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I
flicked on our flashlights from opposite sides of the sluice. The men in the
boat threw their hands up, and one of them shouted, "Don't shoot! Don't
shoot! We're just going fishing."
           
"You can't fish with a rod like that!" the deputy shouted back.
"Throw it in the water!"
            There
was a splash as the pistol dropped from the hand of the man standing in the
stern of the boat.
           
"Get the rest of them overboard before we load your boat with tear
gas!"
            Three
more weapons splashed in the water. The man in the bow of the boat reached
under the seat and tried to slip a canvas sack over the side, but the deputy's
pistol cracked like a whip and a bullet nicked the gunwale beside him.
           
"Leave the money where it is!" barked the deputy. "Put your
hands on top of your head and lie down in the boat!"
            It isn't
easy for one man to lie down in a rowboat, let alone four. But when your have
to, you find a way to do it, and the four bank bandits were smart enough to
figure it out.
           
"OK, Mulligan. Get on the radio and tell 'em it's all over," said the
deputy calmly. And Henry made tracks for the patrol car.
           
"You characters ought to know you can't fish in this county before
daybreak," said the deputy, as he lighted a cigarette. "Now, just as
soon as we can truck a ladder in here, we'll get you out of there."
            It only
took about ten minutes for two more patrol cars to show up at the old mill. And
we didn't need a ladder to get the captives out of the sluice. We just opened
the upper gate long enough to float the boat up to the top of the wall, and the
bank robbers climbed out meek as lambs. I don't think they ever knew there was
only one policeman on the scene when they threw their guns in the water.
            Freddy
Muldoon ran up and kicked the biggest man right in the shins. "That's for
calling me 'Fatso'!" he shouted, and then he retreated to a safe distance.
One of the policemen grabbed him by the collar and half carried him off the
dam. The big man stood there with his mouth open, rubbing one leg against the
other.
           
"There ought to be a law against kids," he said. "I knew there'd
be trouble when I found them two in the alley."
           
"What about my transmitter?" Dinky asked. "It's in one of those
canvas bags."
           
"We'll have to hold it for evidence, sonny," said one of the
policemen. "You'll get it back later on."
            Chief
Putney didn't get in on the capture. He and three other policemen were
blockading the mouth of Lemon Creek with two motorboats, and they didn't have a
radio. It wasn't until daybreak that they saw Mr. Monaghan standing at the end
of his dock waving a pair of red flannel drawers at them. When they got back to
the police station we were all sitting around sipping hot chocolate and talking
to a reporter from the Mammoth Falls Gazette . Henry asked Chief Putney
if he could send a patrol car out to Indian Hill to pick up Homer and Mortimer.
           
"You've just given me a great idea," grumbled the Chief. "We
don't need a police department around here anymore. What we need is a good
all-night taxi service. Have you got fifty cents for the fare?"
           
"No!" said Henry.
           
"Oh, that's really too bad!" said the Chief, sarcastically. Then he
turned to Billy Dahr and told him to send a car out to Indian Hill.
     
     
    The Cool Cavern
    © 1968 by Bertrand R. Brinley
Illustrations by Charles Geer
    T HE M AD S CIENTISTS ' C LUB always has a bunch of projects hanging fire that we hope to do something about
someday. For instance, one of Henry Mulligan's favorite ideas has always been
to build a submarine that we could use to explore the bottom of Strawberry
Lake. Henry has a theory that the lake wasn't always as big as it is now. He
figures there might be a lot of interesting Indian relics on the lake bottom,
and maybe even a whole Indian village.