The Avenger 31 - The Cartoon Crimes (11 page)

“That figures,” said Early.

“It does?” said Smitty. “You mean, Early, you got some idea about why Harmon is acting so goofy?”

“Do you think we ought to confide in—” began Thompson.

A smile touched Early’s face. “Ha,” he said. “This time I’m one jump ahead of you boys. In the past, on more occasions than I want to enumerate, you and the Avenger have been very lucky. You’ve beaten me to the punch. Not this time around, Smith. Ah, no.” He paused to rub his hands together. “You don’t know that Wayne Harmon has been using the
Wonderman
strip to communicate messages to foreign agents. Didn’t know that, did you? And what is more, it was Thompson and I who—”

The bedside phone began to ring. Nellie went over and answered it. “Good morning, Lewing residence. Yes, he is. Hang on.” Holding the receiver toward Agent Early, she said, “For you.”

“Hello, Early here. What? He did what? Wait, Allen, you’re . . . He did, though?” Early’s head bent low. “Whole gang of them, you say? Yeah, I see. But are you sure they . . . Head man signed a full confession? Yeah, sure. Be right down. Got something to tell you, anyway.” He hung up, not looking at anyone.

“What’s happened, sir?”

“Avenger’s picked up some people,” said Early.

“Who?”

“Seems to be the whole blasted sabotage ring,” said Early in a faraway voice. “Except for Harmon. Let’s go, I want to have Allen put as many men as he can on Jeanne Lewing’s kidnapping.”

“I’m going to tag along, Early,” said Smitty. “You wouldn’t mind giving me a lift? We had to hitch home to here in the back of a potato farmer’s pickup truck.”

Early poked his cheek out with his tongue. “Okay, we’ll take you along, Smitty,” he said after a moment. “But you have to promise not to gloat.”

“Gloating ain’t my style,” Smitty assured him.

“Now I know you did something to this bunch,” accused Lieutenant Allen.

The Avenger leaned forward in his chair. “I didn’t hear that last.”

“I said I’m sure you doped this last batch of guys you brought in.”

Benson looked shocked. “Whatever makes you think that, Lieutenant?”

The prisoners were off in one of the questioning rooms. Benson, Josh, and Cole were sitting around the policeman’s office.

“All you have to do is look at them,” said Allen. “They’re google-eyed, punch-drunk, and—”

“Need I remind you, Lieutenant,” put in Cole, “that a punch is the basic cause of the well-known punch-drunk appearance? We did engage in fisticuffs with these vaga—”

“Yeah, I know that.” Allen pressed his fingertips against his desk top. “Why don’t you simply tell me what you slipped them and why?”

Cole turned to Josh. “What did he say?”

“Didn’t catch it.”

The lieutenant stood up. “Now listen to me,” he said in a voice that was almost loud. “Don Early may humor you guys, but when you’re in my bailiwick, I want you—”

The door opened. Don Early, his tan raincoat draped over his arm, came in. “Your point,” he said to the Avenger.

Smitty and Thompson followed. “We got a mess back at the Lewing household,” Smitty announced. “This guy—”

“Smith,” said Lieutenant Allen, “I’ll thank you to sit down and keep quiet.”

“I’m sure you would, Lieutenant,” said the giant. “The thing is, this Harmon guy kidnapped Gil’s wife and we ain’t got, to my way of thinking, time for a lot of talk.”

“What?” said the policeman. He frowned in Early’s direction. “You didn’t tell me anything about—”

“I did say I had something to discuss with you,” said Early. “That was it. Apparently Wayne Harmon has made off with the Lewing woman.”

Cole spread his hands apart and pressed them together. “Wayne Harmon? Why, he seemed as nice and honest and freckled as the boy next door. What a surprise this is.”

The Avenger stood up. “How long ago was the girl taken, Smith?”

The giant was still watching Cole, a puzzled expression on his broad face. “We ain’t sure. See, Nellie and me, after her car got blowed up, had to . . . But I can fill you in on that later,” he said. “The important thing is, Harmon swiped her.”

“What about Gil Lewing?” Lieutenant Allen asked Early. “Is he in on it?”

“He’s unconscious,” replied the government agent. “Harmon drugged him.”

“I still don’t quite trust that Lewing guy,” said Allen.

“He’s really unconscious, Lieutenant.”

“What’s Harmon’s motive?” said the policeman.

“Harmon is part of the espionage ring,” said Early.

“Heavens to Betsy,” said Cole. “That nice young chap . . . a spy?”

Lieutenant Allen came around from behind his desk, heading for the door. “I’d better get out descriptions of Mrs. Lewing and Harmon. What kind of car is he driving, do you know?”

“He was driving a green four-door sedan,” said Smitty. “Last time I saw him in a car, that is. See, with all the fog last night—”

“I’ll check with the motor vehicle boys.” Allen left them.

Before the door had completely closed, Benson had crossed to it. “We’ll be going,” he said.

Smitty, still puzzled, looked at his colleagues one by one. “Don’t you think we ought to stick around here and ask them spies you caught some questions?”

“Why, Smith,” said Cole, “it was you yourself who burst in here and suggested action.”

“Yeah, well, asking those bozos questions might be action, too.”

“Come along, the game’s afoot,” said Cole. He tossed a mock salute in Early’s direction. “Until we meet again.”

When all the Justice, Inc., teammates were gone, Early turned to Thompson. “They know something,” he said.

“Yes, but what?”

“That’s what I’d like to know.”

Smitty cracked his knuckles. “You all look like the cat who ate the thingamajig,” he said as their car sped along the morning road. “I got the feeling it wasn’t no surprise to you, the announcement that Wayne Harmon is one of the spies.”

He and Josh were sitting in the back seat. The black man said, “Lieutenant Allen guessed right, Smitty. We used a little truth gas on those babies.”

“The result was,” said Cole from the driver’s seat, “a good deal of hitherto unknown information. One of the choicest tidbits being the news that Gil Lewing was nursing not an assistant but a viper in his bosom.”

The Avenger said, “It seems the whole lot of them had given up the idea of driving Lewing crazy in order to gain control of his strip. They were now planning to kidnap his wife, to use her as a lever to force him to cooperate.”

“Yeah, I heard about how they was sending secret messages through the funny papers or something,” said the giant. “All seems kind of screwy to me.”

“Plans often seem screwy when they go awry,” said Cole. “Had it but worked, Smitty—”

“Okay,” the big man said. “So you got these guys to sing. I still don’t see why we hotfooted out of the police joint and are now barreling back to the Lewing house.”

“I have a feeling that Harmon, who was aware of all the details of the upcoming kidnapping and was going to play a part in it, will go ahead and use some of the original elements,” said Benson.

“Maybe so,” said Smitty. “Yeah, that’s right. He don’t know all his pals are in the jug, or that they spilled any beans to us.”

“The gang had prepared a hideaway,” said the Avenger. “Some place to keep the Lewing girl while they tried to negotiate with Gil Lewing. It’s not a bad place to hide, and I’m betting Harmon took her there anyway.”

“Yeah, where?”

“It’s one of a series of small islands off the tip of Long Island. Once privately owned, it’s been abandoned since before the war. There are some buildings still standing there, though, and a usable dock.”

Smitty nodded. “So why are we going to Lewing’s house instead of this island right off?”

“I want to arrange for a nurse to look after Lewing, if he’s still unconscious,” said Benson. “And I need Nellie with us.”

“What for?” asked Smitty.

“To fly the plane,” answered the Avenger.

“They’ll find your car,” said Jeanne.

The old motor launch chuffed across the blue water.

“Shut up, dear,” said Harmon. “You know, you’re still usable with a few welts and bruises on you. So keep quiet.”

He’d tied her hands and feet before tossing her into the boat and starting off from the private pier. No one had been around, no one to see what he did, no one to call to for help.

“By now they’ll be searching all of Long Island,” persisted the girl. “They’ll be sure to check that old shed.”

Harmon let go the wheel. The launch went wobbling along as he stepped back and slapped her across the face. “Now, Jeanne, please keep quiet.” He caught the wheel and got the boat back under control.

After a while Harmon said, “It’s really not a bad place, this island we’re going to. Though there are a lot of rats around. People sometimes picnic on the far side of the island, which is what attracted the rats in the first place. Used to belong to a millionaire. He had some sort of Swiss chalet built; you’ll be staying in what’s left of it. This millionaire hired one of the top illustrators of his day to come out and do murals all over the place. Must have been quite impressive once, all depicting events in the life of King Arthur. Trouble is, this painter used paints with egg yolk in them. The darn rats seem to love the stuff. They’ve been eating the pictures right off the walls for years. I’m not boring you, am I?”

Jeanne made no reply.

“I’m not boring you, am I, dear?”

“Not at all.”

“We’ll be spending a lot of time together, and I don’t want to bore you. Well, the next twenty-four hours, anyway,” said Harmon. “Then I’ll have to start making my moves to get myself out of the country in one piece. After today I’ll be leaving you alone on the island for a while. Just you and the rats. I wouldn’t worry, they’re probably scared of people. I don’t know, you hear such stories about rats . . . we’ll simply have to wait and see.”

The launch was drawing nearer to the island.

“You’ll like its name,” said Harmon. “It’s name is Grmm Island. That’s with two
m
’s. named after old Ogden W. Grimm. As I said, a millionaire and a patron of the arts. Maybe I’ll draw something on one of his walls. I’m sure the rats won’t mind.”

There were rats. Scruffy gray things, watching from the dry brush.

“They seem to be staying away from us, don’t they?” said Harmon.

He’d untied her feet, not her hands, so she could walk up through the tangle of briars and brush. It was hot, dusty.

“When I was a kid I used to like to visit my grandfather in Iowa,” said Harmon. “Didn’t know I was a farm boy at heart, did you? Did you?”

“It comes as a surprise.”

“Anyhow, what I really liked about that was he’d let me use his .22 rifle to pop off rats in the barn. Boy, did I get good at that. One summer I must have bagged about . . . well, here’s the chalet.”

The walls of the large brown wooden house were still standing, with much of the gingerbread trim. Very little of the roof was left, hardly enough to cover the main room. There was no glass left in the windows. Most of the red brick chimney had tumbled down. It was a pile now, with weeds and grass growing through it.

“Shame, isn’t it?” said Harmon, gesturing at the house with his gun. “Terrible what time does. Does it to people, too. Last time I visited my grandfather out there in Iowa, he was a wreck.” Using the gun barrel, he knocked on the door several times. “That’s for the rats. Want to scare the little beggars off.”

From inside the ruined house came skittering sounds, squeekings, scratching. A few of the gray rats came climbing out through the ruined windows.

Harmon laughed and took a shot at them. “Take that, you rats!”

The slug blew one of them to pieces. The rest tried now, desperately, to climb back into the chalet.

Harmon laughed again, pounded on the door, and then kicked it open. “More fun with a .22,” he said.

Some of the rats had been feasting on something in the moldy hallway.

Harmon kicked it aside, then reached back and pulled the girl into the house. “Not as fancy as the place you and Gil have, but still on the Sound.” He gave her a shove toward the living room.