CHAPTER VI.

IN SEARCH OF A CLUE.

"Heigho! what's all this fuss and feathers about?" demanded the old retired traveler, as he came limping along, with his crutch and cane.

Several neighbors accompanied him, having been aroused by the clamor.

"Same old story, sir," remarked the disgusted Andy, still clutching his bruised toe tenderly. "They've been trying to beat us one way, if they couldn't another."

Frank gave him a nudge.

"Be careful what you say, Andy," he remarked. "There is no proof as yet that any one we knew had a hand in this business. You may get in trouble if you mention names offhand. Go slow now. We'll find out the truth later on, perhaps."

So Andy, taking heed, managed to tell what had happened without directly accusing any one. Nevertheless, it was not difficult for those who listened to guess where his suspicions lay. And perhaps they thought, after all that had occurred in the past, with the hand of Puss Carberry moving the pieces on the chessboard, that Andy was justified in believing as he did.

After a while the excitement died away. The boys had opened the shed and made sure that no lingering spark remained to threaten their beloved little aeroplane with destruction. But it was all right and they feasted their eyes on it, as if they never before realized how precious it had become.

"Getting to be a regular thing, seems to me, these night alarms, boys,"

remarked one of the neighbors, for not long before they had been aroused in the middle of the night when the two jewelry thieves tried to steal the aeroplane and were baffled in their design by the two boys, sleeping at the time in the shed, so as to guard their flying machine.

"If one watchman ain't enough I'll get three--half a dozen if necessary," declared Colonel Josiah, as he glared at the offending Shea and pounded on the turf with his heavy cane. "But these lads are going to be protected, if it takes my last dollar. I'll get a Gatling gun and train it here, so we can blow the rascals to smithereens if they try such a dastardly job again."

But everybody knew that the genial old colonel did considerable talking and bl.u.s.tering, but was harmless withal.

Shea promised to remain awake the balance of the night. He even went to the house and armed himself with a big horse pistol that the colonel owned and which had many a story connected with its keeping company with the traveler in foreign lands.

"Huh! I've got half a notion to camp right here again, like we did that other time, Frank," said Andy, before they locked the wide doors of the shed. "Here's my cot and blankets, you see, just as I left 'em."

"No need of that, Andy," returned his chum, smiling. "After all this rumpus you couldn't hire that fellow to come back here tonight. He may be ten miles away by now. Wonder if that's the last I'll see of my wheel?"

"Now," continued Andy, "if you're addressing that to me I'd like to prophesy that you'll find the bike somewhere off the road a mile or two away, where the fellow pitched it when he concluded to make a sneak _back_ to town."

"There you go, barking up that same tree again. I never saw such a positive fellow as you are," declared the other, smiling. "Your name ought to be Thomas, for you seem to doubt everything that you can't just understand."

"Well, if not Puss, who, then?" demanded Andy, aggressively.

"I confess that I don't know at this minute," admitted Frank. "But I hope to discover the truth in some way. Remember how that other time, when some one tried to injure us by sneaking in here and cutting the canvas wings of our monoplane all to flinders, I picked up a playing card and we afterwards traced it to the owner?

"Yes," cried the other, instantly, "and wasn't that party Puss Carberry all right?"

"It sure was," laughed Frank. "But forget this thing for now. Perhaps tomorrow we may be able to find some clue that will tell which way the wind blows--it might be the print of a shoe in the earth or something like that. Lots of ways to pick up information, if only you keep your wits at work."

"Yes," returned Andy, "and if it's Frank Bird who's doing the thinking. But perhaps it would be silly in me sleeping out here tonight.

I'd better be traipsing back to bed right now, because, you see, I'm only half dressed and it's chilly."

"Good. I'll see you to the house, because I've got to walk home, now that my wheel has gone up the flume," remarked Frank.

"What's the matter with you using mine?" demanded the other. "That plug you put in holds dandy, and there's nothing the matter with it right now. Same old place, under the side porch here. Guess the lamp is on the b.u.m, but you hardly need that. If a cop holds you up, explain what happened."

"All right, I guess I might as well ride as walk. But I hope I get my wheel back. It's nearly new, you know, and cost a heap," Frank remarked, as he dove under the stoop, to presently appear dragging the other bicycle.

"Apply to Puss and Company for further information," called Andy, holding the door open a crack to shoot the words out and then closing it.

Frank, laughing at the obstinate ways of his chum, pushed the machine out to the road and was soon moving along. Evidently he lacked the same confidence in Andy's wheel that he felt in his own, for he made no attempt to speed as he went toward town and home.

Fortunately he met no policeman, who might ask impertinent questions as to just why he was riding after dark without a light. And reaching home he found his father sitting up in his office waiting to hear his report.

Dr. Bird was quite satisfied with what Frank had to say in regard to the condition of the sick girl. He knew that the boy was well up in medicine, even though he had never tried to push him in the least. Frank gave evidence of being what is known as a "natural born doctor," keenly alive to everything pertaining to surgery. More than once he had set broken limbs for dogs and cats and done it in a manner that aroused the warmest praise from his father, who, deep down in his heart, knew the boy had it in him to become a famous surgeon, if he kept along in this path when he came to take up his life pursuit.

Frank believed he ought to tell about the dastardly attempt to destroy the monoplane. And, of course, the good doctor, who always thought the best of people, was horrified to hear his story.

He shook his head sadly after Frank had finished.

"I don't know what people are coming to nowadays," he remarked. "No matter who did that mean act, it was wicked. Man or boy, he ought to be severely punished for it. The rights of property seems to be getting less respect every year. It puzzles me to lay the blame for this spirit at the right door. But things were not so in my young days, Frank. We live in fast times, my boy, fast times!"

Frank thought so himself, as he went off to his room. Imagine his father, some forty years ago, ever dreaming of building an air-ship and speeding through the upper currents, perhaps thousands of feet above the earth, at the rate of a mile a minute! And yet that was what he and Andy had been doing, thinking nothing of the feat, as they became accustomed to its performance.

Fast times, indeed!

Frank did not allow the startling incidents of the night to keep him awake. He knew just how to get a grip on himself and put all these things out of his mind, once his head touched the pillow.

Time enough in the morning to begin worrying about that lost wheel and trying to figure out who the firebug could have been.

At breakfast Frank had to go over the whole story again for the benefit of Janet, who had heard enough about it from the doctor before her brother came down to whet her appet.i.te for more.

Frank could see that she shared the suspicions entertained by Andy. Janet knew Puss Carberry of old and despised him most heartily. At one time he had taken a great liking to Frank's pretty sister, but when she learned what his nature was Janet had cut him dead on the street. And from that day on she had believed Puss capable of almost anything.

"Even after you saved his life yesterday, too!" she exclaimed, indignantly.

"Hold on there, sis," cried Frank, laughing. "You're as bad as Andy, who is ready to condemn on general principles. We haven't got a sc.r.a.p of evidence to prove Puss guilty. Just as like as not he would show an _alibi_ if we accused him of it, and prove that he was at home all evening. So please don't mention his name to anybody or I may get in a sc.r.a.pe."

"But you're going to find out, aren't you!" demanded Janet.

"I surely hope to, and recover my poor bike in the bargain. Luckily I've got my name and address scratched on the underpart of the frame, if the finder only takes the trouble to look. And now I'm off downtown, to speak to Chief Waller about it."

Ten minutes later Frank dropped off in front of police headquarters. And no sooner had he alighted than the lad discovered that there was a buzz of excitement about the place, for several men were conferring and the chief himself seemed disturbed. He looked eagerly at Frank as the boy came forward and started to relate what had occurred on the preceding night out near the residence of Colonel Josiah Whympers.

Immediately the face of the chief began to light up and an eager glow shine in his eyes. It seemed as though what Frank was telling must have given him a connecting link that he had found himself badly in need of.

"Now we know where he went!" he exclaimed, calling to one of his men. "Go out to Colonel Josiah Whympers', Green, and see what traces you can get of him." Then once more turning to the astonished boy, he went on: "You see, we had a jail delivery here last night. A desperate scoundrel managed to slip away undetected and we only found it out this morning. And the man who got out was your old friend, Jules Garrone, the French aviator, who was caught by the help of the Bird boys and their bully little aeroplane! Get that, Frank?"