The Counterfeit Mystery

by Norvin Pallas

  “Nothing up there, except a lot of old cobwebs. It’s just an old attic. But it looks like the squirrels did get in up there. I don’t suppose the family ever went up there, except perhaps to adjust the blades when they needed fixing. Listen to them.”

  Once more the blades seemed to be straining in the slight breeze. It gave the whole dusty, deserted place an eerie feeling. This old mill, picturesque though it might be, could hardly be described as cozy. It was too big and empty, too far from everything, placed thousands of miles away from where it really belonged, The boys looked through the downstairs rooms, and then found a door leading to the basement. It wasn’t a full basement, but a mere dugout where vegetables had probably been stored. Anyway, there was nothing there for them to see. They came up again in a few minutes, and stepped outside into the bright sunshine.

  “Now what?” asked Nelson.

  “I don’t know,” Ted mused. “Mr. Masters certainly went to an unnecessary lot of trouble in order to call attention to that upstairs room. I wonder what he expected us to find?”

  “There wasn’t anything there,” Nelson reminded him.

  “I know, but—Hey!” Ted suddenly pounded his hands together. “Remember that tramp? He was there.”

  “Sure he was,” said Nelson practically, “but he’s gone now. You didn’t expect him to sleep there for a week, did you?”

  “No, not that,” said Ted excitedly. “What I mean is that he was there before us. Maybe he found whatever there was to find first, and took it with him.”

  “Found what?” asked Nelson skeptically.

  “That’s exactly what I’d like to know.”

  “Then what did that letter writer want us to come out here and find it for, if it’s gone already?”

  “How does he know it’s gone? He may have planted it here weeks ago. He couldn’t know that the tramp found it first.”

  “Well, maybe,” said Nelson, scratching his head. “But if there was something here, and a tramp did take it, what good does it do us now? It’s just as good as gone forever.”

  With this Ted could hardly help but agree. Still, he didn’t like to quit if there was still a chance.

  “Where do you suppose that tramp went, after we scared him out of here?” he asked.

  “Where would any tramp go? To the railroad, of course.”

  “And then where?”

  “Well,” said Nelson with a laugh, “the tracks only go two ways, so I suppose he went either one way or the other.”

  “That’s not hard to figure out. But how did he go? Hop a freight, or shanks’ mare?”

  “He couldn’t have hopped a freight along here very well, could he? There’s no freight yard around. He must have walked here, stopped at the mill for the night, and when we disturbed him, continued on to wherever he was going.”

  “And where was that?”

  “To the nearest freight yard, probably. And by this time he might be a thousand miles away. It’s almost time for the tramps to start moving south, anyway.”

  “Yes, I know,” Ted mused. “But I’m not so sure it had to happen that way. There’s a lot of comradeship among these tramps. They get to know each other, eat together, exchange information. I wonder if this tramp couldn’t have been heading for a nearby hobo camp? If he did, even if he’s gone by now, he may have left some traces.”

  “Sure, and just where is the nearest hobo camp?”

  “I don’t know, but I know somebody who would—Ken Kutler.”

  “O.K.,” Nelson went on, “so you find out where the hobo camp is, and then what do you do? You think you can just go down there and poke around, and they’ll tell you everything you want to know? From what I’ve heard, they’re a pretty close-mouthed bunch.”

  “Well, we can handle that when we come to it. If we don’t learn anything, what are we out?”

  “I’m not certain,” Nelson murmured, “but you sure do drag me to the darnedest places. Well, I’ve never visited a hobo camp before, and it might be interesting. Maybe I’ll like it so well that I’ll never come back. When do you want to call Ken?”

  “At the next drugstore.”

  “That’ll be a quarter. Wait till we reach the other side of Forestdale and you can call for a dime.”

  Ted smiled. Nelson had some rather peculiar ideas of economy and would actually have circled out of their way in order to save a little on the call.

  “We’re on this side, remember? There’s a place. Let me off.”

  A few minutes later Ted returned to the car. “He knew where it was, all right. A place called Hoboville, and it’s along the tracks, about ten miles down. What do you say we take a run down there tomorrow morning? Don’t wear your best clothes—and don’t bother to shave.”

  “Don’t worry about me,” Nelson agreed. “I’m not due for another shave for five days yet.”

  “Good. Oh, yes. Ken said one thing more: ‘Say hello to the professor for me,’ and then he laughed and hung up before I could ask him about it. I wonder what he meant?”

  CHAPTER 16

  THE SEARCH FOR THE PROFESSOR

  “It should be along here.” Nelson consulted his road map. “The fellow at the station said it wouldn’t be on the map, but here’s the ravine he told us about.”

  “That looks like a dirt road, coming up ahead,” Ted observed, “just beyond that line of trees. Did he say how far down the road the camp is?”

  “About a mile. This road goes to an old stone quarry, but he said you can’t miss the camp. Kind of a dense underbrush, with a lot of little shacks scattered through there. He was kind of curious what we were going there for, but I didn’t tell him anything.”

  “That’s good—since you didn’t have much to tell him anyway. Just that we’re looking for a mysterious professor, and what a professor is doing in a place like that I wouldn’t know.”

  “They must just call him that,” was Nelson’s opinion. “Well, here’s the road. Hold on!”

  This last advice was good, for the dirt road was heavily rutted and Nelson was obliged to reduce his speed considerably. They had not gone far before they saw a man trudging along, going in the same direction they were.

  “Want to offer him a lift?” asked Nelson.

  “Why?”

  “Why not? He might be able to give us a little information. Anyway, it won’t hurt to have a friend in this place.”

  While this man wasn’t the sort of passenger they would ordinarily pick up on the open road, they reasoned that since they were heading into the hobo camp anyway, if one man was dangerous, then the whole idea of visiting the camp was crazy.

  Nelson drew up a little ahead of the stranger and called out, “Want a ride, mister?”

  The man looked up and smiled. He was a young man, not the older, tough, hobo type they had expected to find. His clothing was rough, and he certainly hadn’t shaved for several days, but he looked quite intelligent.

  “Sure,” he agreed. “Sometimes it’s that last mile that gets you.”

  He climbed in beside them. There was no need for either to ask the other where he was going, since there was only one place for the road to go.

  “Nice weather,” he remarked, as though to ward off any questions about himself.

  They knew better than to ask any personal questions, but thought they might be able to get away with some general ones, such as “Where can we find the professor?” They Were going to have to start asking that question soon, and there seemed no better time to begin.

  “Do you know someone called the ‘professor’?” asked Ted.

  “The ‘professor’?” His manner became more guarded. “I know lots of professors—or I did once.”

  He was clearly going to be difficult. “No, I meant a professor out at the hobo camp.”

  “A professor in Hoboville?” the tramp countered blan
kly. “What would a professor be doing in a place like that?”

  This was a question they couldn’t answer, and wouldn’t have felt like answering even if they could.

  “Of course we don’t know whether he’s a real professor,” explained Ted patiently. “It may be just a nickname.”

  “Lots of fellows have nicknames,” the tramp mumbled. “Fact is, nearly everybody out there’s got a nickname of some kind. They don’t care much about telling their real names. It isn’t that they’ve got anything to hide; they just want people to let them alone. That’s why they took up hoboing in the first place.”

  He spoke of hoboing as though it were quite a respectable and normal occupation. Meanwhile, Ted realized, he had skillfully diverted them from their questions concerning the professor. Ted was determined not to be outwitted.

  “A camp like this one—Hoboville, you called it—doesn’t it usually have a person in charge?”

  Their passenger looked vague. “I wouldn’t know about that. Everybody’s on the move pretty much. Maybe there’s one fellow stays around more than the others; maybe there isn’t. I never paid much attention to that, and I don’t think you ought to, either.”

  In spite of their slow speed they were nearing the hobo village. If they didn’t get some information out of him before they got there, Ted felt they never would. But how could they appeal to him to tell them what they wanted to know?

  “Draw up on the side a minute, Nel,” Ted suggested. Ted turned to the tramp once more. “Look, we’re not tied up with the police or anything like that. We’re just out for a little information, and we think maybe the professor could help us.”

  “What kind of information?” asked the tramp quickly.

  “Well, it’s kind of hard to explain. We think a certain tramp may have picked up a package—by mistake—and we’d like to know what it contained.”

  “If you don’t know what was in it, what business is it of yours?” the tramp queried.

  “Well, we think it’s our business,” Ted explained, “but if it turns out that it isn’t, then that’s all right, too. Somebody left a package for us to pick up, and by the time we got there it was gone.”

  “Then why don’t you ask that somebody?” the man suggested.

  “We can’t very well. We don’t know who it was.” The explanation was becoming more involved, and it looked as though they weren’t going to find out anything. There was no use explaining to the tramp they weren’t even sure there was a package.

  “You say you don’t know who left the package, or what was in it, and you aren’t sure whose package it is. Maybe the guy who found it has as much right to it as you have.”

  “That’s right, he may,” Ted agreed. “In that case he can keep it.”

  “He can keep it? Looks like he’s got it already. Say, do you birds know any newspapermen?”

  “Well, a couple,” Ted admitted, “but we’re not here for a newspaper story.”

  The tramp shook his head. “Newspapermen are almost as bad as cops. You know what I think? You look like two nice fellows, coming from good homes and everything. I think the best thing you could do is forget about all this, turn around, and go straight home. You might be fooling around with something you don’t understand.”

  “Can’t you just tell us if there is somebody called the ‘professor’?” asked Ted.

  “If there was somebody named the ‘professor,’ and you were supposed to know who he was, then you’d know. If you don’t know, it’s because you aren’t supposed to know. I’m new here, and I’m not going to stick my neck out. But I still say you’d better go home. You won’t get anywhere around here asking questions. Nobody’ll tell you anything.”

  “Well, we’ll try it, anyway,” Ted said with a sigh, and Nelson started up the car again.

  They could see the end of the road up ahead, and wondered if they had missed the village altogether, when their passenger told them to stop.

  “Right here. Thanks for the lift. You can come up to my shack for a minute, if you want to.”

  They didn’t see any shack, and partly out of curiosity they followed their strange passenger. He led them down a narrow, hardly marked woodland path, made a couple of turns at unexpected points, and presently they almost stumbled upon a rude lean-to, cleverly concealed among the underbrush.

  “All the comforts of home,” Nelson muttered sarcastically, for the shack certainly wasn’t much to look at. Its materials were of the poorest sort, its workmanship crude. Still, to somebody it was home, and probably a big improvement over sleeping out in the cold and wet. It had a stovepipe sticking out the roof and a bucket of water with a dipper outside the door.

  When they followed the man inside, they found a rough fireplace where the simplest kind of cooking was possible, a table, and a stool, and something that vaguely resembled a bed. For all its lack of elegance, it wasn’t the worst place in the world, and they could imagine that even in the dead of winter a person might hole up here and be quite snug.

  “Is this yours?” asked Ted.

  “In a sense, yes. I just pulled in yesterday. It’s mine for as long as I want it. Then I’ll be on my way, and somebody else will use it.”

  Once more they couldn’t avoid the feeling that there was some directing hand guiding the affairs of this encampment, but their host had refused to answer their questions about the professor, and they didn’t know where else to turn for information.

  “Well, I guess we’ll stroll along,” said Ted, after a few minutes. “I don’t see anyone else around. Think we could find a couple of other residents if we scouted through this brush?”

  “If you don’t see them, it’s because you aren’t supposed to,” the tramp warned. “I’d advise you to be on your way. However—” He shrugged, to show that he was going to accept no responsibility for what they did next. Maybe that was the whole trouble with these fellows, Ted thought—they didn’t want to be responsible for anything.

  After leaving the hut, they started down another trail. They followed the most unlikely turns, until presently they came upon another shack, very similar to the one they had just left.

  “Must have had the same contractor,” Nelson joked in a low voice.

  At first they thought there was no one at home, but upon hearing them, a grizzled old man came out and motioned them to be on their way. Ted started to speak, but the man shook his head and continued his motions. Making one more futile attempt, Ted finally decided it was useless, and the boys retreated along the path.

  “I guess our friend was right,” Ted remarked. “Nobody’s going to tell us anything. Well, it was a good idea, while it lasted.”

  “This is getting screwy,” Nelson remarked. “First we were looking for a lost town; then a waterfall people can’t locate; next a package that may not exist; and now it looks like we’re hunting for a mythical man.”

  “Oh, he exists all right,” said Ted with conviction. “Ken said so, and Ken knows. But he’s about the most elusive character since Kilroy. Well, I don’t see any help for it. Off we go, no wiser than when we came.”

  They returned to the car and drove off slowly. Twenty minutes later, when they were several miles along the main highway, Nelson chanced to ask Ted for the road map, lying on the seat beside him. When Ted reached for it, he gave an exclamation and held up a grimy wallet.

  “Something our friend must have dropped. Think it’s all right to look in it?”

  “Sure. Why not? You always look in a wallet you find, to see if you can find who it belongs to.”

  While it was true they knew to whom this wallet belonged, they didn’t know his name. Ted unfolded the wallet. There was no identification inside of any sort, nor was there any money in the bill compartment. At first Ted thought it was entirely empty, but upon exploring one of the pockets more fully he shook out a piece of metal—probably a lucky piece�
��and a little clump of hair followed. The hair was blond and curly—probably a girlfriend’s.

  “There’s sometimes a secret compartment in those wallets,” Nelson reminded his friend.

  “I know. I’m looking for it.” It took only a few moments more for Ted to discover the secret of the hidden compartment. He opened it and whistled. “Hey, pull over and take a look at this!”

  Nelson did, and whistled, too. “Holy mackerel! How much is in there?”

  “Over three hundred dollars. I never saw a hundred-dollar bill before—and I don’t see very many of these fifties, either.”

  “That’s some load of money for a tramp to be carrying around. I always thought some of those guys weren’t as poor as they tried to pretend. Do you think he stole it?”

  “Can’t say. Maybe not. As far as we know it’s his own money, and it’s up to us to return it to him. You can’t blame him for not flashing money like that around. He probably travels in some pretty questionable company. Well, let’s turn around and head back. I’ve got a feeling somebody’s going to be very, very happy to see us.”

  “You can say that again,” Nelson agreed, as he turned the car around and headed them back toward Hoboville.

  CHAPTER 17

  A NIGHT IN HOBOVILLE

  Their hobo friend was indeed glad to see them. He was looking very disturbed until he noticed their approach. Then he greeted them with a smile.

  “Find it?” he asked. “I wasn’t sure exactly where I dropped it, but I figured it was probably in the car.”

  “Yes, we found it,” Nelson assured him, and handed the wallet over.

  “Well, I’m surely glad to get that back,” said the tramp in relief. He held up the lucky piece. “I got that from my mother. I can’t say it’s brought me very much good luck so far, but then, who can tell? Maybe I would have had a lot worse luck without it.”

  Apparently no one was going to say anything about the money in the secret compartment. The boys weren’t going to mention it, and the tramp evidently was hopeful they hadn’t found it. A certain anxious air betrayed the fact that he was eager to get off by himself for a moment to check the wallet.