Free The Sting of the Scorpion by Franklin W. Dixon Page B

about it?”
    â€œWith a black chin-beard, this guy might even fit Pop Carter’s description of that elephant trainer, Kassim Bey!”
    Before Frank could reply, a scream rang through the house!

CHAPTER XI
    The Knobby-Nosed Peddler
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    â€œTHAT’S mother!” Frank cried.
    Joe dropped the photos and both boys dashed into the kitchen. They found their mother backing away from a huge scorpion!
    The horrid-looking creature, now poised on the kitchen counter, was brown and hairy and about six inches long. Mrs. Hardy, pale, stared at it with a shocked expression, holding one hand over her mouth. In her other hand she held a wide-mouthed plastic container.
    â€œOut of the way! I’ll swat the nasty thing!” exclaimed Aunt Gertrude as she burst in from the dining room. Brandishing a fly swatter, she advanced on the scorpion with lethal intent.
    â€œNo. Don’t kill it!” Frank protested. “It’s an interesting specimen.”
    â€œInteresting, my hat!” sniffed Aunt Gertrude. “That creature may be deadly!”
    â€œI’m not so sure. Where did it come from?”
    â€œOut of here,” Mrs. Hardy replied in a shaky voice, holding up the plastic container.
    Frank and Joe examined the label, which bore the name Vinegareen. But no manufacturer’s name or address was shown.
    Joe glanced at his mother, puzzled. “Where’d you get this, Mom? At the supermarket?”
    â€œCertainly not!” Aunt Gertrude cut in, in a scandalized voice. “I got it this morning from a door-to-door peddler.”
    â€œSome phony!” said Joe angrily. “What did he tell you?”
    â€œThat he was handing out free samples of a new food product. Said it was highly condensed, and mixed with water, it would give a particularly rich, flavorful form of vinegar.”
    The spinster paused to examine the plastic container. “Hmph. Empty, is it?”
    â€œIt is now,” Frank said drily.
    â€œI might have known there was something wrong with such an offer. I thought at the time the fellow looked suspicious. ‘That man’s got a criminal type of face,’ I said to myself. ‘He’ll come to no good end!”’
    Miss Hardy seemed as annoyed about being cheated out of the expected free sample as she was about the sinister trick that had been played.
    The boys smothered grins, then Frank turned anxiously back to their mother. “It didn’t sting you, did it?”
    â€œNo, but it frightened me out of my wits.”
    â€œI don’t blame you. That thing really looks scary.”
    With a shudder, Mrs. Hardy went on, “When I opened the container, it crawled out on my hand! I had to shake it off in the sink.”
    â€œIt’s a wonder it didn’t sting you,” Joe said.
    â€œFrom what I read in the encyclopedia,” Frank said, “I’ve a hunch this is a whip scorpion called a vinegaroon, a kind that’s found in the southwestern United States and Mexico. It’s called that because it emits a vinegary odor when aroused, just as this one’s doing. Many people think they’re highly venomous, but the scientists who study scorpions say they are not.”
    Aunt Gertrude described the peddler as a knobby-nosed man with sideburns, wearing a yellow knit sport shirt and checked summer slacks.
    â€œNeat description,” Frank said approvingly. “You make a good witness, Aunty.” He added with a slight frown, “Funny thing is, the guy sounds familiar, somehow.”
    Unfortunately, with no photographs of the Scorpio gang to go on, there was no way to identify the man as a member.
    The boys managed to corral the scorpion back into the plastic container and delivered it to the home of Thomas “Cap” Bailey, their science teacher and track coach at Bayport High, with whom they had once searched for fossils out West in a place called Wildcat Swamp. Cap verified