Read The Secret of Wildcat Swamp Online
Authors: Franklin W. Dixon
The Secret of Wildcat Swamp (9 page)
“Say, Frank, where were you going in such a rush?” Chet asked.
“To get that sign on the tree. I have an idea about it.”
With the others following, he pushed through the dark swamp to the gnarled willow tree.
Frank pointed out the dangling sign to Chet. Then he yanked the weathered old board loose.
“I want to compare this with the piece of wood you found, Chet,” he said.
As they struggled back up the hill to the pit, Chet puffed and heaved. “You sureâmake things âhard,” he said.
Joe was the first to notice that something was amiss at the pit.
“Hey! I left my shovel right here. Where'd it go?”
“Everything is gone!” cried Cap.
“The board too,” Frank said. “We've been robbed!”
“That cry was just a trick to get us away from here,” Cap declared. “Somebody wanted our tools. Put out your lights, boys. There's no sense making targets of ourselves.”
The four stood motionless in the darkness. Frank broke the silence by whispering that it would be hopeless to try finding the thief in the darkness. The logical move was to return to their campsite as secretly as possible.
By this time all of them except Chet knew the route well enough to find it in the dark. Chet stumbled along between Frank and Joe. Reaching camp, they crawled into their sleeping bags.
“Now tell us about the sign, Frank,” Chet whispered.
“I was going to try fitting the two pieces together. I think originally it was all one sign.”
“But that would mean it doesn't refer to wildcats at all,” Chet pointed out.
“Right! It would read, âHere lie the bodies of twenty wildcatters'!”
“Wildcatters has two
t's
,”
Joe reminded him.
t's
,”
Joe reminded him.
“The second t could have been right on the break,” Frank explained, “and easily have rotted away.”
Chet still did not see the real significance. “What's the difference whether there were twenty wildcats or twenty wildcat hunters here?”
Cap spoke up. “A wildcatter, Chet, isn't an animal hunter. He's a man who hunts for oil-well locations.”
“Oil prospectors!” Chet whistled. “You mean there might be oil here?”
Cap said that was quite possible, and then Joe exclaimed, “Those rusty pipes we found could have been part of some drilling equipment! And that skeleton in the cave might have been another one of the wildcatters!”
“Sk-skeleton!” Chet quavered.
“Oh, we didn't tell you about our Mr. Bones!” Joe laughed. “Wait till you see him. He's out of this world.”
Chet crawled deeper into his sleeping bag and was silent.
“Seriously,” Frank said a moment later, “I wonder what really happened to those wildcatters, and when.”
“I've been mulling that over myself,” said Cap, “and I've about decided that it couldn't have been too long ago.”
“I think you're right,” said Frank.
“Well, I feel we can be certain,” Cap said, “that there still may be a few men living who learned about the possibility of oil below the swamp from some of those wildcatters. That's why they're trying to run us out of here.”
Frank remarked that a certain George Moffet seemed to fit right into this theory. No doubt he was trying to get Mrs. Sanderson's property.
“Is there any way of telling where there might be oil except by drilling?” Chet asked Cap.
“Yes, indeed,” the teacher replied. “In certain periods in prehistoric times far more oil deposits were formed than in others. If I could locate some fossils from one of those periods, I'd know we've made the right guess about the situation here. Incidentally, every big oil company today employs a paleontologist for this kind of exploration.”
“If we're going to do any more digging,” Chet spoke up, “we'll have to buy some more tools.”
“Joe and I might get them in Red Butte after we see Dad,” Frank suggested. “Tomorrow night we plan to meet him at Spur Gulch, Cap,” the boy added, and told him about Chet's message.
Bailey volunteered that he and Chet buy the tools. They would stop at the Sanderson ranch and tell Harry and his mother their suspicions.
Next morning, an hour after sunup, Frank and Joe set off in an easterly direction, while the others went northwest.
“I'd like to look around that cave once more before we leave,” Cap said when they reached the ledge. “Besides examining those pipes again, we may find other clues to prove we're on the trail of the old wildcatters or of some new ones.”
Chet was reluctant, but on the other hand, he didn't want the teacher to think he lacked courage.
“Okay, Cap. Lead the way!”
When they reached the narrow opening in the rocks, Chet glibly offered to remain at the cave entrance to “guard the horses.” Cap grinned as he dismounted.
“If there's trouble,” the teacher said, “we're better off together than split up.”
“You've talked me into it,” Chet replied solemnly.
Flashlight in hand, Cap stalked ahead of him down the incline to the cave entrance below the ledge. At the end of the passage, where it broadened out into the wider portion of the cave, Bailey's light flickered.
“Battery's getting low,” he muttered to himself.
As Chet beamed his own light around, Cap entered the inner part of the cave. Stepping past the skeleton, barely discernible in the dim light, the teacher bent to pick up a rusted section of pipe. As he did, a faint sound in a recess of the rock wall made him straighten up.
“That you, Chet?”
“What did you say?” Chet boomed from the passageway.
In sudden alarm Bailey swung his fading flashlight toward the wall. It picked up a dark figure crouching in the gloom.
“Don't move!” came a whispered command.
At the same moment, an arm snaked around his chest like a hoop of iron, pinioning his arms to his sides. With a clatter, Cap's flashlight dropped to the rock floor.
“Chet!” he gasped. “Get help! Hurry!”
“Shut up!” his attacker hissed.
The arm tightened its grip, choking off any further warning. As Cap struggled, another man rapped him sharply on the side of the head with the butt end of his gun. The science teacher crumpled to the floor.
“That'll take care of him for a while!” the gruff voice muttered in the darkness. “Now let's get the other one.”
But Chet, having heard Cap's desperate plea for help, had made his decision. Even though he was scared, Chet would never run out on a friend in distress.
He had recently learned some elementary judo. As a flashlight suddenly beamed in the passageway, Chet poised himself. Seconds later a man of medium height emerged from the inner cave.
As Chet had been taught, he let out a blood-curdling scream and shouted some unintelligible gibberish. His amazed adversary stopped in his tracks. The boy backed away a few inches. If he could keep this up until he reached the entranceâ
The man, though, was not to be fooled a second time. He lunged savagely at Chet. Instantly Chet grabbed his outstretched arms and pulled his attacker sharply forward. Off balance, the man stumbled toward him.
With split-second timing, Chet brought his knee up sharply against the man's chin. He went down like a sack of lead sinkers.
Not knowing there was a second enemy, Chet relaxed. Suddenly his hands were locked behind him in a firm grip. He tried to break free, but the attacker twisted his arms painfully.
Resistance was futile.
CHAPTER XII
Ambush
WHILE Chet was struggling with his new enemy, the man he had knocked down began slowly to get to his feet. Holding his jaw, he shone a big flashlight on the boy and glowered.
“Wise guy, eh? Break his arm, boss.”
“Can the cracks! Get on with this job!”
The injured man's companion collared Chet and shoved him deeper into the cavern, where the other fellow stuck a candle into a crevice and lighted it.
In the eerie glow Chet saw Cap lying prone on the ground. Then, for the first time, he got a good look at the second assailant, a small, wiry man wearing a badly fitting green uniform and holding a short rifle.
As Chet stared, Cap came to and staggered to his feet.
“You're the rangers who ordered us out of this area!” he charged.
“Very clever!” the scrawny man said sarcastically. “But since you weren't smart enough to take a friendly warning, we're going to teach you a lesson!”
“Listen here,” Cap retorted angrily, “I demand that this boy and I be treated according to law. You have no right to hold us without valid complaint.”
“No? Well, we're taking the right.”
“You can't get away with this!” Chet said hotly. “We know who you are, and we know what you're after! You're impostors, and you're trying to steal Mrs. Sanderson's land!”
“And you,” Cap added, pointing at the wiry man, “you're Willie the Penman!”
The other man looked startled. “They know we'reâ”
“Shut up!” the small fellow ordered. He turned to Cap and Chet. “You don't know what you're talking about. If you have any sense at all, you'll keep your mouths shut.” He turned back to his companion. “Give me the wire.”
The captives were led deeper underground, back into the dim recesses of the cave. Then the men, using lengths of tough copper wire, tied their prisoners' hands behind their backs and bound their ankles.
“Are we being kidnapped?”
The little man said with an ugly laugh,” I wouldn't call it that. We're not taking you anywhere. You're just going to lie right here in this cave and have a good rest.”
“Yeah, and when we get around to it,” his henchman added, “we'll send the sheriff to pick you up.”
With that, the two men left the cave. When the sound of their footsteps had died away in the gloomy vault, Chet spoke up. “Do you think they really will send the sheriff to get us?”
“I wouldn't count on it,” Cap replied. “I can't picture those two criminals helping the law.”
“Do you suppose Frank and Joe will ever find us?” Chet quavered.
Meanwhile, the Hardys had altered their plans. Since they did not have to meet their father until midnight, they had decided to ride first to Sheriff Paul's and find out about the “ranger trouble.”
Upon reaching the Paul ranch, the boys dismounted and knocked on the front door. To their amazement, it swung wide open under Frank's touch,
Joe called out, but there was no reply. He peered into the neat living room.
“The place is deserted and the note we left is still on the table!”
“That's funny,” Frank remarked. “Mrs. Paul must have gone off soon after we did.”
“I hope nothing's happened to her,” Joe said apprehensively.
The boys circled the house, but there was no sign of the sheriff's wife. Nor was she in the barn or any of the other ranch buildings. The boys were more mystified than ever.
“Let's go back to the house,” Frank suggested.
In the kitchen they saw unwashed dishes on the sinkâa startling contrast to the spick-and-span condition of the house. Near the door was a basket of clothes. On a hunch, Frank felt them.
“They're still damp, Joe. That means Mrs. Paul was interrupted in her work. She must have left here in a hurry. Let's check the corral.”
Joe, first to reach it, called out, “Look at these fresh hoofprints. Several riders were here.”
Frank knelt down. “Three sets come up to the gate, then four go away. The question is, Did Mrs. Paul go with the others, or leave later?”
Carefully checking the trail and the turnoff into the ranch, the boys discovered that one set of hoofprints were headed in another direction.
“She might have ridden off to warn somebody about her visitors,” Joe said, “probably her husband. But why didn't she use her radiotelephone? I noticed one in the living room.”
Hurrying back to the house, Frank examined the set. “The sheriff no doubt uses it to contact police headquarters at Red Butte. I'll do the same.”
He switched on the set and waited for it to warm up. However, no hum came from the loudspeaker. He pressed the microphone button.
“That's funny, Joe. This set doesn't seem to be putting out at all.”
Frank tried again, but the output dial remained at zero. Turning off the set, Joe unsnapped the cover slides, and removed the top.
“No wonder!” he exclaimed. “A tube is missing!”
“That's proof enough for me,” Frank cried. “Those visitors were here for no good reason.”
“We'd better ride to Red Butte as fast as we can and report the whole situation,” Frank said grimly.
“Right,” Joe agreed. “Then later we can hop a train from there to Spur Gulch.”
Hurrying outside, the Hardys sprang into their saddles and galloped off. At this rapid pace, they quickly covered a mile. Then they were forced to slow down because the trail had entered a rocky valley.
As they proceeded, the valley became a narrow pass walled in by steep rock formations on either side.
“I guess it'll have to be Indian file now!” Frank said, cantering in front of his brother. As they neared the end of the pass, he suddenly reined in.
“What's up?” Joe asked, almost colliding with Frank's mount.
Frank did not answer, but from up ahead, Joe heard a gruff voice shout:
“Hold it!”
A man in cowboy attire, astride a pony, blocked the exit to the pass. The boys couldn't see what he looked like, because of the dirty blue kerchief tied over the lower part of his face and a ten-gallon hat pulled low on his forehead.
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