Inside of half an hour the boys were on a friendly footing with the young operator and felt as though they had known him a long time. He was only a few years older than themselves, and had been a full-fledged operator for about six months. The Mountain Pass station was his first assignment, and he was inordinately proud of the complicated apparatus that went to compose it.
“This is some little station that Uncle Sam has rigged up here, and while there are plenty of bigger ones, there are very few that are more complete and up to date. Look at this three unit generator set, for instance. Compact, neat, and efficient, as you can easily see. It doesn’t take up much room, but it can do a whole lot.”
“It does look as though it were built for business,” admitted Bob. “I suppose that unit in the center is the driving motor, isn’t it?”
“Right,” said the other. “And the one nearest you is a two thousand volt generator for supplying the plate circuit. The one at the other end is a double current generator. That supplies direct current at one hundred and twenty-five volts and four amps for the exciter circuit, and alternating current at eighty-eight volts and ten amps for feeding that twelve volt filament heating transformer that you see over there in the corner.”
“Pretty neat, I’ll say,” remarked Joe.
“I think so,” said the other, and continued to point out the salient and interesting features of the equipment. “Over here, you see, is our main instrument panel. These dials over here control the variable condensers, and the other ones control the variometers. But there!” he exclaimed, catching himself up short. “I suppose none of you ever heard of such things before, did you?”
The radio boys looked at each other, and could not help laughing.
“We’ve got a faint idea what they are, anyway,” chuckled Bob. “We’ve made enough of them to be on speaking terms, I should say.”
“Made them!” exclaimed the other, surprised in his turn.
“Sure thing,” grinned Bob. “We’ve made crystal detector sets and vacuum tube sets, and——”
“And other sets that we never knew just how to describe,” interrupted the irrepressible Herb, with a laugh.
“Yes, that kind too,” admitted Bob, with a grin. “But, anyway, we’ve made enough to know the difference between a variometer and a condenser.”
“Well, I didn’t know I was talking to old hands at the game,” said the operator. “I suppose I might have known that you wouldn’t take that long walk out here through the snow unless you were pretty well interested in radio.”
“Yes, we’re dyed-in-the-wool fans,” admitted Bob, and told the operator something of their radio work.
“I’m mighty glad to know that you fellows do understand the subject,” said the operator, when Bob had finished. “I’m so enthusiastic about it myself, that it is a real pleasure to have somebody to talk to that knows what I’m talking about. So many of the people who come here seem to be natural born dumb-bells—at least, on the subject of radio.”
“Such as you took us for at first, eh?” asked Jimmy, with a grin.
“I apologize for that,” said the other, frankly. “Please don’t hold it against me.”
“Personally, I don’t blame you a bit,” said Bob. “We can’t expect you to be a mind reader.”
“Well, then, that’s settled; so let’s look at the rest of the station,” said the operator, whose name was Bert Thompson. “This is our transmitter panel over here. It is very compact, as you can see for yourselves.”
He opened two doors at the front, one at the bottom, and raised the cover, thus exposing most of the interior mechanism to view.
“Here are all the fuse blocks down at the bottom, you see,” Thompson continued. “The various switches are conveniently arranged where you can easily get at them while you are sitting in front of the panel. Then up here are the microphones, with their coils and wiring where you can easily get at them for inspection or repairs. Rather a neat lay-out, don’t you think?”
“No doubt of it!” exclaimed Bob, admiringly. “We’ve never made a CW transmitting set yet, but we hope to some day. A set like this would cost a pile of money, even if you made it yourself.”
“Rather so,” admitted the young operator. “It takes a rich old fellow like Uncle Sam to pony up for a set like that.”
“We’re more interested in receiving sets just at present,” said Joe. “Let’s take a look at that end of the outfit.”
“Anything you like,” said Thompson, readily. “That panel is located on this side of the room.”
“I suppose you use a regenerative circuit, don’t you?” asked Bob.
“Oh, yes,” answered the other. “That helps out a lot in increasing the strength of the incoming sounds.”
“I suppose you use a tickler coil in the plate circuit, don’t you?” ventured Joe.
“No, in this set we use a variometer in the plate circuit instead,” said Thompson.
“Speaking of regenerative circuits, have you heard about Armstrong’s new invention?” asked Bob.
The operator shook his head. “Can’t say that I have,” he said. “It must be something very recent, isn’t it?”
“Yes, I believe it is,” said Bob. “I read about it the other day in one of the latest radio magazines.”
“Do you remember how it worked?” asked Thompson, eagerly. “I wish you’d tell me about it, if you do.”
“I’ll do my best,” promised Bob. “The main idea seems to be to make one tube do as much as three tubes did before. Armstrong found that the limit of amplification had been reached when the negative charge in the tube approaches the positive charge. By experimenting he found that it was possible to increase the negative charge temporarily, for something like one twenty-thousandth of a second, I think it was. This is far above the positive for that tiny fraction of a second, and yet the average negative charge is lower. It is this increase that makes the enormous amplification possible, and lets the operator discard two vacuum tubes.”
“Sounds good,” said Thompson. “Do you suppose you could draw me a rough sketch of the circuit?”
“Let’s have a pencil and some paper, and I’ll make a try at it,” said Bob. “I doped it out at the time, but likely I’ve forgotten it since then.”
Nevertheless, with the friendly aid of the eraser on the end of the pencil, he sketched a circuit that the experienced professional had no difficulty in understanding.
“You see,” explained Bob, “with this hook up you use the regular Armstrong regenerative circuit, with the second tube connected so that it acts as an automatic switch, cutting in or out a few turns of the secondary coil. The plate circuit of the second tube is connected to the plate of the detector tube through both capacity and inductance.”
“I get you,” nodded the operator. “According to your sketch the plate and grid of the second tube are coupled inductively, causing variation in the positive resistance of the tuned circuit.”
“That’s the idea exactly,” agreed Bob. “You see, this is done by means of the oscillating tube, the grid circuit being connected through the tuned circuit of the amplifying tube.”
“Say, that looks pretty good to me!” exclaimed Thompson. “I wonder how Armstrong ever came to dope that out. I’ve been trying to get something of the kind for a long time, but I never seemed to get quite the right combination.”
“Well, better luck next time,” said Bob, sympathetically. “There are a lot of people working at radio problems, and it seems to be a pretty close race between the inventors. Something new is being discovered almost every day.”
“If you fellows are building sets, you’re just as likely to make some important discovery as anybody else,” said Thompson. “That super-regenerative circuit is a corker, though. I’m going to keep that sketch you made, if you don’t mind, and see if I can make a small set along those lines. I have lots of spare time just at present.”
“It will repay you for your trouble, all right,” remarked Joe. “We’re figuring on doing the same thing when we get back home.”
Jimmy had tried faithfully to follow the technicalities of the recent conversation, but his was an easy-going nature, disinclined to delve deeply into the intricate mysteries of science. Herbert was somewhat the same way, and they two wandered about the station, laughing and joking, while Bob and Joe and the young wireless man argued the merits of different equipments and hook-ups.
“Say!” exclaimed Jimmy, at length, “I hate to break up the party, but don’t you think it’s about time that we thought of getting back to the hotel? Remember we’ve got a long way to go, and it’s four-thirty already.”
“Gee!” said Bob, glancing in surprise at his watch. “I guess Jimmy is right for once in his life. We’ll have to hustle along now, but we’ll drop in here often while we are at Mountain Pass—unless you put up a ‘no admittance’ sign.”
“No danger of that,” laughed the other. “The oftener you come, the better I’ll like it. This is a lonely place, as you can see for yourselves.”
The radio boys shook hands with Bert Thompson, and after thanking him for the trouble he had taken to show them the station, they started back for the hotel at a brisk pace.
The days were growing very short, and it was after dark when they reached the hotel. Very warm and comfortable it looked as they approached it, windows lighted and throwing cheerful beams over the white snow outside. A red glow filled the windows of the living room, and the boys knew that a big wood fire was roaring and crackling in the big fireplace. As they drew close, a tempting aroma of cookery reached them, and caused them to hasten their steps.
They had barely time to get freshened up before the dinner bell rang, and in a short time they were making havoc with as fine a meal as any of them ever tasted.
When they told about their visit to the radio station, Edna and Ruth Salper, the daughters of the Wall Street broker they had met in the snowstorm, were among the most interested of the listeners.
“We find it so dull over at our house we are glad to come over here for meals and to visit,” said Ruth Salper.
“I suppose being in the woods in winter is rather dull,” returned Joe, politely.
“Did you boys really know enough about radio to talk all afternoon with the man in charge of the government station?” inquired Edna, curiously.
“Why not?” asked Bob. “Don’t you think radio is a broad enough subject to talk about for an entire afternoon?”
“Oh, I suppose it is,” she admitted. “But why don’t you share some of your fun with us?”
“Just what do you mean?” asked Bob. “Do you want to talk radio with us all tomorrow afternoon?” he went on, with an irritating grin.
“No, of course I don’t, stupid,” she exclaimed. “But why can’t you bring your old wireless things into the hotel parlor and let us all hear some music? We’d be ever so grateful if you would.”
The radio boys looked doubtfully at each other.
“We’d do it, fast enough,” said Bob. “But we didn’t bring a loud speaker with us, and without that nobody could hear much unless he had a set of telephone receivers.”
“Oh, dear!” she exclaimed. “I just knew you’d make some excuse or other.”
“A loud speaker is something that looks like an old-fashioned phonograph horn, isn’t it?” asked Ruth, the younger sister, before any of the radio boys could refute the older girl’s accusation.
“Well, yes, it looks like that; but the details are different,” replied Bob.
“Yes, but if you had a phonograph horn, couldn’t you fix it up so that the music would be loud enough for us all to hear it?” persisted Ruth.
“Good for you, Ruth!” exclaimed her sister. “I know what you mean. You’re thinking of that old phonograph they used to have in this hotel, before they got the big new cabinet machine.”
“If Edna and I get that horn for you, it will be easy for such experts as you boys are to make a—a what-you-may-call-it—loud speaker—out of it, won’t it?” asked Ruth, demurely.
“I think they’re kidding us now, Bob,” said Joe, grinning. “When a girl tells you you’re an expert, you can bet she’s figuring to wish something on you.”
“Yes, but it’s so unusual that we ought to do something to encourage it,” laughed Bob. “Let’s call their bluff. Probably they’ll never be able to find a horn, anyway.”
“Don’t count too much on that,” said Edna, with a dangerous smile. “We almost always get what we ask for.”
“Yes, and you are everlastingly asking for something, it seems to me,” grumbled her father, who had joined the little group at that moment.
“Now, Daddy, you know you love to give us things,” chided Ruth. “If we suddenly had everything we wanted, you’d be dreadfully disappointed.”
“There’s no danger of that happening,” said her father, a smile softening his grim face. “But what is it you’re after just at present?”
“We want that big phonograph horn they used to have here in the hotel,” said Edna, with a provoking side glance at the radio boys. “Will you ask the manager to hunt it up and lend it to us?”
“I’ll see what I can do about it,” promised Mr. Salper. “I remember the horn you mean, but it was probably thrown away long ago.”
The radio boys rather wished that this might prove to be the case, but they were not destined to get off so easily. The first thing they saw when they entered the dining room the next morning was a large wooden horn, of a style in universal use in the early years of the phonograph, standing prominently near their table.
“There, now!” exclaimed Jimmy, in a low voice. “You see what you’ve let us in for, Bob. Why didn’t you tell them that we didn’t have time to waste building a loud speaker, and settle the thing right then and there.”
“That’s easier said than done,” answered Bob. “Why don’t you go over to the Salper’s house and tell the girls that?”
“Yes, go right over and be rough with them,” advised Joe. “Tell them that you’re not afraid of girls, and they can’t put anything over on you.”
“Aw, I would have, last night; but it’s too late now,” said Jimmy, lamely.
“Yes, you would!” jeered Herb. “After all, it won’t be so much work. You’re an expert carpenter, Jimmy, and can make a bang-up job of it.”
“That’s always the way,” complained Jimmy, heaving a dismal sigh. “You fellows think up a good, hard job, and then I do the work. I’ve never known it to fail yet.”
“Buck up, Doughnuts,” said Bob. “Think of how the girls will thank you for it. You’ll be the most popular fellow in the hotel.”
“Like fun I will!” returned the fat boy. “But I’m not going to let it interfere with my appetite. I can see where I’ve got a hard day ahead of me.”
It proved to be a busy morning for all the radio boys. Immediately after breakfast they fell to work on the horn, and after some three hours of steady labor they had constructed a passable loud-speaking horn, using one telephone receiver clamped securely at the narrow end. They mounted the whole thing on a solid wooden pedestal, leaving two substantial shelves at the back to hold their radio apparatus.
It did not take them long to mount the receiving outfit in a neat manner, and when this was done they all drew a long breath and sat down to admire the result of their labors. While still engaged in this gratifying occupation, Edna and Ruth Salper entered.
“Oh!” exclaimed the former, with a gesture of delight, “doesn’t it look simply beautiful? I never thought you boys could make it so quickly.”
“You’ve got Jimmy to thank for that,” said Bob. “I never saw him work so hard in his life before. It was easy to see that he was thinking of you and Ruth all the time, from the way he put his heart into it.”
“I didn’t anything of the kind,” said the embarrassed Jimmy. “I never thought of them once, even.”
“What a dreadful thing to say,” laughed Ruth. “I didn’t know you hated girls, Jimmy.”
“Who said I hated ’em?” demanded Jimmy, getting as red as a beet. “I—I——”
“Love them,” Joe finished for him. “Is that what you are trying to say, Jimmy?”
“Say, who asked you to butt in?” inquired Jimmy, desperately. “Everybody is trying to tell me what I mean, until I don’t know which is right myself.”
“Never mind,” said Edna, coming to the rescue of the floundering youth. “We are grateful to you for working so hard for us, anyway.”
“Oh, that’s all right,” mumbled Jimmy. “If it works all right, we won’t worry about the labor we put into it.”
“But don’t you expect it to work?” asked Edna, teasingly.
“Sure it will work,” asserted Bob, before Jimmy could involve himself again. “That is, you’ll hear music, all right, but it probably won’t be very loud, even with the help of the horn. We’re a long way from the broadcasting station, you know. If we were within ten or fifteen miles of it, I’d say surely that it would be a success.”
“I’ll go and get the loop aerial, Bob, and we can test it right now,” suggested Joe. “What do you think?”
Bob nodded, and Joe left the room, returning a few minutes later with the loop. This was soon connected with the set, and then Bob began tuning for signals.
“Mercy! what was that?” exclaimed Edna, while Ruth gave a little scream.
From the horn came an ear-piercing howl, followed by whistles and weird unearthly shrieks. But the boys only laughed heartily at the girls.
“That’s nothing but old man static,” said Bob. “We’ll soon get him off the wires.”
“Does he live near here?” asked Ruth, innocently.
“Wow!” shouted Herb, and the boys could not help laughing, although they stopped as soon as they saw the mystified and somewhat hurt expression in the girl’s eyes.
“That was just Bob’s slangy way of talking,” explained Joe, after he was sure that he had regained control of his features. “Static is the electricity that is always in the air, and gives us radio fans a good deal of trouble.”
“Oh, I see,” said Ruth, and she was a good enough sport to laugh at her own mistake.
Meantime Bob had finally got the set tuned to the proper wave length, and the little group were all delighted with the clarity and volume of the resultant sounds. They were not nearly as loud as an ordinary phonograph, but were sufficient to be heard distinctly in a fairly large room.
“It’s too bad we only have a one-stage amplifier,” said Bob. “If we only had another transformer and vacuum tube, we’d have a loud speaker that you could hear all over the hotel.”
“I think this one is plenty good enough,” asserted Edna.
Both she and her sister were as excited as children with a new toy, and they were both delighted with the music.
“You boys will have to bring this wonderful thing into the parlor tonight, and let everybody hear it,” coaxed Edna. “I know they will all be tickled to death to hear a concert in this new way.”
“They might not be as enthusiastic as you think,” said Bob, doubtfully. “Maybe they’d rather just talk, and wouldn’t thank us for interrupting them.”
“What an idea!” exclaimed Ruth. “Just try it once, just to please us, and you’ll soon find out whether they like it or not.”
“Well, if it’s to please you, we’ll certainly do that thing!” Bob gallantly remarked, and was rewarded by a friendly smile.
“Edna and I will speak to the manager about it this afternoon, and I know it will be all right,” she said. “We’ll tell you what he says at supper time.”
The radio boys, although they were radio enthusiasts themselves, did not actually realize how deeply interested people had become in this new and wonderful science. They were somewhat surprised, therefore, when the manager sought them out that afternoon and told them that he would be more than delighted to have them give a radio concert that evening.
When he had gone the boys grinned at one another.
“We’re getting to be popular around this place,” remarked Bob.
“We sha’n’t be quite so popular tomorrow, if the concert broadcasted tonight isn’t a good one,” said Joe.
“I only wish we could get that loudspeaker to speak just a bit louder,” said Herb. “It’s only fair now, and those people will be expecting a lot, I suppose.”
“I was thinking the same thing,” remarked Bob. “And if we’re willing to pitch in this afternoon, we can improve the strength of our set a lot”
The others looked incredulously at him.
“Explain,” said Joe. “You’ve got us guessing, Bob.”
“The way we’ve got our set hooked up now, we’re using a loop antenna, aren’t we? Well,” as the others nodded assent, “why not unwind the loop and string a double aerial on the roof? That would give us a lot more power, you know.”
“Right you are!” exclaimed Joe. “That should make a lot of difference.”
“But if we do that, we’ll have to have a ground, which isn’t necessary with the loop antenna,” objected Herb.
“That’s true enough,” agreed Bob. “But that’s easy, after all. We can hook our ground wire to one of the steam radiators.”
“Trust Bob to think of everything!” ejaculated Jimmy.
“Bob is thinking that we’d better get busy, then,” said that individual. “Heave yourself off that nice soft couch, Jimmy, and get your hat and overcoat on.”
Jimmy emitted a dismal groan.
“Have a heart, Bob,” he complained. “You know I worked so hard this morning that I’m all in.”
“All right, then, you stay there; but we’ll tell Edna and Ruth that you refused to help,” said Joe, cruelly.
This threat had its effect, and Jimmy struggled to his feet and had his outer clothing on almost as soon as the others. It was a beautiful day outside, and after they once got warmed up, they thoroughly enjoyed the work of stringing the aerial on the roof. They brought the leading-in wire to one of the windows of the hotel parlor. It was not necessary to insulate this with anything heavier than friction tape, as this was to be only a temporary installation. Before dark they had everything ready, and then they went inside, moved their receiving set into the parlor, and connected it up to the leading-in wire. Following Bob’s suggestion, they attached a ground wire to a radiator, and found that everything worked perfectly. As they had anticipated, the signals were considerably louder, and the old phonograph horn filled the big room with a satisfying volume of sound.
During dinner the boys were so excited that they could hardly eat, and immediately afterward they hurried into the parlor. The guests had been notified of the impending concert, and soon almost everybody in the hotel had crowded into the room.
The hotel manager made a little speech introducing the boys to those who had not already become acquainted with them, and mentioning the concert that was to come. Then every one waited expectantly for the promised entertainment.
It proved unnecessary to do much tuning, as the adjustment they had secured that afternoon proved to be very nearly correct still.
When the first clear notes floated into the room many of the audience straightened up in their chairs, while looks of astonishment passed over their features. At first they were too engrossed with the novelty of the thing to pay much attention to the music, but gradually the golden notes wove their magic net and held them all enthralled. The night was an ideal one for radiophony, cold and still, with hardly any static to annoy. One selection after another came in clear and distinct, and after each one the audience applauded instinctively, hardly conscious of the fact that upward of one hundred miles of bleak and snow-covered mountains and valleys lay between them and the performers.
At length, to everybody’s regret, the last number was played, and the receiving set was silent. Not so the audience, however, who overwhelmed the boys with thanks, and made them promise to entertain them in a similar manner on other evenings.
After most of the audience had drifted out the Salper girls thanked the boys prettily for all they had done, and they felt more than repaid for the hard work of the day, even Jimmy admitting afterward that “it was worth it.”
The next day the boys were eager to see Bert Thompson, the radio man, and tell him about their successful experiment, so they set out for the government station soon after breakfast. It had snowed in the early morning, but had now stopped, and the air was cold and bracing.
The four lads relieved the monotony of the long walk with, more than one impromptu exchange of snowballs. It seemed that they had hardly started before they had traversed the miles of difficult going and found themselves in the snug interior of the wireless house.
As they were approaching it, they were astonished to see Mr. Salper emerge, a heavy frown on his usually none-too-cheerful countenance. He only nodded to the radio boys in passing, and hurried away through the snow at a pace of which they would never have believed him capable.
When they entered the station they found Bert Thompson excited and angry. When they opened the door he started up, but when he saw who his visitors were, sank back in his chair.
“I’m glad it’s you fellows!” he exclaimed. “I thought it was that Wall Street man coming back. I’m not sure but I’ll throw him out if he does. I’d like to, anyhow.”
“You are all up in the air,” said Bob. “Did you have an argument with Mr. Salper?”
“Well, he did most of the arguing,” said the other, with a faint smile. “He’s so blamed used to having his own way that if any one doesn’t do just as he wants, he gets mad.
“I suppose I should make allowances for him, because he has plenty to worry him,” went on Thompson. “Some of those Wall Street manipulators are a ruthless bunch, and when they aren’t busy taking money from an innocent public, they stage some battles between each other. Mr. Salper has an idea that a bunch of them are trying to swing the market against him while he’s up here, and he seems to think that this is a public radio station, with nothing to do but send and receive messages for him all day. I’m working for Uncle Sam, not for him.”
“Oh, well, don’t let him get you all stirred up, anyway,” said Bob. “He doesn’t mean half of what he says. He was real decent last night while we were giving our concert.”
“What do you mean, concert?” asked the wireless man. “Are you in the entertainment game now?”
“Something like that,” answered Bob, grinning, and then he told the operator about the concert of the previous evening.
“That’s fine,” said Thompson heartily, when he had finished. “That was a good idea, to use a regular aerial instead of the loop. It certainly catches a lot more.”
“Yes, but the loop is mighty handy, just the same,” remarked Joe. “Especially in a portable set. You can set it up in no time.”
“Oh, it’s handy, there’s no doubt of that,” admitted the young wireless man. “I wish I had been there for the concert. I heard most of it here, but it must have been fun to watch the faces of the audience when you started in.”
“It was,” laughed Herb. “I think that some of them imagined we had a phonograph hidden somewhere because after the concert was over a number of them looked all around the set as though they were hunting for something suspicious.”
“Likely enough,” agreed Thompson. “Some people are mighty hard to convince.”
After some further conversation the boys took their leave, promising to come again for a longer visit. On the way back the chief topic of discussion was Mr. Salper, and the boys wondered more than once just what the nature of the trouble was that caused him to haunt the wireless station and besiege the operator with a flood of messages.
“Well,” said Herb, philosophically, “‘it is an ill wind that blows nobody any good.’”
Bob, who had been shaking a tree for nuts and had shaken down more snow than anything else, looked at Herb inquiringly.
“Now what’s the poor nut raving about?” he asked slangily of Jimmy and Joe, who were also engaged in nut gathering.
“I was just thinking,” said Herb, with an attempt at dignity, “how sorry I am for all those poor sick people in Clintonia.”
“Oh, yes, you were,” scoffed Jimmy, who was eating more nuts than he saved. “You were thinking how lucky we are to be here picking nuts in the woods instead of slaving away in Clintonia High.”
“Gee, that fellow must be a mind reader!” exclaimed Herb, grinning, and Bob, coming near, made a pass at him.
“Say, get busy, old bluffer,” he said. “You’re getting slower than Doughnuts here. You haven’t got half the nuts that I have.”
“But I’m having twice as much fun,” countered Herb, unmoved “A fellow can’t work all the time.”
“I wish I knew what was worrying Mr. Salper,” said Joe, suddenly. “I wonder if that Wall Street bunch, is really out after his money.”
“Gee, he sure does know how to change the subject,” murmured Herb, and Bob threw a nut at him, which he successfully ducked.
“He seemed rather cut up about it, anyway,” said Bob, in answer to Joe.
“I wouldn’t trust those Wall Street sharpers out of my sight myself,” added Jimmy solemnly.
“Gee, listen to the financier,” gibed Herb. “He’s lost so many millions in Wall Street himself.”
“Not yet,” said Jimmy, plaintively. “But wait, my boy, my life is all before me.”
“Say,” cried Joe, “if you two fellows don’t look out I’ll put you in my pocket with the other nuts.”
“Mr. Salper seems kind of a nut himself,” said Joe, continuing with his own reflections. “He seems to have a grouch on everything and everybody.”
“No wonder, with all the worries he’s got,” said Jimmy, adding dolefully: “You see the penalties of extreme wealth.”
“One thing you’ll never have to worry about,” said Herb, and Jimmy grinned good-naturedly.
“I’d rather have my sweet disposition,” he sighed, “than all of Salper’s wealth.”
“I don’t see why you think he’s so wealthy,” Bob objected. “Everybody who trades in Wall Street isn’t a millionaire, you know.”
“Say, wait a minute!” cried Bob suddenly, with an imperative wave of his hand. “Did you hear anything?”
They listened for a moment in breathless silence and it came again, the call that Bob’s sharp ears had first detected. In the distance it was, surely, but a distinct cry for help, nevertheless.
“Come on, fellows! We’re needed!” cried Bob, and, dropping his bag of nuts in the snow, he started off at a swift pace in the direction of the sound.
The rest of the radio boys needed no second invitation. They started after Bob, pushing swiftly through the deep snow.
But as the seconds passed and they heard no further outcry, they thought that they must have been mistaken or that they had started in the wrong direction.
However, as they stopped to consider what to do, the cries began again, louder this time, a fact which told them they had been on the right track all along.
They hurried on again, sometimes plunging into snowdrifts that reached nearly to their waists, but keeping doggedly on to the rescue.
It was enough for the radio boys that some one was in trouble. Even roly-poly Jimmy, puffing painfully, but running gallantly along in the rear, had but one thought in his head, and that to help whoever needed help.
As they came nearer the cries became louder, and they thought they could distinguish three voices, and one seemed to be that of a woman.
Another minute they came upon a cleared space and stopped still for a moment to stare at the amazing scene which met their eyes.
A woman stood, nearly knee deep in snow, waving her arms wildly, and even in that moment of astonishment they recognized her as Mrs. Salper. She was gesticulating toward something in front of her and calling urgently to the boys to hurry.
Then the lads saw the cause of her distress. At the foot of a steep rise of ground, almost a small hill, was all that was to be seen of two girls. These latter had their heads above the snow that enveloped them and they were trying desperately to work their arms free of the icy blanket. From their expressions and from their wild cries for help it could be seen they were panic-stricken.
“A snowslide!” Joe, who was standing close to Bob, heard him mutter. “Those girls had a narrow escape to keep from being buried entirely!”
The next moment he was dashing off in the direction of the two prisoners, shouting encouragement to Mrs. Salper. The others were close at his heels.
“We’ll get you out all right,” he called to the frightened girls, who had stopped their struggling and were looking at him hopefully. “Just keep still for a moment and save your breath. We’ll have you out of there in a jiffy.
“Dig, fellows, for all you’re worth,” he added to the boys, who, as usual, looked to him for directions. “These girls must be pretty cold by this time.”
For answer the boys did dig manfully, the imprisoned girls helping them as much as they could with their numb fingers, and before many minutes they had the snow cleared away sufficiently to be able to struggle through it to a spot where it was not so deep. The girls were, of course, Edna and Ruth Salper, the pretty daughters of the Wall Street broker.
Edna and Ruth were trembling with cold and with the shock of their recent accident, and Mrs. Salper ran to them, putting an arm about each of them protectingly and pouring out thanks to the embarrassed boys.
“That’s all right,” said Bob, modestly. “We couldn’t very well have done anything else, you know. I hope,” he added with a glance at the shivering girls, “that the girls won’t take cold.”
“They will if I don’t get them home quickly,” said Mrs. Salper, adding, with a worried frown: “I wish we hadn’t come so far from the house.”
It was then that Joe broke in.
“I tell you what,” he said, eagerly. “It isn’t far to Mountain Rest——”
“And there’s sure to be a fire in the grate up there,” Bob finished for him.
“And it’s a fire that will warm you up in a jiffy,” added Herb with his most friendly smile.
“If we can only make it,” sighed Mrs. Salper.
The radio boys knew of a short cut from this spot to Mountain Rest and along this they led the others as swiftly as they were able to travel. And on the way they learned how it was that the girls had happened to be in such a predicament.
“I shouldn’t have let them do it.” It was Mrs. Salper who told the story. The two girls were still too shaken from their adventure to say anything. All they could think of was the comforting shelter of a room and an open grate fire.
“They wanted to climb up that little hill to see what was on the other side of it,” the lady went on to explain. “I didn’t want them to, for I saw that the snow was deep. But they were in wild spirits, wouldn’t listen to me, said I didn’t need to come if I didn’t want to—which I didn’t!—and off they went.
“When they had nearly reached the top Edna started to fall——”
“No, it was Ruth, Mother,” corrected the girl, showing the first sign of returning interest.
“Well, it doesn’t matter,” said Mrs. Salper, with a sigh. “The result was the same. One of them clutched at the other and they both toppled down the hill. Their fall must have loosened a mass of the drifted snow and it came down on top of them. Heavens!” she shuddered at the memory. “It seemed as if the whole mountain side were falling on top of them! I thought they would be completely buried!”
“Well, we were, almost,” said Ruth, chafing her cold hands to bring the circulation back into them. “Anyway,” she added with a stiff smile, “I feel almost as frozen as if I had been!”
“I bet you’re cold,” said Bob, sympathetically. “Never mind, we’ll have you warmed up in a jiffy now.”
As a matter of fact, the big hotel was even then looming before them, and in a moment more they entered its doors, to find to their delight that a roaring fire was burning in the grate of the big living room.
The two girls rushed to it joyfully, holding out their chilled hands to the blaze, snuggling to its warmth like two half-frozen kittens.
They happened to have the big room all to themselves at that moment, and, after having drawn chairs up to the fire for Mrs. Salper and the girls, the boys excused themselves and hurried back to the spot where they had dropped their bags of nuts when the cry for help had interrupted them in their occupation.
“Never do to lose the fruits of our labor,” said Herb, grinning, as he picked up his own particular bag.
The other boys did likewise, and they were soon hurrying back to the hotel again, talking excitedly about the rescue of the Salper girls.
“It’s mighty lucky we happened to be near enough to hear the cries for help,” said Joe, soberly. “It would have been pretty hard for them to have forced their way through those drifts alone, half numbed as they were.”
“Yes,” agreed Bob. “It’s pretty nice to think of them warm and snug before the fire just now.”
“Queer,” observed Jimmy as they neared the house, “that we should have been talking about them just at the time the thing happened.”
“Queer,” said Herb patronizingly, “but not half so queer, Doughnuts, as the modern miracles that happen every day——”
“Take radio, for instance,” finished Bob, and they entered the hotel laughing.
They found the two girls recovered from their fright and quite a good deal happier than they had been a few minutes before. They regarded the radio boys with interest, and it was clear that the girls and Mrs. Salper had been talking about them during their absence.
“You’re often called the ‘radio boys,’ aren’t you?” challenged Edna, as the boys drew chairs up to the fire.
“Why, I guess so,” said Bob, with a smile. “Lots of folks call us that.”
“Dad was up at the radio station the other day and the operator there was enthusiastic about you,” said Ruth Salper, in her direct way. “Said that if you kept on the way you were going, you would soon know more about radio than he does himself.”
“That’s mighty nice of him, but I’m afraid he was boosting us too high,” replied Bob, trying hard not to show how pleased he was.
“That fellow at the station has forgotten more about radio than we ever knew,” added Joe modestly, but in his heart he was as pleased at the praise as Bob was. It is always nice to receive commendation from some one who is an authority.
“You’re very modest,” teased Edna gaily. “But when dad says anything nice about anybody he generally means it. He doesn’t say nice things very often——” She caught a glance of reproof from her mother and bit her lip penitently.
“You mustn’t say unkind things about your father, Edna,” said Mrs. Salper, gently. “You know he is worn to death with business worries. If we could once succeed in making him forget his responsibilities, he would be as jolly and fun-loving as he used to be.”
“Yes, dad used to be no end of fun,” said Ruth, adding, with a fierce little frown and a clenching of her fists; “I just wish I could get hold of whoever’s worrying him so. I’d give them something to worry about for a change.”
Then, seeming to realize that the boys might not be interested in her personal affairs—though as a matter of fact they were interested, extremely so—the girl tactfully turned the conversation to something which she thought might interest them.
“Could we see your radio set?” she asked, impulsively. “We’d just love to have you tell us about it. As much as we could understand,” she added, with a smile for the boys.
Mrs. Salper protested feebly, but so eager were the boys to show off their set to the girl radio fans that her opposition was overcome almost at once.
Then followed a happy hour during which the radio boys talked learnedly of condensers and amplifiers and different kinds of receivers until the admiration of the girls mounted almost to awe.
“My, but it sounds worse than Greek!” cried Edna Salper once, as she bent absorbedly over the apparatus that worked such miracles and bore such high-sounding names. “This is the tuning apparatus, isn’t it?” she asked, gingerly touching the wire coil. “It seems almost impossible that you can tune to any wave length with this thing, just as the piano tuner can tune the wires of his instrument to the proper sound vibration.”
“It—the whole thing—seems impossible,” added Ruth, while Mrs. Salper found herself quite as interested as her daughters.
“Yes, that’s the way it seemed to us at first,” agreed Bob, his eyes shining. “When Doctor Dale told us we could make a set for ourselves we could hardly believe him. But it didn’t seem a bit hard once we got started and learned the hang of it.”
“You mean to say that you made this set yourselves?” asked Mrs. Salper, with interest.
“Oh, this is nothing. We’ve made lots of ’em,” said Jimmy proudly, at which Herb promptly kicked him under the table. The injured Jimmy glared at his assailant, but the others were too much interested in the subject to notice him.
“You see this is a comparatively small set,” Bob explained.
“But we’re working on a powerful apparatus now,” broke in Joe eagerly. “And when we have that in working shape we’ll be able to send as well as receive.”
“Well, I think you’re just as smart as father said you were,” said Ruth, and at this candid compliment the confused boys thought it time to change the subject.
“How about listening in a while?” suggested Bob, struck by a sudden inspiration. “We ought to be just about in time to catch the afternoon concert—if there is one. Would you like to find out?”
“Would we?” cried Edna, enthusiastically. “Indeed we would!”
“Just try us,” added Ruth happily.
So the boys showed them how to fit the head-phones, not using the loudspeaker they had made from the phonograph horn, and adjusted the tuning apparatus to the proper wave length, and the girls answered to the thrill of catching music magically from the ether just as the boys had done on that never-to-be-forgotten evening when their first concert had reached them over the wires of their first receiving set. Crude it seemed to them now in the light of later improvements, but an instrument of magic it had been to them that night.
No wonder that the boys felt a warm and real friendship for the Salper girls—and Mrs. Salper, too—a friendship that would have been surprising, considering the shortness of their acquaintance, had it not been that they were all radio fans, dyed in the wool.
So quickly did the time fly that Mrs. Salper was amazed and apologetic when she found how long they had lingered.
“We must hurry!” she exclaimed, starting toward the door, the girls reluctantly following. “Your father will surely think we are all lost in a snowdrift.”
“Which two of us came very near being,” added Edna, with a laugh.
“Don’t joke about it,” said Ruth, with a shiver. “I must say being buried in a snowdrift wasn’t very pleasant—while it lasted.”
The radio boys insisted upon accompanying the Salpers home, explaining that they could show them the shortest path. Gaily they started out and before they had reached the Salper place the friendship which had begun the evening of the concert with their mutual interest in radio, became steadily stronger.
It was plain that, besides being grateful to them for having come to the help of the girls, Mrs. Salper liked the boys for their own sakes.
When they reached the house she begged them to come in with her so that Mr. Salper might have the opportunity of thanking them for their kindness.
The boys skillfully avoided accepting this invitation by pointing out that it was getting late and the path would be hard to find in the dusk.
“Thanks ever so much for everything,” Ruth Salper called after them as they started off, and Edna added:
“We’re going to frighten dad into getting us a radio set by threatening to make one ourselves!”
“I shouldn’t wonder if they could make a set, at that,” said Bob thoughtfully, as they tramped on alone. “They’re smart enough.”
“For girls,” added Herb, condescendingly.
Whereupon Jimmy turned and eyed him scornfully.
“Say, where do you get that stuff?” he jeered. “If those girls couldn’t make a better radio set than you, I’d sure feel sorry for them.”
“Ha! I’ll wash your face for saying that,” was the quick answer, and the next instant Jimmy felt some snow on his ear. Then began a snow battle between all the boys which lasted until they reached the hotel.
After that the boys saw a good deal of Edna and Ruth Salper. The latter were thoroughly good sports and entered into the fun of the moment with such enthusiasm that the radio boys declared they were lots more fun than a good many of the fellows they knew.
They went nutting together, tramped through the woods, read together the latest discoveries in the radio field, until the girls became almost as great enthusiasts as the boys.
The boys were often asked to visit the Salper home, but it was seldom that they took advantage of these invitations.
“It would be pleasant enough,” Herb declared, “if only grouchy Mr. Salper were not always around to put a damper on the sport.”
As a matter of fact, on the rare occasions when they happened to meet, Mr. Salper hardly uttered a word, but it was this very silence of his that made the boys uneasy.
“I feel sometimes,” Jimmy remarked, “as if I’d like to put a tack on his chair, just to see if he’d say ‘ouch’ when it stuck into him.”
“He’d probably say a sight worse than that,” Bob replied, with a laugh,
However, they were having too good a time to allow Mr. Salper and his grouches to interfere much with them.
They became familiar figures at the sending and receiving station, and the operator always received them cordially. They often had long and interesting discussions which were not only delightful to the boys but extremely helpful as well.
“It seems,” said Jimmy, with a grin, “as if all the radio inventors were running a race with each other to see who can get the greatest number of inventions on the market in the shortest space of time.”
“You said something that time, boy,” the operator replied ruefully. “The smart fellows are keeping us dubs on the jump trying to catch up with them. Not that I intend to put you in the ‘dub’ class with myself,” he added, with a grin.
“I only wish we knew half as much about the game as you do,” Bob returned heartily. “I think we’d be mighty well satisfied.”
One day when the radio boys had left Edna and Ruth Salper and were tramping through the woods alone, they spoke of the operator admiringly.
“He sure does know a lot about radio,” said Joe. “He must stay up all night studying.”
“Guess that’s what’s the matter with him,” remarked Bob, soberly. “He spends too much of his time indoors, boning. He should get out in the open more.”
“Looks as if a little fresh air might tone him up some,” Herb admitted. “He looks as if a breath of air might blow him away.”
“If I looked as thin as he does, I’d go see a doctor,” said Jimmy emphatically.
It was a fact that the operator at the station, while looking far from strong when the boys had first seen him, had grown thinner and thinner and paler and paler until now he seemed to be positively going into a decline.
Because they had a sincere regard for Bert Thompson, the boys had tried to lure him out into the open, but he had been proof against all their blandishments. And after a while the boys had given up trying.
“If he wants to kill himself,” Bob had grumbled, “I suppose we’ll have to let him have his own way about it.”
And now at this particular time when the boys were at peace with the world, something suddenly happened that gave them a rude jolt.
Talking happily of improvements they expected to apply to their new radio outfit, they came suddenly upon—Buck Looker and his crowd.
To say they were surprised would not have half expressed it. They were dumbfounded and mad—clear through. So here were these rascals, turning up as they always did, just in time to spoil the fun.
That Buck and his cronies had been talking about them was evident from the fact that at the appearance of the radio boys they stopped short in what they were saying and looked sullenly abashed. And from their confusion Bob guessed that the meeting was as much a surprise to the “gang” as it was to themselves.
The boys would have gone on without speaking, hoping to avoid trouble if it was possible, but Buck hailed them boisterously.
“Say, what are you guys doing here?” he asked, sneeringly, thrusting himself almost directly in front of Bob, so that the latter would be forced to step aside in order to pass him.
“That’s what I’d like to ask you,” returned Bob, feeling himself grow hot all over. “Get out of my way, Buck. You’re cramping the scenery.”
“Aw, what’s your awful rush?” asked Buck, refusing to move, while Carl Lutz and Terry Mooney sidled over to the bully, keeping a wary eye on Bob’s right fist, nevertheless.
“Say, get out of here, Buck Looker, and get quick!” It was Joe who spoke this time, and any one not as stupid as Buck Looker would have known it was time to do as he was told.
But because of the fire that had burned to the ground his father’s disreputable cottage in the woods and which he and his followers had blamed upon the radio boys, Buck Looker thought himself safe in taunting the latter as much as he wished. He assumed that they would not dare resent anything he said or did, for fear he would make public the matter of the fire and accuse them openly.
It was a chance of a lifetime for Buck—or so he thought—and he was determined not to over-look it. So his manner became more insulting than ever and his face took on a wider grin as his glance shifted from Bob to Joe.
“So you’re in a hurry, too, are you?” he sneered. “Going to set some more houses on fire, eh?”
He turned to his cronies with a grin and they piped up together as if by a prearranged signal:
“Firebrands!”
This undeserved insult was more than the radio boys could stand, and all stepped forward with clenched fists.
“You take that back, Buck Looker!” cried Joe, with flashing eyes.
“Take back nothing!” answered the bully.
“Yes, you will!” broke in Bob, and caught Buck by the arm.
At once the bully aimed a savage blow at Bob’s head. But the latter ducked, and an instant later his clenched fist landed upon Buck’s chin with such weight that the bully was sent over backward into the snow.
At the instant when Buck made his attack on Bob, Terry Mooney tried to hit Joe with a stick he carried. Joe promptly caught hold of the stick, and, putting out his foot, sent Terry backward into a snowdrift. Seeing this, Carl Lutz started to run away, but both Herb and Jimmy went after him and knocked him flat.
“You let me alone! I didn’t do anything!” blubbered Carl, who was a thorough coward.
“You can’t call me a firebrand,” answered Herb, and while fat Jimmy sat on the luckless Carl, Herb rammed some snow into his ear and down his neck.
While this was going on both Buck and Terry had scrambled to their feet, and then began a fierce fight between that pair and Bob and Joe. Blows were freely exchanged, but soon the radio boys had the better of it, and when Terry’s lip was bleeding and swelling rapidly, and Buck had received a crack in the left eye and it was also swelling, all three of the cronies were only too glad to back away.
“Have you had enough?” demanded Bob, pantingly.
“If you haven’t, we’ll give you some more,” added Joe.
“You just wait! We’ll get square with you some other time,” muttered Buck. And thereupon he and his cronies lost no time in sneaking away into the woods.
“Of all the mean fellows that ever lived!” cried Herb.
“I guess they’ll leave us alone—for a while, anyway,” came from Joe, as he felt of his shoulder where he had received a blow.
“I wonder what those fellows are doing around here, anyway,” said Bob thoughtfully. “Do you suppose they’re putting up at the Mountain Rest Hotel, too?”
“More than likely,” answered Joe, gloomily. “Perhaps they’ve been driven out of Clintonia, too, on account of the epidemic. I heard quite a number of the other young folks were getting out. The whole town is pretty well scared.”
“They are sure trying their best to make trouble for us,” added Jimmy.
“That fire in the woods was just nuts for them,” said Bob, with a frown. “They’ve been trying for a long time to get something on us, and now they think they’ve got it. They think we’re afraid to beat ’em up now as they deserve, for fear they’ll tell everybody we set that old shack on fire.”
“It was a funny thing,” remarked Joe, musingly, “how that fire started, anyway.”
“Oh, what’s the use of worrying?” added Herb, carelessly. “I reckon the memory of that licking will keep Buck quiet for a while. Say, that was a fine piece of work you did, Bob! The memory lingers.”
Bob grinned.
“How about yourselves?” he asked, adding, with a gleam in his eyes: “I didn’t notice Terry Mooney and Carl Lutz looking very happy!”
The radio boys saw Buck Looker often—all too often—in the days that followed. As the boys had feared, Buck and his crowd were staying at the Mountain Rest Hotel, and it was almost impossible to help encountering them.
Several times there were arguments which almost resulted in blows, but Buck always managed to sneak off at the critical moment, leaving the boys to fume helplessly.
“Wish we could find out how that shack of theirs caught fire,” Joe grumbled on one of these occasions. “Then we could stop their mouths on that firebrand question once and for all.”
“Wouldn’t make any difference,” remarked Herb gloomily. “If they couldn’t make trouble for us on that score, they’d think up something else.”
But about this time something happened that took the minds of the radio boys from Buck Looker and his trouble making.
One day, as they were tramping through the woods in the still deep snow, they came upon a little decrepit-looking one-room shack, standing dejectedly within a circle of skeleton trees.
They had wandered further than usual from camp in exploring the surrounding country and had come upon the tiny cabin unexpectedly. Jimmy was about to utter a gleeful shout at sight of the interesting-looking place when Bob clapped a warning hand over his mouth.
“Keep still,” he whispered sharply. “I hear voices in there.”
“Well, what if you do?” demanded Joe, but he kept his voice cautiously lowered just the same. “Probably some harmless dubs——”
“Like ourselves,” finished Jimmy, with a grin, “seeking shelter from the bitter weather.”
“Well, whoever they are, they sure are mad about something,” said Bob, hardly knowing why he should be so excited.
The voices inside that one-room shack had been raised in altercation, but now, as the boys listened, somebody evidently cautioned silence, for once more the tones were lowered almost to a whisper.
“There’s something mysterious about this,” said Bob, his eyes gleaming joyfully. “I vote we look into it.”
“Right-o,” agreed Joe, following the leader as Bob started softly toward the shack.
What they expected to find they had no idea. But it was an understood, though unspoken, rule with the radio boys never to pass by anything that looked in the least mysterious. And certainly this queer little shack in the woods bore all the air of mystery.
There was one small window near where they were standing and the four boys crowded up to this, jostling each other in the attempt to be the first to see through the dingy pane.
“Hey!” whispered Jimmy in anguish, as Joe’s foot clamped firmly down upon his. “Quit parking on my toe, will you? There’s lots of room on the ground.”
Joe snickered derisively and that small sound came near to proving their undoing. For inside the cabin it happened that for a moment every one had stopped talking and in the silence Joe’s laugh was distinctly audible.
“Some one’s getting in on this,” they heard one of the voices say, as though its owner were nervous, yet was trying his best to hide his uneasiness. “Let’s take a look around, boys. You never can be too sure.”
The radio boys looked at each other in consternation. There was no time to get away, even if they had wanted to. And now that they were convinced there was crooked work going on in the shack, they certainly did not want to leave.
Bob flattened himself against the wall and motioned to his chums to do likewise. If the fellows found them and wanted to put up a fight, “well, they’d get their money’s worth, anyway.”
But it so happened that the lads were not discovered. The door of the shack was on the opposite side from them, and either the men were too lazy to search carefully or they were too confident of the obscurity of their meeting place. At any rate, they went to the door, looked around, and, finding no one within sight, evidently decided that they had been mistaken in thinking they had heard a suspicious noise and reëntered the shack without searching further.
“You’re crazy, Mohun,” the boys heard one of them remark, in an irritable voice. “You’re letting your imagination—and your nerves—run away with you.”
“Well, this deal is enough to get on anybody’s nerves,” was the grumbled reply, evidently from the person addressed as Mohun. “If we don’t put it across pretty quick I’m going to quit. I’ve told you too much delay would be fatal.”
The boys glanced at each other, and the relief they had felt at not being discovered was closely followed by huge excitement as they became more and more certain that they were on the verge of making an important discovery.
They crowded closer to the window though, mindful of how close they had come to discovery, they were careful to make not the slightest sound.
Bob, who was closest to the window, could, by exercising the greatest caution, peer into the shadows of the room. He put out his hand as a warning to Joe, who was crowding him closely.
“Don’t push,” he said, in the merest whisper. “I have a notion this is going to be good.”
So had the other boys, but they were mad clean through at the fate that prevented their getting a glimpse into the tumbled-down shanty. However, they held back, knowing that if they were too eager they would spoil everything. Discovery then would mean that they would never hear the secret these men were about to disclose.
The old shack had evidently once been lived in, for it was fitted up with furniture of a crude sort. Along one side of the room ran two long bunks, one above the other, and on the walls were some old dilapidated-looking pictures, evidently cut out of magazines or news periodicals.
There was a three-legged, rickety table in the center of the room, and about this the conspirators—for such they were—were gathered. Two of the men had chairs, patently home-made, for seats, while the third, who sat facing Bob, had merely an empty wooden box turned on end.
It was this last fellow who was now speaking and who had been addressed by the name of Mohun. He was short and of fair complexion, with protruding, horsey teeth that stuck out disagreeably over his lip.
Another of the trio was a giant of a fellow, tall, dark and heavy-browed, while the third, who sat with his back to Bob, was of slighter build, but nearly as tall.
Mohun seemed to be the leader of the party, for now he was leaning across the rickety table, talking earnestly and emphasizing his remarks with blows of his fist upon it.
“I tell you, Merriweather,” he said, addressing the giant, “this is our time to act. You are merely pussy-footing when you ask delay. I am convinced that delay means suicide.”
Jimmy, catching the last word, gasped involuntarily and Bob nudged him warningly.
“Keep still,” he hissed. “This sure is going to be good!”
The two other men looked uncertain but the fellow called Mohun was pushing the point home.
“This is our chance,” he cried vehemently. “Salper is out of the way for the present, but we never know when he may take the notion to go back to the old job. They say he is getting mighty restive already.”
At the mention of Mr. Salper’s name Bob fell back in his amazement and landed on Joe’s foot, whereupon the latter emitted a squeak of pain that he immediately stifled.
“Did you hear that?” demanded Bob in an excited whisper, without a thought for poor Joe’s foot. “They’re talking about Mr. Salper.”
Eagerly he turned back to the window while Herb whispered in an awed tone:
“Maybe they’re going to murder the old fellow.”
“Say, keep still, can’t you?” said Bob impatiently, as he strained his ears to catch the lowered tones of the three men.
Herb subsided, and the four of them waited with bated breath to find out what these three conspirators had to do with Gilbert Salper.
“Maybe you’re right, Mohun,” the tall man with the craggy brows answered reluctantly. “But I can’t help thinking that to strike now is a poor move.”
“In two or three weeks we’ll have everything just as we want it,” added the man who sat with his back to Bob. “We’ll have a sure thing then, while now——”
The man called Mohun threw up his hands in a gesture of despair.
“Pussy-footing again!” he cried disgustedly. “What kind of gamblers are you, anyway, to wait until you have a sure thing before you test your luck? Don’t you know that the big deals down on the Street that have been successful have been put through because the fellows doing it had nerve?”
“Yes, but not many of the deals have been as big or as important as this,” said the giant quietly.
“All the more reason to strike quickly,” argued Mohun, with heat, adding in a lowered tone: “I tell you this absence of Salper from Wall Street is the chance of a lifetime. It’s the thing we’ve been waiting for. With him on the Street we haven’t a chance for our lives. With him away, we have everything in our own hands. Now it’s up to you whether we make the most of our luck, or throw it in the rubbish heap.”
“But Salper is up here for an indefinite length of time,” argued the man with his back to Bob. “It is said he will stay at least a month, maybe two. And a week—two at the outside—is all we need to make sure of relieving him of some of his ill-gotten wealth.”
The man laughed noisily at this poor attempt at humor, and Mohun glanced nervously about him.
“Better look out,” he said, peevishly. “You never can tell who’s listening. They say the trees have ears around this way.”
“Your nerves are getting the best of you, I think,” cried the big man. “Just because you’ve got cold feet is no reason why we should take the chance of losing out on the biggest deal we’ve had the chance of handling for many a day. Get a good sleep, man, and you’ll think the way we do, tomorrow.”
For a moment it seemed as though Mohun were about to spring upon the big man and Bob held his breath, expecting a struggle. Mohun’s face turned a brick red and his lips drew back from his protruding upper teeth as though in a snarl. His hands clenched, he took a step toward the bigger man who had half risen from his chair.