Tom Swift and His Aquatomic Tracker (3 page)

"Monsieur is most venturesome." The waiter raised his eyebrows, shrugged expressively, and glided away.

The man in tinted glasses and his two companions were now dabbing their lips with napkins as if about to leave. In desperation, Chow got up and headed toward the suspect’s table, intending to walk boldly past for a close look—again a collision course with the seated woman, whose delicate-framed glasses suddenly dived soupward from her less than delicate nose. But as he approached, the man suddenly turned around to speak to someone at the table behind him. The Texan could see little more than the back of the man’s head.

Aaa ding dang! Shoulda stayed put,
thought Chow.
Coulda seen him perfect.

Fuming, he returned bumpingly to his own table, then saw that the suspect was now facing his dinner companions again.

"Make up your golsarn mind, buster!" Chow steamed.

Once more, Chow started toward his quarry’s table. The seated woman had now migrated to the opposite side of her table—which
hélas
turned out to be on Chow’s new route.

"Sorry, ma’am."

"Sir!
Must
you?"

"Wa-aal shor! You should allus say you’re sorry when you thwack someb’dy’s backside."
That gussied-up lady musta been born in a barn!
he told himself.

Several other diners looked annoyed as the pudgy, bowlegged cowpoke maneuvered his bay window past their chairs for the umpteenth time, and the waiters looked on helplessly, with horrified fainting looming on the horizon. And again, as Chow approached, the mustached man turned around to resume chatting with the person behind him!

Chow’s face was now perspiring furiously. The man’s companions—one a woman, the other a burly, fat-faced fellow—stared up at him.

"Say there! You looking for someone, friend?" the burly man asked in a needling voice.

"Mebbe I am an’ mebbe I ain’t," Chow snarled. He walked slowly past, peering back over his shoulder in hope that the mustached man would turn around again.

Kee-rash
! A trayful of dishes and silver went flying in all directions as Chow collided with a waiter. Chow staggered back from the impact, tripped over a diner’s foot, and fell back flat onto the floor.

"
Nom de nom
!" the waiter wailed in genuine French terror as he gestured toward the prairie wild man on his floor.

Chow grasped the extended hand. "Nice t’ meet ya, Nomdy. Chow Winkler." He quickly added: "Oh yeah—
sorry
. Can’t fergit that!"

"Haw, haw, haw!" The burly man roared with glee. "That’s what happens when you don’t watch where you’re going, fat boy!"

"Now jest a corn-shuckin’
minute
, you smart French-fried so-an’-so!" Using the waiter’s hand to brace himself, which yanked the waiter into a near somersault, Chow struggled to his feet. Salad dressing, genuine
Mode Francais du Poupon Megiariffe
, wormed down his head and face. "If it’s trouble you’re lookin’ for― "

The mustached man suddenly rose from his chair and exclaimed, "Shut up and wipe off your big barndoor face, you loudmouthed range bum!"

"
Range bum
!" Rumbling with full-throated rage, Chow mopped the salad dressing from his eyes and tried to focus on his enemy. "Yew hear what he said, lady? ― Naw, not you, ma’am, the fat one b’hind you."

Finally finding his adversary somewhere on the other side of the dressing, he barked ominously:

"Take off them glasses, an I’ll show you who’s a range bum, mister!"

AT THAT moment of drama—high noon at night!—Tom was tooling through downtown Shopton in his bronze sports car, powered by the silent electricity of a Swift solar battery. Arriving in the Carlopa Heights district, Tom’s dashboard guide-map directed him to the Quel Fromage restaurant, where he ignored the frowning valet and slid into a parking space on his own.

Inside, the restaurant was in an uproar. Most of the diners had left their tables and were crowded in a half-circle around the far end of the room. Tom noticed one woman in particular—wide, handsome, dignified, and somewhat elderly. She was half-crouching, money in her hand, as if rapidly laying bets on changing odds.

Loud grunts and exclamations could be heard. "That’s the stuff, baldy!" one of the onlookers called out. "You’ve got him now!"

"Good grief, what’s going on?" Tom gasped.
Did he mean Chow?

The youth burrowed through the animated crowd, then stopped in amazement. Chow and a mustached man were seated at a table, sleeves rolled up and engaged in an arm wrestling contest! Both their faces were beaded with perspiration.

Suddenly Chow forced his opponent’s arm to the table and crowed in panting triumph, "Gotcha, Duke!"

"Okay, okay, cowboy—you win."

Just then Chow caught sight of Tom. "Hi, buckaroo!" he bellowed. "Step up an’ meet Duke Tyler,
former
arm-rasslin’ champ o’ Brazos County, Texas!"

Grinning with disbelief, Tom shook hands with the mustached man.

"But—er—what about that fellow you wanted me to see, Chow?" Tom inquired.

Chow, meekly embarrassed, gave a sheepish chuckle. "Oh yeah, wa-aal,
that
. It was jest my ole range pal, Duke, from years back on th’ Horton spread. Only I didn’t reckernize him behind them cheaters—an’ also he’s growed a mustache since I seen him last. Got a little gut on ’im, too."

"Still got m’ hair, though, Chow-boy."

"That ya do, Duke."

As the crowd returned to their tables, dazed waiters found Tom a chair and hr sat down with Chow, Duke Tyler, and Duke’s two companions, one of whom, namely the woman, turned out to be Mrs. Tyler.

Tom’s expression told the big chef he needed to commence an explanation
fast
.

"It’s like this, Tom. I ’as here eatin’ this pitiful food when I catch this voice goin’ off across the restaurant, right loud. It was Duke, but I didden know it—said some stuff about ‘Tom Swift an’ his big funnel’ an’ how you was jest wet b’hind the ears an’ how he wanted t’go on over t’ Sweden an’ take you down a peg."

"Had me a few drinks gullied down," Duke muttered apologetically. "No offense. Big talk."

"Born in Texas," noted Mrs. Tyler.

Chow continued, "Some more o’ that big talk an’ I was allfired
sure
he was one o’ them enemies that always turn up whenever you got something goin’ on, boss. So― "

The young inventor gave his friend a reassuring smile. "So you decided to play detective."

"Uh-huh. Afore he had a chance t’ pull anything."

A pretty girl in a pretty skimpy outfit, who had been walking around with a dainty camera, sidled up to the table and purred, "Monsieurs, if you’d care to remember this awfully
exciting
evening at Quel Fromage, here are some glossy photos of the big match that I took." As Tom reached for them, she went on, "And they’re
only
$7.99 each. We can supply copies, incidentally."

Tom jovially purchased the set and divvied them up, keeping one for himself to show to his family and Bud. As he slipped it into his pocket he said to Chow with a chuckle, "Thanks for looking after me. It was a great try, pard, and I sure appreciate it. But after this maybe you’d better leave the detecting to Harlan Ames."

"That’s our plant police feller," Chow explained to the others. "Knows his business."

Tom briefly excused himself to call home, leaving Chow happily swapping reminiscences with his friend. An hour later they all bid one another goodnight.

As Tom and Chow headed for the door, the young inventor said softly, "I spoke to the owner when I made my call, Chow. I offered to pay for any damages—after all, you were acting as my personal representative, in a way!"

"Thanks much, son. But lookee, I prob’ly helped their word o’ mouth. Nothin’ s’good fer advertisin’ as a little excitement!"

"Well, that headwaiter looks like he’d like to brain you with a leg of lamb!" retorted Tom.

"Aw, no, that’s Mr. Nom. He looks that
heartburn
sorta way all the time.
Adios
, Nomdy!" Chow called across the crowded room. "Don’t let the bugs bite!"

Before retiring Tom made a PER call to Bud aboard the
Sea Charger
, on the side of the earth where it was late morning. He told Bud the story of Chow’s exploit, and could easily imagine his pal shaking with laughter. "Man oh man! Wish I’d been there to see it, genius boy!" Bud exclaimed.

"I’ll show you the photo. How’s the new work team?"

Bud answered, "They’re fine—Zim did a great job with ’em on Fearing." Zimby Cox was a veteran sub pilot who had been assigned to head up the training program at the tiny islet that served as the Swift Enterprises base for spacecraft and submersibles. "I’ll be down in the tube with them tomorrow, though. That guy Alix Tuundvar—something like that—says his crew’s been having on-the-spot questions about how to maneuver the diversuits near the repelatrons."

"Which you know all about. I know you’ll be a great help, chum."

The next morning, as Tom and his father sat discussing the SubMoBahn project in their shared office, Harlan Ames came striding in from the Security office next door. A newspaper was folded under his arm. "Got something you two will want to look at."

"Is that the
Shopton Evening Bulletin
?" asked Mr. Swift.

"No, this is a
real
newspaper—from that big town with the initials NYC." Beckoning Tom over, Ames spread the front page on Damon Swift’s desk. Its screaming yet ever-dignified headline read:

STATUE SHIP SINKS OFF NORWEGIAN COAST;
ALL SAFE

The first paragraphs of the story described how the big vessel, an oil-freighting supertanker, had foundered in the Norwegian Sea off Alesund. The cause of the event was unknown as yet, though there were no signs of a collision with another vessel. "All hands were rescued, thank goodness," murmured Tom’s father.

"I read about this just the other day," declared Tom. "In addition to oil, they were carrying a large cargo of valuable statuary from the State Museum in Trondheim to Greece, from where they’d been ‘borrowed’ during the Greek civil war fifty years ago. One of the statues is pretty famous—the Delian Apollo." The crewcut youth glanced up at Ames. "Bad news, but why did you want us to know about this?"

"They’ll probably ask Enterprises to assist with the salvage job as we’ve done before," the security chief said. "But that’s not the main reason. Notice the name of the ship?"

Mr. Swift shrugged. "The
Centurion
."

"Wait—I get it!" exclaimed Tom. "Harlan’s suggesting it could tie in with the ‘drowning Roman’ image!"

"Hmm." Mr. Swift frowned thoughtfully. "A
Centurion
was a Roman military officer in the days of empire—that fits, all right. Which implies that the group behind the transmission knew beforehand that the ship was doomed."

"Sure, because they’d planted a bomb aboard!" Tom reasoned. "The drawing authenticated the transmission, like a ‘watermark,’ for the recipients—probably a diving crew waiting in the area—and the ciphered map must show precisely where she’d be sunk. They could be planning to retrieve the statues in order to finance..." At a warning look from his father, Tom finished with: "—some kind of criminal activity!"

"That’s my thinking as well," stated Ames.

Tom frowned. "But... there’s a piece that doesn’t quite fit. In trying for a match I pulled up topographical info from all over the world. And that includes ocean-floor topography. I specifically remember that those waters were covered, yet the diagram contours didn’t correspond to anything in the area."

"Nevertheless, fellows, I’m treating this as a lead." Ames promised that he would speak to John Thurston immediately. "By the way—don’t strain your brains trying to keep the terrorist business secret from me. Thurston’s made me a part of the knowing circle, as of this morning."

"Sorry, Harlan," said Tom.

Tom made further studies of the transmission, trying vainly to interpret the maplike diagram. He stayed into the evening, Chow bringing him a light dinner and some disapproving looks. But at last Tom abandoned the effort and headed homeward. "I’ll give it tomorrow," he told himself. "But then it’s back to the
Sea Charger
." He hadn’t felt it necessary to inform the Swedish firm managing the SMB construction, Lor-Sofviio, of his brief absence. "But if they try to reach me and I’m not there, it’ll give me one more problem to juggle."

Tom’s thoughts were scattered by the bleep of the car cellphone. He answered—but no one replied on the other end.

"Hello?
Hello
?"

Yet there
were
sounds after all. Tom suddenly realized what he was hearing. Sobbing!

"...T-Tom..."

"Sandy? What’s― "

"Ohhh—oh
Tom
. They called here, and I—I—The project—the sea tube—s-something terrible! And, and― "

An instinct told Tom Swift exactly what his sister was about to say! "Bud!
What’s happened to Bud?
"

WHEN Bud Barclay had said
tomorrow
to Tom, he hadn’t mentioned that "tomorrow" on the Baltic Sea would start for him before dawn. The sky was still black with a touch of cream when the
Charger’s
sea elevator—a repelatron descent platform Tom had devised nicknamed a bubblevator—was swung out over the gray waters to lower the athletic youth to the fore-end of the growing SMB, now within twenty miles of its destination on the German coast.

"Glad I am to have experienced this already," remarked one of Bud’s companions, Rutgar Spirss, as the frigid waters closed in around them. "But the first time, on your island, my eyes were ready to jump out of my head."

"An elevator made out of a bubble," murmured Alix Tuundvar, chief of the work crew. "I do assume, Bud, that we do not need to seal our diversuits to enter the tube-tunnel?"

Bud nodded. "Our own repelatron bubble will overlap the air space at the open end of the tube."

"This, I already knew!" piped up Rutgar with a laugh. "I did my homework. The repelatron spaces merge together like water droplets, Alix. One merely walks across—dryly!"