into his trap. I’ll stay right here.”

Walking to the window, she gazed down. Cars were passing along the street. If she shouted for help someone might hear her. However, to explain her predicament would be rather awkward.

Penny’s gaze fell upon the telephone which had fallen from the desk to the floor. Picking it up, she dialed the number of her own house. Mrs. Weems answered.

“Hello,” said Penny cheerfully, “Dad hasn’t come home yet by any chance?”

“He’s just now driving into the garage,” the housekeeper replied. “I’ll call him.”

A moment later Penny heard her father’s voice at the other end of the wire.

“Dad,” she said, “I’m down at your office, sitting behind some barbed wire entanglements. I wish you’d get a policeman and see what you can do about rescuing me.”

“Is this one of your jokes?” Mr. Parker demanded.

Fearful that her father would hang up the receiver, Penny talked fast and to the point. Mr. Parker assured her he would come without a moment’s delay.

“I guess that will teach Peter Fenestra not to get funny with me!” she congratulated herself. “It pays to do a little thinking. Fenestra will be arrested, and then I’ll drive out and learn what he hides in his cave.”

Penny sniffed the air. She could smell smoke, and she thought it must be coming from a cigarette. Evidently Fenestra had stolen to the door and was patiently waiting for her to emerge.

“He’ll have a long wait,” she chuckled.

Gradually her elation died. The odor of smoke had grown stronger. She saw a wisp of it filter beneath the door crack. Penny’s heart caught in her throat. Tensely she listened. Was it imagination or could she hear the crackle of flames?

“Fenestra may be burning the papers of a scrap basket just to smoke me out,” she thought. “Probably that’s just what he’s doing.”

Pulling the heavy desk away from the door, she stood with her ear against the panel. Distinctly she could hear the crackle of flames. The wood felt warm to her cheek.

Suddenly Penny was afraid. Frantically she turned the key in the lock.

The door swung outward to the pressure of her shoulder. A wave of heat rushed in.

Penny staggered backward, horrified by the sight which met her eyes. At the end of the newsroom, where the exit should have been, rose a towering barrier of flames.

CHAPTER 24

A BARRIER OF FLAMES

Escape through the newsroom was cut off. Panic seized Penny, but only for an instant. Retreating, she telephoned the fire department. Then finding a chemical extinguisher, she began fighting the flames.

Black, rolling smoke billowed into her face, choking and blinding her. The heat drove her back.

From far down the street came the wail of a siren. Penny rushed to a window. A pumper and a hook-and-ladder truck swung around the corner, lurching to a stop.

Raising the sash, she stepped out onto the ledge, waving to the men below.

“Stay where you are!” shouted a fireman. “We’ll get you!”

A ladder shot up, but Penny did not wait to be carried to safety. Before a fireman could mount, she scrambled down with the agility of a monkey.

“The fire started in the newsroom,” she gasped. “But it’s already spread into the composing department.”

“Anyone else in the building?”

“I don’t think so. There were three scrub women, but they’re probably out now.”

Lines of hose were stretched to the hydrants, and streams of water began to play on the flames. A crowd, following in the wake of the fire engines, was ordered back by the police. One young man broke through, darting to Penny’s side.

“Jerry!” she exclaimed.

“Gosh, how did it start?” he demanded. “Why, Penny, your hair is singed!”

“I was in it,” she said briefly. “I can’t explain now, but the fire was started by Peter Fenestra.”

“On purpose?”

“I don’t know about that. He was smoking a cigarette.”

“Have you told the police?”

“Not yet. I’m waiting for Dad.”

A car inched through the crowd, stopping a few yards away. Mr. Parker leaped out and ran toward the burning building. He was stopped at the entrance by a fireman.

“Let me in there!” the publisher shouted, trying to free himself. “My daughter’s inside!”

“No, here I am, Dad!” Penny cried, grasping his hand.

Mr. Parker said no word, but he pulled her to him in a rough embrace. The next moment he was trying once more to enter the building, intending to save important papers.

“Take it easy, Parker,” advised the fireman, barring the door with his hose. “The smoke’s bad in there.”

“Will the building go?”

“We’ll save most of it,” the fireman assured him confidently.

Penny plucked at her father’s sleeve. “Dad, oughtn’t the police be sent after Peter Fenestra? He’s responsible for this, and a lot of other things, too!”

“You mean Fenestra set the fire?”

Above the roar of flames, Penny tersely disclosed how the man had compelled her to take refuge in the inner office room. Jerry also heard the story, and when she had finished, he said to Mr. Parker:

“Chief, let me take a couple of policemen and nail that fellow! Maybe we can arrest him at the farm before he makes a get-away.”

“Go ahead,” urged Mr. Parker.

“I’m going along,” declared Penny, and darted away before her father could stop her.

Twenty minutes later, with a police cruiser dispatched to Fenestra’s place, she and Jerry drove there in Mr. Parker’s car. Parking some distance down the road, they walked cautiously toward the farmhouse which loomed dark against the sky. No lights burned in the windows. The grounds appeared deserted.

“Looks as if Fenestra isn’t here,” observed Jerry. “No use waiting for the police.”

Boldly going to the front door he pounded on it, ordering in a loud voice: “Open up!”

“He’s not here,” said Penny after a moment. “Unless perhaps he’s hiding.”

“The place looks deserted to me.”

Penny glanced toward the storm cave, remembering that she had the key to the padlock in her pocket. Jerry read her thought, and followed as she went quickly toward the mound.

“It’s locked,” he said, indicating the padlock.

“Here’s the key.” Eagerly Penny offered it to Jerry. “I’m sure this must be the one.”

The reporter gave her a flashlight to hold while he tried to fit the key into the lock.

“It’s no go, Penny.”

“But I was so sure, Jerry.” She stooped to examine the padlock. “Well, no wonder! It’s been changed.”

“Then we’re out of luck until the police get here.”

“Isn’t there any way we can open it ourselves?”

“Maybe I can break it.”

“There should be tools in the barn, Jerry.”

“I’ll see what I can find.”

Leaving Penny, the reporter disappeared in the direction of the barn. Extinguishing the flashlight, she patiently waited.

Suddenly she was startled to hear running footsteps. Barely had she crouched behind the storm cave before a man emerged from among the pine trees adjoining the road. It was Peter Fenestra and he was breathing hard.

Straight toward the cave he ran. Pausing at the slanting door, he peered quickly about, and then fumbled with the padlock. In desperate haste he jerked it loose, swung back the hinged door, and descended the stone steps.

Penny waited a moment, then crept to the entrance.

Fenestra had not taken time to lower the door behind him. A light shone from an underground room at one side of the main passageway, and she could hear the man’s heavy boots scuffing on a cement floor.

Penny considered going after Jerry and decided against it. Fenestra’s frantic haste suggested that he might not linger long in the cave. What could he be doing beneath ground?

With Jerry so near, she felt that it would not be too dangerous to investigate. Warily she tiptoed down the steps.

A low, rounding doorway opened from the descending passage. Peering into the dimly lighted room, Penny did not immediately see Peter Fenestra.

Instead her gaze roved about the walls of what appeared to be a workshop. Tools were neatly arranged over a bench, while a cupboard of shelves contained miscellaneous mechanical parts.

At the far end of the cave stood an urn-like contrivance which the girl took to be an electric furnace. An armored cable ran from it to a heavy wall switch having two blades and a sizable wooden handle. Plainly it was designed to carry a very heavy current.

Peter Fenestra came from behind the furnace. Penny saw him throw the switch. Almost immediately she heard a low hissing sound from the interior of the metal oven. Slowly the furnace heated, and soon glowed weirdly.

As she pondered what the man could be intending to do, she heard a slight sound at the stairway entrance. Thinking that Jerry had returned, she started up the steps. Not one figure but three loomed in the doorway!

Penny flattened herself against the dirt wall. But she could not avoid being seen. A flashlight beam focused upon her, and the next instant a revolver muzzle bit into her side.

“Keep quiet!” she was ordered in a whisper. “You won’t be hurt!”

Penny stared into the grim face of Anchor Joe. Behind him came John Munn, and a man she had never seen before. In a flash she knew why they were there—to avenge themselves upon Peter Fenestra.

Quietly as the men had moved, they had been heard in the next room.

“Who’s there?” Fenestra called sharply.

John Munn and Anchor Joe stepped into the rectangle of light, their revolvers trained upon the man.

“Just three of your old pals, Otto,” drawled Anchor Joe. “Reach!”

“Listen, Joe, you got me all wrong,” Peter Fenestra whined. “I can explain why I kept the gold. I’ll give it all to you if that’s what you want. I’ll do anything—don’t shoot.”

“Shootin’ would be too good for you,” retorted Anchor Joe. “We got other plans.” His face was dark with rage.

“Sure, we know how to deal with a traitor,” added John Munn, deftly whisking a revolver from Fenestra’s hip pocket. “You thought you could hide from us. You thought by changing your name, and coming to this out-of-the-way town you could fool us. Why, you dirty rat, you even thought you could get by with pushing me off a bridge!”

“Your greed kept you here,” taunted Anchor Joe. “You couldn’t bear to leave any of those gold bars behind.”

“You thought you’d melt down the last of ’em tonight and skip,” added John Munn. “You’re goin’ on a long trip all right, but with us!”

A pair of steel cuffs were slipped over Fenestra’s wrists. Speedily, the sailors searched the cave, gathering up several bags of what Penny assumed to be gold.

“How about this bar?” John Munn asked his companions. “Can we handle it?”

“Too heavy,” answered Anchor Joe. “With Moyer hot on our trail, we’ve got to travel light. Get going and I’ll follow.”

Munn and his companion marched Peter Fenestra from the cave. Taking a cord from his pocket, Anchor Joe bound Penny’s hands and feet.

“I’m tying ’em loose,” he said. “And I’ll leave the cave door open. After we’re gone you can yell for help.”

“Joe, where are you taking Fenestra? What has he done?”

The sailor did not answer. Seizing a bag of gold, he slung it over his shoulder and went quickly up the stairs. Penny was left in the darkness.

CHAPTER 25

SAILORS’ REVENGE

Minutes later, Jerry, returning from the barn, heard Penny’s muffled scream for help. Descending into the cave he immediately freed her and learned what had happened.