Amazing Stories, Vol. 2, No. 1 — page 39: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

3 ™ 7 of ~ i a a Pe oe 7, aa -. a - Pn »* ‘oe a i es Z of -; eed EA Cae oe a! =) > Ve we i> + es Xa . a a a 5a. it a s mr me ke TN a ae fe '. os = YE ad =i . ~~ Pa. ‘ — »=> hye tes oe 59 + pas ; sharing his belief that the vault had been robbed, so very confident had he been. “T must be wrong,” he muttered. could I be?” He resumed his restless wandering about the room. Then he decided he would sit down and concentrate upon the thing. At one side stood a small box, labeled by the manufacturer “aluminum containers.” He would move that box around in front of the vault door and sit upon it and see if, by sheer will power, he could figure it out. But the box, when he laid hands upon it, did not budge easily. Goodwin frowned, exerted a little more strength, found it still immovable. His mind, still wrestling with the problem of where he had been deceived, abruptly centered upon the box. If, as its label indicated, it contained aluminum con- tainers, its weight should be inconsiderable. Yet it was heavy, decidedly so. He bent over to look at its nailed-on lid. Apparently the lid had at some time been pulled off and nailed on again. Empty nail holes gaped a half inch from the heads of the nails. Why he did it Goodwin himself probably could not have told, but he picked up a hammer lying con- viently near, and ripped off the board cover. The box, indeed, contained aluminum cans, but when he picked up one it was heavy. He pried off the lid. The next minute he had dashed into the experi- mental room. “Come here,” he cried. “I was right after all. The vault has been robbed. The platinum is out- side, at least four cans of it are, in a box labeled ‘empty containers.’ ” Captain Thompson was immediately in a state of great agitation and excitement. As custodian of the plant he could foresee trouble ahead for him when the time came for explanations and an accounting. He was determined to open every box in the place to see how much platinum there was. Barry restrained him. “The capture of the thief is the first thing,” he said, laying a hand upon the officer’s arm. “I can sympathize with you, can un- derstand your wanting to know the worst at once, old man, but to disturb these boxes is to warn the man we are after. We must leave them as they are for the present.” Voices on the Radio 1: bigs canbe ae the captain yielded. He was nervous as they returned to. the experimental room. He had just closed the door to the vault room and snapped its triple locks when a voice broke in on them. “Jim!” it cried, “Jim!” Yet not a person was to be seen. Except for themselves the room was empty. “Jim, Jim!” the voice kept on calling, apparently from the far side of the room. “Are you there, Jim?” Goodwin grasped Barry by the shoulder. “That voice,” he whispered, tense with excitement, “don’t you recognize it from the record I made, Barry? It is Porter. The platinum pirate. I would know it in a million.” The government man laughed, shook off the hand and stared in the direction from which the voice was coming. “Porter, yes,” he said, shortly. “But Porter, a mile away, fifty miles away, a -— ® > \ “Yet — how “5. ~~te oe a . . “ < @ . P pee” 7 a ~ - -, » » - e < . 1 ey, as ee yo ea Se . bn Ve Pte ee tet ae a 2 74 AMAZING STORIES “ih oe ey t S « Tee r She ota . OF 4 ae . *s = ee eS oe i So, = id oe ei ee af ate eee & a a ee, ? » aa es =e re ad ehh ee bi = A a . 7 hundred for all we know. He is talking by radio, to an accomplice, no doubt. While you were in the vault alone, Thompson here was showing me his radio receiving set. You interrupted us with your discovery of the platinum. Ah, he is gone,” as the voice suddenly ceased its imperative calls for Jim, whoever he might be. Goodwin leaped to the instrument, shouldering Barry aside. His hand seized the tuning knob, whirled it gently, manipulating it to first one wave- length, then another. The loud speaking device brought to their ears the whine of the static in the air, a bit of news bulletins being broadcast from some distant city, market quotations, two amateurs jamming the air with mere pifile. “There’s a chance, a bare. chance,” murmured Goodwin, tuning off from the lower wave-lengths upon which the amateurs and broadcasting stations work. And at six hundred meters he caught the voice again, calling “Jim, Jim,” then it was gone. He tuned in and tuned out at various wave-lengths catching the voice, losing it, catching it again. “I’m on to him,” he said. ‘“He’s running up and down, trying one length, then another, trying to locate Jim.” Finally the scientist caught up with him again at six hundred and fifty meters. “Jim! Where are you, Jim?” he had said and instantly a second voice broke in: “All right. Here I am. If you would stick on one wave-length long enough for me to get tuned-in properly there wouldn’t be any call for you to get excited.” Apparently Jim, whoever and wherever he was, was peeved. The high, nasal tones of the platinum pirate interrupted him. “I’ve been trying to get in touch with you for two days,” he said. “I’ve got an order for a thousand.” | Goodwin flashed a triumphant glance at Barry. The pirate had not been frightened off, then. He had fallen into the trap laid for him by the scientist. He was going to try to deliver that thousand ounces at a hundred dollars an ounce. But, if the scientist and the detective had their way and if Porter was planning on making a haul from the platinum in that vault yonder, he was due for the surprise of his life. Through the radio Jim had given an exclamation of surprise. “A thousand!” he cried. “Why, man, if we get away with this we’re fixed for life, rich. Gosh all fishhooks!” “I thought so at first,” said Thompson grimly. “T am positive now. Gentlemen, Jim is no other than Jim Elston, the electrician here. ‘Gosh all fishhooks’ is his favorite expression.” “Listen,” cautioned Goodwin. The pirate was talking again. “You will want to get a move on,” he said. “I'll be on hand tomor- row night, same old way. Midnight. Goodbye.” CHAPTER VIII Taking Finger Prints From a Bottle Which the Thief Had Used as a Missile LD PETER, night watchman in the building which housed the Jackson plant laboratories and experimental station, was found the next morning, with a fractured skull, lying half in and half out the door by which he would have quit _ EomIchoo - * f > aS ee ee! oe eee “SEC