CHAPTER X
AT THE CLIFF HOUSE
"Well, why don't you ask him up?" inquired Pep, after a moment of silence. "He's that quiet man we met on the train; isn't he?"
"Yes," replied Frank, his mind busy with many thoughts.
"Then have him up," added Hank Strapp. "This isn't any way to be hospitable. We Westerners don't act that way. Tell him to come up, boy!" he called to the messenger.
"Oh, sure, have him up by all means," assented Frank. "I wasn't thinking about it, I guess."
"Too much upset over not getting that concession?" asked Randy.
"Some—yes," admitted Frank.
But, all the while, he was wondering what Mr. Bullard could want of them. Frank felt sure it was something to do with Royston, and he was not disappointed.
"I must apologize for bothering you," began Mr. Bullard, when he had greeted the friends, "but I need some help, and I don't know to whom else to appeal in this instance."
"If you're short of money," began Mr. Strapp, generously, thrusting his hand into his pocket, "why, say the word and——"
"No, it isn't money," replied Mr. Bullard, with a smile, and a meaning look at Frank. "I can get all that I need."
"You're lucky," observed Pep.
"Have you told them who I am?" asked the government man with a quick look at Frank. The latter shook his head.
"What's this—more mystery?" inquired Pep. "Have we run up against trouble out here, too?"
"Oh, this hasn't anything to do with us," spoke Frank, little realizing how soon he and his friends were to be concerned with it, and what a complication was to ensue. "I didn't tell you, because there wasn't any need of it, and because he wanted to keep it quiet, but Mr. Bullard is a government Secret Service man."
"Whew!" whistled Pep. "So that's what's in the wind. Well, I don't know that he can arrest me for anything," he added with a laugh.
Hank Strapp looked at Ben Jolly, and both gazed rather reproachfully at Frank. The latter felt the implied rebuke, and hastened to say:
"It wasn't my secret, so I couldn't let it out. But I guess the time has now come," and he looked at Mr. Bullard for confirmation.
"Yes, there's no harm now in telling your friends who I am," said the agent. "And I need your help. I think I am getting Royston where I want him, but I have to drop out of matters for a time, and I need someone to keep him in sight. I thought of asking you to do it, as you can perhaps succeed better than any of my fellow agents."
"Royston!" cried Pep. "Has he been up to some tricks? What are you, anyhow—a detective?" he asked, his eyes shining with elation.
"Something like that, you might say," replied the Secret Service man, smiling.
Explanations followed, and Frank was reproached by his chums for keeping back the secret, though the chaffing was only in fun.
"I wondered why Royston was getting so friendly with us, especially after the experience he had with you in the bank," said Randy to Frank. "Now I understand."
"I was afraid you fellows would tell him too much of our business," Frank responded, "but I didn't want to warn you against him, or tell you Mr. Bullard was after him, for fear you'd act so oddly that he would suspect something."
"I think he is entirely without suspicion, so far," put in the government agent. "And I want to keep him so. But there have been developments since coming to San Francisco that make me believe he is trying to work some big swindle. I'd like to get evidence enough against him to convict him, but it isn't going to be easy."
Thereupon he told the boys more details of the nature of the illegal business of which Royston was at the bottom. The man, as I intimated, made a specialty of organizing and exploiting questionable enterprises. Some of these were pure "fakes," intended only to swindle the public. Others were illegal in themselves, and were only a cloak for real thieving operations.
But the man was "slick," as Hank Strapp expressed it, and, so far, had succeeded in escaping arrest, though the government had been after him a number of times. He always got away in time, or so changed the nature of his enterprises as to come within the strict letter of the law.
"But now," said Mr. Bullard, in telling the story, "he is planning something big. The trouble is, though, that I am afraid he suspects me. I have been getting a little too friendly with him, in the hope of getting evidence against him, and now he begins to draw back.
"That is just what I don't want him to do. If he escapes me now I may never land him again. Of course I could turn the matter over to another Secret Service man, but I don't like to do that after I have been on the case so long, and have followed him across the continent. I had much rather finish it, now that I have begun, and I think I can do it, with your help."
"Then you can count on us!" cried the Westerner, with bluff heartiness. "We're with you until the cows come home, and when Hank Strapp, that's me, from Butte, Montana—when Hank Strapp says that, he means it. Put her there, pardner!" and he held out a big hand, which Mr. Bullard grasped.
"Oh! That's enough!" cried the government man, as he felt his fingers crushed in a hearty grip. "I'll take your word for the rest of it, Mr. Strapp."
"Pshaw now! I sure didn't mean to hurt you," apologized Hank. "But I've got feelings, I have."
"So have I!" said Mr. Bullard, with a wry face, as he looked at his numb fingers.
"I mean I feel friendly toward you," explained the Westerner.
"I appreciate it," responded the agent. "No more demonstrations needed," and he laughed. "But I am glad you will help me. It means I can still keep control of the case."
"Of course we'll help," said Randy. His chums nodded their assents. Ben Jolly nodded his head to signify that he, too, would be with his friends.
"But I hope it doesn't interfere with getting my new pipe organ," he said with a sigh. "I really ought to be getting some practice, for I haven't touched an organ since we left New York. Though if we're not to have a concession at the fair I don't see much use of getting ready."
"What's that!" exclaimed Mr. Bullard. "Can't you carry out your plans for opening a motion picture theatre here?"
"Not as we intended," explained Randy. "The best places, in fact the only places, where we could open such a place in the Zone are gone. We don't know what to do. But don't let us inflict our troubles on you. How can we help you?"
"That's too bad," said Mr. Bullard, sympathetically. "Perhaps I may be able to suggest a way out. I don't like to blow my own horn, but I have quite a few friends in the government service, and you know the government is doing a lot toward this exposition. I will take up that matter for you."
"If you will, it will help a whole lot!" cried Pep, with eager enthusiasm. "But now let's hear what we can do for you."
Mr. Bullard then explained matters. It is not necessary, at this time, to go into details, which will be developed as the story progresses. Sufficient to say that Mr. Bullard had gotten on the track of some illegal operations planned by Royston, but the agent was not in a position to further follow his man.
"So I'm going to depend on you new friends of mine," he said, nodding at the motion picture chums.
"We'll do all we can for you," promised Hank Strapp. "I wish I had my old lasso, and my forty-five——"
"I'm hoping it will not come to violent measures," said Mr. Bullard, with a smile. "I like peaceful means so far as they can be used."
"Let Ben Jolly play him to sleep with a tune on the pipe organ and then arrest him," suggested Pep with a laugh.
"No, I don't want him to go to sleep," objected Mr. Bullard. "I want to get him in the very act—'with the goods,' as you boys say. And I think I will, with your help. It is very good of you to offer."
Then he went into more details, which the boys carefully memorized. For they did not want to put down anything on paper. In fact, Mr. Bullard advised them against this.
"You can't tell what may become of a piece of paper," he said. "We have often gotten evidence from the ashes of burned papers, and tearing up documents is only making a little more trouble for whoever wants to piece them together, and decipher their contents. Your memory is the best document in the world, if it is properly trained."
The immediate matter in hand was this: that Royston was about to take up his quarters at the historic Cliff House, where, so the agent suspected, he was going to plan for one of the biggest swindles of his career.
"And I'll need someone at the Cliff House on whom I can depend," the Secret Service man resumed, "and who will understand how to play the game. I know it's asking a good deal of you for some of you to go there to get evidence, and I'd go myself, only, as soon as I make my appearance there, Royston will be sure to suspect, I am afraid."
"We'll manage it, somehow," promised Mr. Strapp. "We intended to spend some time there, anyhow, so it will not interfere with our plans. Now as to details."
These were arranged, and it was agreed that Frank and Pep should pay a preliminary visit to the Cliff House the next day.
Mr. Bullard then left, after thanking the boys for their help. He also promised to do what he could in the matter of getting them a place at the fair.
"Though how he is going to do it, when there aren't any places left in the Zone, is more than I can understand," said Randy.
"Leave it to him," advised Mr. Strapp.
The remainder of the day was spent in talking over plans, and in paying a visit to other fair officials, in an endeavor to devise some means of running a motion picture show. But nothing could be done, and the only chance the boys saw ahead of them was in opening one in San Francisco proper, which they did not want to do.
Frank and Pep made an early start for the Cliff House the next morning, and as what happened there requires telling rather in detail, I will devote a new chapter to it.