Freddy and the Flying Saucer Plans (10 page)

But though the spies lurked and thought, neither activity brought results. Not until the slender man with the small neat beard had an idea. It was probably the first idea that any of the spies had had. Mostly they just hung around and watched for Freddy and hoped they could get him alone in a dark cellar where they could bang him on the head until he told them where he'd hidden the plans. This gave them lots of time to think, but their thinking was a pretty poor grade of thinking and until this man—Penobsky was his name—had his idea, nothing that was worth trying had come to the surface.

Penobsky realized that his idea wasn't a very good one, but it was all he had, and so he acted on it. He had lived in America a good many years. When he was twenty he had joined the Communist party, more because red was his favorite color than for any other reason. Also he liked to go to meetings and applaud. It made him feel that he belonged to something.

This is a very important feeling to have, but it would have been better for him if he had joined something whose purposes he understood, like Rotary or the Salvation Army. After a while he began to feel this dimly himself. So having saved a bit of money—he was a plumber, which is a well-paid profession—he went abroad to find out.

When he came back a few years later he didn't know any more than he had before. But the Communists had supposed that he knew what they were up to because he was so enthusiastic, and so they didn't try to explain. It is always a lot of trouble to explain something that you don't understand yourself. And—because it is always easy to be enthusiastic about something you don't understand—Penobsky kept right on being a Communist.

Also he had been offered a job as a spy. And as he felt that this was a step upward in the social scale, he put away his plumber's tools, washed his face and hands, grew a small neat beard, and took it.

Penobsky knew from watching the jail that the sheriff and a good many of the prisoners always went to the local ball games. But he had never seen Freddy leave the jail. On the Saturday after he got his idea, the Tushville team was coming over to play a double-header against Centerboro. He shaved off his beard, bought a secondhand bag of plumber's tools, put on a pair of dirty overalls, rubbed a lot of black grease into his hair and over his face and hands, and walked boldly up to the jail and rang the bell. None of the other lurking spies recognized him, so they didn't interfere.

“Sheriff asked me to stop by,” said Penobsky to Louie the Lug, who opened the door. “Leak in the hot-water line.”

“I don't know nuttin' about it,” said Louie.

“It's in the bathroom,” said Penobsky.

“There's twenty bat'rooms in dis jail, chum,” Louie said. “Dis ain't no cheap flea bag. Every guy's got his own private bat'room, even sheriff's got one.”

“O.K., your highness,” said Penobsky, “let's see 'em all.”

So Louie showed him through the jail. He went into all the bathrooms and turned faucets on and off and whacked pipes with a hammer. Most of the prisoners weren't home; those that were said they didn't have any leak. He didn't stay long in any of the bathrooms; he was looking for Freddy, and at last he found him.

Freddy was lying on his bed, reading. He said he felt it was his duty to read during his spare time, to improve his mind. He was reading a book on the lives of famous bandits. Of course some books improve the mind more than others. There was a tap on the door and he said: “Come in,” and Louie brought in the false plumber. “Dis guy's lookin' for a leak in de hot water.”

“Haven't got any leak,” said Freddy.

Penobsky had recognized Freddy immediately. “Better be sure,” he said, and started for the bathroom.

“But I tell you—” Freddy began. Then he stopped and wrinkled up his nose. “Perfume!” he thought. “That's the terrible perfume from my water pistol. How could this guy … Golly, if he shaved off his beard and dirtied his face …” Then he said: “Come to think of it, there is a little leak, back of the tub. Better take a look.”

As Penobsky passed the bed to go into the bathroom the smell came stronger. This was certainly the spy he had squirted with perfume in Uncle Ben's shop. Freddy thought furiously for a minute. “If I was in his place, what would I do? I guess I'd get rid of Louie, and then I'd tie me up and twist my arm until I told him where the plans were. Yeah, only I don't want my arm twisted. And if I just handed 'em to him, he'd smell a rat.”

His thoughts were interrupted by a call from the plumber. “Boy, I'll say you've got a leak!” And as they looked in the door, sure enough, water was squirting out of the hot-water faucet and hitting the ceiling. “Better go down cellar and shut off the water,” Penobsky said to Louie, “or we'll flood the jail.”

“Louie, you stay right here,” Freddy said. He had no intention of being left alone with a probably cruel and merciless spy. On the other hand, the spy must somehow be kept from leaving. For an idea had come to Freddy and he thought it might work. He said to Louie: “This guy isn't a plumber. Not if he doesn't know enough to shut off the water before he takes a faucet off.”

“If dere ain't any leak, he makes one,” Louie said. “Maybe he is a plumber at dat—wants to make a job for himself.” Louie was smarter than he looked.

“I think he does, and he wants to make it in my bathroom because he's after me,” Freddy said. “He's a spy. So let's lock him up until the sheriff gets back.”

So they shoved Penobsky into the room named Fagin, and then, having turned off the water, went up and put Freddy's faucet on.

In the cellar, while turning on the water again, Louie said: “Hey, Freddy, you don't suppose dat plumber guy will escape t'rough de window, do you?”

The sheriff liked to please his prisoners, and so although there were iron bars on all the windows, he had had them fixed so the whole frame, bars and all, swung outward. He did this because the bars made some of the prisoners nervous—they said they made them feel shut in. Of course it looked all right from the outside, but as the sheriff knew, it's not pleasant to feel that you're shut in and can't get out. It was very thoughtful of him.

“He doesn't know about the windows,” Freddy said. “But anyway he won't try to escape; if he'd wanted to he'd have pulled that gun on us that was sticking out of his pocket.”

So when the sheriff came home Freddy took him up to see the prisoner.

The sheriff looked at him with distaste. “He's pretty dirty,” he said. “What charge you expect me to hold him on?”

“Impersonating a plumber,” said Freddy promptly.

“I
am
a plumber,” Penobsky said and showed them his union card.

“Well, then,” the sheriff began. He obviously didn't want to have this greasy and grimy creature in his nice clean jail.

“Carrying concealed weapons,” said Freddy. And he slid a fore-trotter into the man's pocket and pulled out a pistol.

The sheriff said reluctantly: “We-ell, I s'pose if he'll take a bath. And wash out the tub afterward—”

“I can't take a bath,” said Penobsky. “Against doctor's orders.” He was afraid Freddy would recognize him if he washed his face. He didn't know of course that the pig had spotted him by the perfume.

“Well, you can't stay in my jail unless you do,” said the sheriff.

“It's honest dirt,” the man retorted.

“Well, there ain't any place for honesty in a jail. So we'll just let it go down the drain. I'll give you a choice; either you take a bath, or I'll have the boys give you one. With yellow soap and a scrub brush.”

“There ain't any bathroom with this room,” said the man sullenly.

Here was the opportunity that Freddy had been watching for. He looked meaningly at the sheriff. “He can use my tub if he'll scrub it out. And if he'll mop up the mess he made in there monkeying with the hot-water faucet.”

The sheriff said all right, and when Penobsky had gone into Freddy's bathroom and shut the door, the pig took the sheriff out into the hall. “Look, sheriff,” he said, “don't give this guy that single room. Put him in my room, there's two beds there.”

“Got one of your ideas, hey?” said the sheriff with a grin.

“Yeah,” said Freddy. “If it works I'll tell you about it in the morning.”

CHAPTER

10

It took Penobsky several hours to degrease himself, and he still looked streaky. But he cleaned up the tub and the floor before he came out of the bathroom. He still smelt faintly of the terrible perfume, though now he was quite recognizable as the dapper spy, even without the beard. But Freddy pretended not to recognize him, and asked him questions about various kinds of plumbing fixtures—which of course he knew all about.

Freddy gave him no chance to try to get information out of him by torture. The water pistol was in its holster and he kept his hand on it as they talked. Penobsky eyed it warily; it was plain he didn't want another squirt from it.

Finally Freddy said: “As soon as it's dark, what do you say we sneak out of here?”

“Sneak out!” Penobsky exclaimed. “Out of a jail?”

“Sure,” said Freddy. “Look.” And he went to the window and swung out the frame in which the iron bars were set. “We just drop out and beat it.”

“For Pete's sake!” said the spy, who of course didn't know much about the Centerboro jail. “You known about this all the time?”

“Just noticed it this morning when I leaned on it. Well, what do you say?”

But the spy shook his head. “No, I guess not,” he said. “They can't do anything to me. You see, I got a permit for that gun. If I run away I won't get it back, and the sheriff might catch up with me and then he'd really have something on me. He'll have to let me out in the morning when I show him the permit.”

“Why didn't you show it to him when he pinched you?” Freddy asked.

“Do you know,” said Penobsky, looking surprised, “I never thought of it! Now can you beat that for absent-mindedness?”

If he did have a permit, Freddy knew perfectly well why he hadn't shown it. He wanted to be locked up here, close to the saucer plans. But he didn't say any more.

At supper the spy was introduced merely as a plumber who had been jailed for carrying concealed weapons. He was quiet and didn't talk much, and afterwards went up to the room. Freddy stayed down playing games until bedtime. When he went up Penobsky was in bed, blinking and yawning sleepily. But his eyes didn't look sleepy.

Finally Freddy went to bed. He turned the light out, but he didn't pull down the shade, and the street light outside lit up the room so that they could see each other clearly. They lay on their sides, each in his own bed facing the other. The water pistol was in plain sight on Freddy's pillow, and he held it pointing straight at the spy. Penobsky, however, appeared not to see it. He lay with his eyes closed, and pretty soon he began to snore. So Freddy began to snore too.

Freddy lay quite still and snored. At first they were good full-bodied snores that would have done credit to someone five times as big. But gradually they grew softer and softer and finally stopped. But Penobsky's snores went on.

Then suddenly they stopped too. “Ha,” thought Freddy, “he's waked up. If he really was asleep. Now's the time for my sleep-walking stunt.”

Every now and then Mr. Bean would have a spell of walking in his sleep. Once he had come out late at night in his night clothes and had dashed about the barnyard, banging on the doors of the stable and the cow barn and the pig pen and the other buildings, and shouting: “Get up! To arms! The British are coming!” The animals thought he'd gone crazy, of course, and none of them let out a peep; but Mrs. Bean had come out in her old blue bathrobe, and instead of yelling at him, had gone quietly up to him and put her hand on his arm and said: “Better come back to bed, Mr. B.” And he had gone as quietly in.

He didn't remember anything about it the next morning, but he said at breakfast that he had dreamed something about being Paul Revere.

Freddy had remembered that, and another time when he had heard a noise in the night and had looked out and seen Mr. Bean, in his long white nightshirt and the nightcap with the red tassel, walking across the barnyard with his eyes shut and his arms held straight out in front of him, he had gone out and said quietly: “You'd better go back to bed, Mr. Bean.” And Mr. Bean had turned around and gone, still with eyes shut and arms stretched out.

So now Freddy got up, and without trying to be specially quiet or anything, with his fore-trotters held out in front of him and his eyelids nearly shut so that he could just see, walked around the room a couple of times, muttering to himself, then went to the post at the foot of Penobsky's bed where the plans were hidden, unscrewed the knob, and took them out.