The Scarlet Lake Mystery: A Rick Brant Science-Adventure Story

by Harold L. Goodwin

  CHAPTER IX

  Ghost Town Clue

  Rick refused point-blank to go to bed. He wasn't tired, he insisted, andhe meant it.

  Scotty yielded. "Okay. I see your point. It's hard enough to sleep inthe daytime anyway, but when you're all keyed up, it's impossible.Didn't lunch make you sleepy at all?"

  "A little, but that shower and change of clothes woke me up again.Scotty, I'll never forget that horrible instant when I realized thatOrion wasn't going to take off. Honest, it was like watching somethingbeautiful die. It..."

  Hank Leeming, their security officer roommate, came into the bunkroom intime to hear Rick's last comment. Hank was young, usually smiling. Hewasn't smiling now. "I was in the blockhouse when the first one blew. Iknow how you feel, Rick. It makes you want to lay violent hands on theman responsible."

  The security officer changed the subject abruptly. "Luis Hermosa wantsto see the boy who saved his life, and the one who helped."

  "You mean the fireman who fell in the propellant?" Scotty asked.

  "That's the one. He's in the infirmary. Can you both go?"

  Scotty shrugged. "Sure. If he wants us to. But he doesn't owe usanything. Someone else would have dragged him out if we hadn't."

  "If _you_ hadn't," Rick corrected. "I didn't move fast enough."

  "Neither did anyone else," Hank pointed out. "Don't be overmodest aboutit, Scotty. Go and see him."

  The infirmary, operated by Lomac, was only a block away. Rick and Scottywalked over and checked in at the reception desk.

  The infirmary clerk directed them to one of the four rooms in the littlebase hospital. "Go right in."

  Luis Hermosa was awake. Rick knew he must be in pain from his burns,which were extensive, but his smile gave no evidence of it. It was awarm smile that demanded a smile in return.

  "This morning there was no chance to give you my thanks," he greetedthem. "I asked for you to come so that you may know how I feel."

  Scotty put a hand gently on one of the bandaged ones. "No thanks arenecessary."

  Luis shook his head. "It was a brave thing. You might also have beencaught by the fuel, and you did not even have a suit such as I wore.When I and my family light candles to thank God and to ask His blessingfor you, we will want to give Him your names."

  They told him their names, and his lips moved as he repeated them. Thenhe waved them to chairs. "Please sit down and talk with me for a fewminutes. This is not a place where one can extend the hospitality of hishouse, but I can at least offer you chairs."

  Keen brown eyes surveyed them. "You are both very young, eh? What areyou doing here?"

  "Working," Scotty answered. "I'm in vehicle maintenance and Rick is inPegasus electronics."

  "So? It is an exciting place in which to work. Even I, a fireman, feelthis excitement. Tell me, do you think this _hombre de terra_, thisEarthman, was the cause of the tragedy this morning? I call it atragedy, because it was so. So much work, so much love went into thatrocket! _Sangre de Cristo!_ It was a terrible thing."

  "No one seems to know for sure," Rick replied. "The project officercouldn't say. But there was no Earthman picture."

  The bandaged hands spread expressively. "A picture could have beenburned. Now perhaps we will never know. You understand, I have thoughtmuch about this thing. Once I believed this Earthman made the rockets gobad because he must think such things are against the will of God. Butwhen I heard of the thefts, I no longer thought so. I thought about howa thief could take his stolen wealth from this guarded place."

  "We've wondered about that, too," Scotty said.

  "You decided something?"

  Rick leaned forward on his chair. Luis Hermosa had started him thinkingagain.

  "The thief couldn't get his stolen goods from the base if he wentthrough a gate in his own car, could he?"

  "He would not dare," Luis replied, "because he knows the guards checkthe trunks of cars, and sometimes even look under seats. He might beunlucky. He would know this."

  "Spot check," Scotty nodded.

  Rick hadn't known about the spot check, but it made sense. He continued,"So there's only one way. The thief has to take the stolen supplies fromthe base in an official vehicle."

  "Such vehicles are not checked," Luis agreed excitedly. "But also, suchvehicles are not taken far from this camp. If a truck, say, were gonetoo long, would it not be noticed?"

  "It certainly would," Scotty stated.

  "There must be only a few places where the thief could go," Rick saidthoughtfully. "When he reaches one, he must hide his stolen goods andleave them. Later, by traveling a long way to reach the spot from themain road, he could get the stolen stuff with his own car. Or, maybesomeone from outside who doesn't work on the base at all could go to thehiding place and pick them up. Can you think of any other way?"

  Luis and Scotty couldn't, and said so.

  Rick asked, "What are the possible places?"

  "What would such a place need to be like?" Luis asked, then answered hisown question, "It would need to be on a road, not only leading from thebase, but to the outside. Also, it would need to be a lonely place,would it not? And it would need to be a place where the things could behidden and not be seen, but where a helper from outside could find themeasily. You see, I follow your reasoning. Where is such a place?"

  The boys waited. Luis knew the area. He might have a good idea.

  "There is one which is perfect. It is called Steamboat."

  "But that's a town," Rick objected. "People would notice a truck fromthe base."

  Luis chuckled. "People, yes. Ghosts, no. An evil man like this Earthmanwould not care what a ghost saw, would he? Ah, but you are new here, andyou do not know. Steamboat is a town without people. No one has livedthere for forty years."

  "A ghost town," Scotty said in surprise. "But don't tourists go to ghosttowns?"

  "They do," Luis agreed. "They go to Searchlight, and to Rhyolite, and toCalico, and other ghost towns near here. But they do not go toSteamboat. It is on bad roads, many miles from the nearest good highway.Besides, who has heard of Steamboat? No newspaper writes about it, andno one advertises it. You cannot even buy a souvenir at Steamboat. Thereis no one to sell them. Ghosts do not peddle souvenirs."

  Luis chuckled at his own joke. "You have a good head, Mr. Brant. I willthink about this. Perhaps you will think some more, too, and we willcompare notes later. Will you come to visit me again?"

  "We'll come," they promised.

  Outside in the brilliant sunlight, Rick said to Scotty, "You bet we'llgo to see him again! How did you like his idea about the ghost town?"

  "It can be reached from Careless Mesa," Scotty pointed out. "I wish we'dknown it was a ghost town. We could have explored it some afternoon."

  Rick said what had been on his mind since Luis made his suggestion. "Ithink we'd better pay it a visit."

  "When?"

  "What's the matter with right now?"

  "Nothing, I guess. But why the rush?"

  Rick wasn't sure himself. "Maybe there isn't any rush. But on the otherhand, maybe there is. Look, we've kind of assumed Mac and Pancho are inon this, haven't we? Well, their movements must be pretty well known, atleast while they're at work."

  "They have to check their truck in and out. Why?"

  "Let's talk about it over a coke. It's hot."

  They hiked to the recreation hall and got cokes from the automaticdispenser. Rick set his thoughts in order.

  "I'm not so sure about Mac and Pancho. They were at Careless Mesa thismorning. At least I'm certain Mac was, because I heard his voice when hechecked in by radio. And probably Pancho was, too, because it takes twomen to handle a radar unit. One of them might have been able to sabotagea rocket, although I doubt it, but how could they take advantage of theconfusion to steal the transistors when they're not even on the base?"

  Scotty finished his coke and banged the bottle on the table foremphasis. "Okay. They couldn't. But why are you so sure they couldn'tsabotage a rocket?"
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  "I'm not sure," Rick replied. "But now that I've seen how the baseworks, it seems to me that only someone who works on the rockets couldsabotage one."

  "Careful," Scotty said with a groan. "You're dumping the only suspectswe have."

  Rick grinned ruefully. "I know it. Anyway, we have to keep moving, evenif it means starting all over again. So let's start at Steamboat."

  "Okay. And just for the fun of it, I'll check the vehicle board. Itwon't hurt to know how much time Mac and Pancho have spent off the basein their truck. Suppose I gas up the jeep and meet you at the barracks?"

  "I'll check out with Pegasus. Will you have any trouble?"

  "No. Everything just about closes down the day of a shoot. I'll be therein ten minutes."

  The boys parted at the door of the recreation hall and Rick started backto the barracks. As he passed the main administrative building, JohnGordon fell in step.

  "If I knew you two, I'd be mighty proud of both of you," the scientistsaid whimsically. "You for the job you did with Gee-Gee last night, andScotty for pulling that fireman out this morning."

  Rick smiled his thanks. "Anything new?"

  "Not so far. Tom Preston is having the warehouses checked, just in case.But it's a terrific job going through an inventory item by item."

  "Can you find out if the clerks leave the warehouses during a shoot?"Rick asked.

  "Tom has already gone to work on that. I'll find a way to let you know.Keep in touch, Rick."

  Rick continued on to the barracks, mind churning with confused thoughts.If only they had a few hard facts to work on! There wasn't a singledefinite clue to anyone. And, after last night, how could he suspect anyof the dedicated, hard-working rocketeers? Impossible to imagine thatanyone who had worked so hard on one of the projects could deliberatelysabotage it. Yet, there was no other answer. No one outside thetechnical and scientific staff would have the opportunity or knowledge.

  "At least," he concluded ruefully, "if we assume it's someone with readyaccess to the projects, we've cut down the size of the haystack. We'relooking for one man out of only about five hundred!"