The Firebug

  CHAPTER XI JOHNNY GETS A TIP

  "Johnny," began the Chief as Johnny entered the office late thatafternoon, "there's a man in town I want you to watch. I want----"

  Suddenly he paused to stare at the swollen side of Johnny's head. "Whohit you?" he asked.

  "I--I got a bump there." Johnny did not wish to tell the Chief about hisisland experience. He was afraid the Chief would not like his goingagainst advice; and besides, if something came of this little excursion,something really big, he felt that he had a right when the time was ripeto spring it as a surprise. He was truly relieved when the Chief did notpress the question.

  "As I was about to say," the Chief resumed, "there's a man come to townrecently, a man I want you to get in touch with if you can. That is, Imean locate and shadow him. The fact that he wasn't here at the time thisseries of fires started doesn't necessarily prove that he hasn't a handin them. The brains of a gang is not always on the spot all the time.

  "This man," he leaned forward in his chair, "is credited with a dozen bigblazes in New York, and now he's come to Chicago.

  "He's been credited with them but, shrewd as the New York police are andpersistent as were the insurance patrols, not one of these fires has beensurely pinned on him. So here he is in Chicago.

  "His name is Knobs Whittaker; at least Knobs is what he goes by. Thereason for the name is that on each side of his bald head, well above hisears, is a sort of knob. You've seen cattle that had their horns treatedwhen they were calves and had no horns to speak of--just knobs?"

  "Yes."

  "Well, his knobs are like that."

  "Sort of a dehorned Devil?"

  "Exactly that, from what I hear."

  "There," said the Chief after fumbling about in the pigeon holes of hisdesk, "is the address where he was last seen. He was seen entering thedoor that leads up the stairs to the second floor. I wish you'd go overthere this morning and give the place the once over. You may see Knobs,though I doubt it. Anyway, fix the building in your mind and find out allyou can about it."

  "Right," said Johnny as he pocketed the slip of paper handed to him.

  The place, he noted, was on Randolph near Franklin, not five blocks fromhis own room.

  "Right down town," he thought to himself. "Lot of wholesale shops inthere; shoes, plumbing goods, machinery, and the like. Very respectableplace. You wouldn't look for anything queer in there; but then, you nevercan tell."

  In this conclusion Johnny was right.

  The building to which he had been directed, and where Knobs had last beenseen, proved to be a narrow four-story structure with a small squarehallway at the front. On the right side of this hallway one might readthe names of the occupants. On the first floor was a manufacturingchemist; on the second a wholesale diamond merchant; on the third apublisher of cheap juvenile books; and the fourth had been taken over bythe National Novelty Company, whatever that might be.

  Johnny was studying this board and beginning to wonder in a vague sort ofway if the top floor had been taken over by Knobs and if he thought hisbusiness of setting fire as being in a way a distinct novelty, when abroad shouldered, smooth shaven man of neat appearance alighted from thesmall elevator and, as men will do, removed his hat to dust his bald headwith a silk handkerchief.

  Johnny took in the top of that head at a glance. With great difficulty hesuppressed an exclamation of surprise. Above each ear there was adistinct, glistening knob.

  With the greatest of effort he tore his gaze from the man and, leapinginto the elevator, called hurriedly:

  "Third floor."

  He had taken the elevator because he did not wish to fall under thesuspicions glance of that man. He had chosen the third floor because hewas quite sure books were safe; this notorious firebug would have nothingto do with them.

  "So that," he thought to himself as the elevator crept upward, "isKnobs!"

  He found himself tremendously impressed by the appearance of the man. Hehad personality, which is more than one may say of most of his kind. Helooked dangerous, a square-jawed villain who would stop at nothing.

  Because he had been so greatly impressed and also because Knobs had twicebeen seen in the building, Johnny made a careful survey of the premises.The diamond merchant's place on the second floor, he discovered, was wellwired with a noted burglar insurance company's apparatus.

  "I don't wonder at that," he told himself. "With such men as Knobs about,it's highly necessary."

  On the third floor he found a hallway leading to a back window. Thewindow looked down upon the roof of a two-story building.

  "One could reach that roof at a leap if he found it necessary," he toldhimself.

  He had not expected to find the Novelty Company open for business. Theyweren't.

  "Guess that's about all I can discover for this time," he concluded as heonce more entered the elevator and dropped to the ground floor.

  The Chief was well pleased with his report. "Johnny," he said, "you'dmake an inspector, give you time. There's one thing you wouldn't know,though, so I'll tell you. A chemist's establishment or a drug store isone of the most dangerous risks an insurance company can take. That'sbecause if it gets on fire it goes up like a flash. There are likely tobe dangerous fumes that drive the firemen back, and perhaps an explosion;too many chemicals about and in time of fire they raise the very deuce!

  "You don't understand why that is, eh? Well, that's because you're nochemist. I've dabbled into it a bit, and you'd better when you get time.It pays to know a little about many things, and a lot about one thing.That's what makes a useful citizen out of a man.

  "I'll tell you about those chemicals. There's always lots of chloridesand sulphur about a chemist's shop. If the chlorides are heated at allthey give up oxygen, and oxygen will make anything burn--a wrought-ironpipe or a steel crowbar. The sulphur mixes in and that makes a fire thatnothing can stop. It laughs at water. As for chemical engines, it givesthem the roaring Ha! Ha! When a fire like that burns out it don't muchmatter what you had in the beginning; all you've got in the end is ashes,and mighty fine ashes at that."

  Johnny listened to this lecture with intense interest. When it was overhe sat in a brown study from which he emerged to exclaim:

  "That's queer!"

  "Nothing queer about it," protested the Chief, "just nature takin' hercourse, that's all."

  "That's not what I meant," said Johnny. "I meant it was queer thatthere'd be a diamond merchant's place above a chemist warehouse. Queercombination, don't you think?"

  "Yes, queer enough, but you do get some queer ones. Diamond merchant hashis fire insurance, though, the same as others. Rate would be high; butlow rent probably makes up the difference. Besides, chemists' places arenot as dangerous as they used to be; there are laws regulating the amountof the dangerous stuff they may keep in any one place."

  "Are inspections frequent?"

  "Not as frequent as they should be."

  "Honest inspectors?"

  "I don't know. That doesn't come in my department."

  There the discussion ended, but Johnny pondered long over that diamondmerchant's place above a chemist's shop. In the end, however, he forgotit to think of his flat-bottomed boat and the marsh south of the city. Hehad promised to take Mazie out there late this afternoon. She hadlistened eagerly to the story of his adventure out there, and had saidshe thought the place must be "perfectly bewitching."

  Johnny was not so sure about that. He had a wholesome awe of the placesince that shot.

  "But of course," he had said at last, "that fellow just happened to runacross me before I left the city, and followed me out there. There'd beno danger a second time--no danger at all."

  So in the end he had promised to go. They planned to take their lunchalong, to arrive about an hour before sundown and to stay for a look atthe moon rising over the marsh.