15 : Ramble and Scramble
ALL DAY working at the library, Bob moved as though
his mind was a million miles away—and it was. He took a
book on codes and ciphers from the shelf and looked at it.
but learned nothing. However, he hoped that while he was
getting nowhere, Pete or Jupiter might be getting some
clues. After supper he rode his bicycle hopefully down to
The Jones Salvage Yard, crawled through Tunnel Two
into Headquarters, and was greeted by blank faces.
Pete admitted frankly that he was no good at secret
messages. Jupiter, pinching his lip, called the meeting of
The Three Investigators to order.
“I don’t know what Mr. Silver’s message means,” he
said. “But some points seem to make sense of a sort. Now
for Part 1, about Bo-Peep losing her sheep, I agree with
Mrs. Claudius. That refers to the picture of the shep-
herdess and her sheep being hidden.”
The other two nodded their agreement.
“But what about that ‘call on Sherlock Holmes’?” Bob
asked.
“I wish we could!” Pete exclaimed. “We could use
him.”
“I don’t understand that yet,” Jupiter admitted. “Be-
cause Sherlock Holmes’s message, Part 5, is ‘You know
my methods, Watson.’ which is a well-known phrase from
the stories, then, ‘three sevens lead to thirteen.’ So far
that last is totally meaningless.”
Blackbeard cocked his head. “Three severns lead to
thirteen,” he announced.
“It sounded to me as if he said ‘severns’, not ‘sevens’,”
Pete stated.
“That’s just the English accent,” Bob put in. “Go on,
Jupe.”
“Well, for Part 2 we come to Billy Shakespeare stutter-
ing a famous quotation,” Jupiter said. “That doesn’t make
any sense to me either.”
“Part 3, Blackbeard’s own message, sounds like a ref-
erence to a pirate island or hide-out,” Bob said. “Mr.
Claudius said John Silver liked stories of pirate islands
and if he could find one or anything that could be thought
of as one, he might choose it as a hiding place.”
Jupiter unfolded a map. “Here is a map of lower Cali-
fornia,” he said. “We know from Carlos that Mr. Silver
was gone three days. He either walked or hitchhiked
someplace, hid the picture in the metal box, and came
back. But in three days he could have travelled almost
anywhere. Out to Catalina Island. Down to Mexico. May-
be even as far as Death Valley.”
“Death Valley!” Pete exclaimed. “There are plenty of
dead men’s bones in that place! That gets my vote. But
can’t you just see us searching Death Valley for a box?
”We’d join the dead men guarding it in about two days!“
“It’s just one possibility,” Jupiter said. “But it does
have promise.”
“Part 4 of the message, ‘I shot an arrow as a test, a
hundred paces shot it west’, sounds like a direction,” Bob
suggested. “To tell us we are supposed to go a hundred
yards west from someplace.”
“Sure, but where?” Pete demanded. “The corner of
Hollywood and Vine?”
“We’ve already mentioned Part 5, Sherlock Holmes’s
speech, and agreed we don’t understand it,” Jupiter said.
“That brings us to Part 6, ‘Look under the stones beyond
the bones for the box that has no locks.’ That again
sounds like a straightforward direction.”
“As straightforward as two pretzels wrestling,” Pete
grumbled. “What stones? What bones?”
“He’s making it sound like a pirate island again,” Bob
put in.
“I never heard of any pirates on Catalina Island,” Pete
said, “and that’s almost the only island round here.”
“There were a lot of highwaymen during the years of
the gold rush,” Jupiter suggested. “Perhaps you could call
them pirates.”
“That’s a possibility,” Bob agreed. “But what about the
final message. ‘I never give a sucker an even break’? That
certainly sounds as if Mr. Silver is telling us he’s fooled us
ail along, especially as the last half of the message is
another old slang phrase meaning something is positively
certain. What it adds up to is that John Silver is really
saying, ‘Even if you solve my message you won’t find the
picture, and that’s for sure.’”
Jupiter’s round face was set in a discontented scowl. He
enjoyed problems but he hated to be baffled. And at the
moment he was thoroughly baffled.
“Well,” he said, “I only hope that Mr. Huganay, the
art thief, is having as much trouble as we are. Because
though we have the message, thanks to Blackbeard, he has
the other parrots and will sooner or later get them to talk.
And we want to find the lost masterpiece before he does.
Our pride as investigators demands it.”
For a while they were all silent. Then the First Investi-
gator rose.
“I’ll phone you when I have made some progress,” he
said. “No use getting together before then. Or if you have
any ideas, you phone me.”
They parted, and Bob and Pete made their way to their
homes, where their parents looked slightly surprised to
see them home so early.
The following day, Jupiter, helping in the salvage yard,
made three mistakes in charging customers. Pete cleaned
up the family garage and washed and greased his mother’s
car, waiting to hear from Jupiter. Bob, at the library, mis-
filed so many books that finally the librarian sent him
home, where he stretched out on the window seat in the
living room and stared at the clouds over the nearby
Santa Monica mountains, as if hoping to find an answer
written up there somewhere.
He was so quiet, even when his father came home un-
expectedly for supper, that Mr. Andrews looked at him
somewhat anxiously.
“Something the matter?” he asked, getting out his pipe.
“Something bothering you, Bob?”
“It’s a riddle, sort of, Dad.” It had at last occurred to
Bob that possibly someone else might be able to offer a
suggestion. After all, his father was considered quite a
bright man. He turned on his elbow, looking owlishly
earnest with his ruffled hair. “If you wanted to hide some
buried treasure so that you could leave a message saying,
‘I’ve buried my treasure where dead men guard it ever.’
Where would you put it?”
“On Treasure Island,” his father said, lighting his pipe.
“The one Robert Louis Stevenson wrote about. Or some
other pirate island.”
“But suppose there weren’t any pirate islands around?”
Bob persisted. “Then where would you put it?”
His father thought about that puffing to get the pipe
well started.
“Hmm,” he said. “There’s one other good spot that
would fit the description.”
“There is? Where?” Bob asked, sitting up now.
“A graveyard,” his father chuckled.
“Wow!” Bob passed his father so fast heading for the
telephone, that his Dad almost dropped his pipe. Shaking
his head at the excitability of his son, Mr. Andrews went
to wash up. Bob meanwhile was calling the number at
Headquarters. After a few rings Jupiter answered.
“Jupe,” Bob said, keeping his voice low. “You know
Blackbeard’s message?”
“Yes?” Over the phone June’s voice had an expectant
ring in it.
“Well, suppose it referred to a graveyard. Dead men
would be guarding the treasure there, wouldn’t they?”
There was a long silence at the other end. Then Jupiter
said, in a rather strangled voice, “Bob, don’t go out. I’ll
call you back later.”
All through supper Bob fidgeted, waiting for the phone
to ring. The ring finally came just as he was finishing
dessert. Bob was at the phone before the second ring.
“Yes?” he said.
Jupiter’s voice was tense. “Red Gate Rover. Ramble
and scramble,” he said and hung up.
Bob hung up also. Wow! Ramble and scramble! That
meant to get to the salvage yard as fast as possible, to use
the secret back entrance, and to be sure no one saw him.
“Mom-Dad—” he said hastily, “I have to go out.
Jupiter needs me. I’ll be back by ten. May I? Thanks!”
And he was gone before they could open their mouths.
“Now I ask you,” his father said, “what was that
about?”
“The boys are trying to locate a lost parrot.” His
mother smiled. “Bob mentioned it several days ago. I sup-
pose Jupiter has a clue.”
“A lost parrot.” His father chuckled and finished his
coffee. “That certainly sounds harmless enough.” Then he
looked startled. “But what would that have to do with a
graveyard?”
Meanwhile, Bob was pedalling with all his might
through the back streets towards the rear fence of The
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