Upon the pa.s.sage of the State prohibitory law every saloon in Riverbank had been closed and there had been growlings from the saloon element. Five of the leading prohibitionists had received threatening letters and, a few nights later, the houses of four of the five were blown up. Kegs of powder had been placed in the cellar windows of each of the four houses, wrecking them, and the fifth house was saved only because the fuse there was damp. Luckily no one was killed, but that was not the fault of the "dynamiters," as every one called them.

The town and State immediately offered a reward of five thousand dollars for the arrest and conviction of the dynamiters, and detectives flocked to Riverbank. Real detectives came to try for the n.o.ble prize. Amateur detectives came in hordes. Citizens who were not detectives at all tried their hands at the work.

For the first few days rumors of the immediate capture of the "ghouls"

were flying everywhere, but day followed day and week followed week, and no one was incarcerated. The citizen-detectives went back to their ordinary occupations, the amateur detectives went home, the real detectives were called off on other and more promising jobs, and soon the field was left clear for Philo Gubb.

Not that he made much progress. Each night he hid himself in the dark doorway of Willc.o.x Hall waiting to pick up (Lesson Four, Rule Four) some suspicious-looking person, and having picked him up, he proceeded to trail and shadow him (Lesson Four, Rules Four to Seventeen). Six times--twice by Joe Henry--he was well beaten by those he followed. It became such a nuisance to be followed by Philo Gubb in false mustache or whiskers, that it was a public relief when Billy Getz and other young fellows took upon themselves the duty of being shadowed. With hats pulled over their eyes and coat-collars turned up, they would pa.s.s the dark doorway of Willc.o.x Hall, let themselves be picked up, and then lead poor Detective Gubb across rubbish-enc.u.mbered vacant lots, over mud flats or among dark lumber piles, only to give him the slip with infinite ease when they tired of the game.

But Philo Gubb was back the next night, waiting in the shadow of the doorway of Willc.o.x Hall. He did not progress very rapidly toward the goal of the reward, but he counted it all good practice.

But being beaten twice in succession by Joe Henry aroused his suspicion.

Joe Henry ran a small carting business. He had three teams and three drays, and a small stable on Locust Street, on the alley corner. He was a great friend of Pie-Wagon Pete and he ate at the Pie-Wagon.

Philo Gubb, after leaving Mr. Medderbrook, had not intentionally picked up Joe Henry. On his way to the Pie-Wagon it had been necessary for him to pa.s.s the alley opposite Joe Henry's stable and his detective instinct told him to hide himself behind a manure bin in the alley and watch the stable. In the warm June dusk he had crouched there, watching and waiting.

Mr. Gubb could see into the stable, but there was not much to see. The stable boy sat at the door, his chair tipped back, until a few minutes after eleven, when one of Joe Henry's drays drove up with a load of baled hay.

Philo Gubb heard the voices of the men as they hoisted the hay to the hay-loft, and he saw Joe Henry helping with the hoisting-rope. The hay was water-soaked. Water dripped from it onto the floor of the stable.

But nothing exciting occurred, and Philo Gubb was about to consider this a dull evening's work, when Joe Henry appeared in the doorway, a pitchfork in one hand and the slab of pine in the other. He looked up and down the street and then, with surprising agility, sprang across the street toward where Philo Gubb lay hid. With a wild cry, Philo Gubb fled. The pitchfork clattered at his feet, but missed him, and he had every advantage of long legs and speed. His heels clattered on the alley pave, and Joe Henry's clattered farther and farther behind at each leap of the Correspondence School detective.

"All right, you explain," said Joe Henry sullenly.

"Now you ain't to breathe a word of this, cross-your-heart, hope-to-die, Philo Gubb. Nor you neither, Billy," said Pie-Wagon Pete.

"Listen! Me an' Joe Henry ain't what we let on to be. That's why we don't want to be follered. We're detectives. Reg'lar detectives. From Chicago. An' we're hired by the Law an' Order League to run down them gools. We're right clost onto 'em now, ain't we, Joe? An' that's why we don't want to have no one botherin' us. You wouldn't want no one shadowin' you when you was on a trail, would you, Gubby?"

"No, I don't feel like I would," admitted Philo Gubb.

"That's right," said Pie-Wagon Pete approvingly. "An' when these here dynamite gools is the kind of murderers they is, an' me and Joe is expectin' to be murdered by them any minute, it makes Joe nervous to be follered an' spied on, don't it, Joe?"

"You bet," said Joe. "I'm liable to turn an' maller up anybody I see sneakin' on me. I can't take chances."

"So you won't interfere with Joe in the pursoot of his dooty no more, will you, Gubby?" said Pie-Wagon Pete.

"I don't aim to interfere with n.o.body, Peter," said Philo Gubb. "I just want to pursoo my own dooty, as I see it. I won't foller Mr.

Henry no more, if he don't like it; but I got a dooty to do, as a full graduate of the Rising Sun Deteckative Agency's Correspondence School of Deteckating. I got to do my level best to catch them dynamiters myself."

Joe Henry frowned, and Pie-Wagon Pete shook his head.

"If you'll take my advice, Gubby," he said, "you'll drop that case right here an' now. You don't know what dangerous characters them gools are. If they start to get you--"

"You want to read that book--'The Pale Avengers'--I just gave you,"

said Billy Getz, "and then you'll know more."

"Well, I won't interfere with you, Mr. Henry," said Philo Gubb. "But I'll do my dooty as I see it. Fear don't frighten me. The first words in Lesson One is these: 'The deteckative must be a man devoid of fear.' I can't go back on that. If them gools want to kill me, I can't object. Deteckating is a dangerous employment, and I know it."

He went out and closed the door.

"There," said Pie-Wagon Pete. "Ain't that better than beatin' him up?"

"Maybe," said Joe Henry grudgingly. "Chances are--he's such a dummy--he'll go right ahead follerin' me. He needs a good scare thrown into him."

Billy Getz slid from his stool and ran his hands deep into his pockets, jingling a few coins and a bunch of keys.

"Want me to scare him?" he asked pleasantly.

"Say! You can do it, too!" said Joe Henry eagerly. "You're the feller that can kid him to death. Go ahead. If you do, I'll give you a case of Six Star. Ain't that so, Pete?"

"Absolutely," said Pie-Wagon.

"That's a bet," said Billy Getz pleasantly. "Leave it to the Kidders."

Philo Gubb went straight to his room at the Widow Murphy's, and having taken off his shoes and coat, leaned back in his chair with his feet on the bed, and opened "The Pale Avengers." He had never before read a dime novel, and this opened a new world to him. He read breathlessly.

The style of the story was somewhat like this:--

The picture on the wall swung aside and Detective Brown stared into the muzzles of two revolvers and the sharp eyes of the youngest of the Pale Avengers. A thrill of horror swept through the detective. He felt his doom was at hand.

But he did not cringe.

"Your time has come!" said the Avenger.

"Be not too sure," said Detective Brown haughtily.

"Are you ready to die?"

"Ever ready!"

The detective extended his hand toward the table, on which his revolver lay. A cruel laugh greeted him. It was the last human voice he was to hear. As if by magic the floor under his feet gave way. Down, down, down, a thousand feet he was precipitated. He tried to grasp the well-like walls of masonry, but in vain. Nothing could stay him. As he plunged into the deep water of the oubliette a fiendish laugh echoed in his ears. The Pale Avengers had destroyed one more of their adversaries.

Until he read this thrilling tale, Philo Gubb had not guessed the fiendishness of malefactors when brought to bay, and yet here it was in black and white. The oubliette--a dark, dank dungeon hidden beneath the ground--was a favorite method of killing detectives, it seemed.

Generally speaking, the oubliette seemed to be the prevailing fashion in vengeful murder. Sometimes the bed sank into the oubliette; sometimes the floor gave way and cast the victim into the oubliette; sometimes the whole room sank slowly into the oubliette; but death for the victim always lurked in the pit.

Before getting into bed Philo Gubb examined the walls, the floor, and the ceiling of his room. They seemed safe and secure, but twice during the night he awoke with a cry, imagining himself sinking through the floor.

Three nights later, as Philo Gubb stood in the dark doorway of the Willc.o.x Building waiting to pick up any suspicious character, Billy Getz slipped in beside him and drew him hastily to the back of the entry.

"Hush! Not a word!" he whispered. "Did you see a man in the window across the street? The third window on the top floor?"

"No," whispered Philo Gubb. "Was--was there one?"

"With a rifle!" whispered Billy Getz. "Ready to pick you off. Come! It is suicide for you to try to go out the front way now. Follow me; I have news for you. Step quietly!"

He led the paper-hanger through the back corridor to the open air and up the outside back stairs to the third floor and into the building.

He tapped lightly on a door and it was opened the merest crack.