The House on the Cliff/Chapter 6
CHAPTER VI
Snackley
At that moment the farmer's wife appeared, bringing a drink of hot ginger and water, which the man on the couch gulped down gratefully.
"We'll put him in the spare room, Mabel," decided the farmer. "He needs a good warm bed more'n anything else just now. I'll look after him, if these boys here will help me."
"I―I think I was shot―" muttered the stranger. He motioned weakly toward his side.
Frank leaned over.
"Why, there's blood on his coat!" he exclaimed.
A hasty examination showed that the stranger was right. There was a bullet wound in his right side. It was evidently not serious, merely a flesh wound, but it had bled freely and the man was weakened.
Gently, the boys helped removed his clothing, and with warm water and a sponge the farmer bathed the wound. The bullet had passed right through the fellow's coat after searing a path across his side. Disinfectant was then applied, the stranger gritting his teeth with pain, and after that the bandages were put in place.
"Now we can put him to bed. Can you walk, stranger?"
The man made an effort to rise, and then fell back weakly upon the couch.
"I'm afraid―I can't!"
"All right, then, we'll carry you. Give me a hand with him, lads."
Between them, they carried the wounded man upstairs into a plain but comfortably furnished room. Here he was put to bed and covered with warm blankets. With a sigh of relief, he closed his eyes.
"He's weak from loss of blood. That's mostly what's the matter with him," the farmer said. "We'll let him have a good sleep."
They left the room, and when they went out into the kitchen again the Hardy boys told the farmer and his wife of the strange adventure they had just been through. The farmer listened thoughtfully.
"Queer!" he observed. "Mighty queer!" Then, glancing significantly at his wife, he said: "What d'you think of it, Mabel?"
"I think the same as you, Bill, and you know it. Most like it's been another of them smuggling mix-ups."
The farmer nodded. "I've an idea it's somethin' like that."
"Smuggling!" exclaimed Frank.
"Sure! There's quite a bit of smuggling goes on around Barmet Bay, you know. Leastways, there has been in the past few months. That's been my suspicions, anyway. I've seen too many motorboats out in the bay of late, and I've heard too many of 'em prowlin' around at night. If it's not smugglin' it's some other kind of unlawful business."
"Do you think this fellow may have been shot in some kind of a smugglers' quarrel?"
The farmer shrugged. "Maybe. Maybe. I ain't sayin' nothin'. It ain't safe to say anythin' when you don't know for certain. But I wouldn't be a mite surprised."
Mr. and Mrs. Kane, as they introduced themselves, were just about to have dinner, and they invited the Hardy boys to stay. This the lads were glad to do, as they were very tired by their exertions of the morning, and were already feeling the pangs of hunger.
They sat down to the simple but ample meal, typical farm fare of roast beef and baked pork and beans, with creamy mashed potatoes, topped off with a rich lemon pie, frothy with meringue, and fragrant coffee. During the meal they discussed the strange affair of the bay. The Hardy boys did not mention their experiences at the Polucca place, for they had learned that one of the chief requisites of a good detective is to keep his ears open and his mouth shut and to hear more than he tells. At that, one mystery was enough for one dinner.
"I'd like to find out more about this affair," said Frank, when the meal was concluded and Mr. Kane sat back luxuriously in his chair and puffed at his pipe. "Perhaps that fellow is awake now."
"Wouldn't do any harm to see. You might ask him some questions. I'm just as curious about it as you are yourself."
They went upstairs. The stranger was sleeping when they looked into the room, but the slight noise they made awakened him and he gazed at them dully.
"Feeling better?" Joe asked.
"Oh, yes," replied the stranger weakly. "I must have lost a lot of blood, though."
"That was when they shot at you just before the boat blew up," said Frank.
The man in the bed nodded, but said nothing.
"What's your name, stranger?" asked Mr. Kane bluntly.
The man in the bed hesitated a moment.
"Jones," he said, at last.
It was so evidently a false name that the Hardy boys glanced at one another, and the farmer scratched his chin doubtfully.
"How come you to be in such a mess as this?" he asked, at last. "What were they shootin' at you for?"
"Don't ask me, please," said the mysterious Jones. "I can't tell you. I can't tell you anything."
"I suppose you know these young fellers saved your life?"
"Yes—I know—and I'm very grateful. But don't ask me any questions. I can't tell you anything about it."
"You won't even tell them? Not after they saved your life?"
Jones shook his head stubbornly.
"I can't explain anything about it. Please go away. Let me sleep."
Frank and Joe signaled to the farmer that it would be best if they withdrew, so they left the room and closed the door. When they went back downstairs the farmer was grumbling to himself.
"I'm hanged if he ain't the most close-mouthed lad I've ever seen!" he declared. "You saved his life and he won't tell you why he come to be racin' around the bay in a motorboat with fellows shootin' at him."
"He must have some good reason. It's his own business, after all," reflected Frank. "We can't force him to explain anything."
"He's in with them smugglers, that's what he is!" declared Mr. Kane with conviction.
"I guess we had better be getting back home. Do you mind keeping him here? We can have him moved to a hospital."
The farmer shook his head.
"Smuggler or not, he stays here until he gets better. Nobody ever said Bill Kane turned a sick man out of doors, and nobody ever will. He stays here until he gets better."
"We'll come back in a day or so and see how he is getting along," Joe promised.
"He'll have the best of care here. Whether it's smugglin' or not that he's been mixed up in, it doesn't matter. My wife and I will look after him."
The Hardy boys arranged to have the rowboat returned to its mooring place, then took their leave of the good-hearted farmer and his wife and made their way out to the road. Then they went back to the place where they had left their motorcycles, and in a short while were speeding again on their return to Bayport.
"That fellow is certainly a queer stick," remarked Joe, as he and his brother motored toward home.
"I'll say he is!" answered Frank. "There's something mighty queer about all this, and don't you forget it!"
It was mid-afternoon when they turned their motorcycles into the driveway beside the Hardy home, and after they had put the machines in the garage they went into the house. They found their father, Fenton Hardy, in his den just off the library. He was never too busy to talk to his sons, and when they came in he put down the papers he was studying and leaned back in his chair.
"Well, what have you two been up to to-day?" he inquired, smiling.
"We've had a real adventure, this time, dad," Frank told him. "We were out to the old Polucca place with some of the fellows."
"That's the haunted house, isn't it? See any ghosts?"
The boys looked at one another. "No, we didn't see any ghosts, exactly," said Joe. "But—"
"You don't mean to tell me you heard some!" Fenton Hardy threw back his head and laughed with delight.
"You may laugh; but some mighty queer things happened out there," insisted Joe.
Whereupon the brothers told their father of the strange experiences at the deserted farmhouse. But Mr. Hardy refused to take them seriously.
"Some of your school chums playing a joke on you," he said, dismissing the affair. "They'll be laughing their heads off about it right now."
"But how do you account for the tool boxes being robbed?"
"They just did that to make it a little more mysterious. Probably they will hand you back your tools at school on Monday, just to prove their story."
This aspect of the situation had not occurred to the boys. They began to look a bit sheepish. If it had been the work of practical jokers it was only natural that they would seek something definite whereby to prove the fact that they had been at the farmhouse.
"Gosh, we'll never hear the end of it, if that's the case," sighed Joe. "Oh, well, we'll just have to take it in good part. But we didn't tell you about what happened on the way home. Tell him about it, Frank."
"Another adventure?"
"A real one. No practical joke about this."
Frank thereupon told their father about the two motorboats in Barmet Bay, about the chase and the resulting explosion. He modestly underestimated their own part in the rescue of the victim of the wreck, but Fenton Hardy nodded his head in satisfaction as the story went on.
"Good work! Good work!" he muttered. "You saved the fellow's life, anyway. And it looks as though you've stumbled on a mysterious bit of business in that motorboat chase. What did the man say his name was?"
"Jones," answered Frank doubtfully.
Fenton Hardy raised his eyebrows. "Of course—there are lots of Joneses in the world. It might be his real name. But more than likely it isn't. Would he tell you anything about the reason for the chase? Did you question him?"
"He wouldn't tell us anything at all. We made a few inquiries, but he said he couldn't explain."
"Still more mysterious," reflected the detective. "Do you think he will talk when he gets better?"
"I'm afraid not. He seemed quite determined not to tell us anything about himself or about the men who were chasing him."
"Don't you remember, Frank?" exclaimed Joe. "When we brought him into the house, just as he became conscious again. What was it he said?"
"Oh, yes! I had forgotten. He said, 'Snackley got me, the rat!' Whatever that meant."
"Snackley!" exclaimed Fenton Hardy, starting up. "Are you sure he said Snackley? Are you sure that was the name?"
"I'm certain. Aren't you, Joe?"
"Yes, that was the name, all right."
"Well that does give us something to work on," the detective said. "Probably you have never heard of Snackley, but I have."
"Who is he?" asked Frank.
"Ganny Snackley is a noted criminal. He is a smuggler—one of the leaders of a ring of smugglers who bring in opium and other drugs from the Orient. Is it possible that he is bringing drugs into the country at Barmet Bay?"