Robert Arthur - The Mystery of the Talking Skull

Bob grinned. Pete’s face was a study in conflicting emotions. He didn’t want to be left out of anything, no matter how much he protested.

“Oh, we’ll come with you,” Pete said. “The Three Investigators stick together. Maybe it won’t take long and we can still go scuba diving.”

“In that case, the meeting is adjourned,” Jupiter stated. “Let’s go.”

Leaving word with Titus Jones that they would be gone for a while, they bicycled into Rocky Beach. The Jones Salvage Yard was situated on the outskirts of the small city, but it did not take long to reach the centre of town where Police Headquarters was located.

They parked their bikes and entered, to be greeted by the officer in charge behind the big desk.

“Go right in,” they were told. “The Chief is waiting for you.”

They went down a short hall to a door marked Chief of Police , knocked, and entered. Chief Reynolds was seated behind his desk, puffing thoughtfully on a cigar. He waved them to chairs.

“Sit down, boys,” he said. They sat and waited expectantly. The Chief took another puff on the cigar before he spoke.

“Well, boys,” he said then, “I’ve had some interesting answers to my questions about that fellow Spike Neely. He was Gulliver’s cellmate in prison for a time, as you know. It seems that Spike was a bank robber.”

“A bank robber!” Jupiter exclaimed.

“Exactly.” Chief Reynolds nodded. “In fact, he was sent to prison for robbing a bank in San Francisco six years ago. He got away with about fifty thousand dollars in bills of large denominations. He was eventually caught, about a month later, in Chicago. An alert teller in the bank had noticed when he demanded the money that he had a slight speech defect — had trouble pronouncing the letter L. This tripped him up when a policeman in Chicago questioned him.

“However, and this seems to be the big point, the money was never recovered. He hid it and hid it well. Nobody could even get him to admit he had stolen it. Undoubtedly he planned to leave it hidden until he got out of prison and then recover it.

“Now let’s take this whole thing step by step. Six years ago, Spike was captured in Chicago, about a month after the bank robbery. He probably hid the money in Chicago, but he could have hidden it right here in the Los Angeles area.

“You see, the police learned that before he went to Chicago he spent a week hiding in the home of his sister in Los Angeles. Her name is — Mrs. Miller — Mrs. Mary Miller. She was questioned at the time, but she couldn’t tell the police anything helpful. She’s a very respectable woman. Until the police came, she never even knew her brother was a bank robber.

“Thinking that Spike might have hidden the money in her house before he went to Chicago, the police searched it thoroughly. They didn’t find anything. As he arrived there the same day he pulled the robbery up in San Francisco, he must have had the money with him. So the official theory is that Spike hid the money in Chicago.”

“In the letter he wrote to Gulliver a year ago, he mentions a cousin, Danny Street, in Chicago,” Jupiter put in. “Could he have left the money with him?”

“The prison authorities thought of that, Jupiter. As you suspected, they read the letter to Gulliver very carefully before they mailed it. In fact, they wired Chicago to investigate Danny Street. But the Chicago police couldn’t find anyone named Street who had the slightest connection with Spike Neely.

“They finally decided the letter was harmless, so they mailed it. First, they analysed it in every way for a secret message, but they couldn’t find any.”

“Neither could I,” Jupiter admitted. He was pinching his lips to put his mental machinery in high gear. “Just the same, I deduce that some other criminals, learning of the letter, suspected it actually did tell where the money is, somehow. So they took to shadowing The Great Gulliver. That’s when he got frightened and disappeared.”

“Or was killed,” Chief Reynolds said gravely. “I think it’s plain that Gulliver never found the money. But someone may have tried to make him tell where it was, and got angry when he wouldn’t—because he couldn’t. On the other hand, he may have just taken alarm and gone into hiding, leaving his trunk behind.”

“He must have suspected Spike Neely was trying to tell him something.” Jupiter was thinking hard. “Otherwise why would he hide the letter? Let’s suppose he just disappeared. Then these other criminals, who are still around, read in the paper of my buying Gulliver’s trunk. They believed that there might be a clue to the stolen money in the trunk.

“That first night, they tried to steal it but were foiled because Uncle Titus had hidden it. Then they took to following me around. They were watching the salvage yard, figuring how to get their hands on the trunk, when they saw us sell it to Maximilian the Mystic. So they followed Mr. Maximilian, forced his car off the road, and stole the trunk.”

“They sure wanted that trunk badly!” Pete exclaimed. “I’m glad we got rid of it in time.”

“You really should have brought the trunk to me,” the Chief pointed out.

“We suggested that, sir, to Mr. Maximilian,” Jupiter answered. “He wouldn’t hear of it. He wanted the trunk. And of course we didn’t know anyone would actually injure him to get it. Besides, we couldn’t find any clue in it.”

“Well, what’s done is done,” Chief Reynolds said. “But all this talk has been leading up to a very important point. We’re agreed, aren’t we, that these criminals think there’s a clue to the missing money in that trunk?”

The boys all nodded.

“Well,” the Chief continued, “now the crooks have the trunk. They’ve searched it carefully. They haven’t found any clue. So what do you suppose they think now?”

Jupiter caught on first and swallowed hard. Seeing that Pete didn’t get what the Chief meant, Bob burst out, “They think we found the clue and took it out of the trunk before we sold it to Mr. Maximilian! They think that we — that we still have the clue to all that money!”

“But gleeps!” Pete objected. “We don’t! We don’t know a thing!”

“I know that,” the Chief said. “And you know that. But if these fellows think you have the clue — well, they might still come round and try to force you to give it to them.”

They thought about this. It wasn’t a pleasant idea.

“You mean we could still be in danger, Chief?” Jupiter said at last.

“I’m afraid so.” Chief Reynolds spoke seriously. “So I want you to keep alert. If you see anyone who looks suspicious hanging around the salvage yard, call me at once. Or if anyone gets in touch with you about the trunk, let me know. Will you do that?”

“We certainly will!” Bob promised.

“There’s one problem,” Jupe said, frowning. “A lot of strangers come to the salvage yard as customers. It’s hard to tell if any of them are suspicious. But if we notice anyone who does seem suspicious, we’ll notify you immediately.”

“Be sure you do,” said Chief Reynolds.

In a very thoughtful mood, The Three Investigators left Police Headquarters and rode back to the salvage yard.

“More and more I like this whole business less and less!” Pete exploded. “I don’t want any tough characters thinking we have a clue we don’t have. There’s no telling what they might do. People like that don’t listen to reason.”