Роберт Артур - The Mystery of the Screaming Clock

“Exactly,” Hugenay agreed. “My own conclusion. A trick lock opened by a special sound.”

“Now,” Jupiter said, “if you have the clock, we can try it out. I don’t think that business about holding hands or waiting for midnight means anything. It’s just atmosphere.”

“There is, unfortunately, a difficulty,” Hugenay said slowly. “The clock no longer exists. I took it apart looking for a hidden message engraved inside it. It won’t scream any more.” He sighed. “I did not anticipate this. It is one of the few times I have been guilty of a grave error. But it can’t be helped. The clock is gone.”

“Then,” Jupiter said, “I don’t know what we can do.”

“There is a way,” Hugenay said. “It is crude and I detest crudeness, but this time it is necessary. My men will open up all the walls in this room, including those behind the bookcases. If there is a secret cupboard or other hiding place we will find it.

“Fred,” he said to one of his men. “Go out to the car and bring in the tools. We have work to do.”

MR. CLOCK’S LIBRARY was a mess. It looked as if a bomb had exploded or a demolition squad had started to demolish the house. The latter was almost correct. Certainly Hugenay’s men had wrecked the room. They had attacked it with chisels, drills, axes and crowbars.

First they had removed all the books from the shelves, stacking them on the floor, and taken down the pictures and mirror. Then they had opened up the wails, methodically. They had examined every section of the room for an opening behind the wall. They had ripped down some of the bookshelves looking for a secret door, or a hidden closet. They had even attacked the ceiling until they found it was solid plaster.

All of their efforts had ended in failure. They hadn’t found anything remotely resembling a secret hiding place.

Hugenay looked angry as well as disappointed.

“Well,” he said. “We have failed. Bert Clock has hidden something so well I cannot find it. I would not have believed it possible.”

“Does that mean you can’t prove Harry’s father is innocent?” Jupiter asked.

“Not without finding the stolen pictures, boy,” Hugenay replied. “And as you can see, we have not found them. Unless you have some more ideas.”

Now Jupiter was pinching his lip. An idea was coming to him.

“Mr. Hugenay,” he said. “The clock is destroyed, but maybe the scream isn’t.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“There’s a man, a Mr. Gerald Watson, who has a collection of tapes of all the radio shows Mr. Clock did in the series, A Scream at Midnight . Each of them starts with a scream. Maybe this particular scream is recorded on one of the tapes. If it is and we can borrow the tape and tape recorder from Mr. Watson, we don’t need the clock.”

“Call him at once. Time is important!”

Jupiter went out and called Mr. Watson. Mr. Watson was puzzled at first, but he quickly recognized the scream Jupiter described.

“I know the very one you mean, yes indeed. My goodness, that scream made Bert famous, in an old film twenty years ago. Of course I have it on a tape. I can put my hands right on it. I’ll be glad to lend you the tape and the recorder, but I insist, you must tell me later what this mystery is all about.”

Jupiter promised and said a man would be right over and hung up. Bob and Harry and Mrs. Smith came out of the kitchen to listen, and were startled when they saw the mess in the library.

“Golly, Jupe, you’ve really wrecked that room!” Bob said. “Did you find anything?”

“Not yet,” Jupiter admitted.

“Why, it looks as if you’re trying to tear the house down!” Mrs. Smith exclaimed. “I’d never have given you permission if I’d known you planned to do so much damage!”

“We are looking for evidence that will prove your husband innocent,” Mr. Hugenay told her. “Do you wish us to stop without finding it?”

“Well, no, no, of course not,” Mrs. Smith answered, flustered. “If you can prove he’s innocent, I guess it’s worth any amount of damage.”

“We will try to do no more.” Hugenay made a little bow, and she seemed satisfied.

They had already dug into all the walls looking for a hiding place, so now there was nothing to do but wait. The man named Joe had gone in the car for the tape recorder, and in about an hour he returned, lugging the heavy machine.

“Here it is,” he said. “The old fellow put the tape on, so it’s all ready to roll.”

“Very well,” Hugenay said. He turned to Jupiter, “Do you know how to run this apparatus?” he asked.

“Yes, sir.” Jupiter opened the carrying case of the tape recorder, got out the electric connection, and plugged it in.

“Let’s put the room back the way it was,” he said. “I mean we can’t really do it completely, but let’s hang the pictures and the mirror and put some books back on the shelves.”

Hugenay started to protest, but reconsidered. “Do it, men,” he said, and they obeyed instructions. They rehung the mirror and pictures, arranged some of the books in the bookcases, and stepped back, waiting.

“Now, some action, please!” Hugenay said impatiently. “I think we are wasting time, but let us at least try.”

“Yes, sir.” Jupiter had been running the tape at low volume, listening to it while the men worked. He had located the place on the tape where the scream came, and wound the tape back.

“Now I’m ready,” he said. “Everyone please remain quiet.”

He started the tape and turned up the volume. There were a few words of conversation between a man and woman. Then the scream came, highpitched, desperate, and eerie. It rang through the room, and with a last despairing wail was silent. All of them waited for a secret door to open or a panel to pop out of the wall.

Nothing whatever happened.

“I knew it!” Hugenay exclaimed. “I tell you, boy, there’s no place in this room five valuable pictures could be hidden. No place!”

“I think there is, sir,” Jupiter said, with sudden eagerness. He had noticed something the men hadn’t and suddenly he thought he knew where the stolen pictures were hidden. It only remained to test his theory.

“Let’s try it again,” Jupiter said. “Perhaps the volume wasn’t high enough.”

He pushed the volume knob all the way round. Then he rewound the tape and started the scream once more.

This time it burst upon them as a screech of such terror that they put their hands over their ears. Up, up, up went the sound of the scream until it was almost unbearable.

Then it happened.

The glass in the large mirror on the wall cracked in a thousand pieces. Glass sprayed across the floor. In a second there was nothing left of the mirror but the frame and a few jagged pieces of glass sticking to it.

Where the mirror had been was a brilliantly coloured picture. As they watched, it curled forward and fell to the floor, followed by four more pictures that had been carefully sandwiched between the glass and the frame.

The purpose of the screaming clock was at last explained. Heedless of the broken glass, Hugenay darted forward to snatch up the first picture, an abstract consisting of whirls of colour against a black background.

“The pictures!” he exclaimed in triumph. “Half a million dollars’ worth, and at last I have them!”

At that moment, the library door opened, and a voice behind them said sharply, “Put up your hands! You’re all under arrest!”