THE MYSTERY OF THE MISSING EYEBROWS

By STEPHEN RUDD

The Newspaper Boys’ Series

Illustrated

Published by the R. H. Gore Publishing Co.

Copyright, 1921 R. H. Gore Publishing Company All rights reserved

RENFRO HORN STORIES TO FOLLOW SHORTLY By THE SAME AUTHOR

THE LUCK OF A RAINY NIGHT THE RISE OF ROUTE 19 THE WHITE BAG’S SECRET THE CLUE OF THE TWISTED PAPER THE LONG LOW WHISTLE THE MYSTERY OF THE BLUE MILK THE LEAK AT COOGAN’S CHIMNEY THE GROWL OF THE LOST DOG THE COURAGE OF RENFRO HORN THE FALL OF THE EAST SIDE BULLY THE SCOOP OF THE CUB REPORTER

R. H. Gore Publishing Co., TERRE HAUTE, IND.

A WORD TO ALL NEWSPAPER BOYS

This volume, the “MYSTERY OF THE MISSING EYEBROWS,” is the first of twelve books written about newspaper boys by an old newspaper boy, and the picture of Renfro Horn is the likeness of a flesh and blood newspaper carrier, the real Renfro Horn, who inspired these twelve books, that the newspaper boys of these United States might understand the responsibility they bear to the world.

The newspaper that you take each night to your subscriber’s door plays a great part in the life of each subscriber. Thru rain and snow and cold you go, and if you are a good carrier, as all newspaper boys should be, you will overcome all problems to have your paper there at the exact time each day, as early as you can get there, regardless of weather, unmindful of play, striving all the time to be first to deliver papers in your territory.

And if you are to succeed later in life, you will constantly strive to make route gains for your newspaper. A new subscriber each week, a gain of only one new subscription each week, if you do it regularly, will mean that you are a good carrier, as good as Renfro Horn and Renfro is one of the best, for he carried papers on a route for the writer of this book who is a circulation manager.

When your subscribers quit, make them give you a good reason. And collect your bills. When folks do not pay, tell them about the six or seven times you come to their door each week, and ask them if they can do you just the one favor, and remind them you bring the biggest value in the world for the money, the news of the whole world, plus your good service.

Newspaper boys are becoming the great men of the world. We have one of them as president of these United States. Others are in high places. The newspaper training is valuable, as much so as school, but you must look about you and make mental notes and you must be a go-getter like Renfro Horn. And here he is. Read about this newest and greatest Boy hero, who is just a carrier of newspapers like yourself. And when you know him as well as we do, you will like him quite as well, and you will want to follow his many adventures in the other books to come.

By The Author

The R. H. Gore Publishing Co., General Offices, Myers Building, Terre Haute, Ind.

CONTENTS.

[Pg 7]

THE MYSTERY OF THE MISSING EYEBROWS.

CHAPTER I. THE MYSTERIOUS HOUSE.

Renfro Horn was quite sure that Captain Pete would never have spoken had he not dropped the rabbit. But the sound of its frozen body striking the hard crust on the top of the snow made the old man turn around to discover the reason for the sound. And at the same time he saw the rabbit he saw Renfro.

“Oh,” he snarled, “Spyin’ on me ag’in—sneakin’ on an old man’s own grounds.”

The jerking of his shoulders broke the string which held the other rabbits to his shoulder. A rattle like falling twigs. They were all on the top of the snow. With a rush the old man was down on all fours trying to roll them together.

Renfro stepped up to help him. And then he saw the three quails and stopped. One minute [Pg 8]he stared at them: the next he stooped and fumbled with the tops of his shoes.

When he looked down at the ground again the quails were gone, and the rabbits in a close heap. Renfro knew what was under the pile, but he pretended not to have seen them. He remembered the notices the game marshal had had posted about quail hunting the week before.

Imprisonment and fine for the first offense. Captain Pete had one of these notices on his own big front gate.

“Pretty good luck?” Renfro twisted at the top button on his mackinaw. “Fourteen rabbits I should guess.”

“Twenty-two,” Captain Pete was proud of his good fortune. “And all shot in my own fields. You can go on, buddy. I’ll tote them down to my shack myself.”

“Down to the shack?”

Renfro asked the question. Captain Pete answered it. “Yes, I’m a stayin’ down there this winter. An old man like me can’t chop wood enough to keep the big house warm. I didn’t even try to. Moved down to the shack in September.”

[Pg 9]

With a last look at the pile of frozen rabbits Renfro walked slowly away down toward the road which led back to town. The three quails and the threatened fine were instantly forgotten. But a big question was in his mind.

If Captain Pete had been living in the shack ever since September, then who had been living in the big house? Four times recently, when he had been out on late walks like this one, he had seen queer lights spring from its windows.

They didn’t stay in one place but seemed to flash from one room to another. The last time they had been in the right hand room in the upper story and then suddenly had gone out and flashed in the lower left hand corner. He had thought it queer then, but had regarded them as certain proofs of Captain Pete’s queer mind.

Where the two paths, the short cut and the longer way round intersected, Renfro paused uncertainly. The short one meant a saving of at least a quarter of an hour and he would be on time for supper. The longer one would make him late and bring upon his head the reproofs of both his mother and father.

Yet he wouldn’t know about the lights if he [Pg 10]chose the short cut. And he had to know about them tonight. Better risk his family’s wrath than miss a chance to solve this mystery.

And Renfro hurried down the long path which led past the big white house.

Just after he was out on the road he met Clint Moore, the boy who sold chestnuts on the Horns’ home street in the early fall. “Who’s living in the old Hall house?” Renfro asked him.

Clint whistled, “Just old dippy Captain Pete Hall,” he laughed. “An he’s worse off his nut than ever this winter. Don’t have no fire nor nothin’. We’d think he was dead if we didn’t see his lights of nights once in a while and see him agoin’ huntin’ past the house.”

Renfro stared at him. The dusk was beginning to get heavy, but he could still see Clint’s eyes and he knew he was telling the truth. He started to ask him another question when Clint said, “I’m going your way so we might just as well walk along together if you don’t mind. There’s a basket ball game in town tonight and I’m going to go and stay at my aunt’s.”

He talked on about the ball game but Renfro [Pg 11]wasn’t listening. He was staring at the big Hall house which was less than a quarter of a mile ahead of them. It set back off the road another quarter of a mile and in front of it was a long row of pine trees.

They almost shut off all view of the old white shell whose original owners had claimed that it was “a palace with fourteen rooms.” But in the upper right hand corner of it a light was plainly visible to both boys and—

“There’s the old fellow now.” Clint pointed at the small window, thru the ragged blind of which were gleams of light. “Don’t see it often but some times—”

And then the light suddenly went out.

Renfro was silent. Captain Pete with his twenty-two rabbits and three quails was back in the woods. He was sure of that. But who could have had that light? And did Captain Pete really live in the shack now or had that been merely a story he had told to take Renfro’s attention away from the quails?

Renfro was still wondering about that when they reached the end of the car line and boarded the car which took them past his home. Clint [Pg 12]would have to transfer at Liberty Avenue.

They were the only passengers on the car until three paper carriers with their big bulky paper bags got on a few blocks farther up the line. When each had finished carrying his own route he had waited for the others. Riding in together gave them a chance to talk over profits, new subscribers and the adventures they encountered on their routes.

Renfro tried to listen to them and to Clint at the same time. His questions about Captain Pete had reminded Clint of an old hired man they had once had. He had known Captain Pete Hall before he got to be so queer. There had been a brother who had been wild to get rich. He and some confederates from another city had made counterfeit money in the little shack on the Hall place.

“Captain Pete found their outfit but he didn’t know his brother was one of the counterfeiters so he went to the sheriff about it and the whole gang was arrested. His brother got the stiffest sentence of the whole lot.

“He hated Captain Pete then,” Clint went on with his story. “He said that when he got [Pg 13]out he was goin’ to kill him. Worryin’ about that upset Pete’s mind.”

When Renfro asked him about the time at which the brother was to be free again Clint shook his head. The hired man had never told him anything about the length of the sentence Pete’s brother had gotten. He had told all of the story he knew. His mother had once said that Captain Pete’s brother was dead. “Better off that way than the way Pete is,” he laughed.

When he got off at the corner several other passengers entered the car. Renfro studied them—the man with the beetling eyebrows and weak mouth, the woman with the near seal coat and the genuine diamonds. There was something queer about them. The papers recently told the story of a jewelshop theft. Renfro began to wonder.

The carrier boys jostled against him as they went to leave the car. The little one was bragging about a ride he had taken on the patrol wagon the night before. There had been some trouble in the street on which his route lay and the corner police had taken him along to [Pg 14]help give directions about the location of some houses.

And then Renfro’s own street was called. With an effort he left the interesting couple, the lively wide awake carrier boys, and the two men in uniform. His own avenue lay before him, placid and uninteresting. The bright street lights made every corner on it as visible as if it were in the day time.

He ran up the great stone steps to his own home. He opened the door, entered the hall and knew he was late for supper. With a dash he was up stairs and to the bath room to wash his face and hands.

And down stairs in the dining room his parents were discussing him. His father, tall and thin and patrician looking, adjusted his horn rimmed spectacles and said once more that he knew his son was queer. Otherwise why would he walk alone as he did? If he didn’t go out to some queer spot he walked around the home yard. Why, once he had counted one hundred trips Renfro had made around the house, his head down and his feet moving at a fairly rapid pace.

[Pg 15]

Other thirteen year old boys were playing ball or visiting in the drug stores. It was uncanny—this way he had of walking alone.

Mrs. Horn, also tall and thin and socially graceful, rustled her stiff silk dress and frowned. She too, thought Renfro was queer. But she was sure it was all due to the detective stories he read continually. Mary had told her that morning of seeing a light under his door at about three o’clock one night, at half past one on another, and when she had slipped down there had found that he was reading.

“They are about horrible crimes,” she shuddered. “It worries me so that I cannot sleep. I am afraid he will cultivate criminal tendencies. What he reads will influence him, I’m sure. Now I read of a boy—”

Mr. Horn shook his head. “Nonsense,” he said shortly. “There’s no criminals in our families. Renfro is a little queer. None of us boys was the least bit like him. But he’s clever with all his queer streaks. Why in that continued story—that detective one he coaxed me to read, he had the mystery all solved before the last chapter was published.”

[Pg 16]

Well, Mrs. Horn was determined of one thing. If Renfro had to read such queer stories he should not do it in the middle of the night. “I’ll change his room,” she said with emphasis. “There is that old music room right across from—”

“From mine,” Renfro finished in the door way. “And I’d like to have it for my own library,” he added and walked to the table.

His unsatisfactory explanation of his walk half angered his father. But he did not know what to say about it. The report card Renfro had brought home a few days before had been almost perfect. He couldn’t command him to hurry from school to study. He was just ready to mention some errand he had at his office when Mrs. Horn spoke.

“Renfro,” her voice was fretful and accusing. “I needed you this afternoon to go out to Captain Pete Hall’s for me. It’s rabbit season now and I wanted some for dinner tomorrow. I waited over an hour for you and then I drove out there by myself.”

She shivered. “It’s an uncanny place—that big house is. The shrubbery has grown everywhere [Pg 17]and the weatherboards and shutters which have dropped off the house lay just where they have fallen. It was like working my way thru a maze to get to the door. And what made it worse it was just getting dark and—”

“And Captain Pete wasn’t home,” Renfro finished for her remembering again the three quails, the rabbits and the shack story the old man had told back in the woods.

Mrs. Horn gave him a severe look. She allowed no one to interrupt her without giving them a reproof.

“Yes, he was,” she snapped back, “but he didn’t have any rabbits for sale. What was worse he said he wouldn’t have any at all. He mumbled something about not going to hunt this season and shut the door in my face.”

With a gasp Renfro half rose from his chair, stared at his mother, heard his father’s gruff command to behave himself, and settled back in his seat again, smoothing out his napkin with a great effort. But his eyes remained round and his mouth opened and closed several times before he spoke.

[Pg 18]

CHAPTER II. RENFRO WANTS A NEWSPAPER ROUTE.

When Renfro did manage to speak he asked his mother another question. “What time was that, mother?”

Mrs. Horn studied a minute. The question annoyed her but she was too well bred not to answer it. “Oh, about five, I should imagine. I waited until four thirty for you before I left the house, and I was back at half past five. Why do you ask, Renfro?”

Instead of answering her, Renfro asked another question. “Are you sure it was Captain Pete, mother? You know he is old now and changed and—” he hesitated and finished lamely, “It might have been some one else.”

His mother’s high bred voice was impatient. She wanted to dismiss the subject and discuss finances with her husband, showing him her need for a larger allowance. “Of course, I am sure it was Captain Pete. Haven’t I bought turkeys of him for five seasons? Of course, he looks old now. He looked that way the first time I saw him. And, Renfro, please be still [Pg 19]and let your father and me talk about something much more important.”

The steel like edge to her words clipped off any further questions Renfro wanted to ask. But tho he couldn’t ask them out loud they surged back and forth in his mind while he ate. Could he have been mistaken about the time he saw Captain Pete in the woods? Had it taken him and Clint a longer time to walk to the car line than it did him when he was alone?

And if it did, then why was Captain Pete unwilling to sell any of the twenty-two rabbits?

Now there had been the three quails. Renfro was sure that Captain Pete saw him staring at them. Could he have recognized Mrs. Horn and been afraid that Renfro might tell her about the quails? A denial of having hunted might throw them off the track should they feel it their duty to report to the game warden what Renfro had seen.

But Renfro smiled at his own last conclusion. Captain Pete Hall was too wise a man to believe that. Also he was too greedy to miss the chance of selling any of his game.

[Pg 20]

But Renfro’s thoughts were diverted from the old hunter and the inhabitant of the big old house by his father who directed a question to him. The discussion with his wife over finances reminded Mr. Horn that his son too had an allowance. “Keeping your book so that it balances this month?” he clipped out his words, “And did you save anything last?”

“Yes sir,” Renfro smiled. “I saved half of my allowance last month. I want to buy—”

“Some new detective stories.” Mr. Horn laughed and turned the conversation back to his wife again.

Renfro felt as if he could not stand it a minute longer. With a low apology he rose from the table and then they noticed him. “Renfro,” his mother spoke sharply, “You are not to go out of the house tonight—not even to walk around the yard.”

His father curtly repeated her command. And with sinking heart Renfro left the room, wandered thru the library and dragged his feet up the stair way to his own room. It was only half past seven o’clock. And he did not want to read.

[Pg 21]

He walked to the window and opened it. The cold air sharpened his brain. He looked over to the south. Yes, that was the right direction. Just three miles from the court house tower was Captain Pete’s tumbling ancestral mansion and the little shack in which Renfro and the old man, before he had gotten so grouchy, had once roasted potatoes and meat.

“I’m sure it was Captain Pete and I’m sure it was about five o’clock when I saw him. Now mother must have been mistaken—” he began to think and then stopped.

Slowly he closed the window. “Mother,” he spoke out loud deliberately, “saw some one else. Pete has rented that big house or been scared out of it, or some one who knows how secluded a life Pete lives, has discovered that he is down in the shack for the winter and is making the big house his headquarters.”

His hands went deep into his pockets. His mind began to make definite plans for ways and means to solve the mystery of the stranger whom he was sure his mother had seen. He himself would watch the house and also the shack. There was still the possibility that Captain [Pg 22]Pete might have hurried home and he, Renfro, might have mistaken the time a few minutes.

In that case there was something mysterious about the shack and Captain Pete did not want him to make any more trips or visits there, giving as an excuse that it was his new home. “But I’m going out there tomorrow afternoon,” he began, “and every other afternoon and evening I can, only first I’ll have to find an excuse which will satisfy the folks.”

For half an hour he worked framing excuses for those trips. And then Mary, the second maid, brought one directly to his room. Mary was a woman with imagination and romance, she said, tho in her form she was fat and homely and of Scotch descent. Cautiously she tapped at Renfro’s door.

“Here’s the Evening Globe, Mr. Renfro,” she whispered, thrusting the folded paper into his hand. “Right on the front page there’s more about that big jewel robbery. Them hired detectives don’t seem to get nowhere with their clues and I thought mebbe me, with my imagination, and you so clever in workin’ out mysteries, [Pg 23]we could beat them once. It would show—”

But Renfro didn’t hear the rest of her hopes. The paper clasped in his hand became the master key to the mysterious house. It had reminded him of the carrier boys, who had ridden home on the car with him.