The answers only partially satisfied Ma Harper. Evidently she was afraid that Penny might be an investigator, for she debated a moment. Then she said: "You wait here until I talk to someone."

"But I really must be leaving."

"You wait here, I said!" Ma Harper snapped. "Maybe you're okay, but I ain't takin' no chances on you getting me into trouble about these stockings. Wait until I talk to Joe."

Leaving Penny on the balcony, she went out by way of the front living room door. After it had closed, there was a sharp little click which made the girl fear she had been locked in.

The truth was quickly ascertained. The door was locked. For an instant, Penny was frightened, but she told herself she was not really a prisoner.

There were windows she could unfasten, and another door at the rear of the house.

Intending to test it, she went quickly through the kitchen. Voices reached her ears. Evidently Ma Harper and the two men were standing close to the door, and although speaking in low tones she could hear most of the conversation.

"The girl may be all right, but I think she was sent here to spy!" Ma reported. "If we let her go, she may bring the police down on us!"

"And if you try to hold her here, you'll soon be in trouble!" one of the men answered. Penny thought the voice was that of Clark Clayton. "You and this petty stocking business of yours! We warned you to lay off it."

"Sure, blame me!" Ma's voice rose angrily. "The truth is, you're getting scared of your own racket. I was sellin' stockings and makin' a good, safe income until you come along and talked my husband into lettin' you store your loot in our bas.e.m.e.nt. Well, I've made up my mind! You're gettin' the stuff out of here tonight, and you're not bringing any more in!"

"Okay, okay," growled Sweeper Joe. "Just take it easy, and quit your yippin'. We'll move the stuff as soon as it gets dark. Fact is, we've made a deal with a guy that runs a junk shop near the factory. He's offered us a good price. We had to play along slow and easy to be sure he wasn't tied up with the cops."

"What about the girl?" Ma demanded. "If I let her go, she's apt to get me into hot water about those stockings."

"That's your funeral," Joe the Sweeper retorted. "If you'd handled her right, she wouldn't have become suspicious."

The discussion went on, in lower tones. Then Penny heard Ma say:

"Okay, that's the way we'll do it. I'll think up some story to convince the girl. But that bra.s.s must be out of here tonight! Another thing, you can't sell the lantern that simpleton, Adam Glowershick, stole from the _River Queen_."

"Why not?" Sweeper Joe demanded. "There's good bra.s.s in it."

"You stupid lout!" Ma exclaimed, losing patience. "That lantern is known to practically every person along the waterfront. Let it show up in a p.a.w.nshop or second hand store, and the police would trace it straight to us. You'll have to heave it into the river."

"Okay, maybe you're right," the factory worker admitted.

Penny had learned enough to feel certain that bra.s.s, stolen piecemeal from the Gandiss factory, had been stored in the Harper bas.e.m.e.nt. Even more astonishing was the information that the trophy taken from the _River Queen_ also was somewhere in the house.

"If the lantern is thrown into the river, no one ever be able to recover it," she thought. "If only I could get it now and sneak away through a window!"

Penny's pulse stepped up a pace, for she knew that to venture into the bas.e.m.e.nt was foolhardy. She listened again at the door. Ma and the men still were talking, but how long they would continue to do so, she could not guess.

"I'll risk it," she decided.

The bas.e.m.e.nt door opened from an inside wall of the kitchen. Penny groped her way down the steep, dark stairs but could find no light switch.

The cellar room was damp and dirty. As her eyes became accustomed to the dim light which filtered in through two small windows, she saw a furnace surrounded by buckets of ashes and boxes of papers and trash. A clothes line was hung with stockings and silk underwear.

Penny poked into several of the boxes and barrels. All were empty. Then her gaze focused upon another door, which apparently led into a fruit or storage room. It was padlocked.

"The bra.s.s is locked in there!" she thought, her heart sinking. "The lantern too! How stupid of me not to expect it."

Without tools, Penny could not hope to break into the locked room. There was only one thing to do. She must get away from the house, and bring the police!

Starting up the stairs, she stopped short. An outside door had slammed.

In the room above she heard footsteps, but no voices.

Frightened, Penny remained motionless on the bas.e.m.e.nt stairs. She could hear Ma Harper tramping about, evidently in search of her, for the woman muttered angrily to herself.

"I don't dare stay here," the girl thought. "I'll have to make a dash for it."

Penny reasoned that in reentering the house, Ma Harper probably had left the front door unlocked. What had become of the two men she did not know, but she would have to take a chance on their whereabouts.

Noiselessly, she crept up the stairs to the kitchen door, opening it a tiny crack. Though she could not see Ma, footsteps told her that the woman had stepped out onto the balcony overlooking the river.

"This will be as good a chance as I may get," she reasoned.

The door squeaked as she opened it wide enough to slip through. Unnerved by the sound, Penny moved swiftly across the kitchen to the living room.

"So there you are!" cried Ma Harper from the balcony.

Penny threw caution to the winds. Darting across the room, she jerked at the outside door. It opened, but on the porch, facing her, stood Sweeper Joe and Clark Clayton!

CHAPTER 18 _OVER THE BALCONY_

Panic-stricken, Penny's first thought was to try to dart past the men.

But she realized that to do so would be impossible. Warned by Ma Harper's excited cries, they had moved into position to completely block her path.

"Stop that girl!" shouted Ma Harper, bearing down, upon her from the direction of the river balcony. "She's from the police and sent here to get evidence!"

Whirling around, Penny ran back toward the kitchen, with the woman in pursuit. She did not waste time testing the rear door, for she already knew it to be locked.

However, opening from the kitchen was another closed door which appeared to give exit. With no time to debate, Penny jerked it open and darted inside.

Instantly, she saw that she had made a serious mistake. She had entered a small washroom and had trapped herself. And Ma Harper was practically upon her.

Penny did the only possible thing. She slammed the door and turned the key in the lock. For a moment at least, she was beyond reach.

"I've really trapped myself now!" she thought, recapturing her breath.

"What a mess! If I had used my head this wouldn't have happened."

Penny sat down on the edge of the bathtub to think. Already Ma Harper was pounding and thumping on the flimsy wooden door panel. The door rattled on its hinges.

"You open up or I'll break down the door!" the woman shouted furiously.

"You hear me?"