Mystery Solved

The three of them jumped out of the car and approached the Ford. Walters looked it over, checked the license number and said, “This is it, all right.”

Ken threw open the door next to the steering wheel. “Hey, Paul, Walters,” he cried, “come here, quick.”

He was joined by his friend and the detective. “Look,” he muttered and pointed at the driver’s seat.

They looked. There on the seat lay a white card. Walters grabbed it and turned it over on both sides. It was a plain, white, blank card. “Can you beat that!” gasped Walters.

Paul took his own card out of his pocket and gave it to Walters. “Here,” he said, “compare the two.”

The detective made the comparison and announced, “Identical.”

Ken burst out laughing. The detective asked angrily, “What are you laughing at, you young pup?”

“Now it’s your mystery,” answered the boy. “You look for him and the next time you see him don’t close your eyes.”

[244]

“Trying to be smart,” countered the detective, grinning. “Well, I’ll have to start looking for him all right.”

Walters searched the front and the rear of the car but he found nothing suspicious. His investigation completed, he asked Ken to get into the Ford and follow him. The detective drove back to police headquarters where the stolen car was parked and the owner of it was notified.

Ken and Paul walked out of the police headquarters in high spirits. There was no particular reason for it but they thought it quite humorous that Walters was now involved in the mystery of the white card. And Ken didn’t seem to get tired of repeating, “From now on, perhaps he will get out of the habit of closing his eyes.”

And after he said it, he would laugh, assured that it was a very good joke. Paul said, “Forget it for a while. Which way are you going?”

“Which way are you going?”

“Well, I was on the way to the library when Walters picked me up. So I guess I will continue my trip to the library.”

“That suits me,” said Ken, “I’ll go along.”

Whistling, chatting, they walked along Main Street when Ken suddenly saw something that made him quickly alert.

Paul was eyeing a window display as he walked. He felt his arm pinched and he uttered a muffled cry. “Hey!”

[245]

Ken muttered, “Shsh! Look!”

Across the street was the man who looked so much like Mr. Wilson! The boys gasped. He was standing in the doorway of a three story apartment house. The ground floor was occupied by a haberdashery on one side and a shoe store on the other. The mystery man, with his wild, maniacal appearance, glanced both ways, then he walked off, heading north. Paul cried, “Come on. I’ll take care of him, Ken. You run into the hall of the building and see what he may have been up to.”

Ken rushed into the hall. He searched frantically and at last he found under the stairs a bundle of rags evidently soaked in gasoline or kerosene, in flames. The wall and the back of the stairs were already beginning to smolder. By some luck, there happened to be a pail of dirty water at the other end of the hall. He grabbed it and dashed the water on the fire. The flames were out in a moment. With the rags soaking wet, he wiped it across the smoldering wood.

Holding on to the rags, he ran outside and looked at the number of the building. At the curb he found a sheet of newspaper which he wrapped around the wet rags. And to make sure he did not forget the address, he wrote it down.

In the meanwhile, Paul had approached the man and took him under the arm. “Do you mind if I walk along with you?” he asked.

“Oh, no, no. No, not at all.”

[246]

“My name is Paul. What is yours?”

“Who, me? I have no name.”

“That’s too bad,” said Paul. “I thought everybody had a name.”

“Everybody except I,” was the answer.

Paul was at a loss what to do or say. On the spur of the moment, he remarked, “There is a man who wants to see you. I will take you to him.”

“That is very nice of you. Where is he?”

“Straight ahead, down Main Street.”

“That’s fine. Let’s hurry, because I don’t want to keep him waiting. I don’t like to keep people waiting.”

Just then Ken came running up and took the man by the other arm. Together they led the man to police headquarters and into the detectives’ room. Walters was there and as soon as he saw the boys and the man, he jumped to his feet. “Where did you get him?” he cried.

“He was looking for you,” said Ken, “so we thought we would bring him here.”

“Stop kidding, will you, and tell me what it’s all about?” demanded the detective.

The man stood there very innocently looking from one to the other. Ken removed the covering of paper from the rags and showed it to Walters. Paul said, “We saw him come out of the hall of a building....”

“357 South Main Street is the correct address,” said Ken, interrupting. “That bunch of rags was[247] in flames and the wall and the stairs were already beginning to smolder.”

“And so we brought him here,” concluded Paul.

The detective turned to the man. “What’s your name?” he demanded.

The man shrugged his shoulders and opened his arms in a gesture of complete ignorance. “Did you try to start a fire just before at 357 South Main Street?” the detective again asked.

But the man kept his mouth shut, grinned and would say nothing. The detective was growing red in the face. Paul said, “You ought to have him examined by a doctor.”

“Where do you live?” asked Walters.

But questioning him was futile and a waste of breath and effort. The man either would not, could not, or just did not understand enough to answer the simple questions. Walters searched him. In his right coat pocket was found a bunch of white cards. Paul and the detective took out their cards and compared them to the bunch. “Identical,” muttered Walters.

“Hooray!” cried Ken. “The white card mystery is solved.”

The man grinned sheepishly. Walters continued searching him. In the other pockets they found more white cards, various odds and ends such as pieces of string, a pocket knife, several pencils, shoe strings and an empty wallet with a name and[248] address. Paul read............