She produced two papers from inside her waist.
I must confess that, at first glance, I saw nothing
remarkable.
“The first one looks,” said Tish, “like
a grocery order. It’s meant to look like
that. It’s relieved my mind of one thing—McDonald’s
got no wireless or he wouldn’t be sending cipher
messages by an Indian.”
It was written on a page torn out of a pocket notebook
and the page was ruled with an inch margin at the
left. This was the document:—
1 Dozen
eggs.
20 Yards fishing-line.
1 pkg. Needles—anything
to sew a button on.
1 doz. A B C bass hooks.
3 lbs. Meat—anything so
it isn’t fish.
1 bot. Ink for fountain pen.
3 Tins sardines.
1 Extractor.
Well, I could not make anything of it; but, of course,
I have not Tish’s mind. Aggie was almost
as bad.
“What’s an extractor?” she asked.
“Exactly!” said Tish. “What
is an extractor? Is the fellow going to pull
teeth? No! He needed an e; so he made
up a word.”
She ran her finger down the first letters of the second
column. “D-y-n-a-m-i-t-e!” she said
triumphantly. “Didn’t I tell you?”
Well, there it was—staring at us.
I felt positively chilled. He looked so young
and agreeable, and, as Aggie said, he had such nice
teeth. And to know him for what he was—it
was tragic! But that was not all.
“Add the numbers!” said Tish. “Thirty-one
tons, perhaps, of dynamite! And that’s
only part,” said Tish. “Here’s
the most damning thing of all—a note to
his accomplice!”
“Damning” is here used in the sense of
condemnatory. We are none of us addicted to profanity.
We read the other paper, which had been in a sealed
envelope, but without superscription. It is before
me as I write, and I am copying it exactly:—
I shall have to see you. I’m
going crazy! Don’t you realize that this
is a matter of life and death to me? Come to
Island Eleven to-night, won’t you? And
give me a chance to talk, anyhow. Something has
got to be done and done soon. I’m desperate!
Aggie sneezed three times in sheer excitement; for
anyone can see how absolutely incriminating the letter
was. It was not signed, but it was in the same
writing as the list.
Tish, who knows something about everything, said the
writing denoted an unscrupulous and violent nature.
“The y is especially vicious,”
she said. “I wouldn’t trust a man
who made a y like that to carry a sick child
to the doctor!”
The thing, of course, was to decide at once what measures
to take. The boat would not come again for two
days, and to send a letter by it to the town marshal
or sheriff, or whatever the official is in Canada who
takes charge of spies, would be another loss of time.
“Just one thing,” said Tish. “I’ll
plan this out and find some way to deal with the wretch;
but I wouldn’t say anything to Hutchins.
She’s a nice little thing, though she is a fool
about a motor boat. There’s no case in
scaring her.”
